(00:00:00) Weather forecast for the state of Minnesota, there's a chance for showers and thundershowers in northern Minnesota this afternoon partly cloudy across southern Minnesota highs low 70s in the Northeast low 80s in the southwest programming on Minnesota Public Radio is supported by the Guthrie Theater presenting Moss Hart and George Kaufman's comedy once-in-a-lifetime June 3rd through July 1st. Only tickets available online at Guthrie Theater dot org and good afternoon. Welcome back to mid-day of Minnesota Public Radio. I'm Gary eichten glad you could join us during his lifetime Hubert Humphrey was often portrayed by his critics as a typical glad-hander one who didn't know when to stop talking a man who was so consumed with being president that he willingly checked his principles and his dignity at the White House door. But Hubert Humphrey was so much more. He was one of Minnesota's most influential powerful and beloved politicians and some Scholars will tell you that Hubert Humphrey was one of the best United States senators in American history today on. Midday. We're going to hear from Humphrey protégé Walter Mondale on the Hubert Humphrey that mr. Mondale new their political careers were remarkably similar both helped build the dfl party here in the state of Minnesota both served as US senators from Minnesota both served as vice presidents of the United States both won the Democratic party's nomination for president and both of them lost their bid for president Walter Mondale is conducting a series of public lectures at the University of Minnesota titled 50 years the Mondale lectures on public service and Hubert Humphrey was the subject of yesterday's Forum this hour we're going to hear from mr. Mondale later. We'll hear from two other admirers of Hubert Humphrey, but to begin former vice president Walter Mondale, (00:01:53) I must And my remarks with an apology. Hubert's history should include must include the story of so many others who lived and worked with him Muriel his family. The Freeman's so many of you in this room, but I can't do it in this short lecture and still say what I believe I have to say about Hubert. So please accept my apologies. I want to talk about Hubert Humphrey because he was a very important part of my life for a very long time. I first met him at Mcalister's a student in 1946. And then for over 30 years. I worked with him on the campaign Trail at the state capitol in the US Senate and in the White House. Through it. All he burped was my mentor friend and colleague and what a blessing that was. I believe that Hubert was the single most influential and successful political leader in Minnesota's history. He was also one of the most creative and successful public servants in our nation's history. These are not words of puffery Hubert's greatness was rooted in the way. He looked at government that government should and could do wonderful thing to make life better for everyone. He was the nation's most effective Apostle of the active use of government as an instrument of social justice since Franklin Roosevelt. As he put it the moral test of government is how he treats those it treats those in the dawn of Life the young those who were in the Twilight of Life the elderly and those in the shadows of Life the sick the needy and the unemployed. That's what he was all about armed with that belief Hubert helped in many ways to shape the modern Progressive agenda of America. He led the Civil Rights Revolution within the Congress as Martin Luther King did on the streets. Beyond our borders Hubert linked America to the cause of freedom and Independence around the globe. As a teacher then a candidate and then the dynamic reformist mayor of Minneapolis. He captured the imagination of everyone who lived in Minnesota. Hubert led the fight that changed our state from a conservative and isolationist one into a progressive outward-looking State and he aroused a whole generation of Minnesota political and Civic leadership Orville Freeman there from the start once said Humphrey was the guy who put it all together. He couldn't have done it alone, but certainly until some of us could fly alone. He was the leader. And Hubert soon became a national leader and Minnesota became a major source of ideas and creativity and people a small state respected far beyond its size. And Hubert really took off in 1948 when he electrified the Democratic Convention as we just saw with the Civil Rights speech urging civil rights it drove the Dixiecrats out of the convention and out of the democratic party and ironically helped Truman when the presidency for a full term. That same year Hubert scored a big win over a tough incumbent becoming the first elected dfl United States senator in our history when Humphrey arrived in Washington Time Magazine featured him on its cover pictured in front of a tornado. He he was they proclaimed the Whirlwind of the Midwest describing him as Minnesota's Brash bustling hard-working fast-talking Fireball a glib jaunty spellbinder. But Hubert had a rough start in Washington Southern Democrats, like disliked him because of his stand on civil rights Senator Russell of Georgia called him a damn fool, but Hubert quickly mastered the job as soon gained the respect of all Senators, including Senator Russell. He gained seats on powerful committees. And with time ascended to the majority. Whip of the Senate. Hubert was apart a big part of a sweeping National Reform movement that then gained incredible momentum soon. The Congress had huge Democratic margins moreover. We now had the Magnificent Warren court with members like Thurgood Marshall the first black Justice ever to sit on the Supreme Court, which now stood strongly for civil rights and provided broad legal support for federal efforts to achieve social justice. These were Hubert's most productive and creative years. He loved it. I was fortunate there to be for a part of their for a part of it. I came to the Senate with the remarkable 89th Congress when we were really at high tide these days when I see the Democrats desperate to get 51 Senators. It's a sounding for me to remember that I took my seat along 68 Democratic senators. Things really moved with John F. Kennedy was President the Peace Corps in the nuclear Test Ban Treaty. Both Humphrey ideas became law in 64 Congress under Hubert's leadership past the historic Civil Rights Act. Then we passed voting rights to fair housing laws. We enacted Medicare improve Social Security past federal aid Elementary and secondary education and financial aid for college students. We created Head Start and acted food stamps and legal services and expanded Housing Programs. We later created the Department of Housing and Urban Development and the Department of Transportation as well as new Institutes of Health. We passed the landmark air and water protection laws created the Arts and Humanities endowments. And that's just the beginning of the list Hubert's Mark was on all of it. I don't think there's ever been a time quite like it in our history. How free strength came from his belief that also flowered from his personality? He liked people he really did. He couldn't stay away from them. He liked people so much that he couldn't be with them. He wrote letters to them. He once told me that he treated a letter just as he would treat someone who came into his home at the end of long days. He would go back to his office and dictate letters sometimes for hours. He would dictate what his aides called clip letters. These letters were two constituents on articles his staff and clipped from Minnesota newspapers, and he would comment in these letters and graduations marriages new businesses a prize heifer a tragedy whatever even responded to letters that came from outside the state here's one typical the dress to the rape reigning Miss Georgia peanut princess princess honest to goodness. Dear Miss Brown, I agree with you. That peanut butter is as much or more of a household treat as Mom's Apple Pie. My favorite sandwich is peanut butter bologna cheddar cheese lettuce and mayonnaise on toasted bread with lots of cuts of Underside. Another favorite is toasted peanut butter cheese and bacon sandwich or if I'm in a hurry just peanut butter and jelly. I also like peanut butter and cheese on crackers. Give me the crunchy or the smooth. I'm not fussy. In other words, I just love peanut butter sincerely Hubert H (00:11:38) Humphrey. (00:11:48) Gilbert's kindness was his great strength, but sometimes it was his weakness as well. He never understood hate or getting even or being vindictive. I once told him during the Humphrey Kennedy primaries in 1960 that the big difference between him and the Kennedys what it was that if you oppose them you went on a list and paid for it. But if you oppose Hubert, he smiled Shrugged his shoulders and work doubly hard to make sure you hell no grudges. There was another virtue that became a weakness as well Hubert may have wanted the presidency too much as I well know others have had the same desire. But as I reread Hubert's audit and bag autobiography the other day his itch to become present jumped out from almost every page and as best I can count he actually ran for president four times. It is certainly one of the reasons that he accepted the vice presidential nomination in 1964 and left the Senate at the Pinnacle of his power. He thought being vice president at this stage was the only way to the presidency Hubert told me that he liked the vice presidency that he learned a lot and grew a lot and I'm sure some of this is true, but I believe that being Lyndon Johnson's vice president was a personal and political disaster for Hubert. To behaving with humorous job was made Impossible by the erratic ego-driven irascible character of Lyndon Johnson a man who regularly did great things is present, but who was often cruel and demeaning toward Hubert? Unfortunately also Hubert served as vice president in the worst of times the Vietnam War soon overshadowed everything else in time this war and his support of it scarred his public reputation 1888 him from old friends and loyal constituencies ruined his 68 convention shattered his campaign and probably cost him the presidency. Once elected vice president at least for a while Hubert tried to be an inside critic of the war the week. He was inaugurated. He wrote a letter to his Senate colleagues warning of the danger of u.s. Engagement there. And in March 1965 just two months into his new job. He drafted a thoughtful memo to the president outlining what he thought the adverse political Fallout from Vietnam would be here at home. His predictions turned out to be so accurate. It's almost spooky to read it. Now he foresaw diminishing public support for the war and growing public hostility with more of the hostility coming from the left and from friends then from the right Hubert was rewarded for his Candor by being exiled for almost a year from the administration's inner councils on Vietnam. And in fact for most everything else President Johnson, we now know was conflicted as well and disturbed by the way, the war was going but publicly he was committed to the war and he demanded unwavering agreement from those around him and Humphrey gave it how priests Aldous private doubts and increased his public support for the war. And this remain true even after Johnson had withdrawn from the presidential race and 68 and Hubert had become a candidate to succeed him. When Hubert try to put a little space between his own views and Vietnam and those are the administration Johnson refused. When Hubert drafted to compromise Plank and the war for inclusion in the convention platform in a desperate way to try to bring some more unity and that fractured convention. He cleared it with Dean Rusk other key advisors including some leaders of the Kennedy McGovern and McCarthy groups, but Johnson sent an emissary to Chicago to tell Hubert it was unacceptable to him and Humphrey relented several of Humphries friends urged him to resign from the vice presidency, but he would not he said he had a four-year contract with the American people. Part of you was decision was also based on political survival. He understood his few did the Vic addictive nature of Lyndon Johnson. He believed that President Johnson might have supported Nixon over Humphrey or he might have crippled his campaign in other ways. I'm also sure that nothing would have been more difficult for a vice president then to break publicly with the president in the middle of a bloody war a hurdle his critics refused to consider but whatever the reason the public image of Hubert bending under Johnson's pressure may have hurt him with American public just as deeply as did the Vietnam issue itself in his book Humphrey wrote. I tried to be fair, but instead I looked weak. Johnson he said ruin my credibility and made me look like a damn fool. Most of the campaign was a nightmare. He just couldn't be heard over the noise. Here's an example. Few weeks of this presidential campaign. I believe that the Republican candidate. I believe the Republican candidate owes it to the people to come out of the Shadows. But when Humphrey finally put some distance between his views on the war in Johnson's and is pivotal Salt Lake City speech in Lake September his campaign finally began to move his speech privately cleared by our negotiators in Paris didn't really say that much that was new but there was Hinton it that Humphrey is present would change our Vietnam policy and it was clear that he had finally stood up to Lyndon Johnson. I could feel the change take place. It energized the campaign. He started getting real crowds big excited crowds old friends return and campaign contributions float in Victory was now a possibility And while Johnson was angry about Hubert's break interestingly. He did not attack on free instead. He did everything he was asked to do for the campaign including putting his immense power and Texas to work for Humphrey Humphreys declaration and Johnson support Vietnam declaration and Johnson support came too late to win even so Humphrey lost by one of the smallest margins in presidential history 7 tenths of one percent or a 500,000 volts. I believe that President Humphrey even with all of his baggage would have ended the War sooner than did Nixon and I know we would have been spared Watergate and the cynicism that followed and I am sure that his administration would have been based on the decency imagination and sense of justice that Hubert displayed throughout his life. But it was not to be so now Humphrey was back home and out of office for the first time in 20 years. What happened? Next is a part of the Humphrey story that most histories overlooked. But the story that I think should be told it's a story about overcoming adversity about taking hits getting back up and carrying on in some ways. It's the most impressive part of his career. By itself 1968 had been one of the worst years in American history all of us in this room that went through it know what I'm talking about. We faced a worsening war the Tet Offensive the assassinations of Martin Luther King and Bobby Kennedy the Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia. The collapse of the Johnson presidency the convention nightmare the riots and the campus disruptions. And of course Humphrey was caught right in the middle of it Hubert had suffered for miserable years in the vice presidency and then lost in the Cliffhanger to Nixon and he continued to meet widespread resentment over the war and the party that he spent his life building had come apart. Most of us at that point would have taken deep breath and just gone fishing but not Hubert with Jean McCarthy's retirement in 1970 Hubert had a chance to return to the Senate he ran and he won big and he was thrilled to be back in the Senate but he quickly found that things had changed. He asked for a reassignment on the foreign relations and Appropriations committees. Both power committees that he'd been on when he left to become vice president instead. He was given week committees with no subcommittee or staff. He found himself a senior senator by experience, but a junior under Senate rules. He was welcomed but not Embrace. He was an Insider on the outside. It was not quite rejection, but it was very close. I believe he was shocked. It was not what he expected. He knew for example that when Barry Goldwater came back after he had run for president to the Senate. He was given his choice of committees when he returned. That's when Hubert could have said again forget it if they don't want me around in a leadership role. I'll just play around that again. That's not what he did. Now with an ambiguous role senior Statesman and rookie. He became a different kind of leader and this is what I came to know Hubert best. Although I had shattered Hubert during most of my career. It was now in the Senate as colleagues. They really became close. Although tensions between same state senators are legendary in Washington. We instead work very well together representing Minnesota not to brag, but I believe we made a strong team. I saw Hubert get up off the floor and become a national hero again. I saw him convert small positions in the big things very much. Like he had developed a powerful platform from the miserably week Minneapolis mayor's office in 73 return to the Foreign Relations Committee quickly rising to power from a junior position on that committee and 75 you became chairman of the joint economic committee and launched a vigorous range of hearings issued reports, and it was there that he hatched his famous humphrey-hawkins bill. In 77, he was selected Deputy Pro president pro tem of the Senate which guaranteed him a spot at all leadership meetings. When Hubert had returned to the Senate after his presidential campaign, he feared that his role in support of the war had alienated him permanently from Young Americans, but what he walked around the capitol, he found that young people kids students love being with them. He found no resentments. So he spent a lot of time talking with young people everywhere as long as they wanted. He was always late. He told me once he said I've been around here so long. I'm like one of those statues in Statuary Hall only I can talk and and he would talk. And then he started giving speeches all over the country again, and he found that people listened in 1976 when President Carter and I were elected Hubert was recuperating from surgery and unable to campaign still he won re-election to the Senate by an astounding 68% of the vote of the people of Minnesota. Now, he attended President Carter's weekly house quite house leadership breakfast. And as I predicted Carter and Humphrey hit it off Humphrey was now fascinated about the new Minnesota vice-presidency about how it could be that the vice president and the president were friends. We would often talk about it and when you became ill I would pick Heaven mural up on Air Force two, whatever I could when I called told Carter that Humphrey had never been to Canada interesting. I was talking to him in the hospital. So what are you going to do this week? And I saw John and I are going up to Camp David. He said what's it like though? He'd been vice president for he had never been to Camp David. So I called Carter President Carter. He immediately called Humphrey in invited Hubert and Muriel with him and they went up to Camp David and Humphrey told me how thrilled he was by that he was still going strong, even though he now knew that he had terminal cancer and it was a cancer that spared him nothing but that didn't stop him either. I often visited him at the university hospital where he was recuperating from yet another surgery. I remember telling him that we had to find some way to lick his cancer because we had so much to do his eyes lit up and right there on his sick bed. He spelled out a brilliant 20-point program to keep us busy for another 10 years. When he should have been in bed, he got up to give that wonderful valedictory speech to his best friends at the AFL-CIO convention in st. Paul. Nobody who was there will ever forget it. It was pure Humphrey not a note in front of him 50 minutes long a ringing plea for social justice for the use of government to hire the unemployed to rebuild our cities here. He was still pitching still teaching and still moving at that point. It became almost too much for him and tears were showing he stopped a moment and said this Just remember this (00:28:22) mom said yeah, they'll take your picture if you wipe your eyes with the kleenex. Well, that's all right. Take it. The liver doesn't have any tears doesn't have any heart. (00:28:45) And then he went back one last time to the Congress before a crowded Senate and then a crowded house and its members rows one by one to honor him and it didn't stop at the aisles. I saw Barry Goldwater with tears running down his cheeks run up to hug him. Hubert was once asked if he would ever get out from under Johnson's unpopularity never he answered but just before he left us the Washington Post reported on a pole of a thousand people who had chosen him the greatest senator of the past 75 years. My God Humphrey said Lyndon Johnson is going to be sore as hell about (00:29:29) this. (00:29:37) At the memorial service for Humphrey in the capital rotunda with presidents and leaders gathered as it would to say goodbye to a Fallen Hero. I ended my eulogy to Hubert with one of my favorite quotes from Shakespeare because I thought it described him the best a good leg will fall a straight back will stoop a black beard will turn white. He curled Pate will grow bald a fair face will wither a full I will wax Hollow. But a good heart is the sun and the moon or rather the Sun and not the moon for it shines bright and never changes, but keeps its course truly that was certainly true of Hubert's heart. Thank (00:30:32) you. Former vice president Walter Mondale speaking yesterday at his continuing series titled 50 years the Mondale lectures on public service. Yesterday's Forum was titled Hubert former vice president Mondale was joined Yesterday by several other civil rights and political leaders who shared their memories of Hubert Humphrey among them a Minneapolis native Harry Davis who began his Public Service in the Minneapolis School Board in 1969. Just the third person black person to serve on the board Davis ran for Minneapolis mayor in 1971 with a campaign calling for integrated education. He lost but he won that same year the federal courts ordered the Minneapolis public schools desegregated Davis told the audience at the Mondeo lecture series about the first time he met Hubert Humphrey and the impact that meeting had on his life. Here's Harry Davis. I'm amazed at (00:31:31) All of the history that Hubert Humphrey is a part of it this state and not only the state but the whole country. I met him as a very young man just married with one child and I had the privilege of serving him at the NAACP banquet at Phillis Wheatley. And that was kind of a complete change in my life. I had looked at life. rather disappointedly Minneapolis, which was my home And as a descendant of a slave mother and a Winnebago Sue father. That Minneapolis was a place where people of color. Only Could by and live in certain areas And as I listened to Cecil Newman, and dr. W d Brown And other civil rights leaders, I wondered what we would do to overcome that. And although I went through many of the leader training ships with the NAACP and the Urban League. It didn't dawn on me that there would be a person in the future that would arise and be kind of the leader of opening those doors. I couldn't see that because there was no evidence that that was going to change. And as I want about trying to learn from those civil rights leaders. I started to develop my own feeling but then Hubert Humphrey who I had a chance to serve made a compliment to me that. I would go a long way because I knew how to treat people. And I said to myself. Well, if I go it's because of him because he knew how to treat me. and as I took on the responsibility of trying to be a part of changing Lifestyles, you know as much trouble as he would Humphrey went through bringing civil rights to the Congress and to the country and of the Dixiecrats leaving the Democratic Party. If he had that much trouble, what would I be able to do? Well, my life started to change. And then I remembered at Phillis Wheatley house one of eleven settlement houses in the City of Minneapolis. There used to be great artists that would come and stay there. Marian Anderson. Rolin Hayes. Duke Ellington Count Basie chick Webb, they used to stay there at Phillis Wheatley, which was great for us because we would listen to them rehearse in the assembly. But why weren't they staying in the downtown hotels? They couldn't and then one day when we Raymond Cannon and attorney here said to us Marian Anderson is coming to sing at Northrop Auditorium. He's going to be in concert. The course that was the Orchestra Hall before Orchestra Hall and as I listened to her rehearsing in the Phillis Wheatley assembly, I realized what a marvelous Negrete voice she had but then again I said to myself well, why is she staying here Phyllis? Wheatley when the other great artists that come stay at the downtown hotels 11th in the Curtis the Dyckman the Nicollet And I soon found out she couldn't. So as a young group of civil rights leaders, we went down and demonstrated in front of that hotel that refused her. And so we found out that they open the doors for her to come in and stay at that hotel. Why because the mayor had visited them. And that was to change it seems like you had friends that understood what you were going through. And then I remember the time that I ran for the Minneapolis School Board. In 1968. I was appointed 1969 David Price and I ran for the school board and a strange thing happened. The conventions were a week apart. The Republican convention was on one Saturday the Democratic Convention on the next Saturday. We discussed that and we both went and were endorsed by the Republicans and we both went and was endorsed by the Democrats. So actually we made history but that election also. Set fire on to me. Because during that election David Price and I got more votes than the mayor of Minneapolis. And of course 1971 as you understand was a great a great challenge to not only Minnesota but the country because the Minneapolis school board was ordered by the federal court to desegregate their school system and their I said the chairman of the board. Which the court said if you don't do that, you may be sent to prison in contempt so we had to move very rapidly. (00:37:06) Well (00:37:07) the count of that election decided the election for a 1971 and the Democratic Party. Came to me and asked me if I would be their candidate. and like a fool I accepted. That's what my wife said. But it wasn't foolish to accept because that experience in my life. I think Open the Eyes of the whole city of Minneapolis for the things that we're going on with in Minneapolis itself, you know, there's an old saying that you have to clean your own house first. Before you can expect people outside in your neighborhood to clean there's and I think that that was the helping hand that helped us clean minneapolis's house. I didn't understand what a great experience. I was going to have. I just wanted to hold up in front of you. Some material on my campaign and Hubert Humphreys picture. He didn't have to do that. On the other hand on the other side is Walter Mondale didn't have to do that. But as I went through that experience. My life changed every day. I would get a threatening phone call not 14567 threatening phone calls. My children had to be exported to school in the squad car. I had a 24-hour bodyguard everywhere. I went and not just a regular police officer and FBI agent. My son who was an athlete at Central had to be escorted and guarded what he played football and ran track. So that was really an experience for me. And at the end of The Campaign or before the end of the campaign. I would have this encouragement. I would go to the lemming hotel and I would meet you at Humphrey Walter Mondale and on Frazier who would tutor me a how to run a campaign how to debate the items of debate. How to put your your candidate to your opponent by ending your speech about putting them where they have to answer to you even taking the out of the Old Log Theater and sitting in the audience as I spoke and corrected my speaking in how to call attention to certain issues. That was a great experience a wonderful experience, but I had the opportunity to go all the to all of the local colleges and the University of Minnesota and speak to their political science classes because I was unique I was different. How was the first person of color ever to be endorsed by a major political party for a major political position? What a great opportunity. And as I spoke to those students many of them came and join my campaign. Join my campaign. I think the one college that brought in the most students was McAllister Macalester College. And as I went out campaigning door-knocking certain parts of Minneapolis weren't so acceptable. Who the candidate of color? And as I was going with some of the students in that area. A car pulled up and two gentlemen got out of that car and walked up to me. It was Hubert Humphrey and on Frasier and they went door-to-door with Me Knocking and shaking hands at introducing me. To the people in that section of the city. Was a great encouragement for me and what a good thing for the students to see? That their congressman and their political leaders were interested in this campaign to that point. Well, I remember the concession speech. You know, when you lose you you have to stand up in front of people like this and admit that you lost. You know, you think they can count him often times you wonder why do I have to stand here and Seed when they knew that I lost but I did stand there and all in front at the Old Nicholas Hotel. You remember the ballroom with the big beautiful chandeliers. That's where I made my concession speech and in front of me on the sitting on the floor all these students from all the different colleges. And after I can finish my concession speech many the girls were crying and one of the young lady said to me. Oh, mr. Davis. I wish you were one. You would have been a great mayor and I said, well I didn't win but the door is open now for you who knows someday. You may be mere you know who that lady was sharing Sales Belton. He was a junior at Macalester College. So what a great tribute to? Hubert Humphrey who really didn't have to Do things like civil rights to maintain his great leadership? But you know, he said those who put Sunshine into the lights of others can't keep it from themselves and Hubert Humphreys light, even though he is left is still shining. Thank you (00:42:55) when City civil rights leader and former Minneapolis School Board member Harry Davis, he shared his memories of Hubert Humphrey at yesterday's Mondale lectures on public service Norman Sherman was vice president and presidential candidate Hubert Humphreys, press secretary. He also helped Humphrey write his autobiography education of a public man at yesterday's Mondale lecture. Mr. Sherman told some stories about the years. He spent with Hubert Humphrey. (00:43:23) I'm just going to tell a few anecdotes that I think answer some of Arts questions. I've asked myself some of the same question. What was it about Humphrey? That was so special. I've been around a lot of politicians over a lot of years. Minnesota politicians are better than most Humphrey was better than any of them. He was an extraordinary guy and it showed up. I made a list I think in his energy which everybody is talked about. I want to ask him how he got so much work done and he had two answers when he would tell you glands the second one. He say work an extra eight hours a day and he did he could go to where everybody around him was exhausted and laying on the floor and hoping for some sustenance some pause and Humphrey would still be going just joyous and what he did he had more knowledge than any man. I ever met in politics. He had a computer like brain. You could give Humphrey a memo on Bankers who were coming on a minor issue and it would feed into his mind and it would spin out a coherent historic context. It was extraordinary you would think how is he possibly know? I think he never forgot anything. He read anything people. It was just extraordinary. So I think his knowledge was special his Spirit was beyond belief. They've all describe various aspects of it. There was nothing the got this man down not his ill health not insult. There were times in 68 when when some of the pickets got to him, but he was resilient. I remember Landing over and over again. We would be in five cities flying west across the country and the rest of us were just dragging Humphrey would get up for the last thing in his face would be tired as eyes would be Hollow and he'd look out the window across the tarmac and see the crowds and the adrenaline would flow. You could see the skin tighten up in the eyes brighten. He loved I mean you talk about handling Stevenson once turned to and we were campaigning at st. John's Adlai. Turn to him said Hubert you really like this incredulous, but but in fact he did. If I had more time, I would tell you lots of things. I want to respond to Vietnam the I try not to get into what Dan Humphrey believe about Vietnam when he was vice president, but I want to tell you one thing when Humphrey came back from Macalester. I came back also is kind of an aid and one day he called me into the office and said I'm going to see this is an I think March of nineteen whenever I've tried to block out 60 and March of 1969. He said I'm going to see the president and I'm going to tell mr. Nixon that I would support him if he will withdraw from Vietnam immediately as the titular head of the party. I will assure him that I will do everything to make sure that he is not attack. I will do everything I can to support him. And that was the first time that he and I for a long time and talked about Vietnam. It was very clear what he wanted to do and what he would have done had he been president, but he said I'm going to see Nixon I said sir, whatever you do when you come out of the Oval Office don't smile. Well, he said oh, I understand and I said don't overstate your support for what you've just said to Nixon voice. No. No, I understand it. Well, I watched television and Humphrey bounce they all use the word bounce Humphrey came out of the Oval Office like he was on a trampoline and he had a grin from here to here and he overstated what he had just told Richard Nixon it was awful and I just I died and the next day when he was back in his office in McAlester. I went into the office and he looked at me. He said I blew it didn't I he he he was just wonderful on that. I think that what what I will do I think is just tell you the one of the thing is that while he had a vision and he had a grand ideas. He focused on people in a way that nobody I've ever Known this done and I tell you two stories when I first went to work for him. I didn't think I could make it. I didn't think the intensity of working for Humphrey was what I could stand and he caught what people think of them is a big spender. The fact is Humphrey hated to spend money. I gave more money to Christian churches Across America on going to church with Humphrey because he never had a dollar in his pocket. I've told it it totaled it up and it's horrendous, but He would not put in an intercom system on the phones in our office in Washington front of the first one to work for we had a buzzer system. He said what the hell is wrong with keeping the buttons buzzer system. So he had a little keypad and your desk would buzz. You know, that was the senator pushing the button meant he wanted to see you and I ran through these six intervening offices. I was lowly. I was back near the mail room where they opened the mail all day and I raced in to see Humphrey and he handed me a letter that had been written to him. It was on the you know, the pads of paper with the lines on it badly written and it was from he said get this guy a job. This guy needs a job. I went back to my desk and I read it. It was from a woman whose husband had been in lemon Leavenworth. He was a convicted felon, he was a lemon worth in some years previously. She had written Humphrey and asked if he Could get her husband transferred to Sandstone. So the family could visit him. I'm free of done that when the guy got out she had written again and said my husband is having trouble finding work. I'm afraid got the guy a job at Howard Lake in a slaughterhouse this letter came because there was a period in which little slaughterhouses closed across Minnesota and had no known family members and there was no there were no benefits. No workman's comp nothing. The guy was out of work. He was now convicted felon who knew how to hammer cattle in the head kill him and I'm free said get them a job. He said, you know everybody back there enroll vogs office you get them a job. And so I took the letter to my desk and being wise and I put it aside and the next week my desk buzzed again and I ran through the my six offices into the Steeplechase got into Humphreys office. And he said did you get I won't use the man's name a job yet. And I said who well, he said that letter I gave you last week, I'd forgotten about it. I hadn't done anything and he said look get him a job. So I called roll vogs office and arrange to have the guy considered as a truck driver. And I went and reported it to Humphrey and he said good work Marvin and then word came he'd flunk the exam. I don't know what the exam was. I went back and reported to Humphrey that he'd flunk the exam thinking I was absolved of all responsibility. We said get them another exam white said what is it get them another exam and so we did and he was hired. He ran a snowplow during the winter. He did something else during the summer Humphrey wrote him a letter is though he'd been appointed CEO of Honeywell or General Mills and I said why well, he said it's important and the that that was the kind of subliminal Care that IBM is no political game. They couldn't he guy couldn't vote for him. The family couldn't the family couldn't brag about what Humphrey had done for him. But he cared he cared about this guy and he was ready to bug me. The other thing he did that I think is indicative of what sort of person he was called me one day and he said I want everybody who won a prize at the Minnesota State Fair to get a letter. I said an individual letter of form letter. No. No, he said an individual letter as I said Senator. This is a waste of my time and money. I'm a federal money. I am not to be well, he said you college graduates are so filled with yourself (00:52:38) said you get (00:52:40) mail that you throw away without even reading it he said, You write letters to people and you get answers, but he said there are a lot of people in Minnesota that are alone. They may be lonely. If they have done something that their peers recognized as being special. They deserve a letter from their Senator and I said, yes, sir. I I tell people my classic was congratulations on growing the largest green bean and Kandiyohi coming this way Humphrey Humphrey felt that he the people needed to be touched needed to be raised up that their aspirations might be simple and might be cross stitch. It may be canning beans but by God, it was as important as most anything else. I have lots of other stories that ultimately civility civility is I think what distinguishes Humphrey from a lot of what goes on today? I'm very new that bipartisanship was compromised not posture. He knew the government was able to do good and the lack of government was not a positive thing. That's all I have to say that (00:53:59) Norman Sherman who was Hubert Humphreys, press secretary back in the 1960s. Mr. Sherman spoke yesterday at Walter mondale's lecture series 50 years the Mondeo lectures on public service yesterday's Forum, which was held at the University of Minnesota was titled Hubert. Now. If you missed part of our midday program today, we're going to be rebroadcasting these excerpts from the forum tonight at nine o'clock rebroadcast. Second chance to hear it. Also later today. Make sure you check out our website. There were many interesting. King Stories the Mondale Forum that we haven't had time to get on the air today as a web only extra. You can hear what former Minnesota Republican congressman and Governor elk we had to say as well as the comments of former Mondale, press secretary allies lie, that's on the midday page at Minnesota Public Radio dot-org. Well that does it for our midday program today. I'm Gary eichten. Thanks so much for joining us Sarah Myers the producer of our midday program care a fig and shoe is our assistant producer and we had some help this week from Laura McCullum. I'm off next week Mike Mulcahy Minnesota Public Radio is senior political editor will be on hand. Hope you can tune in in June of nineteen twenty a mob lynched three black men in downtown Duluth and then posed with the bodies for a post card photo. You can hear from some of the people whose lives were changed by what happened that night visit postcard from a lynching at www.nasa.gov. Look radio dot-org. You're listening to Minnesota Public Radio partly cloudy Sky 72 degrees at Cana wfm 91.1 Minneapolis. And st. Paul Sunny to partly sunny through the afternoon could hit 77 degrees yet today partly cloudy tonight with a low near 60 tomorrow chance for some afternoon thunderstorms with a high temperature near 80 degrees.