1969 --- A Seed Takes Root

I was in the Times newsroom for some amazing moments. I was there when Neil Armstrong stepped onto the moon. It was a strange event in that place. The Times newsroom was filled with people who were trained to NOT be affected by what was happening and to totally focus on its newsworthiness and to be witnesses to history. The credo was that the Times was supposed to be recording history as it happened and should do so in the same academic fashion as a history book would be written. The room was filled with young idealistic people, veteran reporters (notorious drunks), copy editors who were more interested in how many words a story ran than how many deaths it talked about, reporters who had seen it all, and editors who were always ‘above’ the news. But when Armstrong stepped out onto the moon, the entire room hushed and people were blown away. It felt like the world had changed irrevocably in that moment. I’ll always remember being there for that.

And there was the only time they ever literally ‘stopped the presses’. Generally speaking, since the Times went to press in prime time, speeches were pre-distributed to journalists so they could write their stories before the actual events. And when LBJ sent around his speech on the afternoon of March 31, 1968, it was no different. The story was written and the paper was sent to press at 9PM as the President began to speak. Except, in this case, not only did the President change the language but he changed everything. I recall the editors sitting around the television in the center of the newsroom as LBJ began to speak. And a few sentences in, they began to look back and forth at one another. Head were shaking and faces were turning purple as he went further and further from the distributed text. Finally, when he announced that he was withdrawing from the election and wouldn’t seek a second term as President, they had to stop the presses and redo the entire paper. It never had happened before and has never happened since. A memorable madcap moment that saw the entire place go from dead stop to frenzied madness in the space of about 10 minutes.

http://millercenter.virginia.edu/scripps/diglibrary/prezspeeches/johnson/lbj_1968_0331.html

Henry Kamm was one of the many Times reporters who covered the War in Vietnam. I recall sending him the nightly cable one day relaying a request that he provide a map that showed where My Lai was. This was a typical Times attempt to cubbyhole a story. There had been a massacre at a Vietnamese village named My Lai and the Times wanted to show the readers exactly where My Lai was. Never mind that most people didn’t have a clue where Vietnam was except some vague notion of ‘Asia’. The Times had to show everyone where it exactly was.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/My_Lai

So… Kamm responds to the cable in the most incredible language, suggesting that they are out of their minds to ask for a map like that. He says that there are similar massacres happening every day and in every corner of the country; that there are about 10 or more villages named My Lai and that they are pretty much all gone, either burned up by napalm bombs or torched by troops. He then sends an articulate map, giving map coordinates of half a dozen different My Lais, explaining that he was sorry that he couldn’t send pictures but that they were all gone and the people were all dead. He further suggested that they come see what was happening over there before they sent any more inane and ridiculous requests. Kamm was my idol after that. The guy actually had a moral compass and wasn’t afraid to let it show. There were a few reporters like that. John Kifner, Michael Kaufman and Henry Kamm were the most notable although I’m sure there were others.

Okay… so one day in 1969, flush with money and likely stoned (still working at the Times), I decided to take a week’s vacation to Florida. I was engaged at the time but that’s a whole other digression and Cheri didn’t come with me so I’ll just say Cheri ended up becoming collateral damage from this trip. I stayed at the Doral Beach Hotel and the first day there, I wound up at the pool, sitting next to this freak from Philadelphia named Beanie who had hair to his waist and a guru-type grin that he perpetually wore on his face. In the course of the week, I spent a lot of time with Beanie, discussing so many things in so many obtuse ways that my head was spinning at ridiculous speeds. Between sharing joints and opinions, Beanie ripped away any remaining objections I had to leaving my life and starting again. We talked about everything from the war to the cost of pot. He also happened to have a fifth booze bottle that was filled with coconut oil that he had brought back from Jamaica (along with a whole bunch of other ‘stuff’). Beanie showed me the virtues of coconut oil as a sun-tanning device and how to roll a huge spliff and by the time the week ended, I knew I wasn’t long for the New York Times. I wanted to ‘Be What I Could’ and not ‘Be What I Was’. And thus began a long journey that was unimaginable at the time but, looking back, was probably inevitable.