August 10, 2025
EOS / DAWN
Earle Chesney (holding bat), aide to US President Dwight D. Eisenhower, being presented with a cricket bat during the Pakistan team’s visit to the White House in Washington on their brief visit to the US in 1958. (From left to right, back row) Nasim-ul-Ghani, Saeed Ahmed, Zulfiqar Ahmed, Mahmood Hussain, Saeed Ahmed Khan (Manager), Chesney, Abdul Hafeez Kardar, Ikram Elahi (partly hidden behind Kardar), Imtiaz Ahmed, Ijaz Butt, Wazir Muhammad, Waqar Hassan, (Sitting, from left to right) Khan Mohammad, Mohammad Munaf, Alimuddin, S.F. Rehman, Haseeb Ahsan and Wallis Mathias | For Cricket and Cou
Formed in 1953, the United States Information Agency (USIA) was, for nearly half a century, the nation’s federally funded propaganda machine to repel the influence of Soviet communism. Three years after forming the agency, President Dwight D. Eisenhower launched its “people-to-people” programme, an extension of the USIA’s activities, for which the president himself served as honorary chairperson.
To run the sports committee that the programme established, Eisenhower had fellow military man Edward (Eddie) P.F. Eagan run the show. Col Eagan was one of those extraordinary individuals who became the first person in history to win gold medals in both the summer and winter Olympics, fought in both World Wars, and studied at Yale, Harvard and Oxford. Other members of the committee included sporting legends such as athlete Jesse Owens, baseballer Joe DiMaggio, boxer Jack Dempsey and golfer Ben Hogan.
In the backdrop of the USIA and Soviet communism was Pakistan, forging its own legacy from a tumultuous start to its story as a new nation state following World War II. This was inculcating a sense of ownership for those who represented Pakistan on any global stage and, with one of the nation’s major exports being its brand of cricket, captain Abdul Hafeez Kardar was adamant that Pakistan’s young cricket team tour the United States as well.
KARDAR’S PERSISTENCE, HANIF’S EXPLOITS
In his later years, Kardar was Pakistan’s envoy to Switzerland and the food minister for Punjab. While captaining the Pakistan side, he was an assistant adviser in the federal education ministry. However, his initial political skills were already evident, as he recounts in Green Shadows, his diary of the tours to the West Indies and the United States.
At the height of the Cold War, cricket became an unlikely weapon in Pakistan’s diplomatic arsenal. This is the forgotten story of Pakistan’s 1958 US tour, backed by Eisenhower’s propaganda machine and spearheaded by a captain of some political nous…
Kardar had started thinking of a visit to the US in 1957, when Pakistan’s maiden tour of the West Indies was confirmed, and approached the American ambassador to Pakistan, Horace Hildreth, to discuss this possibility. Hildreth felt that there would not be enough cricketers available in the US, but Kardar mentioned a number of clubs in Philadelphia, New York and California.
However, when no response was received by November 1957, Kardar wrote to Mohammad Ali Bogra, who was in his second stint of serving as Pakistan’s ambassador to the US, having served as Pakistan’s third prime minister in between. Bogra was initially dismissive of the request, but Kardar pointed out that a team could be raised even with the staff from the Commonwealth embassies in Washington and also from the Commonwealth representatives at the United Nations.
Formed in 1953, the United States Information Agency (USIA) was, for nearly half a century, the nation’s federally funded propaganda machine to repel the influence of Soviet communism. Three years after forming the agency, President Dwight D. Eisenhower launched its “people-to-people” programme, an extension of the USIA’s activities, for which the president himself served as honorary chairperson.
To run the sports committee that the programme established, Eisenhower had fellow military man Edward (Eddie) P.F. Eagan run the show. Col Eagan was one of those extraordinary individuals who became the first person in history to win gold medals in both the summer and winter Olympics, fought in both World Wars, and studied at Yale, Harvard and Oxford. Other members of the committee included sporting legends such as athlete Jesse Owens, baseballer Joe DiMaggio, boxer Jack Dempsey and golfer Ben Hogan.
In the backdrop of the USIA and Soviet communism was Pakistan, forging its own legacy from a tumultuous start to its story as a new nation state following World War II. This was inculcating a sense of ownership for those who represented Pakistan on any global stage and, with one of the nation’s major exports being its brand of cricket, captain Abdul Hafeez Kardar was adamant that Pakistan’s young cricket team tour the United States as well.
KARDAR’S PERSISTENCE, HANIF’S EXPLOITS
In his later years, Kardar was Pakistan’s envoy to Switzerland and the food minister for Punjab. While captaining the Pakistan side, he was an assistant adviser in the federal education ministry. However, his initial political skills were already evident, as he recounts in Green Shadows, his diary of the tours to the West Indies and the United States.
At the height of the Cold War, cricket became an unlikely weapon in Pakistan’s diplomatic arsenal. This is the forgotten story of Pakistan’s 1958 US tour, backed by Eisenhower’s propaganda machine and spearheaded by a captain of some political nous…
Kardar had started thinking of a visit to the US in 1957, when Pakistan’s maiden tour of the West Indies was confirmed, and approached the American ambassador to Pakistan, Horace Hildreth, to discuss this possibility. Hildreth felt that there would not be enough cricketers available in the US, but Kardar mentioned a number of clubs in Philadelphia, New York and California.
However, when no response was received by November 1957, Kardar wrote to Mohammad Ali Bogra, who was in his second stint of serving as Pakistan’s ambassador to the US, having served as Pakistan’s third prime minister in between. Bogra was initially dismissive of the request, but Kardar pointed out that a team could be raised even with the staff from the Commonwealth embassies in Washington and also from the Commonwealth representatives at the United Nations.
US President Dwight D. Eisenhower shakes the hand of Hanif Mohammed and meets the Pakistan cricket team on day four of the third Test between Pakistan and Australia at the National Stadium in Karachi on December 8, 1959 | White Star Archives
Bogra discussed this possibility with his aides, Pakistan’s Consul General in New York Khwaja M. Kaiser and young diplomat Agha Shahi, who were instrumental in giving practical shape to the idea. The tour to the US was confirmed while Pakistan was playing its fourth match against the West Indies in Georgetown, British Guyana. This was considerably better news than the eight-wicket loss Pakistan suffered in the Test itself, which also lost them the series 3-1.
Meanwhile, news of the exploits of Hanif Mohammed scoring 337 had reached the US. The Washington Post reported “Cricket Star Bats 16 Hours, 13 Minutes”, though for most readers, perhaps, it might have been confusing how this superhero effort “could only earn Pakistan a tie [sic] with the West Indies in their first Test match.”
Pakistan’s team manager, Saeed Ahmed Khan, flew a week ahead of the team to make arrangements. The people-to-people programme put aside $15,000 for the tour and set tickets at $1.50, hoping to finance the tour through ticket sales. Hanif Mohammed, perhaps regrettably for those who had read about him, and pacer Fazal Mahmood did not join the team.
‘COSMOPOLITAN TEA-SIPPERS’
Bogra discussed this possibility with his aides, Pakistan’s Consul General in New York Khwaja M. Kaiser and young diplomat Agha Shahi, who were instrumental in giving practical shape to the idea. The tour to the US was confirmed while Pakistan was playing its fourth match against the West Indies in Georgetown, British Guyana. This was considerably better news than the eight-wicket loss Pakistan suffered in the Test itself, which also lost them the series 3-1.
Meanwhile, news of the exploits of Hanif Mohammed scoring 337 had reached the US. The Washington Post reported “Cricket Star Bats 16 Hours, 13 Minutes”, though for most readers, perhaps, it might have been confusing how this superhero effort “could only earn Pakistan a tie [sic] with the West Indies in their first Test match.”
Pakistan’s team manager, Saeed Ahmed Khan, flew a week ahead of the team to make arrangements. The people-to-people programme put aside $15,000 for the tour and set tickets at $1.50, hoping to finance the tour through ticket sales. Hanif Mohammed, perhaps regrettably for those who had read about him, and pacer Fazal Mahmood did not join the team.
‘COSMOPOLITAN TEA-SIPPERS’
Pakistan arrived at Idlewild Airport (now known as John F. Kennedy International Airport) on April 29, 1958. Members of the people-to-people sports committee welcomed the team, alongside the executive officer of New York City mayor Robert F. Wagner. Kardar writes that, after supper, the team went around Times Square and Broadway. “I do not believe any of the players slept till two or three o’clock in the morning,” he noted in his tour diary.
Cover page of the December 21 edition of the American news magazine Life, featuring US President Eisenhower waving to the crowd alongside President Gen Ayub Khan upon his arrival in Karachi in December 1959 | Life
The next morning came a visit to City Hall. The 16-member Pakistan squad — described by The New York Times as “cosmopolitan tea-sippers” — was welcomed by Mayor Wagner. A photo published in the next day’s paper showed Wagner swinging a bat gifted by the team, along with a green tie.
That afternoon, the team went to Washington DC and, the next morning, they were hosted by Commander McCormick-Goodhart, a retired British naval officer who had a cricket ground on his estate. Though Pakistan were supposed to play, Kardar notes: “Washington produced real English cricket weather and the organisers were very happy that they had not really arranged a match.”
The team then went around Washington and, later that evening, attended a reception at Ambassador Bogra’s official residence. Gen Ayub Khan was also present, who in May 1958 was serving as the commander-in-chief of the Pakistan army. However, since Green Shadows was published later, Kardar refers to him as the President of Pakistan.
The following morning, the team visited the White House and were received by Earle Chesney, an Eisenhower aide who had gained fame as a political cartoonist and would arrange tours for VIPs visiting the president’s home and offices. Eisenhower himself was unavailable, due to world events — as Richard Heller and Peter Oborne also note in White on Green: Celebrating the Drama of Pakistan Cricket. Vice President Richard Nixon had been attacked in Venezuela, with protestors ultimately breaking the windows of his motorcade.
The next morning came a visit to City Hall. The 16-member Pakistan squad — described by The New York Times as “cosmopolitan tea-sippers” — was welcomed by Mayor Wagner. A photo published in the next day’s paper showed Wagner swinging a bat gifted by the team, along with a green tie.
That afternoon, the team went to Washington DC and, the next morning, they were hosted by Commander McCormick-Goodhart, a retired British naval officer who had a cricket ground on his estate. Though Pakistan were supposed to play, Kardar notes: “Washington produced real English cricket weather and the organisers were very happy that they had not really arranged a match.”
The team then went around Washington and, later that evening, attended a reception at Ambassador Bogra’s official residence. Gen Ayub Khan was also present, who in May 1958 was serving as the commander-in-chief of the Pakistan army. However, since Green Shadows was published later, Kardar refers to him as the President of Pakistan.
The following morning, the team visited the White House and were received by Earle Chesney, an Eisenhower aide who had gained fame as a political cartoonist and would arrange tours for VIPs visiting the president’s home and offices. Eisenhower himself was unavailable, due to world events — as Richard Heller and Peter Oborne also note in White on Green: Celebrating the Drama of Pakistan Cricket. Vice President Richard Nixon had been attacked in Venezuela, with protestors ultimately breaking the windows of his motorcade.
The logo of the People to People programme on a memorandum ahead of Pakistan cricket team's visit to the US | Eisenhower Presidential Library
PRESS MEETS AND PRIVATE RECEPTIONS
The next stop was Philadelphia, where another match was scheduled, but it was washed out due to rain. The team then returned to New York for the longest leg of their tour, which included a litany of media commitments.
In his diary, Kardar wrote that in all the radio appearances and talks shows that he or the Pakistan team appeared on, 20 million Americans tuned in. From the Ed Sullivan Show alone, 10 million people watched the Pakistani cricket team. Kardar also appeared on the CBS show To Tell the Truth, a clip of which goes viral from time to time on social media.
The team also visited the Yankee Stadium to watch a charity match. The authors Heller and Oborne learned from Sheikh Fazlur Rehman — a member of the touring party who played one Test match for Pakistan — that he received a bat from Yankees superstar Mickey Mantle, but Rehman had since misplaced it.
Another reception held in honour of the team was by Aly Khan, the son of Sir Sultan Mohammad Aga Khan (Aga Khan III) and father of the recently deceased Prince Karim Aga Khan (Aga Khan IV). He had been given the role of Pakistan’s ambassador and Permanent Representative to the United Nations. Khan’s new sport of “pen-pushing” was much different from his usual horse-riding, racing and skiing exploits, but the new ambassador’s office was described as “a nerve centre of disparate activities”, with endless visitors and phone calls.
Aly Khan’s popularity was evident by how Kardar was tired of shaking hands and seeing off the three to four hundred guests who arrived at the reception. “I must confess that, at the end of the day, my feet ached and my hands had cramps,” he remarked in his tour diary.
Though Aly Khan did not play cricket, he advocated for its popularity in the US, also bowling the first ball between the Pakistan and Joint League of New York match, a practice similar to the “first pitch” before baseball games, where celebrities come out to fanfare for the event.
Throughout the tour however, the cricket was proving to be an afterthought. Kardar does not note much on the matches and lists only three games that were played by the Pakistan team, instead of the six that were reportedly planned. However, interest (perhaps curiosity) in the sport was keen, with 1,500 people turning up to see Pakistan in the first match.
The reporting for the matches and tour at large had to take the tone of explaining the sport to the hosts. For example, this is from The New York Times on one of the matches:
“An hour and twenty minutes after the beginning of the cricket match at Downing Stadium on Randalls Island yesterday, Alim-Ud-Din was looking for the out-spin and, instead, received a ball that spun in. He missed the ball with the paddle and was thus bowled by Leslie Russell, whose delivery struck the wicket for an out. Put in more familiar terms, Alim-Ud-Din was expecting the curve. He was crossed up by Russell, who pitched a screw-ball, thus gaining the first out of the game. Put in any words, it was cricket.”
CAPITALISING ON THE CANADIAN CONNECTION
The team then crossed over to Canada, for which Kardar had written to his Oxford varsity teammate Basil Robinson, who later led a Canadian side on a tour of England in 1954. Robinson was also working in the Canadian External Affairs Office and Kardar was confident that the tour would be confirmed, which it was in March 1958.
Pakistan arrived in Toronto on May 15 and the players stayed with Canadian families throughout the tour, in an effort to “see their way of life from close range.” However, Kardar had also written to Robinson saying that the team “were willing to accept the barest minimum expenses.”
The team played three matches in Toronto, one in Ottawa and an unspecified number in Montreal. In Ottawa, the players also got to visit the House of Commons and see Prime Minister John Diefenbaker.
After four days in Montreal, the team then got on the Empress of France to sail to Liverpool, from where they then flew to Pakistan. The team arrived in Karachi on June 6, after six months of travels across the Caribbean, North America and Europe.
IKE TAKES STRIKE
Meanwhile, Gen Ayub Khan had been eager to maintain cordial diplomatic relations with the US during the early part of his tenure. Pakistan’s neighbours, India and Afghanistan, were leaning towards the Soviet Union in Cold War politics, but Pakistan was increasingly known as a US-backed country in Asia, particularly after joining the (short-lived) Central Treaty Organisation (CENTO), a military alliance made to deter Soviet expansion in the Middle East.
After Ayub’s installation as President of Pakistan in October 1958, President Eisenhower visited Karachi in December 1959. Such was the fanfare of the visit, Life magazine’s cover on December 21, 1959, shows a beaming Eisenhower waving to a crowd with Ayub beside him. The headline: “Triumph in Pakistan: Ike and President Ayub.”
Ayub had officially made Rawalpindi the capital of Pakistan just six weeks before Eisenhower’s visit, but the garrison city was reportedly not equipped to host such a high-level visit. Therefore, Karachi was to be where the US president would visit.
Hundreds of thousands are said to have lined the streets of Karachi as Eisenhower made his way from the Mauripur landing strip in Karachi on December 7, becoming the first US President to visit Pakistan — notably during a dictatorship. Incidentally, no US President has visited Pakistan during a civilian government.
Writing for The New York Times, Paul Grimes reported that Ayub had ordered the removal of 500,000 refugees in the city and moved them to Korangi early in 1959. On December 8, Eisenhower visited the Quaid-i-Azam’s mausoleum to lay a wreath and then was at the National Stadium Karachi, slated to watch half an hour of cricket.
Meanwhile, Fazal Mahmood had learned during the third and final Test against Australia that Eisenhower would be coming to watch the match. Fazal writes in From Dusk to Dawn that he was sitting at the stadium with the secretary of the national cricket board, when they learned the news over telephone. Both men then decided to ring the Pakistani Embassy in Washington DC to have Eisenhower’s tailor make a bottle-green jacket and dispatch it on the first flight to Karachi.
Time was also on their side. The Test began on December 4 and, after three days of play, there was one rest day. Eisenhower’s visit was scheduled for the fourth day of the Test, on December 8. Once the jacket was received, a monogram of the Pakistani team was placed on its front pocket.
When the team was being presented to the US president, Fazal gifted the blazer to Eisenhower who, according to Fazal, remarked to Ayub at how well it fit him and he watched the match wearing the green blazer.
While Australian captain Richie Benaud quipped to Eisenhower how the latter had joined the Pakistan camp, in a private meeting with Ayub earlier, he had remarked how the Test at Karachi needed to be the last played on a matting wicket. In dictator-like fashion, Ayub issued an edict for matting to end across cricket in Pakistan.
The cricket itself, unfortunately, was not much to write about. The close of the day’s play had Karachi hero Hanif Mohammad score 40; he would later go on to make an unbeaten 101. Pakistan would end the day at 104-5 in their second innings, after having gained a lead of 30 runs from the first innings.
Eisenhower is noted to have not understood the game of cricket much, but was thunderous with his applause for the (few) scoring shots and good fielding. However, his memoir Waging Peace did not mention the match.
Fazal also might not have been pleased to learn that when Heller and Oborne inquired about the jacket from the Eisenhower Presidential Library, they found out it had been lost and was not included in a list of gifts that Eisenhower had received in Pakistan. Pakistan also lost the three-match series 2-0.
The writer is Managing Editor of Folio Books.
He can be contacted at saeedhusain72@gmail.com
Published in Dawn, EOS, August 10th, 2025
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