The importance of history can never be over-stated. Nor can or should it be forgotten.
President Richard Millhous Nixon resigned on August 9, 1974. This CBS report aired after leaks from White House sources to the network revealed the 37th president’s intentions to resign in the face of almost certain impeachment over the Watergate scandal, in a speech from the Oval Office the previous evening carried live on national Television and Radio.
Nixon was given an unconditional pardon from President Ford on September 8, 1974.
The facts and circumstances surrounding President Nixon’s resignation are readily available from sources around the web, so we won’t go into it in great detail. What is important is documenting the audio from media sources. This website will endeavor to branch out in that direction as time goes on, in documenting history through audio sources recorded as they were originally broadcast.
This aircheck is courtesy of Contributor Steve Tefft.
Sounds like this was a mic-to-speaker recording and judging from the TV interference tone I hear throughout I’d guess this was from WCBS-AM. (880 would have that noise when a TV was on nearby.)
Nixon’s isn’t the only tarnished legacy this reminds me of; the other is Dan Rather’s! He was so much of part of CBS history I wonder how they can do any kind of retrospective pieces without him. (I’m wondering how CBS-TV will handle this coming Nov.22nd.)
Mark, you are correct. I recorded this WCBS-Newsradio 88 snippet with my trusty Realistic cassette recorder and a hand mic set up on front of my Radio Shack clock radio. It was recorded in Killingworth, CT, some 105 miles from Manhattan. I was a bit of a radio news bug back then(I was 16 at the time), and we always had WCBS on our radios. I’ve several other radio reports from the 70s that I will send to steve for his use.
“Bullitin” is misspelled in the headline.
It is Bulletin.
Tony
Well, thank you for that. I’m sure its a slip of the fingers
Was working at the CBS affiliate WZKO-AM when I heard this come through in summer ’74. Unforgettable. Also kept a strip of the bulletin from the AP wire machine.
Cronkite was giddy.