Tip:
Highlight text to annotate it
X
SHERYL VOGT: It's November 17th, 2006. I'm Sheryl Vogt for the Richard B. Russell Library
for Political Research and Studies at the University of Georgia, and I'm interviewing
Kil Townsend in Atlanta, Georgia. This is part of the Russell Library's Political Party
Oral History Series. Mr. Townsend, would you please state your full name, and when and
where you were born? KIL TOWNSEND: It's Kiliaen Van Rensselar Townsend.
That's a family name, and you're never named "Kiliaen (inaudible) Van Rensselar," and that
was the Dutch habit. I was born in Garden City, Long Island, New York.
VOGT: And would you tell us something about your family in general?
TOWNSEND: Well, my father was interested in politics, I guess, but he was in Wall Street.
Went down there at the age of 16, and he was a partner -- the youngest partner at the time
-- at the age of 22 at a big firm, and did very well there for a long while, until the
Great '29 Crash. My mother was a socialite out of Southampton, and she was a great athlete
herself, as far as women. And so we were a big deal in Garden City, which of course was
a small commuter town. My father started the country club there, and started the first
Fire Department on -- having paid firemen, and all that. So we -- we were, you might
say, a big deal in a little pond until 1929. Then the Crash came, and my father lost everything.
My parents were divorced. My mother moved to New York City. She inherited some money,
so she lived in the grand style for a while, and we went to the right schools. And then
I went off to boarding school along with my brothers; they went to Choate, and I went
to Trinity-Pawling. And then the money began to give out, and the school said I couldn't
leave. I -- my mother said she couldn't pay for it, so I stayed as a guest for the last
two years at boarding school. (laughter) They had me do a little work, and I sold the New
York Times, and I used to be the reporter for the New York Times on the athlete reports
about Pawling's football team, and they'd -- I'd send little articles into the papers
Saturday night, or telegraph. And sold the New York Times paper, and worked in the office
of the school at night as the night telephone operator. I think there was only one telephone
in the whole building, and I'd have to go up and get whoever was being called. So then
I was going to go to college, and of course there wasn't any money, and Duke at that time
wasn't much of a college. It had just gotten all its money and had no standing at all,
and very cheap -- I guess to induce people to go there. So we figured out I should go
there, and I applied there, and one of the teachers at Pawling said, "You've got to go
to a real college. You can't go to Duke." And I said, "Well, I can't afford anywhere
else," and he said, "Well, I'll get you a scholarship at Williams." And of course, I
didn't know much about Williams at that time; it was just sort of a regional college, a
good reputation. So I got the scholarship, and it all worked out fine. I went to Williams,
waited on table in the fraternity -- I -- I joined a fraternity that I knew needed people
to wait on -- to wait on people. And then was the treasurer of the fraternity house,
and this all paid my room and board. And I didn't do much at Williams. I didn't even
do well academically. I was too young. I went when I was 16, just turning 17, and that's
too young to go to college. But I got along all right. So then when I graduated, my brother
-- who meanwhile had married a -- a Jell-O heiress -- had enough money to help me go
to law school. So we picked Virginia -- or I did -- because I thought it was -- well,
first I was -- entered Har-- Harvard. I remember it was no trouble getting into law school
in those days, and they took anybody that got -- graduated from Williams. And I paid
my $25, but then I came through Charlottesville on the way back from my brother's -- my other
brother had a ranch in Texas by then -- and I just fell in love with Charlottesville,
and the university, and the grounds, and the whole thing. I was just overwhelmed with it.
So I went in to see the dean there; it was the middle of summer, and of course, it was
much too late, theoretically. And I said, "Dean, is there any chance that I could go
here, to this law school?" And he -- and I said, "I went to Williams." He said, "If you
went to Williams, you're in." So, and this -- this is how easy it used to be in those
days (laughter), and he didn't -- hadn't had any Williams men. So I said, "There's one
problem, though -- I have a very good friend who's -- not very good marks, but's a good
football player." He said, "Well, I don't know about him." And I said, "Well, we're
big friends, and we're going to be coll- law school together." He said, "Well, I'll take
a chance on him." So he took him, and so we two went to Virginia, which gave me my transportation,
because he had money and a car and everything. He lived in New York City. So Virginia worked
out very well for me. I got on the law school re-- review -- the review -- on the Law Review,
and (inaudible), and had go- good marks, and fortunately, lived on the lawn in my last
year, which was really quite an experience. If you've ever seen Virginia, it's just a
great privilege to have a room on the lawn over their horrible little rooms, and you
have to go outside and freeze to death to go to the bathroom. But by my third year,
I couldn't wait to see if I was qualified, and so that was a nice experience. So then
the war came along, and everybody was joining the war, and a lot of patriotism, and everybody
felt guilty not signing up. Well, I -- my eyes were too bad to get into -- well, everybody
was going to the Office of Naval Intelligence, most people, or Army Intelligence, and I couldn't
get in. And so Judge Parker, who was a famous U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals judge in Charlotte,
was -- had lost his clerk to the Army, and of course, being a clerk of a U.S. Circuit
Court judge is a great honor, or a great job to have. So he interviewed me, and -- and
-- and employed me as a -- I think they called them "secretaries," but we usually say they're
"clerks." And that was a very interesting experience, though it didn't last too long
because then I had to go in the Army, anyway, eventually, so I went ahead and volunteered
that summer after I graduated, and spent three-and-a-half years in the Army.
VOGT: Well, while you were at Virginia, were you involved in politics at all?
TOWNSEND: Not -- VOGT: Local politics, or... ?
TOWNSEND: -- not really. I had -- my father of course was for Wendell Wilkie, who was
a big Republican (laughter) running again Roosevelt. And everybody on Long Island around
Garden City seemed to be a Republican at the time, and so I didn't know much about the
Democrats. So no, I didn't really -- involved, and I think I -- I voted in -- in 19- let's
see: I guess when I was 20 years old I voted, and from then on. In fact, I guess I voted
for Wilkie, as I remember, and my father got me to register. So I really wasn't -- except
-- and my father and my grandfather had -- editor of a newspaper which was sort of a Republican
mouthpiece around Long Island, and going way back, of course, my father told me and showed
me the history of the Van Cortlandts, and the Van Rensselars, and Scotts (sp?), and
all who were all involved in politics in New York. But other than that, I didn't have any
particular interest in it. VOGT: That was one of the original Dutch families
(inaudible)? TOWNSEND: Yeah. The -- Kiliaen Van Rensselar
was the first Patroon, and of course, he owned all the land, and they had given him -- the
Dutch had given him all the land between Albany and New York City (laughter) up the Hudson,
which I'd -- he didn't leave me any of it. But anyway, they were a big deal until the
English took over, and of course, the Dutch ran everything for years until they lost out,
and the Scars and Cortlandts and Van Rensselars and all were intermarried, and so my father
named me Kiliaen Van Rensselar Townsend. As I said, you have to use -- the middle name
goes with it. You can be called a "Van Rensselar" without "Kiliaen," but you can't be a "Kiliaen"
without a "Van Rensselar," at least theoretically. So my mother said, "You can't name him that!
They'll call him 'Kil'!" Well, of course, he said, "Oh, no -- they'll never do that."
(laughter) Of course, that was my name from then on. And I must say, the name has been
very helpful in many ways, because people are always sort of interested in -- and it's
-- the funny thing is the way they remember it. I'd run into anybody -- especially back
in college and law school, they don't say, "Hey, Kil!" They say, "How's Kiliaen Van Rensselar?"
And I don't know anybody's middle name, but just around here, a lot of people know my
middle name. (laughter) It sort of strikes people's fancy, so... And then in a couple
of cases, it -- it really meant something as far as -- well, my Army career, and people
that saw the name and helped me. So anyway, the Army experience was very much non-military.
I got in the counterintelligence corps, and we put on civilian clothes, so I wasn't even
in uniform the last three years of the war. And I was stationed at various cities -- Savannah
and Mobile, and Oak Ridge, up at the -- yeah, atom bomb center up in Knoxville, and that
was interesting. And then I married the boss's daughter, the boss being a colonel of the
-- of the intelligence corps in the Southeast, (inaudible) Everett, who was a civilian reserve
who was in the Army now. And so we were married when we got out of the Army, and -- well,
no, just -- well, no. I was married when I was commissioned as a second lieutenant while
I was still in the Army, married up at Carlisle Barracks, the famous Jim Thorpe school. And
then, of course, I was discharged within about a year, and moved to Atlanta. And of course,
I had my law degree and got my bar exam out of the way in Atlanta, but I didn't practice
any law for a couple of years. I was busy trying to make money in the war surplus business.
A number of us bought all this stuff from the wa- Army and resold it, and it -- it worked
out pretty well, so I did that a couple of years.
VOGT: Well, what -- what brought you to Atlanta? Was it --
TOWNSEND: Well, my wife is -- was from Atlanta. And so I moved here, and my family -- my father
hadn't -- well, he still lived in Long Island, and -- and then my mother had moved to Florida,
and so my brother was in England, and my other brother was in Texas, so there wasn't much
reason to go back to New York City. Oh, I still have quite a few relatives up there.
So that got me as far as Atlanta, and then I didn't practice much law. I -- Dorsey -- Sam
Dorsey, Dorsey & Dorsey Law Firm, he asked me to work with them, or for them, and I did.
And then I got interested in this heating glass -- heating product that had just been
invented. It'd be able to heat homes electrically, and heat motels, and... And so I got a franchise
for that for the Southeast, and started an electric heating business. And of course I
immediately ran right into the opposition of the power company, because they didn't
want any heat load in the winter. They had too much load in the winter now, and they
didn't have any air conditioning load, so they fought me every time I tried to do anything.
They fought me to the death, and did kill a lot of sales, but I managed. We were fairly
successful throughout the Southeast, and it's -- incidentally, ten years later, the power
company president called me and said -- Ed Hatch (sp?), he called and said, "Kil, I have
a Christmas present for you." I said, "What's that, Ed?" He said, "We're going to help you
rather than fight you. You're right: we should have been helping you all along because we're
going to need the load in the winter since our air conditioning load will be outbalanced."
See, it used to be there was too much in the summer. Now, they're going to have too much
-- I mean, they're going to have too much load in the summer, and they needed a load
in the winter. But that was too late to save my making a lot of money out of it! (laughter)
So meanwhile, I'd gotten interested in politics, which is what you're interested in, and -- and
do you want me to go into that part, how that all started in 1947?
VOGT: Well, that's right. How soon did you get involved with the Republican Party?
TOWNSEND: Well, as soon as I got down here. My father said, "The lawyer's club is very
exclusive. You get blackballed by one person, you can't get in." He said, "Nobody gets in
practically unless they're -- nobody knows them too well. They only have about -- less
than 100 members." There are now 2,100 members. (laughter) He said, "And I've got to get you
in there before they get to know you (laughter), or somebody might blackball you!" So he got
me in, and here I am in the lawyer's club with a young -- well, I guess I was 30 -- 28
years old, with all these well-known lawyers in Atlanta. And so when I went to one of the
meetings of -- early meeting, Elbert Tuttle, who was the famous lawyer at the time -- he
later became one of the most prominent Republican... He had moved here from Hawaii, and was recognized
by everybody as a very courageous lawyer because he took on all these segregation cases and
-- and things against Black people. He defended a lot of Black people, and most people wouldn't
touch that in the South, but he didn't give a damn. He just went ahead and did it. And
everybody admired him even though he wasn't supposed to do it. So anyway, I knew who he
was, and he cornered me in the lawyer's club. He'd just -- he'd gotten out of the Army;
had volunteered in the Army, been stabbed in a foxhole by a ***. Here he is, 45 years
old and volunteered to be a captain in the Army. So a great guy. So he approached me.
He said, "Kil, you must be a Republican because you're from up there in New York, Long Island."
I said, "Well, I am, I guess." He said, "Well, we're trying to start the Republican Party.
There is no party here." There are just a few people who used to go up to the National
Convention who were paid by whoever -- whoever was running. Taft was running at that time
for President, in -- back in '44, in those days. So they would pay the delegation to
come up, which of course, a number of them were Blacks, and some very respectable people
would -- would go to the Republican Convention and vote for whoever brought them up there.
And so that was done throughout the South. So he said, "We want to start a real, legitimate
party, nothing to do with that kind of monkey business. And would you help?" And so I said,
"Oh, I'd be glad to." So he met with Bob Snodgrass, who was a very prominent automobile layaway
-- he financed automobiles, and Harry Summers, who was the leading businessman in town, the
Chamber of Commerce and the whole bit. He was a Chrysler dealer for apparently the whole
stage of Georgia. Well-known. So these three people were very well known, respected people;
want to start a party, which gave it a good start to begin with. Of course, I was nobody,
but I was going to be the legman. Obviously, I was the young one; they were all 50 or so
years old. And I would do the legwork. So the first thing we had to do was to get organized,
because we had -- the next President was going to Tom Dewey. There wasn't any question that
Tom Dewey would be the next President, and he was going to run, and had to have some
support and publicity. So we went to work on trying to get publicity for Tom Dewey,
a Dewey/Warren ticket. Governor Warren was going to be the Vice President. And so we
were a big deal then because everybody figured we were going to be the leading people as
far as politics in the Republican Party, and there were practically none of us. There was
one other fellow named Bill Schotzer (sp?) who -- I was named the secretary of the party,
I think, and I think Bill was named the vice president or something. He was a businessman
locally. And there were about -- I guess there were 20 or 30 of us, me and Pendergast (sp?),
and a few people that came out of the woodwork and said they wanted to help the Republican
party. And of course, some people were very suspicious -- suspect because they figured
Dewey was going to win, they had better get on the bandwagon, including Mayor Hartsfield,
who was a good friend of mine later on, a great mayor. He had enough sense to help us
because he figured if we get in, we could certainly help the city of Atlanta. See, the
theory is that there was nobody here for the Administration to appoint. You could figure
Elbert Tuttle would probably be Attorney General, I'd probably be Chief Justice of the Supreme
Court, and -- and Harry Summers would be Secretary of the Treasury. There was no telling where
we'd all go. (laughter) I mean, we were just joking, but I mean, in a -- in a sense, it
would have been hard to find anybody in Georgia to appoint for all the jobs they -- the poli-
these political things, offers. So Bill Hartsfield let us put a banner across Peachtree, a Dewey/Warren
-- a great big banner up high, 15 feet above the street, across between the two office
buildings. Which was unheard of -- nobody had ever been allowed a banner, much less
Dewey/Warren! (laughter) Right in downtown Atlanta! And I'm -- too bad I don't have a
picture of it. And so then the -- somebody gave us a great big ground floor store, which
you have a picture of with a big Dewey/Warren banner right next to the Henry Grady Hotel,
which was the big Democratic headquarters. That's where all the politicians stayed during
the Assembly, and the governor and everybody used the Henry Grady as their headquarters.
And here we were right next to them with this huge Dewey/Warren headquarters (laughter)
for... And of course, they were running Harry Truman. And of course, Harry Truman was then
the President, and had no chance to beat Dewey, because everybody thought was -- Truman was
not any good. And so here we were in the driver's seat, and we had the party started, you might
say, and some publicity. And Warren came down to Macon; he never came to Atlanta, and he
had a friend (inaudible) in Macon, as I remember. And so we had all that we wanted, and we were
in the catbird seat. Well, of course about 3 o'clock in the morning, we were all down
in that headquarters, and there were a lot of people at headquarters that night because,
of course, again, we were going to win. And so there must have been a hundred people who
came in to just make contact with the Republicans. And people bowed and scraped, and I thought
I was a big deal, and everybody was so nice to me, and I didn't realize that -- what the
reasons were (laughter), because in politics, it's strictly what they can do for you. (laughter)
There's none of -- there's no friendships except for -- for, you might say, "the wrong
reasons." Not none, but I think most of them. So anyway, about 3 o'clock in the morning,
after the Chicago Tribune announced that Dewey had won, it came out that Truman of course
had won. Well, I mean, that place just died. (laughter) (inaudible) We all slumped home,
and nobody ever heard about us or spoke to us for about two more years! (laughter) I
say that, but I mean, here we were. I -- we were probably sort of objectionable because
we were so sure we were going to win, and here we (laughter) -- here we were just nothing.
So we got to start over again. And so nothing happened for, oh, 1951, and here comes -- the
'52 elections are coming up. And Elbert Tuttle comes me. And of course, he had kept in touch
with the Dewey people. The Dewey people were the key to the Republican Party because he
had been the nominee, and the people in his office sort of -- you know, the Republican
stronghold. And so Elbert called me and said, "Kil, I've got something for you to do. We've
got to -- we've got to get a 'Citizens for Eisenhower' committee together, because we're
trying to make Eisenhower run as a -- for President, and hopefully, he'll run as a Republican."
At that time, Eisenhower was head of -- head of NATO in -- in Paris, and he made a big
point of never letting anybody know what his politics were, and wouldn't tell anybody anything.
And people as prominent as Hugh Scott and Dewey himself and everybody went over to Paris
to try to persuade him to run, and he wouldn't give anybody any indication that he would.
So the big hope was that -- among us who were Dewey people -- was to get him, because we
were trying to stop Bob Taft. Taft was the Senator from Ohio who had voted against the
draft and almost killed this country (laughter) back in '41 as far as the Army after -- and
very conservative, and almost ridiculously conservative. Very bright and fine person,
but... And he was the one that had this political organization to get the people from Georgia
to come up to the Convention and vote for him. And he had the same group of people who
would come up to the Convention and would be voting for him in 1952 unless somebody
opposed him. Well, we were going to be the opposition, if we could get Eisenhower to
run. He would be the only person that could possibly stop Taft, because Taft had everybody
locked up politically through all his connections and years and -- and contacts. So Elbert said,
"We have to start an 'Eisenhower for President,' and I can't do it because I'm the chairman
of the p- party." He was our state chairman, and Harry Summers was our National Committee
man. You had to have those, and -- and a -- a semblance of an organization. So he -- he
-- he said, "I'll -- I'll look to you to do it." So he -- he said, "Get a bunch of people,
and let's get a -- some publicity in the newspaper about an Eisenhower -- 'Citizens for Eisenhower'."
This was a "citizens," not so much "Republican," although we all knew it was Republican. But
the idea was to show that everybody was for Eisenhower -- and they were. They -- a lot
of Democrats and a lot of Independents. Everybody loved Ike, even then. So I got 15 friends
-- absolutely nobodies like me -- and took the names down to the Atlanta Constitution,
I'll never forget, and looked up George Goodwin, because I'd read about -- I guess I'd met
him. He had won a Pulitzer Prize, and he's the Political Editor of the paper. He's the
one that exposed the 250 dead people who voted alphabetically for Herman Talmadge, and that
won him a Pulitzer Prize. You know that scandal? And so George said, "Kil, I -- you -- you've
got to have some big names. I can't -- you can't get publicity just through 15 people
saying you're for Eisenhower. (laughter) That doesn't mean anything." He said, "You've got
to get a name." I said, "I don't know any big names." He said, "Well, what about Mr.
Woodruff of -- head of Coca-Cola? He's a big friend of Ike's." Everybody knew that. I even
knew that. And he said then, "Bob Jones. You know, he's -- has him down at Augusta, and
you know, he's building a house (inaudible), and they're big buddies." And he said, "You
need somebody like that." I said, "Well, I'll see what I can do." So my father-in-law's
friend Herb -- I mean... Pope Rock (sp?) had been Mr. Woodruff's attorney at one time,
and he pointed out, "He's a very difficult man, and he doesn't speak to anybody unless
it's God himself. And it's going to be very difficult, but maybe I can get him to listen
to you." See, I was going to ask him if he'd support us. I thought -- I assumed he would,
because, you know, he's a big buddy of Bob Jones. And then as far as Bob Jones himself,
luckily my wife had gone to school with his daughter, so that gave me a little "in" there;
I mean, at least introduce myself as -- so he'd know that I was somebody he should talk
to. Well, I took on Mr. Woodruff first. Well, he couldn't have been ruder. He just said,
"Who the hell are you, and what do you think you're doing calling me, and who told you
to -- you could talk to me?" I mean, he just -- I'd heard he was a rude guy. Everybody
thought he was wonderful, of course, for the same reasons everybody would like him. But
anyway, so I got absolutely nowhere there, so I thought, "Well, Bob Jones has been known
never to have leant his name politically. Never backed anybody; very careful about how
people use his name, trying to" -- you know, take advantage of his... And he was -- Bob
Jones at that time... you called him "Bobby," but he's -- we call -- he's really "Bob."
He was bigger than Babe Ruth or anybody. I mean, Bob Jones hasn't faded away, but in
the -- in the early Fifties, that was a great name. And so I called him with much trepidation
and said, "Mr. Jones, this is Kil Townsend; my wife knows your daughter and all... " He
said, "Mr. Townsend, what can I do for you?" And I thought, "Well, at least I can talk."
So I gave him my spiel about how we were starting a "Citizens for Eisenhower," and we needed
a -- a good name, and get some publicity, and see if we can get him to run for President.
He said, "Mr. Townsend, will you give me 48 hours?" Well, right away, I knew he was going
to call Ike. He wasn't going to put his on something that Ike wasn't even going to run!
(laughter) So of course, Elbert immediately called Tom Dewey in New York and alerted everybody
that I was waiting on talking to Mr. Jones within 48 hours, because they knew that if
Ike said, "Yes, I'm going to run," Bob would lend his name. If he said, "No, I'm not running,"
Bob would obviously -- it was just as clear-cut as that. So of course, within the 48 hours,
I called Mr. Jones. He said, "Mr. Townsend, what do I do?" (laughter) Well, we all fainted!
I called -- called right away, and (inaudible) called New York -- and of course, Herb Brunelle
(sp?) was the big deal in New York with Tom Dewey. And they really realized that Ike would
run as a Republican. Say -- I made it clear that it was a "Citizens for Eisenhower." And
so I go down to George Goodwin and say, "Now I've got a name for you. How about this?"
I said, "I got Bob Jones going to be on my committee." Well, George was (laughter) really
excited. He put it on the wire, the AP and the whole thing, and all over the country,
college friends of mine, classmates and all sent me clippings from San Francisco, Chicago,
Boston -- "Bob -- Bobby Jones backs Ike," or "Bobby Jones on committee to help Ike run
for President." Tremendous publicity! It was really a -- a great thing for -- for the whole
thing. And that was the first club started, also, the first one to get going. So that
was a big deal. And so now we really had something to work on, but of course, Taft's people really
went to work then. I mean, they -- they realized they had somebody who was a threat, and tried
to pooh-pooh the whole idea. So Ike came back, resigned from the thing in -- NATO, I guess,
and gave his first speech in Kansas. And of course, he wasn't much of a speaker, and -- and
it didn't go over well as far as his talk. But everybody loved Ike. It just -- it was
just a -- like Santa Claus. So we had a lot of people willing to help us, and said they
would vote and everything. So we were doing well here, had the publicity, and... nobody
bowed and scraped to us in the sense they knew we were going to win -- they just wanted
-- hoped Ike would win, but most people thought Taft would probably win. So all of a sudden
come that spring -- or that summer before the Republican Convention, we hear rumors
that there's another group claim-- or -- or we had our convention. Let's -- let me back
up. You have to have a convention to nominate your delegates before the National Convention.
You're supposed to have it in an open meeting; newspaper ads about having a meeting so that
everybody can come and put up whom they want. So we had our meeting; had about 300 people
came down to the Fulton County Courthouse. Had quite a few Blacks that were interested,
which was fine, and some of the old stalwarts like John Wesley Dobbs, who was a famous Black
preacher here, and we were going to put him on the committee, of course -- I mean, on
the delegation. So we had our meeting. Everything was (inaudible) just the way it's supposed
to be done, and picked our delegates. So we were very careful to name some Taft delegates
because we felt that was only fair, because there were Taft people. And our national chairman,
Harry Summers, was a big Taft friend, and was for Taft; made it very clear he -- he
wasn't a- against Ike, but he was -- had been more of a Taft man. And then there was some
people very loyal to Warren. Warren wanted to run for President. Everybody knew he really
wasn't going to get it, but he was very much like Ike: he was a moderate liberal Republican,
governor of Ca-- California, and very respected. So we put a Warren delegate on the sixth (inaudible)
because 14 delegates, I think, or 15. Had a Warren delegate, and had three Taft delegates
appointed. See, we had control of it, so we were able to appoint who we wanted, so we
made a point of putting three Taft delegates, including Harry Summers, and then 11 or 12
Eisenhower delegates, which we figured was about the balance. So here we are, all set
to go to the Convention. Then we hear there's another group going to go to the Convention
and claim they're the delegation, that we're not legitimate. And all of a sudden, they
go before a judge down in Macon -- I think his name was Barlow (sp?) -- and he ruled
that that delegation was the legitimate delegation. It had -- it had nothing to do with courts;
there was no (laughter) reason to rule! They just got this statement which, it wasn't a
suit of any kind that had anything to do with the judicial system. (laughter) But anyway,
he ruled it, and these people -- I knew a number of them -- were all Democrats that
of course recognized that if they could get Taft in, they could get a lot of contracts
and a lot of the, you know, appointments. And nice people like Roscoe Pickett, who everybody
knew and I knew, and Foster; they had been very busy with state Democrats, and defense
contracts and road contracts, and were very tied to him. But that didn't matter, because
they were going to be the Republican Party. So here we are, faced with a battle as to
who is the regit-- legitimate delegation to Chicago. So Elbert goes up a week early to
do the groundwork; of course, be a lawyer, since he was a lawyer anyway, and the head
of the party. And I went busy trying to find clippings of our meetings to be able to take
clippings blown-up, show that we had actual meetings. And they couldn't show they'd ever
had a meeting except in a telephone, and we could show that we'd met at the County Courthouse,
and hundreds of people, and voted legitimately. Well, that all looked good, so when I got
it all together, I left for Chicago, brought it up there to Elbert. And meanwhile, they
were having the Convention -- pre-Convention delegation... seating and the arguments appear
before a camilla -- committee that was headed by Carroll Reece, who was a Tennessee Republican
Congressman; big man -- big Taft man, very close to Taft. Committee was stacked against
us, we knew that. But we figured there was just no legitimacy to this other crowd, and
there wasn't any. There was nothing they could show, and we had Harry Summers on our side.
He was (inaudible) the National Committee, and he was a Taft man. How could we lose?
I mean, even Harry Summers (laughter) will say that we're the only legitimate delegation,
because we were, and he was one of our delegates, had been to our meeting. So we get in the
meeting, and Elbert Tuttle shows the reprints; I had them blown up and brought up, and it
was newspapers. Gave the arguments about how we had the meeting and who we were, and how
this other crowd didn't even come to a -- our meeting, and had no meeting. And -- well,
Carroll Reece didn't even listen, so then Elbert used his trump card, and he said, "Now,
Harry Summers will tell you who's the chairman." You know, he's -- he's -- Carroll Reece and
he were big buddies, big friends. And so this was going to be a clincher. Well, Harry Summers
wouldn't speak. He wouldn't speak for us. He just didn't say anything. So here we were,
sitting there with Harry Summers (laughter), who was our big friend and started the whole
party (laughter), and even though he was for Taft, he was our friend. And he just deserted
us. Well, Reece just ruled, "You're out; the other crowd is in." So we were all thrown
out of the Hilton hotel -- see, they have these -- all these rooms reserved by the National
Committee. Had to find a flea bag to sleep in -- the Marson (sp?) Hotel, which was a
terrible hotel. (laughter) And Elbert and his wife, and my wife and I, we all slept
in one room with -- we were lucky to get a room in Chicago. And they took over our rooms,
and they were going to be the legitimate delegation. We were out. Well, of course, when Ike heard
about this -- see, if they didn't have the Georgia 14-15 votes, Ike couldn't be nominated.
It was that close. Everybody knew that. And Texas. He -- he needed Texas, too. And they
ruled Texas out, but Georgia was going to come up first alphabetically at the Convention.
So if the Georgia delegation voted for Taft, that was the end of the whole thing. Taft
would have been the nominee. So el- Ike was in Ka- Denver, and came to Chicago by train
-- in those days, everybody went by train -- and he was furious. And we thought, "Well,
he's our only savior." Meanwhile, I'll never forget: my wife got stuck with pins. When
you had a Taft button on in the elevator, somebody would -- (inaudible) (laughter) would
stick you with a pin! I couldn't believe it! The Taft people were all over the place, and
they were plenty of Ike buttons, but people began to stop wearing them -- they were afraid
they might get assaulted. People called me from all over. Even Ralph McGill, the big
Democrat editor of the Atlanta Constitution, called me in Chicago and said, "Kil, this
is a crime! You -- you people are legitimate. They're just trying to steal this thing from
Ike." And they were. They were going to steal the nomination. And so then, Henry Cabot Lodge,
who was the famous Senator from Massachusetts running the campaign, and he asked me -- because
they knew I was the one that had gotten Bob Jones involved -- to see if I couldn't get
Bob to come up to Chicago and speak on TV for Ike. And in those days, apparently, they
didn't have remote or something, but for some reason, you had to come to Chicago to do it.
And so I -- well, I said, "Well, you know, he's all crippled up." By that time, Bob was
really in pain. I mean, perspiration, and just his hands, and he -- you know, he had
that problem, crippling problem, and had two -- two canes, and... So I called; I said,
"Bob, I hate to ask you, but they would love to have you come. It would be a big help,
because we really are in a hell of a shape up here. We need everything." And he said,
"When's the next train?" (laughter) That's the kind of guy he was. He was really a great
guy. And there was a lot of trouble when he came up there with Cliff Roberts, I'll never
forget. And I met him at the train station. And of course, Cliff Roberts hardly ever spoke
to me. I don't know what he thought I was -- some kind of animal or dog (inaudible)
or something. I don't know. Anyway, Bob couldn't be nicer to -- to little me. And so we took
him to the station, and he -- he made this broadcast for Ike; got back on the train,
and went back to Atlanta. Really, it's -- really, it was a wonderful thing to do, and I'm sure
it helped. So anyway, Ike has a reception for all of the delegates and people, and he
speaks to us there, and we can see he's just livid, because he saw this thing as just being
stolen. So we decided, I -- "we" -- they decided. I went to all these meetings a lot of times
because I was nobody, but I was always sort of like a legman, carry his bag. And Herb
Brunelle and Jim Ha- Jim Haverty -- Jim Haggey -- Jim Heighgety (sp?) was the press secretary,
and Sherman Adams, New Hampshire governor, and Henry Cabot Lodge, and -- I'm trying to
think. There were about seven of them who ran the whole thing. I mean, they were the
Ike managers of the campaign, and... So we -- they met, and I -- Elbert always said,
"Don't say anything -- just sit -- sit here." (laughter) So I heard them decide they were
going to take the floor of the Convention -- had never been done -- and see -- let the
-- let the Convention itself decide whether Georgia was legitimate or not -- or, which
delegation. So this was a big hoo-rah, and a big thing, and of course Elbert Tuttle was
going to lead the fight. So Elbert Tuttle has to get up in the -- in front of the whole
Convention when they start the Convention Monday morning and argue the case for Georgia.
And of course, all the politics were going on meanwhile, trying to persuade delegations.
And the Ford people and General Motors were all for Ike, and Chrysler people were all
for Taft, and that's why Harry Summers had to vote and stick with Taft, and why he killed
us: because Chrysler apparently -- we heard later -- said, "You'll lose your dealership
if you don't do what we tell you to do." This is the way politics worked. So I don't blame
Harry in a -- in a way. (laughter) So Ford and -- and Time magazine was all for us, and
Newsweek. And Time put out a special edition of Time -- it looked just like a Time magazine,
but it promoted Ike (laughter) in a sense, the pictures and everything. And that was
put in every delegate's box. And I mean, all sorts of things were done to try to get the
delegates for Ike, and then the Taft people doing all sorts of things for their people.
And so Elbert did a splendid job. Harry Summers was sitting up on the platform with only about
15 or 20 of the most important Republicans in the whole delegation -- I mean, the whole
room. And of course, Harry was there because he was such a big Taft man; had been a Taft
man the last four -- eight years, and was being honored on the platform up there. So
here he is, sitting up there on the platform, and Elbert's arguing against him. And Elbert
won. The delega- the -- the Convention voted -- very close, but voted to seat us, and that
-- that was -- it was all over. I mean, once we were seated, they knew the vote would be
enough for Ike. Well, I was in the back. I walked out around -- I mean, I wasn't -- I
wasn't -- I wasn't seated in the Convention because we weren't seated. The other ones
-- the other ones, incidentally, were seated until we -- the routing, and then they threw
them out, and we got our seats (laughter), and got our hotel rooms back. So I was out
in the back of the platform -- I remember there was these curtains -- and Harry Summers
came out of those curtains, and of course he and I had been big friends because he and
I were the Humane Society. He put up the money, and I did the work trying to get a Humane
Society started here, and -- and we were very small then, but we got it going. And so of
course I spoke to Harry, said, "Hello," and he just said, "Hello," and he walked out.
Nobody knew where Harry went for two weeks. He was a missing person. It was very strange.
Everybody called me and said, "Where's Harry?" And, "You ought to know." I -- I hadn't heard
from him. And this is how it affected him. And what he did is he hid down in (inaudible)
with some friend. The whole thing was so embarrassing, and -- and he's -- he is -- I mean, Elbert
Tuttle and he was great friends. He was just letting him down politically. This is what's
happens in politics. People take on a -- a character that they really shouldn't be. I
mean, they do things politically that are just beyond honorable friendships. So finally,
Harry's -- I got hold of him, and -- or he called me, I think, and he came -- came back
to Atlanta, and -- and they never spoke again. When Elbert needed to know something from
Harry, he'd call me and say, "Will you ask Harry this?" Or Harry would call me and say,
"Oh! Will you ask Elbert this or that?" (laughter) They never spoke again, and here they'd been,
you know, just... So that was the -- so now we have Ike as the nominee, and we obviously
were going to win because we were going to beat Stevenson. So we get him down here, and
of course the mayor and everybody is now bowing and scraping. He had a police escort to Hurt
Park, and we -- (inaudible) he speaks at Hurt Park, and Talmadge sits on the platform with
him. (laughter) You know, he's smart enough to realize that Ike's going to be President.
And so everybody is for Ike, but -- and Georgia, what happened: he got 40% of the vote. He
didn't get all the vote (inaudible). He got -- which is very big. I mean, Republicans
usually got 2 percent or something, and he got a big vote here, and had a parade down
Peachtree, and mobs, thousands of people, and it was quite a successful visit. But he
didn't need the state of Georgia as far as the election. And so that brought us up to
Ike being President. He'd had our delegation up -- before he was President, up to Tacoma
University, and we'd met with him there. And of course, Ike thought a lot of Elbert Tuttle,
and a lot of feeling that Elbert Tuttle would be appointed a -- a judge, but they appointed
him Deputy Secretary of the Treasury, I think is what they made him. I think Hubert Humphrey
-- not Hubert Humphrey. The head of General Motors I think was made Secretary of the Treasury.
So Elbert was a -- he -- Elbert was in the sub-Cabinet then, and of course, Bob Snodgrass
didn't want any job, and of course Harry Summers was out, and I didn't want a -- I mean, I
wasn't expecting to be Attorney General. And so we (inaudible) around there. In '52, the
party really got started, you might say; I mean recognized as a legitimate party. So
then -- VOGT: At this time, how would you say that
the Republicans distinguished themselves from Democrats, especially --
TOWNSEND: Well -- VOGT: -- in terms of platform?
TOWNSEND: Well, we -- we were -- we were looked on as fiscally conservative, but very moderate.
I mean, Ike was a very moderate -- he would qualify as a middle-of-the-road Democrat now,
just like me. I mean, we were -- we were the moderate people. The Democrats, especially
in the South, were the segregationists; you know, against -- well, all for segregation,
and headed up all the important committees. So Congress was very conservative, and we
were the -- we were definitely the moderate side, and the party (inaudible) all the good
things, I thought, was trying to help the average person rather than just help the rich
(laughter), and the thing was -- it has completely reversed. I mean, it's -- it's absolutely
exactly the reverse to what we were. And so I was one of these moderate Eisenhower -- I
call myself an "Eisenhower Republican." And we were looked on like that, and... And so
then Nixon -- of course, get back to Nixon, I should tell this tale, because it's interesting.
Nixon was then a Congressman from California, and we wanted Warren to be friendly to the
Eisenhower run for the Presidency, because he -- he -- first of all, he -- he was like
Eisenhower. He was very much of a moderate. And we were going to -- the idea of might
even put him on the ticket. But Warren wanted to make a run for the Presidency; just, you
-- you run one time, or second time around, you know, you just let them nominate you,
and then you switch on the second or third ballot. So everybody knew that Warren couldn't
win, but we wanted his votes, California being big -- a lot of delegates. So what does Nixon
do but in the middle of the train ride, Ike coming from Denver, he calls -- I think Herb
Brunelle -- and says, "You know, I've got some people who will vote for Ike instead
of Warren." Well of course, the very thing we didn't -- the damn sneaky -- Tricky Dicky,
the very thing we didn't want, and here he is messing it up for -- and you know, under-
undercover sort of business. And of course, they nixed the whole idea, they said no. Well,
as I got in these meetings, I was very unimpressed with whatever came up about Nixon. He -- you
know, he had -- he had won the nomination out there by accusing -- what's her name?
A Congressman of being a Communist. Congress- a Communist and a Red, and all that. And really
won that whole election out there on the wrong -- on the -- unfair tactics. He was just that
kind of guy. So I -- I just didn't like him from the very beginning. So when they nominated
him as President -- I mean, as Vice President, I never did understand. I -- I didn't hear
that particularly -- wasn't at that particular session, and Elbert never could explain it
exactly, except he was so well-known because he was a big anti-Communist crusader, and
they figured that would help Ike, and that he would be popular because he's thinking
everybody was a Communist. And that was very popular at the time to think that way. And
Ike didn't want to get in the middle of that, so they could let Nixon do the dirty work
about accusing everybody of being a Communist. So I was all against Nixon. So in '56... or
whenever it was when Ike had his heart attack -- '55, I guess -- the question was, what
do we do without Ike? Nixon is the Vice President; he'll end up as the nominee for the party
next time. So I started a "Nix on Nixon" campaign. Got stickers and -- and bumper stickers and
all, and wrote all of my friends -- and -- and I knew a lot of the national Senators and
people who had been at the C-- Convention with -- with -- for Ike. And most of them
agreed. They said we shouldn't have -- he'll get it because he's the Vice President. It's
sort of customary for the Vice President to be in the lead for the nomination if Ike isn't
the Pr- isn't running. And I said, "Well, if we don't stop him now, even if -- if we
let Ike make him his Vice President again, he'll be the (inaudible) in 1960, he'll be
the favorite." Well, I had a -- some support, but not enough to do anything, and in fact,
I ever suggested we put Milton Eisenhower on the ticket in place of Ike. Milton was
his brother; quite a famous college president. And so anyway, in 1960, we have our convention
down at the Courthouse; a whole crowd of people now show up because the Republican party is,
you know, well -- better known, and more people are getting interested. And we'd had somebody
run for Congress as a Republican. Was that Randy Thrower? Let's see: Baxter Jones ran,
and... You know, we'd had a little national activity, or at least an attempt at national
during the Fifties. And so our convention was whether to -- who to nominate for President
for 1960, and of course, the sentiment was for Nixon. So I spoke up at the County convention
for Rockefeller. I said we needed -- and Rockefeller had been a big Eisenhower man, and of course,
he's governor of New York, very popular, and been governor for years. And I just thought
he'd make a good President because he's very moderate -- like maybe you might say "liberal."
(laughter) And got nowhere; in fact, made some enemies because I was against Nixon.
And they went ahead and voted to back Nixon, and of course, they voted for him for President
in 1960 at the National Convention. I didn't go to that Convention, and in fact wouldn't
have been asked, because they figured I'd probably be for Rockefeller. (laughter) So
Nixon was nominated, and Georgia helped nominate him, and of course he was a disaster as it
turned out. But Nixon catered to Georgia constantly after that. He came to this state I don't
know how many times because he was going to run again. You know, he ran for governor and
lost, but he decided he was going to run for President, I guess because he kept co- see,
people love to be spoken to and have their picture taken in politics, and he'd have everybody
come to a dinner and take a picture, and -- and cater to them. So they know him, whereas they
didn't know -- well, you know Rockefeller, he hadn't been traveling around, and they
didn't know... any of his other competitors -- you know, Nixon's competitors. So Nixon
worked hard at it, and did a good job as far as Georgia -- getting Georgia to be very much
Nixon territory. And the party bigwigs who took over were of course all Nixon people.
Now, we should get into that, because there was a whole takeover of the party in 1964.
See, we're talking 1960, so they're Nixon people, but not at our convention particularly.
But in '64, the whole Goldwater, which was sort of part of the Nixon crowd prompted --
VOGT: Right. It was the (inaudible) in '62. TOWNSEND: Yeah. The -- and -- yes. So we were
going to have all different delegate-- bigger delegations, and --
VOGT: You had Callaway that was elected. TOWNSEND: And Callaway was elected to --
VOGT: Congress. TOWNSEND: -- Congress, and he was a big Goldwater
man. And of course Nixon didn't try to oppose Goldwater. I mean, he wanted to sort of (settle?)
along with him. So they were all part of that same crowd. So they took over in '64, and
threw out all the... what you might call Eisenhower Republicans" in the party positions, and -- and
in fact, named Harry Summers as an honorary chairman, because of course he'd been a Taft
and would be a Goldwater person. So Harry made sort of a belated comeback -- although
he never cared to do anything about it -- in 1964, 12 years later. He was redeemed, you
might say, as a Taft man. And so the Goldwater people took over, and -- the party, and -- and
Bo Callaway of course headed up the party. And so Bo won the Congress seat from a fellow
named Garland Byrd, who was no good anyway, but I mean, he was a -- had been lieutenant
governor, and wasn't hard to beat, probably. But anyway, Bo won, and so then he just -- he
was -- you know, he started to run for governor, and I got all involved in that because he
was against Arnold and Maddox. Arnold and Maddox were running in the Democratic primary,
and Maddox won the primary, but Arnold had this tremendous following, particularly among
the Jewish community in my a- area -- the northwest. All the influential Jewish community
pretty much lived right out in -- right where I represent -- represent. And of course, I
know a lot of them. And a lot of other people were for Arnold because he was not Maddox,
and was a very progressive moderate Democrat who had been a very good Governor. So people
didn't want him to quit the race, so they decided they were going to do a write-in.
And you have to have a majority of the votes to be a Governor, and if you had three in
there, you run the risk of a -- not getting 50%. It don't matter who you are, you -- either
Maddox or Callaway couldn't get 50% with Arnold in there as a write-in, because this write-in
was very serious. I mean, everybody knew it'd be thousands of votes. So I remember, I got
with Bo; in fact, I drove him up to -- we -- he wanted to visit some children's prison.
What's the one up here in north Georgia? And I drove him up there, and I said, "Bo, you've
got to get these Arnold people off your back -- I mean, or out of the race, because with
them in there, we are in terrible shape, and they -- they are much more for you than they
are for Maddox." You know, they were all -- those kind of people were not at all for Maddox.
(laughter) And -- and I said, "If you'll just get with them and cater to them, and all they
-- they'd probably give up this effort." Because they wanted somebody, and -- and Bo here was
-- he sounded like Maddox all the time. You know, he was way over (laughter) on the right.
Very conservative, all with the Goldwater thing, but not that conservative. (laughter)
I mean, Maddox (inaudible) and kill all the Blacks, or -- or at least eliminate them.
So I said, "You just have to move over a little. If you'd just be sort of in the middle...
Don't -- you don't have to be real liberal. Just -- just -- just cater to them and tell
them what you're willing to do, and you're not against the Blacks and all that, and...
Well, he didn't listen. He didn't do a thing about it, and of course, they got 50,000 write-in
votes, I think, and -- and then you know what happened then. Callaway -- we had the vote
in the General Assembly. Of course, I voted for Bo, and all of us did, but he didn't have
enough votes. Maddox lived in my district; I represented him, and I was very embarrassed
because when I voted for him, we each made a little speech when we voted, and I said,
"In the -- in the district that Mr. Maddox lives, they voted nine to one for Callaway."
There was no need to point that out, that he was very unpopular in his own -- he lived
out on Mount Paran Road. And I apologized later to his wife. I said, "There was no reason
for me to say that." She was very nice, and I always got along with Maddox. I always thought
he was a pretty nice guy. I mean, he's crazy in a way, but he's -- I always say he's the
only Governor I know that left poorer than he -- when he went in. (laughter) Everybody
else made a lot of money. VOGT: Going back prior to this '64 -- or '66
campaign, when you were working with the party, were you involved in recruitment for the party,
identifying candidates to run, and... ? TOWNSEND: No. No, I didn't -- I really didn't
do much of that. I -- I kept in touch more with the national party, and of course -- and
I got into the Rockefeller effort in 1968 and '72. And I was always in -- interested
and involved with the people involved nationally, not locally. Locally, I didn't really have
any big say. Of course, after '64, I always had no say because everybody knew where I
stood. I was this "renegade Republican" (laughter), and so I -- I really didn't have any influence
on that. Of course, I supported people like Fletcher Thompson and the ones that ran, but
I knew the others -- a lot of them better. I knew (inaudible) Fowler (sp?) and Judge
-- what's his name? Who was a Congressman? Much better than I did the Republicans. I
mean, I -- I knew a lot of those moderate Democrats. So I really was -- I'd say from
-- from 1960-64, I wasn't involved -- oh, well, I was involved in '64 -- yeah, again
nationally, because we were going to try to nominate Scranton against Goldwater. The governor
of Pennsylvania was a guy named "Scranton." A very fine Governor, and everybody thought
a lot of him, but he was a moderate, Eisenhower-type guy. And so I and my wife and child, we went
to San Francisco to try to help Scranton. I wasn't a delegate; Bo Callaway had headed
the delegation. And we got out there, and Goldwater had just taken over. You couldn't
even get a telephone as far as special phones or anything. It was amazing how the Goldwater
people just took San Francisco over, and you had the feeling that you can't win because
mechanically, we were (laughter) sort of -- they were way ahead of us, and much better organized.
And of course Rockefeller was going to run, too. And there was no problem there because
all of a sudden, Happy -- you know, his wife -- announced her pregnancy. And of course,
in those days, you weren't supposed to be divorced, even though Stevenson had been,
and this brought attention to everybody that he was -- Rockefeller, his second wife, having
another child, sort of as if that was a crime. I mean, today, it'd be a complement. In those
days (laughter), you were condemned if -- any kind of marital thing. So that was the end
of the Rockefeller campaign. And the Scranton thing went right down the tube. We didn't
get anywhere. And here I had to see all my -- my friends, people I knew, the Callaway
delegation just triumphing, and they were going to be the big deal. Well of course,
they ended up losing (laughter) overwhelmingly in the general election, but I don't think
any of us knew they were going to lose that badly. They just did terribly, as you know.
So that set them back. But then I think that's in 1968 is -- is that when Fletcher Thompson
first ran? I can't remember. VOGT: That may have been in... But I knew
that Callaway was really involved in -- was it the Young Presidents Organization?
TOWNSEND: Probably, yeah. He was under 40, and they -- you had to be under 40, head of
a company, and he was big in that. VOGT: And I think he did a lot of -- a lot
Re- a lot of promotion of the party through that organization.
TOWNSEND: He did. He got a lot of young Republicans and conservative ones like Dillard Munford
(sp?) locally, and a lot of them... And in fact, I was looking through my stuff the other
day, and here's a letter sent out to registered voters against me; a letter signed by Dillard
Munford (sp?) and Bob Redfern (sp?), and... LaCraw (sp?), and six guys, all of who are
friends of mine, and good friends now, and what I thought were friends then. (laughter)
But they wanted -- they thought I was too liberal. This was 19- nine- not 1952. 19...
65, when I ran. I was too liberal for them, and they wanted this other fellow, V. H. DeGolding
(sp?), who ran against me. Very nice guy. And I -- I had completely forgotten that.
(laughter) And of course, they never mentioned it after I won. They were big supporters.
Once you win, you have no problem (laughter) with your enemies. But... so no. I'd say Fletcher
Thompson was the first move of any sort -- see, Bo was dropped out by then as far as elected
office, and Fletcher ran against... what's his name that didn't want to be on the Maddox
ticket and quit? You know, he'd been in Congress. So what -- not -- what is -- Danny's dead
now. Judge... became a judge later. Very fine guy. Been in City Council here, and been a
Congressman. He refused to stay on the ticket with Maddox, and resigned from Congress, which
I thought was a -- sort of a noble thing to do. (laughter) And so here was this vacancy,
and a guy named Archie Lindsay (sp?), a Democrat, was going to run for it. He was a nobody;
he was a County Commissioner. And so Fletcher Thompson jumped in there. He had been active,
I guess, in the Goldwater movement, a lawyer from East Point. And he jumped in, and nobody
gave him a chance. I mean, (inaudible) win and raise money, and -- and all that. And
no further. No, I guess, he'd gotten in the race before the fellow was resigned. Yeah,
he got in there anyway, and had no chance at all against the incumbent, and -- God,
I can't think of the incumbent's... what was his name? Anyway so then when the incumbent
resigned, then Fletcher had a very good chance because he was as well known as this other
guy, and won. And so he was the Republican party, you might say, elected nationally,
and of course locally, we weren't running anybody for -- until Rodney Cook ran for City
Council. Well, I guess he ran in '64 or five, maybe, or six. Rodney Cook and *** Freeman
-- did you have *** Freeman's name? TOWNSEND: No, I didn't have his name.
VOGT: Well, *** Freeman became a Councilman with Rodney Cook as a Republican. Everybody
knew they were Republicans. So they were elected to the City Council, although it was a nonpartisan
race, that people knew they were Republicans. And *** Freeman won. I think he's -- I don't
know whether ***'s still alive or not. TOWNSEND: We're at the end of the tape.
VOGT: Yeah. So the -- so there was a little movement there locally.
END OF PART 1