by Hill, Clint
IN THE WEEKS leading up to the election, President Eisenhower did very little campaigning for Vice President Nixon—in large part because Mrs. Eisenhower and the president’s physician intervened. They were so concerned about Ike’s stress level that they convinced Nixon to dissuade the president from accompanying him. In the final week, however, the race had become so close that the Republicans had to pull out all the stops, especially in New York, where forty-five electoral votes were on the table, and Kennedy appeared to have the lead. It was time to bring in the GOP’s biggest asset, the President of the United States.
A daylong swing through New York was set for November 2 that included two rallies in different cities, a ticker tape parade through Manhattan ending with a rally in Herald Square, and an evening rally at the New York Coliseum. I was one of four agents assigned to do the advance, and as we had just a few days to get all the logistics and police reinforcements lined up for each location, we had no time to spare. Special Agent Stu Knight—who would later become director of the Secret Service—was in charge, and he assigned me the motorcade and Herald Square rally.
Nixon’s campaign staff had devised the general plan, and it was up to us to implement it. The motorcade would begin in the Battery at the southern tip of Manhattan and end at Herald Square at Thirty-fourth Street and Broadway—a distance of more than four miles through the canyons of high-rise buildings in the most densely populated city in America, with the president and the vice president traveling together in an open-top car. The event was scheduled for noon, a time when people would naturally be emerging from their offices to go to lunch, and with many side streets blocked off by uniformed police officers, there would automatically be a massive crowd, making it look like the entire city of New York was Republican. I was not at all familiar with New York City, but having traveled around the world with President Eisenhower, I knew this would be a security nightmare.
Fortunately, a couple of agents from the New York City Secret Service Field Office were assigned to assist me. New York was their territory, but most important, they had a great relationship with the New York City Police Department and the city’s Bureau of Special Services and Investigations (BOSSI). These guys knew the city inside and out—not only the names and locations of every medical facility and specialist in case of emergency but also where potential trouble spots were throughout the city and who might stir up problems. My biggest concern was how to corral overflow crowds on the sidewalks and streets to allow the police motorcycles and the vehicles in the motorcade plenty of space to move. Two weeks earlier, Senator Kennedy had campaigned here, drawing uncontrollable crowds estimated at well over a million, in a scene similar to what we’d seen in New Delhi and Manila. It was my responsibility to make sure that didn’t happen during President Eisenhower’s visit.
The weather was crisp and cool on Wednesday, November 2, a perfect day for a fall parade, and New York City was abuzz. The Nixon campaign people had released the motorcade route to the press a couple of days earlier, and the crowds had started gathering up and down Broadway. Our relationship with the NYPD had paid off, and the city’s entire force was called in to assist with security. Preparations started at dawn, blocking off side streets, strategically posting officers along the parade route and speech sites, and readying mounted officers on horseback for additional crowd control.
At 11:55 a.m. President Eisenhower arrived at the 30th Street Heliport, right on schedule. We whisked him to the beginning of the parade route in lower Manhattan, where a string of cars filled with dignitaries was lined up and ready to go. Tens of thousands of people packed the area, turning Wall Street into a sea of people, with NIXON FOR PRESIDENT banners and WELCOME TO OUR COUNTRY’S FIRST TEAM signs bobbing overhead. The Republican committee had supplied tons of multicolored paper to the high-rise offices, and as soon as Nixon and Eisenhower emerged, a swirling blizzard of confetti poured down from above as the crowd erupted into cheers and applause.
When I saw the president and vice president climb into the back of Secret Service car 4-B—the black presidential convertible—I jogged to the front of the motorcade. The chief of the NYPD and SAIC Al Whitaker of the New York Field Office were in the pilot car out front, and as the advance agent for the motorcade, I would ride in the front passenger seat of the lead car—the car immediately in front of the presidential limousine—guiding the long string of cars behind us.
The portable radio crackled with the voice of the supervising agent in the follow-up car: “Providence departing.”
Using Eisenhower’s code name, it was the signal that the president was ready.
“That’s it,” I said. “Let’s go.” A team of NYPD motorcycle officers, lights flashing, pulled out ahead of us, and the motorcade was under way.
As we traveled up Broadway, hundreds of thousands of people were jammed on the sidewalks behind police barricades, while thousands more draped themselves out of windows, hurling bucketsful of confetti as we crept along at ten miles per hour. It felt like we were driving through Times Square on New Year’s Eve, and Vice President Nixon was in his glory, standing up in the back of the car, his arms outstretched to the cheering throng, getting a taste of what it would feel like to be president after having spent eight long years in Eisenhower’s shadow. Sitting a few feet behind him, Ike was perched on the backseat, waving and smiling, mindful that this was Nixon’s day to be in the limelight.
The sole purpose of this parade was for the candidate to be seen by as many people as possible, and from that standpoint, it was a roaring success. From where I was sitting, this entire situation—the president and the vice president riding together in a slow-moving open-top car, in broad daylight, surrounded by a million unscreened people—could hardly have been any more tense.
Fortunately, the NYPD did an outstanding job of crowd control, and while everyone was covered in confetti, we made it without incident to Herald Square. The president gave some glowing remarks about Nixon, took a few minor stabs at Kennedy’s lack of experience, and then turned the stage over to Nixon. As Nixon finished his stump speech, we got Eisenhower back in the car and drove straight to the Waldorf-Astoria, where, once the president was safely in his suite, I finally breathed a sigh of relief.
ON ELECTION DAY, Tuesday, November 8, while President Eisenhower helicoptered to Gettysburg to vote, I was assigned to secure the suite at the Sheraton Park Hotel in Washington, where Ike intended to visit vice presidential candidate Henry Cabot Lodge before giving a speech to supporters in the Grand Ballroom. If Nixon and Lodge won the election, I was instructed to remain there to protect Mr. Lodge.
At some point well after midnight, Mr. Lodge came out of the suite and said, “Agent, you might as well go home. We have lost the election.”
I couldn’t just leave without authorization from my supervisor, so I stayed at my post outside the door until shortly after dawn, when I got the word that I could go home. Throughout the night, I imagined what it would be like to protect the newly elected president, John F. Kennedy. I didn’t know much about him other than the fact that he was a forty-three-year-old senator from Massachusetts, and would be the first Catholic president of the United States. He seemed to have a vibrant, charming personality, and surely the mere age difference between Kennedy and Eisenhower would be an adjustment.
I thought back on the twelve months I’d been on the White House Detail—the privilege of traveling all over the world, witnessing historic events—experiences most people would never have in an entire lifetime. And in that time, those of us who made up the small group of Secret Service agents that covered the president had developed into a tight-knit team, bonded by our shared experiences. When we were away from Washington, we worked together, ate together, and often slept together in shared hotel rooms. We trusted and relied on each other like brothers. As the hours passed and I thought ahead to the future, I looked forward to being assigned to the new president.
THE DAY AFTER the election, President Eisenhower headed straigh
t to Augusta for some post-election golf. The mood on the plane was somber, and some of the secretaries were even crying as they came to terms with the reality of their personal situation. Many had expected that Nixon would win and they would continue at the White House, but now Kennedy would be bringing in his own people. They would all have to find new jobs.
Ike played eighteen holes that afternoon, and when he was finished, Special Agent in Charge Rowley called two other agents and me into his office. Rowley explained that he needed to reassign some of the agents in order to continue covering President Eisenhower, as well as President-elect Kennedy, until the Inauguration on January 20.
Rowley told the other two guys to pack their bags and catch a flight to Palm Beach, Florida, to join the President-elect Detail. Kennedy was staying at his father’s residence there, and intended to stay through the holidays as he sorted out his administration. An uneasy feeling started to come over me as Rowley was talking, and I wondered why I wasn’t included and going with them.
Finally, he turned to me and said, “Clint, Defense Secretary Tom Gates is here briefing the president and is returning to Washington shortly. I want you to fly back with him, then go to Secret Service headquarters and talk to Chief Baughman. The chief is expecting you.”
My heart sank. Why? Why aren’t I going to Palm Beach? Have I done something wrong? Am I being fired? I had a dozen questions, but I simply answered, “Yes, sir.”
Like the secretaries on the plane down to Augusta, I was suddenly filled with a sense of foreboding.
PART TWO
* * *
With President Kennedy
John F. Kennedy’s election in 1960 coincided with the transition to a new era in American history. There was a marked difference between the outgoing Republican president—a seventy-year-old grandfather and former general—and the incoming charismatic forty-three-year-old Democrat with the attractive wife, young daughter, and new baby expected before the Inauguration.
The challenges facing this new, relatively inexperienced president were daunting, however, and he would have to prove himself. In the wake of the U-2 spy plane incident, tensions with the Soviet Union were high, and there was growing fear of the spread of Communism in the Western Hemisphere as Cuba’s revolutionary leader, Fidel Castro, aligned his regime with the Soviets. Many Americans believed war with the Soviet Union was inevitable. Additionally, racial tensions were mounting—especially throughout the South—as the civil rights movement was coming to the forefront.
Kennedy would note in his Inaugural Address, “Let the word go forth from this time and place, to friend and foe alike, that the torch has been passed to a new generation of Americans.”
There was a confidence in John F. Kennedy, and his vision provided a sense of hope and promise.
8
* * *
On the First Lady Detail
“How old are you, Clint?” Chief Baughman asked.
“I’m twenty-eight, sir,” I replied. I was sitting in the Treasury Department office of Secret Service Chief U. E. Baughman along with his deputy chief, an assistant chief, and two inspectors, and feeling very ill at ease.
They were asking me all kinds of questions about my background, my family status, my previous work experience—and I knew they had all this information in my file. It didn’t make sense. I couldn’t imagine what I might have done wrong, but it felt like I was being interrogated for an investigation and I was about to be fired. And then the questions got even stranger.
“Do you have experience riding horses? Know how to play tennis? Are you a good swimmer?”
Every so often, the men would confer in a corner of the room, whispering so I could not make out what was being said, and then return with another round of questions. Finally, Chief Baughman said, “Clint, we have made a decision. You are being assigned to Mrs. John F. Kennedy.”
The First Lady’s Detail? Why me? I thought. I was grateful I hadn’t been fired, but to be on the First Lady’s Detail felt like a demotion. While those of us with President Eisenhower were traveling around the world, always on the go, I had felt sorry for the guys assigned to Mrs. Eisenhower going to tea parties and canasta games. Now that was going to be me. I was devastated.
There would be just two of us on Mrs. Kennedy’s Detail—Agent Jim Jeffries and myself—responsible for her protection around the clock, and my new assignment was to begin immediately.
WHEN I FIRST met Mrs. Kennedy on November 11, 1960, in the living room of the Kennedys’ Georgetown town house, it was clear that she was not looking forward to having a Secret Service agent around her at all times, and this was going to be an adjustment for all of us. She was nearly eight months pregnant, and over the next couple of weeks she didn’t leave the house very often, except to take long, leisurely walks outside each day for exercise.
President-elect Kennedy had gone to Palm Beach, where his father had a residence, to focus on the transition and the selection of his cabinet and staff, and I didn’t meet him until the day before Thanksgiving, when he returned to Georgetown.
Mrs. Kennedy introduced us, and he immediately reached out his hand and gave me a firm, vigorous handshake. It was a brief meeting, but even so, I got a sense of John F. Kennedy, and it was easy to see how he had been able to connect with voters. He was charming as hell, but I also saw a man who really cared about his family as well as the people around them.
I had the opportunity to check in with the agents who had been assigned to President-elect Kennedy and had been with him down in Palm Beach for the past two weeks, and the stories they told reaffirmed my initial impression. Unlike President Eisenhower, who had referred to most of us on his detail simply as “Agent,” Kennedy had taken it upon himself to learn every agent’s name. Harry Gibbs told the story of how he had suddenly been dispatched to Hyannis Port when Kennedy was elected and then flew with the detail immediately to Palm Beach. He didn’t have time to pack any warm-weather clothing, and as soon as he landed, he was directed to stand post at the left corner of the backyard, on the seawall.
“I was standing there in my wool suit and fedora, the sweat just pouring down my face,” Harry said. “The president-elect had some reading material with him outside on the patio, and he kept looking over in my direction. Finally, he got up, walked over to me, and asked me what my name was. And then he asked me why I was wearing a wool suit when it was about eighty degrees outside!” Gibbs said with a laugh.
“I told him I’d just flown in from Washington and didn’t have time to change. So he suggested I move to a different spot, under a tree, where I’d at least be in the shade.”
I shook my head with a grin. Kennedy clearly meant well, but obviously he didn’t understand that we had specific designated posts around the perimeter of the building for a reason. Moving to a different position because you were hot or cold or wet was not an option.
“Of course I told him I couldn’t do that,” Gibbs said, “and then he asked how many agents were on the post at that time, and turned and walked into the house.
“When he came back out, he had a stack of short-sleeved golf shirts in his arms, in all different colors. He put them down on the ground and said, ‘Pass these out to the agents with my compliments. I think you’ll do a better job of protecting me if you’re not uncomfortable.’ ”
There was no doubt this administration was going to be entirely different from the last. Our job was to protect—we had no political allegiance—but from the very beginning, the courtesy and respect with which both Mr. and Mrs. Kennedy treated all of the agents set the groundwork for what would become one of the most memorable times in not only my life, but for my colleagues’ lives as well. None of us realized it at the time, but we were being swept into Camelot.
AFTER HAVING THANKSGIVING dinner with his family in Georgetown, President Kennedy departed Washington on the Caroline, the Kennedy family’s private plane, and headed back to Florida with plans to return a few weeks later when the baby was due. As it tur
ned out, Mrs. Kennedy went into labor that night, and I ended up at the hospital pacing the floor like an expectant father, while President-elect Kennedy immediately flew back from Palm Beach.
At 12:22 a.m. on November 25, 1960, Mrs. Kennedy delivered a healthy, six-pound-three-ounce baby boy. Thankfully, both the baby and Mrs. Kennedy were doing well, and as the nurses brought the baby out to place him in an incubator, I got my first glimpse of John F. Kennedy Jr. Four hours later, President-elect Kennedy arrived and, having just flown to Florida and back in less than ten hours, he was a bit disheveled but anxious to see his wife and the new baby. I was standing outside her room when he arrived.
The Kennedys’ firstborn son was the first child ever to be born to a president-elect, and news of the surprise, premature birth spread quickly. Members of the press were bombarding the hospital with phone calls and swarming outside the maternity wing trying to get in, but keeping the press and other intruders at bay was one of our chief concerns and priorities—not only as a matter of personal security but also as a matter of privacy.
President-elect Kennedy was overjoyed with his newborn son, and over the course of the next several days I could see the genuine care and concern he had for his wife during his daily visits. He knew me by name at this point, and before entering Mrs. Kennedy’s room, he’d stop for a moment to check with me about everything that had happened since his last visit. Had she slept? Had she eaten? Everything all right with the baby?
Mrs. Kennedy was very weak following the cesarean section, and at the recommendation of her doctors she and the baby remained in the hospital for nearly two weeks. Finally, on December 9, Mrs. Kennedy was well enough to be released, and the press was invited to take photographs. I tried to stay out of the way, but managed to be caught in the background of one picture, which fortunately didn’t make it into the newspapers, but that the photographer printed out a copy for me to keep for posterity. At the time I was somewhat embarrassed, but looking back, I’m so thankful for all the photos I managed to collect in this manner.