Yorba Linda Welcomes Library of Native Son

Long mired in controversy and delays, the Richard M. Nixon Presidential Library has finally found a home, near the site of the former President’s birthplace in Yorba Linda.

But the announcement Monday of a final resting place for Nixon’s mementos did not end the debate.

That lives on, embodied in the frail but spritely form of 93-year-old Edith Eichler, who said she is not so sure she wants to sell her home to make way for the library complex.

It is a home she has lived in for more than 62 years. The property was bought, ironically, from Nixon’s father when the still-sleepy town was a maze of orange and lemon groves.

Her property is part of a nine-acre parcel that city officials Monday said they intended to buy for the Nixon library. The nine acres includes the now-vacant Richard M. Nixon Elementary School and one other private residence.

Yorba Linda officials had previously announced that they planned only to buy a six-acre portion of the site, where the school is located, from the Yorba Linda School District for $1.3 million.

But at Monday’s press conference, they said they would like to acquire the entire nine-acre parcel that made up the original homestead owned by Nixon’s father, Francis.

Only no one told Mrs. Eichler about the plan, she said.

“No one has talked to me about it or even written a letter,” she observed as she sat in her favorite chair in the small, cozy home filled with antique plates and crystal she has collected over the years.

Mrs. Eichler said she knew the Nixon family well. She recalled that she and Hannah Milhous Nixon, the former President’s mother, organized the first Yorba Linda women’s club in the early 1920s.

She remembers Nixon as “just another of the boys,” who played and ran errands along the rural roads.

“I don’t want to have to move into a retirement home. I’d like to stay here the rest of my life,” she said. “This home, after more than 60 years, has become very comfortable for me. At 93, you don’t transplant very well.”

Yorba Linda Mayor Roland Bigonger said the city wants to buy the entire nine-acre site and demolish the buildings so that the library will be “located on a site which has historical integrity in terms of the life of the President.”

Bigonger said it might cost $300,000 more to buy the two parcels. He said the city intended to contact Mrs. Eichler when all the paper work is complete, adding that he expected no trouble in acquiring the property.

“We certainly would offer a fair and equitable sum for the land,” he said. “I think everyone will agree eventually.”

While the property on which the two homes sit might not be needed for the complex, the agreement reached with the Richard Nixon Presidential Archives Foundation stipulates that all three parcels be acquired by the city for the foundation’s use.

Monday’s formal announcement brings to full circle the search begun nearly five years ago by supporters of the former President, during which time Yorba Linda was considered then rejected as the site to house the papers of one of this nation’s most controversial leaders.

Aides have said that Nixon originally wanted the library built next to the small, wood-frame house where he was born, but the land was unavailable in 1983, so a site in San Clemente was chosen instead.

The foundation has agreed to restore the home where Nixon was born in 1913 and open it to the public.

Foundation executive director John C. Whitaker did not attend Monday’s press conference, but in a telephone interview from his Washington office he said Nixon supporters were relieved that final negotiations for a location have concluded.

“We went through a long and frustrating negotiation in San Clemente that took so long that other alternatives had to be considered,” Whitaker said. “But now, we’re off and running and on our way to getting this done.

Yorba Linda has given us active and immediate support.”

Bigonger said the city has already begun preparing an environmental impact report, which should be completed by March. Construction, which is scheduled to begin in September, should be completed by January, 1990.

City Manager Arthur Simonian said the city will give top priority to the project, which must receive Planning Commission approval before it can be built. “We won’t short-circuit our process, but this will definitely be on the fast track,” he said.

Delays in the process of approving permits to build the library in San Clemente caused Nixon officials to make good on their long-threatened vow to look for another location.

In April, 1983, Nixon chose a 16.7-acre site for the library along an ocean bluff overlooking Casa Pacifica, the home he used as presidential headquarters while on the West Coast.

But development of the library was tied to another, 253-acre project that includes hotels, homes and a commercial complex being built by the Lusk Co. of Irvine. Approval of the entire project stalled as city officials and developers negotiated proposals to preserve the environment.

New architectural designs for the library have not been completed, but the building will reflect the character of the wood-framed birthplace, Whitaker said.

The foundation has raised $25 million in private donations to build the facility, which will include a museum expected to house exhibits related to Nixon’s work on foreign and domestic issues.

The library will initially include Nixon’s vice presidential papers, personal papers since he left office, book manuscripts and personal White House diaries. Missing will be more than 44 million pages of documents and 4,000 hours of tape recordings accumulated during Nixon’s six-year presidential term.

After his resignation in 1974, Nixon waged an unsuccessful fight to have some of the documents destroyed, resulting in a congressional decree that all presidential papers are the property of the federal government.

The documents are stored in a Virginia warehouse, where National Archivists are removing classified information before their public release.

The foundation expects that the library and museum will attract more than 500,000 visitors to Yorba Linda each year, but so far there has been little comment from Yorba Linda residents about the project.

Unlike San Clemente, there have been no citizen groups clamoring for the city to house the Nixon library.

But Mrs. Eichler, for one, thinks the plan is a good idea.

“I think it’s a good, logical location,” she said. “I think it will be good for the city. But my property has value to me as a home. I would hate to see it bulldozed and destroyed.”