Know It All

The maiden name of Richard Nixon’s mother was Milhous. It is also his middle name.

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On June 17, 1972, employees of the Committee to Re-Elect the President were arrested when they were caught breaking into the Democratic National Committee headquarters. The Watergate scandal had begun.

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Gerald Ford (1913-2006) was the first president of the United States to be appointed to office rather than elected. He was appointed after the resignation of Richard Nixon on Aug. 9, 1974.

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In 1974, President Gerald Ford granted Richard Nixon a pardon for any crimes he committed or may have committed while in office. In a televised speech, Ford declared “our long national nightmare is over.”

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Rathergate, Monicagate and Contragate were all scandals that shocked the nation. Do you remember what the scandals were and the years they occurred? See answer at end.

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The investigative reporters that covered the Watergate scandal for the Washington Post wrote a non-fiction book in 1974 about the scandal titled “All the President’s Men.”

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The 1976 movie, “All the President’s Men,” based on the book, starred Dustin Hoffman (born 1937) as Washington Post reporter Carl Bernstein (born 1944). Robert Redford (born 1937) starred as reporter Bob Woodward (born 1943).

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The Washington Post, a newspaper known for its coverage of American politics, is the oldest newspaper in Washington, D.C. Founded in 1877 by Democrat Stilson Hutchins (1838-1912), the first issue had four pages and cost three cents.

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American writer Emily Post (1873-1960) penned her first book about etiquette in 1922 titled “Etiquette: The Blue Book of Social Usage.” Post believed that proper behavior consisted of common sense and consideration of others.

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C.W. Post (1854-1914) started a cereal empire when he created Instant Postum Cereal Beverage in 1895 in Battle Creek, Mich. The drink was a caffeine-free powdered coffee substitute.

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Grape-Nuts cereal was introduced in 1897. The cereal contains neither grapes nor nuts. The inventor of the cereal, C.W. Post, chose the name Grape-Nuts because the cereal contained maltose, which he thought was grape sugar, and it had a nutty flavor.

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Brothers John Harvey Kellogg (1852-1943) and William K. Kellogg (1860-1951) invented Corn Flakes cereal in 1884. They were trying to create a substitute for bread.

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“Wednesday is ‘Wink Day’ in New York” was a 1907 advertising campaign for Corn Flakes. Ads in New York newspapers targeted housewives by offering a free box of Kellogg’s Toasted Corn Flakes to every woman that winked at their grocer.

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Answer: Rathergate was a 2004 scandal in which Dan Rather of “60 Minutes Wednesday” presented documents that criticized the quality of President George W. Bush’s service in the Air National Guard in 1972-73. It was later admitted that the documents were never authenticated. Monicagate was the President Clinton-Monica Lewinsky scandal of 1998. Contragate, also called the Iran-Contra affair, was exposed in 1986 when it was discovered that the U.S. government was providing covert military aid to Nicaraguan contra rebels by selling arms to Iran.

Know It All is by Kerry McArdle. It runs in the weekend and Wednesday editions of the Daily Journal. Questions? Comments? Email knowitall(at)smdailyjournal.com or call 344-5200 ext. 114.