eastern and pacific. also this weekend, more from the contenders, our series on key political figures who ran for president and lost but changed political history. sunday, 1928 democratic presidential candidate former new york governor al smith. to mark the 100th anniversary of first lady pat nixon's birth, the richard nixon foundation and the national archives posted a discussion of her diplomatic work of an ambassador of good will. pat nixon traveled to more than 75 countries during her time in the white house. her daughter, julie nixon eisenhower, offers her own recollections and insights. this program is about 90 minutes. >> good evening. i'm from the archives of the united states and it's a pleasure to well i don't mean you to william g. mcgowan theater this evening. we are celebrating first lady, pat nixon. and a special welcome to the

c-span audience. before we begin, i would like to tell you about two programs coming up later this month. on wednesday, april 18th, we'll have a special discussion on slavery freedom to observe the 150th anniversary of the d.c. emancipation. the next week on monday, april 23rd, we'll host a nipgs nixon legacy forum called wages peace, nixon and politics in the middle east. to learn more about these and all our programs and exhibits, consult the monthly calendar of events and there are sign-up sheets in the lobby where you can receive it by regular mail or e-mail. you'll also find brochures about other national archives exhibits and programs. another way to get more involved in the national archives is to become a member of the foundation for the national archives, the foundation supports the work of the agency, especially our outreach programs and the applications of membership. and another way to support the national archives is to visit our archives shop.

we do that physically or virtually and our number one item, sales item, is this photograph of president nixon and elvis presley. where is it? it's gone. sorry. there it is. [ applause ] >> this the truly our number one item, which is really very nice. we are very pleased to be partnering with the richard nixon foundation in presenting this panel discussion. and we are honored to host our panelists, colonel john view brennan, the nixons marine corps aid, william r.kotus, the assistant chief of protocol for visits during the nixon years, and general don hughes, military assistant to president nixon, bob, curator of the centennial exhibit at the nixon library.

and i encourage you if you have not been to yorba linda recently, please visit this exhibit. it's exthe records in their. and a special welcome to julie nixon eisenhower. julie serves as a member of the board of the nixon foundation. pat nixon was liked by a broad spectrum of people at home and abroad, regardless of their political means. she had a talent for connecting with people and putting them at ease. tonight we look forward to learning more about her and her national travels and valued role as a goodwill ambassador. no other first lady had traveled so much until pat nixon set out into the world. she traveled to over 75 countries, most famously china and russia with the president, but also on her own to liberia, ghana, event someday louisiana, southeast asia and more. in 1970 her immediate and heartfelt trip to peru after a

devastating earthquake earned her the grand to the people and the government. with a greedy head of state, introducing herself to children or bringing comfort in a crisis, pat nixon was also a caring and gracious lady. now we'll turn you over to sandy quinn, the vice president of the nixon foundation. he was an assistant to richard nixon and traveling with him during the 1962 gubernatorial bid and later served as staff to governor ronald reagan and u.s. senator george murphy. he was head of marketing for walt disney world in florida through construction and its opening and several years of operation and later joined the marriott corporation as a division vice president. he was president of quinn o'brien marketing and communications and for many years served blue chip corporate accounts throughout the united states. ladies and gentlemen, please welcome sandy quinn. [ applause ]

>> well, i can't miss this opportunity to raise some money for the richard nixon foundation, which is privately supported because david was so kind to present that photograph of president nixon and elvis presley when they visited, when elvis presley visited the president at the white house. now, i know all of you are elvis fans, you're nixon fans, so you can get key chains and magnets and mugs. t-shirts and that photograph, too. and that photograph in several colorful executions on t-shirts. and you can do that on www.nixonfoundation.org. great gifts. thank you, david. and thank you, david, for embracing so much of our programming. we've had several nixon legacy forums right here on this stage.

nixon legacy forums tell the story of what happened in the white house and all of the arenas of innovation and vision that he, that he insisted on. in energy, in health care, in law enforcement, supreme court justices and diplomacy, we have seven more planned this year. some of them we hope will be on this stage. and if you check our website, you'll know when and where they are. we are in pat nixon's 100th birthday year, her centennial. and because of that, on march 16th, we opened the spectacular pat nixon exhibit. a centennial exhibit. people were her project, because indeed they were. that exhibit will be out all summer long and into the fall. then next year is richard nixon's centennial and we'll do the same for the 37th president.

now, tonight, however, we're focusing on a particular aspect of pat nixon's extraordinary contribution as first lady, and that was as ambassador of goodwill. and our panel will address that, but first i'd like to show you a brief video. a short video with some comments from well-known americans who we are very proud of. let us view the video, please. and now the sound. well, let's not view the video

if it has no sound, so maybe if we can work out that technicality we'll come back to it. but now let's go right into the panel. so if we could have the lights back on, please. i'd like to introduce the panel, starting with its moderator, bob bozvoc, who was the curator of the nixon exhibit and worked closely with nixon in his new jersey office because he was one of the principle authors and architects of the exhibit tri, that you will see at the richard nixon presidential library in yorba linda. bob worked closely with him and we are delighted to have him here as moderator. bob. [ applause ] bill was assistant chief of protocol in the state department and was assigned to mrs. nixon, traveled with her on so much of her travels, later he was director of the office of

international visitors for the united states information agency, bill konas. [ applause ] >> jack brennan, jack brennan, colonel brennan was the nixon, the marine aid to president nixon from 1969 through '74. later when the president went to san clemente after the presidency, he was his chief of staff. he accompanied president and mrs. nixon to china twice, including the original trip. general don hughes, he was the military assistant to president nixon. he was also his military assistant as vice president. he was commander in chief for the pacific fleet. knew the nixons very well and we are proud and delighted to have him here. and, of course -- [ applause ] >> and, of course, julie, who is author of the biography of her mother entitled "pat nixon, the

untold story." and also worked with her husband, david eisenhower, in writing "going home to glory." a memoir of dwight d. eisenhower from the period 1961 to '69. ladies and gentlemen, your panel. [ applause ] >> well, i hope we can get that video working before we are done because it is really good. >> because he produced it. >> we take it for granted these days that senior government officials travel all around the world, but that hasn't always been true. so i think a great place to start today would be to ask you julie, who although was only 5 years old when her parents when on their first international mission of vice president pat

nixon, because she's an authority of her mother and on the biography of her mother, "pat nixon: the untold story." the biography of pat nixon. it is available on e-books now. go find it for your kindle or knock or any other reading device, but julie, if you would start by talking a little bit about the context in which that first trip, that president eisenhower asked your parents to make, what,000 miles, ten weeks, 17 countries. >> right. well, it was 1953 and eisenhower, when he was elected, i would say it was probably the height of the cold war. the war was still raging in korea. the french were fighting in vietnam. there were a lot of countries all over the world that were -- that had to declare themselves neutral. they has been colonies for a long time and now were neutral.

and the soviet union and the united states were vying to become their friends and their protectors and their advisers. and my mother wrote a letter to her dear depend, helene drown, that summer of 1953 and she said, they had talked when they were together and said, dear helene, i guess we won't be able to see you this summer because the president said to dick after a meeting, what are you doing this summer? and dick said, well, nothing, mr. president. and the president said, well, i want you to go to asia and i want you to take pat. and that was the genesis of what was the first of what became the goodwill trips all over the world, all four continents, 53 countries, and the reason that that first trip was such a success was articulated by the secret service agent who was with my parents. his name was jack they arewood, and there were only two secret service agents on that detail, by the way, who traveled with my parents. they had a staff of five people,

my mother had no assistant. they were gone 70 days. they were in 17 countries, including vietnam, korea, iran, pakistan, afghanistan, 12 other countries. but anyway, jack sherwood wrote in his diary, the nixons are really shaking things up because they are not doing what is expected diplomatically of these usual trips. they are stopping their motorcade, they are getting out, they are shaking hands with people, rich and poor, they are meeting with labor leaders, they are meeting with quote -- unquote agitators and communists. they mingling and mixing. it was the people to people contact of the goodwill trips that made them so effective. that's why eisenhower was sent to all four continents in the next eight years. that's the context of how my mother started out as the ambassador of goodwill with my father. >> don, you -- julie mentioned

the five staff members in the first term they traveled with. you joined the vice president's staff as a military aid early in the second term as vice president. i wonder if you could tell us a little bit about how you came to that position and kind of what the role was. and what was travel like for the vice presidential party during those years? >> well, i would like to, first of all, straighten the pacific fleet thing up. i had a fleet, but they were a fleet of airplanes. i like to go off julie's story for that particular trip, because that resulted in my getting over there. rose woods was on that trip, and they used admiral ratford, the chairman of the joint chiefs, they used his aircraft and he sent his senior officer, his senior exec along.

and rose woods was on the trip. so when he finished those 70 or 75 days, rose had worked him over pretty good about how small the staff was and that he was watching her do all of these things. and when he got to see, when he reported back to the admiral, he said if anybody ever needed a couple of military aids, it's the vice president. so i started to get some unusual phone calls. and i was a very unhappy camper in flying a desk in the pentagon and would have done anything to get out. and so when i got these phone calls, i wasn't sure what they were going to be the result of, but i went. and pretty soon i talked to admiral ratford, and the next i think i know, i had been selected to be one of the first presidential, vice presidential aides, colonel curbman was the other. and i have to admit when they

got over there, the president, the vice president and mrs. nixon, too, really didn't want us around because they weren't used to having the military. but anyway, after much persuasion from admiral radford, the vice president agreed to take us for three weeks on a trial basis. we were going to africa. >> yeah. >> well, being the senior, cushman went with the preponderate and the vice president, and i went on a press plane with rose and then i would then be an aide to pat when we got on, in africa. well, i didn't know anything about it, so when we first struggled along a few things, i wasn't sure -- nobody knew who was the aide and who was the aidee, but she was a teacher. and she quickly picked up on the

fact that she had a lot to teach. at first it was very formal, but then we gradually got to know each other and we got along fine. then when we came back from that trip, the day of the decision came, and our little hole in the senate office building, cushman went in to see the vice president about our fate. he came out and he said, well, i'm going to be the national security adviser, and he said, you can go back to the air force. so i grabbed my phone and i started to deal, dial the air force to say that the vice president wanted me to go to george air force base and fly f-100s. and about that time, rose got up and stormed into the office. she came out about three, four minutes later brushing that red

hair back, and she said, put the phone down, sonny. donnie cox is pregnant, your the new appointed secretary. and the military aide. so that's how i got there. >> don, on those trip stories, what were the conditions you were working under on travel? what kind of aircraft were you on? and what were the challenges? >> in those days, the vice president did not have any of those trappings or whatever you want to call them. we were strict ly at hop up there. if we had any political or something that was non-governmental, we would rent an airplane. but if it was official business, we would be -- the white house would give us an airplane to go do it. and interestingly enough, we got stuck one night coming back.

and we were all stacked up going into washington. and this is with a government airplane. so it was quite annoying. and the next day colonel draper heard about it, he was the white house aide, and he said, from now on, when you're flaying flying in a military airplane, you're air force two. so that's how air force two came about, but the airplanes themselves in those days, when we first started, they were strictly prop airplanes. the jets were coming into being, but we didn't have them. in fact, we didn't have them until we took the trip to russia. >> jack, you were a military aide during the white house years, were conditions quite as primitive as they were during the vice presidential years? >> well, once my boss who was general hughes, by the way, but after a couple years of 707s and helicopters, i think we kind of got spoiled as he was recognizing. we got to the point where advancement was when we said, we

take a 707, we don't want one with windows in it. he was getting a little tired of that and he said, i think we'll teach you a lesson, but he didn't say it out loud. but for bill and i and the team, we went to advance and make the arrangements for mrs. nixon to go on the africa trip, three countries in africa, we didn't get a 707 with windows. we didn't get a 707 without windows. we got the columbine. he gave us a four-engine plane that we had to stop in bermuda, we had to stop in the azores, we finally got to africa. now -- >> but it was president eisenhower's plane. it had prestige. >> right. it was very prestigious junk. >> and we dropped an engine. >> we dropped an engine in bermuda. and i had just gotten my yellow fever shot and i was sick as a dog. when we got to africa, i didn't want to leave africa. i'm not going back in the plane. i was going to stay, but they wouldn't accept me. overall because of general hughes, things significantly

improved in the white house. and a significant thing, during the transition, general hughes wrote a note for the president to sign, maybe it's called an executive order, saying the white house communications agency came under his cognizance. so everything military, which by the way there are more than 2,000 people directly reporting to and supporting the president, and they all came under general hughes in the military office. but when the white house communications agency there, it made a huge difference first because of coordination and then, of course, getting money from the defense department. we could say, we need this, we need this. it was remarkable how much we got things improved. so much so, a very quick story. in the soviet union we were riding on a soviet plane and it broke down. i had insisted we had a backup plane, once again soviet built, and that communications we put on it. because the president is required to be in communications with the congress at all times. well, the plane broke down.

we moved to the backup plane, took off. and helen thomas, who we'll talk about a little bit later, was a up irep upi reporter. she said, oh, we got you now. you can't have communications on this plane. i said, call kent davis. i said, yeah, helen. nancy was there with bob holderman's wife. you remember that? >> well, jack, you know, talking about all this white house communications in 2000, it just seems alien to even hear it because my mother, you know -- i mean, why wasn't she sick from the flu shot, or whatever, the yellow fever? in other words, she was a one-man band. when they went to china, she took one aide with her. i mean, that's the way she always traveled. and i think, don, you reflected on that. they didn't even want you and bradford to be hired on, right? because i think they realize

when you're a diplomat you're most effective if you don't have a big entourage. you've got to get out and meet people. and, of course, the presidency today has changed. and i understand that there has to be 00 la lot of security. but it's most effective when, you know, you go to the markets and you meet the people and just don't have the shielding. >> and, don, you were in africa with mrs. nixon in 1957. and she visited some markets and had trouble with the limousine. tell us a little bit about that. >> unlike the -- africa was a lot tougher in those days, jack. but that was the trip that we went on to commemorate the ghana becoming a nation instead of a colony of great britain. and we went through a great deal of ceremony there, but then we

went on up to libra liberia, wh don't care to return to, but the amazing thing about it was that the place is just terrible. the heat and and all that goes with it, the humidity. but strangely enough, pat never of showed it. i was by now, by the time we got there, i was fairly well acquainted with her. we made a lot of side trips because the vice president was going one way and we were going the other. he was going to some of the diplomatic pass. but we went down to the schools, to the hospitals, and the people just loved her because she didn't go through as a prefungtry visit and look around and say, that's nice. she was talking to the people in

the beds. she was talking to the kids. she loved the children, and they responded to her. the one thing that was a little tough was when wie went down to the marketion the farmer's market, i would say about a half mile of farm that extended out to the ocean. it was covered, but it was open on the sides. it was brim. you could smell it a mile away. it was their market day, and they had all the vegetables and fish and the meat in that 110-degree heat. she went down the whole length of it, meeting the people, and they were handing her little presents, maybe an orange or something. i was loaded by the time we got half we through. but she stepped across dead rats

and she avoided the debris on the dock and just did it beautifully. so that -- >> don? i was just going to say, you might not have liked liberia, but she loved it because that's where she went back in '71/'72 and represented the united states for the inauguration of tolbert whose grandfather was a slave. >> yeah. >> just an historic thing. and that's the great picture where she's wearing the turban. there's a famous picture which will come up later where she's wearing the turban. but you're so right. during the vice presidential years it was really primitive conditions of travel and all. >> very primitive. >> i know my mother told me that on that trip in '53, the 17 countries, they had air conditioning one night. it was in saigon and the american ambassador gave up his bedroom. but that was the only time they had air conditioning that whole trip.

>> bill? >> can i carry on with liberia? we advanced liberia with ten men and one lady. and the lady is here, mary lou shields, who worked with us in protocol. >> she was on the trip? >> on the advance. mary lou, can you stand up? >> she was in charge. [ applause ] >> don't you want to tell that quick story, mary lou? >> no, i'm not going to tell that story. >> anyway, as jack mentioned, we went on the eisenhowers' plane and we had ten men and one woman, and the woman was mary lou, which is quite interesting, and we did drop an engine there. but getting to liberia, president tolbert, it was the inauguration, and of course he invited president nixon. president nixon couldn't go so he sent mrs. nixon.

>> bill, if i could, before we get to that story, i want to stay on one more thing on the vice presidential years. we have some great pictures that are going to go with that and i don't want to spoil it. i want to just ask don briefly to talk to us about the trip to south america and specifically in ka iraq das where the nixon mothered cade was attacked. >> that's the centerpiece of the whole vice presidential years. it was a trip that the vice president really didn't want to do. he felt that it was needed and so forth, but the state department and president eisenhower asked him to do it so he did. we, again, got the airplane from the joint chiefs and we started down to visit the fron deasy

inauguration which was the first general inauguration, first free election since the group. that was the purpose of the trip. but, of course, the president and pat were thinking of other things they could do in the other countries, which we did. the initial trips, argentina. uruguay and paraguay were very benign. bolivia wasn't bad but you couldn't breathe at 13,000 feet. then we went down to peru where we had been warned that we might be picking up some communist reaction, some heckling and things of that nature, but nothing real serious. until we got to peru and the issue was whether he would go to the san marcus university -- i guess it was the oldest in the