I was in middle school when Tricky Dick Nixon went down. In April, 1974, went on a class trip by bus from Durham, North Carolina, to Washington, D.C. (about five hours door to door), and one of the images that sticks to mind is walking with classmates and teachers on Capitol Hill, threading through phalanxes of protesters and across a de facto no man's land, right through a perimeter of riot police Myrmidons ringing the federal buildings. An exciting spectacle, and I'm still friends with other witnesses to the event, which I believe was part of the April 27, 1974 mass anti-Nixon protest.
UPI captured some of went on in photos, accessible here:
http://www.upi.com/News_Photos/Archives/1974/1651/1/
Fast forward to August 9, 1974. My father had taken me with him on a business trip to Norfolk, Virginia, and on that morning, I was left at a business associate's house in Virginia Beach. As I watched Nixon resign and flee the White House by helicopter oon TV, outside the heavens opened up and Virginia Beach flooded. Flooded so fast that the only way through the neighborhood for hours was by canoe. Then Gerald Ford was sworn in, the waters receded somewhat, and my father returned
These are the kinds of things you don't forget.
Today's Rune: Joy.
2 comments:
I do remember this, although I don't think I was ever as politically aware as you were.
Compared to Bush and Chaney, Nixon was simply a neophyte nabob of crassness.
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