Countywide : Nixon Remembered With Talk, Video

On the eve of the 20th anniversary of Richard Nixon’s resignation, a former White House aide is hoping the medium often blamed for bringing down the Yorba Linda native’s presidency will now help round out future character portraits of the controversial chief executive.

Frank Gannon, who was 25 when he joined the Nixon White House in 1971, showed excerpts from his new four-part video series called “The Real Richard Nixon” Monday morning at the Richard Nixon Library & Birthplace.

Culled from 38 hours of interviews with the former President over a 10-month period in 1984, the video--in what Gannon called an “objective, non-confrontational” style--gives Nixon’s recollections of his tumultuous political and personal life.

“If you have spoken on camera,” said Gannon, who trained as a historian at Oxford University, “you can address posterity and not be filtered through the psycho-historians, the historians and the pundits.”

The 20 minutes of outtakes Gannon selected for the 300 Nixon library visitors Monday morning were largely of a nostalgic nature. In a tape chronicling his last days in office, Nixon remembered his famous farewell talk to the White House staff.

In the speech delivered on nationwide television 20 years ago today, Nixon said: “Only if you’ve been in the deepest valley can you know how magnificent it is to be on the highest mountain.”

“It was a very emotional speech,” Nixon said on the tape. “I recall speaking from the heart.”

Gannon also provided his own accounts of Nixon’s final hours while leaving office. Gannon traveled with the former President as he left Washington for the last time as chief executive and flew to El Toro Marine Corps Air Station.

Gannon remembers thousands of people were solemnly waiting to greet Nixon. The crowd began to sing “God Bless America,” Gannon said.

“It was another in a series of very moving moments,” said Gannon, who for four years helped Nixon compile his memoirs.

In a tape entitled “The Early Life,” Nixon--who ironically was noted for his harsh language inside the Oval Office--humorously recounted a childhood incident where an elder scolded him for using the word “golly.”

In the same tape, Nixon thanked his Fullerton High School football coach who taught him: “If you don’t win, you kick yourself in the butt and make sure you don’t make the same mistakes again.”

The videotapes, filmed 10 years ago and some of which aired on CBS’s “60 Minutes,” also include an hourlong piece featuring Nixon’s memories about the former First Lady, Pat Nixon.

Nixon said it was love at first sight when he initially saw his future wife.

“The most common denominator of the recollections is his wife, Mrs. Nixon,” Gannon said.

In spite of the sympathetic tone of Monday’s tape selections, Gannon said his interviews with Nixon did contain “tough questions.”

“He got ticked off,” said Gannon, who described himself as a “loyalist, but not a blind loyalist.”

Nixon biographer Jonathon Aitken, a former member of Parliament and chief secretary of Britain’s Treasury, will speak at the Nixon Library today about the former President’s legacy. The talk starts at 10:30 a.m.