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Thursday, May 27, 2021

FEATURED 4 Lyndon Baines Johnson Becomes the President (1963)



LBJ IS SWORN IN AS PRESIDENT
Lady Byrd, LBJ and Jackie Kennedy aboard Air Force One

Type of Activity
Political Rally and Motorcade
Location
Location
Dallas, Texas
Date of Activity
22 N0v. 1963
Coordinates


President Kennedy decided to embark on the trip to Texas with three basic goals in mind: he wanted to help raise more Democratic Party presidential campaign fund contributions; he wanted to begin his quest for reelection in November 1964; and, because the Kennedy-Johnson ticket had barely won Texas in 1960 (and had even lost in Dallas), President Kennedy wanted to help mend political fences among several leading Texas Democratic party members who appeared to be fighting politically amongst themselves.

Little did anyone ever imagine that this day in history would forever be remembered for changing the American Presidency forever! At the end of this day the United States would have a new President of the United States with the swearing in of Lyndon B. Johnson aboard Air Force One.

Sequence of events November 22, 1963

11:25 am. After an overnight at Ft. Worth, Air Force One departed Carswell AFB for Dallas. It was a short flight aboard Air Force One.

11:40 am. Arriving at Dallas Love Field where a reception line of Dallas dignitaries, including Mayor and Mrs. Earle Cabell waited at the bottom of the stairs with a bouquet of red roses for Jackie.

President and Mrs. Kennedy deplane in Dallas

A reception line of Dallas dignitaries greeted the President and First Lady

Vice President and Mrs. Johnson at Love Field

11:50 am. The Presidential Motorcade leaves Love Field on Friday, November 22, 1963

The rain had cleared and the temperature was in the 60s so, by a standing order issued by JFK himself, the car’s bubble top of the Presidential limousine was not installed over its occupants in order to give the people of Dallas a more intimate view of the President and his party.

The President and First Lady spent almost 15 minutes mingling with the excited Love Field crowd before climbing into the back seat of their convertible limousine, joining Governor and Mrs. Connally who occupied the jump seats.

The Presidential Motorcade Departs Love Field

Vice President Johnson’s Limo and USSS Follow-Up Car

2:30 pm. As the motorcade made its way through a very large turnout of supporters, the open limousine heads west through Dealey Plaza when President Kennedy was fatally shot and Texas Governor Connally was seriously wounded by an assassin later identified as Lee Harvey Oswald.

1:00 pm. The President was rushed to Parkland Hospital and pronounced dead after arriving at Parkland Hospital.

Parkland Hospital Emergency Room

Boarding Air Force One

2:28 pm. Lyndon Baines Johnson is sworn in as president aboard Air Force One with Jackie Kennedy at his side.

LBJ receives the oath of office aboard AF-1

2:47 pm. Air Force 1 departed Dallas Love Field to return to Washington D.C.

6:05 pm. Air Force One landed at Andrews AFB

The President's Casket is moved from AF-1 to Hearse at Andrews AFB 

Jackie Kennedy at Andrews AFB

LBJ would serve out JFK’s term as President; he ran for reelection in 1964 and won. It was later in 1965 that I was interviewed and accepted an assignment with the White House Communications Agency and spent nine years providing communications for the White House!


The WHCA AFTER ACTION REPORTS OF NOVEMBER 22, 1963


THE WHITE HOUSE

WASHINGTON
April 1, 1997


Ronald G. Haron

Senior Attorney
Assassinations Records Review Board

600 E. Street 2nd Floor
Washington D.C. 20530

Dear Mr. Haron,

White House Communications Agency (WHCA) has searched their files for assassination-related records and was able to locate several statements from WHCA personnel who were on duty at various locations at the time of the assassination of President Kennedy. These statements were found in a folder titled “PRES KENNEDY ASSASSINAITON”. Copies of the statements are attached. There is no other assassination related material in the folder, except the list of telephone calls recorded by the White House switchboard on 22 November 1963, previously forwarded to your office.

The WHCA has completed its assassination-related records search.

Sincerely

SIGNED
Gregory G. Raths

Lt. Col. USMC
Assistant Chief of Staff

White House Office

White House Communications Agency (WHCA) Communications Center Switchboard

Radio Operators after Action Reports
[BK Notes: Many thanks to Doug Horne for providing these records] 

The Dallas White House switchboard had been established in the Sheraton-Dallas Hotel 

WHCA Trip Officer for Presidential Visit to Dallas, Texas

CWO Arthur W. Bales, Jr. 

The following is approximately the sequence of events, as recalled by the undersigned, in Dallas, Texas, 22 November 1963 

THE WHITE HOUSE COMMUNICATIONS BRANCH
SUBJECT: Sequence of Events – 22 November 1963

TO: Commanding Officer, WHCA

1. Prior Communications Arrangements: The Dallas White House had been established in the Sheraton-Dallas Hotel, and Communications facilities included a one-position switchboard with 3 dial trunks, 2 LD’s 3 tie lines to the Fort Worth White House Board, 1 tie line to the Sheraton-Dallas Hotel Bd., 3 extensions to Love Field, 4 extensions to the Dallas Trade Mart (site of the President’s scheduled speech), secure teletype equipment, and radio and phone patch facilities to cover the motorcade.
2. Planned schedule of Events: The undersigned was to cover the President’s arrival at Love Field and, with the Special WHCA Courier, travel in the motorcade and cover all stops to include the President’s departure from Dallas. SSGT Robert D. Brazell, with six men, were manning the Dallas White House; and seven men, making the Texas circuit aboard the Press Plane, were to remain at Love Field, as they would not be needed in Dallas. A recoding technician, Specialist John Muhlers, was set up and stationed at the Dallas Trade Mart to record the President’s speech and to furnish audio feeds to the various news media.

3. The arrival and Motorcade: Air Force One landed and the President spent some time shaking hands and greeting the large crowd at Love Field. The motorcade then departed for the trip through downtown Dallas and to the Trade Mart. In the WHCA Communications Car were: A telco driver; the undersigned WHCA Advance Officer; the WHCA Courier, Mr. Gearheart; and the Telco special representative (or “Shadow”), Mr. Herb Smith. We were approximately six cars and two (Press and Staff) buses behind the President. The motorcade had just passed the last buildings on the route before entering the freeway to the Trade Mart. The WHCA Communications Car was around two corners from and not in sight of the President’s car. Three explosions were heard, and I thought that they were backfires from vehicles up ahead. Herb Smith remarked that firecrackers were inappropriate for the occasion. Then the USSS Agent riding with the President announced on the FM “Charlie” radio, Lawson, he’s hit”. The motorcade came to an abrupt halt with one bus and the WHCA car still around two corners from the President. Realizing that emergency communications facilities may be required on the spot, I instructed the driver to get Mr. Gearhart immediately to the vicinity of the President and to keep him there regardless of my own location. I, with the Telco representative, Mr. Smith, then started running toward the scene of the shooting. As we rounded the first corner the motorcade suddenly raced away. I commandeered a police car and instructed the driver to take us immediately to the Parkland Hospital. We arrived short minutes after the President.

4. The Parkland Hospital: The very limited telephone facilities at the hospital were tired up by the members of the Press Pool. I immediately seized all but one line (leaving Merriman Smith on the one most remote from the Emergency Rooms) and established direct circuits to the Signal Board in Washington; the Dallas White House Switchboard; and to the Signal board via the Dallas and Fort Worth White House Boards. I assigned police officers to guard these phones and instructed the individual Signal Operators in Washington who were on these circuits to handle no other calls, but to guard these lines exclusively. I then ordered six lines in to the hospital from the Dallas White House Board and informed appropriate White House Aides of my actions. I then checked back with the Dallas White House and learned that SSGT Brazell had, on is own initiative, ordered in an additional switchboard position, 3 additional dial trunks, 4 trunks to Washington, and had alerted Telco to the possibility of further TTY facilities being required. I instructed SSGT Brazell to direct four of the seven men (Press Plane Riders) at Love Field to report to me at the hospital, and the other three reports to him at the hotel. The six lines to the hospital, the four trunks to Washington, and the additional TTY facilities were cancelled before completion. As the WHCA personnel arrived from Love Field, they replaced the police officers who had been guarding the seized telephone lines. At the appropriate time I instructed Mr. Gearhart to remain with the President Johnson, and they left shortly for Love Field. I remained at the hospital and later went to the field with (the body of) President Kennedy and Mrs. Kennedy, instructing the WHCA personnel to remain at the hospital until released by the White House Staff personnel who were remaining there a while longer. Meanwhile, I had advised Captain Stoughton, WHCA Photographer, and SP5 Muler (Recording – stationed at the Trade Mart) of President Johnson’s return to Air Force One: enabling Captain Stoughton to be the only photographer aboard when the President took his oath of office. Muler recorded the proceedings, and the tape was returned to Washington via Colonel McNally aboard the Press Plane.


ARTHUR W. BALES, JR.
CWO USA
Trip Officer

Chief Switchboard Operator White House Switchboard in Dallas, Texas
SSG Robert Brazell

The following is approximately the sequence of events, as recalled by the undersigned, in Dallas, Texas, 22 November 1963 

PHYSICAL SITUATION

1. 1 Position 555 PBX trunking to Washington through Ft. Worth with no direct connection to Washington.

2. 3 City Dials

3. 3 LD Toll Terminals

 4. Radio on top of PBX

CHRONOLOGICAL SEQUENCE OF EVENTS 

1. Complete relaxation waiting for parade to arrive at luncheon site.

2. (1230) A Sudden blearing of radio “Lead us straight to the hospital he’s been shot – repetition “He’s been shot.”

3. Realization of inadequate facilities to handle any emergency of this type.

4. Placed order for additional 555 positions, additional dial trunks and more extensions in the Room even before the party arrived at the hospital.

5. Party reached hospital and all dial trunks lit up immediately.

6. Direct connection set up immediately between Agent directly outside of emergency room and Mr. Behn in his office in Washington which became the Washington Command Post and he cleared the house. Ordered to monitor the circuit which was done to the best of our ability, on top of moving regular traffic

7. Calls from members of the President’s family bridged into the Behn-Emergency room focus. (E.g. Attorney General asked whether a priest had been called.)

8. Constant advisement on the location of the Vice President.

9. Made arrangements with police to have WHCA Press Plane party rushed to hotel for use as needed.

10. Dispatch of part of this contingent to assist at the hospital on CWO Bales’ orders.

11. Mr. Kilduff ordered the return of the delegation enroute to Japan immediately upon perceiving the   seriousness of the situation. Placing of this in the hands of the WHCA Duty Officer in Washington.

12. Answering calls with extension on top of PBX; then routing them to proper spot. Utilized radio man Lukens on “hold and wait” calls.

13. President Johnson returns to aircraft.

14. Second peak of calls for day doing such things as finding Judge Sarah T. Hughes to swear in the President and find someone in the Department of Justice to dictate the oath of office. Vice President Johnson personally spoke to the clerk In Judge Hughes’ Office.

15. By this time the telephone company had performed a near miracle and installed the second 555 position with three additional dial trunks on it. 

16. An effort was being made to bring up four full periods back to Washington but desisted when It became obvious that the need for them was almost over.

17. as a general comment: enough traffic passed through that one position 555 as should normally have gone through a 3-position PBX at full throttle.

SSgt Brazell

PS: The Switchboard operator recalls placing a call from Attorney General to Air Force One prior to the swearing in ceremonies; he does not know to whom he spoke but feels it was to the Vice President. 

WHCA Signal Board and Communications Center handled traffic from Dallas and other sources.

Chief Switchboard Operator, Signal Switchboard, Washington, D.C.
MSG Tarbell,

The Following is approximately the sequence of events, as recalled by the undersigned, in Dallas, Texas, 22 November 1963 

On November 22, 1963 the first indication of any sort of trouble in Texas was a short UPI release which came in on the printer in the Comm Center at approximately 12:30 p.m. stating that the President had been shot in Dallas, Texas. We here at the Washington Switchboard had heard nothing of any trouble. However, shortly after we received this we received an incoming call from Agent Emory Roberts in Dallas asking for Chief Wildy and then right after this call another call from Mr. Bales at the hospital in Dallas, asking us to stay on the line and keep the circuit open. One operator did just that. We actually did not get official word of the assassination. The Information via radio and of course, there were many rumors as to who had been killed or wounded. First reports had it that an Agent had been shot along with the President. Of course, not having any official word, we could not give out any information. 

As the minutes passed it became more and more apparent that what was just rumor was not fact and at approximately 2:05 p.m. official word was released that President Kennedy had been shot and killed while riding in a motorcade in Dallas. Immediately after the announcement, the switchboard went completely wild with everyone attempting to call out and anxious wives trying to call in to find out if their husbands were all right. The Sterling Exchange within a short time became overloaded and we could not dial out. The focal point for calls here at the White House was John McNally’s office in the East Wing with Senators and Congressmen proceeding there. It soon became apparent that one line off of our board could not handle traffic so five (5) additional temporary lines were asked for and were installed at 1645 to Mr. McNally’s office. 

We had no direct lines to Dallas, Texas off our board. We had full period loops to Fort Worth, Texas and they worked Dallas off their board. They only had a two position 555 and could not really handle too large volume of traffic. They were able to advise us when the oath of office was administered to President Johnson and when Air Force 1 took off from Dallas. As soon as it was ascertained where the body of President Kennedy was to be taken we started asking for lines to that location. One line to the Naval Medical Center was installed at 1850 and an additional line to same location was put in at 2052. During the time that Air Force 1 was enroute back here, we had a constant phone patch up to them with President Johnson calling various people here in D.C. and in Texas. 

At this time we only had one line off our board to the President’s residence on 52nd Street, N.W. It was decided that this would not be sufficient to handle traffic so five additional lines were installed to that location at approximately 2200. Also at the same time, we had President
Johnson’s commercial phone disconnected at this residence. 

The personnel on duty here at the Signal Switchboard on the day shift of course did not leave at 3:00 p.m. when the shift ordinarily ends, but stayed on duty until approximately 7:00 p.m. with the exception of me and I went home at 11:00 p.m. after a long and hectic day.

Never in all my experience on the switchboard have I ever seen a board so busy for such a great length of time. It was an experience which all of us here at the Switchboard do not want to see this happen again at least in our lifetime

(Sgt. Tarbell) 

Chief Operator, Communications Center, Washington D.C
SFC Carriger

The following is approximately the sequence of events, as recalled by the undersigned, in Dallas, Texas, 22 November 1963 

Someone handed me a bulletin from UPI stating that President Kennedy had been shot in Dallas, Tex. I immediately called Sgt. Tucker and passed info to her. Her immediate reaction was “Oh, you’re kidding me”, repeated several times. After I had somewhat convinced her that info received over UPI news circuit, she said she would pass to Major Patterson.

Next I took bulletin to Mr. Harmon, the Duty Officer. He was on phone at the time trying to get verification and amplification of facts. All later releases were passed to Mr. Harmon to centralize all info.

We were working Dallas via TWX. We immediately called Dallas and kept them “up” on the TWX. We next attempted to get a full period on-line ckt with Dallas. I don’t recall if this project was completed. Next, we re-activated full period on-line ckt to Ft. Worth. This took approx. two hours to complete due to the fact the circuit had been released to Telco earlier.

Comm Center personnel were calling in for instructions. Advised to “stick close to phone” and if anything developed, we would advise. Some of the evening trick personnel reported for duty as much as one and a half hours early and some of the day trick personnel stayed on duty until President Johnson returned to Wash, D.C
There were no increases in traffic during this time. However, later that night, we started receiving messages of condolences from various heads of State.

During the return flight of AF-1 from Dallas, we were working the aircraft via KW-7. The operator aboard the aircraft was so busy that he could not attend the ckt. We attempted to relay three or four messages of condolences to AF-1 (one of the messages was from Queen Elizabeth) but were unable to ascertain that the message was received.  

Polly Yates, Asst. to General Clifton 

We informed Polly Yates of situation. She said if were unable to get a receipt for the messages, she would see that they were available for delivery upon PRESUS arrival in Wash. D.C.

We did not get any acknowledgements of Receipt and Miss Yates was so informed. 

SFC CARRIGER

Operator, Communications Center, Washington, D.C
SP 4 White

The following is approximately the sequence of events, as recalled by the undersigned, in Dallas, Texas, 22 November 1963 

Someone handed me a bulletin from UPI stating that President Kennedy had been shot in Dallas, Tex. I immediately called Sgt. Tucker and passed info to her. Her immediate reaction was “Oh, you’re kidding me”, repeated several times. After I had somewhat convinced her that info received over UPI news ckt, she said she would pass to Major Patterson. 

Next I took bulletin to Mr. Harmon, the Duty Officer. He was on phone at the time trying to get verification and amplification of facts. All later releases were passed to Mr. Harmon to centralize all info. 

We were working Dallas via TWX. We immediately called Dallas and kept them “up” on the TWX. We next attempted to get a full period on-line ckt with Dallas. I don’t recall if this project was completed. Next, we re-activated full period on-line ckt to Ft. Worth. This took approx. two hours to complete due to the fact the circuit had been released to Telco earlier. 

Comm Center personnel were calling in for instructions. Advised to “stick close to phone” and if anything developed, we would advise. Some of the evening trick personnel reported for duty as much as one and a half hours early and some of the day trick personnel stayed on duty until President Johnson returned to Wash, D.C.

There were no increases in traffic during this time. However, later that night, we started reviving messages of condolences from various heads of State. 
 
During return flight of AF-1 from Dallas, we were working the aircraft via KW-7. The operator aboard the aircraft was so busy that he could not attend the ckt. We attempted to relay three or four messages of.

SP4 Witte 

Operator, Communications Center, Washington, D.C
SGT Bodensteiner

The following is approximately the sequence of events, as recalled by the undersigned, in Dallas, Texas, 22 November 1963
 
I was wondering about the Comm Center as usual picking up little bits of information about how the place worked when I was attracted by a series of 5 bells on UPI. I looked over PFC Russell’s shoulder to see what was about to appear. There was nothing for what seemed like a long time, but was probably less than ten seconds, and then, on a line, in a shaky hand came UPI’s bulletin heading “….Dallas, with Kennedy….” The text consisted of five words online, gabled, misspelled and unsteady, “Kennedy, Connelly shot, possibly fatally.” and then nothing.

Russell jumped and said “hey you guys look at this!” The guys were SGTS Dreyllinger and Bodensteiner who were standing by the TWX. Dreylinger and Bodensteiner laughed slightly, as one would at a bad joke (which, it turned out, is what they thought it was). I went around to check the patch board to make sure someone hadn’t plugged UPI onto a different machine and put a piece of our gear at the other end of the monitor I had been watching in order to see what kind of action they could get out of duping a couple of new bodies in the Comm Center (It had been a slow afternoon). For a full minute people just walked around in circles, Russell and I affirming that we had actually seen the bulletin come in on the monitor (although admitting the possibility that someone at UPI might be wanting to lose his job in a hurry), and the rest of the Comm Center personnel becoming more and more convinced that the bulletin was real. AP came in with a confirming bulletin in about 70 seconds after UPI. Someone called the Duty Officer. A couple of people, including me began to ring up the trip sites and put them in uppers.
Someone in the front office began to call up off duty personnel and have some of them report to the Comm Center. SFC McCullough began to get the suitcases down from above the ECTRRM gear. I spent the rest of the afternoon passing general info and info from the news services to the trip sites.

Patrick and I went home at the usual time, more to get us out of the way than for any other reason. 

I was working on a circuit near our UPI and AP news monitors when one of the other operators, who had been reading the news, told me that the President had been shot. My first reaction was   that I though he was only joking.
 
He then told me to come and read it on the UPI monitor myself. This still didn’t convince me that it was true, thinking that he could have easily typed it on the machine himself as a joke. I no sooner had told him that wasn’t a very nice rumor to start when I saw a more detailed item come over our AP monitor. We then told the other operators and the D.O. was notified.

The next hour or so was spent mostly between watching the news for the latest developments and informing our personnel that were out at the various trip sites on this tour of the President. 

The rest of the day followed the general routine for a normal day, except for the atmosphere of and the conversation among the operators on duty.
Most of the operators on the day shift stayed over three to four hours after the normal shift change in case of any unexpected occurrence.

SGT BODENSTEINER 

Air Force One 26000 Radio Console

Radio Operator, aboard AF-1 for the flight from Dallas to Washington D.C
MSG John Trimble

The following is approximately the sequence of events, as recalled by the undersigned, in Dallas, Texas, 22 November 1963 

After an overnight at Ft. Worth, Air Force One departed Carswell AFB at 1125 AM (Local Time) for Dallas. After a short flight we arrived at Dallas and blocked in at 1140 AM.

After the rain storm of the previous night the sun seemed particularly bright as the President and First Lady deplaned to the warm greeting of what was probably the largest crowd of the Texas tour. The Last we were to see of them together was when they departed the airport in their open car.
 
The first indication that anything was amiss came when one of the WHCA representatives, Theron Burgess, who was on duty at the airport, told me that someone in the motorcade had been hurt. My first reaction was that one of the Secret Service Agents had fallen from the car. About 15 minutes later we were told the ready the airplane for immediate take-off. At this time we were not told why we were leaving or what our destination would be. No information was forthcoming at this time and since we at least needed a destination for flight clearance purpose Col. Swindal asked me to check with the switchboard. After identifying myself to the switchboard operator he told me that the President had been shot and that no other information was available. This was relayed to Col. Swindal although he had just heard it himself from another source. 

My communications equipment had been on since receiving the immediate take-off order. I had cleared a voice and teletype frequency with Andrews Airways. Even though I was using the callsign AF 26000 and could not tell the reason for clearing a voice frequency, Andrews cooperated fully. I was making periodic signal checks with Andrews when someone entered the airplane and said the President was dead. 

All the chatter ceased and I think we were all numb and did out jobs automatically as we waited for the body to arrive from the hospital; waited for President Johnson; and finally for the judge to arrive and perform the swearing-in ceremony. We departed Dallas at 1447 Dallas time for the three hour flight to Washington.

I was busy every minute of the trip and had three phone patches going simultaneously for much of the time. The normal HF air to ground communications had to yield to higher priority traffic. Some position reports were sent, some were not. Quite a bit of time was spent by Dr. Burkley and General Clifton in the air and General Heaton on the ground concerning removal and preparation of the body after reaching Andrews.
 
My circuits were in continuous use and Andrews always had a waiting list of various officials who wanted to communicate with the airplane. Due to the limited facilities on both ends, many times I had to decide who we would talk with next. I had a good knowledge of the Kennedy team and don’t think I made any mistakes in this respect. 

We had been cleared to an altitude of 29,000 feet upon leaving Dallas. I was able to send one of the few position reports over Nashville and found that we were then at 41,000 feet because of winds and weather.
 
About this time I received a call from the rear of the plane saying that President Johnson wanted a phone patch with Mrs. Rose Kennedy. I immediately seized my best frequency and placed the call through Andrews and the WHCA switchboard. A short time later both the President and Mrs. Johnson offered their condolences to Mrs. Rose Kennedy. These Mrs. Kennedy accepted in a strong, clear voice.

A few minutes later I placed a call, again through the WHCA switchboard to the wife of Governor Connally in Dallas. Both the President and the First Lady talked with Mrs. Connally and assured her that the Governor would be all right. 
The rest of the flight was about as hectic as the first. We landed at Andrews and blocked in at 1805 local time.
 
A large crowd and many bright lights were visible when the doors were opened. Mrs. Kennedy was scheduled to leave by another exit but insisted on being lowered to the ramp with the remains. She entered the ambulance and accompanied the body out of sight.
 
After President Johnson made his very short talk and departed, I remember thinking what irony that this terrible thing had to happen at all --- but to have it happen in the United States. Somehow it was still unbelievable.

JOHN C. TRIMBLE
MSGT, WHCA

PRESIDENTIAL MOTORCADE



NOV 22, 1963 DALLAS, TEXAS

President's Car, 1961 Lincoln Continental Convertible (modified)

ADVANCE CAR
      
1. DPD Capt. Perdue W. Lawrence  
(DPD Call #125)

Vehicle: hardtop - provided by DPD    

Aka: lead police vehicles (CE 767)

Relevant photos/film: none.

Occupant sources; CE 767, CE 769, 7H582 Lawrence, Lawrence

Exhibit 2

Notes:

The Advance Car at Parkland Hospital
PILOT CAR                                                                       

1. DPD Dep. Chief George L. (G.L.) Lumpkin (DPD Call #5)
2. DPD Det. Faye M. (F.M.) Turner
3. DPD Det. William "Billy" L. Senkle
4. Lt. Col. George L. Whitmeyer, U.S. Army
    Reserve, East Texas Section Commander
5. Jacob "Jack" L. Puterbaugh - White House

Vehicle: White Ford sedan - provided by DPD

Aka: lead police vehicles (CE 767)

Pilot car (CE 768)

Relevant photos/film: none.

Occupant sources: CE 767, CE 768, 4H170 Curry, Stevenson Exhibit 5053, interview by author of G.L. Lumpkin.

Notes:

Pilot Car getting ready to leave Love Field

ADVANCE MOTORCYCLES                                      

1. DPD Sgt. S.Q. Bellah
(DPD Call #190)
(DPD Equipment #)
2. DPD Glen C. (G.C.) McBride
(DPD Call #133)
(DPD Equipment #340)
3. DPD J.B. Garrick
(DPD Call #132)
(DPD Equipment #358)

Vehicles: Harley-Davidson two-wheel motorcycles

Aka:    Lead police vehicles (CE 767)
Motorcycles (CE 768)
Lead motorcycle squad-N&A

Relevant photos/film: DCA film, Altgens 1-2, Bothun 1, Moorman 3.

Occupant sources: Lawrence Exhibit 2.

Notes: These 3 motorcycle officers ride ahead of the motorcade at Main and Houston to cut off Stemmons Freeway traffic (Lawrence Exhibit 2). Moorman #3 shows McBride and a portion of Bellah's motorcycle (Mack and author's interview with Jean Hill, 10/15/92). After the shots, Bellah reports to Dealey Plaza (DPD Recordings). Officer TA Hutson testified that he thought Garrick was at the entrance of the Depository shortly after the shooting (7H28). McBride's actions are unknown. 

Advance Motorcycles


 Advance Motorcycles

LEAD MOTORCYCLES
 
1. DPD Leon E. (L.E.) Grey
            (DPD Call #156)
(DPD Equipment #351)
2. DPD E.D. "Buddy" Brewer
(DPD Call #137)
(DPD Equipment #348)
3. DPD Harold B. (H.B.) Freeman
(DPD Call #135)
(DPD Equipment #345)
4. DPD W.G. Lumpkin
(DPD Call #152)
(DPD Equipment #343)
5. DPD Sgt. Stavis Ellis
(DPD Call #150)
(DPD Equipment #)
            (NPOA)

Vehicles: Harley-Davidson two-wheel motorcycles

Aka:    Lead police vehicles (CE 767)
Motorcycles (CE 768)
Lead motorcycle squad (N&A)

Relevant photos/film:  DCA film, Altgens 1-2, Bothun 1, Croft 1, Bond 1, Weaver 1, Moorman
            4 (missing), Bell film sequence, McIntyre 1.

Occupant sources: Lawrence Exhibit 2, 6H303-308 Brewer, author's interviews with Stavis Ellis and
               W.G. Lumpkin.

Notes: At Main and Houston Brewer and Freeman join the 3 Advance Motorcycles to assist in Stemmons Freeway traffic control, leaving Ellis, Grey and Lumpkin leading the motorcade through Dealey Plaza (Lawrence Exhibit 2). None of the three leave the motorcade as is claimed to be seen in the Zapruder film, as all three can be seen beyond the underpass in the Bell film and in the McIntyre photograph. Ellis, Grey, and Lumpkin escort the motorcade to Parkland (author's interviews with Ellis and Lumpkin, Bowles Manuscript). After the shots and traffic control on Stemmons, Brewer reports to Dealey Plaza by driving back the wrong way on Elm Street. Freeman goes on to Parkland (Lifton). However, Officer TA Hutson testified that he thought Freeman was at the entrance of the Depository shortly after the shooting (7H28). Brewer is later inside the TSBD on the 6th floor. Moorman #4, which is missing, shows Lumpkin and the sixth-floor corner window of the Depository (Mack).


Lead Motorcade Motorcycles

LEAD CAR                                                     

1. DPD Chief Jesse E. (J.E.) Curry
(DPD Call #1)
2. SA Winston George "Win" Lawson (SSR)
3. DC Sheriff James Eric (J.E.) "Bill" Decker
(DPD Call Dallas #1)
4. SAIC Forrest V. Sorrels

Vehicle: White Ford Mercury 4-door sedan
   Lisc TX #N or M U 8631 - provided by DPD

Aka: 

Relevant photos/film: DCA film, Croft 1, Altgens 1-3, Martin film sequence, Hughes film sequence,
Weaver 1, Altgaz 1-7

Occupant sources: CE 768, CE 771, 4H170 Curry, 17H628 Lawson.

Notes: SA Lawson has portable DCN SS radio tuned to "Charlie" frequency, however, according to Curry it "wasn't working too well" at the time of the assassination, and thus there was "no radio contact" between the Lead Car and the Presidential Limousine (Curry 2).

Lead Car and Advance Motorcycles at Parkland Hospital

PRESIDENTIAL LIMOUSINE

(SS WHCA code-SS-100-X)
1. SA William R. "Bill" Greer
2. ASAIC Roy H. Kellerman (SSR)
(SS WHCA code-Digest)
3. Mrs. Nellie B. "Nell" Connally
4. Governor John B. Connally
5. Mrs. Jacqueline B. "Jackie' Kennedy
(SS WHCA code-Lace)
6. President John Fitzgerald "Jack" Kennedy
(SS WHCA code-Lancer)

Vehicle: Midnight blue 4 door 1961 Lincoln
   Continental Convertible (modified)
   Lisc DC #GG 300 (3/31/64) - provided by SS

Aka: President's Car, SS-100-X (CE 767 & 768)

Relevant photos/film: many.

Occupant sources: CE 767, CE 768, 2H68-70 & 18H724-727, 728-729 Kellerman, 2H115 & 18H723
Greer, 4H130-131 Connally.

Notes: "#7" in right-front windshield. Limousine has mounted SS radio tuned to "Charlie" frequency. All SS agents armed with .38 revolvers. SA Hill moves back and forth from the SS car to the limousine, finally staying there following the shooting until arrival at Parkland. Presidential Limousine comes abreast of and passes the Lead car on west side of Triple Underpass. Limousine armor plated for President Johnson by Hess & Eisenhart of Cincinnati and is presently on display at Henry Ford Museum, Dearborn, Michigan. )

   Motorcade turns to enter Dealey Plaza  
   
Presidential Motorcade in Dallas

President Kennedy, First Lady and Texas Gov. John Connally

PRESIDENTIAL MOTORCYCLES

1. DPD William Joseph (Billy Joe, B.J.) Martin   
(DPD Call #131)
(DPD Equipment #344)
2. DPD Robert Weldon (Bobby, B.W.) Hargis
(DPD Call #136)
(DPD Equipment #347)
3. DPD James M. (J.M.) Chaney
(DPD Call #151)
(DPD Equipment #337)
4. DPD Douglas L. (D.L.) Jackson
(DPD Call #138)
(DPD Equipment #356)

Vehicles: Harley-Davidson two-wheel motorcycles

Aka: motorcycles (CE 768)

Relevant photos/film: many.

Occupant sources: Lawrence Exhibit 2, 6H289-293 Martin, 6H294-296 Hargis and the Steve Barber                    interview of Robert Hargis, Bowles Manuscript.

Notes: Chaney and Jackson stop for a few seconds in Dealey Plaza after shooting. Chaney then moves ahead and informs Chief Curry that The President has been hit. Jackson follows him and the two escorts the motorcade to Parkland Hospital (WFAA Tapes, Bowles Manuscript). Hargis "parks" his motorcycle in the middle of Elm after the shots and runs over to the north Elm sidewalk near the fallen Newman family. He returns to his motorcycle and rides under the Triple Underpass to check the other side. He then returns to Dealey Plaza, specifically outside the TSBD (6H295-296). Hargis Does not run up the grassy knoll as is often claimed. Officer Martin escorts the motorcade to Parkland Hospital (Paschall pc film sequence, Bell film sequence, Daniels film sequence 1, 6H291-292, Bowles Manuscript).


Presidential Motorcycles

Presidential Motorcycles

PRESIDENTIAL SECRET SERVICE FOLLOW-UP CAR
(SS WHCA code-Halfback)
1. SA Samuel A. "Sam" Kinney                             
2. ASAIC Emory P. Roberts (SSR)
(SS WHCA code-Dusty)
3. P. Kenneth "Ken" O'Donnell-Special Assistant to President
(SS WHCA code-Wand)
4. David F. Powers-Assistant to President
*-private color movie (last sequence 12:25)
5. SA George W. Hickey Jr.
6. SA Glen A. Bennet
7. SA Clinton L. "Clint" Hill
(SS WHCA code-Dazzle)
8. SA William "Tim" McIntyre
9. SA John D. "Jack" Ready
10. SA Paul E. Landis
(SS WHCA code-Debut)

Vehicle: Black 4 door 1956 Cadillac
Touring 4-door convertible
Lisc DC #GG 301 - provided by SS

Aka:    SS Follow-Up Car SS-679-X (CE 767 & 768) Secret Service Follow-Up Car (N&A)
Queen Mary (Youngblood p.109)

Relevant photos/film: many.

Occupant sources: CE 767, CE 768. 2H68-70 Kellerman,2H134-136 & 18H809 Hill, 7H472-474                                      Powers 7H446-447 O’Donnell, 8H 730-765 (SS agent reports)

Notes: Follow-up car has mounted SS radio tuned to "Charlie" Frequency.  All SS agents armed with .38 revolvers. Hickey has AR-15 Colt .223 automatic rifle. SA Hill moves back and forth from the SS car to the limousine, finally staying there following the shooting until arrival at Parkland. SA Bennett moves to limousine on Main Street and returns to Follow-Up Car. During shooting SA Ready runs towards the limousine but is called back by ASAIC Roberts (18H749).

Presidential USSS Follow up Car (Halfback)

First Lady tries to get help

USSS Follow Up Car leaves Dealey Plaza, heading to Parkland Hospital

Waiting at Parkland Hospital

VICE PRESIDENTIAL CAR
 
1. TOPS Herschel D. Jacks                                                                        
2. ASAIC Rufus Wayne Youngblood (SSR)
(SS WHCA code-Dagger)
3. Congressman Ralph W. Yarborough
4. Mrs. C.A. "Lady Bird" Johnson
(SS WECA code-Victoria)
 Vice President Lyndon B. Johnson
(SS WHCA code-Volunteer)

Vehicle: Steel grey 1964 Lincoln 4-door convertible
Lisc 0060 provided by Eagle Lincoln-Mercury Dallas through Dick Fisher

Aka: Vice President's Car (CE 767, CE 768 and N&A)

Relevant photos/film: many.

Occupant sources: CE 767, CE 768, 2H68-70 Kellerman, 2H156-148 & 18H766,772, Youngblood, 7H439-440 Yarbrough, 18H801 Jacks, Youngblood, authors interview with Youngblood 3/5/93.

Notes: All SS agents armed with .38 revolvers. Vehicle obtained from Ford dealer in Dallas (18H778). ASAIC Youngblood has portable DCN SS radio tuned to "Baker" frequency. Youngblood moves to rear seat to shield Johnson during the shooting and remains there until arrival at Parkland (2H149-152 Youngblood).

LBJ and Lady Bird in VP Limo 

Vice Presidents Limo

Vice President and Mrs Johnson with Texas Congressman Yarborough

VICE PRESIDENTIAL SECRET SERVICE FOLLOW-UP CAR
(SS WHCA code-Varsity)

1. TDPS Joe Henry Rich                                                                  
2. Clifton C. Carter-Political Aide to Vice
President (SSR, Kivett's)
3. SA Jerry D. Kivett
(SS WHCA code-Daylight)
4. SA Warren W. "Woody" Taylor
5. ASAIC Thomas Lemuel "Lem" Johns (SSR)
(SS WHCA code-Dandy)

Vehicle: Yellow 1964 Ford Mercury 4-door sedan,
Model 54A Monterey with Breezeway Design
Lisc TX #P2 0060 - vehicle provided by Eagle Lincoln-Mercury Dallas through Dick Fisher.

Aka: Vice President's Follow-up Car (CE 767)
VP Follow-Car (CE 768)
Vice President's Secret Service Car (N&A)
#5 (Trask)

Relevant photos/film: many.

Occupant sources: CE 768, 2H 68-70 Kellerman, 7H474-475 Carter, 18H800 Rich, 18H 773-775 Johns, 18H 776-777, 778-781 Kivett, 18H 782-784 Taylor, Youngblood, authors interview with Youngblood 3/5/93 and Glynn 3/5/93.

Notes: All SS agents armed with .38 revolvers. ASAIC Johns has portable DCN SS radio tuned to "Baker" frequency. Carter has SA Kivett's portable DCN SS radio tuned to "Charlie" frequency in his lap (7H474). Left rear door is open throughout motorcade. SA Johns exits car in Dealey Plaza, is left in Dealey Plaza, and catches a ride in Camera Car #1(18H774).

Vice President's Limo and USSS Follow Up Car

MAYOR'S CAR

1. TDPS Milton T. Wright (Badge #790)                           
2. Dallas City Mayor Earle Cabel
3. Elizabeth "Dearie" Cohen
4. Congressman Raymond Roberts

Vehicle: White 1964 Ford Mercury Comet Caliente
2-door convertible, model 76B with red interior,
Visors raised - vehicle provided by Eagle Lincoln-Mercury
 Dallas through Dick Fisher.

Aka: Car #1 (CE 768 & Curry 1, p.16)
Dignitary Car 1 (Cutler)
Dignitary 1 (Trask)

Relevant photos/film: DCA film, Dorman film, Craven film.

Occupant sources: CE 768, 7H478-479 Cabel, 7H485-486 Mrs. Cabel, 18H802 Wright, Manchester,  DMN

Notes: #1 in front windshield.

Dallas City Mayor Earle Cabel’s Car in the Motorcade 

Mayor Cabel's Wife waiting at Parkland Hospital

NATIONAL PRESS POOL CAR

1. SW Bell Telephone Co. Driver                                                      
2. Merriman Smith-UPI
3. Malcolm "Mac" Kilduff-Assistant White
House Press Secretary for President
(SS WHCA code-Warrior)
4. Robert E. Baskin-DMN Washington Bureau
5. Jack Bell-AP
6. Robert Clark-ABC

Vehicle: Grey or blue 1960 Chevrolet Bel Air2-door sedan
   Lisc TX #NJ 4115 – provided by SW Bell

Aka: Wire Service Car (CE 767)
Telephone Car (CE 768)
Telephone Company Car (Curry 1, p.16)
Press Car (Cutler)
Press Pool Car (N&A)
Press Pool Limousine (Biffle)
Print Press (Trask),

Relevant photos/film: DCA film, Zapruder film; Dorman film, Craven film, Wiegman film, Hughes film.

Occupant sources: CE 768, Bishop, DMN 11/20/63.

Notes: Coat on right rear window deck (Wiegman film). Following the shooting, this car and the cars forward of this point race off immediately out of Dealey Plaza for Parkland Hospital. The cars behind this car lag behind in Dealey Plaza, primarily due to the fact that this and the other camera cars stopped to let out passengers, with Camera Car #1 leading the rest and still in the Plaza at least 50 seconds after the fatal shot .(photo/film analysis). Kent Biffle identifies the driver as a "Texas" highway patrolman" (DMN 11/20/83).
Pool Press Car





Press Vehicle Placard













CAMERA CAR #1 MOTION PICTURE CAMERAS


1. Driver
2. John Hofan-NBC sound
3. David Wiegman, Jr.*-NBC B&W movie
4. Thomas J. Craven, Jr.*-CBS B&W movie
5. Cleveland "Cleve Ryan"-Lighting
Technician
6. Thomas "Ollie" Atkins*-United States Navy,
White House color movie

Vehicle: Yellow 1964 Chevrolet Impala
2-door convertible Super Sport (SS) provided by Earl Hayes
Chevrolet Dallas through Sam Bloom

Aka: Press Photo Car (CE 767)
Press Pool Convertible (CE 768)
Cam 1 (Cutler)
Movie Cam 1 (Trask)
National Press Car (N&A)

Relevant photos/film: Stoughton 1, Towner 2, Wiegman film, Couch film, DCA film, Zapruder film, Hughes film, Nix film, Martin film, Bell film, Atkins film.

Occupant sources: CE 768, C&A Article, Trask.

Notes: Wiegman, Atkins, and Craven jump out of car at head of Elm Street and run up the knoll to film the Newman’s. Camera Car #1 pulls out of line at the base of the knoll and Wiegman, Atkins and Craven re-enter the car. SA Lem Johns also enters this car at this point. Camera Car #1 then rejoins the motorcade between cars #15 and #16. At the Trade Mart it gets out of line and then rejoins the motorcade again, between cars #16 and #17. It arrives at Parkland at 12:45-12:50 PM (18H774).

Camera Car #1

CAMERA CAR #2 NATIONAL STILL CAMERAS

1. Driver                                                                                          
2. Clint Grant*-DMN B&W still
3. Frank Cancellare *-UPI B&W still
4. Capt. Cecil Stoughton *- WHCA, White House color still
5. Arthur Rickerby *-Life B&W still
6. Henry Burroughs *-AP B&W still

Vehicle: Silver 1964 Chevrolet Impala 2-door convertible
Lisc TX 4 P1 7856 - provided by Earl Hayes
Chevrolet Dallas through Sam Bloom

Aka: Press Photo Car (CE 767)
Press Pool Convertible (CE 768)
Cam 2 (Cutler)
Still Cam 1(Trask)

Relevant photos/film: Towner 2, Willis 6, Wiegman film, Nix film, Couch film, DCA film, Darnell film, Zapruder film, Hughes film, Martin film, Bell film.

Occupant sources: CE 768, C&A Article, Trask.

Notes: Cancell are jumps out of car at the head of Elm Street, runs up the knoll to photograph the Newman’s, and does not return to motorcade, possibly riding to Parkland with Couch (see below).

Camera Car # 2

CAMERA CAR #3 LOCAL CAMERAS

1. DPS Driver                                                                                     
2. James H. Underwood *-KRLD (CBS) B&W movie
3. Thomas C. Dillard *-DMN B&W still
4. James Darnell*-WBAP Ch. 8 (NBC) B&W movie
5. Malcolm 0. Couch*-WFAA Ch. 5 (ABC) B&W movie
6. Robert H. Jackson*-DTH B&W still

Vehicle: Grey 1964 Chevrolet Impala 2-door convertible
          Provided by Earl Hayes Chevrolet Dallas through Sam Bloom

Aka:  Press Photo Car (local press) (CE 767)
          Press Pool Convertible (CE 768)
          Cam 3 (Cutler)
          Local Cam 1 (Trask)
          Local Press Car (N&A)

Relevant photos/film: Wiegman film, Couch film, DCA film, Dorman film, Hughes film, Nix film, Martin film.

Occupant sources: CE 768, 6H155-157 Couch, 6H162-167 Dillard, 6H167-168 Jackson, C&A Article, Trask.

Notes: Jackson throws exposed film to a pre-arranged film drop at the NE corner of Main and Houston. The film falls to the ground. This is partially visible in Hughes film and may explain why Jackson took no photos at the time of the shots.  After shots, Underwood, Dillard, and Darnell jump out of the car at the head of Elm Street. Darnell films the Newman’s (Darnell film). Couch jumps out of the car at the base of Triple Underpass while Jackson remains. Underwood and Darnell remain in Dealey Plaza, while Dillard enters car #13. Couch and some other unidentified photographer(s), (Cancellare, Darnell?) later get a ride to Parkland from a passing motorist.

Camera Car #3 Local Cameras

FORWARD MID MOTORCADE MOTORCYCLES                 

1. DPD Hollis B. (H.B.) McLain                                                
(DPD Call #155)
(DPD Equipment #352)
2. DPD Marion L. (M.L.) Baker
(DPD Call 4134)
(DPD Equipment #346)
Lisc TX # G 1986

Vehicles: Harley-Davidson two-wheel motorcycles provided by DPD

Aka:

Relevant photos/film: Couch film, DCA film, Cancellare 1, Bond 4, Towner 3, Hughes film.

Occupant sources: Lawrence Exhibit 2

Notes: Baker and McLain are on Houston Street during the assassination (Bowles manuscript). Baker parks his motorcycle and enters Texas School Book Depository following the shots (3H249). Baker is later at Parkland Hospital (3H268). McLain escorts the motorcade to Parkland. Baker mistakenly identifies McLain as L.W. Williams in his Warren Commission testimony (3H268).
             
Forward Mid Motorcade Motorcycles  

CONGRESSMAN’S CAR #1
 
1. Driver                                                                                        
2. Congressman George H. Mahon (Lubbock, TX)
3. Congressman Walter Rogers (Pampa, TX)
4. Congressman Homer Thornberry (Austin, TX)
5. Lawrence F. "Larry" O'Brien-Special Assistant to President

Vehicle: White 1964 Ford Mercury Comet Caliente
2-door convertible, model 76B with red top
Vehicle provided by Eagle Lincoln-Mercury Dallas through Dick                    Fisher.

Aka: Congressional Car (CE 767 and N&A)
Car #2 (CE 768 & Curry 1, p.16) (3
Dignitary Car 2 (Cutler)
Dignitary 2 (Trask)

Relevant photos/film:  Lewis W. Williams 2, Cancellare 2, Willis 6, Hughes film, Dorman film, and Martin film.

Occupant sources: CE 768, 7H461-465 O'Brien, Author’s interview with Jim Wright 7/29/92, Valenti.

Notes: "#2" in left front windshield. Dillard jumps on rear trunk and gets ride to Trade Mart and Parkland. Jim Wright identified from photos the man in the #3 positions as one W.R. Poage, Jr., however T can find no reference as to his being in this location, nor in the motorcade, yet several sources place Congressman Rogers in this car. Seth Kantor's handwritten notation on the White House List and his 3/5/93 letter indicate Poage was not on the trip. CE 768 incorrectly places Congressman Albert Thomas in this car.

Congressman’s Car #1

Congressman's Car

CONGRESSMAN'S CAR #2

1. Driver                                                                                  
2. Congressman Albert Thomas (Houston, TX)
3. Congressman Jack Brooks (Beaumont, TX)
4. Congressman Lindey Beckworth (Gladewater, TX)
5. Congressman Olin E. "Tiger" Teague (College Station, TX)
6. Congressman James C. Wright, Jr. (Ft. Worth, TX)

Vehicle: White Ford Mercury Comet Caliente
2-door convertible, model 76D vehicle provided by Eagle
Lincoln-Mercury Dallas through Dick Fisher

Aka: Congressional Car (CE 767 and N&A)
Car #3 (CE 768 & Curry 1, p.16)
Dignitary Car #3 (Cutler)

Relevant photos/film: Lewis W. Williams 3, Cancellare 2, Willis 6, Martin film.

Occupant sources: CE 768, authors interview of Jim Wright 7/29/92, Valenti.

Notes: "0" in left front windshield. CE 768 incorrectly leaves Congressman Albert Thomas out of this car.

Congressman's Car #2

Congressman's Car

CONGRESSMAN'S CAR #3
1. Driver                                                                                    
2. Congressman John Young (Corpus Christi, TX)
3. Congressman Henry B. Gonzalez*-B&W still 1
            (San Antonio, TX)
4. State Senator William Patman
5. Congressman Graham Purcell

Vehicle: Grey 1964 Lincoln sedan provided by Eagle
               Lincoln-Mercury Dallas through Dick Fisher

Aka:      Congressional Car (CE 767) Car #4 (CE 768 and Curry 1, p.16.)
              Dignitary Car 4 (Cutler)

Relevant photos/film: Willis 6, Bond 6, Martin film.

Occupant sources: CE 768, Manchester, authors correspondence with                                     Congressman Henry B. Gonzalez, 6/8/92, Valenti.

Notes:

Congressman's Car #3

VIP CAR

1. Major General Chester V. "Ted" Clifton, US Army                      Military Presidential Aid (senior ranking)
(SS WHCA code-Watchman)

2. Major General Godfrey "God" McHugh, US Air Force  
          Air Force Presidential Aid
(SS WHCA code-Wing)

3. Julian 0. Reed Gov.-Connally's Press Secretary (NPOA)

Vehicle: 1964 Ford Mercury Colony Park Station
Wagon 4-door, model 71D (9 passengers)

Vehicle provided by Eagle Lincoln-Mercury Dallas through Buck Ferrell.

Aka: White House Staff Car (CE 767) Car #5 (CE 768)

Relevant photos/film: Willis 6, Bond 5, and Bond 6.

Occupant sources: Manchester, authors interview with Jim Wright 7/29/92 and Mary Ferrell 3/5/93.

Notes: Julian Reed visible getting in or out of left rear door in Willis 6 photo. Exits right rear door at Parkland (Wiegman film). According to researcher Mary Ferrell, this vehicle was originally scheduled to carry Washington Press Representatives and to be driven by TDPS officer. Remarkably, this vehicle was actually Mrs. Ferrell's own personal vehicle with only 2000 miles on it (authors interview with Mary Ferrell, 3/5/930 and Buck Ferrell 3/21/93.

VIP Car

MID MOTORCADE MOTORCYCLES

1. DPD J.W. Courson                               
(DPD Call #153)
(DPD Equipment #355)
2. DPD Clyde A. Haygood
(DPD Call #142)
(DPD Equipment #357)

Vehicles: Harley-Davidson two-wheel motorcycles provided by DPD

Aka:

Relevant photos/film: Bond 4, Wiegman film, Bothun 4, Willis 6, Cancellare 1, Bond 5, Bond, Towner 2 & 3, Cabluck 3, Cancellare 3, Atkins film.

Occupant sources: Lawrence Exhibit 2, 6H299-302 Haygood, author's interviews of Courson and Haygood.

Notes: Courson escorts the motorcade to Parkland (author's interview of Courson, Bowles manuscript). Haygood parks his motorcycle at North Elm curb and runs up the grassy knoll to the Overpass in to the railroad yards. Minutes later he returns to his bike, encounters James Tague and Charles Brehm, and reports to the rear of the TSBD. He is later inside the TSBD on the 6th floor (6H306).

Mid Motorcade Motorcycles

WHITE HOUSE PRESS BUS #1
 
1. Driver                                                                           
2. Harry Cabluck*-FWST B&W still
3. Richard Beebe Dudman-St. Louis Post Dispatch
4. Douglas Kiker-NY Herald Tribune
5. Robert MacNeil-NBC Bureau Chief
6. Robert Manning-WH Staff
7. Robert Charles Pierpoint-CBS TV WH Corr
8. Charles "Chuck" Roberts-Newsweek
9. Hugh Sidey-Time Magazine Washington Bureau Chief
(NPOA)

Vehicle: Continental Trailways Bus - provided by Continental Bus Co. Dallas through Sam Bloom

Aka: Press Bus (CE 767) Press Bus White House and Travelling Press Bus (CE 763)

Relevant photos/film: Willis 6, Bond 5, Bond 6, Towner 3, DCA film.

Occupant sources: CE 767, CE 768, DTH 11/22/63, Roberts, MacNeil 1, MacNeil 2, author's
            Interviews of Harold Cabluck 4/17/88 and Richard Dudman 9/9/79, Time 11/28/88, p. 45.

Notes: Sign affixed to side of bus, "White House Press". McNeil and Cabluck exit Press Bus and go up knoll. MacNeil enters the TSBD and calls NBC at 12:34 PM CST. Dudman and others also exit the bus (McNeil, author's interview of Dudman and Cabluck 4/17/88).

White House Press Bus #1

LOCAL PRESS POOL CAR
 
1. Lewis Harris-DMN Editor                                           
2. Mike Quinn-DMN
3. Kent Biffle-DMN
4. Larry Grove-DMN (NPOA)

Vehicle: Chevrolet 4-door hardtop (?)

Aka: Local TV and Press Auto (CE 768)

Relevant photos/film: Bond 6.

Occupant sources: DMN 11/23/63, 4/5/81, 11/20/83.

Notes: Biffle exits car and runs up knoll. He then enters the Depository along with a WFAA TV reporter (probably Tom Alyea). Grove also exited the car. Harris, in the DMN 11/20/83 article, insinuates that this car and the occupants unofficially joined the motorcade at Love Field, rather than having been a planned vehicle.

Local Press Pool Car

WHITE HOUSE PRESS BUS #2

1. Driver                                                                             
2. Sidney Davis-Westinghouse Broadcasting
3. Robert John Donovan-LA Times Washington Corr
4. Seth Kantor-Scripps-Howard
5. Robert Young-Chicago Tribune (NPOA)

Vehicle: Continental Trailways Bus provided by
Continental Bus Co. Dallas through Sam Bloom

Aka: Press Bus (CE 767)
Press Bus White House and Travelling
Press Bus (CE 768)

Relevant photos/film: Bond 7, DCA, and Paschall.

Occupant sources: CE 767, CE 768, DTH 11/22/63, 2H340-341, 20H407 Kantor, author's interview of Richard Dudman 9/9/79 and Kantor 3/5/93.

Notes: Sign affixed to side of bus, "White House Press". No reporters were allowed to exit this Bus in Dealey Plaza (Kantor).

White House Bus #2

REAR MID MOTORCADE MOTORCYCLES

1. DPD Sgt. R. Smart                                                         
(DPD Call #170)
            (DPD Equipment #)
2. DPD Robert Joseph (Bobby Joe) Dale
(DPD Call #161)
(DPD Equipment #350)

Vehicles: Harley-Davidson two-wheel motorcycles provided by DPD

Aka:

Relevant photos/film: Paschall film, Bond 7.

Occupant sources: Lawrence Exhibit 2

Notes: Positions varied more than other motorcycles (photo analysis). Dale escorts the motorcade to Parkland (author's interview with W.G. Lumpkin). Smart's actions are unknown.

Rear mid Motorcade Motorcycles

EXTRA CAR #1

1. Driver                                                                                         

Vehicle: Grey or blue Chevrolet hardtop provided by Earl Hayes
            Chevrolet Dallas through Sam Bloom

Aka: extra cars (CE 767) extra Car (CE 768 & N&A)

Relevant photos/film: Bond 8 (partial), Paschall film.

Occupant sources:

Notes: Occupied by only one person for use as extra vehicle in case of a breakdown of any other motorcade vehicle

Extra Car

WESTERN UNION CAR

1. R.C. Johnson - Sales Manager, the Western
Union Telegraph Co.
2. (FNU) Yates - Sales Manager, the Western
Union Telegraph Co.

Vehicle: Black 1957 Ford hardtop provided by Western Union

Aka:

Relevant photos/film: Bond 8, Paschall film, misc. video.

Occupant sources: 21H420. Semingsen Exhibit No. 3001, Attachment7

Notes: Occupied by two persons
            Chrome trim, fins, sign affixed to driver-side door

Western Union Car 

WHITE HOUSE SIGNAL CORPS CAR

1. Chief Warrant Officer Arthur W. Bales, Jr.                                    US Army, US Signal Corps (SS WHCA code-Sturdy)

2. Ira Gearhart-US Army (SS WHCA code-
The Bagman/Shadow/Satchel) (NPOA)

Vehicle: White 1964 Chevrolet Impala hardtop
Sedan 4-door (white Pontiac Curry p.16)

Aka: White House Communication Car (CE768)
USA Signal Corps Car (N&A)

Relevant photos/film: Paschall film, misc. video.

Occupant sources: CE 768.

Notes: CWO Bales has portable DCN SS radio and is monitoring both "Baker" and "Charlie" frequencies.

WHCA Car




WHCA Vehicle Placard














EXTRA CAR #2

1. Driver                                                                                

Vehicle: White over dark blue or black 1964
Chevrolet Impala hardtop Sedan 4-door provided
 By Earl Hayes Chevrolet Dallas through Sam Bloom

Aka: extra cars (CE 767) extra Car (CE 768 & N&A)

Relevant photos/film: Paschall film, misc. video.

Occupant sources:

Notes: Occupied by one person, Extra of any other motorcade vehicle in case of breakdown

Extra Car #2

OFFICIAL PARTY BUS

1. Driver                                                              
2. White House Staff Members
3. Presidential Staff Members
4. Vice Presidential Staff Members
5. Governor's Staff Members
6. Airport Reception Committee
7. H. Barefoot Sanders Jr.-US Attorney
8. Jack Joseph Valenti-Aide to Vice President
9. Marie Felmer-Secretary to Vice President
10. Evelyn Maurine Lincoln-Personal Secretary
To President (SS WHCA code-Willow)
11. Rear Admiral George G. Burkley, MD, US Navy,
Presidential Physician (SS WHCA code-Market)
12. Mrs. Elizabeth "Liz" Carpenter-Executive
Assistant to Vice President
13. Pamela Tunure, Personal Secretary to
Mrs. Kennedy
14. Sgt. Paul Glynn, US Air Force-Personal Aid to
Vice President
15. Mary Gallagher (NPOA)

Vehicle: Continental Trailways Bus provided by Continental Bus Co. Dallas through Sam Bloom

Aka: Staff and Dignitary Bus (CE 767)

Relevant photos/film: Bond 9, Paschall film, misc. video.

Occupant sources: CE 767, CE 768, Manchester, Youngblood, Jovich, Valenti Author's    
            Interview with Paul Glynn 3/5/93.

Notes: Sign affixed to side of bus, "Official Party".

Official Party Buss

REAR POLICE CAR (DPD Car #260)

1. DPD J.M. Philips                                                 
(DPD Call #158)
2. DPD L.S. Davenport (?)

Vehicle: Black over white 1963 Ford hardtop
Sedan 4-door with "push-bumpers"

Aka: White APB (Accident Prevention Bureau)
Car (20H490)
Rear police vehicles (CE 767)
Police Car (CE 768)

Relevant photos/film: Paschall film, Darnell film, misc. video.

Occupant sources: Lawrence Exhibit 2, Darnell film.

Notes: Vehicle occupied by two persons, if Davenport was in this vehicle, 
      he was pulled from 2-wheel motorcycle duty for this assignment.

Rear Police Car

REAR POLICE MOTORCYCLE

1. DPD (unknown)                                                                

Vehicle: 3-wheel motorcycle

Aka: rear police vehicles CE 767 motorcycles (CE 768)

Relevant photos/film: Misc. video.

Occupant sources: Lawrence Exhibit 2.

Notes: 3-wheel motorcycle has no Channel 2 access.

Rear Police Motorcycle

VICE PRESIDENTIAL MOTORCADE
 FROM PARKLAND MEMORIAL HOSPITAL TO DALLAS LOVE FIELD


MOTORCYCLES                                                           
1. DPD
2. DPD
Vehicle: Harley-Davidson two-wheel motorcycles

Aka:

Relevant photos/film:

Occupant sources: (18H784 Taylor CE 10240)

Notes:
Lead Motorcycles for VP motorcade to return to Love Field

VICE PRESIDENTIAL CAR

1. DPD Chief Jesse E. (J.E.) Curry                                     
(DPD Call #1)
2. Congressman Albert Thomas (Houston, TX)
3. Congressman Homer Thornberry (Austin, TX)
Vice President Lyndon B. Johnson
(SS WHCA code-Volunteer)
5. ASAIC Rufus W. Youngblood (SSR)
(SS WHCA code-Dagger)

Vehicle: White Ford Mercury sedan Lisc. TX 4MU 8631 - provided by
             DPD

Aka:

Relevant photos/film:

Occupant sources: 18H737 Roberts, 18H770 Youngblood, 2H152-153 Youngblood, 18H813 Rowley

Notes: Vehicle had been used as Lead Car in motorcade.

Waiting for VP to leave Parkland Hospital

VICE PRESIDENTIAL SECRET SERVICE FOLLOW-UP CAR
                              (SS WHCA code-Varsity)

1. DPD Inspector Putnam                                                
2. SA Warren W. "Woody" Taylor
3. SA Glen A. Bennet
4. Congressman Jack Brooks (Beaumont, TX)
5. Mrs. C.A. "Lady Bird" Johnson
(SS WHCA code-Victoria)
6. SA Jerry D. Kivett
(SS WHCA code-Daylight)

Vehicle: Unmarked police sedan - provided by DPD

Aka:

Relevant photos/film:

Occupant sources: 18H737 Roberts, 18H780 Kivett, 18H813 Rowley

Notes:
Secret Service FU Car leaving Parkland Hospital with the VP

SECRET SERVICE CAR #1                                                           

I. DPD Officer driver                                                
2. DPD Officer
3. Ira Gearhart-US Army (SS WHCA code-
The Bagman/Shadow/Satchel) On DPD officer's lap
4. SA John D. Ready
5. ASAIC Emory P. Roberts
(SS WHCA code-Dusty)
6. SA William "Tim" McIntyre
7. Mrs. Elizabeth "Liz" Carpenter-Executive Assistant to Vice President

Vehicle:

Aka:

Relevant photos/film:

Occupant sources: 18H780, 18H813 Rowley

Notes:

Secret Service Car #1

DALLAS POLICE CAR

1. DPD Officer driver                                                             
2. Clifton C. Carter-Political Aide to Vice President
3. Jack Valenti-Aide to Vice President
4. Capt. Cecil Stoughton*-White House color still
5. ASAIC Thomas "Lem" Johns (SSR)
(SS WHCA code-Dandy)

Vehicle: Dallas Police Car

Aka:

Relevant photos/film:

Occupant sources: 18H775 Johns, 1SH813 Rowley

Notes: Departs Parkland 1:26 PM CST
Arrives Love Field 1:33 PM CST

Lady Bird Johnson leaving Parkland Hospital

 JFK HEARSE MOTORCADE
 FROM PARKLAND MEMORIAL HOSPITAL TO DALLAS LOVE FIELD

LEAD CAR


1. DPD Officer
2. SA Winston George "Win" Lawson
3.
4.

Vehicle:

Aka:

Relevant photos/film:

Occupant sources: 18H744 Hill

Notes:

Rear Police Car

LEAD MOTORCYCLES

1. DPD Leon E. (L.E.) Grey                                                               
(DPD Call #156)
(DPD Equipment #351)
2. DPD Douglas L. (D.L.) Jackson
(DPD Call #138)
(DPD Equipment #356)

Vehicle: Harley-Davidson two-wheel motorcycles

Aka:

Relevant photos/film:

Occupant sources: Bowles Manuscript p. 122

Notes:

Hearse Motorcade leaving to go to Love Field

O'NEAL MORTUARY COMPANY HEARSE

1. SA Andrew E. Berger                                                     
2. SA Stewart G. Stout, Jr.
3. ASAIC Roy H. Kellerman
4. SA Clinton L. Hill
(SS WHCA code-Dazzle)
5. Mrs. Jacqueline B. Kennedy
(SS WHCA code-Lace)
6. Rear Admiral George G. Burkley, MD, US Navy,
Presidential Physician (SS WHCA code-Market)
7. President John Fitzgerald Kennedy (deceased) [in casket]

Vehicle: White 1964 Cadillac Hearse

Aka:

Relevant photos/film:

Occupant sources: 18H 756 Landis, 18H785 Stout, 18H 796 Berger, 1811814 Rowley, 18H726 & 728 Kellerman, 23197 Kellerman, 2H 143 Hill

Notes:
O’NEAL Co. Hearse waiting at Love Field

MID MOTORCADE MOTORCYCLES

1.                                                                                  
2.

Vehicle: Harley-Davidson two-wheel motorcycles

Aka:

Relevant photos/film:

Occupant sources:

Notes:


Mid Motorcycles Hearse

SECRET SERVICE FOLLOW-UP CAR

1. SA William R. Greer 
2. SA David B. Grant
3. SA Samuel E. Sullivan
4. SA Ernest E. Olsson, Jr.
5. SA Richard E. Johnsen
6. SA Paul E. Landis
(SS WHCA code-Debut)

Vehicle: Steel grey 1964 4-door Lincoln convertible 3 Sedan
              Lisc TX ilP2 0060

Aka:

Relevant photos/film:

Occupant sources: 18H723 Greer, 2H126 Greer, 18H744 Hill, 18H 791 Sullivan, 18H 792
Olsson, 18H 799 Johnsen, 18H757 Landis, 18H814 Rowley

Notes: Vehicle had been used as Vice President's Car in motorcade. SA Richard E. Johnsen has CE-399.

Secret Service FU Car in Hearse Motorcade

WHITE HOUSE STAFF CAR

1. Driver                                                                                                      
2. Malcolm "Mac" Kilduff-Assistant White House Press
Secretary for President (SS WHCA code-Warrior)
3. Evelyn Maurine Lincoln-Personal Secretary
To President (SS WHCA code-Willow)
4. Pamela Tunure, Personal Secretary to Mrs. Kennedy
5. Mary Gallagher (NPOA)

Vehicle:

Aka:

Relevant photos/film:

Occupant sources:

Notes: Departs Parkland Hospital 2:08 PM CST and Arrives Love Field PM CST

White House Staff Car

Air Force One 26000 and 27000 (1962-2001)

 Air Force One SAM 26000

Type Of Activity
Presidential Transport
Location
Location
Worldwide
Date of Activity
 Oct 1962 to  June 2001
Coordinates
33°40′34″N 117°43′52″W

The primary presidential aircraft, number SAM 26000 is based at Andrews Air Force Base, Md.

When the president is aboard either aircraft, or any other Air Force aircraft, the radio call sign "Air Force One" is used for all communications and air traffic control identification purposes.

Principal differences between the C-137C and the standard Boeing 707 aircraft are the electronic and communications equipment carried by the presidential aircraft, and its interior configuration and furnishings. Passenger cabins are partitioned into several sections: a communications center, the presidential quarters, and a staff/office compartment. There is limited seating for passengers,
including members of the news media.

Background

Aircraft SAM 26000 is the most famous and widely known Air Force aircraft. It joined the presidential fleet on Oct. 12, 1962.

Originally painted red the Kennedys had the aircraft redesigned into the iconic blue it is today

In May 1963, on a trip to Moscow with a U.S. delegation, aircraft SAM 26000 set 14 speed records, including the Washington to Moscow record of 8 hours, 38 minutes, 42 seconds.

President Kennedy and the First Lady arrive at a rally in Houston

This was the same  aircraft  in  which President John F. Kennedy flew  to  Dallas, Texas, on Nov. 22, 1963, and in which his body was returned to Washington, D.C., following his assassination.

LBJ becomes President aboard SAM 26000

Lyndon B. Johnson was  sworn into office as the 36th president of the United States on board the aircraft at Love Field  in Dallas the same  day.  

LBJ visits Vietnam in 1965 unannounced while attending the Manila Summit Conference

This  aircraft  was  also used to return President Johnson's  body  to Texas following a State funeral in Washington, D.C., Jan. 24, 1973.

President Richard M. Nixon used aircraft SAM 26000 extensively during the first four years of his administration. 

Air Force One at El Toro MCAS while visiting San Clemente

My first experience in working with SAM 2600 was while I was assigned to San Clemente in 1970 our detachment worked all of the arrivals and departures at El Toro,  We plugged in the ramp phone and  the other circuits into the nose of SAM 2600 for the onboard telephones to connect the aircraft to the San Clemente switchboard.  When the President departed we disconnected all of the phones.

His most widely  heralded trips included the around-the-world trip in July 1969, to the Peoples Republic of China in February 1972, and to the  Union of Soviet Socialist Republics in May· of that same year.

President Nixon dubbed SAM 2600 the Spirt of 76 a short time before leaving for Beijing

Aircraft SAM 27000 has established its own history and reputation. This aircraft was accepted by the Air Force on Aug. 4, 1972 and was placed into service after nearly 200 hours of service testing and evaluation. It was first used by President Nixon on Feb. 8, 1973.

President Gerald R. Ford first used aircraft SAM 27000 on Aug. 19, 1974, when he flew from Andrews Air Force Base to Chicago to address the Veterans of Foreign Wars convention. 

President Ford arrives in Chicago Note: The state of the art Ramp Phone

He later traveled overseas on a 7-day State visit to the Far East and visited Tokyo and Osaka, Japan,  Seoul, Korea, and Vladivostok, Russia.

President Ford on one of his overseas trips on SAM 27000 in 1975

Also, in May 1975, he made his first trip to Europe, visiting Belgium, Spain, Austria, and Italy. In July and August 1975, President Ford returned to Europe to visit the Federal Republic of Germany, Poland, Finland, Hungary, and Yugoslavia. He flew to France in November 1975; and to the Peoples Republic of China, Indonesia, and the Philippines in December 1975.

President Jimmy Carter made his first trip aboard aircraft SAM 27000 on March 16, 1977

President Carter visited three states, including New York where he addressed the United Nations General Assembly when he first used SAM 27000. His first overseas trip was made to England and Switzerland in May 1977. In December 1977 and January 1978, President Carter flew to Poland, Iran, India, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, France, and Belgium. He flew to Venezuela, Brazil, Nigeria and Liberia in March 1978; Panama in June 1978; the Federal Republic of Germany in July 1978; Israel in March 1979; Austria, Japan, and Korea in June 1979; and Italy, Yugoslavia, Spain, and Portugal in June 1980.

On Feb. 19, 1981, President Ronald W. Reagan first flew in aircraft SAM 27000 for a  brief trip to Santa Barbara, Calif. He returned to Andrews Air Force Base, Md., on Feb. 22, 1981. In March 1981, President Reagan flew to Canada.

President Reagan stops by the Communications Center aboard SAM 27000

President Reagan aboard SAM 27000

Ronald Reagan was SAM 27000's most frequent flyer, flying longer and farther than all the other presidents who flew on it, traveling more than 675,000 miles aboard it. Reagan used Air Force One to travel to all parts of the world to pursue his ambitious diplomatic goals, taking three trips to Asia, six to Europe, and twelve trips to foreign places in the Western Hemisphere. Reagan flew to three of his four summit meetings with Soviet Leader Mikhail Gorbachev aboard SAM 27000: Geneva, Reykjavík, and Moscow (one was held in Washington, D.C.).

The Reagans' last flight aboard the plane was on January 20, 1989, when the now-former President and First Lady flew back to California.

SAM 27000 at the Reagan Library

The Presidential Aircraft SAM 27000 with the Air Force designation C-137C. was officially retired in  2001 and has been on display at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library since 2005.

SAM 27000 Cockpit

USAF VC-137C Communications Systems Operator using Kleinschmidt terminal     
  (1970s or early 1980s)          

Specifications  
       
         Primary function: Presidential transportation

Prime contractor: The  Boeing Company

Thrust: 18,000 lb. each engine

Power plant/manufacturer: Four Pratt & Whitney JT3D-3B turbofan engines

Dimensions: wingspan 145 ft. 9 in, length 152 ft. 11 in, height 42 ft. 5 in


Speed: 540 mph
Ceiling: 42,000 feet
Range: 7,140 miles
Load: up to 50 passengers
Crew: 18
Maximum takeoff weight: 336,000 lb
Status: Retired

The Presidential Service Badge

 Presidential Service Badge

Type of ActivityCommunications support for the White House
Location
LocationWashington DC
Date of Activity
Mar 1942 to Present
Coordinates  38°53′52″N 77°02′11″W

The Presidential Service Badge

The award was established in 1964 and is a badge of the United States military issued to service members who serve as full-time military staff to the President of the United States. Such personnel are stationed at the White House and should not be confused with the senior military officers of the United States Department of Defense who advise the President but are not assigned as direct Presidential aides. Each badge is stamped with a unique serial number which, when issued, associates that badge with a specific individual.

Establishing Authority

Executive Order 10879 of June 1, 1960 was signed by President Dwight D. Eisenhower establishing a White House Service Badge. President Lyndon B. Johnson retired the White House Service Badge and issued a separate Presidential Service Badge by signing Executive Order 11174 on Sept.1,1964. 

Background

Typical recipients include: Military aides to the President appointed from each of the services (pay-grade O-4 or higher) who, among other duties, rotate being the so-called "Emergency War Officer" with "The Football", a briefcase containing nuclear decision-making tools kept within ready access of the president at all times, White House military public affairs officers, Servicemembers assigned to the White House Communications Agency (WHCA), which supports Presidential communications worldwide, Servicemembers assigned to the White House Transportation Agency (WHTA), which provides motor vehicle transportation to the White House as directed by the White House Military Office, Marine Helicopter Squadron 1 (HMX-1) "Marine One" flight crew, (Previously awarded to the Executive Flight Detachment: “Army One”) Navy Seabees who run (Camp David Naval Support Facility, Thurmont) Marines assigned to the Marine Security Company at Camp David.

The Presidential Service Badge is awarded after at least one year of satisfactory service "to any member of the Armed Forces assigned to duty in the White House Office or to military units and support facilities under the administration of the Military Assistant to the President by the Secretary of the Army, the Secretary of the Navy, the Secretary of the Air Force, or, when the Coast Guard is not operating as a service in the Navy, the Secretary of Transportation, upon recommendation of the Military Assistant to the President". The Presidential Service Badge is recorded in the awardee's military service records and is authorized for wear as a permanent decoration. 


Recipients are the only Americans authorized to wear the "Presidential Seal or Coat of Arms" on their uniforms and civilian clothes.

LBJ’s Texas Ranch
 Welcome to the LBJ Ranch

Type of Activity
Communications Support
Location
Location
Johnson City Texas
Date of Activity
 November 1963 thru January 1969
Coordinates
30° 14′ 29″ N,98° 37′ 32″ W

The ranch is located on the north side of United States Route 290, about fourteen miles west of Johnson City, which lies between the highway and the south bank of the Pedernales River.

It is now a National Park that protects the birthplace, home, ranch, and final resting place of Lyndon B. Johnson, 36th President of the United States. During Johnson's administration, the LBJ Ranch was known as the "Texas White House" because the President spent approximately 20% of his time in office there.

On July 12, 1952, they moved into their ranch home. To commemorate the event, LBJ took a small limb and scratched in the concrete ...walkway near the south gate, the date and "Welcome to the LBJ Ranch."
 
The President enjoys the Ranch with his family

Beginning in the summer of 1955, with Senator Johnson's heart attack and the long months of recuperation at the ranch, more and more public business was carried on at his Texas home. By the summer of 1957, Mrs. Johnson recalls, their living room had been largely used by office activities. A secretary had taken over her desk, and another desk and secretary were moved in during periods of heavy workloads. The room was becoming, increasingly crowded and hectic. Telephones seemed to ring constantly.

The Johnson's accordingly decided to have an office addition built onto the west side of their home. Which would include a new Office, living Room and Bedrooms.

THE OFFICE

Mrs. Lyndon Johnson recalled that from the autumn of 1958 until January 1973, this new room had been her husband's office, first as senator and majority leader, then as vice president and president, and finally as rancher and elder statesman.

She pointed out President Johnson's desk and chair in the northeast corner. The desk had been given to her husband by his staff when he left his position as majority leader of the Senate to be inaugurated as vice president on January 20, 1961.

President Johnson's desk and chair were in the northeast corner and faced west. In the west wall, above the north cabinets, was a built-in, remote control, television . The desk occupied by the president's senior secretary and her chair were in the northwest corner, facing east. In the southwest corner, also facing east, was a second secretary's desk and chair.

LBJ’s Office at the Ranch

The White House Communications Agency addressed the communications needs of President Johnson and installed a totally new voice communications system in the Ranch house which also included a recording device in the office that the President could activate from his desk.

LBJ’s Office at the Ranch

After LBJ became president, there was a piece of  Plexiglas installed to shield the louvers in the door giving access to the den. This was to ensure that there would be more privacy for confidential conversations in the living room or den when this door was closed.

THE LIVING ROOM

Until 1958, when the office was built, the living room this was where most of the inside entertaining and a "considerable amount" of business took place. Sometimes, however, they convened in the dining room or den.

LBJ holds a meeting in the ranch’s living room

Liz Carpenter, Mrs. Johnson's press secretary, recalled that the office was unsuited for presidential meetings because it was a crossroads of ringing telephones, speech writing, messages, and other activities. If the meetings were held indoors, the living room was the usual choice. 

LBJ holds a meeting in the ranch’s living room

The living room offered more access to services and on the north wall was another three eyed monster as they were called by WHCA technicians. This was three TV’s side by side on a stand, so all three networks could be monitored simultaneously and remotely controlled.

The Living room at the Ranch

During the presidential and post-presidential years there was a large recliner chair in front of the fireplace for the President, This recliner chair had been given to him by his staff and was finished in cream-colored corduroy. There was always a telephone within reach of the president's recliner.

THE PRESIDENT'S BEDROOM

President Johnson always wanted a comfortable room with lots of light, access to the swimming pool, three television sets, and his favorite Melvin Warren paintings. Whenever he was hospitalized, he took the things he loved with him--the Warren paintings, etc. During the times that President Johnson was recuperating he would often hold meetings in his bedroom.

Between President Johnson's bed and the east wall was the large massage table used by Lt. Tom Mills, a medical liaison, and other corpsmen to give LBJ an evening massage.

The President's Bedroom

While LBJ occupied this room there were three television sets on the stand in the southwest corner. These he could operate by remote control from his bed, and, if he wished, he could view programs originating from the three networks simultaneously.

The President's Bedroom

On the "unremarkable" bedside table, near the door, was a telephone. Like the telephone in the office there was a recording device attached and the President could manually activate it from the telephone. Also, in that area were the hookups for the house's intercom system and the president's oxygen system.

THE AIRSTRIP

A 3,000-foot asphalt landing strip was built in 1955 and, until extended to 6,150 feet in 1964, handled only light aircraft.

A JetStar or similar aircraft usually landed at the ranch

Air Force One never landed at the LBJ Ranch. Although the strip was long enough, the caliche base lacked enough stability to support the impact of the big Boeing 707 in landing.

James Cross LBJ’s pilot seen here with the JetStar 

Interior of the JetStar

THE LBJ RANCH HANGAR  

The hangar was built by a Houston contractor in 1956. The frame, formed of oil pipes, was put up after the concrete foundation was poured.

The hangar at the LBJ Ranch in January 1962, was not being used for the purpose for which it was built because the Johnson's Lodestar was too large. During the vice-presidential years, the hangar area for hay storage, and bales were sometimes stacked to within inches of the overhead girders. Soon after Lyndon Johnson became president, the ranch Foreman was told "to get the damned hay out so the hangar could be used for more vital purposes. "

Hanger Area also WHCA  Comm. Trailers and USSS Command Post

After this was done, measures were taken to convert the interior into an area for presidential press conferences and a movie theatre as well as an area where the airplane could be housed.

When the president acquired his King Air, its tail assembly extended too far above the ground to permit it all the way into the hangar. To alleviate this difficulty, changes were made to the large front door.

The center room at the end of the hanger was used by the telephone people as a communication room during the vice-presidential years.

The hangar is painted LBJ green and is a multipurpose, 17-room structure. It includes, in addition to the hangar, a projection room (equipped for both 16- and 35mm movies), kitchenette, restrooms, storerooms, and quarters.

HANGAR AREA STRUCTURES

The hanger area and Airstrip at the LBJ Texas Ranch Compound

In 1967, several maintenance-oriented structures were erected or relocated in the area adjacent to the hangar. These included the following:

Freezer-cooler Shed

This corrugated-metal structure with shed roof adjoins the north side of Klein's shop. Its exterior is painted LB J green.

Five-unit Carport

This structure is between Klein’s shop and the old Martin barn. It is screened from view on the south by a row of wax Ligustrum. Consisting of a flat corrugated-metal roof and steel supports, his five-stall structure, originally part of the 10-unit east carport, was relocated on this site in the autumn of 1967. It is painted LB J green.

Housed in two of the bays are the two Lincoln Continental convertibles owned by President Johnson and donated to the American people.

Single-unit Carport

This structure , consisting of a flat corrugated-metal roof on steel supports, was west of Klein's shop in the autumn of 1967. It had been one of the 10 units in the east carport and is painted LBJ green.

Car Wash Shelter

Located on a concrete pad with a drain on a site southwest of the hangar is the car wash shelter . It consists of a metal roof on steel posts and is painted white.

Welder Storage Shed

This structure is positioned between Klein}s shop and the freezer-cooler shed. It has a flat corrugated-metal roof and steel supports and is painted a gray-green.

SECURITY-ASSOCIATED STRUCTURES 

Secret Service Guard Shacks

Secret Service Guard Shack

Two of the original three Secret Service small frame structures with asphalt-shingle, gabled roofs still exist today. These lap and gap sided structures are painted white. They have single doors with double-hung windows in the other three walls. They are positioned of the east and west security check and at the cattle guard south of the Pedernales.

Secret Service Guard Shack


LBJ ranch weather station

North of the ranch house, at the northeast corner of the yard enclosing the Secret Service building, is a weather station. It is equipped with a louvered wooden stand, thermometer, and rain gauge. The combined anemometer and barometer are in the Secret Service building. This equipment is employed to provide weather data for air traffic and to supply weather reports as called for by Lyndon Johnson when he was absent from the ranch.

Secret Service Command Post

During the vice-presidential years, there were no Secret Service people at the ranch except when the Johnson's were in residence. Whenever the Johnson's were expected, several security people would appear a few hours before their arrival.

At first the Secret Service employed Klein's old shop as their office, or they sat in cars. A trailer was then moved into position by General Services Administration (GSA) north of the ranch house and east of the frame well house; contractors were hired to make the necessary plumbing and sewer connections.

This building served as the Secret Service's ranch command post until after the assassination of President John F. Kennedy and the swearing in of Lyndon Johnson as 36th president.

Understandably, security now became all important. There was an influx of agents, and more commodious facilities were needed. After the Secret Service took possession of the structure, GSA became responsible for its conversion from a ranch quarters into a Secret Service command post and for its periodic maintenance.

Several structural changes were made to adapt the building to its new mission. The bathtub was removed from the bathroom and several urinals were added. The screened porch at the northeast corner was enclosed and outfitted as an office. The window and framing in the south wall were removed and replaced by a picture window giving the USSS a better view of the entire Compound.

Secret Service Command Post

Behind the Secret Service Command Post is a series of dark green buildings. This was the Command Center. Within four weeks of President Johnson taking the oath for the Presidency in November 1963, right after President Kennedys assassination, the LBJ Ranch had enough communications equipment for a small city: microwave towers providing 120 channels to Austin, two-way radios, teleprinters, cryptographic machines, and an extensive telephone system with 100 lines. These buildings housed the WHCA switchboard and Communications Center with 50-kilowatt emergency generator.

WHITE HOUSE COMMUNICATIONS AGENCY COMPLEX (WHCA)

The WHCA complex consisted of three connecting trailers . These structures housed the WHCA switchboard, the cryptograph section, and quarters for the military aides and other personnel on 24-hour call. WHCA would establish a detachment of permanent technical personnel to maintain and operate the radio, paging and cryptographic equipment they had installed.

White House Communications/ Switchboard Building

This building, a single-story steel structure painted gray-green, has a shallow, sloping gable roof. Manning the switchboard while the President was away from the Ranch was also the detachments responsibility!

Military Aides Trailer

This 10’ x 30' metal trailer has a flat roof and is painted gray-green. Connected with it are two large cooling units . The axis of this structure is north-south. The Military Aids Office was incorporated in this trailer with facilities for on Duty personnel.

Communications Center Trailer

This 10' x 40' metal trailer is at right angles to the military aides' trailer. It has a flat roof with a cooling unit on top. There is a single entry , and its exterior is also painted gray-green. WHCA also maintained the Secure teletype equipment located at the Ranch.

Aerial View of the entire Compound of the LBJ Texas Ranch WHCA and USSS CP left of the hanger

PRE-PRESIDENTIAL WHITE HOUSE TELEPHONE COMMUNICATIONS.

During the vice-presidential years, the number of telephones in the house and its immediate grounds was increased from 11 to 15. These were installed in areas frequented by Johnson, like the swimming pool. There was also a separate service system to the foreman's quarters in Stonewall.

As the months passed, Vice President and Mrs. Johnson found they required more space in the house for visitors and employees, and they asked Southwestern Bell to move its equipment out of the hangar. Southwestern Bell constructed a small structure erected behind the building subsequently occupied by the Secret Service. Known as the "O" carrier building, this structure housed the ranch telephone equipment until shortly after President Kennedy's assassination.

Before the Dallas tragedy, in anticipation of President and Mrs. . Kennedy's visit to the LB J Ranch, arrangements had been made with White House Communications Agency to install switchboards at the ranch and Austin's Commodore Perry Hotel.

PRESIDENTIAL TELEPHONE COMMUNICATIONS AT THE TEXAS WHITE HOUSE

In the days immediately following November 22, 1963, Southwestern Bell and Southwestern States agreed that the former would assume responsibility for installing and servicing local telephone facilities required by the President. Southwestern Bell thus faced a monumental challenge of installing and placing in operation by December 12, the date Johnson was scheduled to make his first trip as President to his home, a complete communications network.

A site was cleared, foundations poured, and the building assembled within 72 hours. Next, sophisticated equipment was rushed to the Pedernales and installed by a 100-man crew working around-the-clock.

Three microwave towers were erected--one on Hartman's hill, another at the Sawyer Ranch, and a third at the new telephone communications building. The microwave system provided 120 channels from the ranch to Austin. The switchboard was positioned in a trailer hauled in and parked east of the "O" carrier building. A second trailer served as a communications center and was equipped with teleprinters and several cryptographic machines. These linked the Texas White House with 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue . Southwestern Bell working with WHCA had met the challenge, and, on December 10, the new communications system operational. It was now announced that Johnson's first presidential visit to the Texas White House had been delayed until Christmas. Permanent microwave towers were substituted for the trio of temporary towers. The "O" carrier equipment mandated doubling the size of the telephone building. A 200-pair cable was "plowed" in east of the ranch.

The telephone communications building housed enough equipment to service a small city e One-third of the structure was occupied by power equipment. There was a 50-kilowatt emergency generator preempted from American Telephone and Telegraph. A beautiful chrome-plated machine, the generator had been scheduled to be at the New York World's Fair.

In addition, Southwestern Bell servicemen installed 72 telephones. There were call directors in every room. White House Communications Agency selected the type of telephones to be installed at the ranch and Mrs. Johnson the color of the instruments. There were telephones in every room of the Texas White House, as well as in the president's bathroom and at the pool .

Following the president’s return to Washington in early January 1964, At the request of WHCA, radio circuits were established For the USSS and given code names-- Baker and Charlie for the Secret Service and a third frequency for the staff people. President Johnson complained about the poor audio quality of the line employed for top secret communications until he became accustomed to it. This line required two or more circuits and a "scrambler" to guard against wiretapping .

The President's cars and the boats at Lake LBJ had radio-telephone capability. These provided direct communications with the ranch switchboard.

WHCA personnel manned the PBX switchboard and serviced all their equipment. Southwestern Bell maintained the gear in the telephone building. When the President was. in residence, personnel were on duty round-the-clock in the communications building.

The Texas White House Compound, 

Television interviews and programs originating at the ranch called for special equipment , and this was provided the networks . The transmission was via microwave channel to Austin .

In June 1966 Southwestern Bell replaced the 70-foot microwave tower east of the telephone exchange with a low tower near the exchange's southwest corner. Although the latter tower was dismantled and removed, the concrete foundation can be identified. 

In 1965 San Antonio civic interests brought pressure to bear, and it was determined that Randolph Field was to share with Bergstrom as the Texas arrival and departure points for Air Force One on the presidential visits to the Hill Country.

A press center was therefore established at San Antonio's El Tropicano Hotel to supplement those already in existence at Bergstrom, the Fredericksburg Community Center, and in Johnson City. The press center at Johnson City was established because of pressure from the media people for such a facility at the ranch, which the president vetoed. Southwestern Bell and General Telephone Company accordingly set up the Johnson City press center to meet this demand.

After LBJ left the presidency in January 1969, Southwestern Bell removed the microwave system and drastically reduced service to the ranch. Although WHCA continued to maintain some radio systems the Detachment personnel were re-assigned. The USSS did keep some permanent support for the President and First Lady when he left office Security reasons.

White House Voice Recording Systems
Type of Activity
Tape Recording Conversations
Location
Location
Washington DC and Others
Date of Activity
 1940 through 1974 and maybe more
Coordinates
38°53'51.2"N 77°02'20.9"W

Did You Know:  U.S. Presidents Have Secretly Recorded Conversations Since 1940

Forty-four years ago, Richard M. Nixon became the first (and only) U.S. president to resign his office. A prime reason for his unprecedented decision was the revelation of his White House recording system—which showed his effort to conceal a major abuse of executive power.

In an era of diminished expectations of privacy, Nixon and several of his predecessors, who wanted to preserve important facts that might come up during a meeting or during a telephone call, recorded nearly 5,000 hours of presidential conversations beginning in 1940.

PROTECTING REPUTATIONS

President Franklin D. Roosevelt was outraged with The New York Times in 1939 for publishing what he called “a deliberate lie.” Someone who attended a meeting of the U.S. Senate Committee on Military Affairs in the White House quoted Roosevelt as saying that the country’s frontier lay on the Rhine River in Europe.

After that incident, the president’s stenographer suggested that he start recording his meetings. Roosevelt experimented with the standard dictation device of the time, a hard-wax cylinder recorder designed by Dictaphone, but the test proved to be unsuccessful. It had less than 10 minutes of recording capacity, and its microphone was often ineffective.

David Sarnoff, president of the Radio Corporation of America, offered Roosevelt an alternative recording device that the company had licensed from inventor John Ripley Kiel, who recorded sound by indenting patterns on a disc or ribbon instead of on a cylinder. It was, in the inventor’s words, the only “device that could record for as long as 24 hours unattended” and “immediately have the recording played back.” It was installed in the White House basement directly under Roosevelt’s desk in the Oval Office. A microphone was hidden in the president’s desk lamp, offered 180-degree sound pickup. Roosevelt pressed a button to activate the system, which then recorded only in response to sounds.

Roosevelt recorded 14 press conferences in 1940 during his toughest reelection campaign. The eight hours of recordings. After he won reelection, he never used the sound recorder again. It remained in the White House until 1947, when the National Archives took possession of it and transferred the recordings to acetate discs.

EISENHOWER’S SYSTEM

President Dwight D. “Ike” Eisenhower began recorded meetings upon taking office in 1953. The White House Signal Detachment (WHSD) installed a Soundscriber Tycoon dictation system in the Oval Office early that year.

A button in the president’s desk turned on a microphone hidden inside a fake telephone on the desk; the rest of the system’s components were housed in the adjacent office of his secretary, Ann C. Whitman. However, Eisenhower often would forget to turn the machine on at the start of a meeting, and many of the conversations he did record turned out to be indecipherable.

By 1955 the White House had switched to another dated but durable format, the Dictaphone Time Master’s red vinyl Dictabelt. Eisenhower recorded about 75 meetings.













By 1955 the White House switched to the Dictaphone Time Master’s red vinyl Dictabelt

JFK INCREASES USE

President John F. Kennedy significantly increased the amount of recording in the White House. Like Roosevelt, Kennedy wanted to ensure that the people he spoke to in private said the same things in public.

His system, installed in 1962 by the White House Communications Agency (WHCA), used a Model 5 reel-to-reel magnetic tape recorder made by Tandberg Radiofabrikk, a Norwegian company. Obtained from the U.S. Army Signal Corps, it could record up to two hours on a reel with greater frequency response than the earlier indenting recorders, and with minimal distortion. Microphones were hidden behind the drapes in the Cabinet Room, under Kennedy’s desk, beneath a coffee table in the Oval Office, and in the White House study. Kennedy also had a Dictaphone machine connected to his telephone.

In 1962 and 1963, the White House recorded 265 hours of meetings and 12 hours of phone calls. The microphones still picked up background noise, however, including the air conditioning hum, paper shuffling, and the tapping of Kennedy’s legs against his desk. JFK’s vice president, Lyndon B. Johnson also recorded telephone conversations with a Dictaphone, an Edison Voicewriter, and IBM’s transistorized Executary.

A Model 5 reel-to-reel magnetic tape recorder made by Tandberg Radiofabrikk was installed in 1962 during John F. Kennedy’s presidency.

LBJ MOVES INTO THE WHITE HOUSE

Apparently, when he moved into the Oval Office four days later November 26, 1963, he initially used Kennedy's Dictaphone system. Gradually, President Johnson expanded his use of the Dictaphone system. He began recording his telephone conversations in the Oval Office and from other locations.
                  
President Johnson looks at the news feed and watches his Three Eyed Monster in the oval Office

WHCA was responsible to install the recorders on the Telephones that the president approved. WHCA was also responsible for maintaining the White House switchboard, the telephone systems, the "triple" television sets and news wire machines throughout the White House, and the pager buzzers to aides and secretaries. 

The President’s desk in the Oval Office

 Call Director on the President’s desk 

The coffee table with Phone

When he moved into the Oval Office on November 26, 1963, Johnson had the WHCA technicians install new machines on each of his secretaries' desks. The machines were physically located inside the knee wells of each secretary's typing desk. From their office next to the Oval Office, the President's secretaries could record the President's conversations on the telephone lines that went into the Oval Office and the Little Lounge next to the Oval Office.

Gradually, Johnson had WHCA install Dictaphones in several locations because he desired “complete coverage.” Dictaphone recorders were installed in his master bedroom where the President himself controlled the switch that turned the machines on and off. The recording system was placed under his bed and controlled by a switch on the telephone that was next to his bed in the residence section of the White House, also at Camp David, and in two locations in Texas: in his office and bedroom on his ranch in Stonewall.

LBJ held many meetings in the Master Bedroom

Both the Cabinet Room and lounge recording systems were installed over the weekend of January 19, 1968, by Sergeant First Class Joseph B. Wilson and Navy Yeoman Gordon Olson under the supervision of Lieutenant Colonel James Adams. Adams was responsible for the white House Residence Branch of WHCA.

Beginning in early 1968, Johnson had the White House Communications Agency (WHCA) install a conventional reel-to-reel analog recording system in the Cabinet Room and in his small private office next to the Oval Office. A WHCA carpenter drilled eight holes in the underside of the Cabinet table to feed microphone outputs to a mixer in the basement. Voices were still hard to hear among other noises in the room.

WHCA also installed Dictabelt machines in the White House Situation Room and on the desk of the Duty Officer in the Communications Center. President Johnson also wanted a portable system that he could use when he traveled outside of Washington, D .C. Although this machine was not used regularly, there are some recordings of the President speaking on the telephone while he traveled.

Jack Albright the WHCA Commander and other members of the White House staff suggested that Johnson, in constant fear of leaks during his second term, was afraid that the existence of the Dictaphone system would become known. Therefore, he used the system infrequently and carefully.

President Johnson ordered all traces of the Dictaphone systems removed in mid-December 1968, so the President elect, and his staff would not know that recording telephone conversations ever took place. WHCA removed the machines in the White House and at Camp David over the weekend of December 28, 1968. However, they left the machines at the President's ranch in place.

LBJ in the cabinet meeting room

As president, Johnson relied on Dictaphones rather than tape recorders to save more than 800 hours covering 9,000 telephone conversations on five phone lines, including two at his ranch in Stonewall, Texas. Johnson was the first president to use his recordings; his secretaries transcribed them for his review each evening.

NIXON, HIS RECORDINGS AND THE WATERGATE SCANDAL

Johnson encouraged Nixon to use his system just before Nixon took office. He declined at first but also wanted to ensure the accuracy of statements by people who met with him and keep a record for his memoirs. His chief of staff, H.R. Haldeman, considered Nixon to be “far too inept with machinery” to operate a recording system so the installation used modified, voice-activated Sony TC-800B reel-to-reel tape recorders.

Nixon learned that Lyndon Johnson had in the White House's West Wing a taping system that permitted him to record both meetings and telephone conversations. When Nixon came to the White House on Inauguration Day, 1969, he found what he believed to be Johnson's taping equipment in what was, the small room just to the west of the Oval Office. It was hidden in the upper part of a closet just next to the fireplace.

Nixon abhorred the idea of taping the president's meetings and telephone conversations. He ordered the equipment removed immediately when he came to the White House, as he did Johnson's triple television monitor system and his ticker-tape machine. The new president shared none of LBJ’s love of gadgetry. All of Johnson's machines were quickly removed. Nixon's White House, as these actions taken immediately after his arrival seemed to assure, was to be free of garish electronics, and there was to be no surreptitious recording of meetings and conversations.

The problem was that people who met with the president did not always report accurately or completely what was said and decided privately. Sometimes the error was honest; Nixon often knew much more about a subject than the person he was meeting with and misunderstanding sometimes resulted from this. More often, though, the inaccurate reports had more self-serving motives. Contact with the president presents many temptations to people and brings out many things in their personalities that might never have appeared had they not been flattered with Oval Office meetings. Johnson had warned Nixon about what would happen. "Everybody in this town," he said, "will call somebody else and say, 'the President wants this, and the President wants that. And the people who claimed to know what the president wanted were often believed—because they had just this morning, or just yesterday, stepped out of a meeting in the Oval Office. Sometimes the misreporting of fact had a bad intent, sometimes it represented a willful manufacture of false knowledge to gain some end.

Nixon wanted an accurate record of his presidency was for his eventual use in preparing his memoirs and other writing projects that he might undertake after his term of office was over.

Something had to be done, Nixon agreed, to ensure that we possessed an accurate record of what was said in meetings. WHCA tried a series of experiments during 1969 and 1970.

Of course, Nixon's presidency was ultimately brought down in large measure by tape recordings of his meetings and telephone conversations. He changed his mind about tape recordings, but he did so hesitantly, over a considerable period, and because of a sequence of failed attempts to solve a problem that seemed to leave no alternative to recommencing taping in the White House.

Two years into his presidency, Nixon had still not found a satisfactory way of getting a full account of what was said and decided in his meetings. Many experiments had been tried, and just as many had been discarded. It was Lyndon Johnson who finally solved his problem, not with a new idea, by any means, but with a decisive nudge toward an old idea. As a former president, Johnson could offer Nixon advice on some subjects with an authority no one else could match. Somehow, probably through some friend of Nixon's who had been conversing with Johnson on how best to set up a Nixon Library, word got back to Nixon, probably in late 1970 or early 1971, that Johnson's view was that he was foolish not to be keeping a record of what was going on, and that a good record was essential to the preparation of a former president's memoirs.

Initially only the Oval Office and the Cabinet Room were included in the system. The Cabinet Room was the only location ever to be included in the taping system that was not sound activated; a control mechanism in Butterfield's office had to be switched on to activate the machinery. The Oval Office machinery—and this was true of all the other White House taping locations—was activated by the Executive Protective Service's First Family Locator system; whenever an officer notified the system that the president was now in the Oval Office, the appropriate light came on in boxes scattered around the West Wing, and the taping machinery switched on. It was poised and ready to begin taping whenever any sounds occurred.

The White House Communications Agency eventually installed seven of the recorders in the White House and set up others in the Executive Office Building; Camp David, and on four presidential telephone lines. They were connected also to the president’s electronic location system, a radio-frequency device Nixon carried that activated receivers in certain rooms he entered.

President Richard M. Nixon used voice-activated Sony TC-800B reel-to-reel tape recorders. 

The taping system began operating in the Oval Office and the Cabinet Room on February 16, 1971. On April 6, the president's office in the Old Executive Office Building and his telephones in both this office and the Oval Office, and the telephone in the Lincoln Sitting Room in the Residence, were added to the system. Over a year later, on May 18, 1972, the president's office and two telephones in Aspen Lodge at Camp David were also added to the system, The Camp David installation completed the system.

The map below of the Oval Office shows the positions of seven microphones. Five (M-1 through M-5) were at the President's desk, and two were in the wall lamps on each side of the fireplace.
Microphone locations in the Oval Office Enlarge 

What makes the Cabinet Room recordings unique is that the room itself could accommodate more participants than the average meeting recorded on a White House Telephone, in the Lincoln Sitting Room, or in the president's Executive Office Building retreat. Thus, these recordings often captured larger meetings with Congressional leaders, various domestic councils, presidential commissions, task forces, meetings of the National Security Council, an occasional Joint Chiefs of Staff meeting, top secret briefings by Director of Central Intelligence Richard Helms, an international summit meeting--such as the U.S.-Soviet meetings during June 1973, and, of course, Cabinet meetings, along with many other types of gatherings.

The Cabinet Meeting Room 

The Aspen Lodge office was taken off the system in March 1973. On April 9, 1973, Nixon told Halderman to remove the rest of the taping system, but later that same day he changed his mind—he wanted to retain the system, but he wanted it converted to a switch basis. Nixon's order was not carried out. The sound-activated system remained in place in the president's offices until it was finally shut down on July 18,1973, two days after Alexander Butterfield told the Senate Select Committee on Presidential Campaign Activities—the so-called Ervin Committee—of its existence.

Nixon never used the White House tapes for any of the purposes he had had in mind when he ordered the system installed until he ordered Halderman in mid-April 1973 to listen to the recording of his March 21, 1973, conversation with John Dean during which Dean had described at length the problems that Watergate had created for the presidency. He wanted to know precisely what he had said during that troubling conversation.

Also, while taping at other White House locations was ended earlier in 1973 by Watergate-era Chief of Staff Al Haig, the Cabinet Room recordings continued until July 1973, even after the revelation of the taping system before the Watergate investigation committee by presidential aide Alexander Butterfield.

The prosecution was interested in tapes of a discussion between Nixon and his chief of staff, H.R. "Bob" Haldeman, that were captured by the president's secret White House recording system in the days immediately following the break-in at Democratic National Committee headquarters.

But those tapes contain a mysterious 18.5-minute gap -- a patch of buzzes and clicks of missing audio -- in the middle of a recording made June 20, 1972, three days after the break-in.

Rose Mary Woods, Nixon’s loyal private secretary, was tasked with transcribing the tapes before they were turned over to prosecutors. Woods testified in front of a federal grand jury in 1974 that she was using a Dictaphone, which had a pedal that would pause the recording when she lifted her foot off it, and she claimed she had erased part of the tape by mistake.

Rose Mary Woods, President Richard Nixon's secretary transcribing recorded tapes 

Her explanation was that she was listening to the tape and … the telephone rang. So, she kept her foot on a pedal, pushed the wrong button. She pushed record instead of off and reached for the phone.” Woods testified that when she accidentally pushed record on the Dictaphone, it recorded over part of the original conversation. There’s a famous photo of Woods re-creating the moment, in which Woods attempted to keep her foot on the Dictaphone pedal and reach for the phone on the other side of her desk at the same time. Some have jokingly referred to it as the “Rose Mary Stretch.” The audio couldn’t be recovered during the trials. It is widely believed that the President had tried to alter the tapes but erased the missing 18 min. himself!
 
Oval office meeting note the Dictaphone machine next to the President’s desk 

After Nixon's resignation, most thought that was the end of recordings but was it? There is evidence to support that presidents continued to roll the tape — albeit in a more limited way. There is no law preventing secret White House recordings, and some kept it up — most notably Reagan.

Reagan was presented with the option of continuing or not continuing the phone tapings in the Oval Office for national security purposes, obviously tapings were a very controversial subject ever since the Nixon days. But Reagan could see the value of it, not so much for history but for accuracy ... and readily agreed to continue the tapings."

Ford, Carter and George H.W. Bush reportedly had no-recording rules, and there's no evidence that Bill Clinton taped anything secretly in the White House.

There's some evidence that George W. Bush recorded at least some video conferences. As for Obama, There is only speculation that recordings were made, but we know that the NSA can collect anyone’s telephone conversations.

But an Obama official told NPR that while it was true the Obama White House recorded interviews with the media — a common practice among campaigns, too — it was out in the open. And that they didn't record private meetings.

The Presidents’ recording efforts in the White House have had many consequences, most notably Nixon’s resignation. It is hard to imagine that any President has tried to record conversations since it was disclosed over forty years ago when it was common practice, but it appears that with today's advanced technology don't Assume it isn't happening today and in the future!

LBJ Communicating with the World  (1966)
Air Force One SAM 2600



Type of Activity
Communications
Location
Location
Worldwide
Date of Activity
 August 1967
Coordinates
38°53'51.2"N 77°02'20.9"W

Note:  Excerpts from an Article found in the Bell Telephone Magazine, Spring 1966, Titled,  Communicating Presidents by Merriman Smith was used in this Post.

As late as 1929, the President of the United States did not have a telephone in his office. In the spring of that year, however, Herbert Hoover had a telephone installed at his desk. Until that time, the presidential telephone had been in a hallway booth outside the office Where it had been dating back to Dec. 1, 1878, and President Rutherford B. Hayes. Since March 27, 1929, when Mr. Hoover brought the black stand-up instrument out of the hallway and onto his desk, each succeeding President has had progressively better communications.

From a handful of draftees and regulars in 1942 the White House Signal Detachment (WHSD) evolved an organization whose efficiency, variety of skills and esprit-de-corps stood unbeaten in the service of future Presidents.

President Roosevelt’s primary mode of travel was either by automobile or rail car. The use of Mobile radios or HF radios became the Primary means of communications while a network of voice communications connected the White House with the world.

In 1954, during the Eisenhower Administration, the White House Signal Detachment (WHSD) was reorganized under the Office of the Chief Signal Officer, Army Signal Corps as a Class II unit and renamed the White House Army Signal Agency (WHASA). The WHASA primary responsibility was to provide communications for the President at the White House and when the President traveled but WHASA was also responsible for the Communications at Shangri-La (renamed Camp David) the Eisenhower Gettysburg farm and the Presidential Communications Rail Car which was stored near Harrisburg PA.

The Presidential Communications Rail car in PA.

WHCA HF Radio Console

The White House Army Signal Agency (WHASA) was organized at the beginning of the World War II for providing, maintaining, and operating facilities for the transmission, reception, and safeguarding the security of Presidential communications primarily during the President’s travels which evolved into today’s White House Communications Agency (WHCA).

Presidential Communications of 1965 uses the most sophisticated kinds of communication helping our chief executives to carry out their duties as national and world leaders. Air Force One, a gleaming silver and blue jet transport, speeds across America at 35,000 feet bound for the Orient and a Summit Conference of nations involved in the Vietnam war. The President of the United States sits in a reclining leather chair beside a long table in his combination office and sitting room. Tiny gold stars shine in an artificial sky on the ceiling. This is the larger room of his suite in the after section of the aircraft. At the end of his table a tiny red-light glows. The President picks up a white telephone. "Hello there, Senator," he says. "Are you all going to vote today on the bill 1 called you about from Texas last night?"

President’s Office on Air Force One 

Conversation ends quickly, and the President says to an aide, "Have the White House send us the roll call on that bill before we refuel in Hawaii. Now I would like to talk to Secretary Rusk in London." The aide picks up another telephone in the cabin and gives instructions to the communications center in the forward area of Air Force One next to the control bridge. 

Air Force One's HF Radio Console

Processing the call to the White House WHCA manned Signal Board and the White House Admin board in Washington. In less than a minute. Rusk is on the radio telephone and instructions to transmit the Senate roll call are received back at the White House by radio teletype.

White House Teletype terminal 1966

Improving communications plus marked advances in transportation have freed American chief executives to move about the earth. Today it seems almost silly, but as recently as 1947, the legality of official papers signed by President Harry S. Truman was challenged because he affixed his signature to these documents while visiting Brazil.

In 1967, President Lyndon B. Johnson could sign important legislation 40,000 feet above Kuala Lumpur without causing the slightest legal ripple among constitutional purists on Capitol Hill.
 
 Working aboard Air Force One

Moreover, effects of continuously improving and expanding communications are wider by far, socially, economically and politically, than their application at the White House. The earth shrinks daily under a network of cables, wires, radio channels and satellites.

Rapid advances in telecommunications are not without negative aspects. For one thing, they have shortened the line between cause and effect. This cuts into allowable reaction time for governments and their chiefs.

Also, people of every land know more about each other than ever before. Such knowledge is not always pleasant. In newly emerging countries, newly acquired facts do not equate with understanding, for our scientists are many time-miles, possibly light years, ahead of the growth rate in other areas of human progress.

High-speed communications available to a President today may improve his functional ability, but somewhat in ratio to the added number of problems with which he must deal. During the 1965 crisis in the Dominican Republic, U.S. Ambassador Tapley Bennett was on the telephone to the White House and State Department, giving a running account of street fighting as bullets ripped into the building from which he spoke.

As recently as the late Thirties, it would have been many hours, even days, before such on-the-spot diplomatic information would have been available to the Washington decision-makers. This may be a plus for national welfare, but it is hard on the men who must decide what to do about crises, particularly when they draft messages for the "Hot Line" Teletype to the Kremlin.

The promise of communications

Quite aside from the personal hardship on a President being awakened at 3:30 a.m. by a telephone report on new race riots in a distant American city or by a call from the Pentagon about a deadly fire aboard a U. S. aircraft carrier in the Gulf of Tonkin, it could be that the wizardry of modern communications has more promise of holding another World War in abeyance than many of the other, more conventional diplomatic efforts.

The problem is one of understanding the torrent of words and pictures flashing from nation to nation. International understanding is bound to improve as information flows into heretofore blind areas, but there remains a question : will understanding improve with the speed which is needed to convince others that modern warfare is a depleting and self-defeating answer to differences among men?

The weight of being the focal point of a world-wide communications system may be an onerous chore for a future American chief executive, but Lyndon B. Johnson is fortunate — he grew up as a political leader in an era of enlarging communications. Thus, he is not only at home with the lights of a Call Director blinking beside him, but he insists on constant communications capability.

Call Director on the President's desk 

LBJ in constant touch

LBJ's Office at his Texas ranch

His practice of being able to keep in touch goes far beyond the conventional telephone. While he is away from his ranch home and office, he is in constant touch with the rest of the world through a highly sophisticated radio system over which telephone calls can be patched as necessary through the White House Signal Switchboard or the White House Adnin. Switchboard.

The White House Admin Switchboard 1967

It is startling at first to be riding with him when he picks up the microphone of a radio transceiver beneath the dashboard to ask,

"Is Mrs. Johnson around?"

"One moment, sir," comes the crisp voice of a secretary.

Then only moments later, "Yes, dear."

"Bird, we're 22 minutes away from the house and I'll be bringing four of the boys to lunch."

"Fine, dear, everything is ready."

FM radio in the Presidential Limo.

Another Johnson auto trip might be interspersed with this sort of radio traffic:

Voice suddenly from out of nowhere (actually one of his special assistants back at the ranch office) :

"Sir, Secretary Wirtz is calling about that emergency board. Do you want him put through?"

President: "Tell him I have the names from Washington by Teletype and I'll sign the order this afternoon. I'm about 30 minutes from the house and unless it is urgent, I'll talk to him then." (short pause)

Voice: "Nothing urgent, sir. He'll call again at 2:30."

FM Radio telephone in the rear seat of the limo.

The circuit is of such quality that there is no added shortwave lingo to establish that the message was understandable and received. The President merely puts the Handset back in its socket, flips a switch and the car fills with soft tape-recorded music.

Presidential communications are more impressive when he is away from the White House simply because they are more visible, more noticeable. For example, on a typical speaking trip to New York or San Francisco, the White House party may take along as many as 100 shortwave handi-talkie radios, plus one or more base stations operated by the White house Communications Agency.


A temporary trip switchboard installed to handle all telephone and radio traffic during the event.

When needed, these hand-sized, miniaturized transceivers are connectible with telephone land-lines. If the trip involves several cities, it is quite common, for example, to hear one of the President's assistants using a handi-talkie to the travelling White House switchboard, operated in conjunction with the radio base station, to check plans with a White House advance man several hundred miles away.

The radio base used for any phone patch requirements at the event.

President and press inseparable

While the marriage often has shotgun aspects, a modern President and the press are inseparable, be it on the island of Samoa or the great banquet hall of the Waldorf Astoria Hotel in New York. From 30 to more than a hundred correspondents, photographers, broadcasters and their technicians with thousands of pounds of equipment move with a chief executive. The size of the party depends on the trip. A White House press chartered plane for a routine weekend trip to Texas usually involves 40 to 60 media representatives plus White House travel and communications personnel of which a representative of AT&T is a permanent adjunct.

Press expects good service

AT&T would be expected routinely to have at least 20 long distance lines connected near the arrival Site, complete with tables and chairs and other facilities for the press.

The interlocking relationship between the President, the media, the public and communications facilities becomes tighter and more essential with each year. Aside from scientific and technical progress involved, distribution of news is now so much a part of the presidency that if a chief executive drops from public view for very long, readers, listeners and viewers here and abroad begin to ask disturbing questions. Critics may say it is self-serving, but no President has been quite as conscious of media technical requirements as LBJ. And there is reason to believe his successor will be even more aware of the need to get his story across.

Communications seem effortless,

President Johnson may not be expertly aware at times of communications difficulties and perhaps this, to put it plainly, is because his own access to telephone and Teletype, plus sophisticated radio, seems so effortless that he takes such technical aids for granted.

LBJ Oval Office 
     
Seated in his office beside a Call Director that can route his calls through four different White House switchboards which have the capability of preempting any busy line in an emergency, a few feet away from the desk, two press association teletype writers, operating 24 hours a day in soundproof housings, and three TV screens to monitor each of the networks, it is small wonder that a President comes to accept this sort of arrangement as a norm. He sees press association reporters lugging 10-watt walkie-talkies and assumes that if he can reach the rest of the world in seconds, we can do the same.

The WHCA Signal Switchboard  1970

For example, he thought enough communications equipment for the world could be installed overnight at Classboro, New Jersey, for his meeting with Soviet Premier Alexei N. Kosygin in the early summer of 1967. After all, AT&T and the White House Communications Agency provide the White House and the Soviet party with all the circuits they needed.

This comforting attitude did not take into consideration such factors as White House priorities, marshalling an army of installers and tons of equipment, provision of extra power and a simple but unrelenting thing called the clock. Operating in darkness and intermittently heavy rain, thousands of technicians could not have met the requirements in the few hours allotted them. But they came close. By the second day of the meeting there were hundreds of circuits operating virtually from the front yard of "Hollybush," the graceful old house where the Big Two met on the campus of Southeast New Jersey State College. During the Johnson administration WHCA faced many travel challenges like the one described above.

Futuristic science fiction, a Strangelove dream of the Presidency in 2000 A.D.? No, a routine moment of 1966, albeit difficult for the uninitiated to comprehend. And even more amazing when regarded alongside recent history.

                 Interview of Maj. Gen. Jack A Albright                    The White House Communications Agency (WHCA)
Brig. Gen. Jack Albright, WHCA Commander from Apr. 1965 to June 1969

Type Of Activity
Communications support for the White House
Location
Location
Washington DC, worldwide
Date of Activity
1965 to 1989
Coordinates


Jack A. Albright, was an Army Major General who served as commanding officer of the White House Communications Agency and retired in 1976, as the commander of Army Communications Command at Fort Huachuca, Arizona.  General Albright was the second WHCA commander serving under presidents Johnson and Nixon from Apr.1965 to June 1969. This Interview was obtained from the LYNDON B JOHNSON Presidential Library. There were two interviews transcribed.

DATE:      December 11 , 1980
                 INTERVIEWEE: JACK ALBRIGHT
                 INTERVIEWER: MICHAEL L. GILLETTE

PLACE:   Cosmos Club, Washington, D. C. Tape 1 of 3


INTERVIEW I Of II

G:        Let's start with the circumstances of your being hired to begin with, General Albright.

A:      Right. On  the  twenty-fifth  day  of  April  [1965]  the  President  removed  the  previous commander, Colonel [George J.] McNally, who had been in the White House since World War II. McNally was a former member of the Secret Service and had been transferred into this duty in telecommunications after World War II, about 1947. He had served previous time in this while still a member of the Secret Service, but the President removed him for various reasons. The principal one was no accessibility, no availability when the President wanted him.

So, then I was at a meeting in Paris and [was] called back from Paris and was interviewed on the twenty-sixth and seventh of April, first by [Joseph] Califano, who was then assistant to the secretary of defense and the deputy secretary of defense, and then by Mr. [Marvin] Watson, and then by General [Chester V.] Clifton, who was a military aide to the President at that time. At the last then I was taken in, introduced to the President. The President asked me where I was from. I told him I was from Mississippi. He said, "Well, that's a part of Texas, isn't it?" in a joking matter, and I said, "No, sir, it's not." He said, "Well, you sound like a Texan," and I said, "That's a Mississippi accent."

So, he said then the main thing that he demanded of me was that I be available when he wanted [me] to, and when he said he wanted something, not to quibble with him and act like he didn't know what he was asking for, but to get on with it. If I came to a point where it couldn't be done for some reason, come back and talk to him. He warned me, "Don't talk to those staff. They try to filter through two or three staff members what I want, and you'll never get it right. So, if you've got a question, come to me."

So, our relationship was established that first day, where he said what he wanted me to do. I actually reported in on the thirtieth day of April,1965. My immediate boss was to be Bill Moyers, who was then in the staff as a principal staff [member], not as the appointment secretary. Marvin Watson was that position. But he had not yet moved over to be press secretary, I don't believe, at that time. George Reedy was still there. Shortly after Bill Moyers moved to press secretary, George Reedy left and Marvin Watson then became my boss. This was the summer of 1965.

G:      You mentioned before we turned on the tape in that initial meeting with the President that  he emphasized accessibility and said that he wanted you to be available to him when he needed you. Can you recall his words on that?

A:       Well,  it's  almost  like  I  stated.  He said, "That  previous  fellow  was  never  available  when wanted him. There's one thing you've got to understand, you're working for me. When I want you, I don't want some underling, I want you. When I tell you what to do, I don't want you to argue with me and say, 'Mr. President, you can't do it that way.'  If you go  out and find you can't do it, then you come back to me and explain why you can't. I'm a reasonable man, we'll talk it over and we'll work out a way to do it. I've got many years of experience in communications. " He visualized himself as a great knowledge and great background at this. He said, "Therefore, when I tell you these things, I'm not doing it just because I don't understand what I'm asking. But talk it over with me if there's a question."

G:        Was he speaking in terms of his radio station, do you think?

A:        That, and his telephone service, the two together, not his speech environment. He said, "I know nothing about those teleprompters. That's your problem. You've got to do those." But it was primarily the radio in the Texas area.

We had a very difficult job the next two years to build a system that suited him in that area. And then the telephone system. The telephone system, occasionally you'll hear noises on the line, a click or a change in volume level or something. It irritated him very much when he'd hear one. He said, "That's not supposed to be." Well, even in the finest system today there's an occasional click on the line.  I tried to explain this to him.  It didn't ever really make him happy. He did get to the point where he would not work me over every time, he had noise on the line, but it never made him happy if he had noise. But this is a fact of commercial telephone systems here and all over the world. They occasionally are noisy. He felt that the system was breaking in or somebody was tapping the line, and I kept assuring him, "Mr. President, this cannot be anybody tapping your lines." "How do you know who's on the other end?" Well, he had me, I really didn't. But I knew locally there wasn't anybody because it was in my hands and I knew what I had.

G:        Is there any system that would prevent somebody from tapping the line.

A:        No. Not really. You go through too many junctions, too many switches, too many possibilities of people to cut in. The odds are badly against it, though. The best place to tap a phone is at its source. Certainly not a hundred miles away or five hundred because it becomes a random choice and the telephone exchange is your best protection, because it seeks through a series of lines and picks out another line to connect this one to from your phone. And so, your best source--if it gets past your own exchange, the odds get bad that somebody can tap it.  It's really very difficult.  Now on the opposite end, if they know just who you're calling, certainly they could. But he called so many and so often that it was very ineffective.

G:        You'd have to tap every phone in Washington.

A:        Couldn't do it. It would be really impractical.

G:       Well, outline the functions of WHCA [White House Communications Agency] when you took over.

A:        There's quite a difference between the functions we had when took it over and the functions, we had by the time he left office.

Now first of all, when arrived there our functions were primarily to provide his telephone system for him, his message-handling capability, any secure voice systems that he had, minor speech environment for him, meaning the podium, the microphone, public address system, connection to the press and so on. This was generally the function. We reproduced tapes and placed them in the archives and so on.

As time went on, though, he wanted more things. He wanted to be able to read his speech while looking at the audience, and so we turned to the philosophy of the teleprompter. We went to contract with a New York company, and they provided us with a great number of teleprompters.  Now, these were heavy, very heavy things to haul  around. There are generally three things that looked like podiums that sat out in front of him and through a piece of glass it reflected the speech which was passing on a tape or in fact a teletype paper below that. So, he read this as though he was reading it as a speech from a paper. Now this was all controlled, speed-wise and everything else, by a man sitting back behind the curtain judging the President's rate of speech, and always keeping where the President could see a couple of lines, three lines at the most. And his speech flowed through there. The print was about an inch high, very large print.

G:        Big yellow background?

A:       Yes, on a yellow paper. And so, he had little trouble reading it. He could read it   either directly ahead of him or to either side of something like a forty-five-degree angle from that. That's the first innovation we put in.

Then he wanted lights, very cumbersome lights on him so he would look good with the television and the photography and so on. Now it was not too difficult to do if you have time and if it's in a stable environment such as the White House. The problem came, though, as he wanted to travel with this, and so he had to go to a different set, different kinds of poles to hold up the lights, different kinds of lights. He wanted a soft light to make him look good, soft light form for photography, not harsh form. But it became a very [cumbersome] thing. This piece of equipment in the White House weighed about eight hundred pounds and so it was very difficult.

Then he wanted a curtain, a backdrop, a blue velveteen type of material which gave him a nice image to be projected against for television and pictures. Well, that must have weighed about two hundred pounds, all the scaffolding that went with it and all of the curtain hangers and everything weighed about another couple of hundred pounds. It was a big thing. It was around, oh, twenty-five feet wide and about certainly twelve or fourteen feet high, very difficult to manage.

So, we finally, after some two or three months of struggling with this, convinced him to use it only in the local Washington area where we've got time to do these things and could do it correctly, and to not carry this stuff on the road. Well, this gradually faded out and we didn't carry the backdrop. We carried lights for some years.


G:        Did you carry the backdrop for a while?

A:        Yes, we did. This was several months.

G:        Where did he get the idea of using the teleprompter? Were other politicians using it?

A:        No. I think Bob Fleming may have led him into this. Bob Fleming had seen this being used in the television environment, which was very common in that environment. The actors stand there and read their lines, it's right underneath the camera itself, and you're looking at what you're reading, and they don't have to change their eye contact with the public. And so, as a result think Bob might have gotten him into it.

We called in a company from New York which was providing it called QTV. They were providing this for a number of studios and a number of people who were preparing films on the West Coast. And we showed one to him as an example. Well, he liked it. He said, "I think I like that." Well, it was heavy, four hundred and fifty to five hundred pounds per installation and in addition to this that podium we had weighed about over a hundred. Later in the time we wanted certain protective measures in the podium, bullet-proof arrangements and so on, and that rascal became even heavier. You could take the pieces of bullet-proofing out and slide them into another box and haul them separately, but that total package was about four hundred and fifty pounds exclusive of the teleprompter.

So, you see we became a logistic problem after a while. This stuff became so heavy I was getting a third of the weight in the forward end of a Jetstar, as an example, about all the weight they could carry. Then some of the pieces I carried, like this lighting system, I couldn't get it in anything less than a 707. So, I was getting into a real logistic problem. I can't catch a commercial plane and ship it out to West Virginia somewhere, because no commercial plane would take that. Some of the pieces were oh, twelve, fifteen feet long, some of the poles that held this thing up. Now, Secret Service had inspected and insisted it be very stable, very secure, so it didn't fall on him, and it's a good point. It's a very valid point. So, they had to be very sturdy.

An interesting point in this regard. After he made his Asian trip in March 1967, I believe it was; anyway, when he went around the Philippines and had the all Asian trip  out there, he came back, and as we were leaving Alaska, he called me on the intercom and told me he wanted to make a speech at Dulles when we arrived.  Now we're then about five, six hours out between Alaska and Washington. So, I called and my man on the ground said, "Well, there's storm going on here. don't know how long it's going to go on, but it's a windstorm, high winds. You want to put it at Dulles?"  We said, "Yes, take it out there." So, he hauled it all out there--we had duty officers always on duty to do this--and he put it up and the Secret Service said, "Nope, you can't leave that up there." The wind was blowing it like this, even though they had it wired, held in place by people. The Secret Service said, "No, that's going to fall on the President. Take it down."

So, I went back to the President somewhere about midpoint, had to wake him up to talk to him, and told him, "The Secret Service says I can't put it up, sir.
They've got to take it down."   He said, "You don't mean to tell me you're going to let a little old thing   like the Secret Service tell you how to do your job? I said, "No, sir, they're not. But they're worried about your safety." He said, "You go tell them not to worry about my safety. If the damn thing falls on me, I'll give you hell later, but I told you to put it up." went back to my man and I said, "Okay, put it up." He said, "Wait minute, I'll let you  talk to a Secret Service man." So, I did. I told him, and he was a friend of mine, but a businessman and doing his job. He said, "No, Jack, I'm afraid it's going to fall.  I just can't do it." I said, "Look, if I put extra wires, extra cables, tie it down in the back with sandbags, extra people holding to it where it won't fall forward. If it falls, it's got to fall backward." He finally agreed to it.

Well, the upshot of it all was as we got nearer, within an hour, it was pouring cats and dogs and the President said to Jim Cross, the pilot, "What's the weather like?" Jim said, "It's raining like hell." He said, "Take it down. Get it inside." So, we had to tear all that stuff down and move it inside of Dulles Airport.

Well, we circled the field and it cleared up, it quit raining, and so he calls me again on the intercom and said, "I understand it's quit raining." I said, "Yes, sir." He said, "Well, put it back up." said, "Mr. President, it takes thirty, forty minutes." He said, "Don't tell me your problems. Just get it up." So, Jim Cross had to circle the field a couple of times until told them to get it back out there. And they put it up and we got it back up and tied it down again. The Secret Service was fretting, very unhappy. Just as he stepped off the plane, as he started down the top, it dropped loose again, and it just rained all over us. They got an umbrella over him but everything else is soaking wet, the crowd is wet. They're there.  He looks around at me and he said, "Why didn't you leave this inside?" And I said, "You said put it outside, Mr. President."  He said, "Yes, I guess I did. I ought to get my ass wet."

G:        So, did he speak outside?

A:      He did talk, yes, he did. He talked out there in the rain. Because he said, "We've changed it   twice, we're not going to change it again."

G:        That's a good story. How did the teleprompter work out for him?

A:      Extremely well. Your biggest problems came on days when we were doing something as the State of the Union, as an example. When we did the State of the Union address in 1968, we actually rehearsed it thirteen times. He went through it and he'd tear it up and he'd add to it and the staff writers were there. As we were rehearsing again--it's now about eight-fifteen at night--and we're sitting in the theater and we're rehearsing, he finally turns to me and he said, "Have you got any suggestions for this thing?" I said, "No, Mr. President, I've heard them all day long. He said, "Well, are you going to have time to make corrections and get it on there?" I said, "Yes, if you quit about twenty minutes to nine, I'll make it."   Because we had to go back and type the corrections in,  paste them in, cut them in place, on not three rolls but four rolls of paper.

G:        Why four?

A:       Because there's one on each side. Each one of these is a roll of paper, a huge roll of yellow paper, and each one goes in the teleprompter. They are remotely controlled by somebody back in the back, but he's got to look at it, too. And they all synchronize, they're all following the same sequence and so on.

On that occasion I made it, I had the police escort me, and I got in there and got it into the things at one minute to nine. He came in at nine, I'm one minute ahead of him.

             Now the only time we had a complete failure was in San Antonio, Texas. I was in the hospital. I had a viral infection of some sort, close to pneumonia, but I was in the hospital. So, they called for the teleprompters to be brought from the Ranch.  Now what he didn't know then and he found out later, those teleprompters had never been used. Our method, we'd already put them up, we'd tested them day by day to make sure they worked. But what nobody ever noticed or ever caught in all of this is that the wires were reversed and when we were running the main one forward, they were going to run in reverse.   So, we got it up to a speech at the American Legion in San Antonio, and he got up to speak, and as he opened his mouth all three of them ran off the tape backwards.

But my main one was still going forward. He looked at one and he looked at another. Now I'm lying in bed in the hospital. This is not helping my health at all. I had watched him so many times, I said, "My God, something's wrong with the teleprompter!" and I grabbed the phone and I called the Ranch and asked them what was wrong. The guy sitting in the back of there said, "Nothing's wrong! I'm looking at the tape!" I said, "No, you're not! You're looking at your tape! His is not running! Neither of the three." Well, this guy snuck around on his knees and got up there and looked and sure as hell, he's back reading from the book. That's how I could tell, when he starts turning pages, he always had a text in front of him to fall back on, and that's what he did. He read that.

G:        But did he turn the pages when he had the teleprompter working?

A:       No, no, no. He would get five, six, seven pages behind. Sometimes he'd look down and see he's on page--we had the pages marked at the bottom of the page on the teleprompter, page thirteen, and he could turn to thirteen if he wanted to catch up. Frequently he never looked at the text, didn't fool with it at all, and he made no effort to keep up.  Because if    it was working well, he didn't need it. But on this occasion, he had to read it from the text, and I watched him read it all the way through.  He doesn't read well with good eye  contact. Having to look at the script that way and then look up, he lost contact quite bit. And I knew something was wrong.

Well, after it was over Marvin Watson said, "You've heard of what a buffer is?" I said, "A buffer? Yes, I know what it is." He said, "Well, I want you to know I'm a buffer tonight. The President wanted to chomp off your derriere.  All I can say is, 'Sir, he's in the hospital up in Washington, D.C.  You can't blame him for this.  You can blame his other people and so on.
You can't jump on him.'" And he said, "I took the beating." He said, "I blame you, Marvin, for not checking them." Well, they'd been in there and looked, fellow ran the machine, and it ran forward, ran the machine and it ran backwards. But nobody had ever checked to see they were not synchronized exactly the same direction. They were in opposite directions.

G:        How long after you came on did, he adopt the teleprompters?

A:       Oh, let me see now. hired a man to do this for me, a fellow named Adams, Jim Adams, to head the audio-visual and teleprompter, It would be in the summer of 1965, 1 would venture to say in the order of June, July 1965.

G:        Did you notice any departure in his speaking style as a result of the teleprompter, other than I assume he would have more eye contact with the audience?

A:        Well, that was the principal difference. I think he did develop a sense of--he spoke with more confidence I guess is a better word because he didn't have to try to do the second function of fumbling with what page he's on or following it there. And even though we printed it in the book, you never had print that large. The type of print for a speech is not that big. The speech for the typewriter for that teleprompter was huge print, and it came through as a real big print about so big. That was magnified, too.

G:        We have one of those on exhibit at the Library.

A:       Yes, that's the first one that I bought, and I had sent down there, right. You also have one of his  podiums down there.

G:        Was there more than one podium?

A:        Oh, good God!

G:        The big heavy one?

A:        had twenty of them.

G:        You're kidding?

A:       You ever try to cover him when he's making six or eight, seven stops a day, and six or seven or eight the next day in a campaign-type thing? No way with two; we had to have twenty. And with the teleprompters I didn't have quite that many, I think I had ten, ten sets.

The next administration would not use either the podium--that size, they wanted something different in size--or the teleprompter. They wouldn't use either one. And so, they went back to mothball. I don't think there are any of them; I think they've disposed of all of them in the White House now.

G:        I saw one the other night at the Sheraton Park that looked identical to the one that President Johnson used to use.

A:       Oh, yes, this is a common one that a lot of people are using with the three. And some of them won't have cover in front of them, all you see is the glass sitting out there. But his did, he often had something up there where you really couldn't see the glass, it was   hidden by something of equivalent height and all you saw was just a piece of stuff. Now that was always below him enough that it didn't cut him off along about here. But he stood behind that podium with about that much sticking up behind the podium, because he's a tall man. But he didn't want to be standing and looking over the thing at the crowd, as he said. We designed that podium around his height, him standing behind it, saying no. We'd keep sticking things under there until we got the height he wanted.

We had the same problem with microphones. First of all, he didn't want any microphones out, he didn't want to see a microphone. So, I tried putting the microphones inside the podium. Well, your loss was so great, there were so many  vp's, voice power and projecting power when you do that, and your microphones just pick up all the noises if you bump that podium and other [noises], it wasn't satisfactory. So, I convinced him after maybe a couple of times trying it that it wasn't good. So, he'd let me go back then to the two microphones outside.

Then we got into a squabble, as some of the papers said, with the unions, the broadcasters' unions, and they felt that they didn't want to take a feed from our people in the White House. So as a result, we went to four microphones on most occasions where two of these would be given as a feed to the broadcasters and we would take a feed from them, and the two for the public address system were always separate. One on each side was for PA and one on each side was for the  connections to the press and radio. They took their tapes from that.

We've had some interesting failures over the years. I had some real traumatic times in providing this. He made a speech in Vietnam--

G:        This is at Cam Ranh Bay?

A:        Cam Ranh Bay, first time he went through there in 1967. We'd been to Manila. He wouldn't let us take anybody with me. I was allowed to take on that occasion one man with me. That was the around-the-world trip, no, the second time I guess it failed on me.

G:        This was the Harold Holt funeral, is that right?

A:      That's right. That was on the two days before Christmas, 1967. We went to Thailand, and while in Thailand he made an early morning speech, but he wouldn't let me take but one recording man with me. We took the recording man and we didn't take the podium, tie put the cords up and microphones and so on. Well, he did visit the troops in the hospital over in Cam Ranh Bay first and then came back and I had things set up and he made his speech. Then we got ready to get on the airplane and this young kid I had there--I left him there for others to come and pick him up, he wasn't going on the rest of the way around the world with us--admitted very tearfully to me that the recorder had failed. He didn't have a copy of the speech. So, I had to borrow a tape from the press plane from one of the test men that they had recorded on an identical type recorder. I borrowed the tape from one of these people. I don't now recall who it was. And the President the minute we got in the air wanted to hear it, how it sounded, how he had come across, and so fortunately I had one. Normally I would have had one of my own. My man would have recorded two tapes, he had two tape recorders--but they both failed. I couldn't do a thing about it.

Somehow or other in the feed from the jack, from the multiple, they had failed. So, I borrowed this one and played it for the President, you know. Then after it was over with, he said, "Yes, very good, very good. Your boy will take the tape on back and let's get copies in the archives." said, "Mr. President, I've got to tell you. don't want you to get too mad at me, but we didn't get a copy of it. This is the copy we borrowed from the press." And he just died laughing. He said, "Well, at least you showed common sense enough to borrow one. If you'd gotten on here without one, I'd have been unhappy." (Laughter) So anyway, we got one for him to hear.

G:       While we're on the subject of his speeches, many things have been written about how he failed to come across over television and how he was so effective in small groups and one on one, and for some reason he couldn't relate over television.

A:        That's true. I think he was at his best where he was speaking to ten to fifty people in a room three times this size, but intimate, and he's got something to tell them, something he wants to talk about, I think he was at his best, most persuasive at that point. And he came across because he usually didn't have a script. He usually took it right out of his heart, his soul, and that's where it came the best.

The next best would be where he's speaking to a live crowd, a crowd sitting in front of him, oh, five, ten thousand people sitting there listening, you know. They're hanging on every word, or they're reacting. They're laughing with him or enjoying his speech, and he'll stop and listen to them laugh. He gets real charge out of this thing.

Now how I learned this was the hard way.   We had a speech in Pocatello, Idaho.  It was at the nuclear reactor plant out there, one of the first ones in the nation we had run by the government. He went out on a dedication of the first X number of years, I believe it at this time was twenty years. It had been built in 1947, and this was now 1967, and he went out to make a dedication of this thing at that time. So, I had to hire a local contractor to come in and put in a public address system. We expected a huge crowd, about twenty thousand people. So, we built a system, a monstrous system. Oh, I don't know, it must have had twenty-five to thirty huge speakers, tall, almost as tall as the doors there, and driven by some huge amplifiers.  I took precautions to have two generators.  In addition to commercial power I had generators backing it up. I had done everything I thought was necessary.

And so, they went through all the introductions. The governor spoke and the head of this reactor site out there spoke. The President got up to speak and he hadn't mumbled more than two or three words and it quit. The public address system quit. 

Now we had him on nationwide radio, nationwide TV and the cameras out front.  That part of it was not affected. It was the amplifiers that went from the original connection, that connection failed. Not the amplifiers, they never failed. The connection, that cord, the inter-connecting to the PA system just completely quit. He looks around at me and he's doing like this, and I said, "Go ahead, you're on television," and he kept going.

Well, for some agonizing four-and-one-half minutes he talked. The crowd's getting restless; they can't hear. Nobody can hear him except the people on the stage with him. Finally, the PA system came back on. My people are frantic.  They're changing cords, they're changing wires, doing everything in the book. Finally, they got the right combination and it came back on. Then he finished his speech.

Well, we went on back to the helicopter and went back to the airplane, and he called me in and said, "What went wrong?" said, "I don't know yet, Mr. President. We're still investigating. I'll let you know as soon as they call me back." Well, within ten minutes I called them on the ground and said, "What happened?" They said, "Well, it's a nightmare. It's one of the things you dream it couldn't happen but did. It's what you know as a hot solder joint came open. As it gets hot and the longer it stays hot it tends to open the solder joint. That's a rare case, but it does. You've all heard of cold solders, but not hot solders. That's what happened. This connection of that wire to that plug actually quit, came apart, and as it stayed off for a while it cooled and made the electrical connection again and the PA system came back on, you could feed the PA system again. Your voice could get through." And they said, "It's not one chance in a million it could happen again. But it did happen."

So, I went in and told him, and he said, "Well, I'm sure glad you people found it while I was speaking." I made the mistake of saying "Sir, we didn't find it. We didn't find it till just now. We don't know why it came back on." He said, "You mean that thing could have quit again?" and I said, "Yes, sir. You could have finished your speech and had none, but you're on TV and radio." He said, "Son, don't ever do this again. I'm not interested in all those people out there on the radio and TV. I'm assuming they're there, but I don't know they're there. But did you ever try to stand up and talk to twenty thousand people and you stand there flapping your gums and everybody saying, 'I wonder what the hell he's saying?' Next time that happens you walk on and say, 'Hold it, Mr. President.'" I said, "Mr. President, you really don't want me to do that." He said, "You're blessed right I do!  You come tell me to stop till you get it fixed.   I'll sit down and wait for you." said, "That would make you awful mad." He said, "I wouldn't be any madder than if I couldn't talk to those people. I was pretty unhappy. They came there to see me, and that's what's important." So, he did feel very strongly about a crowd; live audiences appealed to him.

G:        Did you ever interrupt him subsequently?

A:     Not in that environment. I have interrupted him a couple of times when we were making rehearsals, yes, where something had gone wrong or the teleprompter was momentarily faulting, or slowing or something, and I've stopped him in that. But these were not critical times. Never in a public speech, no.

G:        Could you argue with Lyndon Johnson?

A:     Well, yes. I was one of the first ones that I know of that ever worked for him that argued without getting fired. He never called it arguing, he called it expressing my opinion. But used to discuss things very vociferously with him sometimes.   But that was after the   first year. The first year I did not; I had a great deal of fear and awe of the man I didn't know.

But after a year of working literally twelve hours or more per day, seven days a week, I got to the point where I really said, "This is crazy. I'm doing a job. I'm not doing a job I enjoy. I am doing a job because it needs to be done, has to be done. But why should I be afraid of him? If he fires me, I can go back to living like a white man.  I'm not going to continue this."

So, he called me over one day at the office about some little thing, I don't know, he wanted done to the Ranch. So, I said, "Mr. President, let's discuss another way of doing this." He said, "Why? Don't you like my idea? Don't you think know anything about this?" Then he started that usual stuff he'd tell me. I said, "It's not that, Mr. President. There's a better way to do it and cheaper." "Cheaper?" he says. So, he perks up and he listens to me.

Well, the staff was about to go through the floor. By this time Marvin Watson is having apoplexy. He said, "You can't talk to the President like that!" I said, "Well, I've got to tell him, and I will." told him. said, "Mr. President, now here is what I suggest we do"--I didn't ever tell him we've got to do it--"but I suggest we do it this way. Now one, think you've got a better system, and second, you're going to save money," and I told him how much it would save. He said, "Okay. You do it your way and then you bring me the bills and show me you saved money. When you do, I'll I say you're the greatest."

Well, I don't know, two weeks, three weeks [later] I did, I took it to him, and I showed him. I said, "Now this is what I told you it would cost you, and that's what it is." He said, "My God,' He knows what he's doing for a change."

No, I never really argued with him. discussed things with him. But I got to the point where I wasn't afraid to. His staff was deathly afraid of him. I don't know what Marvin and they talked to him [about] in private. I was never privy with just the two of them alone, but I was there when there were groups and they wouldn't dare say anything to him. If he said something, that was it, you did it that way whether you understood it or not. They wouldn't ask questions. I said, "Marvin, I can't live like this. I've got to know what he really wants. You're not telling me what he wants.

You don't know what he wants." He said, "No, I don't."  I said, "Let's go in and ask him."  Well, he said, "You sure you want to?"   So, from then on, I had no trouble.   But if you worked for the President, you learned very quickly, you either had to have rapport with him and try to  do what he wanted done, or you weren't there.
He didn't keep people around that didn't try to please him. As long as he knew you were trying, he'd give you every effort in the world.

He never fired me. That's another thing.  He never once fired me.  I've seen him  fire George Reedy on a regular basis. Fired Bill Moyers a couple of times. I never heard him fire Watson, but Watson told me he had fired him a couple of times. But he never fired me because he asked me one day, "What will you do if I fire you?" said, "Well, I had a job before I got here, Mr. President. I'll go back to the military, and if they don't want me, I’ll retire." He said, "Well, no, but I mean what would you say?"  said, "Well, I'd say, 'All right, Mr. President, that's what you want,' and I'd leave. He said, "You really would leave?" and I said, "Yes, sir, and I wouldn't come back. I'm not one that you could fire today and hire tomorrow. If you don't want me here, say so and I'm gone." He just laughed and said, "Well, some of these other people know I love them too much. Old George knows this. He knows I wouldn't fire him. I just get mad at him sometimes, let my temper get the best of me. But he gets about as far as Dallas and I call him and say, 'Come on, George, let's come back. I'll send a plane for you.'" This happened time after time. I guess George told all this, too, if you've ever read his stories of it.

G:        Anything else on the problem that he had relating on television?

A:        Well, cut that off a minute. (Interruption)

Speaking back to the specific day of this, 31 March, 1968, we were aware that something was amiss, something was up, by about two o'clock in the afternoon when Jim Jones and Marvin Watson, who was the postmaster general, called me and said, "Have you got a young man that's an excellent typist for the teleprompter and he's one of your teleprompter men and a man that we can entrust implicitly?" And I said, "Marvin, you can trust any man I've got implicitly." He said, "No, no. I want a man that will come in here and go over something with us and not even tell you.

He works for you, but he'll come out and say, 'I can't tell you." And I said, "That doesn't bother me, Marvin, whatever you want." So, we picked a young boy whose name escapes me now, but he's one of our teleprompter operators, a very good one, but a young fellow, twenty-one, twenty-two. He'd been with us for a year or so, but he did an outstanding job.

So, they called him into the office, and this is on the order, let's say, of three in the afternoon, and his speech was scheduled for I believe, I recall, it was nine. So, they called him into there and he typed up an approximate seven-minute addition to the regular tape. Now we had rehearsed the tape in the morning. We knew what was on that.  There wasn't a thing about this. Of course, he just made an addition at the end of it. And so, this kid stayed with them. I saw him again the next time, after he had put the tape back together and after he had put it into the machine, and they rehearsed it one time with the President in the President's office, and we weren't in there. Only he was in there, only this young kid. But when I saw him, oh, before the broadcast, somewhere around eight- fifteen, eight-thirty I guess it was, he was as white as this piece of paper, literally numb, just scared to death. And I said, "Now just relax, son. Nobody's going to bother you at all.  You go in there and do your job, that's all he's asking you to do."   He said, "I've never been put in a position like this before," I said, "Don't you worry about it. The President asked for you this way, and it's up to you to do it right. Don't you worry about anything, what we think or anything else, it's not up to us to know. We'll hear it tonight." Now he went in there, and of course when he made his speech I'm standing behind the camera as far from me as the door, in front of the desk there and so on, during everything, watching my boy sitting off to one side running the teleprompter and so on for him that night. No hint of anything wrong except we knew something was coming. We'd speculated all day on the thing.

G:        What did you think? Did you have any speculation?

A:      We thought he had some breakthrough on Vietnam. That's the consensus of the crowd. The cameramen had sensed it was going to run longer than they'd thought. They didn't know about the addition, but people in the staff did, many of them did. They knew seven minutes is all they knew. And Marvin said to me, "Your boy is a good kid. He's holding up very well." Jim Jones said the same thing. And I said, "All right, nobody knows anything, Jim.  Just go ahead with it."  So, when he got to that then he stopped, just a pause, you know, and then went into when he announced that he didn't intend to run. This kid began to get color in his face for the first time, toward the end of that thing, like he's breathing normal, you know, it's almost over. And when it ended, we literally had to help the kid out of that office. Had to send another man in to get him.  He was so nervous he sat there shaking like this, just like a leaf. Did a beautiful job to the point of the end and then he just broke down.

Well, told the President about this two, three days later. He asked about the boy, said, "How's he doing?"   said, "He's great."   "I want to send letter," he said, "Give me   draft of a letter to thank him for this," and I did. He was empathetic. He liked to have people around him that did a good job get credit for those kinds of jobs, and he's thoughtful in that regard. And so, I told him about the letter, said, "This man was a nervous wreck. If he'd been a drinking man, we'd have had trouble with him that night, because we had to carry him out of there, literally hold him to lift him out of there. He  was frozen stiff in there and shaking." He said, “Well, I guess it’s a lot of responsibility. That kid has known since about three o’clock today what I was going to say. Question is, how do I say it? That’s what we manipulated all afternoon. We massaged it and rewrote it and tore it up and he did it again. must say that he worked hard all the way through it. He’s fine boy.” So that’s the story on that one. This kid had added it to it.

G:      Did President Johnson at that point, when you were talking to him about it, say anything  about his speech and how he regarded that last seven minutes?

A:      Oh, no.  No, no.  I heard a very interesting one, and I don’t know whether you want this one on the tape or not: Marvin Watson’s explanation as to why he didn’t run. Have you ever heard that?

G:        I’d like to hear that. No.

A:       Well, I was a member of the White House staff mess, being the commander of the unit. I was the only one in my unit that had membership in there. So, I frequently ate there, not every day, but when I was there, I would eat there. They had a big round staff table in the corner, ten seats at it. Marvin and Bill Moyers and Jim Jones and so I ate there frequently at that staff table. You could come in and order your meal and slip quietly out. You didn’t have to sit around for any protocol for the rest of them to wait to come and eat and so on.

I was in there about, I don't know, I recall about a week, ten days later. Marvin came in about the time I did, and Marvin now was postmaster general. He was not in that environment, but he ate there still. He said, "Would you have lunch with me?" and I said, "Yes, where are you going to eat?"  He said, "I'm going to sit at the staff table."  So, we sat down, the two of us, and then the table sort of filled up. I don't remember who all was there, but it was a bunch of, I'd say, junior politicians, up and coming politicians. They're all either advance men or they work in some capacity in there. Not any of the high-level staff, not a one. They were all, oh, I’d say early thirties, late twenties, I mean youngsters. So, they all sat down. We introduced ourselves around the table, to me. Marvin knew them all; didn't know them. But he introduced me. So, he said, "Gentlemen, I got a question for all of you and I'd just like to hear an answer from one of you at a time. Everybody but the General. I don't want the General to comment one way or the other. I know he's got his own views, and he's not a politician, so I'm not going to ask him.

Gentlemen, just why did President Johnson choose not to run?" And I'd hear answers. He gave them a few minutes to nibble on their salads and so on. He said, "Okay, now." He started with the first one.

Well, in short, I don't remember what they all said, but the consensus of the group was that he had had really a tough presidency, that Mrs. Johnson had been urging him to quit, and he felt that it was an appropriate time since he was the top of the heap in effect and [to] leave at that point was the best time. And in general, that's the theory.

One of them did even advance the theory that he felt that because of Vietnam that it would be a difficult campaign and he didn't look forward to going through that kind of thing. He didn't feel like he was anxious to fight, that was the way he expressed it. When they got all through Marvin said, "Gentlemen, let me tell you something.

There's not a one of you that understands President Johnson, not one of you. Now first of all, he's a fighter. He's a born politician and a fighter.  No group of demonstrators out there are going to run him out of anywhere. He's not scared of a single one of them. He's not scared--no personal safety concern at all. And Mrs. Johnson, yes, she's urged him to leave, But more than once, and he's always said, 'Now, I'll let you know, Lady Bird, when I decide to quit.' That's all he would ever tell her, never said yes or no. That's not the answer. I want you to know something. This man does everything for a reason, and so he's got his reasons. This is the reason."
  
"During the month of February, we asked for and received a report back from each of the states, the Democratic apparatus in each state, to give us a feel, grassroots feel,   how would the President fare if the election were today?

And then a projection, did they see any change in this--what they knew about things--between now and the election itself, which would cause that to change?  Gentlemen, not the majority, not the consensus, 90 per cent approximately came back and said, 'Mr. President, if the election were held today you wouldn't have a prayer. If the election were held in November and if certain things occur, you've got a reasonable chance.' But the reasonable chance only made it move back to about 35 to 40 per cent in his favor, that he might have that kind of an odd. This is fairly unanimous then. I went to him with that and showed him that.

He's a man that won by a landslide in 1964, and he was not about to be defeated by this kind of a coalition in 1968. And gentlemen, that's the answer.  He's not going to be embarrassed by a defeat in 1968, and he doesn't want to risk it."

That's what Watson's explanation to that group was as the reason why he didn't run. I'd never heard it from anyone else. I'd never heard the President himself say so. I don't have any reason to question one way or the other. Marvin won't deny this; he'll remember saying all this, I'm sure,

G:        There were a lot of other witnesses, too.

A:        There were eight others, right. Now whether they remember it the same way but that's   basically what he said. That's why he made his decision.

G:       Did the President seem relieved after he had made that decision? Did he behave as if some of the pressure were off of him at this point?

A:        No. Momentarily yes, guess that's correct.  But within a matter of a week, two  weeks, he was still back to his nervousness. He'd come to the point where he was thoroughly paranoid about making a trip. He was concerned about demonstrators. He was concerned about people disruptions of all sort. So therefore, we had no notice. We'd get no notice. I mentioned that we'd have to board a plane with him. He'd want to make a speech, for example, in New York, and I'd get the word between six and seven in the evening.

I'd catch a plane with him, with my people. We'd go to New York and take the speech environment equipment with us, set it up on the stage at the Waldorf-Astoria or the Americana, wherever he was speaking, connect to the public address system in the house. Sometimes I had less than an hour to do this. In the meantime, there's a banquet going on down below, and he's coming in there to speak to the crowd, to some special gathering. They frequently didn't know he was coming until such time as they'd see us working up there behind the curtain, or know we were putting the microphones in place and the podium and so on.

But they caught on pretty quick and then the hubbub would begin. The Secret Service were all over the place checking doors and so on. So, then they knew. But he was already in the building, he was in a suite somewhere upstairs talking to somebody, and then finally he would come down. But that's how it came.

It became very, very difficult job.  Now he never complained when we had a little slowness, I've had to delay him sometimes. I said, "I'm not ready yet," and he'd say, "Well, when are you going to be ready?" I'd say, "Five minutes," "Ten minutes," whatever I thought it would take. And he didn't ever give me any hell, I'll say that for him. He used to chafe under it, yes, knew he did. But he was still nervous.

Now I can tell you one story that I'll bet you never heard, or if you have, stop me if you've heard it. Even until they nominated Hubert Humphrey, the President still expected to be called as a unanimous nominee again. Did you know this?

G:        No.

A:     The only other men that know that story is a few members of his staff such as Jim Jones, Marvin Watson again. We were in the hotel in Chicago, the Blackstone Hotel, and Marvin Watson and I were sitting together as the convention went on. We'd been out and prepared this whole hotel for the President to come up from Texas. He had the Jetstar sitting down at his Ranch in Texas where it could pick him up and bring him up there. I had people there to come with him.

We had everything in readiness, all the presidential podiums and everything else right there in Chicago. I had forty-some odd people in Chicago waiting, and we were all ready. And so, at three o'clock on the afternoon Marvin said--word had come back they were preparing to nominate Humphrey that night and the groundswell was not there.  tell you how far we had gone, we had the camera, the 16  mm camera, projector loaded with film from the 1964 campaign, "Hello Lyndon," and we had a screen and were prepared to drop down from the roof of the auditorium, that huge screen, and he was supposed to walk in with us playing, showing that picture, and singing "Hello Lyndon." That's how far he thought they would nominate him by acclamation.

Marvin called him on the phone, put me on the phone with him, and he said, "Mr. President, I've got some bad news.  It's not going to go that way.  They're going to nominate Hubert." He said, quote, "Those ungrateful sons of bitches. Okay. Who's with you there?" Marvin said, "General Albright is here." He said, "Okay. General, how many people you got there?" I said, "About forty-three or four," I don't recall the figure, but about that.

He said, "Get the equipment. Quietly get them out of town. Don't get them out through the Chicago airport. Run them all over there and get them out of different airports. I don't want anybody to know we had made any advance preparations. Clean it up."  I said, "I'm sorry, Mr. President."  He said, "Well, that's the way it is." 

Then I got off the line and he talked to Marvin some more. But I heard that much of it  and then went out to order my people to clear it up. But that was somewhere between three and four on Wednesday afternoon when they nominated Humphrey.

G:        I don't think it was ever publicized that all that was, there.

A:        It won't. You ask Marvin Watson about it. He'll confirm it, because he was sitting there with  me on the phone.  Maybe he was going to put that in his book later, don't know,  but that's the facts of life.

G:     How is this set-in motion to begin with? Did he call you in or was this something Marvin Watson arranged?

A:       No. Jim Jones started me to work. Jim Jones ordered me a week before to go out and make the advance preparations. Then I didn't really see Marvin until that morning. I was in Chicago from one Monday, and Marvin was there but I didn't see him until Wednesday morning. He said, "Well, this will be either a very good day or a very bad day." He told him what was happening. The President was sitting at the Ranch waiting, anticipating. He said, "We're still seeing what's happening. It's not dead yet. There's a good possibility they'll still call for him. And if they call for him, he will jump in that jet, he'll come to Chicago and come wheeling in here and he'll be nominated again. He fully expects them to nominate him."  Now I had gotten to know Marvin fairly well and I asked him, "Marvin, what do you think?" he said, "I'm hesitant to speculate at this point. I'd rather just wait." He wouldn't comment one way or the other.

Don't think. he really believed they would, but nevertheless he's playing always the loyal politician and aide to the President. So, when it came, he knew by mid-afternoon it wasn't going to happen. He said, "Well, we have got to tell him."

G:        His March 31 statement was so categorical in ruling that out.

A:        He said that, recognizing that at the moment he wanted to express to the people so he would be free then to work to end the Vietnam thing. That's the way he expressed it, as you know. But in his own mind and among his own people, the few really close people to him, they knew better than this. They knew he didn't really mean that. 

George Christian, I've heard him say the same thing.  Jake Jacobsen, I've heard him say it, that  the President really said that, but in his own heart didn't mean it, that he kept hoping that they would nominate him anyway. And so, I'm saying the preparation was there. That plane was sitting there. The pilots were there sitting in the airplane. Everything was in readiness. They could have left there within certainly ten to fifteen minutes after he got the word "come on," and that's what Marvin called to tell him. Either come on, or sorry, and that's what he told him.

 G:     Well, at the time it was speculated that Frank Erwin and some other members of the Texas delegation were prepared to put his name in nomination. Was this part of that, do you know?

A:        I really don't know who was behind the scenes, because I didn't keep up with many of the other politicians. The only one I kept was the one I worked with on a regular basis. Of course, Marvin came back into that at that time. He were never close to the group that worked directly with Humphrey, because we were never allowed to be. That's another story.

G:        Well, how did you get your people out?

A:        First of all, I called my man in charge and I said, "Okay, the President has said clean it up, get them out of town, two to an airport. So, rent cars, take your equipment, go out In different directions." We scattered them all out.

            We sent them out through Minnesota and down through Illinois, Indiana. It took them about a day and a half to get them all out of there and scatter them. Some of them had to catch the same airport, but half a day later or a day later, where it wasn't obvious. Because that called for equipment. We hauled in huge equipment. They'd go down and put it in on the freight. They couldn't identify it as White House. They couldn't do any of that stuff. They just had to take an ordinary ticket. All in civilian clothes, they couldn't tell it. But just cleaned it out of there. They made it. Oh, they thought maybe broadcasting system had decided to pull some equipment out and so on. The airlines couldn't tell that when you don't block up at one airport. If it all had gone out through Chicago, sure, they'd have known it. That's why he said not through Chicago. We couldn't go out through that airport, O'Hare, at all. Cleaned them out.

G:        Do you think he wanted Humphrey to win that election?

A:       That I'm not sure about. I really don't know. I know this, I think if he did, he waited too long. I think the facts will bear that out. That had he thrown his weight to Humphrey earlier than he did, I think that Humphrey would have won. The difference between them, as you know, was extremely small, some four hundred thousand votes difference. It could easily have gone the other way. But he really didn't throw his full weight behind him until probably Friday before the election itself.

G:        What did he do then?

A:      Well, he made a speech at a gathering with Humphrey I think or a speech in which he  said, "that's the man to have" and he spoke up for him.  But up until that time he had not  spoken or done anything at any press conferences or anything. He just sort of let it go by default. And that's what they said, the way they accused him, the other Humphrey people said, "Well, he's killed us by faint praise or no praise at all." I’m not sure how he felt about it. I’m sure he was deeply hurt that he was not nominated. I know that. I heard his expression, I know it. But I don’t think he had any personal animosity against Humphrey. Not that at all. It’s just a question of the deep feelings he had of his own abilities and desires. I think as much as anything.

G:       That’s fascinating. We were talking about the people you worked with in the White House. Bill Moyers and then Marvin Watson and I guess Jim Jones.

A:      Mostly these were the appointments secretary or a special assistant to the President for domestic affairs, someone like Jake Jacobsen, Joe Califano, some of that crowd. We worked very closely with them day by day. I never really knew Califano personally. Very aloof, very business-like. But I got to know other people such as Jake Jacobsen and Bill Moyers, Jim Jones, now a congressman from Oklahoma. I’ve seen him in recent years, testified before him a couple of times. And Marvin, I hear from Marvin occasionally, talk to him on the phone. I got to know those fairly well.  In general, the rest of the staff, no.

Firstly, it was the people who went to the Ranch with him is the  people you got to know, because they’re down there day after day after day, and you talk to them day after day after day. You sense the things that are bothering them and that are frustrating them, the things they need, the things they’re working on. You got some feel of all of that.

G:        Did you sense a lot of rivalry among the White House staffers?

A:        No. I was never close enough to the rest of them to ever sense that. If I had ever felt there was any, it would have had to been from those who were driving the hardest to be closer to the stage and it might have been people such as Valenti, Califano, some of that group, who were always appeared to strive for it [?]. But certainly, no striving, no stress, I mean people like Moyers, George Christian, Jake Jacobsen, that crowd, none of that, or Watson either. Never felt that at all.

G:       If you were going to--just from your own perspective--identify one staffer as being the closest to President Johnson, who would you--

A:        It would have to be Watson.

G:        Really?

A:        Yes. I don’t think there’s any question.

G:        Why would you feel that way?

A:        Well, primarily, and my mind is biased admittedly, because he was there probably the greatest length of time. Now, Jim Jones was an assistant to Watson, see, when I first got there. He had just come on board there when I got in there in April of 1965, and Watson was the key man. Well, Watson left there. I don’t remember the exact date when he became postmaster, but somewhere around the beginning of 1968 or late 1967, I don’t recall exactly, yet Watson still travel. Every time we had an overseas trip Watson went with us as a close confidante. And whenever the President would need something, he would tell either Jim Jones or Watson and they would call me. That’s the reason I say they were the closest.

But in the day-to-day workings of the office, while others had access to the President--that's an interesting point incidentally--the President had a general rule that had been passed to us through even Moyers before I got there that only a limited number of people could call the President direct through the switchboard. Now I ran the switchboard. But I had to set up ground rules. "This is the list that can call the President day or night." That's what the President wanted. And he'd accepted this.

G:        Where would this ring? Would this ring in--

A:        Wherever he was. See, we always knew where the President was, He couldn't get away from us at all, because Secret Service were always adjacent to where he was. If he was in his bedroom, they were in the outer hall out there, or somewhere in the Mansion watching things. But we formed series of lights throughout the Mansion outside the room he was in, and that light would always light up green when he was out of there, and the same  thing would light up down in Secret Service, showing on a big board what room he was in: the East Room, Fish [?] Room, these little lights just followed him. Now, we didn't have that the first couple of years.

G:        When was that put in?

A:        I'd say it would have been somewhere about my second year, I don't know, 1966 sometime. But he thought it was fascinating that people could tell where he was without having to talk on the radio. They didn't have to say a word, all they did is when he moved to the next room that light would change and come on there, and then people down in the Secret Service office following him could always look up at that board and say, "Okay, he's out of the East Room. He's now in the corridors. He's on the way to the West Wing. He's now in the Oval Office or he's in the Cabinet Room," wherever. They could always follow it very carefully. And it helped. Now that was available to us only in the White House. We didn't extend that outside of there. It was always Secret Service who did the notification when he went somewhere else.

G:        They'd tell you. 


A:     We told the Secret Service board, but I ran all the radio systems and could say that my switchboard knew at any time where the President was, because we manned the console, the radio console for Secret Service. They always had their own down there, but I  always listened on everyone, on Channel B and all the other channels that they had, Secret Service channels. I heard everything that was ever said on those channels, because I'm monitoring them. If something happened to one of the Secret Service men, could not pick it up, if they're based down at the Secret Service office, one of my men answered. If we went on a trip, we always had one.   We'd give them base in their own office, and  then we handled all the channels, we heard them all. So, we knew, too, where the President was at any time.

Because if you get a call--let's say it's an emergency, and you've got to get the President in a hurry, we don't want to have to look for Secret Service and beg us [them] to tell us where the President [is], "I've got to get a message to him."   So, we watched these movements and we kept it on a piece of paper, on a trip. The President is in his car, the President is such and such a place.  We could always reach that agent.  We did have to on many occasions call and say, "We've got a telephone call for the President. Does he want to take it?" "Who is it from?" We'd tell him. "I'll ask him." He asked him. We generally called a staff member, either Jake Jacobsen or Watson or Jones later, and say, "Telephone call for the President from"--let's say--"one of his men in California, the fund-raiser," or one of that crowd, "wants to talk to the President." "Well, can it wait?" "He says not." And he said, "Wait a minute," and he asked the President. The President, "Yes, let me have it." So, he picks up the phone in the car frequently and talks to him, through the radio system. Now, it's a non-secure system and it wasn't very smart, but he did this occasionally. Now if he could get to a phone, he'd have a more secure [system].

G:        What do you mean by a non-secure system?

A:        Any radio system is non-secure.

G:        You mean somebody could pick it up on the same frequency?

A:     Anybody who's got a radio set on the same frequency can hear it. There's nothing peculiar about it.  None of those VHF systems at those times on the radio were secure. It's conceivable that you can do that, but it's a complicated system, especially if you jump out and run from here to there and no time for preparation.  You can't do that very well.  So those nets were highly vulnerable. We suspected the press always of listening in.

G:        Is that right?

A:       The press had their own radios in the cars, and they'd listen to that channel. We suspected that. There's nothing we could do about it. It's a public channel. It happened to be allocated to Secret Service, but I couldn't keep them off of it. So that's what I say, an open circuit. No, I'd say there's not a doubt, Watson was undoubtedly the closest to him. The man who spent the most time with him was not Watson, but Jacobsen. Jacobsen spent month after month after month at the Ranch with him.

He'd go there and he'd literally--he'd move out of there at night if the President would go to bed, and that's the last he'd see him until the next morning, seven-thirty, eight o'clock he's back over there and the President's up again. But he was with him every minute, except that six, seven hours he was allowed to sleep at night. So, in our speaking with him, he was with him. I'm not saying he was that close to him.

G:        Sure, well, let's talk about the telephone system a little more. Did the White House  operators               work under your supervision?

A:       You've got two different kinds of telephone systems. We had a telephone system in the White House, which in effect belonged to Mr. [William] Hopkins. That was called an administrative telephone system. The telephone operators were women, and they worked for Mr. Hopkins. They did not work for me.

The other switchboard, which was in the protected area within the White House itself, in the sheltered area, was called Signal. That switchboard worked the President, the White House staff, the trunk circuits to the Ranch, the overseas circuits and so on. Whenever he went on a trip, all circuits terminated back there, all came back to that board. That was all military, not a civilian in the whole crowd. All military.

Now when the President traveled to the Ranch, after 1965 he wanted the girls to go with him, and so we used to take three or four operators from the White House board, the administrative board, take them to the Ranch, and they operated the board at the Ranch.  Because the President said, "I want to hear that good old girl's voice."   Now I  tried to get him to let me hire some girls, but he wouldn't change it. "No, that isn’t worth  it. Just take these girls over there with you. That crowd will know exactly what I want, who I want, and so on." During the day, when he wanted to get his political friends and so on, he'd say, "Get me Dick Russell." Well, you don't need to explain further to one of these girls. They'd done it on that board hundreds of times before. They had the contacts to the civilian government and the Congress, and where he'd been before, they knew all of his friends. We kept them informed wherever he was, also. Again, they could always trace call right to where he was. They could do it.

However, when he was on a trip away from the Washington area, everything went through that Signal, the military board, which I owned and controlled. Only at the Ranch did I use these women. I tried carrying those women on a couple of other occasions on overseas, and it was disastrous. They just are not used to a fast-moving condition. They worked beautifully in the White House, where you've got a set condition, and they're used to looking for the same people. They knew exactly what to do, when.  But when you're  out there and the Secret Service are moving here and somebody is looking for some there, they didn't know who these people were, and they didn't know where to find all these strange names. Every time we'd go on a long trip, you'd bring in advance people to do the advance arrangements for the local stops. And there might be a name they had never heard of. It might be Lloyd Hand. It might be the mayor from Killeen, Texas. Name escaped me right now, but he traveled with us a number of times. But that's the way it works.

G:        Oh, Connell.

A:        Yes, Ted Connell. Ted. They'd throw Ted in there sometimes, made a lot of trips with Ted. Okay, the guy is out of Philadelphia, sometime out of New York. But these girls in the White House didn't know these people. They never saw them. 

          So as a result, my boys did. My boys had been on numerous trips with him, and so as a result when somebody said, "Find Ted Connell for me," they knew exactly where to look, and they knew where they could find him. Because he always--they had a rule they had to keep us informed. When they're going to move out, going to leave the room, going to be away from the phone, you've got to have radio on your person to let us know where you are. We didn't have beepers in the first few years; we didn't carry those. It's only in the last  year we got into the thing where everybody carried a little beeper in his pocket, and if we needed him, we could buzz it, he'd hear buzz, and he'd have to come back to a phone  and talk to us. We didn't have that at first. . .

G:        They just carried walkie-talkies.

A:      Had a radio, walkie-talkie he kept in his pocket, and they were big things in those days.     They're not small. They were a burdensome thing, but they carried it.

G:        Well, the President had a phone console in his office I suppose and, in his bedroom, as well, is that right?

A:       Had a multi-button phone. He had one of the only phones that we'd ever had built like that. He wanted all of a great number of people to be right on his phone, where he pushed the button, he got them. So, at the Ranch we built him one with twenty-four buttons. They don't make them like that.

G:        Really?

A:       Made it special by AT&T for us, and we put several like that in his office and his bedroom and so on. But he's the only one that ever had that. He probably got one--

G:        Was this more of an intercom?

A:      No. No. Each one of them was a direct circuit where when he wanted to talk directly to    another man, he'd push a button and it'd ring that man's phone. It was a direct line to those  other individuals at the Ranch when he wanted them. He didn't want to go through the  switchboard.

G:        Oh, it was at the Ranch as well as the White House?

A:       Oh, yes, he had them both places. But he wanted all of the certain select lines on there where he could buzz them directly. Also, in the White House he wanted a connection to the administrative board, that one I told you that the girls operated, and Hopkins was responsible for.

G:        But these were not just aides' lines within the White House that tie could punch and buzz?

A:        Oh, yes. Yes.

G:        They were.?

A:        Yes. They were people within the White House environment. Some of them were--he had a couple to secretary, one to secretary of defense, and one to another, but most of them were not. Most of these lines in there--he wanted to have eight or ten lines when he'd pick any one, he wants to talk on now, and he could then go to the switchboard.

Now, we had a rule that almost everything that came out of that board, except the two that went to the White House and the direct lines to staff members, went through the Signal switchboard, Then they placed the calls for him and then called him back and said, "The Secretary of Defense is on the line, sir," something like this, and then he'd talk to them. But he rarely--and we almost always returned it, except when he had asked for it personally in the bedroom or something of that nature. If he had a secretary along, she took the intercom back and said, "Okay, it's ready," and she'd tell the President and he'd go. Or Watson would, or Jones would or somebody. But when he's in his own bedroom, he'd call two or three in the morning and he'd say, "Get me so and so." That's all he'd say, and he'd hang up. So, you'd get so and so, and then call him back and say, "Mr. President, so and so." "Okay, thank you." I've had him call me many times at night, and I've called him many times.

started to tell you a while ago this list. At the telephone thing there was this list of names, and they were the only people that were authorized to disturb the President, when he's asleep or when he's in his quarters or something. Now, you don't have a copy of that list in here. There's none of that in this.

G:        Oh, I've seen it, I think.

A:        Well, there is one somewhere. You don't have it here.

G:        Who was on the list?

A:        Well, this is a different list. This is a different kind of list that's in here, I think. (Interruption) An example of a case like this--

G:        Now, go ahead.  This is a list of people  who--

A:        List of people, and it was a limited list. As I recall, there were seven names at one time. These seven were the only ones that were authorized by the President to call him when they had something to tell him or to talk to him about anytime day or night. In other words, if you've got something to tell him, wake him up. He didn't ever want to be  waked up with a surprise. And so, on several occasions I've had to call him. The night that we had been informed that Robb had been injured, we had to inform him, in Vietnam. Now, he did not want Lynda to know about it and so the President again instructed us specifically, "Do not tell Lynda. She's not to know." And we did not tell her. Word never got to her until he got home.

Another case, the President called me sometime around twelve-thirty or one o'clock at night. I was asleep and it was about that. And he said, "How much money you got?" I did a double-take and I said, "Well, Mr. President I've got"--I said, "What do you need it for?"  He said, "Never mind.  How much you got in your funds?  How much can you make available to me by tomorrow morning?" said, "Well, don't have that much, Mr. President. Probably not over two hundred thousand. Do you need more than that?" He said, "I need a million, and I need it by tomorrow. It's for a very highly hush-hush project.  I'd rather not talk about it.  Can you get it?"  said, "Yes, sir."  So, I hung up and  I called Califano, Joe Califano. Joe was asleep, too, and he said, "I'll call you back." And some twelve, fifteen minutes later he did call back and he said, "Okay, everything's set up." I called the President, called switchboard, identified myself. They knew my voice, but I think I identified myself and I said, "I need to speak to the President." He said, "He's probably gone back to sleep." I said, "I know that, but he asked me to call him." So, I called him back and after two or three rings he answered, "Yes." "Colonel Albright." "Yes, Colonel." I said, "Okay, Mr. President." That's all I said to him. He said, "Okay. You'll have it in the morning?" said, "Yes, sir." He said, "Come see"--who did he say?"--"Jake Jacobsen." "Yes, sir." That's all that was said. He went back to sleep and I went back to sleep.

But by now I was on the list of the people could do that. The officer in charge of the Situation Room in the Pentagon was on that list. Now, he's not by name, but by position, with a direct circuit from the Situation Room in the Pentagon and the JCS to the switchboard. All he'd do is identify himself on that line and say, "This is the duty officer, Colonel so and so." They may come out of the log. He'd say, "I need to speak to the President." Now the President, one of the things he wanted to know after he got deeply involved in actually how the war was going--he was literally controlling the movement of aircraft and strikes and this, that and the other, but he wanted to know when they'd come back from a raid whether there were any planes lost, how many people, and so on, this time of day, This fellow would call him and tell him this.  Now, this is hell.   Often three and four in the morning. And he'd just say, "Okay, thank you," and he'd go back to sleep.

G:        Do you think that he was awakened every night with one thing or another? I mean, surely with these—

A:        He didn't get much sleep. He didn't require much sleep. I've seen him in periods at the Ranch, can't say in the White House how much sleep he got, don't know. would always see a log when we woke him; they always gave me a log the next morning as to the time and who called and so on. And I saw it, but it was not every night. It would be an infrequent basis.

G:        Did Signal keep its own logs?

A:        Yes. But they kept them for the Situation Room, Bromley Smith, and that crowd in the Situation Room. They always wanted them the following morning. We delivered them to them in the morning.
G:        Oh, so you didn't retain them?

A:        We didn't retain them, no, no, not for us.  It was for the Situation Room, so that Rostow in earlier years would know exactly who called and who said what. Generally, we didn't say what the message was, we merely said who called and what source and so on, And he would know. Now if he had a question--I've had him call me, Bromley Smith or somebody would call me and say, "I see where you called the President last night. Do you mind telling me what it's about?"  said, "Not at all."  He said, "Do you want to tell me over the phone?" I said, "No, I'll come over and see you," and I'd go and tell him what it's about. He'd say, "Fine, I just want to keep informed," and he'd tell Rostow or whoever was the security secretary at the time.

G:        Did you ever find out what he wanted the one million dollars for?

A:        Yes. It was for Jim Cross. [He] had told Jim Cross to do something in regard to a relocation site, and Jim Cross had figured out, finally gotten the papers that day late as to what it was going to cost, but informed the President that he didn't have the money, and if he went for it under the guise of that thing--if he did it, it was going to become an item known to the Congress. And the President [said], "No, we don't want that." So, he said, "I'll get another source." Now, I eventually had to go back and explain to Califano what this was about. But that night he wasn't asking for any explanations, he said, "All right," and that ended it. But that's what it went for, went into one of these relocation sites, something Jim Cross needed. He needed a million dollars for it. The President had told him to do it, and Jim said, "All right, I'll do it, but I've got to either make it plain to the Congress what I'm diverting money for.   don't have the money in my contingency fund  to do this."

He said, "I'll get it, don't worry," and he called me. He said, "Can you get it?" And he said, "Give it to Jim." Next morning when I saw him, he said, "Pass it to Jim." All I did was inform my comptroller--in the DCA, I worked for the DCA, that's where my money flowed through, Defense to DCA through there. And it appeared then as an item in the communications budget. That's all they ever knew.

Now that didn't happen that frequently. But that's one case where it did.

Other times he's called me. He called me one night in Texas and woke me up. I'm sound asleep, it's three in the morning.
He said, "What are you doing?" I said, "I'm sleeping." I was in Johnson City, and I said, "I'm asleep, Mr. President." He said, "Aren't you watching TV?" I said, "Mr. President, I don't watch TV at night. I try to sleep.

I am down there all day at the Ranch, and I watch TV all day long."  He said, "Well, there's a good western movie on here on channel 4. You ought to be watching it. It's good  western. But by the way, something is interfering with it.

Something keeps running lines across it back and forth." So, I tried to explain to him. I said, "Look, Mr. President--this was in November 1965--"That's a phenomenon we have this time of year. It's known as a ducting principle [?]. The cumulous [?] layer of air above the earth drops down in height and it tends to trap radio signals, television and so on. In some cases, it carries it hundreds of miles beyond the service area. Now, it's temporary.  It may last two hours, it may last six. It may last ten minutes.  You can't predict it.  But there's not anything you can do  about it."

"Look," he said, "I didn't ask for a long explanation. Just get that fellow off my channel." said, "Mr. President--" He said, "Do you know what station it is?"  I said, "Yes, sir, It's Corpus Christi." It was right on a line with San Antonio. I said, "It's just slightly off line, but it's enough to interfere." He said, "Well, don't give me all the technical jargon. Just get him off the air." I said, "Mr. President, there are only two ways I can do that now and you might get some publicity if you do. I'd call him, identify myself, and tell him that he's radiated outside his service area, to go off the air, or reduce power.  If he can't reduce power, he'll have to go off the air.   Or, if he won't listen to me, I'll call the FCC and ask them to call him and take him off.   Either way you're liable to   get some publicity." "Look," he said, "I'm not looking for publicity this hour of the night, and I'm not worried about anything. But don't you identify with me or with the White House. Just call him and tell him to go off the air." I said, "Mr. President, he's not likely to listen." "Look," he said, "I don't tell you how to do your job, and I don't want you asking me how to do it either. Just get him off." So, he hung up. I did the only smart thing I'd done all night long, I rolled over and went back to sleep. I didn't call anybody, because there was not a thing I could do, not one. That fellow wouldn't have listened to me if had called him.

G:        He was a radio broadcaster, television broadcaster?

A:       Television station in Corpus Christi was broadcasting the same channel--right across the top of San Antonio--and coming in right on top of us and he was watching that channel at the Ranch. And there's not a thing you can do about it. It's there and it's there till it goes away. You can adjust the antenna, you can move it off or you can reduce it somewhat, but you can't get rid of it.

G:        He didn't call you back I assume?

A:        He never said a word, not the next day or any other time.  He would do this. He would call me and ask me a question and unless I went back to him with an answer of some sort, he'd never, never ask me about it again.
G:        Was it a good rule of thumb, if he was asking you to do something that was unreasonable, could you ignore it?

A:        Well, in this case I did, because this was totally unreasonable. In general, the first year I tried to do them until, as I said, I got to the point where I really didn't care. If he fired me, all right. And so, then I'd go back to him, after he'd get this, and I'd usually get a mission not from him direct but from other people. They'd say, "Oh, by the way, the President wants that podium reduced by four inches," and I'd say, "That's not right. He doesn't want that. It will be too short, hit him on his belly button. That's not going to work." That's an example of one. I went back and I said, "Let me see the President and ask him what he wants." And when I got in there that wasn't what he said at all, not at  all.

So, I say I'm getting my messages wrong, but once or twice I went to him and I said, "Mr. President, there is a problem with what you've asked me to do, and this is what the problem is." He'd listen and sometimes he'd say, "Well, why can't you do it the way I want you to?" And I'd say, "Mr. President, you can. But I don't think you're going to be happy."  "Well, how are you to judge whether I'm going to be happy or not?"  he said. "Just do it that way and let's find out."  Well, I had to do it that way once or twice.  I did it exactly as he asked me, and sure enough, he wasn't happy with it. And he said, "You're right. Change it!" He was the first one to admit when he didn't like something. He’d tell you quickly. But I don't call that arguing with him, I call it trying to clarify it with him, trying to be sure that that's what he wanted, and did he understand the difficulties in doing it that way. But sometimes he was adamant, he said, "No, want it just that way." And we did it.

G:        Again, on the White House telephone situation, could he dial number himself from his telephone?

A:        Yes. But they couldn't dial in to him. Nobody [could].

G:        They'd have to go through--

A:        Had an operator intercept, either the White House administrative board with the women on it, or through my boys. No number dialed directly in to him. He had no direct access. He wanted it that way. And of course, the Secret Service wanted it that way. Because you'd get calls all hours of the day and night, crank calls and everything. Once that number gets out, you just couldn't keep it a secret. So, no, he could not.

Now, he could originate. If he really wanted to call somebody, he could pick it up and tell one of these operators, "Give me an outside line," or have his secretary say, "Give me an outside line." Then she could place the call. All he had to do with the board is them give him an outside line connected to the line and he just dialed it straight out.

No problem at all. The phones all worked interconnecting. But no, he could not. Neither Nixon nor President Johnson had a [direct access].                                             

G:      What sort of a ring did the phone have? Was it a one ring? If the President punched your      button—

A:        It started ringing and rang till you picked it up. Not continuous, it was a buzz really, b-z-z-z, like that, and it continued to buzz two seconds, three seconds. Then it would stop and again in another two or three seconds and so on.

But it was an interval type thing. It would do that until somebody picked it up. And if nobody was in the office at all when he rang, they never did answer, and so he said guess nobody's home, that kind of thing.

G:        The recording system that he had for recording the phone conversations. Did you ever have any idea why he wanted to--what his motivation was in getting a recorded record of these conversations?

A:        Yes, I understood that from the beginning. Now, that system was in the White House in a very limited form when I arrived.

G:        Dictabelt type thing?

A:        In earlier years, yes, that's what it was.  Not a very good system and very poor, as a  matter of fact. The girls each day would transcribe it and give him back, as best they could, a verbatim record of what was said. Watson's initial discussion with me, he said, "Look, we get a lot of calls in here from politicians and they want this done, they want this judge appointed. I can't remember all those names. So, the only way I can do it has gotten them down on some kind of tape where I can record it later and say, 'Okay, Mr. so and so, I'll get back to you as soon as we have chance to look at this.' But we wouldn't realize how many calls we get in a day.   Hundreds of calls and everybody wants something,  wants this postmaster appointed or this judge or wants this guy fired, or something they wanted, always. I want to just make a record of it." So, these girls typed these up every day and made a record. I'm sure you've got hundreds of stacks of these in the White House.

Now, an interesting story. (Interruption)

This is going to be a public record now of this?

G:        Well, in time, sure. It's not something you need to release anytime soon.

A:        All right. Well, in the case of the recorder, when I arrived in the White House, they were using a Dictaphone belt-type recorder, and it was in selected desks. The instrument itself was in a desk, and to be actuated they had to reach under the desk and flip switch, actually an overt act to turn the recorder on. And it could be selected and fitted only on certain lines within that telephone. That was the way it was wired.

G:        Was it strictly a telephone operation?

A:        Only a telephone operation, in those rooms, in those offices. Now I'll describe some things later that were different.

After we'd been there for about five or six months, they began to not be pleased with the quality of what they were getting, and at that time Watson said to me, "I want to expand the system." Now mind you, it was fairly close-held, a lot of people didn't know about this. Of course, Mary Jo Cook and some of the other girls there all did, Marie Fehmer, that crowd did, because they worked on them day to day. Juanita Roberts and so on.  But Marvin said to me, "Isn't [there] any better recorder you can buy that could get us a longer carrier on this thing?" I said, "Well, certainly there is. There are high quality recorders that will tape up to eight, ten, twelve hours if that's what you want, long- playing recorder." So, he said, "Well, why don't you get some of those?" I said, "Marvin, give me a list of where you want them."  So, he did.   He sat down and said, "Now want my desk, want it in Jake's desk, want it in Califano's desk," and so on down this list.

So, we went out, bought these recorders, installed them after midnight. Everybody was out of the building. We went in and recorded [installed?] them. Now these were placed different. They were wired into the telephones in such a way that he had to literally push a button below the desk, the same thing with his knee to push it now and turn it on. But it went across whatever line he was talking on at that moment. In other words, it was across all lines, but he could only talk on the one at a time. Whatever line he picked up, that's what recorded. So, the problem then was in the recorder sets he couldn't tell you what line he was on. So, if later he said to me, I wonder what line I took that on, you couldn't tell that except any call that came in for certain selected people, we kept a log at the board. Log such and such a time to the President or to the appointments secretary or Califano or Jacobsen. Selected people he said--we kept a log of how many calls they got, and then they put on it what line they put it on. So, this was a recording device for the aides as well as the President?

A:        The President didn't use those. No.

G:        see. Okay.

A:        The President had them available to him, but the only few times that he ever used it, it would be there in the Mansion somewhere. I don't think he used that in his office.

G:        I see.

A:        But he wouldn't have done it anyway. He wouldn't really have gotten involved in that  kind of thing because Juanita Roberts was sitting right outside his desk and would handle all of his calls, just about all of them he placed. Now he could, as we said, call the operator, place his own, and did. But if he wanted to be recorded, he'd have to tell somebody so they'd turn on the recorder out there to do it.

Now, we could do one more. At the switchboard itself we had two recorders, and if the President told us, "Make a record of this," we recorded it on line before he ever got back on the line, the recorder was on. Then that tape was delivered to his secretary the following morning, next work day, and then she in turn did the transcription.
G:        Juanita Roberts would do this?

A:       Or Marie Fehmer, whoever was outside there at the moment. We never recorded [transcribed?] any of them. We didn't do any of that. Nor did we retain them. We never retained a tape. They all went to that group.

G:       Did you maintain Juanita Roberts' system and Marie Fehmer's, I mean the system that allowed them to record the [calls]?

A:      Yes, right. Yes. We maintained all of those. Everyone was in a desk. I'd have to refresh my memory of the actual documents, I don't have them.

They wouldn't let me have them when I got into this trouble of having made a statement. I tried to retrieve those documents, and at that time [General] Brent Scowcroft would not let me have them. He had them.  They had been turned over to him by the White House Communications Agency. But he would not release them to me, because  now he's in the midst of a Nixon Administration, and I'm trying to find documents to defend me from previous administration.  And while he was nice enough about it, he just didn't feel that in that environment he could do it.  Now later they played false,  because they gave those records to [William] Gulley. Gulley's got them.

G:        They did?

A:      Gulley's got them in his book [Breaking Cover]. Have you read his book? You might should look. Those things [that] are spelled out in his book are the records I couldn't get, even though they are ones that I originated. Unclassified. The only one that was ever classified nature was this one that we kept on where the recordings went.

G:    Well, Marie Fehmer or Juanita Roberts could turn on the recording and record his     conversations.

A:        That's right. Or their own if they chose to. It didn't matter, if they could record. Because they had the job also of transcribing or seeing them transcribed by another secretary the following day. They even had two or three girls that did nothing but that. Every morning, the first thing they'd do they'd have to transcribe these. And that's a tedious task.

G:        Do you think he ever utilized these as proof of what he had said or as proof of what someone else had promised him?

A:        No. Not the tape per se, never, that know of. He used that record. Now I've seen him refer to these records, and Watson and others. They'd have a transcript of so and so, "I talked to so and so yesterday morning at eight o'clock and this is what he said, this is what I said." Now they had those.

Now he generally didn't pass those around. They weren't passed around to anybody, they only came from the secretary back to the man that was involved in the recording. However, I was in there and close enough to them that they knew that I would service the tapes. If I wanted to listen to them, I could listen to them the night before.

Nobody is going to stop me. I could go through the House anywhere. So, it wasn't a question of curiosity; it was a question of doing my job, making sure that they worked correctly. That was my job. So, I provided that service for him. And I put it in there the way they wanted it to work. There was never in the telephone system in there anywhere an automatic recording device that came on. Never an automatic, nor in the offices, never an automatic pick-up.

Now let me tell you one other interesting [thing] we tried, and it didn't work. The President asked me could I put a recording system in the Cabinet Room with multiple microphones to pick up conversations of different people and record it out somewhere else. Well, we did. I don't recall the number of microphones, but we bored holes throughout that cabinet table--it's got holes all in it--and then we covered the holes up every time where you couldn't even see it from the outside. But these little microphones--oh, they're no bigger, well, less than the end of your finger. Now your problem is, if you've ever tried to make a recording of anything with ten people in the room, three of them whispering, two beating pipes, like [James R.] Schlesinger and that crowd, beating pipes on the ashtray, the other guy coughing and another guy scraping his feet, there is no way. You might get a smattering of somebody, because you can't change your microphones. All microphones are wired, they're open, and any sound anywhere in the room is picked up and thrown on that tape. But to go back and make sense out of it, even if you could identify what somebody said, only rare cases could we identify the   voice that clearly. The President, yes. A couple of others you might get through, George Christian, that kind. They spoke a very distinctive form. But so many of our cabinet people we didn't hear that often and they'd come in there and talk, and so we couldn't do much about it.

Interestingly enough, about a month or so after we'd installed this the President said, "Well, is it working? Working well?" I said, "Working but not well, not with that number of people. We're not getting anything but gibberish." He said, "Well, could you do it if it's just one or two?" And I said, "Well, I can record that easy later on." What I didn't know is Bobby Kennedy was scheduled to see him.

G:        Oh, in the Cabinet Room.

A:        Bobby Kennedy was coming to see the President, and he met him in the Cabinet Room.

Well, Bobby had a briefcase in his lap and never opened the briefcase. What we found  after they left is, he had a high frequency buzzer in there that buzzed all the time he was in there, ultrasound, where it was just getting enough of the sound on to that microphone, you couldn't hear anything except the noise. R-r-r-r-r-r-r-.

G:        How did you realize that?

A:        Well, when we tried to transcribe it back.   We knew that something was wrong.   We knew the President hadn't done it, and all the microphones were working before he walked in. And then something happened when we tried to run the tape back and tried to run it and there's that noise, that high frequency buzz. So, we knew somebody had interfered with it. So, our guess is--we couldn't prove it. And the President, we told him about it, he just laughed, said, "That crooked little so-and-so."

But we were pretty sure that he had something in that briefcase. It was nothing more than a continuous buzz. All you needed was something with a battery-type buzzer that makes a fairly high frequency buzz, might interfere with dogs' hearing and so forth, but it also plays hell with that microphone, because it picks up all frequencies.

G:        You know, in some of these books, though, that meeting is recounted in such detail, just verbatim, that you got the impression that somebody must have recorded it.

A:        No. You can take my word for it. It didn't come out of any recording in that meeting, unless Bobby had a recorder in there himself. I don't believe it.

G:        Could he have had one that would not be sensitive to the buzzer?

A:        I don't believe so. Because our microphone was some of the finest that you could buy anywhere in the world, a very expensive one itself. But when it interferes with all of our pickup, it had to interfere with whatever he had. So, I don't believe so. I don't believe anybody could have recorded that conversation. And the President was a little miffed at us, but he realized what had happened. I let him listen to it. And he said, "That son of a bitch."

G:        How did you know he had the briefcase? Did you see it?

A:        Only because I was told that. I didn't know it. See, I wasn't there at the time he went in. But somebody told me, Jim Jones, or I guess it was Watson told me later. He said, "He went in with briefcase in his lap." When he heard the tape he said, "Uh oh, something's interfered." And he could tell it was a buzzer or a deliberate interference. And he said, "He must have had something in that briefcase." They didn't look in his briefcase. Now this would be common; they do other visitors coming in there to see the President. You might look at it. But a political figure like that you wouldn't have, I don't think.

Certainly, no question [inaudible].

Tape 2 of 2

A:        Now that's the only time to my knowledge we ever tried to record anything with an open mike. It's just pandemonium, it's just not feasible. One on one you could; ten people, twelve people, it's impossible.

G:        There was no capability in the Oval Office to record a meeting with say a senator?

A:   Negative, nothing. No, he was very, very careful. I know that office very well,  there's nothing in there. But the tape recorder was there if he chose to use it only for telephone calls. There was no microphone in there. He couldn't record anything.

G:        Lyndon Johnson seems to have been a man that just loved gadgetry.

A:        He did, very much. There's some very interesting stories I could tell you, but you'll run out of tape before we get through. There's hundreds of them.

He loved to call you up and surprise you and say, "Okay, I see they've got such- and-such a product on the market. I'd like to see some of them." He read it somewhere or heard about it. "Get me some and bring them over." We'd take them over and show them to him.

Case in point, just a quickie I'll tell you, make it short. He wanted a cheap, small tape recorder. What's the cheapest on the market and the best quality and all that. So, I went out and got all of these little ones made by Americans, which weren't very good at that time. Then brought him a Japanese one, it's called the X100 believe, is the name  of it. He looked at all of them.  Now this X100 was about five inches wide by about seven inches long and it would record on a full [four?]--I think it was an hour on each side.  He just loved it.  Oh, he thought it was great, thought the quality was great.  He said, "How much is this going to cost? I'm worried about the price of them." I said, "I don't know, Mr. President, probably a hundred or more." "Oh, hell," he says, "it isn’t worth that." Now, he was looking at others that were selling for twenty-five, thirty, thirty-five. The quality of this one was far superior. He said, "Well, I'll tell you what.

I'll-give them fifty. I won't pay more than fifty for it." And he said, "I want fifty of them." I said, "Mr. President, that's an experimental model. It's just in the United States, the first models. They're not here in quantities of fifty." He said, "I didn't ask you to explain where you was going to get them from. Just get me fifty.  There's no hurry.  I'd like them by tomorrow morning." Now this is three in the afternoon, four.

So, I went to the dealer where we get Sony products, Sony 100. I said, "I need fifty." This guy almost died of apoplexy. He said, "There's not fifty in the United States. If I took every, one of them away from every dealer I distribute on the East Coast"--which is what he was distributor for--"I couldn't get you fifty." I said, "Where are fifty?" He said, "Japan," I said, "Get on the phone. Call and tell them to ship you fifty by the first airplane. I've got to have them before the night's over." Oh, my God, he thought I was crazy. Then I told him the second [request], and this really stunned him. I said, "Well, how much are these going to cost?" He said, "I don't know. I'm retailing them at a hundred and fifty-five. I probably get them wholesale for one [hundred] thirty- five." said, "Okay, give me two invoices. One invoice for fifty of these at fifty dollars apiece, and the other invoice for the remaining amount of money. Whatever it is, I want them, I've got to have them." And all the extra freight and all the rest, I had it on the other bill, not on there. I said, "I've got to take that to the President tomorrow morning." "Okay."

So, he gives me the invoice. Now the sets are not even here. All he did was give me the fifty invoice, and the price of it and so on. They called and put them on a Northwest Orient airline out of the Sony factory, delivered them to New York. I had a man waiting in New York, took them off the airplane, got another plane, brought them down, and I delivered them to the President somewhere around nine or ten the next morning.

So, I went in, took them to him, told him I had them--told Watson first. Watson said, "You better tell him. He didn't think you'd ever do it." I said, "Well, I got them." I showed him. "Well," he said, "that's fine, fine. knew you could do it. Now where's that invoice?" I handed it to him. He said, "Fifty dollars? I think you're pulling my leg." "Why, do you think it's worth more than that?" He said, "No! That's all I told you to pay for them.  That's all you're going to pay?"  I said, "Well, you see the invoice, don't you?" I never did say that's all I'm going to pay. I said, "You see the invoice?" "Yes," he said, "but I've a suspicion you've pulled a sneaker on me. You got another invoice?" "You don't want to see that one, do you?" He said, "Not really. This is good enough."

He had a group of people, visitors, through that day. There was a congressional group coming over for lunch, or a discussion of some sort. And he gave them all away, all fifty of them. Then Watson called me and said, "You're going to drop dead. He gave those fifty away, and he wants fifty more."  I said, "Watson, you killed me last night." He said, "Now don't give me your sad story, just get them." I said, "By tomorrow morning?"  He said, "Yes, the same thing."  "And another invoice for fifty?"  told Watson, I showed Watson that invoice, he knew it wasn't true. He said, "Yes. They're so cheap, he wants fifty more."

So, I called this fellow again.  We went through the same routine, got that fellow in Japan, he shipped them back.  And again, delivered fifty the next morning.  He looked at these invoices and he said, "You've sure learned the White House way. You sure learned your way around the White House in a hurry." I said, "No, sir." He said, "That's the way Texans do business. You say to somebody, 'oh, that's too much money. I'll give you fifty dollars for it but I'm going to buy X number,' and the guy comes down in price. That's the way you deal with these Japanese." I said, "Yes, sir." He just laughed. He knew damn well. I felt sure Watson had told him. But that's all he ever saw was that invoice for the first fifty that were shipped--(Interruption)

An interesting point. In November 1968, after the election you'll recall that Nixon set up his offices in New York City. The first people that I met were [H. R] Haldeman and [John] Ehrlichman. They came and asked me to join them in Miami Beach, down at Key Biscayne, to talk about setting up the President[-elect]'s home down there and arrangements for that. So, we went down there and met them. Haldeman did most of the talking, very brusque, not really unfriendly but certainly not friendly at all,  as much as though I was a part of the criminal element and so on. However, he knew I was a military man and he said, "I respect you for what you've done. You've had a job to do. But I want you to be perfectly honest with me."

So, we went through what was to be done for the house. We made the plans and he agreed to them and we left. I gave instructions to my men and I left and came back to Washington.

Somewhere about mid-November--and I don't know the exact date--J. Edgar Hoover either asked for an appointment with the President-elect or the President-elect sent for him, don't know which way it occurred. I'm not sure of that. But he went to see Nixon.  He had an appointment and he went to see him. He spoke to Nixon in the presence of Haldeman, Ehrlichman and two Secret Service [men]. The gist of the conversation was this: "Mr. Nixon, I think you should be aware that there are recorders on every phone in the White House and that every call made through the White House Signal Board is recorded. So, my advice to you is don't make any calls through there that you don't want them to know about. If you want to make calls that are sensitive or to your own people, make them on a commercial system out of here where they can't record it."

Well, this shook the President-to-be. It shook Haldeman, Ehrlichman. But fortunately for me one of the Secret Service men there was not only reporting to his own boss, but a personal friend of mine. He reported it to his boss in the White House, Bob Taylor, and Bob Taylor called me over and repeated it to me. He said, "J. Edgar Hoover has told this to Mr. Nixon, that that's true." Now, the Secret Service never asked the question about it, but we never had a question that they knew. We never denied it; we knew they did. Because they handled the internal security devices, the workings in a room, the sweeps. They handled all of that, the Technical Services Division of the Secret Service. So, he said, "I think you had better tell the President."

So, I went to see Jim Jones and told him that I had to talk to the President. He said, "What's it about?"  said, "Well, I'd appreciate it if you'd let me have chance to  tell him, and you come in with me because want you to listen." went in and I repeated--now, this is third hand at this point. I'm telling him, "This is what I've been told, Mr. President. I did not hear it. I cannot swear it to be true, but I've been told this twice, once removed from the man who heard it. They've already reported this to him." His comment was, "Well, I'm not surprised. He's done this any time we've had a president come in office. That's his way of ingratiating, 'Welcome to the club. Now I happen to have this list of information about various people. I'd just as soon not release it, but. . . .' That's the way he kept his job."
The President was very disdainful of him, said, "I should have fired the son of a bitch when I came into office"--that's the way he said it--"but I was soft-hearted, and I didn't do it.  Okay, what do we got to do to get them out?   want you to come to me by   10 January"--10 January is the day, I remember because it's my birthday--"I want you to come to me by 10 January, me personally, not in a memo, nothing.   You come in and stand up and tell me, 'I've removed every trace. Every recorder is gone, every bit of wiring is gone.' You've taken it all out of here. Nobody can ever find anything in this White House where I had these recorders in these desks, where you could record down on the board. want them all out.  You clear?" "Yes, sir." He said, "Now tell you, unless  you have them, you come tell me you're not ready. But you be sure I'm the one that knows. But I want you to know where everything's gone, and nobody could find them." "Yes, sir."

So, I called my people in who had done the installation, and I said, "Okay, here's your job. Now this is the sequence want them taken out. Some will be at night, some from now on. All the wire, all the traces, everything else. If you have to paint the desks where we had screws in them, all that's got to be corrected and covered over. All is to be done between now and"--certainly I gave them a deadline of the sixth of January. Then I went through the building with them at night to look, and sure enough I didn't find any traces. And I knew where they had been, not all but most of them. So, I went back to the President on the tenth of January and I said, "Okay, Mr. President, it's all clear." "Now you're sure?" "Mr. President, I've been through and looked." He said, "All right. Now you haven't failed me yet, I'll take your word for it."

So, comes 20 January, they take office. Three o'clock in the afternoon I'm in my office. I did not go to the inauguration. I had work to do and I was there in the office in the Executive Office Building and I get a call, "Mr. Haldeman wants to see you." Now I had only met him one time and had not talked to him since. That was down in Florida. went to see him, and he shut the door and [had] very worried look on his face and he said, "We have been told by a source unnamed that you have recorders here in the White House on the telephone lines and all on the Signal switchboard. Is this true? I respect your views as a military man, but I want to know is it true?" I said, "It is not true, Mr. Haldeman. There are none here." He said, "The second question, and I'll leave it to your discretion to answer if you choose to: were there recording devices here at an earlier time?" I said, "I'd rather not answer that." So, he surmised to himself. He said, "Now it isn't as though I don't trust you or I trust you, I don't know either way. But I assume that you'll be as loyal to us as you were to President Johnson and his crowd." I said, "You have no reason to doubt that, Mr. Haldeman, none at all. I'll show you every element of proof of it."  He said, "But I've got an expert here want to go through with you and  look." So, he buzzed, and the girl got an expert. Now what he picked up was a man from the Pacific Telephone Company who had followed his campaign throughout California and sort of strung with him. When he won the election, he came there as an adviser on telecommunications matters. He was there.

So, he introduced this man. I didn't know him. I'd never seen him before, didn't know who he was, didn't know what he knew. I took the man with me and went through the White House. We went and looked at desks, desks outside there--we hadn't changed any of them; they were the same desks in various other people's offices, in the President's desk, went to the basement, went through the Signal Board, went through the main frame. That's where he thought it all was, in all these big taps hanging there. He went through everything. He looked here. We worked about four hours.

About seven o'clock, seven-thirty we finished, and we went back. Mr. Haldeman was still there, and he said, "Okay." left the room. The fellow talked to him for a minute. Then he called me back in and he said, "Okay, thank you very much"--I was now a general,--he said, "Thank you, General. I do appreciate it. I recognize that this was awkward for you, but better to get it out of the way now so we trust each other. 

My man informed me there are none here and no evidence there's ever been any here."  The man then left--he left the office that day, he was in the office guess still, and he left. So, I said, "Mr. Haldeman, I'm a member of your team now and if you don't like what say, you fire me really quick. But I want to tell you something. The next time you call in an expert to go and look at something, for God's sakes, get a man who knows what he's doing. That fellow couldn't find a menstruating elephant walking through seven feet of snow. He doesn't know a thing about telecommunications. He might have been an administrator in the telephone company on the West Coast, but he was never a technician. He knows in general what they're supposed to look like, but I could have hidden forty recorders down there, and he never would have found them. He didn't really know where to look." He laughed and said, "Well, that shows you what we don't know about our own experts. I appreciate you for telling me. Now you've assured me that there are none here?"

I said, "I have assured you, that is true." He said, "Okay. Now would you send me a memo tomorrow morning and tell me that you assure me that there are none. I want your handwriting." So, I gave him one, it's in the records, a memo to him. That's how much they trusted us based on what they had been told by J. Edgar Hoover.

Now my boss--I went to my boss immediately, too, before I ever went to the President and told him. His first question is, "Well, should we tell the Secretary of Defense or what should we do?" Well, I left it to him, what he told him I don't know. Whether he ever told him, I don't know.

G:      You in effect had two chains of command, because it sounds like the President in so many cases wanted you to report directly to him, and yet you did have a regular chain of command in the Defense Department.

A:        Yes. On the military side, I had a boss. My boss was the director of DCA.  In earlier years General [Alfred] Starbird, later General [Richard] Klocko, and at that time it was General Klocko.  He was there when I left.  Now, these people provided all my money for me. They handled all the recruitment of my personnel for me.
I selected the people, gave them the polygraph and everything that was called for, but they did the actual physical moving on their orders. So as long as it appears that the DCA was hiring these people and moving them around and they're paying all the bills, nobody in Congress or anyone else could ever trace what it cost to run the White House. Because the records don't appear like that. They've got a different system today. They've got a better feel, but there's no way to detect it exactly.

They don't know.

So, at any rate, that was my boss in the military chain. But my instructions from the Secretary of Defense, when I went over there was "You've got one job and that is to keep that President happy. I don't care what it costs, I don't care what you have to do to do it, I don't care whether it's legal, illegal or otherwise, if the President wants it, that's an order. We'll worry about the legalities of it later. If you need money, you call Califano." That's why I called him, see.   That's the contact that had.   Then later he left and there was a colonel on the staff that did the same job. But he said, "That's the man you call.

Now if you can't reach us, go to your own boss, tell him what it is, and he's got the problem of finding the money if you need money. But that's it. We're totally here to support you. Your job's over there. If I hear a gripe out of him, you're not there. You're gone. Your career is dead." Just in effect like that. So here I'm standing on tenterhooks. If my President doesn't like what I do my career is dead. And of course, at this time I had over thirty years service, or close to it. No, it was twenty-seven years.

G:        I understand that another WHCA function that was expanded was the coaxial cable tie-in to the White House.

A:        The coaxial cable from where?

G:        Well,  didn't  you  have one  installed,  an  antenna  sort of thing to improve the television    reception?

A:        Oh, you mean the in-house television system?

G:        Yes.

A:        Yes. Yes, we installed that while I was there. As you know, President Johnson was a great believer in televisions. He was given a set of televisions side by side. We called it the three-eyed monster.

G:        Where did he get it, do you know?

A:        Well, the first three had to deal with were GEs. He had three little seventeen-inch GEs side by side. They call for a great deal of electronics below that to do this.
Because what you're doing is, you're switching by remote control from television to television, but you only hear one sound at a time, and you could only watch one channel at a time. You see, put it ABC, NBC or CBS; that's what he watched. He could see all three pictures, but the minute something came on that he wanted to hear, he'd flip through there until he heard the voice on that channel, channel 1, and there was a light underneath there which told him which one he was looking at and listening to the voice.  Somebody gave him one back in the spring of 1965, 1 guess about the time I arrived there.

One of the first jobs I got--and I'd been on the job probably a week, about 7 or 8 May--we took and showed him a twenty-five-inch RCA, some of the first on the market. This was a twenty-five-inch color in a console about so big, a beautiful set. We had taken and shown him one. He liked the color, he liked the contrast. He said, "Yes, I'll let you know how many of those I want, if I want some."   Now this is something like two or three in the afternoon. Well, he had a speech scheduled that night, believe it was the Waldorf Astoria in New York. I flew to New York then after this. He made his speech and we came home.

We had had a dinner engagement that night with a Canadian couple over in Arlington. My wife had gone, and by the time I arrived there it was roughly ten o'clock. I got back from New York on a flight and helicoptered back into the White House and then drove to Arlington and went to the dinner. It was either ten or later. They had all finished eating; they were down to the liqueurs and so forth. Of course, they got to bring out my dinner and I'm sitting there eating my Cornish game hen they had rewarmed, chatting and chatting about what the day had been and what the job was like. I don't know, I had a lot of friends around me, fifteen or twenty, some I knew very well, some I didn't know so well.

The phone rings. They said, "The President wants to talk to you." Well, Christ, this is consternation in that house and to me, too. He had never called me before because I had only been on the job seven days. Then he said, "What are you doing?" Same old question he often asked me. "Where are you?", he'd sometimes say. This night he said, "What are you doing?" I said, "Well, I'm having dinner with some friends over in Arlington." He said, "Well, that's nice, to have lots of friends. You know that television set we saw today?"  And I said, "Yes, sir, the twenty-five-inch RCA?"  "Yes.  Now you've seen these little three sets we've got here that I was given, little GE sets.  They isn’t quite big enough to look at. Can you get me some of those big twenty-five inchers and put them side by side and make them into this thing?" I, said, "Well, yes, sir. What I'll do, I'll get the same one not as a console, but as a table model where we can fit it on this box. But we'll have to work the electronics up; we never built any of those electronics. It might take a few days to do this." He said, "Well, there's no hurry about it. I would like to have them by"--I don't know what he said, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, something like five or six days later.  Now we hadn't even looked at the design.  We didn't know exactly how to go about it. We had good technicians, good people and so we obviously could do it. But we hadn't looked, we just hadn't done it. Because I didn't have any idea, he wanted them in three-eyed configurations.

He said, "Now, want you to get me eighteen of those sets." said, "You want  them made up in six of these?" He said, "No, make five of these three side-by-side [sets] and keep three of them as spares. I'm sure you'll have trouble with some of them." I said, "That's good thinking, Mr. President. Fine. I'll do that." But then he said the one that stumped me and stunned me. He said, "Now guess there's no real hurry about them, but I'd like to have them by ten o'clock tomorrow morning." I did a double-take. I was just new on the job, I didn't know what I could do, what my people could do. I knew little about the job.  I was just beginning to get a feel, and I didn't like what felt so far, I   wasn't sure.  But nevertheless, I said, "All right, Mr. President, I'll try.

I think those are not production-line models; I think they're first-run. I don't know whether they've got eighteen." He said, "Look, don't worry about it. You'll get them. I'm sure you will, Colonel," and he hung up. I am a lieutenant colonel at this point, I haven't even been promoted to colonel. I was scheduled to be promoted a week later, and I was. Not anything he did there, I would have been normally.
So, I called my man, who did procurement for me. He choked a little, but he said, "Okay, I'll go to the dealer and I'll see what I can do."  He went to the RCA dealer local  in town that we had gotten these experimental models from to show to the President.

This guy almost died of apoplexy. He said, "Eighteen? There aren't eighteen! They only built forty to begin with, and these are scattered in the homes of the executives and distributors of RCA products, in their homes up and down the East Coast. Offhand I can tell you there's four or five in the Washington area, there's four or five in Philadelphia and a couple in New York. I wouldn't know where to get eighteen." All my man said, "Well, you've got a problem. You've got to have eighteen by tomorrow morning." Well, I don't know what he did, I don't know what strings he pulled, I don't know who he made mad. All I know is by the next morning I was told at nine o'clock I had eighteen of those sets. So, when I saw the President--called him at ten o'clock. I didn't go to see him. I called him, first time I had ever called him. I said, "You asked me about those television sets? We have them, Mr. President. Do you want me to go ahead and configure them like we talked about?" He said, "Well, I knew you could do it. Yes, go ahead and make five of them up, keep three for spares." I said, "Thank you, Mr. President."

Well, I did.  It took me--I don't know, after we got the first model working, we had our bugs with it. We made it up. Then after we got them made and put them in there  to him, he liked them, But he said, "You know, television reception is not very good here. Can't you improve it?"   Well, we knew the system in the house was antiquated, it had   been there a long time, it had been patched up and people had added to it. I said, "Well, Mr. President, I probably should be able to go with a complete new system.  The one there is just not adequate for what you want. We should do the whole thing and do it right.   I can move the recording studio.   They've been bitching at me to move it for years. I can move it if you want to at the same time. I'll put it over in the Executive Office Building. I'll put my reproducers and everything all over there." "Yes," he said, "You go ahead. It's going to cost you a little money, isn't it?" said, "Yes, sir."  He said, "You got any money?" I thought then, oh, God, I said the wrong thing. I said, "I don't know. I'll find out." He said, "Well, you can get it. Just call Joe Califano. He's got money." Well, he knew what the SECDEF [secretary of defense] said.

So, I did call him, and I needed, I don't know, four hundred thousand, five hundred, whatever it was to buy what I needed to do it and got on with it. But that's when we expanded the system was in the spring of 1965. Now they expanded it later again and moved it later after left there.

G:        Did the three televisions, the three RCAs, have more or less the same electronic system that the small GEs had had? Did you just kind of duplicate that system?

A:        Yes. Just duplicated is all we did. We went over, looked, saw what they had done to it and built one identical.

G:        That was presumably something that GE had done?
A:        GE did it and they did it sort of as a lark. One of the engineers in there said, "We ought to give this to the President," so they did. Once he saw it, he said, "Well, I don't know why I can't do it on a big old color. That's a little black and white." See, GEs were seventeen-inch black and white. So, we then made all these up. We left them at the Ranch, we left them. . . You may have some in your offices there.

G:        We've got one in the Oval Office, I know.

A:        One of those three's?

G:        Yes.

A:        That came out of the Oval Office here. That's because it was an exact [copy].  I guess they just moved the equipment down from here when they moved down. Well, we left all those spares at the Ranch, you know, the other three spares are down there.

G:        I guess so.

A:        Now let me tell you an interesting one, just to carry that story one further. Some year--I don't remember when it was--probably I think it was Jim Jones that asked me. That's in a memo in here, the date's on one of these memos and I don't recall what it is. But he came by and asked me if I could arrange it where one channel on one of those sets would change channels. If he wanted to look through channel two through thirteen, he could do it. I said, "Yes, we've locked them all into position. They really don't turn now with the remote control. But now you've given me a different problem.  Now I've got to have remote control that's bigger because it's got to have now thirteen channels appearing, all are switched at sequences through that or turned to those thirteen channels on the one set." So, what we built was another separate remote control for each of these. The first one and the second was voice only, and the third one we could step it. You could hold down a button and it would go two-three-four and so on, and then it would reverse. If you held the button above you could reverse them, if you got to five and wanted to go  back to four you could, and that's what he wanted.  So, I had to change all of them, and   one set on the right was always the one that changed. I changed all five of those sets.

G:        When you moved your White House television center or whatever you [called it]—

A:        It was a recording studio really.

G:      Yes, recording studio. Did you also put in a videotape capability so that you could tape programs and play them back?

A:        Yes, we started that before that.

G:        Oh, did you?

A:        We started the videotaping of his programs, oh, somewhere--we started out using Sony's. Sony put out a little Betamax, an earlier model.

G:        Was it a half-inch format?

A:       A half-inch format. We found out that that was no good, because we could play it on that Sony, but you can't take it and pick it up and move it and play it on another, and you can't transcribe it from one to another one. It's the doggonest mess you ever saw. They just were incompatible tape-wise to exchange. So that didn't work. We'd have to mark on there, "play it on recorder so-and-so." You had to play it back on the same one, because the little grooves and things in it--it was not a commercial model, it was a home model, and so it was not perfect head on it.

So somewhere after we'd been in this job for three months recording him, when he made a televised program, we made a copy, only when he made televised programs. If somebody else was making a tape of it, we made one and we placed it in the archives.

Well, we then changed off to Ampex, and Ampex had a commercial model.  God, it cost, I don't know, twenty-five, thirty thousand dollars apiece. And it would be small enough, like so, that we could travel with them, only you had to buy enough of them that wherever he went we had to travel, because then he wanted to get--you've got to get a camera and all this stuff that goes with it, to pick your pickups. And that worked out better. Now that was still half-inch tape, but at least they were interchangeable. You could take it off of one Ampex and play it on another.

Then we got a set-up where we bought two, I believe the originals were RCAs, big ones, two inch. And we took them and transcribed the Ampex into two-inch for the record. Now they've changed it since; I believe they've got all Ampexes in there now.
But I think the ones we had last [were Ampex]. I'm not certain about that, but the ones we had were RCAs. Yes, I know we did. We changed them out because I had to give away the RCAs, so I gave it to a movie--out to a relocation site. We had some emergency relocation sites, and I moved it out to one of those, those RCAs and put in I guess Ampexes.

G:        Would he often want to watch, let's say, a "Meet the Press" program at another time, or would he ask for these?

A:    Yes. Yes. We were asked to record certain programs of that nature. We always had this capability, if he wanted to, we'd take it right off the air, record it. We had it on a patch right through to the signals and [we would] take the output of the TV itself and record.

G:       Did you wait for orders from him to record particular program or did you just automatically--?

A:      Certain programs were automatic, "Gunsmoke" as an example. That's one of Mrs. Johnson's favorites. We used to record that. Frequently after we built the system at the Ranch, the cable system and all that down there to give them good television and so on. That's long story in itself, but we did build one down there in the fall of 1965. She would occasionally have a television set that somebody would start playing with and moving the adjustment, and the next time you got nothing. So, she would get panicky. It's near time for "Gunsmoke," she would call over there and say, "Can somebody come adjust this television set, it's all out of order."

So, one night my television man had gone to dinner. I don't know, this was eight o'clock, whenever the show was, eight or nine at night. She called and said, "Colonel, can anybody fix the television set over here?" said, "I can fix it.  What's wrong with,  it?" She said, "Well, it's just out of adjustment, I think. I want to see 'Gunsmoke.' It's coming on in about ten minutes."  So, I rushed over there and here she is in her gown, robe and everything, lying in bed, ready to go to bed, but wanting to watch from the bed. So, I went in and it was true, that's all it was, just out of adjustment. So, I got it back, got the color straight and so on. And she said, "Oh, you're wonderful. I don't know what I'd do without you people." So, I left then.

But we always recorded that because if they wanted to play it back later, they had these recorders and they could play them into their machine and see these. Or we could haul them over there and they could play them. We did that sometimes.

But generally, the things we recorded for him were either press conferences, people that spoke on "Meet the Press," if he was going to church and wasn't going to see it. He'd want to see it later and we'd record that. Anytime he'd have a press conference he wanted to maybe have a chance to look back at it later, see who was asking the questions, these things. We did speeches and put them in the archives. We did a lot of those. You've got all those tapes down there.

G:        You bet. You bet.

A:        And they're all Ampex I guess, aren't they now? G:  I believe they are.

A:        Yes, I believe so.

G:        How about the nightly news? Did he like to--

A:        He'd watch that on the three-eyed monster somewhere. But he rarely ever asked us to record that. I don't recall that at all. He made it a point to be somewhere where he could see one TV or two or three when the news is on. If he was in the White House, he frequently didn't leave his office until after the six or seven [o'clock] news. He was in there until maybe seven o'clock and that's about a normal hour for news. Because I could generally go home after he left the office and went to the Mansion.

G:        He also, I understand, had a ticker tape in the office. Did you have any control over that?

A;      Oh, yes, we ran that, too, the two in his office. That was AP and UPI, those were the news releases, the Associated Press and United Press International. They were on two machines side by side. We had to put a shelter over them to keep the noise down. He'd go along and look at these things and read the paper coming out of the top. Sometimes they didn't work right. He'd call and give us hell, say, "Get over here and straighten this goddamn thing out," and this kind of stuff. So, we did.
G:        Did they just go constantly?

A:        Anything that came on the air came on that line. He just read it off when he wanted to. 

G:        Didn't it all pile up there?

A:        Yes. But every so many hours his secretary would come in and tear off a chunk of it and carry it back out in her office and she would make it into sheets about so big and put it back on his desk so he could read it later. He thumbed through this stuff.  Say, he'd read it or glance through it. Or she'd mark in red those items, anything she'd think he might be interested in. She got pretty astute, either Juanita did or Marie. They got to the point where--or all the girls that worked in there. There were couple of others that worked in the outer office and they knew exactly what to look for.

G:        This really isn't a picture of a man who's isolated from information, is it?

A:        Oh, my God, no. If I had to judge what he saw compared to what his predecessor saw and/or what Nixon saw, there was no comparison. He was an avid reader of the news. And of course, they had this group every morning that screened the papers and took out the articles and clipped them and summarized them and so on. Now here there wasn't a whole lot of effort spending on retyping and so on. You could send him in one all scribbled up or cut out of the paper. He would read all those things. He didn't really worry about how pretty it was. It used to worry some of his staff that it wasn't pretty.

But he would read them all. And if a flash message came in where he had to see it, we  had it delivered to somebody in his staff in a hurry and they wanted him [to see it]. They snatched it and [would] go right on in there with it and he'd read it. Sometimes there  wasn't no more than a half-minute from downstairs the Sit Room, that's where they'd come in. Because they passed over there and then Rostow, whoever it was, the man said, "Send it upstairs quick."

But he really kept up with the news. And when we traveled, I had a real problem  in foreign areas keeping him with enough news, because I had to arrange for an AP and a UPI interconnection no matter where was.  He wanted the news.   usually had to put that in the press secretary's office and then we tore off the pieces of it and gave it to the President.

G:        Was he interested in mainly political news?

A:       Not necessarily. Almost anything that was of international import, anything about the war in Vietnam especially he was interested in, whoever wrote it, no matter whether it's a Swedish paper or what, whoever wrote anything about it. And in late 1967, 1968 the articles in the overseas areas were not complimentary. But he would read them anyway.

G:        Would he?

A:        Yes, he would. He didn't hide from them. (Interruption)

G:        He really just seems to have had a thirst for information.

A:        Yes. It was hard to keep him fully informed. I know some of his staff really struggled on it, especially the press secretary, Johnson, the press man, Tom Johnson. Tom, of course, was assistant press secretary there from, oh, I guess from the time I came in there with Bill Moyers and then stayed on through George Christian until the end. But I got to know him very well. But he was the one who had the phone list. Then later they brought  in a man, director of communications, but it was a misnomer.   He was trying to make   sure that all this information was collected and gotten in to him.   But he never really had   a strong position around there. He was just sort of a collector of everything and it eventually became a booklet form which went to the President.

G:       Did Robert Kintner have a role in the communications aspects? He had that background with NBC.

A:       Not really. remember the name, but I never worked with him very much. He was in the staff there somewhere. recall the name, but I don't know what he did.

G:       Do you recall any other occasions where you woke the President in the middle of the night on something important?

A:        Well, your term what is important or not wasn't the reason I woke him. Usually it's something he asked me to do and said call him back. At the Ranch he has called me a couple of times and asked me something.

He wanted to go to--well, I don't know how much of this should go into the record there. He wanted to go to Mexico. He had talked to Jim Cross about it and Jim was arranging for the Convair to fly down there. He was going to fly inland about eight or nine hundred miles to some ranch down there and look at it because he was considering buying it and he wanted to go see it. Well, again, Jim Cross was urging him, "Please, Mr. President, don't do this. You've got to notify the government of Mexico. We'll get shot down crossing the border." No, he wasn't going to tell nobody, didn't want nobody to know.  This was the hairiest trip ever had, but he gave me a call in the middle of the   night the night before we left and asked me what kind of communications we were going to have from down there.  Now, we're nine hundred miles in the hinterland.  We're not going anywhere near a commercial establishment. We're out in the middle of a ranch.

So, I tried to explain to him the only thing that knew, and he said, "Well, think about it and call me back and see how we can get some." So, I don't know, I sat down and scribbled some stuff, wrote down my thoughts and so on. Basically, we still had to depend on the airplane. There wasn't a hell of a lot I could do. The airplane was the only one that had any communications on it that could have reached back to Texas. So, I finally called him back and I don't know how late it was, but it was after midnight I    know, and I told him this.  I said, "Communications would totally depend on that airplane. don't know how much fuel he can carry in there.  I've got to talk to Jim.  But if he can carry enough in there to keep one engine running after we get off, you can ride around, look at the ranch., whatever you want, but you've got to keep one engine running to keep that radio working. That's your only link out of there, Mr. President." He said, "Well, get together with, Jim, and see what you can do." Well, I talked to Jim, and Jim said, "Well, yes. It's a pretty fuel-efficient airplane but we're going to be almost three hours going in."  This was a Convair, a turboprop, these converted Conair’s  that  they had. They were turboprops. He said, "We can get pretty good mileage on about--" but he said, "Let's think minute.  That's three, six, it will carry enough for about eight.  Let me talk to the crew chief and call you back." So, he did a call--this wasn't at night, this was in the morning talked to him.   He called me back and he said, "Yes, all right, if we're not   on the ground for more than an hour." I said, "Well, Jim, you know as well as I do you and I can't judge that. What did he tell you?" He said, "He just said he wanted to look at this thing. I didn't know whether he wanted to buzz it and look at it or whether he wanted to land and look at it, what he wanted to do. But nevertheless, he wants to go look at this thing." I said, "Well, all right." He said, "Well now, he don't want anybody but you to go with us from your place." I said, "Is he expecting any photographers or anything to take pictures of this?" "Oh, yes, Okamoto is going." I said, "Well, okay." So, we took off: Mrs. Johnson, the President, Jim Cross, Jake Jacobsen, Jim Jones I believe, I'm not certain about that one, myself and about four or five Secret Service men, in this one plane. Now this is a plusher up Convair. We landed. The airstrip was gravel, not a nice airstrip at all, rough landing. But he landed there. Probably the Secret Service was just having a fit, and of course we were worried, something happen to the plane while you're there how are we going to get out?

G:        Was there any follow-up plane or anything? No protection?

A:        He didn't want Mexico to know about it. Mexico knew, of course, the minute he crossed the border. You couldn't hide the damn thing. But they didn't send any planes of pursuit, they just took it as a small plane, smaller than some of the big ones that fly across. And it was low, and they didn't pay much attention. They had sort of a sloppy system in Mexico. They never learned anything, but they could have. That's what worried Cross and what worried me. I tried telling him again. said, "Now, we may get detected in here." told Jim. didn't talk much to him again about it.

Anyhow, we stayed on the ground about an hour and ten or fifteen minutes. How they knew it, somebody met us there with a car and a jeep and a pickup truck.

Three or four things showed up there, and ranch hands I guess [who] belonged to this fellow. Now this was the former president of Mexico, his place, and they were negotiating to buy it. It was either nine hundred thousand acres or just less than a million acres in this ranch.

There was a consortium in the Austin area, they were negotiating to buy this thing.

G:        Was this Las Pampas, is that what they called it?

A:        I believe that's the name of the thing. I don't recall the name. All I know it's hell of a long sweaty trip in and sweaty one out, because I worried all the way.

Well, we never lost communications with the base back at Austin. We were working with the air force base [Bergstrom] at Austin, never lost them.

G:        So, they knew you were down there?

A:        Well, that's all they could do. They knew we were somewhere. They wanted to be [inaudible] and I'm sure Jim Cross had told the Air Force, because if something happened, they'd have to come after us. I bet he told them, but he never told the President he told anybody. But that's who we were working. And then they had a direct circuit patch back to the Signal Board at the Ranch. That's how we would have gotten out of there. We talked to them several times while in the air going and a couple of times coming back.

We didn't need to talk to them while we were on the ground, so we didn't try. But we just kept contact; we knew the circuits were still working. But this was one that Jim and I sweated blood on, and until we touched down at that base back at the Ranch old Jim was just as white as this thing and I felt drained, I was just like this. I just didn't know where--because I worried. But he was so adamant, "Nobody is going to know about it, you aren’t going to tell nobody," and so on. He really had his mind made up. I really questioned why he should have done such a thing. It would have been so simple to have asked the Mexican government for permission to come in for this kind [of thing], but he didn't want anybody to know it because he didn't want--I think it's because of the sale.

He didn't want anybody to know he's interested in it because it would run the price up or so on. But how they could ever have got--these people on that ranch, I'm sure they weren't that loyal to us that they wouldn't go tell somebody.

G:        Did he seem to have a passion for secrecy?

A:       A bit of it.  It got worse as time went on, as I say, as he got to the point where he was beginning to be disturbed by what was happening when they protested and so on. He began to have more of a passion for it.

I did not notice that the first year. The first year, year and a half, he would give us time to do something. He'd say, "Well, we're going"--and we'd get a list--they'd publish a letter, "We're going to Des Moines next week and so and so next week," and your list was published two or three weeks in advance. And he let us go out, he didn't control it. But after he got fearful about it, I had to have a signed paper from Jim Jones or from Watson earlier, before I could send a team out. They'd tell me, "Well, you don't need ten people. Take two or three."  said, "Look, how you going to do your job?   You've asked me to do a job now, I say I need ten people out there. This is what they're going to do. Why in the world do you . . .”?

You've seen all this argument about the people at the Ranch on here.? You've read these papers? Now again, he wanted to get into everything. He did get into everything. He's the one that got into this. He kept saying, "How many people have you got down there? Why do you need so many?" I kept saying, "You've got a facility in Austin, what do you want to do with the press? Do I just tell them they don't get any support?" "No," he said, "You've got to support them." "And at the Ranch you've got a switchboard, you've got all these other facilities down there, a communications center, a secure voice facility, you've got television, you have press conferences. What are you going to do if you have one of those? You want me to go to Washington to get them if  you decide to have one, Mr. President?" "No," he said, "You know I don't. But I want you to keep them to a minimum." "Well, that's what I call a minimum." "Well, that's too many." That's all he'd say.  He wouldn't say how many was too many, but he said, "That's too many." And so, we went around and round several times on that discussion.

Well, he finally got off of me and I did get the detachment down there, and I got a detachment that slowly grew.

Now, that's another funny one. As they grew and as they were stable there and when he wasn't there, he wanted that bunch of people to work as farm hands. He wanted them to report to Dale Malechek and work for him and do things on the farm. He had people out constructing and building fences and this kind of stuff, just like they were regular farm hands. Of course, I would have people still on the facility, on the board.

You could always reach it and always do the other thing. But those on television sure weren't doing anything, so he'd say, "Why can't you be out there taking care of fences or building gates?" and this kind of stuff. Well, I didn't have a good answer, I really didn't. Some of them resented it at first but they got to where they laughed about it and enjoyed it. He talked about my WHCA farmhands. He used to tell his Secret Service when he'd get mad at them, "I'm going to fire all of you and get me some Border Patrols to protect me." And Lem Johns would say, "Now you don't want to do that, Mr. President," and calm him down a little. He used to have sometimes.

G:        He seems to have had disdain at times for the Secret Service.

A:        He did. He resented them staying so close to him. He called it overprotected. "I'm a big boy.  What the hell you are protecting me now for?"  The times he would walk through a crowd is when they really were at their sweatiest point. He thought nothing of wandering out through a crowd, leaving his Secret Service man, saying, "You stay back here." The first time ever saw him do it was in the spring of 1965, and he walked through crowd  of Mexicans down there at San Antonio. He said, "These people love me." He had just spoken to them and the crowd was applauding, beautiful reception to him. He walked through that crowd and pressed the flesh with certainly several thousand people. And the Secret Service are dying. All it takes is one little knife in the rib cage and there isn’t nothing they can do about it, not a thing. Because they couldn't even get close enough to him. He's said, "Now you stay away from me. You stay back there. Now there isn’t anybody going to hurt me. These are friends of mine." He really believed that. That wasn't true, 1968. He didn't say that anymore.

G:        Anything else on his interest in gadgetry that is memorable?

A:      Well, except for his radio system in Texas, as you know, the longer he stayed in office he acquired more and more area that he roamed over. He roamed all the way from Governor [John] Connally's place down south [Floresville], all the way up north of there to Lake Lyndon B. Johnson and Llano on the left and Fredericksburg on the extreme west and so on. That was his playground. And when he was out, he wanted to be anywhere he wanted to go in there. Now he had ranch up in the middle called the West Ranch. She still owns it. And that was one of the most difficult places to get to. Really, we couldn't reach it from anywhere outside of this thing unless we did a lot of extensive extending of the radio system.

So, I went to him in the fall of 1965 and told him this, and he said, "You're going   to make me so obvious down here people are going to say, 'Yeah, spending all that money on the President.' Go putting the towers up there. I don't want to know all this." I said, "Mr. President, please, you're killing me. You can't do this. Do you want a quality system?   Tell me what you want.   Let me figure how to do it.  Please, let me figure it  out." He said, "But I don't want a whole lot of visibility. Those old towers sticking--". I said, "Look, I'll paint those towers. Nobody is going to notice a tower on top of a hill. After a few weeks they're not going to pay any attention to it." He said, "Well, okay. But here is where want to cover." And he drew on a map, a big old road map, "That area there. And I want to cover all that silent."  I said, "Man, there are some places in there that are terrible."  He said, "Look., don't give me your problems.  Just do it."  That's where problems began, because some of those valleys and some of those areas in there, those high hills, there's just almost no way to keep communication going.

He used to love to drive around in his car and talk to anybody. His favorite trick is to call people all over the world from his car, and say, "Yeah, I'm riding around looking at the cows, looking at the deer." It came around and passed it through the Ranch and back to the White House and to Germany, England.

The most difficult time I had one day with him though was after we got the system built. Now we spent a lot of money and built a lot of towers and a lot of systems. And it was a repeated system, whatever closest picked up the signal reflected as the strongest signal back at the home base and that console is what they used to talk back to him. So, you could keep in touch pretty well.

But when they had the blackout, we had just arrived at the Ranch about, I don't know, three or four hours before, and he's out in his car and the blackout in New York City, remember that, some years ago. When was it? 1966, late 1966, early 1966, but about then. We called him and told him, "Mr. President'. there's been a widespread blackout in New York City and its vicinity." He said, "What do you mean?" We said, "All the power is off. Power is off for forty, fifty, sixty miles in any direction from New York City." "Well, my God," he said, "Isn’t that something. Let me talk--" whoever the chief assistant for domestic affairs was in the White House. I guess at that time it might have been Jacobsen. "Let me talk to Jake." So, we got him on the phone and we're driving around in the car, still in the Lincoln. He talked back to Jake and said, "Jake, what are they doing about it?" Jake said, "Well, we're on the ball. We're looking, we're trying to find out what the trouble is. We don't know where it broke down. We don't know how it can happen. All of our information, we all have record, on file, it can't happen. But it did."

He said, "Well, can you get me the Mayor of New York on the phone?" Well, of course, that was really shooting in the dark because this guy is sitting there probably with no candles, no nothing, and he's lucky we can catch him in his office.  Well, God was with us one day. When we dialed his office, they answered and we said, "Is the Mayor there?" They said, "Yes." We said, "The President wants to talk to you." Of course, the President got on there and sort of sympathized with him, said, "I'm sorry about all the trouble. we're having. Any idea what caused it?" Of course, he had no more information than we did. Nobody knew at that time--it was days before they ever figured out what caused it. Anyway, he said, "Well, if there's anything I can do for you, just pick up the phone and call me." The Mayor made some crack about "I wish I could see my phone.

No electricity. No lights on the phone. I really can't see the phone to call you." He said, "Get your cigarette lighter out," In fact, it was what they were using, I guess.

He told me later, I guess it was a day later, "You've got a pretty fair system now.

There's a few sort of dead spots and spots where they're weak. You've got to improve those." So, I have to start all over again.  Found out the worst areas there were in Llano  and that western area where it got really hilly.  I had a heck of a time with that.   didn’t have any problems to the east of there at Johnson City and all the way down to Austin and east of there. It wasn't any better from Austin to San Antonio, I had to extend all those; so, I had to put systems in both of those. But at any rate, before I got through, I had seven separate sites, seven separate towers and bay stations and everything there. All those were keyed by keying lines back to the Ranch. Whichever was the strongest signal that came back to the Ranch and received him the best, that’s the one we worked back to him on. It was a voting [?] system as we called it. But it worked fairly well.

But we still had times--even when I rode through the countryside--and I was around there all the time, I saw every bit of it like the back of my hand and tried to talk back there--there are times when I was really gritting my teeth. There’s just literally no way to cover it complete. We could put one in almost every valley and still we’d miss some. But he accepted it at last and didn’t complain about it. Now and then he’d bitch at me about it, never really telling me go out and spend a lot of money on it, never did that then.

G:       Did the Lincolns have any other capabilities other than the telephone pickup?

A:       Yes. He had a couple of nets in there, the net that the President always used. (Interruption)

G:        We were talking about the Lincoln’s capability?

A:        Yes. In his Lincoln we had only the capability of the channels that he was going to reach.

Now he had two. In all the other cars the Secret Service had all of theirs in those. And we had some arrangement where we could take them in and out. You could take out the Secret Service net by removing a piece of it, or they put it in their other little handset, what was called handy-talky. They could set it in a rack and operate it that way. But in his, no. We kept only the staff net and the primary net that he used, what we called the  LBJ net.

G:        What would you do if he wanted to drive the amphicar, for example?

A:        Drive the what?

G:        The amphicar, that little car that would go into the water, little blue car.

A:        Well, we never had it in there, and he would have been only what the Secret Service had with him when he went in there. He would still have communications with the Secret Service. But it certainly wouldn't have been in the vehicle, unless we had known it beforehand that he had wanted it, then I'd put it on there. But he never indicated it.

Now you know we had stereo in all of them, too. He had tapes and tape decks and so on; we had all that in there. He carried along a lot of country and western music.

G:        Did he?

A:        That was one of his favorites.

G:        I didn't know that. Is that right?

A:        Yes. A lot of tapes. I've bought tapes by the hundreds. I'd have a pack of ten, at least ten tapes in each of those cars. Well, pretty soon I begin noticing they're getting shorter and shorter.  People steal them out of there.  I don't know what happened to them.  I'm not sure the Secret Service took them or who, but somebody would gradually remove one. I got nine, then I got eight. Every now and then the President would say, "Where are my tapes going to?"  I said, "Well, I don't know, Mr. President."  "Well, by God, find out. Get me some tapes back in here. Where is this one for--?" whatever it was, country- western.  Anita Bryant, he loved her.  He said, "Where is that tape of that?"  and that kind of thing. I was always having to replace them.

G:        Amazing.

A:        He used to go out on a boat now and then, a strange boat, you know. He's got somebody out there that owned a boat. I'd have to make some arrangements beforehand to put a radio on it, so he could call out. He loved to do that; he'd call from the boat and talk to us.  Fortunately, up near Heywood Ranch, where he had one of his favorite places up   there on the lake, I had a tower up there where he could reach any place from the lake.

G:      Do you want to talk about the White House recording studio? You haven't gone into that at length.

A:      Well, there wasn't anything unique about this, except that each time we recorded a program, after the program was over, we were required to reproduce a certain number of these. Now in earlier years we didn't reproduce at all for the press, but as time went on occasionally, we would have a program where the press were either not invited and therefore the press got no copies of the recording, but the press office would decide that they're to have a tape.

So, we had a multiple tape preparation machine that would make up to six tapes. Play it off a master and you make six other tapes identical to it. And that's the way we made it.  Once in a while he'd want to release  maybe six tapes, ten tapes, fifteen, and so we made them through that.

Now the recording studio initially was right below the President's office. Almost you could drill a hole through the floor, and you were down there, right underneath. A lot of the people worried about it. The Secret Service never liked that, But from my standpoint it made a lot of sense in that many of our activities took place either in the Oval Office or the little Cabinet Room or the other little office across from the Oval Office, this kind of thing. Many of them took place on that floor. Or if they didn't there, they took place in the Rose Garden, right outside there. Well, it was ideal for us. Our cables ran very short distances back to the studio. So, we didn't have to record at all out there perfectly; sometimes we take a microphone, feed it back to the studio and record it. We could do it that way, too. As long as it's in the house, we had plugs on the wall we could plug into and record. But it's the minute you left that you were dependent then on the recorder itself. We used some very fine recorders. That's another story.  We had a real problem getting the recorders.

G:        Why was that?

A:      Well, we didn't want U.S. recorders; we wanted foreign recorders, UREIS, made in Sweden. We had a heck of a time getting anybody to agree to let us buy them. In the Defense Department, they didn't want me to buy a foreign product with U.S.  money. But I said, "Well, no, that's the one." The press office had listened to it and they traveled with it. It operated battery or AC, either one, you didn't have to worry about this kind of thing. So, we finally kept prevailing on them to let us buy it. But by golly, I had to buy about fifty. See, whenever we traveled my recording team's always carried along spares. They used two of them on recording any speech. I had a spare standing by for the third one. So, they always had three with him, every spot he stopped at. Now, if he stopped forty times today, each of that group has got to have recorders. Now sometimes I could leapfrog them, sometimes I could beat him to the next thing, but that wasn't always the case.

G:       Did you have a problem as you traveled and set up all this equipment and everything with local codes or regulations?

A:        No, no. What we've done on this is, in almost every case you've got a local political advance man there. You always have to, to arrange for a speech or some kind of presentation. Or somebody that's sponsoring that. Therefore, they become the host for this, and so they set the location. If we went into location where there was none of this, as for example, we dedicated a dam out in West Virginia, about sixty or seventy miles east of Charleston, West Virginia, really in the boondocks. There was nothing out there, no communication, no power, no nothing. And here they're going to dedicate the dam.

They've got the stands built out there and they're going to pull the lever that's going to start the water flowing. Well, I had to literally bring all my communications in. I had to go to the telephone company. They built a microwave between Charleston two hops out to that location. I had to bring out generators for the power.  I had to take care of all these things in preparation for it. But no, we get nothing but cooperation.

Now one that's not too well known, but most of my telecommunications was taken care of by the long-distance telephone systems or the local people in an area. Now most of the United States is covered and served long-distance-wise by one company, AT & T. But you get into local areas where you've got a local telephone company the guy doesn't have any capability at all. He doesn't have the lines and he can't do anything. So I had an agreement with all these companies, and I'd go in there and tell them, "I'm going to bring in somebody from AT & T and he's going to make connection from your   central office out to this location. He'll provide the materials at no cost to you. We'll pay you whatever it is to make this interconnection, but he's going to take care of it for me." And they did that sometimes. I had no problem of that nature.

I ran into once or twice where I ran into a union problem. The unions objected to us putting up the lights. We put up the lights and the backdrop for the President to make a speech and they didn't think that we should be doing it. So that became a bit of a [inaudible]. However, it was all resolved before we got there, because they said, "Well, we'll raise a protest. You go ahead and do it, but we're going to raise one." So, we did. No, you got generally the best cooperation in the world because even if they weren't friendly to the President, they recognized the Office of the President and he was entitled to that kind of support. I'd say offhand I got the very best--

G:        That's remarkable.

A:        But it was a difficult job. The most difficult jobs are traveling.

G:        How about overseas? Did that complicate--

A:     Oh, that's even worse. You have to carry everything with you, except your long-distance facilities. We went to places such as New Zealand, Australia, Thailand and so on, and we went to the local telephone company, told them what we wanted.  But you can't do it  quick, you've got to time on those. You can't do those overnight. We carried in all of our own switchboards, our own instruments, and all they do is provide the long distance and local circuits. They connect that. But they've got to do all the cross-connections at the main frame and do all the other kinds of things to support you. No, they break their back for you.

One surprised us and one gave us probably the best service we ever had anywhere, was in France. The French had never been really very fond of Americans per se. As a nation they've always been fairly haughty and independent. But by God, when the President came to visit--this was not with Johnson, this was with Nixon--I tell you, they broke their backs. They produced everything we asked them to do and on time.

Better than the Germans. We heard the Germans were so efficient, could do anything. The Germans finally got it done, but much, much sweat. The British, they're quite good, they're most cooperative, quite good. They don't have the resources. The Germans have the greatest resources and probably did the slowest job of all of them. Even the Italians did a beautiful job. Very nice.  Belgium, of course, Belgium did a fine job, they've  always done a good job. They've got a good system. But I guess Germany was one of our struggle points.  We went to Berlin and went to other places and had a tough time with all of them, but again, that's not Johnson, that's another one.

The worst time I guess we had anywhere with him was Vietnam. When he went to Vietnam, I had to depend on what we had in hand at that location at that time to get him out of there and to get in.  It was extremely limited when he went in the first time in 1967.

G:        Now the last part of that trip was secret, also, wasn't it, the decision to go meet with the Pope?

A:        Oh, yes. Yes. He called seven of us in before he had the thing and I can't recall who the seven were. I know there were seven there. It was either George Christian or Tom [Johnson], maybe both, maybe Bob Fleming, I don't know. Two from the press office I believe. The Secret Service was Bob Taylor and Lem Johns, two of them. He called me and one or two more. There were seven in the room.

He said, "Now, I want you to know that we're going to take this trip, we're going to go to the funeral and then we're going to turn and go north, and I'll tell you where we're going as we go."

Now he wouldn't tell us where he was going. We didn't know when we left there where we were going. The pilot was probably the only one that did [know]. The rest of us didn't. The pilot was also his aide. So, he said, "Now if word gets out of this, I'm going to personally emasculate each one of you." Now we couldn't tell anybody because we didn't know where we were going, not even if we knew we were going somewhere.

However, there's sort of been a tip off. We had to ship so much equipment in standby aircraft that somebody could have taken one look and known. Now we kept airplanes away from the press and away from other people, but I had a plane with fifty-five people on it and about ten tons of equipment sitting out at the airport there down at Melbourne, waiting for his decision to go and where to go.

G:        How did you know how much to get if you didn't know where he was going?

A:        I had to assume if he was going to stop, that he wouldn't stop more than four or five times. He wouldn't let me make any advance preparations. I said, "Mr. President, some of these places you're talking about going, there are really no communications there. If you go to India or Pakistan or Iran, I can't get out of there. There is no international telecommunications out of there. None.

G:        Had he mentioned possible stops?

A:       Well, going around the world we've got to stop somewhere for fuel. Jim Cross was saying, "Sir, we've got to stop for fuel somewhere. Are you going to stop in Pakistan or India?" He said, "Well, I'll let you know." That's all he'd tell you. He wouldn't tell him any more than us.

G:        But he did indicate he was going on around the world?

A:        Oh, yes. He said, "I'm going around the world."  But he didn't say where.  And he didn't say he was going to Vietnam, he didn't say he was going to see the Pope. None of that came out until we were in the midst of the trip. The day of the funeral, the memorial service for [Harold] Holt, he came out of there and then he went to a meeting with various presidents that were there representing other countries to speak about Southeast Asia, their support for Vietnam and so on.

He would meet with this one and that one and so on. This is going on and we're up to now twelve-thirty, one o'clock. He had promised me he'd let me release one plane with all these people on it before we left there. caught him in the hall between some of these visits and I said, "Mr. President, would you let me move my people now?"  He said, "Boy, you are a nervous Nellie, aren't you?"  said, "Yes, sir." He said, "Okay, tell them to fly north." I said, "North, where north?" "Don't worry me. Tell them to fly north and stop for refueling and we'll talk to them again."

Well, told this pilot.  This pilot is a young captain, air force.  It's C-135 and he is having fit. He said, "I can't file flight plan to nowhere." said, "Okay. Go somewhere to Darwin [Australia] and refuel. And then I'll tell you something else. I can't do any better, it's all I've got." Well, he was reluctant, but here again he's talking to somebody that's in authority and Jim Cross said, "Do it, Captain. Quit your arguing." So, he went off.

Well, they flew. They landed at Darwin and they refueled, and now by this time we've taken off. We're roughly four and a half, five hours south of Darwin, in the air.

And they called. My man is Colonel Adams, and I said, "Where are you?" He said, "We're on the ground refueling at Darwin.  Now they're ready to go and the Captain wants to know where do we fly? How much fuel does he put on? He don't know where  he's going." said, "You tell him to get enough fuel on there that he can fly all the way to the mainland. He can fly either to Philippines or mainland Asia.  I don't know where we're going." He said, "Can't you get him to tell you?" said, "No." He said, "Well, the Captain won't fly." So, I said, "All right, I'll try."

Now the President is asleep, and they don't want me to wake him. said, "I've got to have an answer." I went in and talked to the President, and the President was asleep. Again, I was one of the few who can wake him, but I said, "I've got to know. I've got people involved. I can't send that plane out there like that." Jim said, "Well, I can't answer it for you. You'll have to ask him. He's the only one going to tell you; I'm not going to tell you." So, I went in and woke the President. He sat up in bed and stretched and he said, "Yes, what can I do for you?" said, "Sir, need to know where we're headed. I've got a plane refueled, ready to leave Darwin, but I've got to give them some indication what direction.  Where are we headed?"   "Well, yes."   He reached under the bed and pulled up Shell road map, so help me, of Southeast Asia. He said, "Well, we're going to some place up there. I don't know what the name of this base is, but it's an airbase in Thailand." I said, "Sir, there's forty air bases in Thailand!" "Well, Christ," he said, "Do you have one that's Doran or Duran or something like that?" I said, "Yes, might have. Can you find it on there?"  He looked on there and said, "Yes, believe that's it.  That's  the place we're going." So, I went up to Cross, and I'm mad now. said, "Jim, tell me. Is that where the hell we're going?" He won't tell me any more than that, he said, "Don't know any more." Jim said, "Yes, that's it. Big base at--"

G:        Korat, is that what it--?

A:      Korat, right in the center of Thailand. I said, "You're going to take this crowd in there for the night?" and he said, "Yes." So, he said it's spelled K-H-O-R-A-T, K-O-R-A-T--all kinds of spellings on this damn map. I said, "Well, I'm going to pick the simple one, K-O-R-A-T. I think they'll understand." So, I called my man back and told him, and the Captain looking at the map said, "Yes, I've got it.  I know where it is.  I've been there."  He was a long-range pilot; he's been all over the world. He said, "I'll find it."

So, they took off. They go ahead and they land that there. Then they tell the base commander--it's the first time he's ever heard it--there's a group of people coming by, about four hundred people, and they're going to be looking for places to sleep tonight.

Well, this base commander, first of all didn't believe him. He thought we were pulling his leg. "No, sir," he said, "I'm from the White House. That's it." He said, "Well, Jesus Christ, where am I going to house four hundred people?" He said, "Well, you've got a problem there, Colonel. It's your problem, not mine. But I'm going to take all your circuits, I'm going to take all of your circuitry back to the United States and put them on our board." He said, "You can't do that." "I sure as hell can." So, he did. He brought our switchboard in and put it in there and connected phones up to various places and the President's quarters, where they're going to put him, and did all this.

We're about an hour out of there, and the President had said to me when we left--we've got someone on the ground in Darwin. I said, "You going to make any remarks there?" He said, "No, no, no. Just going to slip in and go to bed." (Interruption)

He said, "No. No speech. We're just going to slip in and go to bed.  Too late," he says. Lo and behold, we're an hour out of there, about an hour out of there up in the air over Indonesia, I guess over Borneo, Clementine [?]. And he said to me, "What size crowd do we have to make the speech to?" I do a double take and I said, "Wait a minute, Mr. President. You told me no speeches." "Yes," he said, "I changed my mind. want to make a speech." I said, "Oh, my God." He said, "Call the advance man down there." That turned out it was Ted Connell. He said, "Call him and see what kind of crowd he's got." So, I called this fellow, either Ted or Lloyd Hand, I forgot which it was, with that advance plane, but anyway one of them. I called him and I said, "What's the size of the crowd?" I got my warrant officer on the ground and he said, "Wait a minute." He's counting, and he said, "Oh, about a hundred." I said, "Well, you tell the advance man to come to the radio quick." He got him and I told him what the President said, and he said, "Goddamnit, Jack, he told me no speeches. Don't have any preparation. No podium, no nothing." I said, "He told me the same thing. But now he's changed his mind. He wants them. Get the stuff out and start working." "Oh, my God." He turns to the man and tell him, of course then they start scrambling. They got an hour.

We're about ten minutes from landing when the President said, "Call again and    ask what size crowd. See if they've drummed up ten or fifteen thousand people." Well, this hour of the night, eleven o'clock at night, no way to do that.

He said, "Nevertheless, you've got an advance man down there.  He'll get somebody."  Well, he called.  The advance man wants to talk to the President, said, "I ain't got nobody. I got about maybe  five or six hundred people here." The President said, "Well, I'm not going to talk then. Take it all out of sight. Get it out of sight." Well, wisely, we'd seen him change his mind before. We drug it out behind the crowd, the podium. Didn't disconnect a thing, left it all like it was, just got it out of sight.

He comes down the ramp and the crowd in the meantime had heard something about--word floated through the base and the crowd's now bigger, it's about, let's say, a couple of thousand anyway. He walks out of the door and sees that crowd. I'm on the ground down here. I was standing around outside of his view, just about as far from him as down to the end of the hall there, and I said to myself, "Here he's going to start looking for me." He starts down and he looks off and said something to the Secret Service. They start waving to me and I come running over. He said, "Get the podium." I said, "Mr. President, you told me not to have the podium, to get rid of it." He said, "Yes, but I know you didn't. You got it hiding behind that crowd. Bring it out." So, I did, and he talked to about two thousand people there. But he said to me, "I've learned to read your mind. You're not as sneaky as you think you are."

G:        That's good story.

A:        But I tell you, we had consternation at that base. And of course, most people didn't sleep.

A lot of the press people didn't attempt to sleep. They were all crowded up in barracks and they didn't make any effort to. They stayed in the club and caroused all night or drank. We had a speech at five the next morning, and then he took off to Vietnam.

G:        Did you have any problems getting in and out of Cam Ranh Bay?

A:        No, no. They had that blocked off solid once they knew he was coming in. We got up in the air and nobody knew where we were, even two hours after we left Thailand.
They didn't know in Thailand where we were headed. Nobody told them in Thailand. Because my man called me two hours later and said, "Where is he?"   No, more than that, five or  six [hours]. We'd already been in there, made a speech and came out. He said, "Where is the recording man? Where did you leave him?" said, "I left him where we made the speech." He said, "Yes, I know, but where did you make the speech? Nobody here will tell me. I've got to come get him." They had to send a C-141 over there to pick him up.

I said, "Cam Ranh Bay. Same place we made a speech last time, Jim." He said, "Oh, I know." He didn't ever say where it was. So, he sent it over there. They went by and picked him up. That's another strange one. Flew that whole crowd of men over there, put the plane down, picked this one man up, and every one of them got combat pay exemption for the month, five hundred dollars apiece, because they had landed in the combat zone. I said, "That's the silliest goddamn rule," but that's the way they ruled it.
G:        In Italy I understand that you took helicopters to the--

A:        Yes, that's a real fiasco. That's another sad story. First of all, we were supposed to have ten-place helicopters, and they couldn't get them. Before we got off, the President said to me, "I want you to go with us."  So, I said, "All right, will."  He said, "You go on the other plane now with the aide there." The aide then was a tall Negro aide, a lieutenant colonel.

can't remember his name just now, but whoever it is this was the other aide to Jim Cross, one of the others. He said, "You ride in the press plane with him."  So, I get off the plane and stumble across there. We see the helicopter sitting over there, looked pretty small though. Didn't look like ten-place to me. I get over and here's a four-place helicopter, a pilot, co-pilot. The pilot is standing there at attention and he's saying, "I'm not going to fly. I'm not going to fly." And so, this [aide]--Hugh Robinson is the aide's name--came up and he said, "What's the problem?" He said, "One, I've never flown that kind of helicopter before. Two, I've never been in Rome before. Three, they gave me a picture postcard and tell me what the Vatican looks like. How do I get there? I'm not going to do it." I took one look at that airplane and I said, "That's a four-place or ten?" He said, "It's four."   Hugh said, "It's supposed to be ten."   He said, "I'm not going to fly it." Well, Hugh called him off in one corner and gave him a direct order and said, "You've got to fly." The guy said, "Well, I'm a pilot, a qualified pilot, a navy pilot. I've just never seen that kind of plane before. I don't want the President on it." Well, the President wasn't. The President was on another one. We had hauled an airplane in there, and he had an airplane.

But anyway, they flew out over there and I stayed at the airport. I said, "I'll give my seat up in a hurry." So, we had radios there at the airport and I listened. The dialogue down at the site down there, you can hear them talking.   From the helicopter he's talking  to the Secret Service agent now on the ground. That site was a villa nine or ten miles south of Rome that they opened just for the occasion. So, they flew down there. They're flying around the thing, black as pitch, couldn't see a thing. No lights, no nothing down there except a few in the building down there. They had to open this thing. It had been closed for the winter. Had to go down and open it and get food and servants, the whole works, all in short notice, hours. Well, the Secret Service men on the plane just said, "Hey, Joe, you down there?"  "Yes."   "You got any trees?"   "Yes, there are trees all around here." "Well, by God, is there an open area around this thing?" He said, "Wait a minute."  He said, "Yes.  think you can get in if you come straight down."  He said, "How tall are the trees?" He said, "Oh, about fifty feet." Well, that's where they landed, landed alone, literally more than enough for a plane on a vertical descent, but not the kind of place you want to take a President into on a loaded plane. But they had to. They went right down like a brick, right down that hole.

This pilot of course is sweating blood because coming out how is he going to do that. He can't lift that crowd. So, they had to take some people off and not take them on the next leg. They had to take another plane. They could not fly with the President to bring him out of there. They took two off. They had eight on his plane--or ten, they had ten, I guess.

They took two off and eight flew out through the Vatican. But then after he had met the meeting, then he went up and flew to the Vatican, and he landed in the square right out in front of there on the cobblestones.

G:        LBJ did?

A:        Yes. His helicopter.  Just one helicopter landed.  They landed the other one up on a hill, in a park up there, and then they came down in a car. But he landed there, and they had been sitting there for maybe five or ten minutes, and the pilot happened to be out of the plane and was looking and he noticed the plane is sinking. It's going out of sight. The wheels are gone. The wheel is down about that far in this mud. It's pure mud underneath those cobblestones, never designed for a weight load like that. Here it is going into the ground. Well, he has pandemonium. So, he tells the Secret Service, "I got to get out of here.  can't leave that here."  So, they order him to fly to the top of the hill. He comes out. The President is in visiting the Pope, doesn't know all this, and he comes out and then this guy is landed up on the hill and he's waiting up there.   The President has to take a car up to this hill--it's little steep hill up there to get up to this thing--and of course    he's mad. He said, "Why didn't you leave it there?" So, they tried to explain to him about this.

At any rate, they got up there and he got in it and came back, caught the airplane.

Now this time he split the press. The press was sent off to Shannon, to do a northern route on the press plane, and he took the presidential plane, 26000, and started right across the middle of the Atlantic to come home, through the Azores.

We're up an hour and I'm sound asleep and I get a call, he wants to talk to me. I said, "Yes, Mr. President." He said, "Who do you know in the Azores?" I said, "Nobody." He said, "You don't know the base commander out there at Lajes [Field]." I said, "Yes, I'll get him. Now what do you want?" He said, "We're going to refuel there, and I want everything open." Now this is now arriving there, I think the time would be something around three in the morning, Christmas Eve morning. I said, "All right." So, I called my man at the White House. This is the way I normally did it. I'd call the man at  the White House, my duty officer, tell him what I wanted, they'd get on with it. He never quibbled, he went. No matter how crazy it sounded, he'd do it.

So, he put a telephone call to this commander of Lajes and woke him up. The guy was sound asleep. Now we're three hours, four hours out. It's eleven-thirty at night, but the guy was still asleep. He said, "This is Warrant Officer  Byer [?] at the White House, sir. I want to notify you that the President's plane is due there for refueling at three o'clock in the morning, and he'll have about seventy people with him. When he lands, he wants everything on the island open.”? This base commander hadn't said a word at that point, and he said, "Are you drunk?" This guy said, "Sir, I assure you I am not. I'm speaking from the White House Situation Room." He said, "You're crazy," and he hangs up. Well, Howard didn't get mad.


Dutifully he called him back and said, "Sir, I repeat again I'm not playing a joke. I'm not crazy; I'm not drunk. I'm informing you of something. I've been instructed to tell you this."  And the fellow said, "Do you think that I can go out and find all these people between now and that three hours, get all these people back over to the commissary, the PX, the clubs, the liquor store, everything, and have all the lights on and ready for these people when they arrive at three o'clock?" He said, "Yes, sir, expect you to do that."  He said, "You're still crazy."  He starts to hand   up. Mr. Byer said, "Sir, one warning. If you hang up again the next call you will get will be from the Chief of Staff of the air force.  That's the next number on my list."

The  fellow said, "You're not joking now! You mean this!" "Yes, sir. I mean it. I can assure you. Call me back if you've got a question of who I am, where I am, if this is the number. It's the White House. We mean it, every bit of it. I've instructions to tell you this, from the President." "God," he said. Well, he hangs up.

To make a long story short, we arrived, and it was lit up like a Christmas tree.

Everything was wide open. They bought the PX out. They did their Christmas shopping. They bought the liquor store out. They bought everything that was in the club. They just literally cleaned the place out. Where they got those people from to work and how they got them in there, I don't know what they threatened them or what they offered to pay them. They were all Azorean’s, nearly all of them, a few Americans in the crowd. But they had enough in there to man all of those sites. Now, you would think that one man would have a key, and nobody knows where, but he had a better hold than that. He got them.

So, I saw him at the club, guess, and spoke to him for a minute, told him who I was and told him how it came about, the President had ordered it. He said, "Well, you know, want you to apologize to that fellow for me. I'll call him later.  But when he called, thought I had a drunk, on my hands. And then the second time knew had a drunk on my hands, but I didn't know how drunk he was."

Then the President does the second one, the last one of that trip. We now get off from there and this is now five in the morning, Azores time. We're scheduled to arrive at Andrews at six in the morning, Washington time. I go to sleep again, because I slept every chance I got. He used to kid me about it, and he'd say, "You are sleeping again?" He woke me up and I said, "Yes, sir." He said, "I want to go on nationwide TV when I arrive at Andrews." I said, "Mr. President, that's six in the morning. There's not going to be anybody up watching TV." "I know," he said, "I know. They'll record it and show it later. But I want to be on the TV. You understand?" I said, "Yes, sir." "Can you arrange it?" "Yes, sir." I didn't know I could, but I said 'yes, sir,' anyway.

I called that Warrant Officer again, and of course he's still there. I said, "Another little job. Andrews, he wants nationwide TV."  "God," he said, "I don't know.  I'll call you back." Thirty minutes later he called back and said, "No problem. The networks had camera when he left, and they left camera there and they're now rushing crew out there. They said they'll be ready by the time he gets there at six."  Sure enough, he walked off the plane, he's on the cameras. He stops and makes a little speech at the podium. Then he turns to me and said, "It's not so difficult, is it?" I said, "You're killing me, Mr. President."

G:     Why did they make that first stop at the villa and then go on to the Vatican?

A:    Because the government insisted, they had to see him, he could not come to see the Pope. Now, that’s another story. It went on in a dialogue, an argument between our Ambassador to Italy [G.   Frederick Reinhardt].   have to give that guy guts. 

Even though the President fired him on the spot, that guy stood his ground. He said, "Mr. President, you cannot come into Italy, the government of Italy will not permit you to land here unless  you are willing to see the government. You've got to see the Prime Minister or some representative of the government. You have to see them." He said, "I don't want to see them.   ain't going to see nobody but the Pope."   He said, "You can't go.  This is not a free country to land in. If you could land at the Vatican it would be a different case. You can't do it. You've got to land in Italian territory. They've got to be responsible for your security. They refuse to let you do it." He said, "Well, what the hell did you tell them for?" This fellow said, "Tell them! Sir, you can't go flying helicopters and moving people around in armored cars and Secret Service and everything." "Well, who the hell asked for all of that?" Now, I'm there next to him when he's talking to this Ambassador, and the Ambassador said, "Sir, you just can't do it."

He said, "You know, I'll tell you, you're a stubborn son of a bitch. I'll guarantee you, you're fired. You can't do your job. I told you I didn't want to see anybody but the Pope. If you can't arrange a little old thing like that, I don't want you as my ambassador." The fellow said, "Well, that may be, sir. But all I'm telling you, you're going to see the [heads] of government, or you aren't going to land." And so finally he said, "Okay, goddamnit, where is it?" He said, "Well, they'd have to open a villa. They've already taken steps to start it, assumed that you'd agree." He said, "Well, where is it?" He said, "Well, it's down south of town about ten or twelve miles." He said, "I am not going to ride no hour and a half over there." "Nope, you'll get a helicopter ride down there." He said, "Well, I don't like it, but we'll go."

But he didn't fire the fellow. He forgave him I guess that night. He didn't fire him. But he told me he was going to fire him, said, "Oh, if you can't do a goddamn job better than this, I don't want you as ambassador." That's why he saw them. They insisted. The government insisted. Then after he had seen them, they visited with him and so on, basically he told them about Vietnam. That's what he used as an excuse.  He'd say, "Well, I want to see the Pope and talk about peace" and all this stuff with the Pope and get his assistance to try to bring peace in Vietnam. That's what he professed to talk to the Pope about. What he actually said to him, I don't know. We never recorded that. We didn't do that.

G:        You weren't there at that leg with him?

A:       No, I did not. I was at the airport. See, I didn't go in. They went from there    to the villa and [from] the villa to this landing in front of St. Peters and          they went inside. After they saw him, then they came out. He took very        limited number with him. A lot of people went in and took items in to be        blessed by the Pope and so on, but only a few had really [witnessed] the        actual talk with him. The Secret Service and one of his assistants, I guess      it was Jim Jones, and the Ambassador, the Ambassador was with him. The    Ambassador spoke Italian, and of course the Pope spoke English as well as    we did. He could speak a lot of languages, that one did, too.

G:        That's good story.

A:         I didn't see the Pope, no. I've never seen him, except at a distance. Even        when he came to New York I didn't see him at all.

G:        That's another story I bet.

             Well, shall we break here? I've kept you about three hours.

A:        That's fine. That's good enough.



[End of Tape 3 of 3 and Interview I]


Interview of Maj. Gen. Jack A Albright                                        

President Lyndon B. Johnson promotes Col. Jack A. Albright to Brigadier General.   

             

Type of Activity

Communications support for the White House

Location

Location

Washington DC, worldwide

Date of Activity

1965 to 1989

Coordinates

  38°53′52″N 77°02′11″W

 

This is the second part of an interview with Gen. Jack A. Albright the second WHCA commander who served from Apr. 1965 to June 1969 under Presidents Johnson and Nixon

 

DATE:      December 11 , 1980

                 INTERVIEWEE: JACK ALBRIGHT

                 INTERVIEWER: MICHAEL L. GILLETTE

 

PLACE:   Cosmos Club, Washington, D. C. Tape 1 of 1

INTERVIEW II 


G:        You were going to talk about that trip to the Truman Library.

 

A:        Yes. That was an interesting trip, because we went out the day before to visit and to plan for this. When we arrived at the Library, President Truman was there and [he was] a most gracious host. He came to us, and he said, "Well, you know, I always admired Lyndon. He was a great, great man, a great majority leader. And he is making a great president. You know, I wouldn't offer this for just anybody, but I would really let him and be glad to have him use my podium." I said, "Mr. President, may I see the podium?  He is rather tall and maybe it is too short, maybe we can raise it.  We would take a look at it. We'd like to look at it." So, he said, "Fine."

 

He took us to a back room. Now, he had led us through the Library; he had already walked us through the various rooms and [was] proud of the Library. He showed us the various rooms within there, and then finally found a room where this podium was stored. I do not think I am exaggerating, it could not have been more than four foot, four inches, four foot five. It was extremely short, hit you about your navel. Not something I could have used at all, and about that wide. It might have suited him very well, it might have made him loom large to the crowd in front of it, or behind it to speak. But I did not think the President would be happy with it at all, and so I said, "Mr. President, I do appreciate it, but I don't believe that it would just fit the circumstance, I don't think." He said, "Well, couldn't you put it up on some telephone books or something of this nature and sort of raise it where Lyndon could use it? He's taller than I am." I said, "Yes, sir, but we've found that they've gone through trying times on security and they really feel they need the protection now. What we have done, Mr. President, we have placed certain security within that podium, and so we would prefer to use the regular podium, which is wide, which is about his height. So, if you do not mind, we'll use that one." "Well, that's fine," he said, "whatever you want to do.  But I wanted to make the  offer and let you know how I felt about Lyndon.   He's a great guy."   So, we put his podium in and the President spoke from his regular podium, not that of President Truman.

 

But it is just interesting the attitude, the solicitude he had toward this. But he took all of my other people, the people that came in with me, the public address systems, and he was most solicitous, most anxious to assist, to do anything he can to make sure this  was a success. We were, that morning, about, oh, three hours away from presidential arrival, and he was saying, "We've got to have it right, we've got to have it right." We knew that, of course.

 

G:        Did you have an opportunity to see the two men together, to observe their interaction?

 

A:        Oh, yes, many times. Each year I would say, and you will see it down through the schedule, President Johnson, sort of around the birthday period, he would visit President Truman.


I think probably the last time I recall was in it was 1968, could be 1967, but in that time frame, and he visited him. We went to the house, and they stood together on the porch and took pictures and so on. Afterwards President Truman said, "Well, I’d like to go back to the airport with you," and Bess Truman just said, "No.  Harry, it is time for  your nap. 

 

I'm sorry, you're not going to the airport."   He turned to Lyndon and said, "You see, as you get older you have someone boss you around and tell you what to do. You have to look forward to this." That sort of laughed it off and ended the subject, but he did not go.

 

An interesting story with that though.  In an earlier visit to their home, I think it  was probably in 1966, we went in. Normally before the President's visit we used to install telephones in the facility, in the location where the President would come, both for Secret Service and for the President. But Mrs. Truman told my advance man, she said, "I am sorry, we don't have a phone. Don't have a phone in the home." I thought that was rather odd. Nevertheless, she said, "It's true. We do not believe in phones.  We don't have a phone in the house, and if we need to use a phone, we go down to the phone booth on  the corner." I thought that was rather [odd]. But she said, "Now, Lyndon's coming. He is always a great favorite of mine.


We'll let you put a telephone on the back porch with a long cord, and if he gets a call, he can bring it in the kitchen and talk on it." And that is all we could do. He put a telephone installation on the back porch with a long cord, and he did get a call and took it into the house and talked in there.

 

Well, at the end of that visit, as they were coming from one of the functions and going back into the house, a lot of the photographers were following and the White House photographer, [Yoichi] Okamoto, was attempting to follow. She stopped him and said, "Hold it just a minute. I don't allow photographers in my house." He said, "Why?" She said, "Well, I've got furniture that dates from World War I, old furniture. It suits me, it suits Harry. But I do not want anybody taking pictures of it, I do not want anybody making fun of it. We are not going to have it. You, you are little old Japanese boy, you get off my porch." She told Okamoto this. Okamoto said, "Look, I'm the White House photographer. I'm working for President Johnson." She said, "I don't care who you work for, you get off my porch. I don't want you on my porch." So, he came out in the yard.

 

Bob Taylor and I were standing there during the argument. We were always the kidding kind, and we joked with him a little bit and said, "Oh, you Japanese kid, get away from us. You're terrible." Of course, we had been friends of Okamoto for years. But we said, "You get away from us." He was really burning about this. But she would not allow them in the house. No photographers, and specifically Okamoto, no way. They did take pictures on the porch, and that is all they could do.

 

G:        Was LBJ apprised of this situation later?

 

A:        No, no. No, no. We never told him about that. It really was not a thing we would tell him about. It was just laughable to the Secret Service that heard it. Well, the press around it heard it.  The press was really told, "You can't come in."  They never wrote much about  it, because they had great respect for Mrs. Truman and President Truman. Never said much about it.

G:        LBJ presented Harry Truman with the number one Medicare card, didn't he?

 

A:        Yes, but I do not remember much about that. I was not privy to that or present at the time he did. I do recall that he did, I read about it. But I do not know much about that.

 

G:        Do you ever recall him talking about President Truman after these visits?

 

A:        Oh, he would always have some comment about it. He would inject it in some speeches.  One  speech, he made it and went on to make a speech somewhere else--I think San Francisco. He made the comment he had seen him at the Muehlebach Hotel. This was sometime in early 1965. He made the comment, "I've just been with one of the greatest Democratic presidents since Roosevelt died.  Old Harry Truman, I visited with him at the  Muehlebach. He's one of the greatest, and he's doing great."  [He'd] just tell the people, he said, "He's a wonderful guy," that kind of compliment, always that kind. Nothing but compliments about him. He had a genuine respect for him.  Part of it was palaver and politics, we knew that. But nevertheless, there was a genuine respect for him. He did not have to make those trips. He gained maybe politically from it, but he did not have to make them. He could have gotten public respect otherwise.

 

G:        Did he ever get any advice from Truman during these visits?

 

A:        You could not tell.

 

G:        Really?

 

A:        We never were privy to any of this where they talked together. You really had doubts, because their talks were never long enough or private enough to feel that he could. And what we saw of President Truman, ex-President Truman, in later years did not lead us to believe that he would. He really did not keep up with current events that close, I do not really think so. He might have gotten political advice; I do not know that. But I do not think in world events, no. I do not think so. President Truman was all interested in what he was doing, in terms of the Library, in terms of what he was doing day-to-day. But he never attempted to talk to me or to my people, and I have spent hours with him over a period of time, in and out of his office there in the Library, there and the other times. He never got onto current events or onto politics. He never branched in that area. Always sticking to current, trivial subjects. So, I have my doubts about it, but I never heard anything.

 

On this particular trip we were informed of this only the day before the trip actually occurred.

 

G:        This is the trip to Honolulu?

 

A:        The trip to Honolulu, which is right. They chose the Royal Hawaiian Hotel, and we were given [the third floor], and all the guests were cleared off. My memory may be faulty, but it was the third floor. We cleared it all out. That was given to the presidential party. Now, the hotel itself is an old hotel, it is probably one of the older ones in Hawaii. It really had not many of the modern conveniences; it did not have air conditioning; it did not have modern communications. 

            

             We had to literally start from scratch and wire the hotel. The main frame for it was on the roof, so we had to wire from the roof of the hotel--hang the wires over the side of the hotel and string them in the windows of the various suites on the third floor and apartments and rooms.

 

During the night that first night, which was a Friday night of it is the second February 1961, Jack Valenti was sleeping, and we were laying wires across his bed, stringing wires across his bed. He woke up and wondered what in the world is going on, and they explained what it was, and he went back to sleep.

 

But it was an interesting trip in that it showed that you could in fact [handle it].

 

That was the first--not really an overseas trip, but it was the first trip he had taken outside of the continental United States with us. It had been so long since we had made an overseas trip that the whole organization was out of practice for it, Secret Service as well as us. So, we had to get back in swing.

 

G:        What lessons did you draw from this experience? How did you streamline your operation?

 

A:        The main thing is, we found we had to develop a bit more flexibility, more mobility with our equipment. As he did out there on this, he changed his mind during the trip. He wanted to speak at the East-West Center, and we had nothing at the East-West Center. This was all in a matter of hours we had to arrange things. But we had to learn to get equipment that was flexible to the point--and the East-West Center was at the University of Hawaii. We had to get equipment that would match equipment as we would find it. Sometimes they develop a low level or low resistance speaker system, and you could go in and connect up without any problem. Others it was a high ohmic system and you could not do that. You had to have equipment that was especially designed and matched to it. So, we had to start carrying both, equipment that would match both systems, and that is what resulted from that trip. We built our travel packages considerably different as a result of that one trip.

 

The other main thing we learned was that we are almost totally dependent on in any trip the commercial communications systems that exist, whether it be an AT&T or GT&E or an independent, we are totally dependent on them. Because we had to take over whatever systems exist, and they had to do the wiring; you had to depend on that group to do the wiring locally and change all the telephones out, change them back to our switchboard. Now, we did it within the twenty-four-hour time frame we had, but it was not a simple thing. But without them it would have been impossible. No way. We could not have done it ourselves. As many people as I had, I could not have made the adjustment.

 

Witness that a year later when I will talk later about the second trip to Hawaii, when we went out in preparation for the visit out there in 1967 [1968], just before Martin Luther King was killed. We had to abort and go back a week later. Now that is a massive trip we prepared for that time and yet we were better prepared because of this first trip, because we knew what we had to do, what we had the plan for, and what we could do. So, it was a good traveling experience. But he really had not traveled anywhere in what we called an overseas environment up to that point, not anywhere. That was the first one.


G:        Why do you think he did not travel more outside the [states]?

 

A:        Oh, his politics were mostly domestically oriented. He felt when he took over as president after Kennedy was killed that he had a mission to try to pass the legislation that had been unable to pass, that Kennedy espoused but could not pass. So, in the first hundred to hundred and eighty days he had an objective to pressing for that legislation. He had a control, a way with the Congress, that no president before him has ever had.

 

G:        Now at that East-West Trade Center he, as I recall, gave very enthusiastic support to the idea of educational television.

 

A:        That is correct, he did. That is the first time he had ever spoken of that in public, and he spoke of it very strongly and it gave a boost to all of the ETV programs throughout the United States. But that is where it opened, that is where it began.

 

G:        Can you recall the genesis of this? Did he ever discuss this with you?

 

A:        No. No. That was not anything I even knew about; I did not see it. He did not prepare for those kinds of speeches when he was going on the road. He would have some speech writer, Doug Cater or somebody, write him a speech. Then he would give it--he would not rehearse it. The only speeches I ever got involved in in preparation for was like State of the Union or one where he is going on nationwide TV or where he was going to make a press conference. Sometimes he would rehearse those kinds of things, and I got in on it, but not this kind.

 

He considered those more extemporaneous types of talks. (Interruption) We were traveling from Stewart Air Force Base in New York over to Ellenville, New York. The motorcade was traveling around through the countryside. A crowd would gather. They had heard something about it on the radio, and they would gather along the roadside as we traveled through. He would stop the motorcade and get out and talk to them. Sometimes it would be five, seven, sometimes ten or twelve people. He would talk to all of them, wherever he could. But as we were traveling and close to Ellenville suddenly the motorcade stopped. And we did not know why. I did not know why. I was in about the seventh or eighth car back in the motorcade. When it stopped to a dead standstill, I went forward to see what it was, and here is a horse lying in the road. It looked like a fairly scrawny-looking horse, maybe of a trotting horse vintage, that kind, because that is trotting horse country up there. And the farmer is standing there talking to the Secret Service and the first lead car, which is a police car from the state of New York, and he is irate.

 

He said, "You killed my best racing horse and I want to get paid for it." Well, he was not going to move the horse, nor let them move the horse until he got paid for his horse.

 

So, we had argued for oh, anywhere from five to seven minutes and suddenly the President gets out. He is about the third or fourth car back. He gets out and comes up and says, "What's the problem?" So, they told him.


 He looked at the horse and he said, "Don't look like much of a horse." The farmer said, "Well, he's a trotting horse and he's a good lineage, and he's won many races up here in trotting. He's a valuable horse," He    said, "Well, what do you want for him?" They had explained to him, the horse jumped over the fence and got in front of the motorcade and of course got hit by the lead car and got killed. He said, "Well, it ought to be worth a thousand dollars." The President looked, walked around and sort of looked at him.  He said, "He don't look like any thousand-dollar horse to me."

 

He said, "Well, no, now he doesn't.  He is dead.  But he was worth that." He said, "What would you take for him?"  He said, "Well, I'll take a thousand dollars." The President said, "I'll give you five hundred." He said, "Well, I'll split the difference, how about seven-fifty?" He was a trader, too, you know. The President said, "Okay, seven-fifty." He turned to the Secret Service [man] and said, "Pay him." The Secret Service [man] said, "Pay him? We don't have any money." He said, "Who's got money?" And he said, "Albright. He's the only man who carries money with him."  I always carried an impress fund in cash. The President turned around and said, "What's the problem? Pay the man and let us get on! We're going to Ellenville!" So, I drug out seven hundred and fifty dollars paid the guy and got a receipt for the thing, one dead horse, got in the car and we went out.


We get back to Washington, and I do not know, we went on to these other locations here. It was to Vermont and Lewiston, Maine and New Hampshire and New Brunswick and finally to Campobello Island and back home.

 

So, the following week, it was the twenty-first, twenty-third [August 1966], somewhere in there, I submitted my voucher to clear my account. I put on there "One dead horse, seven hundred and fifty dollars."   It got to the finance officer, and he called me, "You've got to be kidding! You can't put a dead horse on your finance voucher." I said, "Oh, yes I can. That is what happened. You see the receipt for it?"  He said, "Yes, but that's not a deductible item." I said, "Oh, my God, I got a novice here."


 So, I called my boss, who was [Lt.] General Alfred Starbird. General Starbird called somebody in Defense, and somebody in Defense called somebody in Treasury, and Treasury filtered down. This poor finance officer somewhere down the line an hour or so later called me and he said, "Come get your money." So, I went over there, and he wrote it off and signed it. So, I still have the voucher somewhere in my records where he said, "One dead horse." He paid for it just to clear the records.

 

G:        He met with Lester Pearson in Canada; I think?

 

A:        In Campobello, that is right he did.

 G:        Do you remember anything about that?


A:       No, other than the fact that they had a meeting, and they made no real speeches, they made no communiques from it. But they had this speech up there and they met up in FDR's old house up in Campobello Island, what they call FDR's hideaway or something--Shangri La I guess is what they called the place up there.

 

G:        Did he ever talk about FDR when he was there?

 

A:        Not a great deal. Oh, he made a few comments about it, "one of the great presidents" and so on.  He really was not one to dwell on history that much.   In private he never had  much to say about it.  (Interruption)

 

This particular trip was the first place we had done the research work on the nuclear development, and it is the first peaceful development at Pocatello [Idaho]. He dedicated a space science building there and accepted an honorary degree from the University of Denver thereafter, he went on down to Denver to accept it.  But the first site--we had been out and prepared a site for them. We anticipated about ten thousand people to come and hear him. So, we contracted with a local firm to put in a public address system for him. We had some huge speakers, amplifiers, but he was also contracted to be on nationwide TV, and so we had connected for that. Just as all the preliminaries--the Governor of the state of Idaho and so on all were there to make their preliminary political talks and introduce the various dignitaries.

 

About the time the President got up, the public address system quit. It literally quit, nothing. So, my people were scurrying out in front, pulling plugs, and shoving this and shoving that, trying to figure what was wrong.


The President was up there and looking around at me and looking at Marvin Watson out of the corner of his eye, and Marvin [was] saying, "What's wrong?" And I would say, "Keep talking, keep talking." Well, I wanted him to keep talking because it was on nationwide TV. Well, he did keep talking. He kept making snide remarks about it, you know, "the public address system don't work, they wonder what I'm saying out there. But I hope you people out in TV can hear me" and so on. He did talk for four-and-a-half minutes and finally it came back on. He finished his speech and got back on his helicopter. I got on another helicopter.


We flew back over to the air base and flew down to Denver, which wasn't a long flight, he called me in and said, "What happened?"   I said, "Mr. President, I really don't know. I'm waiting for a report." I had a fellow on the ground--a Major Taylor, Joe Taylor, and I said, "I'm waiting on him to tell me."   Now some of that is in this other thing [Interview  I]; you will see some duplication. But that is where it was. I said, "Well, I don't know, but I'm waiting on a call from Joe Taylor."


Well, I finally subsequently got hold of Joe Taylor, and he told me, said, "Well,  we had what is known as a hot short, a hot solder. As it got hot, the solder"--that's S-O- L-D-E-R, see, I've spelled it all wrong in the early interpretation of this thing.  But it  came apart. As it got hot it broke loose, and that is an unusual type of a defect in electrical equipment. But it did. The President said, "My God, I'm glad you found it." I made the mistake of saying, "No, we didn't find it." He said, "You mean it could have quit again?" I said, "Yes," and he augured right through the roof.


 He said, "Oh, my God.  Next time I'm up there, when I'm talking, you walk out in front of me and say, 'Hold it, Mr. President, stop talking, just sit down until I get it fixed.'" I said, "Mr. President, I can't do that. My God! You're on nationwide TV."  He said, "I don't really care how many people are listening.

 

You are standing there with ten thousand people looking at you and they are watching your chops moving and somebody is saying, 'What in the hell is he talking about?' Really, that is a critical thing; you do not want to do that. Stop me next time!" But, well, I did not ever stop him. I never stopped him again.

 G:        Did it ever happen again?

 

A:        Oh, yes. My God! It happened a number of times. (Laughter) That's just one of many, but it was not as obvious to him as that one. I had failures a number of times after that.

 G:        Let us talk about that next Hawaiian trip, October,1966.

 A:      Actually, this was just an overnight stop; all he did, he spent the night there. We stopped in                   Hawaii.

 

Going back a bit, we had a pre-trip group that made the trip. We left on the first day of October,1966, and we got back on the sixteenth. We turned around and left with him on the morning of the seventeenth and went back with him again for the same trip. We were dead, dead on our feet.

 

But at any rate, his trip, we arrived in Hawaii on the seventeenth. He got there and spent the night. Raining like hell, we got off the plane, just pouring rain. I mean just buckets. Every cable was up off the ground and the system was muffled in part at the airport because of the water on the cables. It was not a good arrival at all.


But anyway, he went downtown, spent the night. As a matter of fact, he did not spend the night, he just stopped there and made a speech and went on to Pago Pago.

 

Now in Pago Pago we stopped again for the ceremonies, and we had ceremonies there while they were refueling the plane. He made a couple of speeches there. The most interesting thing is they had the native dances and the native ceremony. He had to drink some of this kava, and some of this is pretty horrible brew that they come up with out there, highly alcoholic but tastes like a very bad bitter coffee, but it has got some native fruits and stuff in it. He would make a face and so on. But anyway, he drank that stuff.


Then we went on to Pago Pago--that's American Samoa--and then finally wound [up] in Wellington, New Zealand. Now this was an interesting trip. He spent I believe a full night there.  Yes, that is right, one full day.  We went up to visit the Maori village up  in the hills and then came back and visited and he spoke at the New Zealand congress.

 

He made some trips around town to a couple of historical sites there. An interesting trip went on very well. But we had enough notice, we had people in place. It is one of the few times for President Johnson I was able to prepare for him. Most of the time he really sort of gave you one day or two, and then he'd give me hell and smile at me as [if] to [say] "See, I told you could do it. No problem at all."

 G:        Then he flew to Australia I guess after that.

A:        He flew then, right, to Canberra. Canberra became our center of operations, and from Canberra,             we stayed there I guess two days, flew one day over to Sydney, flew back to there.


I do not know what came out of it, but one that came, we had a picnic out at the Ambassador's ranch. He had a ranch, out in the country. He put on a nice feed. I am embarrassed to say [I cannot think of] the Ambassador's name. I can see the guy. A fellow who was from Texas, the Ambassador--

 G:        Ed Clark, wasn't it?

 
  A:        Yes, that's right, Ed Clark. A nice gentleman, mustache you know, a very congenial fellow. He and                    his  wife received the press out at his ranch. He had a little barbecue, and he put on sort of                                entertainment out there. The President stayed out there for several hours, and then he flew back, and                 we all went back to town.

 Then the following day we flew up, stopped at Townsville, and then went on up to Darwin, refueled, and then finally on to Manila.

 G:        Now he had been stationed in Australia during World War II.

 A:        Yes. I did not realize how long he had been there, but I guess some of it had been in the Darwin area, Townsville.

 G:        Did he talk about it?

 A:        He reminisced about it a little bit, yes, at the picnic. He did not do much of that other places. But he made a speech at each of these stops where he would stop, Townsville and Darwin. He [said], Well, I am coming back for the first time since 1944"--I guess it as when he was there.

 G:        1942, yes. 1942 it was, I think.

 A:        Oh, no, it was later than that. 1942, no. We did not have anybody there in 1942.

 

G:        Well, he was there.

 A:        1943 maybe.

 G:        No, it was 1942. Yes.

 A:        1942. Gee, Pearl Harbor was in

G:        December of 1941.

 A:        1941.  And then he went down there.

 G:        Well, summer of 1942 was when it was.

 A:        It could have been, they moved anybody, people down there to Guadalcanal at that time, but I did not realize we had a lot of people in Australia that early. I thought it was a little later we got people into there. But maybe anyway it was. But he spoke about his trip down in there, his time in there.

G:        So, you went on to Manila from there?


A:        Manila, right. And they had the conference there in Manila. We were there --they show here as two days.


G:        This was the conference with the other heads of state.

 

A:          Southeast Asian Conference, that is right. Now he spoke to almost all of them during that time frame. Some of them he was trying to reach some sort of a consensus with them. I do not know whether he did or not. He made a number of talks while he was there.

 

G:        Was he pleased with the way it was going there? Did his mood seem positive?


A:      Yes, I think so. He felt that he was being supported in general by that crowd there that he met there, particularly the Thai and the Malaysian group, because he agreed at that point, and we then consented to modify it to continue on. We had already done some preliminary work, but he would not if he had not met them there and made some sort of an agreement to continue with them. We went on from there to Thailand and then into Malaysia.


One of the interesting things that came out of this, and I got one of the chewing’s I had. They had a rice institute down south of Manila and he went down to make a speech at this rice institute. This was arranged by Tyler Abell. Tyler Abell was [assistant] postmaster general at that time, but he was also an advance man on this particular trip.

 

We went down there, and we planned for this presentation, and Tyler Abell came in at the last minute and started changing things around. But he was just about to screw things up good, when I heard about it and I overruled him and said, "No, we're not going to do it that way." He had taken the President's podium out. The President would get mad. He would come in and if he did not find the circumstance, he liked in a presentation view really, he would get very unhappy. So, he told me later, "You're not going to let somebody like Tyler Abell tell you what to do, are you?" I said, "No, I'm not," and he did not. But we put it back in place. We moved Tyler Abell out and shoved him all up to Korea. He went ahead of us on a jump to the Korean site.

 

But he made the speech at the rice institute. This was generally where we agreed to provide some assistance to that rice institute to try to proliferate the fast-growing rice that they had come up with, very prolific rice for Southeast Asia, for Malaysia, for Thailand and for Vietnam.   They agreed to move some of that out there under the auspices of that rice institute.

 

G:        He did go to Vietnam then, didn't he?

 

A:     He went to Vietnam the following morning. I was rudely awakened at two o'clock. I knew something was wrong. I knew that something was going to happen, because I was told to be at the naval base at Subic Bay at something like five-thirty, six in the morning. Well, I was. I was the only member of my group that could be there.


Nobody else from the White House Communications [Agency] was there. We got on a plane, the President's plane, the single 707, the presidential aircraft, and flew to Vietnam.


Then we got there. So, he told me, he said, "I'm going to visit the troops in the hospital. When I come back, I want to have it set up for a speech." I said, "Well, I'll be able to record it.  There's not going to be any podium."  He said, "Where is the podium?" I said, "Podium? You would not let me bring anybody. You just told me, and I am here all alone. I have got microphones prepared for your speech and we will record you, but you are not going to talk into any podium or anything, presidential podium. There is not going to be any presidential seal. You're just going to get up and talk to the troops, Mr. President." Well, he said okay. He sort of accepted it, but some of the other aides there thought I should have brought the whole--and I said, "Well, that's really wonderful to think.  That is a four-hundred-pound podium, and you have got me here alone.  So." He did talk to the troops. We fixed it up, and we recorded it. It was a very, very hush-hush trip, a lot of security involved in the thing. He really had told [General William] Westmoreland that he was coming, and that is about the only one that knew there that he was coming into there.

 

G:        How did he feel about that trip? Did the experience influence him in one way or another?

 

A:        Well, yes, it did, it sort of touched him. Because on the way back he would talk to us about it; he talked to me about it and a couple of others, Marvin Watson, Jake Jacobsen, a couple of others were on there.   He felt he had really had a meaningful trip to him.   He felt he had done something that was important to the troops in Vietnam. He always felt strongly about Vietnam. He felt that it was right, he felt we were doing the right thing. Even though, as he says, his detractors did not feel that way, he felt that he was.

 

G:        Did he also feel that it was important for him to be there to show a measure of support for the troops?


A:       Yes, that is why he went. He would not have gone otherwise. He really felt that it was important. He did not feel as many people did that, he was putting his life in danger; he never felt that way. He never worried about his life really, per se. He never felt there was anybody that was really anxious to kill him.

 

G:        He never had a fear of assassination?

 

A:        Not at that time, he did not. He developed some of it later, but not at that time. And certainly, out there he had no fear. These were among his people. These people in Vietnam were his--you ask the British, the Australians, whatever was there for him were all friends of his. They were people that were supporting the same things that he supported, support for the Vietnamese. And certainly, the Vietnamese that he dealt with, they were there, they were still in power because U.S. forces were there. And so, no, he had no concern about that kind of visit; he felt good about the visit.

 

But an interesting thing happened. Interesting thing looking back on it, it was not too funny at the time. As we left there, he asked me, "Did you get a copy of the tape?" I said, "Yes, we brought one and I have one." He said, "Well, I tell you what, I want to go on nationwide TV when I arrive back in Manila." International TV. And I said, "Mr. President, fine, all right. We can probably arrange this. It probably will be tape recorded, and we would have to go out to one of the TV studios and record. I can arrange that." He said, "But I want to use the teleprompter." I said, "Now wait a minute, Mr. President. I asked you specifically, you personally, did you want us to bring the teleprompters before we came and you said, 'No.  it's too much weight.' So, we did not bring it. That is some we cut out, six hundred pounds. We just cut down in the weight of the things we were hauling around. And you said, 'All right, don't bring it.  It is too much!'" I said, "You don't have them." He said, "Well, don't they have those out here?" I said, "No! They do not have them all over the world! They might have some elementary ones in Japan."  He said, "Well, I don't care where you get them.  Get me one by tomorrow morning!" I said, "Well, I'll try, but I'm not betting that I'll have it." He said, "Well, I don't tell you all my problems. Just find one."

 

Well, I called back to my people in Manila from the air after we took off from Cam Ranh Bay and I told them what I wanted. Then I had an incredibly good man in Manila, Jack Rubley, who is now the head of communications for the ICA, Interagency [International] Communications Agency. I said, "Jack, the President wants to make a TV recording and go on worldwide TV. So, you are going to have to record it in the morning; when he comes back, he wants to record. It is going to be late at night.  But he wants to go on the TV." He said, "Well, would he be willing to wait until in the morning? I can get him on nationwide TV easier in the morning.  Time-wise it's just not right tonight." "But," I said, "he wants the teleprompter." He said, "You know we don't have a teleprompter out here." I said, "I know that, and you know that. But just find one, Jack." "My God," he said, "you give me some of the damnedest jobs."   I said, "Don't tell me   your problems, Jack. That's what he told me." So, we left it laughing like that.

 

Well, when he [Johnson] got back it so happened he changed his mind before he got home. He did not want to make a recording that night. He said, "I tell you what, I'll do it first thing in the morning. But you have it ready at say nine in the morning."

 

So, okay. That would give us an overnight. But Jack had it ready. We could have gone to a studio and recorded it for TV that night. But we put it off until the following morning, sent him out there and did record it.

 

They had a form of teleprompter, some things that he could look at and the tape could be put on there. We did do that, and he recorded it the  following morning. Generally, it was a short message about his feelings about his trip into Vietnam and why he went there.

 

G:        Why did he change his mind, do you think, so many times on things like this?

 

A:        Do you mean on the way home?

 

G:        No, just in general on last minute changes, last minute decisions, changing his mind on whether or not he wants to use this or wants to speak from this podium or that podium, and things like that.

 

A:     I never did figure him out really. I never really understood him that complete. I could have understood more if the circumstances had changed or if there had been an incident or something to upset him or if somebody had called and told him about some press release or something. But I did not often see those things that caused them. But I concluded in general he got tired. Maybe the circumstance appeared to change for him, and so he would say, "Well, okay, I'm tired tonight. We are not going to do it tonight. Let us change it and do it in the morning." I have to adjust it maybe to tiredness, maybe to his age, maybe to the fact that the trip itself was bearing on him. I never was critical of him for doing this. I just reacted to, that was all I could do. And there were times [when] I was there, yes. I moaned and groaned about him doing it. But in retrospect, no, I think that some of that was just a fact of the pressures of the office.

 

(Interruption)

 

Before we left, we were preparing to leave the Philippines and about that night, it was somewhere around two o'clock in the morning, I get a call from Korea. My advance man in Korea tells me, said, "We got a problem up here." "Now," he said, "the problem is, we wanted to use a podium, the President's podium, up here in Korea but we got a fellow by the name of Tyler Abell who sent some advance word up here. Hackler is here, Loud Hackler"--he was acting as the advance man on that particular trip--"but the y say no, we've got to use one that's built in, that's short, that fits the Korean president and matches the decor and all this stuff, and they've gone ahead and had it built." And it is high. Oh, it was a massive speech environment. He was trying to speak to about two million people from a conjunction of a whole series of where roads radiated into a square, I do not know, it was seven, eight, ten roads came to one point in the center of Seoul. A massive and a very impressive sight. But we had built this thing up off the ground, some seventy-five or a hundred feet, and looking down these roads you could see this thing from all directions. So, they were going to make sort of a dais, a real impressive affair. And they did not think this President's podium would fit in that environment or would show.

 

I said, "Look"--this is my man, it's Jim Adams, and I said, "Jim, look, please. The President told me again tonight, he said he wants to speak at that podium up there. So, do not argue with him and we are not going to take any argument. Tell them to put that podium up." So, he said, "All right. I'll tell them."

 

Well, another hour later I am now asleep. I am in the hotel in Manila asleep. I get a telephone call and he said, "Sorry. They say nope, they will not do it. They're not going to do it." And I said, "Who do they want to call them?"

 

He said, "Well, they want Marvin Watson to call them if there's a change. I said, "Marvin isn’t going to like it, I'm going to wake him up." So, I called him and woke him up. "Yes, Colonel, what's the problem?" I said, "Lloyd won't change it.

 

Lloyd Hackler says we're going to use that built-in podium, he will not use a presidential podium." "Didn't you tell him what we told you?" I said, "Yes." "And he still insists?" I said, "That's right. He wants to talk to you." "He'll be sorry he did. Would you get him on the phone and then give me the call?" I said, "Yes." I said, "Okay, Jim, get him on the phone and then give it to me, and I've got Brother Watson standing by.  He is mad.  He woke him up, and he is not happy.  So,  Lloyd may get a few words.  But if you want to put a bug in his ear, you can save him a lot of grief. Marvin is going to just chew his ass out, and he just says it is going to change, it is going to be the presidential podium. Now, if he wants to hear it from you, fine. If he wants to hear it from Marvin, fine."

 

So, a few minutes back, he said, "No, he's got to hear it."  So, I said, "Okay.  Is, he on?"   "Yes.   I said, "Just a minute."   I told the operator to give Marvin the call. Marvin came on and I said, "I want a conference, listen." Marvin said, "Lloyd"--he could be quiet sometimes, but very subtle, but very understanding. "Lloyd, what did Colonel Albright's advance man tell you?" Lloyd said, "Well, I'm doing what Tyler Abell told me.  He told me he wanted this built-up podium up here and all   this.

 

It is what he said. He said, 'Don't deviate.'" And he [Marvin] said, "And since that time they have told you that the President has told me and I have told Colonel Albright, I want that podium up there.  Did you understand that?"  He said, "Yes, Marvin.  They've told me that." He said, "Then, goddamn it, listen to them! Listen to them! Take that son-of-a-bitch out!"--and Marvin didn't normally curse, Marvin is a deeply religious man. He said, "Just take that son-of-a-bitch out and put the President's podium in the middle of it. You clear?" "Yes, Marvin.  Thank you."  Wham!  Marvin did not lose his temper very often, but he did that night, and when we were out in Korea that is what it was.

 

G:        Tell me about the crowd in Korea.

 

A:        Oh, my God, a tremendous crowd. I do not have any way to judge it. We saw really only the piece of it as we drove in from the airport. There must have been a million lining the street. They turned out every school in Seoul. They trucked them in from all over the countryside. Every little kid from that high up to as high as I could reach--really a tremendous crowd. Most of it school kids and people from out of their houses. They were all out to greet, you know, flowers and everything. A real tremendous greeting.

 

You have to read it as planned; you cannot read it as spontaneous.  But they were there. But when you got this speech environment as far as you could see, I have never seen that many people in my life and I have seen speech environments with a half million, three- quarter million. I have to guess well over a million or more in the streets, as far as you could see up seven ways and at every road, solid. And they had speakers built over those roads where they could all hear. But they were there, a tremendous crowd. I have never seen such a crowd in my life, before or since.

Never.

 

G:        I gather Johnson was impressed with the size of the crowd.

 

A:        He was. He made the comment, said, "That's the biggest crowd I've ever seen. I've seen a lot of Mexicans in my time, but never ever seen this." No, he was really pleased with it.

 

We went on then to Thailand. The President took a day, or a night I guess, he went out in the Patio [?], which is a resort area down on the Gulf of Siam and stayed overnight and we went on into Bangkok. He came into Bangkok for the formal meetings with the government of Thailand the following day. They did the usual things.

 

They visited the universities there, Chulalongkorn [University]. They put the wreaths at the tombs of the heroes. They appeared in the parades downtown. All the usual things there, nothing that I recall other than that, nothing significant as a statement came out.

 

Now you recall the Thais of course were with us in Vietnam; they were fighting with us, had two divisions over there and were fighting with us. But they were supporting us all the way. So, he knew nothing but support in that country, too.

 

We left the following day and flew to Kuala Lumpur. And Kuala Lumpur gave him quite an impressive greeting and lined the streets. Now it is about nine or ten miles from the airport into the city, it is quite a ways. And the roads were lined all the way.


G:        That's in Malaysia, is that right?


A:        Malaysia. Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, is the capital. And quite a crowd. Oh, it is a country of--I do not know, I do not remember the population, but it is on the order of twelve, fourteen million. The capital city itself is roughly a half, three-quarter million. But the crowd was out, it was there. Well, done. Stayed one day and then we went on to Korea from there, with two days in Korea. Met at the airport, usual festivities at the airport, made this tremendous motorcade in, the speech before that huge crowd, appeared before the governing body of Korea, visited a few more historical sites. Visited the troops. We had quite a number of troops in Korea. He visited some of the divisions over there.


And then finally we came home to Alaska, stopping in Alaska for a visit. We were going to go downtown and spend the night. They first said we were going to stay overnight and changed it and did not. But we came downtown for a rally; they had a bonfire and we drove down through a motorcade and got into the town.


An interesting one came from that, as we returned. We got on the plane in Alaska to leave. I was on the number-two plane then; he was obviously on the presidential [plane]. He called over and said, "We're going to go into not Andrews but Dulles." Now our original plan was to go back into Andrews, no crowd, quietly slip in. But after this trip he wanted a successful arrival and he wanted nationwide TV and a speech. Now, he had planned neither of those. So, he said to me, "Fix it up at Dulles." So, I called back to Washington from the air, and they said, "Man, it's a bad night here. It is pouring rain.

 

The winds are thirty-five, forty miles an hour. I don't know how you're ever going to do it." I said, "Well, okay. Move your material out to Dulles and go ahead.  Maybe the weather will clear. We are now six hours away from there so maybe it will clear."


Well, three hours out I called back, and they said, "Well, it's still windy. It's still gusty." I said, "Well, the President said put it up outside. He wants to do it outside." Now some of that is in that other [interview], you have heard it. But that same story is there. So, I do not need to repeat this story.


G:        That's the content of it?

 

A:        That's the story, right. That is the context of this. The President said, "I want to do it outside." Then when the wind was so bad, the Secret Service said, "No, you can't do it out here. You can't put that thing up." I went to the President and to Watson and Watson said, "You're not going to let the Secret Service tell you what to do." and I said, "When it's safety, yes, I am." So, they finally accepted some modification of the plan, and he said, "Put it inside," so we did.

 

Then it cleared up, and he said, "Put it outside." I put it outside and as he got off the plane the top turned loose, and it rained all over him and everybody. We really had a mess. I just grinned at him, and I said, "You wanted it outside, we got it outside."

 

G:        When he was traveling overseas, particularly in an area like Vietnam,  was there a division of security between Secret Service and military? Where did one's responsibility end and the other begin I wonder?

 

A:        The Secret Service was always in charge of the security of the President. What they did is they assigned certain functions and certain tasks to the military, and they carried them out. There was complete cooperation, but there was never a question of who was in charge. Secret Service always laid out the plans and the others said, "Now, we can do this, we can do this, we'd like to do this, we're prepared to do this and this and this," and the Secret Service is saying, "Nope. You will do this, you will do this, you will do this." Always in charge. Never was a question of that. Even the FBI, where they cooperated, there was never a question. The Secret Service were always in charge.  (Interruption)


G:        --start with that. The Punta del Este [conference].

 

A:        In April of 1967 there was a plan to hold a conference of the American chiefs of state in Punta del Este, Uruguay. Now, this was interesting in that if you had tried to pick a place that was one of the more difficult places to hold a conference, land to pick a time of year when it would be most difficult to accommodate seven hundred, eight hundred people., you could not have picked one. This one is a resort area. It is one of the leading resort areas in all of the east coast of South America for that time of year. This is a sunbathers' paradise. This is the summertime down there.  These people are there by the thousands, the bathers, the families, they rent places year after year after year, every beach, every condominium, every house, every motel, every hotel, all taken up., And somebody picked that time of year at that location to have it.

 

The second is, there are no telephones in the area, there are no communication to the United States from that area. And they picked that as an area. You could have picked any other major city and we might have done better.

 

But they picked the world's worst, and that is why. But they did not look at that. They never think of that. They think of a place that--it makes a fine-sounding name undoubtedly.   It might have a nice historic  value in future years, nobody has had a conference there in a hundred years.   They pick  out these strange things. I do not know why they do or what prompted that place. I never figured it yet, but I know they did. And from the time we first knew about it, we had our problems. Interesting story with that, I think I have told it on the other tape, about the trip with Bill Moyers when he and I went down there. Isn't that on the tape?

 

G:        I am not sure.

 

 A:     Well, interesting story then. In February 1967 Bill Moyers and I were given a task to go  to Uruguay incognito, unannounced, and we were to fly in not the same identifiable positions we held--he was press secretary and I was chief of White House Communications [Agency].We flew Varig Airlines through Rio [de Janeiro] to Buenos Aires. When we were in Rio we did not go into the airport, could not. We stayed in the airport [airplane], and walked around the plane, walked around the outside, we did not go inside at all. Someone came up to Bill Moyers and tried to talk to him and he kept saying [he] did not speak English, did not speak Spanish, and so they left him alone. They finally came to me and said, "Isn't that Bill Moyers?" and I say, "No, no, no, you're mistaken. That is my secretary. He's a male secretary, travels with me all the time." That is what we agreed would be the cover story. So, they dropped it and left him alone and nobody did. And so, we went that way.

 

We arrived in Buenos Aires and the Embassy personnel met us, the Deputy Chief of Mission. En route from the airport into town, the driver and I were in the front, Bill Moyers and the Deputy Chief of Mission were in the back seat and Bill was sitting behind me. We pulled up behind a car that was ahead of us at the cross walk, but the car behind us did not stop, and hit us. I mean, full tilt. Bang! Bill's briefcase came forward, caught me in the back of the head, threw me into the dashboard under the seat, threw Bill off the seat. I mean he hit hard; it was not any light one. Well, here we are three cars in a row--and we hit the car ahead of us now, mind you. Now we have got a three-car accident. Well, Bill said, "We got to get out of here. We can't be identified in the accident." So, we bailed out--they did. The two of them, the DCM and Bill bailed out of there, ran off and left us, took taxis, and went off to town. Well, here now I am injured. I have got a cut on the knee, a cut underneath the knee, from there, I have got a knot on the back of my head. I am not hurt anywhere, I am not in any danger, but I am limping all over the place, you know,  and I am trying to answer questions. Of course, the driver speaks not enough English to even talk about, and I speak not enough Spanish to even talk about, and I am trying to convince these guys that I am headed for the American Embassy, it is an American Embassy car, so they would release us. Now the car is capable of running, there is not a problem of that, it is the question we are tied between two cars, and they will not let us go. The police are there on the scene.

 

Well, [to make] a long story short, about thirty,  forty  minutes  later  we did get free, we went to the Embassy, and of course Bill was there, and the DCM was there in the Embassy. 

 

They brought in a woman doctor, and she examined my leg and wrapped it up, bandaged it up, put it in a knee stocking from here to here, bandaged my head and gave   me some aspirin and this kind of stuff. Well, I could not go home because Bill and I had to go on to Uruguay.


So, then they arranged for the military attaché to fly us to Uruguay, mind you.

 

Now he has got an old, antiquated DC-3, so Bill and I clandestinely go out to the airport and crawl on this DC-3 and grab our baggage and haul it on there and then they would drag us--we fly across to Uruguay and again the same old story. Everywhere we go we are sneaking around behind the bars to talk to people


So, we talked to people in Uruguay about the conditions there. We go out to Punta del Este and look at it, we talk about the various things. I tried to find out about communications without tipping anybody off of what is coming off, that the President in fact is coming down.

 

Now, people inside the Embassy knew it, there is not any doubt about that. We had to tell somebody. You could not do that. But the people in the government itself of Uruguay and of Argentina never were told. We did not tell them. Until later they announced this meeting. We did not tell another body. But we arranged for all that in advance.


Then we went back and told him, yes, there was sufficient--yes, the Embassy said yes, we can take over a floor of the hotel. Yes, they can throw people out of the hotel.

 

But they never visualized the response they would have to that. They thought we might have as many as a hundred, hundred and fifty. We had about seven hundred people wanting to go to that damn thing, and they had a real problem later. The Embassy had the problem, with about four hundred press, about a hundred and fifty of support, and then of course the political groups in the White House, et cetera. About seven hundred and fifty total. It was a real madhouse. I felt sorry for them. 

Anyway, we went in there. The conference was held. The conference was reasonably successful. We had high frequency. We brought the USS Wright I guess down, the aircraft carrier, which was a communications ship. It stood offshore. We gave communications back through it back to Washington. And at three o'clock the morning of the last day they were scheduled to leave about eight in the morning, had a blackout, all communications failed. Everything. All north-south communications on HF ended. Now, why did it save my ass? There is a cable that runs down the east coast of South America and it was installed--I do not recall the year, but many, many years ago, a real low-speed, single channel cable. Now why you would spend that much money for one cable, I do not know. But it did. It was a teletype cable installed for the news services.

 

Western Union International controlled it. It was forty-five baud circuit, which is--oh, forty-five baud is around fifty-five, fifty-seven words a minute. But it did pass traffic, and that one was the only thing that operated, we could pass traffic. If we had had to have a message--we did not have to--but if we had had to have a message passed either way for emergency purposes, that is all we had. We had no voice, no other messages, no high frequency between that part of South America and North America for that period of time, between four and six a.m.


Well, I caught hell from the President. I mean, he asked me, "What would you have done if I had wanted to make a call?" I said, "You wouldn't have made a call.

 

You would just have had to give me all the hell you want. There isn't anything you could do." He said, "Well, why didn't you arrange something better than that?" I said, "What could I"--we did not have any satellites up then you see at that point that we could use. "What could I have done that's better, Mr. President? We could not do anything with that. We were dependent on high frequency." Now today you have got an easy thing; there is no problem today.

 

G:        Just use satellites.

 

A:        Use a satellite. And when they travel, they do carry satellite terminals. But I tell you, that was a risky business.

 

G:        You would have thought the National Security Council or some group within the White House would have said you cannot have the conference here because we do not have [communication facilities].

 

A:        They would like to have. But they assured him, "Well, we have got six HF circuits with the Wright and four of them commercially from Montevideo, and three of them from Buenos Aires. We've got connections microwaved to Buenos Aires." We showed commercially we could have all these interconnections; it all looked good on paper. But when that blackout spot came, when the sunspot hit, it took it, it took it all. And it happens once every eleven to fourteen years. There is an eleven-year sunspot cycle, and you are not certain whether it is going to be that eleven-year or the thirteen, fourteen, fifteen-year. But it could be an eleven-year cycle, and it happens.

 

G:      Did you have a chance to observe LBJ's interaction with the Latin American heads of state, people like Eduardo Frei?

 

A:        No, extremely limited really. No, I did not. All it is, I heard him talk about it later.

 

G:        What did he say about it?

 

A:       He was never really comfortable with those people. He feels more comfortable with a European than he did with the Latins.

 

G:        Really?

 

A:        Yes, he did.

 

G:        Well now, this is odd, since he came from Texas.

 

A:        It does not matter. You never heard his comments he used to make about the Mexicans. He used to think, "Goddamned Mexicans." He used to speak fairly lowly of them I would say. He watched the others with suspicions. He did not trust people such as the Frenchman and so on.  He would have suspicions about them, he would laugh about them sometimes.

 

             But in  general, he trusted the British probably more than anybody. He was more comfortable with the British. It is an understanding a language maybe that made the difference. Where he had to depend on a translator, he never felt comfortable at it. That is the main reason.

 

G:        Did he understand much Spanish himself; do you think?

 

A:        No. Just enough to talk to the Mexicans on his ranch, "vaminos" and this kind of [thing] is about the extent of it.

 

He could not get much beyond that. He used to talk to them now and then. "Como esta?" and "Bien, no mas" and that is where it ended sort of. I used to laugh at his Spanish. I would hear him riding around in his car and saying, "Buenos Dias, Juan." I said, "You speak the language?" He said, "That was it." Not really. He claimed he did earlier years, but he said, "As you get older, you forget." Which is probably right. (Interruption)

 

G:        Let us start here. Okay.

 

A:        Glassboro, New Jersey is a small town, I might say a real rural, a real country town. I am sure the people of Glassboro probably would not appreciate that description, but that is the way I would describe it. A town of at the most four thousand people. But it has a consolidated school and during the daytime the town is larger because of the number of students, coming into town. But they chose this particular town because it had a historic house in there that they wanted to use for this purpose. Hollybush was the name of the place. So, we got about three days’ notice on this.

 

The other major problem was that it is not on a major route of communications, and yet they wanted to make this a major television-radio nationwide appearance. So, the telephone companies had to break their back, they had to literally build facilities from the Philadelphia area over there to that area, all overnight. It cost them hundreds of thousands of dollars to provide television coverage in that area, live television coverage.

 

They had no capability to originate television there. None. So, it was interesting in that regard in that it took tremendous amounts of efforts on many people's parts.

 

Now, nobody could stay there to speak of. There was not a motel in town. There was not a hotel, motel, no nothing. The nearest was about, oh, twenty-five, thirty miles away, or Atlantic City, which was about forty-five to sixty, I do not remember the exact distance, but about that.  Or the other way, you could come to Penn-Jersey about the same distance. But it was just an interesting trip. Yet they met for some three to four  hours, maximum, had lunch together and talked. But it was interesting in that we got a chance to bring then the Premier of Russia, Kosygin, to talk to us. That is probably the first time we met him except under the auspices of something like either at the United Nation environment or in a Washington environment. We had not met him in the other environments. Now, during the war they had of course, but I mean since that time.

 

G:        Did he have his own communications requirements?

 

A:        They do not worry about it. When they are in this country they really do not have--see their chain of command is not quite the same. In our country a president is always a president, no matter where he is or what he is doing. He cannot abrogate it.

            The exception to it is recent legislation where when he is incapacitated that the vice president assumes the responsibilities of the president until he becomes capable of carrying out the duties again.

 

That is an exception to it. But it is a rarity in which you will ever see that occur. I do not know whether you will ever see it. But in the case of the Soviet Union, they have got a hierarchy that would occur even if something happened to him. It would not matter. They have got a set S.O.P. or standard of procedure that occurs, and so I do not think they need that kind of a rigid communication system.

 

G:        Well was President Johnson disappointed with the lack of substantive accomplishments there at Glassboro?

 

A:        If he was, he did not show it at all. He was grateful for the work he got and the chance to meet and he expressed it that day. But later he expressed it to us as grateful for the support he got in this quick reaction, which is what he called it. This was really done on a spur of the moment, only about three days notice.

 

G:        Anything on his interaction with Kosygin?


A:        No, we would not have heard that at all. It would only have been a political advisor that would have gotten any feel for that kind of thing.

 (Interruption)

 

Normally in our work at the White House the President--and by precedent it had been habit not to wear uniforms for the military personnel, just to keep a low profile, partially because the White House never desired to appear there were large numbers of military people in support of them. So, I never wore a uniform. The President called me on that particular day, the tenth day of November. I had gotten off a plane at Dulles Airport, a Braniff Airline plane, somewhere around noon and I was en route from the airport home when I got a call from Watson, who asked where I was. I informed him I was en route home. He said the President wanted to talk to me. So, I stopped, called on the phone and talked to the President. And the President said, "Where are you?" and I told him. He said, "Let's go visit the troops." I said, "Which troops?" He said, "The US troops, army, navy and air force. You got your uniform on?" I said, "Mr. President, I haven't worn a uniform but a couple of times since I've been in the job with you. Yes, I have got one.  Do you want me to wear it?"  He said, "Go home and get it on and meet me at Andrews in two hours."


Well, this is now twelve, wants to meet at two. I said, "Where are we going?" He said, "First of all, we're going to Fort Bragg, North Carolina, we're going to El Toro, California. We are going to Camp Pendleton, California. We are going to the USS Enterprise. On the way back, we are going to stop at McConnell Air Force Base in Wichita. Then we're coming back to Langley Air Force Base and spend the weekend in Williamsburg." So, I said, "Well, that sounds like an ambitious trip. Can I send some people out to start?" He said, "Nope.  They're all going with me."  I said, "Oh, my God! Can I make some calls?" He said, "Yes, go ahead and call them." So, I started telephoning.

 

I called my man in the White House, my operations man, and I said, "Here's where we're going to go. Start your calling, get your people alerted. Tell them to start preparing some actions on it. We're going to spend the night on the USS Enterprise." Well, that is a real disaster. I do not know whether anybody is ever told you, but the navy has beautiful communications on board to talk to itself but does not have anything to talk to shore. They do not believe in talking to shore. They just do not do it. They can communicate from one ship to another, but they do not plan to talk from ship to shore: there is no system whatsoever, except in port. And this was to be at sea. Well, we knew we had our hands full immediately.


So, I went home. Needless to say, my uniform was not in the best of condition because I have not worn it in two years.  But I did get into it.  I had gained some weight,  too, so I did get into it. I joined them at Andrews. We flew to Fort Bragg, and they had been alerted for two hours and they knew it and they were ready. They had a public address system and he talked to the troops. He welcomed a bunch of people that were leaving there to go to Vietnam. He gave some military decorations to people that were brought in from Vietnam. He talked to some new trainees down there. Then we got on an airplane, then flew all the way across. I guess the next stop was--I guess we flew south first, Fort Benning [Georgia], stopped at Fort Benning. Then we flew across to El Toro. Now it is almost night. Then we flew down to Pendleton and then from Pendleton took helicopters and flew out to the Enterprise and spent the night on the Enterprise.


Now that was the most difficult part of the whole job because the minute, he got on board he wanted to talk to the world, and this was where I had my problems. Because as I say, they are not organized to talk to the world.

 

G:        By this you mean talk to the television audience or call people on the telephone?

 

A:        No, no, he wanted to pick up the phone in his quarters and talk to whoever he pleases.


And that is not possible on a navy ship. The navy captain himself cannot do that. He cannot pick it up and talk to anybody except on that ship.

 

It is well organized internally; he can reach anybody on that ship he wants to. But he cannot reach anybody on shore. The only way he can get a call through to shore is go up to the bridge. From the bridge or from his control room, he could get a call from there ship-to-shore and talk to people. Not telephone, but just to the naval station that terminates that telephone call. [There are] no provisions for patching it anywhere else. Well, I had to decide in a hurry for them to be able to patch it through and get us anywhere we wanted to go in this world from that point. This took a lot of doing, and it was clumsy, a very clumsy system.

 

Nevertheless, we survived the night for that. Next morning, we got up and flew back to El Toro in helicopters. Now this is the whole crowd, carried all by helicopters and brought off by helicopters. And that is a lot of press. I do not remember how many they were, but there must have been two press loads, oh, probably forty press, and then staff and everything.

 

I do not know, fifteen, twenty, twenty-five helicopters, hauled them all out there, in batches, hauled them in, unload, carry it back. The big Marine Corps forty-passenger helicopters.

Then we went to McConnell, spoke to the troops up there. He presented some medals to the air force personnel there. Then we flew to Langley. Now it is nighttime. We have got to have lights up. He went on nationwide TV there.  He spoke to that crowd. And he went to Williamsburg, spent the night there in Williamsburg. He was going to play golf the next morning. I guess he did get up and play golf, but he made the mistake  of going to church. You remember the story. He sat in the front row of the church and this preacher--they had approved his script the day before, and he threw it away as he walked into the pulpit and just blasted the President about Vietnam.


The President sat there and gritted his teeth and took it. Well, they could have choked that preacher. But nevertheless, he was not there after that day, he was not a preacher there. They removed him. But it was really unfair to catch a man that way and be that unkind in his comments about Vietnam. But I guess he had it on his chest and he got them off.


G:        Do you recall the President's reaction to that?

 

A:        At the moment he just sort of gritted his teeth. His reaction in private was a little different.

 

G:        What did he say?

 

A:        He was just saying, "well, I think it was a little unfair" is mostly what he said. He said some other words to other people. I did not hear them personally. Jim Jones is the one who told me later what he said. But in general, he thought it was unfair to catch him in that circumstance. Generally, just hoping for a reaction from the President is what it looked like, hoping that the President would get up and walk out. And the press were sitting in the back hoping this same thing.

 

Well, he did not. He sat through it, he gritted his teeth, listened to the whole thing, this diatribe, which is what it was, about a twenty- minute diatribe about the people who had sent the boys to die in Vietnam. Then he got up and left.


Well, he stayed on until that night. He played golf in the afternoon instead of that morning. Then he went back to the White House.

 

Next morning, I met him in the hallway, and he said to me, "You know it's your fault, that thing yesterday."  I said, "Why?"  He said, "Well, first of all, if you hadn't a been so blessed efficient, we would have never made that schedule, we would have been stymied somewhere along the line, and I never would have made it to church yesterday morning. So, it's your fault." I said, "Well, that's kind of specious thinking, Mr. President. I do appreciate your confidence, but I don't think I caused that." He laughed and said, "No. He was pretty mean, wasn't he?" I said, "He picked on you." He said, "Well, I guess he feels better about it." Then the day's paper said, well, of course, he was no longer there.

 

[End of Tape 1 of 1 and Interview II]








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