Existing comment:
Rose Mary Woods, 1917-2005
Richard Nixon’s longtime secretary Rose Mary Woods “accidentally” erased eighteen-and-a-half minutes from a taped conversation that took place between the president and H. R. “Bob” Haldeman, his chief of staff, on June 20, 1972. Explaining that she had done so by mistake when receiving a phone call, Woods reenacted her motions.
Stretching away from her typewriter and reaching for the phone, she attempted to demonstrate how she had pressed on a pedal of the recording machine, thereby erasing the tape. Yet in her demonstration, Woods took her foot off the pedal. Her inadequate explanation of the tape’s erasure further implicated Nixon, as forensics revealed that the tape contained evidence that he knew about the Watergate scandal and its cover-up.
This portrait was published in Rolling Stone on October 21, 1976, as part of the nation’s bicentennial celebration. “The Family 1976” featured the men and women “who constitute the political leadership of America.”
Richard Avedon, July 30, 1975 |