Now I've Heard Everything

Happy Labor Day!This is the national holiday set aside to recognize the efforts and contributions of America's Workforce. 

So I want to revisit my interview almost a quarter-century ago with the man who was America's top labor leader for 14 years. 

John Sweeney was president of the AFL-CIO. I met him in 1996, about a year after he assumed the presidency of the Union.

In 21 seasons with his hometown Baltimore Orioles,Cal Ripken racked up some very enivable numbers: 3,184 hits. 431 home runs. 1,695 runs batted in.  A 19time All-Star, and two-time American League Most Valuable Plater.

But perhaps his greatest number was 2,632.  That's w many consecutive games Ripken played in,shattering the Lou Gehrig record of 2,130,  25 years ago this weekend.

It was 46 years ago this week that NBC TV viewers first heard that theme music introducing a series called "Littel House on the Prairie."

For the next eight years, it was a perennial viewer favorite.

One of the stars of the series was Melissa Anderson -- known in those years as "Melissa Sue Anderson"; she'll explain why, in this interview.  Anderson played "Mary," one member of the Ingalls family.

What is it like, growing up in what some say was the most famous family of the twentieth century?

Reeve Lindbergh knows. She was born in 1945 to Charles and Anne Morrow Lindbergh.  Her father was "Lucky Lindy" the aviator who made history in 1927 as the first pilot to cross the Atlantic Ocean in a solo flight.

By 1991 when i met and interviewed him, Stan Lee -- the genius behind Marvel Comics -- was a legend.  Almost royalty.

And as he told me then, the Stan Lee - Marvel Comics story actually went back decades. 

Together they transformed a medium that was at one time the exclusive domain of children into a much richer art form.

As public scandals go, this one might seem pretty benign, by today's low bar.  But in 1984, it was a big story when it was revealed thatthe authoirities had broken up a high-priced Manhattan escort service that was being run by a woman named Sydney Biddle Barrows.

Now, when a New York Post reporter uncovered the fact that the 32-year-old Barrows is from the Biddle family of Philadelphia, and is a direct descendant of some of the original Mayflower settlers, he dubbed her the "Mayflower Madam" -- and the name stuck.

Within two years of her company being put out of business, Barrows wrote a bestselling autobiography, called, of course, "The Mayflower Madam."  

Last week Democrats nominated Joe Biden for president. This week, Republicans will renominate Donald Trump, for a second term.

Let's go back 56 years, to July1964, when the GOP nominated Arizona Senator Barry Goldwater.

When I met him in 1988, the country was in the midst of the George H.W. Bush vs Michael Dukakis race. And as you're about to hear, Goldwater had some very specific ideas about that contest.

Years before her husband Al was elected vice president of the United States, Tipper Gore established a reputation of her own, as a social issues advocate. And her issue, in the late 80s, was protecting America's children from sex and violence in the media.

She was co-founder of the Parents Music Resource Center, which led the effort to require warning labels if on media contained profanity, sexual references, or violence.

I met her in 1987. She had just published a book called Raising PG Kids In An X-Rated Society.

Tomorrow, August 20th, is National Radio Day.

Yoday, we're going to revisit my interview 25 years ago with one of the greatest radio personalities of all time.

And I'm going to let you hear the question I asked him that day, and the answer he gave me, that has haunted me to this day. 

I'm talking about the great Wolfman Jack, one of the greatest figures in the history of the music business in America, as well as radio.

The 2020 Democratic National Convention is getting underway this week. It'll look a lot different from any past convention, though, because of the coronavirus pandemic.

Let's go back 48 years, to 1972, when the Democratic party nominated South Dakota Senator George McGovern as their standard-bearer.

Running on a liberal, anti-war platform, McGovern lost badly to Republican incumbent Richard Nixon -- who, less than two years later, resigned in disgrace over the Watergate scandal.

When I interviewed George McGovern 2004, in he had just published a book advocating for those same traditional liberal values.