So Far, Smooth Sailing for Keeper of Cup

My memory’s cobwebs do not recall precisely the format, but I remember “What’s My Line?” as a game show based on the premise that a panel of four could not guess the occupation of the guest within a given number of questions.

Our guest for today’s version of that very same show would be a tall, distinguished man who looks like he could be . . .

Never mind, that’s getting ahead of the game.

“Jack Keith,” he would scrawl on the blackboard.

“Hmm,” a discerning panelist would ponder, noting his bearing and demeanor. “Are you in law enforcement?”

“No,” Keith would say. “But I was. Twenty-eight years with the FBI.”

(You don’t really give these panelists any more than they need to know, but Keith is a garrulous type who probably drove prosecutors crazy during his days with the bureau.)

“Just yes or no,” the moderator would whisper.

“Aha,” another panelist would say, “you’re bigger than a bread box?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“You’re not mineral?”

“No, sir.”

“An animal then?”

Guffaws . . .

“Yes, ma’am, if the other alternative is vegetable.”

Whatever number of “nopes” it took to stump that panel, Jack Keith’s “occupation” would surely go undiscovered. It couldn’t have been any tougher if he was in charge of quality control for a rutabaga farm.

Who would ever guess that Keith is baby-sitter for a 141-year-old mug?

His card says “America’s Cup Security Coordinator.” He is talking the Cup itself, not the event.

Where the America’s Cup has gone, Keith has gone. It’s been that way for five years, or since California Conner rescued the artifact from crocodiles, kangaroos and Kookaburra III in a daring Aussie adventure in 1987. Given that crazy billionaires spend millions of dollars trying to capture this Cup, the San Diego Yacht Club determined it needed a trusted keeper.

Enter Jack Keith.

In truth, it hasn’t been “Indiana Jones” stuff . . . not even “FBI Story” stuff.

However, baby-sitting with America’s Cup has caused Keith to circle the globe and crisscross the continent.

“We didn’t know how much in demand it would be,” he said. “After about a month, it became obvious it was very much in demand.”

Keith and Cup have made, by his estimate, 400 to 450 stops and accumulated more than a half-million miles in the air. Both Keeper and Cup fly first class, though the Cup itself is confined to its carrying case like some cheap violin.

“Sometimes,” Keith laughed, “I’d order a drink for me and a drink for it. Naturally, I’d drink them both.”

Frequent flier miles did not accumulate at a faster rate, however.

“They don’t give mileage to a ‘thing,’ ” Keith said.

Too bad.

Jack Keith may fly free--he gets expenses and a per diem--but traveling with America’s Cup does not give him much in the way of freedom.

“I don’t like to keep it in my room,” he said, “because it kind of ties you up. It requires more attention than a child.”

Keith generally prefers to secure his companion in a vault, though never a safety deposit box. On one occasion, the Cup found itself safely locked in a jail in Monte Carlo. On another, it bedded down in a wine cellar in England . . . though it surely would have preferred the Loire Valley for such an experience.

Untended, this Cup would be a prime candidate for a Cup-napping. It would matter little whether it was serious or frivolous. Pranksters or crooks, take your pick, would prey on such a renowned piece of memorabilia.

Jack Keith has not had any close calls. Three roughnecks in Virginia made some threats before cops hauled them off. A tipsy woman once stumbled over the velvet ropes and knocked it off its perch into Keith’s clamoring grasp, making him a prime candidate to play infield for the Dodgers in his next career. A schemer on a flight to Honolulu tried to sell Keith on how the Cup could make them both big bucks. And it disappeared briefly in a misplaced catering truck in San Francisco.

What we are talking, to be sure, were minor crises. The situation was always in hand.

Jack Keith always got America’s Cup back to its San Diego Yacht Club home.

The real crisis is now.

Jack Keith, not being a sailor, cannot protect his old chum on the water.

If Bill Koch doesn’t do what he does as well as Keith did what he did, America’s Cup will once again find itself in foreign hands on foreign soil.