Nixon at the Lincoln Memorial The Real Story

, nixon, lincolnmemorial, 1970s The most bizarre moment of Richard Nixon s presidency happened on May 9, 1970. Days after the Ohio National Guard killed four college students at Kent State Universityand less than two weeks after the invasion of Cambodia beganthe president took an impromptu, latenight walk to the Lincoln Memorial with Manolo Sanchez, a White House valet. Nixon stumbled across dozens of student protesters at the site, with whom he engaged in bizarre, rambling debate. Scott Calonico, a filmmaker with a fantastic eye for American history, recounts the event in this fascinating documentary. The documentary is largely based on the neverbeforepublished photographs of a protestor, Bob Moustaskas, and memos recorded by Nixon later that day. When the tapes were finally released to the public in 2011, Atlantic contributor Tom McNichol wrote about the event, concluding: Listening to Nixon describe his bizarre sojourn to the Lincoln Memorial is to hear a man who s already sold himself on an alterna