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by Momo » Fri Nov 25, 2022 10:17 am
Another in a series of notable individuals Ron has encountered in his illustrious reign as the world's longest-running sports talk show host.
Although now little-remembered by history, there was a time a post-presidential Richard Nixon called Sports Talk with Ron Cameron, starring Ron Cameron.
Years earlier, the former president had, along with millions of others in a worldwide audience, awaited with rapt attention to Ron’s interview with the former First Lady, Jacqueline Kennedy.
In the years since Dallas, Mrs. Kennedy had maintained a studied silence until she consented to an exclusive interview with a heretofore nationally unknown Detroit sports talk show host. Although Ron was sure this “get” would make him radio's next Arthur Godfrey, his buffoonish effort was immediately seen as the end of his broadcast career. The loosely-described "interview" was so universally panned that his very name entered the lexicon for disastrous performances. To bomb, it was said, was to “Cameron.”
Rather than fueling Ron's equally outsized ego and ambitions, the Jackie interview resulted in consigning him to a future of dead-end, brokered radio jobs, where he hosted shows with an ever-diminishing audience. Ron's residual audience seemed to overwhelmingly tune in to savor the sheer schadenfreude.
Though mostly forgotten in the ensuing decade, Ron had been remembered by Richard Nixon, whose own career highs and lows naturally gravitated him to the likes of Ron (albeit the pendulum of Ron's career swung in a comically constricted time). And as Nixon readied himself for his lucrative television interviews with David Frost to be taped in less than a couple of months, his first post-presidency sit-down with an interlocutor, Nixon wanted to rehearse his planned defense of the series of events known colloquially as Watergate in a setting which would assure him relative anonymity.
Through the efforts of his longtime political donor, Detroit-area industrialist Max Fisher, Nixon learned of Ron's contact number and his then-on-air schedule so he could call when Ron had an open line discussion. When the opportunity presented itself in the evening of Saturday, January 29, 1977, the former president made plans to call Ron long-distance from his San Clemente, California estate.
Ron was in the midst of scouring the newspapers for box scores and statistics of yet-another dreary Red Wings and Pistons season when his unnamed screener - alas, unknown to history - passed him a note that "Dick from San Clemente" was on the line. Announcing the call with the fanfare one would expect from someone who had never previously been the recipient of a long-distance phone call, Ron enthusiastically greeted the caller, asking him if he was from Detroit and had been a long-time listener. "No, Ron," he intoned in his instantly recognizable voice, "this is Dick Nixon. My friend Max Fisher gave me your number."
Ron suddenly felt a lightning bolt of recognition. But all he could think to say in the moment was that he had had Jackie Kennedy on once. "She did a good job," Ron added. "I'm gonna have her back again. I just gotta find her number." When Nixon started talking about having heard that interview, Ron stepped in, apologizing for interrupting, to ask Nixon if he was aware of the presidential battery of "Ike and Nixon," pitcher Ike Delock and catcher Russ Nixon. As a lifetime baseball fan, Nixon laughed, acknowledged his familiarity, while likewise praising Gen. Eisenhower.
The years in the wilderness not having dimmed his skill at connecting to his audience, Nixon brought up the hysteria unleashed in the 1976 season by Mark "The Bird" Fidrych. "I've been a baseball fan all my life, Ron, and, in all those years, I don't think I've ever seen so much excitement generated by any one player before." Ron jumped in to note that he had taken Fidrych to his first hockey game. And that they were great friends. He also mentioned that there had been some talk of The Bird and him being part of a Caribbean cruise the next winter.
The former chief executive then valiantly tried to steer the discussion towards the purpose of his call. "Ron, when we consider all that has come within what became known as Watergate, it's important to understand that if the president approves an action, because of the national security or a threat of significant magnitude, then the president’s decision is one, that, by definition, is not illegal."
Rather than proceed in monologue form, Nixon awaited Ron's response. But Ron's wheelhouse being exclusively sports, his knowledge of the events leading up to Nixon's resignation was most shallow. Notwithstanding, Ron gamely followed-up by asking the former president if people thought he was a "crook" because he stole, "was it $18.50 ... from The Gap."
Nixon was now feeling an unlikely kinship with Jackie Kennedy, who had also found herself at a loss for words in dealing with Ron. "Ah," he began. At that point, though, Ron informed the former president that he had another caller who had been waiting on hold for some time and that he was behind on his break. "But don't be a stranger. Call again."
With the call now history, Ron could not believe his good fortune. "Wow. A long-distance phone call!”
A postscript. Ron was blissfully unaware - even to this very day - of the existence of the highly-viewed Frost-Nixon interviews. On those dates the interviews aired, Ron watched first-run episodes of Match Game PM. Decades after the call, Ron still refers to Richard Nixon as a "great man," and his favorite president.
