Timeless news-reading tips in 1973 speech

Publicity and photos from 1973 speech

Click on photos to enlarge

 




Do you remember ’73? Two weeks after President Nixon’s second inauguration, on Feb. 4, 1973, Harry delivered the following speech at a D.C.-area synagogue event. He was 52. After he died, I noticed the audio cassette tape of the speech mixed in with his music collection. It’s valuable now since we have so few recordings from those days. The transcript below is long and conversational, and you can only imagine his tone quite forceful in spots – so typical of Harry. However, much of his advice and his analogies seem timeless. And his humor, well, it’s so Harry, too.   
 

Speaker Introduction

Our speaker today has had a long and distinguished career in the Defense Department. When you consider what has happened in the last 25 years, it’s a remarkable achievement that he’s been able to stay there so long. His subject is an intriguing one: how to read between the lines. He’s going to give us some ideas of what to look for in reading newspapers and magazines. He speaks from a background of tremendous authority. He’s served [as a civilian] with the Air Force for 25 years, but he has also served in the office of the Secretary of Defense as executive agent to prepare news analyses and public opinion trends. He has continued in this work through all his career. I don’t want to take any more time except to tell you that all his remarks will be “operative”. It gives me great pleasure to give you Harry Zubkoff, whose title is civilian chief of the office of research and analysis for the Secretary of the Air Force, and chief of the executive agency for the Department of Defense to prepare analyses and public opinion trends. Mr. Zubkoff …

“How to Read Between the Lines”

I do have to say Dan, when I get an introduction like that I can’t help wishing my parents could have been here, because my father would have really enjoyed it, and my mother would have believed it.

More photos on this page of Harry in the workplace, 1970s

You know the first time you ask somebody to speak, you’re taking a calculated risk. The second time it’s a known risk. I must say I admire you. I just hope you’re not going to be disappointed. It’s like the lady who went into the store for pantyhose. The next day she came back and wanted her money back, and the clerk said, “What’s the matter? Didn’t they come up to your expectations?” And she said, “No, they come up to my knees.” I’m gonna come up to your knees.

What I want to talk about today is the press. And I’m going to try to give you an objective and a factual view, though I must confess, I suffer from the same affliction as the author of that book, “The Unbiased History of the Civil War from the Southern Point of View.”

You see the problem with the press is it’s not unique to this country. I read this little item not long ago about Queen Elizabeth when she went to France recently. She was really shocked to learn about her image as projected in the French press, and she made a count. In the French media, she had been reported as being pregnant on 92 separate occasions. She had suffered 149 accidents; had 9 miscarriages; abdicated 63 times; was on the verge of breaking up with Prince Philip 73 times; on the edge of a nervous breakdown 32 times; and had 27 attempts on her life.

That’s the way the press operates most all the way around the world. But I don’t want to talk about the lies; they’re relatively easy to spot. Like Mark Twain once said, “It ain’t what you don’t know that makes you a fool; it’s what you do know that ain’t so.” And that’s what’s happening.

* * * 

Now the manner in the way the press handles the news these days has been dubbed as “news-think”. News-think is a frame of mind. What the press is trying to do is put news in the paper; whether it’s news or not, everything has to be labeled news. And this is what we have to worry about. It’s not so much that what we read is the real story about what’s going on; it’s whether it’s a story at all. Because the news is filled with non-stories. And the way to make a non-story look like a story is to put a headline on it, a byline, and sometimes a date line. But any of them could have been written within a period of about 20 years.

In fact, we had some research we had to do not long ago comparing some stories about Vietnam with some of the stories about Korea. And would you believe that in 1952 as in 1972, you could not have told the difference between the stories on Korea and the stories on Vietnam? I think some of the newspapers simply lifted some of the stories out and changed a word here and there. So you have to worry about whether something is a story.

* * *

Also they have a great many subtler devices. You take some of the words they use, the headline writers. They use: attack, accuse, hit, denounce, berate. So you don’t just make a comment or two about a city master plan, you assail it. Even if all you did was scratch your head and make a comment, your opponent could have been your best friend, but it’s your opponent who assails you.

Come to think of it, I ran across this poem here, and I gotta read it, talking about somebody saying something. “As any reader knows, a news source can charge, declare, affirm, relate, recall, aver, reiterate; allege conclude, explain, point out, answer, note, retort or shout; rejoin, demand, repeat, reply, ask, expostulate or sigh; blurt, suggest, report, or mumble, add, shoot back, burst out or grumble; whisper, call, assert, or state, vouchsafe, cry, asseverate; snort, recount, harrumph, opine, whimper, simper, wheedle, whine; mutter, murmur, bellow, bray, whinny – and once in a while, say.”

Now the use of those kinds of verbs, you see, all bring out a picture in a reader’s mind. And it’s done on a calculated basis, really. And reporters use the same kind of a thing. For example, a couple guys in downtown Washington exchange shots. It’s reported as a shootout. Then you’ve got a story, you see. If it’s three people, they call it a riot. Then they put the story on the front page. Now, that alone makes it news, whether it’s a story or not, that’s news, it’s on the front page. I think if we could eliminate the front pages, we’d be a lot better off – like eliminating the last car on the railroad train.

* * *

One of the things they do is tagging. And they also do trending and counter-trending. Now tagging consists really of putting an identifying label on something or someone; very prejudicial. And then you identify them from that point on exclusively by that label. For example, they used to say about George McGovern, he was a mackerel, which is a colorless fish with a large mouth. And for this reason, nobody gave him a chance to get the democratic nomination; he got it anyway. Lyndon Johnson, he was power mad. Bobby Kennedy was ruthless. Gene McCarthy was lazy and cool. If the person they’re talking about manages through sheer guts to show another side of his personality, then the news says he’s changed or matured, and that means he’s ready for a new label.

Of course they ran into all kinds of problems with President Nixon, because they couldn’t come up with a label, so they called him the new Nixon. And then every once in a while to take care of those people who didn’t like Nixon, they would say, there’s a flash of the old Nixon. So it was either the new Nixon or the old Nixon depending on whether you liked him or not.

Also this business of labeling, it’s really overdone. They talked about, for example, the Chicago Seven; there was the Gainesville Eight; the Tweduck Four, and all the rest of them. These are prejudicial labels, that’s what they are, and they automatically color your mind. When they had that Oklahoma state prison riot, somebody wrote the Oklahoma State Prison 500. But that one didn’t take hold.

* * *

Now there’s this business of trending. Trending occurs when the news media decide that events in some area are moving in a given direction. And then all the information on that subject reinforces the idea of the trend. A good example is the way the news handled youth. In 1967, the youth was moving away from politics. It was a trend. In 1968, they were trending back into politics; in 1969 they were getting out of politics; in 1970, they were getting back in again.

The Cambodian incursion, you may recall, that got the youth back in in full fury. Before you knew it, though, they vanished back into the woodwork. Then they were registering in droves for the 18-year-old vote, and the trend was decisive political influence by the youth, that is, if they bothered to vote. Whether they voted or not, I doubt if it would have made any difference. Incidentally, they didn’t vote.

So, that’s trending. Now, counter-trending, that’s the time-honored, journalistic tradition about a man biting a dog. You see, it’s not news when a dog bites a man, but it’s news when a man bites a dog. So, what happens is, when the public has a certain perception about a trend that’s going on, one way to make a news story is to say that it’s going in the other direction. You deny the original trend, which the newspaper established in the first place. You say the country’s gradually moving to the left. So somebody says the country is moving toward the right. As soon as everyone’s convinced we’re moving toward the right, somebody else puts in we’re moving toward the left again. Well that’s what happens.

So news makes news by contradicting itself. That’s the great trick of the trade.

* * *

I want to give you a few more examples about words. You see it more clearly when you read the sports stories. Of course you have to give the sports reporters lots of sympathy. They have to report day after day the same kind of situation. You can’t hear anybody say, today Washington’s going to play. You can never hear the announcers say that this is a pretty routine game, performers are no better than average. All he’s got to do every Saturday or Sunday afternoon is say what a great football game this is. This is one of the most exciting games he’s seen in years, and he wishes everybody could get to see it. The thing is sports are too dull to read about, so you have to listen to the voice.

Also in sports, all games are tough, every opponent is tough, every win is tough, every loss is tough. All the plays are beautiful. In the [inaudible], they always fire their scores. You never hear about an ugly forward pass; they’re all beautiful forward passes. And did anyone ever hear about a dirty-cut athlete? They’re all clean-cut.

Then journalists also coin new words every now and then, enough to drive you out of your mind. Like simplistic. That’s a journalism word, simplistic. Then there’s finalize, relevant, charisma; and irrelevant is almost as good as relevant. Also, cigars and pipes are simply never smoked, they’re always puffed. Nobody eats sandwiches, they always munch on sandwiches. You never drink a beverage, you always sip a beverage. When King Edward abdicated – some of you are in my generation, you may remember – he used the phrase which has endured and will endure forever: at long last. It means exactly the same thing as at last, you see, but everybody who wants to be fancy says at long last. It will never fall out of the language. That’s because journalists keep repeating it. At long last.

We suffer from cliché-itis. You get words like an in-depth report, an ill-informed source. Anybody ever hear of a semi-final analysis? Or how about a shallow report? Or a poorly informed source? All the sources are well-informed; that’s the name of the game. Nobody calls a spade a spade anymore; it’s now an agricultural implement.

* * *

Now listen to what the newspapers do. From a recent news account: “Last week Henry Kissinger flew to the Middle East to explore the possibilities.” Explore is the key word. “Last week a representative of the Kremlin flew to the Middle East to exploit the growing tensions surrounding the tenuous cease-fire.” Actually the use of these words represents a trap. If you happen to agree with the implications of those two statements I just read, then you think it’s straight reporting. But if you disagree, then you immediately see the bias.

So take a careful look at the words they use in the newspapers. Put yourself in the other guy’s shoes. Try to take the other guy’s point of view. Pretend you’re an Arab. And all the sudden you’ll see all kinds of biased reporting in the paper. The truth is, the newspaper is overwhelmingly pro-Israel, and it’s reflected in the story. We’re happy that they’re pro-Israel. [Audience member says “Not the Post”.] No, not the Post, not Christian Science Monitor, not Newsweek. But most of the papers are pro-Israel.

Anyway, our press is really more sophisticated than the press in the communist countries. They don’t have to use words like lackey, or, the favorite word in the Chinese newspapers is running dog, or the imperialistic war mongers. We’re a little more subtle, but results are still pretty much the same. And a lot of it is not done consciously, which is even worse. Do you remember the incident in that Paris Summit meeting? Well TIME magazine and a lot of the news media described Krushchev – listen to these words: intransigent, belligerent, almost incredible, bellowing like a wounded rogue elephant, intemperate ramblings, diatribe, etc. – all loaded words.

The U.S., on the other hand: replied tartly, asserted coolly, and was stern. You see, the Russians, when they’re not bellowing, they’re dower. A stern American politician is a dower Russian political. Our people make speeches, no matter how boring. But a guy like Castro, he speechifies. Sometimes he speechifies excessively. You can just feel the demagoguery in these words. You don’t have to hear a word about what he said, but you’re automatically turned off by the way the papers report it.

* * *

So the papers are reflecting a bias. They don’t like to say that, they deny it, but it’s there just the same. You know the papers use to talk about the peace demonstrations and the peace movement. What they really meant was the Vietnam War movement – not the same thing at all. And just as an aside, a great many of those peace pushers are now urging the United Sates to help Israel’s war effort. Even to the point of a confrontation with Russia. Well, it’s not that they’re for peace, it’s that they’re very selective in the kinds of wars they want to fight.

The papers were kind of schizoid about the whole thing, too. You see, they tried to give the anti-war people an aura of respectability, the peace movement, but then in the next breadth, they talk about their …

[At this point someone turned over the cassette tape, so they lost a bit of the speech.]

… Florida was not particularly sophisticated – I hope there’s nobody here from Florida. It’s all right to go there for a vacation – but! Listen to Smathers, how he lit into Pepper. [FYI, George Smathers and Claude Pepper were Florida senators in the 1950s and ’60s.] He said, among other things, that Pepper was known around Washington as a shameless extrovert; that he reportedly practiced nepotism with his sister-in-law; that his own sister was once a thespian in New York City. And worst of all, Pepper himself before marriage practiced celibacy. Needless to say, Pepper lost the election. I’d figure he’d lose it again today because you can’t practice celibacy and win an election in 1972.

But people really do react in a peculiar way to words, and the newspapers take advantage of it. Now this is the tragic part of it, because people ought to know better. You see the world is not what we think it is. I mean everybody views the world based on his own background, his own education and experience. Everybody reacts to the information he hears and reads and sees. But most of all, of all the ways to see what’s going on in the world, we depend, of course, on the media to furnish us with all the information.

I’ll tell ya, for those of us like me who have been associated with the military departments for a long time, we simply do not recognize some of the information about the military presented in the media. It’s distorted; at least to us it’s distorted. The individual facts seem true enough, but often, equally significant facts which would cast a different light on a situation are not mentioned. And, I’m sure you all know that the papers are full of one-sided, unfavorable stories about defense. And the same information keeps appearing in the papers. Like one of the great myths: defense spending keeps going up and up and up. And no matter how many times or who says that it’s going down, it makes no impression because it’s not repeated. 

* * *

I often wonder, is the problem with me or is the problem with the media? I think it’s with the media. I did a little research. You know, we’re being educated by the media, mostly television these days. The educators are estimating that by the time a child goes to kindergarten, he has watched over 4,000 hours of commercial TV. That’s a lot of commercial TV, and that’s a lot of mistaken impressions that kid gets. By the time a kid graduates from high school, he’s watched 15,000 more hours of commercial TV. By that time he’s through, he’s had it, he’s brainwashed.

This mass media education is called, it’s a highly specialized thing called modern propaganda. Now modern propaganda, you see, is different from the ancient propaganda. Modern propaganda is not lies or tall tales so much; it’s based on facts. It operates with all kinds of truths, and half-truths, and limited truths, and truths taken out of context. One way to characterize propaganda is what I’m telling you today. If the result of this talk is that you read your newspapers more carefully and apply some discrimination and thought to what you read, I will have been successful in getting across some modern propaganda to you, because propaganda provokes a little action.

* * *

There’s a guy in France at the University of Bordeaux who’s generally considered one of the experts in propaganda. His name is Jacques Ellul. He said that in order for propaganda to work, it has to be aimed at educated people. And he says that intellectuals are actually the most vulnerable to modern propaganda. Why? A lot of us pride ourselves on being intellectuals. Well the reason is because intellectuals absorb the largest amount of second-hand, unverifiable information. Further, they have a compelling need to have an opinion on every important question of our time.

All of us know everything there is to know about anything. How many of you say, “Do you know about this?” and their answer is “I don’t know”? No. They all know something. So they all have opinions. And they’re the most easily influenced to have opinions because they consider themselves – all of them – capable of judging for themselves. That’s a great fallacy, we can all judge for ourselves.

So all you see under the influence of propaganda, all these drives that we have, they – unclear, often without any objective – sometimes become powerful, direct, precise. Propaganda gives us the objectives, organizes our traits into a system, freezes us into a mold. Any prejudices we have are going to be hardened by the propaganda. You see, we’re told that we’re right in harboring these prejudices. So then we find our reasons and justifications. And the stronger the conflicts in any society, the stronger the prejudices. And propaganda intensifies these conflicts, intensifies the conflicts.

* * *

So we see a lot of irrationality brought about by propaganda. For example, something that I call the doomsday irrationality goes like this: The world is in terrible shape. We’re dying of pollution. The air, the water – in another 20 years it won’t be fit to breathe, or drink.

I happened to grow up on the shores of Lake Erie. I’ve been reading about Lake Erie being a dead lake. They’ve got me convinced, Lake Erie is a dead lake. I was in Buffalo just a couple months ago. Looked in the paper and found that this year in Lake Erie was the biggest fishing take ever in history. The truth is it all went into gefilte fish, Lake Erie white fish. But that wasn’t in any paper except the Buffalo paper, and it was a trade paper at that. All the other papers are saying Lake Erie is dead. Not only that, we went out to a beach on Lake Erie and went swimming and the water was beautiful. And Lake Erie is supposed to be so polluted according to the papers that it’s worth your life, like going into the Potomac.

Another one of the irrationalities (I’ll be glad to argue with all the environmentalists), the irrationality about DDT – I’ll be glad to talk to you about that. Then there’s the love-hate syndrome. Love among the youth, anyway; you love everybody, except you hate the pigs; you hate the authorities and you hate the establishment – and you hate the military industrial complex. Which is another irrationality. I don’t know what the military industrial complex is. I’ve been living in the military all my life practically. I think it’s a myth! The establishment is a myth. What the heck is the establishment? All of us are the establishment – that’s what everybody is. You know it’s the image of a monolithic, impenetrable, inhuman being that controls our lives, and it’s capable of controlling our lives and nobody can change it! There’s no such thing. What’s the corporate state? Does anybody know what the corporate state is?

Another one of the great myths today is that we’re rapidly running out of energy. This one hits home because energy is in the paper today – we’re rapidly running out of energy. It just isn’t so. There are all kinds of statistics around to prove it isn’t so. There is a great powerful motive on the part of some element to want to push the line that it is true. The motive is money of course.

Well anyway, propaganda, it’s a phenomenon, and you have to recognize it. You have to learn to recognize it.

There’s another myth that technology causes more deaths. Everybody’s heard that one. Actually technology does not cause more deaths. Every one of us is going to die only once. We’re not immortal. So there aren’t going to be any more deaths from technology. What it does is maybe shift the statistics a little bit. Because you take the percentage of people who are killed by automobiles; it’s been going up since the beginning of the century. You can say that the technological development of the automobile brought about some earlier life terminations for some people, but it remains that the overall average life span since the beginning of this century has increased from about 47 to 70 years. And largely, if not entirely, because of technology. Technology doesn’t bring about deaths, it extends life.

* * *

Trouble is, once one of these myths or prejudices take hold, it’s very, very difficult to dislodge it. In fact, I don’t think it’s possible. You have to wait for a new generation. That’s what they have to do in Israel, wait for the next generation.

What we have to do is attack these myths before they gain a foothold. And the only way I know of to attack them is to read with some discernment.

One of the things I often do – do you ever read the newspaper and you get so furious about what you’re reading and you’re writing a letter to the editor in your head – a blistering, long letter to the editor. It never gets written, it never gets sent, but it’s good psychologically to work on it. I think we ought to write more letters to the editor. We ought to not just walk around with the letters in our head, but put them down on paper and send them out.

There’s another interesting statistic: 0.1 newspaper space is to the letters to the editor’s column. Over 35 percent of the readers read the letters to the editor’s column – the biggest percent of readers for any one subject. Why won’t the newspapers expand the letters to the editor’s column? Ask them. [Audience comments inaudible]

* * *

We all know what’s wrong with newspapers; deep down in our minds we know. The thing I want to say about these newspapers, though, if you get the impression from my criticism that I completely disagree with newspapers, it’s wrong. Frankly I think we have a pretty good press in the United States. The problem is you have to learn how to read it. Everybody thinks the television and movie image of our presses, these honest and fearless reporters always going out after the story, searching for the truth and writing it against all odds, and all that – well that’s not what newspapers are all about. Only once in a while is there something like that. I think the Watergate story is one of the most unusual developments of American journalism history, really. But it’s an exception, it’s not the norm.

And another thing, the opinion pages – Outlook in the Washington Post – or the New York Times opinion section. These sections are closed in a way to any other viewpoint but the current, fashionable, intellectual conceit. And people who try to put in different points of view are seldom, seldom successful.

But anyway, you get these newspaper stories and you think they’re trying to get the truth, and you look at every story and you think you’re getting a picture of the truth. Well it’s not so. What you have to do, you have to look at the newspaper as a whole. It’s a whole conglomeration of stories. Collectively, all these stories give you an impression of what’s going on the world, what’s going on in the country, what’s going on in the city. We live in a dynamic world, a shifting world, everything’s moving, everything’s changing. The press is like an impressionist painting; you get too close to look at details, they don’t mean anything. You have to step back and get the whole picture. Then you get a feel for what’s going on.

It’s like when you look down through water, and you know how light is refracted, the refraction of light and water, when you’re trying to judge the size and shape of something under the water. Well, the water corresponds to all the preconceptions through which the news always travels. And reporters, you see, they acquire these preconceptions. They learn by experience the kinds of stories that never get into the papers, the kinds of stories that never make the six o’clock news on television. And so they learn to color their stories so they will get in the papers, maybe even give them a byline. Maybe they will get on TV, give them an extra bonus of fifty dollars. They learn to tell which people are news and which are not news. Most of us are not news. That’s because we lead normal lives. You want to get in the newspaper? Kill your neighbor.

* * * 

Incidentally, I want you to know that when Agnew started talking about the media, and he was so critical, it didn’t surprise me; I’ve always felt that way. Where I differ with Agnew of course is his interpretation of objectivity. He’s like the guy who says there’s a terrible disease called cancer; the cause of it is international Zionism. So get rid of international Zionism, you won’t have cancer anymore. Of course it’s silly, but that’s the way it was.

I agree that the press needs criticism, but it also is a pretty good institution, if you look at it the right way. Just don’t have great expectations. Look at it for your impressions. And if you want to read and find the prejudices, just read the verbs, read the adjectives.

Actually newspapers do a better job than TV; TV gives you only headlines. They give you pictures, most of which are – unless it’s an actual news event taking place at the moment – most of them are distorted. They simply can’t put on the same kind of deep report that the printed press can give you. You see, news magazines, they emphasize a snappy style. Everything’s got to be snappy in a news magazine, cut short – they’re giving you all the news in a week, let’s say. Not true, but it’s news just by virtue they put it in the magazine. Lots of non-stories. All the serious books – the monthlies, the quarterlies, the semi-annuals – every one of them is a captive of a different point of view. Some of them are good if you happen to agree with their point of view. A lot of people only read the things they agree with. I always wonder about that. If you want to keep up with your prejudices, you have to read the other guy’s points of view.

The only thing that could be better in terms of the press is books, and the only trouble with books is that they come too late. Good interpretive books have been written, but by the time they get published, their interpretations have been overtaken by events. You know the first really good analysis of the campus unrest we were having a couple years ago, came out around the time the students were going back to school, started worrying about their grades, and about the jobs, and about their futures. And the new left – what’s happened to the new left? Anybody hear about the new left lately, in all the headlines about a year ago? They went right [audience says the same], right.

* * * 

Well the thing is nothing stays still long enough for a leisurely examination. Unless it stays on the front pages for months on end – and the only thing that’s been on the front pages for months on end is Watergate. Of course, everybody’s saturated with Watergate, and it’s left an incredible impression on our minds. Now, I ask you, if President Nixon were genuinely innocent of the whole business, do you think he will ever, ever be judged innocent by the people. No. I don’t know whether he is or not. (Erase that tape.) [Audience laughter]

Everybody remember the stories about the secret bombing in Cambodia that broke a few months ago? I want to tell you about the newspapers, about secret bombing. We did a research project on it. I had some very bright, young, summer students with me this summer, and they took this on as a project, when the newspaper stories came out about secret bombing in December 1969 and January 1970. These kids went back through the papers for those days. And, they found literally – literally I say – hundreds and hundreds of stories about the bombing in Cambodia back in 1969 or ’70. There was no secret bombing. I don’t know why they called it a secret bombing! [Audience comments inaudible] Nevertheless, if it was a secret I would hate to see something that was out in the open.

Anyway, you don’t read the newspaper stories. I’ll tell you what really happened. People weren’t aware, didn’t realize the implications of what they were reading. But you can get a sense of where we are and where we’re going if you look at the whole paper. And you try to relate all these seemingly unrelated bits and pieces of information that you read about. You get it. You’ll get the idea. Papers don’t spell out everything that’s going on. They provide a lot undigested information, and you gotta do a lot of mental work yourself in order to figure out what’s going on. I’ll tell ya another thing. Anyone who reads the paper shouldn’t be surprised at that secret bombing.

 * * *

But here’s another one. Everybody these last couple of weeks was surprised. Europe generally did not support the United States, did not support Israel, did not support the United States in its efforts to resupply Israel. And everybody got furious, everybody got surprised. I don’t see why we should’ve been surprised. We could have been disappointed, sure, but not surprised because the papers for the last year or two have been full of stories about the European energy problems.

Everybody knows that 80 to 85 percent of European oil comes from the Arab countries. Where do you think their interests lie, with Israel or with their own economic well-being? If they lose that oil, the whole continent’s economy goes down the drain. Who do you think they’re gonna support? Their selves or Israel? In fact, economic considerations are the prime motivating forces for all nations. And don’t ever delude yourself that that’s not true.

Take a little country like Iceland. Iceland depends on cod, fishing, that’s the major economic of Iceland’s economy. So they extend their territorial waters out to 50 miles. Well, England and Denmark and West Germany also fish in those waters, and they also need those fish. You know, Iceland has five ships in the Navy. They took on the British Navy, the West Germany Navy, the Denmark Navy. They shot at them, they boarded their boats, they arrested their people! They’re ready to go to war; you think they could win a war with England or with anybody? They can’t win any war! But you scratch them where it hurts economically and they’re gonna go to war! Everybody knows that. Yet, when that was in the papers, everybody was surprised because Iceland is fighting for its fish. They shouldn’t have been surprised. It was all in the newspapers long before they started.

I’ll tell ya, if I were an Arab oil-producing nation, I’d be worried. Because the colder Europe gets this winter, the more chances are that Europe is going to take some direct action. So don’t be surprised, because it’s in the papers. Incidentally, the secretary general of NATO has said that they consider the cut-off of oil a hostile act. Now what does that mean? That’s a cause for war, of course.

* * *

Well, I don’t want to take up too much time. I just want to tell you this. I got two things to tell you before you start clapping.

You see, the newspapers are good, as I say, for telling you the trends, where we’re going, how we’re gonna get there maybe. They put out early warnings. But it’s like, you know the coal miners used to take a canary down into the shaft to smell the gas. If the canary died, then the coal miners got out fast. Well, that’s what the newspapers are for. They’ll give you the trends, they’ll give you the tip-offs to what’s gonna happen. All you have to do is think about them, be aware of the implications. Everything that affects society and that affects the world is gonna be in the press.

You know, Will Rogers once said, “All I know is what I read in the papers.” And that’s true. I say amen to that. Just no better way to know what’s going on in the world than to read the papers. So start reading and start clipping.

Copyright 2017, Elaine Blackman

Editorials spotlight changing times in old Greenbelt

On this page, we see more views of Greenbelt life in the 1950s. And, we see Harry’s budding passion for independent, community newspapers. This blog post is the third in a series of Harry’s editorials as volunteer editor at the Greenbelt, MD, News Review.


May 13, 1954 
“Time Marches on Greenbelt”

(Harry reviews Time magazine’s coverage of a McCarthy-era case involving Greenbelt residents. He reflected on the case in an earlier post on this blog, Harry recounts McCarthy-era case.)

Although we may be dubious about the circumstances under which it has happened, Greenbelt is now definitely in the national spotlight. Not only is the story of our community and the Chasanow case featured in a big spread in Time magazine; but on last Thursday afternoon our town was also mentioned at length in a phase of the nationally televised McCarthy-Army hearings.

We were particularly interested in the Time article, which reviewed the beginnings of Greenbelt as well as discussing the controversial case that the Washington papers spread over their front pages recently. Our interest of course, is aside from the fact that the Cooperator has received mention in a national magazine. As might be expected from a magazine of Time’s caliber, the facts in the story are brilliantly presented. In addition, Time’s pungent style struck hard at what it obviously believed was the chief aspect of the case.

Harry and Jeanette with then-associate editor Izzy Parker, 1953

However, there is an implication in the story which we believe may give the thousands of readers of Time the wrong impression of Greenbelt. The articles did not, or perhaps could not, make clear that the bitterness of Greenbelt’s stormy period is largely a thing of the past – at least, we have every reason to believe that this is so. Ever since The Great Move of last summer, when hundreds of residents moved out of Greenbelt because they did not wish to purchase homes here, a new spirit has begun to transform the city based principally on the pride of home ownership. Those who felt that Greenbelt offered something only as long as they could live here under low Government-subsidized rents, or who violently objected to the management of a cooperative housing corporation, have left. Those who remained and the newcomers who have since joined are now helping to plan and are looking forward to a greater Greenbelt.

On the other hand, we believe that Time’s statement that “in Greenbelt, where most of the residents are Government workers, the suspensions (of Chasanow and others) cast a pall of fear and dismay” is unfortunately generally true. As we indicated in our front-page editorial of a few weeks ago, the Government employees here are concerned that a false impression of Greenbelt may have been created by the publicity. They fear that Greenbelt may be regarded as a “queer” place with an unhealthy atmosphere. Such fears, if not put aside, could lead to the destruction of our community spirit.

It is to be devoutly hoped that the people of Greenbelt will not succumb to these fears. No one can be certain how all this will work out, but it could be that Time will tell.

May 20, 1954
“Registration Day”

There is never any excuse for the citizen who fails to take advantage of the golden opportunity to participate in his government by voting in the local and national elections. Certainly the excuse that he forgot to register is a poor one. Furthermore, Greenbelt residents can register without the slightest inconvenience since they can do so at the Center School on Registration Day, May 25, until 9 p.m.

Many of us, while we are usually anxious to vote in a presidential election, forget that all elections are equally important – whether for representatives in Congress or local dog-catcher. We have no right to complain about the kind of job our officials are doing if we have not even taken the trouble to register, let alone vote. It is no argument to say that the particular official we loathe was elected by the people in some other district or state. He may well have been elected because others, like ourselves, were not interested in participating in the election.

There is no guarantee that all those elected to office from this area will serve us well, but at least let us be able to say that we did our best to put into office the type of men whom we personally believe would be the most capable for the job.

July 29, 1954
“On Changing Our Name”

The publication of this issue marks an important change in the history of this newspaper – and in the history of this community. For some sixteen years the Cooperator has been an institution in Greenbelt, not only on the scene but a vital part of the scene. Every organization in town, every church, every group, every club, every regularly scheduled activity, has, at one time or another had something to do with this paper, if not in direct participation, then by reading accounts of its doings in our pages. Legions of residents and ex-residents have at one time or another served on our volunteer staff. The publication of this issue, therefore, without the Cooperator banner-head, signals the end of an era.

For the last five years, repeated attempts have been made to change the Cooperator name. On several occasions the membership of the paper has voted to do so, but invariably the same situation arose. While agreeing to change the name from Cooperator to something else, the staff could never seem to agree on the something else. Standing committees, appointed to come up with a recommendation, have remained standing, so to speak, until they finally faded away. Every possible alternative name has been explored, discussed and re-discussed, examined and re-examined, debated and rejected. Difficult indeed to fill the void!

Now, however, to mix our metaphors, we have taken the bit in our teeth and have cast the die. We have decided to make a decision – with the help and understanding of our readers. For an interim period we will publish the paper without a name, meanwhile conducting a public opinion poll on suggestions for a new name. Eventually, we hope, we will arrive at a decision – one which will take the sentiments of our readers into account. Incidentally, it has been suggested that most of our readers might possibly prefer to see us retain the name Cooperator, so that name will be among the names on which the poll will be conducted.

Naturally, there are questions as to why we wanted to change the name in the first place. The reasons are difficult to put into words. When the paper was first organized, in 1937, we assumed it sounded like the ideal name to those who originally adopted it. It may very well have been, because in the beginning the paper was closely associated with, and in fact subsidized by the co-op store. This, of course, is no longer true and has not been true for many years, but the idea still seems to persist that the paper is a house organ for the co-op. Although we have repeatedly asserted our status as an independent newspaper, we believe that a change in name will be a more positive means of affirming the fact of our independence.

In addition, there are a number of Cooperators published throughout the country, at least one of which is circulated in Greenbelt – and this has added an element of confusion to some of our newer residents. Without exception, these Cooperators are closely identified with the cooperative movement or with scientific cooperative organizations. We do not have this feeling of close kinship. It is true, of course, that the paper is published by the Greenbelt Cooperative Publishing Association, Inc., and that, in fact, we are a cooperative organization. But this means only that we are a newspaper – which is published as a cooperative venture. In seeking to change our name we are not seeking to hide our identity. We are rather seeking to clarify our identity.

In the final analysis we are engaged in the business of putting out a newspaper, a typical example, if you please, of “free enterprise” in action. While we are concerned with publishing news of local interest, we are also concerned with selling what we publish, and the feeling is inescapable that we have encountered some sales resistance in trying to sell the Cooperator. Unfortunately, some recent publicity in the metropolitan papers has tended to hurt us, too. This, perhaps, has accentuated our desire to change our name – but this desire was there to begin with. We can just hear the accusation that we are retreating in the face of fire, but that viewpoint, we submit, misses the point completely. The truth is, our newspaper is a public service, and we are trying to perform this service as best we can. We believe that a change in name will make it possible to render a greater service to our community by increasing our readership acceptance, and we are asking our readers for their opinions. We are counting on them to express their opinions, not only at the polls, but also in letters to their editor.

In any event, we are embarked upon an experiment which we believe will have beneficial results. We await your reaction.

Anyone can skim the newspaper archives at:  http://www.greenbeltnewsreview.com/archives/

When he wasn’t the editor, apparently Harry wrote a column called “Words and Music”. (This is not surprising, knowing he wrote a column on music for his retirement community newsletter.)

Copyright 2017, Elaine Blackman

Harry the correspondent

My dad answers questions I never asked him, in the following four communications he wrote in his elderly years. Each reveals an activity or feelings from his past, and each offers a bit of advice to someone who was special in his life. So, to everyone ever touched by – or just curious about – Harry’s communications, please enjoy!


Concerts at the beach

February 2014
Dear [Cousin],

It’s so nice to get emails like this with news about the family. I’ve been thinking about all the [cousin’s family], too, especially since I saw those photos of the ice caves at Crystal Beach. Everybody who ever grew up in Buffalo had to have gone to Crystal Beach. I have lots of memories about the Beach, and about the dance hall where the big bands of the 1930s and early ’40s used to play. In fact, it was the memories of some of their performances – Glenn Miller, Benny Goodman, Artie Shaw, and other orchestras, that motivated me to write a series of articles about the music of the WW II Era for the newspaper in Leisure World.

Now I’m in Riderwood, another development populated by old folks like me, and I have a whole new audience for these articles, since everybody here remembers that music. I just wanted you to know that I’m okay and adjusting to my new circumstances. Email exchanges like this are so welcome and so helpful. It’s so much easier to keep in touch this way than by the antiquated method of writing letters and sending them by snail mail. Keep them coming.

Love,
HZ  

Too bad the Riderwood newsletter rejected his idea for the music column.


Retirement advice

January 2008
Dear Ron:

I deeply regret that Jeanette and I had to leave the celebration Friday before we got a chance to see you and shake your hand. And I can’t tell you how honored and flattered I was that you took the time personally to arrange matters to make it easier for us to attend. I used to think that the 36 years I spent in my job at the Pentagon (plus service in the Army in WW II for a total of almost 40 years of government service) was more than enough for anyone, but your 50 plus years, and Wilma’s, too (for a total of around 100 years) whew!! … Anyway, Ron, I wanted to express my heartfelt appreciation for inviting us and taking the time and trouble to make special arrangements.

Now, a word of advice from an older retiree – do not, repeat do not wait till you finish any projects at home such as remodeling or renovating, etc. before traveling or vacationing. Start booking cruises and other travels as soon as you can, while you both have the strength and stamina to enjoy them. The longer you wait, the tougher it gets to travel. So do it now. And enjoy each other for leisurely breakfasts, lunches and dinners, which, I suspect, you haven’t done very often over the past 50 years.

As for remodeling, I waited till I was 85 before I decided that our big house was too much for the two of us to handle. So we sold out and moved into a nice big apartment which, even though it’s much smaller than any house, relieves us of the problems of maintenance and upkeep and endless chores, as well as stairs up and stairs down etc. It was almost too late, because even though our kids and grandkids and nephew and niece and others helped a lot, it was nevertheless a great physical hardship. I should have done it ten years earlier, when I was 75 and still fit enough to stand the strain.

I feel almost like a member of your family, a cousin, maybe, because Meredith is like my second daughter, the one I never had but always wanted, and I love her.

Anyway, Ron and Wilma, congratulations and best wishes for the best years of your life, the ones starting now.

HZ


Reaction to criticism

February 2007

This is too long to put into an email message, so it will be a letter, instead, with enclosures for you to read at your leisure. I’m writing it over a period of days with additions from time to time as they occur to me. I’ll start by saying I’m sorry you’re disappointed in me, but that’s your problem, not mine. I dunno why I’m perplexing to you. I’m a simple, straight- speaking guy, much like you, but maybe because I’m some 20-odd years older than you, I’m more tolerant, less opinionated, more accepting of people whose opinions differ from mine. Maybe, too, it’s because I don’t have the energy or the stomach to argue with people who disagree with me. I don’t feel as strongly as I used to feel that I have to justify my beliefs or argue the rightness of my convictions. And I don’t feel as strongly as I used to feel that people whose views differ from mine are necessarily wrong. Sometimes they’re right and I’m wrong. And I’m more willing than I used to be to examine the other guy’s views and to accept the fact that he is honest in his beliefs as I am in mine. 
   
I suspect that you’re disappointed in me because I haven’t been making substantial comments on the articles circulating in our round table. Or maybe you want more of my comments on my years in the Pentagon, which could maybe shed more light on what’s going on right now? Maybe you just want more of my views on politics, or government, or the Iraq war, or the Democratic or Republican parties? Views that are based on my experience in government? 
   
The problem is that I feel about my Pentagon years and the work that I did there much the same as I feel about my WW II years and my wartime experience. It’s all in the past, no longer pertinent, not something I want to dwell on any more. I know that some people never grow out of their wartime experience or their worktime experience. They want to relive those times all the time. I can understand that, but I think it’s because they have nothing new to occupy their minds, so they just want to live in the past. Some people never outgrow high school, either. But I don’t want to live in the past. I’m fully occupied with the present and the future. WW II is more than 60 years in the past. My retirement from the Pentagon is more than 20 years in the past. The world and I are now absorbed in the problems of the present.

So, let’s talk about the present. We have gone through the traumatic experience this past year of downsizing, moving from a big house to a small apartment. We’ve been here now since last August and have finally begun to settle in and get the apartment close to the shape we want it in. One of the three bedrooms has been converted into an office with built-ins to house our files, books, records, tapes and CDs, as well as the computer. One, of course is our bedroom and the third is our den/lounge, TV room, spare guest room. Now we’re starting to get involved in community activities. Jeanette is involved in a couple of women’s groups. I have volunteered to serve on two committees, both of which involve a few hours of work each week. Then, too, we go to lectures, social affairs, synagogue affairs and services. I got into a weekly poker game, too.
   
Aside from all that, I agreed to write some articles for a monthly discussion group, dealing mainly with Jewish affairs and Holocaust history. Enclosed are a few things to read about a Holocaust project that is taking a good deal of my time and interest. These are not the kinds of things that I would expect our round-table group to be interested in. The problem is that they do not leave me much time to comment extensively on matters or articles for our round table, and I’m sorry about that. I still send articles for you all to read and read the articles that you all send me, but as far as I can see, the discussion part of our exchange has diminished considerably. I’m not the only one whose volume of comment has shrunk. 
   
Anyway, what I’m trying to say is that I’m trying to cram a lot of activity into living in the present. I’ll be 86 in a few months – in June, to be exact, and the odds are that I really don’t have many more years ahead of me. I would rather think about and devote my creative energies to present-day matters than to spend my remaining time remembering the past. 

   
Communication king

August 2005
Dear [Cousin],

When I saw this TIME magazine cover, I immediately thought of you, since you will be thirteen years old in less than a year. The article inside also made me think of you. So, in case you haven’t seen it, I thought I’d send it to you. I enjoyed reading it and I’m sure you will, too. About 15 or 20 years ago, I helped with a similar article for Newsweek magazine on teen-agers, mostly 16 to 19-year-olds, and I learned a lot then about young people. The trouble with growing old is that we forget what it was like to be young. That’s why you have to keep reminding your parents that you have thoughts and feelings and yearnings and wishes, just as they did once and probably still do. The important thing is to communicate to them and with them, which means simply to talk to them and explain how you feel about things. You’d be surprised, I’ll bet, to see how interested they are to hear your views on everything.                                    

With love,                                            
Your 900-year-old cousin (He was really 84.)

Copyright 2017, Elaine Blackman

Reflections on mortality, learning new things

My parents in 2004 and 2005; Harry at home in 2004

Harry always had his camera close by. Snapping photos at special occasions and distributing prints to friends and family was one more activity that kept him busy and learning new things during his elderly years. Recently I found the three photos above in a file on Harry’s computer with a couple hundred others I’d never seen. I also retrieved the following email he apparently wrote to a friend’s daughter on Sept. 2, 2007, after her father passed away. I hope she will see this blog and feel inspired anew because others are enjoying Harry’s reflections, too, and possibly taking his advice.


Dear Cathy:

A few years ago, an old friend of mine died – I should say a long-standing friend of mine since I have many young friends as well as a few old friends, by which I mean those around my age. I was 86 in June, and there are not many my age left any more. Anyway, when he died in his early 80s, he left two daughters in their late 50s and several grandchildren in their late 20s to early 30s. His wife had died ten years before he did. When he died, TIME magazine was going to write an obit about him and sent a reporter to interview his daughters. What they found out was more than they expected. In the end, they decided to do a story on what they called middle-aged orphans, which is a growing phenomenon in our country as people are living longer and children are generally parents themselves when their own parents die.

You understand, of course, that whenever someone close to you dies, either a relative or a friend, you can’t help reflecting on your own mortality, and this is especially true of those of us who manage to reach their 80s. We know that we do not have many years left to us and we have a desire to impart as much as possible of the wisdom we have acquired over the years to our heirs and younger friends. But, more important, we tend to reflect on just what we have learned from our own experience and just what constitutes wisdom that is worthy of passing on to anyone else. 

Harry in 2007, around the time he wrote this email

When I was young, middle age was considered the 40s and 50s. Old age was considered the 60s and 70s. People who lived into their 80s were called octogenarians; they were few and far between, ancients. My own parents died in their mid-50s, nine months apart, when I was 19 and 20 respectively. Almost all my peers had lost their parents by the time they were 30. It was a rare teenager who had both sets of grandparents still alive then. It’s different now. I keep going to weddings of grandchildren of people I know, where both the bride and the groom have both sets of grandparents attending and dancing at their weddings. In fact, in a few weddings recently, there were four sets of grandparents attending, because both the bride and the groom were marrying a second time and their parents had been divorced and remarried, too. Relationships for them had become extremely complicated, I must say, and after a few explanations I was confused beyond words. Suffice it to say that the wedding party of family alone, in one case, consisting of parents, grandparents, siblings and step-siblings, etc., amounted to 47 people. 

For a couple like Jeanette and myself, who have been happily married for 64 years now, it is sometimes amazing to see the number of divorces among younger couples these days. And yet, when I talk to them separately, I can understand why they found it necessary to separate. What I can’t understand is why they married in the first place. Except for raging hormones and the sexual attraction, they should have known they were incompatible. One of the few advantages of advanced age (like mine) is that we see some things clearly that younger folks find cloudy or obscure. Which is not to suggest superior wisdom – only a different perspective.

I am the youngest of four siblings, two sisters and a brother. We were close in some ways, distant in others. The oldest, a sister, was ten years older than I. My brother was seven years older. My second sister was four years older. The standing joke in the family, after we were all adults, is that my second sister was always referred to as my younger sister, which, by definition she was. My oldest sister died six years ago, at the age of 91. My brother died nine years ago at the age of 84. By the way, he was career Air Force, enlisted in 1940, right after WWII started in Europe in 1939, started as a Flying Sergeant and graduated to the maintenance field and served until he retired with 25 years as a Chief Warrant Officer in the mid-1960s at the age of 55. My “younger” sister is 90 now, living in a nursing home in California. We visited there for her 90th birthday less than a year ago.

The deaths of my older siblings made me feel like an orphan all over again, as I had when my parents died so many years ago, and started me thinking about my own mortality. Every time a friend dies now, every funeral I attend, finds me thinking of all the things I want to do yet and how little time I have left. That’s why I try to do as much as I can each day and why I commit myself to do many things that just a few years ago I would not have done. Because, like most people, just a few years ago I behaved as though I were immortal, as though the thought of death simply didn’t occur to me. Even now, it’s not so much the thought of dying that bothers me – it’s the urge to do as many things as I can while I have the will and the strength to do them.  

I have noted, with a few rare exceptions (your Dad was one of the exceptions), that most of the funerals I attend nowadays involve people who are not doing anything special – not working, not involved in ongoing projects, hobbies, avocations, studies, mind-occupying activities, etc. I don’t mean that they’re just vegetating or sitting in a rocking chair all day. Sure they have a sort of social life, they go out to dinner now and then, they see friends, they play cards, they go to movies. But they’re not doing anything constructive. They’re not using their talents or their skills or their minds. I so admired Tom, I’ll tell you, because his mind never stopped working and gnawing at problems and seeking solutions to all kinds of perplexing things. I felt about him in some ways as if he were my younger brother and he kept asking me why things are the way they are and why can’t we do something to fix them, and the very fact that he kept asking why forced me to think about things I didn’t want to think about. He’s the only person in the world, except for my own brother, with whom I could spend hours on the telephone and enjoy every minute of it – and not begrudge the time taken away from anything else. 

Now, Cathy, I’ve gone on and on bending your ear (eye?) too long and getting a little maudlin, too, but what I started out to say, and took the long way around, is to keep busy – keep your mind working learning new things and dealing with old things in new ways.


Copyright 2016
Elaine Blackman

Memories from the War, the Eisenhower years

In honor of Holocaust Remembrance Day (or Yom Hashoah) on May 5, I’m posting a note Harry wrote to an individual 50 years after his Army service ended. I found the note, plus another one on the Eisenhower years, in Harry’s computer files. I believe both are worth sharing for history’s sake. Harry’s loved ones will enjoy these photos from his time in Germany. (I will not post the gruesome Holocaust photos also in his collection.)






In every photo, Harry is on the left.

Holocaust reflections

In November 1996, Harry wrote to someone (unknown) with a few details on World War II and concentration camps. He had served with an Army mission to hunt down Nazi war criminals and gather evidence for the Nuremberg Trials. (You can read about his experience in an earlier post on this blog.)

When the Allies invaded the continent of Europe in June 1944, the Russians were already moving west toward Europe’s heartland. A great many Germans could see the handwriting on the wall and started making preparations for their inevitable defeat. The Russians were the first to come across the concentration camps, most of them in eastern Poland, and the word started to spread about the horrors they were finding. By the way, most people only hear about the major camps and believe there were only about a dozen or so. The truth is, there were several hundred camps, all of them competing to see who could kill the most people in the shortest period of time. Anyway, those Germans who could see ahead, wanted to avoid the Russians, realizing that the atrocities the German armies had inflicted on the Russians the previous year were about to be returned by a vengeful Russian army. Hundreds of thousands of them fled westward, hoping to be captured by the Americans.    

Starting in October/November 1944, about six months before the war ended, some Germans decided to hedge their bets, so to speak. They would pick the strongest or healthiest young Jews, mostly young women but some men, too, who could be expected to survive under the harsh conditions they would face until the war was over, and help them to “escape”. They would also provide shelter, such as it was, and some food – enough to keep them alive. The survivors could then testify, if need be, to the fact that their benefactors had saved their lives. True, it was a risk for them – they could perhaps be sent to the camps themselves if caught. But it was a calculated risk, and for most of them it paid off. It’s also true that there were some righteous people among them who acted for humane reasons, but not very many.    

When the invading armies got close, the Germans who were stationed at the camps almost all fled, tearing off their uniforms and joining the thousands of refugees streaming along the roads. Your grandmother was one of hundreds of similar survivors we found at that time, all with similar stories to tell. What had happened to them was terrible, worse than anyone in your generation can ever imagine. But what happened to them in the immediate aftermath of the war, at the hands of us Americans, was enough to break your heart. I don’t think that part of the story has ever been adequately told. You should ask your grandmother what happened after she was freed, and how she found her way to America.


The Eisenhower years
In March 2010, Harry jotted these thoughts to someone (again, unknown). He refers to Presidents Eisenhower and Truman, Secretary of Defense George Marshall, and Senator McCarthy. History buffs may especially appreciate this. (You can read about his experience during the McCarthy era in an earlier post on this blog.)

This is my understanding of Eisenhower’s treatment of Marshall. Senator McCarthy, whose claim to fame rested solely on his fiery anti-communism and his accusations that there were communists in the State Dept. and the Defense Dept. (though he never, never once, named one), attacked George Marshall. He called him a man “steeped in falsehoods” and accused him of harboring communists in the State and Defense Depts. and of catering to Russian requests, etc. etc.  Eisenhower, who owed his career to Marshall, and was now the Republican candidate for President, had ignored McCarthy while he was an Army officer, but as a political candidate he had to take a position. I got this from the speech-writing fraternity (a small world in the government, especially at State, Defense and White House).

While campaigning in Wisconsin, McCarthy’s home state, Ike had a prepared speech defending Marshall in strong terms against McCarthy’s charges. But, when it came time to use it, he gave the speech but left out all references to Marshall. He did what all politicians do, he backed away from a fight he thought he couldn’t win – and to hell with principle. The newspapers all commented on it, and I remember that TIME magazine especially gave him a hard time about it. But, what the hell, he won the election and became President – twice, two terms. But he could have stopped McCarthy a lot earlier. As it was, McCarthy figured he had nothing to fear from Eisenhower, so he went ahead to accuse the Army of harboring communists and started holding hearings. That’s when Eisenhower finally decided to stand up and fight – now he was President. Those famous hearings were televised and drew the biggest TV audience ever – up to that time – 1953, I think. McCarthy was finally discredited, later reprimanded by the Senate, and died in disgrace.

But Ike never defended Marshall. He resigned as Sec/Def in 1951, while Ike was campaigning for Pres. The scuttlebutt was that Truman wanted him to stay on with the expectation that Ike would also ask him to stay on if he were elected, but Marshall declined and – get this – because he did not want to put Eisenhower in the embarrassing position of deciding whether to keep him on or not.

Copyright 2016
Elaine Blackman