Tommy Curtis on the impetus for "Meetin' and Greetin'"

"You came up to me and said, 'You're doing a great job,'" and I think I just had huge ratings or whatever it is. You said, 'Tom, you know. I want to say this in the way Andy would say it, because he was a legendary boss and a great guy. He said, 'Tom, I don't think that cruisin' and boozin' is so correct anymore. Can you come up with something else?" You didn't say, 'Stop using 'cruisin' and boozin''," but you said, 'Come up with something else,' and that's how meetin' and greetin' began, thanks to you."

Tommy Curtis, The Matchmaker Meetin' and Greetin'

A Ockershausen: This is Andy Ockershausen and this is Our Town, and this is a special, special broadcast for me, a podcast, to introduce this man that I've known for many, many, many years. The actual creator ofthe iconic American phrase, "meetin' and greetin'," my guest is a local legend according to the Washington Post, and according to WMALFM. He was a Yale man also, and has the unique distinction of having appeared on the front page of the Post Style section, Metro section, Sunday magazine, and a story on page one. In addition, the City Paper profiled him in a lengthy cover piece. Further, he is a subject of an acclaimed filmmaker, Dave Nuttycombe's short documentary, Match Me if You Can. My guest today is Tommy "The Matchmaker" Curtis, and he's back from Hollywood. Tommy, welcome to Our Town.

Tommy Curtis: All of that is because of you, sir. I got to tell you, this is the man that discovered me.

A Ockershausen: You can't blame me for that, Tommy.

Tommy Curtis: It is, it's true.

A Ockershausen: You are Hollywood royalty. Your family, they must have had great roots in New York, where your family's originally from. Correct?

Tommy Curtis: Exactly. My grandfather was Gentleman Jack Cohn, and my uncle was the, what do you call it? I don't want to say hated, but the very controversial Harry Cohn.

A Ockershausen: Harry Cohn.

Tommy Curtis: He was King Cohn

A Ockershausen: A studio mogul.

Tommy Curtis: Right.

A Ockershausen: The first time I ever heard the word, mogul, it was about Harry Cohn.

Tommy Curtis: Gentleman Jack, they argued consistently over the years, because he was the business end, and King Cohn was this guy that was actually, they say-

A Ockershausen: The creative part of the business?

Tommy Curtis: Yeah. You know what? In the movie, The Godfather, the legend is that was my uncle Harry's horse, in his bed.

A Ockershausen: Is that correct?

Tommy Curtis: Because he gave the part to Sinatra in From Here to Eternity, that made Sinatra's career. That's the story, I understand. That's a myth, or whatever.

A Ockershausen: Yeah, but it's a good story.

Tommy Curtis: Yeah.

A Ockershausen: That's unusual to have the business side in New York and the creative side in Hollywood.

Tommy Curtis: Exactly.

A Ockershausen: Your family was the New York side.

Tommy Curtis: Right.

A Ockershausen: You've got so much to talk about, Tommy, but I ran into your name the first time when you were running for the office. I don't know whether it was the school board or something with the city, and you had a place called Wayne’s Love on K street. I couldn't believe it. I said, "Here's the guy, a saloon owner, wants to be on the school board. What is this all about?"

Tommy Curtis: May I just say one thing about that? John F. Kennedy's grandfather, Honey-Fitz, was a saloon owner too. I used that all the time in those days. I said, "Well, it's not that bad." Don't forget, I did go to Yale, so I'm not completely-

A Ockershausen: You're a Yale man.

Tommy Curtis: I'm a Yale man. That was the little castle on K street; you're right.

Charlie Brotman on Sugar Ray Leonard and success negotiating his first professional fight:

"First professional fight, the youngster normally gets $400. That's just tradition and normal. We were able to negotiate with Baltimore for $40,000, considerably higher. We worked with him the rest of his 15 year career."

Charlie Brotman, Public Relations Expert and Announcer of Presidents

A Ockershausen: This is a special treat for Our Town for our million of listeners to have the most famous announcer in the history of the President of the United States, Charles Brotman, a native Washingtonian, grew up here, went to Tech High School, and fortunately moved to West Virginia at one time.

Charlie Brotman: At one time.

Getting Started in Broadcasting

A Ockershausen: That's where he got started in broadcasting, as I recall.

Charlie Brotman: Correct. I went to the National Academy of Broadcasting.

A Ockershausen: And graduated.

Charlie Brotman: And graduated. It doesn't exist anymore, but it was on 16th Street.

A Ockershausen: Know it quite well, 16th and R Street. No, no. Higher there. Park Road.

Charlie Brotman: Yeah, in that area.

A Ockershausen: Charlie, did you get your first radio job in West Virginia?

Charlie Brotman: Ronceverte, West Virginia.

A Ockershausen: Wow.

Charlie Brotman: When I graduated, they said they'll get me a job. At first, they said it was in Owosso, Michigan in the wintertime. I told the people who were going to move me to Michigan, I said basically, "I'm busy right now."

A Ockershausen: Call me.

Charlie Brotman: Finally, when all my friends went back to school in the summertime, that was fall, and I had nothing to do, I said, "I better see what's available." What was available was Ronceverte, West Virginia. That was near the Hotel Grand ... What was the name of that hotel?

A Ockershausen: Bedford Springs?

Charlie Brotman: No.

A Ockershausen: Something like that in West Virginia?

Charlie Brotman: No.

A Ockershausen: West Virginia? Wheeling? Anyway.

Charlie Brotman: That famous hotel.

A Ockershausen: Greenbrier?

Charlie Brotman: Greenbrier. That's it.

A Ockershausen: Wow. That's a resort. That's fabulous.

Charlie Brotman: Yeah, so I would go-

A Ockershausen: Did you live at the Greenbrier?

Charlie Brotman: I used the Greenbrier, played golf there, swam there like I was a guest.

A Ockershausen: That's the best.

Charlie Brotman: I interviewed, goodness gracious, the Prince of Wales. Is that possible?

A Ockershausen: Yeah, he could have been visiting there. Absolutely.

Charlie Brotman: Yeah. He was visiting the Greenbrier, and I had a little microphone and tape recorder that I put right behind a plant. I was interviewing the Prince of Wales. He said that he'd just gotten off a golf course. He says, "Don't tell anybody, but I gave myself some “gimmes” I would never have made.

A Ockershausen: That sounds like Bill Clinton. The Prince of Wales was King of England for a while.

Charlie Brotman: That's it.

A Ockershausen: He abdicated. He married a woman from the state of Virginia.

Charlie Brotman: Yes.

A Ockershausen: Wallis Simpson.

Charlie Brotman: Correct.

A Ockershausen: We all know that, Charlies. We learn a lot.

Charlie Brotman: She was a really lovely lady.

A Ockershausen: I'll bet, being at the Greenbrier. That started you, and you've interviewed celebrities your whole life now, whether it was in live radio or over a PA system. Then you came to Washington and said, "I'm going to be in the PR business."

Charlie Brotman: Correct.

A Ockershausen: How'd that happen?

Charlie Brotman: Yeah, basically everything has a beginning and end. I hope the end isn't soon, but in any event,

Mark Russell, the laughter of politics, on roasting "Charlie Brotman -

"Why did I want to get on? Because it was a roast and you must go on first. It's an old rule of the Friars Club. The guy to say, mmhmmhm gets all the laughs. In Charlie's case, there's one obvious reference. I talked about how wonderful RFK Stadium was and that there's no AstroTurf at RFK Stadium and the only AstroTurf there at all was on Charlie Brotman's head. Referring of course to his magnificent hairpiece made by little old ladies in Iran."

Mark Russell, Political Satirist and Entertainer

A Ockershausen: I'm Andy Ockershausen and this is Our Town. We have the distinct pleasure of talking to a Washington legend who is also a Buffalo legend and he's my legend and his name is Mark Russell.

Mark Russell, WMAL and Bill Trumbull

Mark Russell: Thank you Andy. Thank you. You gave me my first job in radio, right in this building. WMAL, this was the first nonsmoking building in the city. It opened in the late '60s, early '70s and people said, that's never going to work. You can't smoke in the entire building?

A Ockershausen: That's right, it drove Bill Trumbull crazy.

Mark Russell: I was on with Bill Trumbull and you gave me that job too.

A Ockershausen: Absolutely.

Mark Russell: We were on Sundays. This was when WMAL carried the Redskin game so this was off season.

A Ockershausen: Right, I recall.

Mark Russell: Trumbull and I are on and we have a new sponsor, a billiard academy. Not a sleazy pool room but a billiard academy. We said, we want to welcome our new sponsor, fancy billiard academy, that's what they call them now. Bill said, I don't know how wholesome they are. He said, I was there the other night and I engaged two little old ladies in a game and I beat them and they took me out behind the place and broke my thumbs.

A Ockershausen: Only Trumbull. Didn't we do something with you in a snowstorm too, had to pick you up somewhere?

Mark Russell: I was home and I couldn't make it to the station. Again, it was a Sunday. Tremendous snowstorm and they gave me the names of the schools that are closed. Okay, read these names. This school is closed, this school is closed, this church is closed. I said, the Pixieland Day School, which was where my daughter was going, a little day school. Pixieland Day School will be open but the Pentagon will be closed. Well, the switchboard lit up. The Pentagon is closed? What do you mean?

A Ockershausen: Only you, Mark Russell.

Mark Russell: I'm surprised you didn't fire me then.

A Ockershausen: Those were the great days of WMAL but we want to talk about you and your early days in Buffalo. Were you born in Buffalo, New York?

Mark Russell: Yes, I went to Catholic school.

A Ockershausen: Tenacious.

Mark Russell: I was 18 years of age before I knew that Protestants also played basketball. As a young man I dodged the draft, I did it my joining the Marine Corps.

A Ockershausen: I did not know that.

The Marine Corps

Mark Russell: After the nuns in Catholic school, Marine boot camp was a piece of cake. I enlisted during the Korean War, the forgotten war. I never forgot. I was wounded in that war. It was Tijuana but I was wounded.

A Ockershausen: Where did you go to basic in Camp Lejeune?

Mark Russell: No, I went to Parris Island, which was déjà vu going on these days.

A Ockershausen: It was tough.

Mark Russell: They've got a huge scandal now, a horrible thing. I was there. There were seven Marines killed back in 1953. They were drowned by this drill instructor who was busted down from Staff Sergeant to Buck Private. We've got this hazing going on now, which is tremendous.

A Ockershausen: Were you on the base?

Mark Russell: No, I was there before that. We had to shine our shoes,

Ray Schulte on going out on his own -

"Once I said that to myself I go 'What am I doing? What am I doing? What am I doing?' I was just so focused. I just said, 'I'm going to do it.' I had no idea that Don Mattingly was going to be the 1984 batting champion."

Ray Schulte, Sports Marketer Extraordinaire, Schulte Sports

A Ockershausen: This is Andy Ockershausen and this Our Town, and we have the great pleasure today to talk to the president, owner, chief medical officer, chief boss of Schulte Sports founded in New York City in 1984. Ray, welcome to our town.

Ray Schulte: It's my pleasure to be part of Our Town.

A Ockershausen: Our Town, right Ray. You knew that.

Ray Schulte: Yes, I did.

A Ockershausen: I wish it was my town, but it's not. It's Our Town, everybody has it. Ray, I found out about a lot of things about you, and knowing you personally of course makes a big difference, but to find out about your early years in New York. I thought you were from up New York State but you tell me Westchester.

Ray Schulte: That's where I was born. I was born and raised in Westchester up near Peekskill, West Point.

A Ockershausen: Big bucks.

Ray Schulte: You keep saying that.

A Ockershausen: They're building a new bridge. Is that the Tapan Zee Bridge across the Hudson?

Ray Schulte: It's an old bridge.

A Ockershausen: Goes over to West Point?

Ray Schulte: Close to it, yes.

A Ockershausen: It's a big, huge bridge. It's going to be eight lanes or something. It's probably a public works project.

Ray Schulte: Have you ever been to West Point?

A Ockershausen: I love it. Absolutely.

Ray Schulte: It's one of my favorite places.

A Ockershausen: We took Janice up there. My wife Janice, of course. We were guests of the Commandant of Cadets, and they were playing football. They were playing Harvard. I went to the football game and I called my friend Henry, the bookie, and said, "Henry, I'm betting. Harvard, they got the worst looking uniforms. Nothing looks alike. They're awful. I'm betting on Army." Harvard decimated them, beat the hell out of Army, but that's away from West Point. Isn't that a fabulous post, isn't it?

Weschester, NY | SUNY Cortland State | Tampa

Ray Schulte: It's fantastic. I was born and raise in Westchester. Then I went to school in Cortland State. That's up near Ithaca, Cornell.

A Ockershausen: It's SUNY?

Ray Schulte: That's a SUNY school. Yes. Spent four years up there.

A Ockershausen: That's close to Rochester? Cold country?

Ray Schulte: No, it's actually in between Ithaca and Syracuse.

A Ockershausen: Oh, I see. Cold country, right?

Ray Schulte: Cold country.

A Ockershausen: The finger lakes?

Ray Schulte: Close.

A Ockershausen: What did you do in the winter in Cortland besides drink? You told me a story about the bars.

Ray Schulte: Remember, we were college kids. We spent a lot of time downtown just mingling and getting to know other people. You know how it is.

A Ockershausen: 10,000 for SUNY. They're six campuses all over the state of New York?

Ray Schulte: Yes. I loved it. I went up there to play football and lacrosse and baseball. It was fun for me, and then I graduated there and went down to Florida in Tampa.

A Ockershausen: How do you go from Westchester ... Did you go to Miami first or Tampa first?

Ray Schulte: After I graduated, my whole deal was I was going to go down and visit my brother who went to the University of South Florida, and my uncle who worked in Tampa he had just started a radio station in Tampa, WRBQ.

A Ockershausen: Is he still alive? Is the station still on the air?

Ray Schulte: Yes. It's changed formats.

A Ockershausen: Oh, I'm sure. The whole world has changed.

Marty Aronoff on sitting in the broadcast booth -

"My elbow is one of the most televised elbows in the country, because it's usually in the shot. Sometimes I tell friends of mine, 'If you say something nice, I'll write your name on my elbow.'"

Marty Aronoff, The Legend Native Washingtonian

A Ockershausen: This is Andy Ockershausen, and this is Our Town. We're talking to the busiest guy in Our Town, the man who knows all, sees all, and tells all, but nobody knows him. That's why we're so delighted to have him and a chance to talk to the real Marty Aronoff. Marty, welcome to Our Town!

Marty Aronoff: I'm glad to be here, Andy. Looking forward to it.

A Ockershausen: I don't know how we caught you on the rebound, but you're not doing a game tonight or you didn't do one last night, but you got one coming up, right?

Marty Aronoff: I'm doing game five, the deciding game, tomorrow night for Fox Sports. The Dodgers at the Nationals with Kenny Albert

A Ockershausen: Right here in Wheatey-ville, right?

Marty Aronoff: Absolutely, and it's one of the big events in Washington sports in a long time.

A Ockershausen: Oh, I tell you Marty, the town will be going crazy. I'm sorry that they have to take this fifth game, I thought they were going to win. I just felt so good at getting Kirshel out of there was a made thing, but it didn't happen.

Anyway Marty, Janice just pointed out to me, being a dummy, I assume everybody knows Marty Aronoff is the world’s greatest statistician.

Marty Aronoff: Thank you.

A Statistician

A Ockershausen: Now tell us what a statistician is.

Marty Aronoff: I sit right next to the announcers at every event I work. I work mainly with ESPN, I do their Monday night football, I do college football for them. I do the NBA, major league baseball.

I'm observing the game. I give notes to the announcers that I don't want to ever break up their rhythm when they're saying things over the air, but as I make observations I'll give them notes. If something happens that I think sort of has a historical bent to it, something today that may have related to a game in past years, I'll pass that on.

I'm talking to the people down in the production truck, in the television truck, about graphics we can put up to supplement what the announcers are saying. I've been doing it full-time since 1983 and I actually started part-time in 1975, so it's been a long and fruitful career.

A Ockershausen: Long and wonderful career! Now tell us about the early days. You are a Washingtonian. A native.

Wilson High School, Penn State and Northwestern

Marty Aronoff: I am, I was born in Washington, I went to Wilson High School.

A Ockershausen: It's our neighbor up here, WMAL.

Marty Aronoff: Absolutely, and I graduated in '56, I went to Penn State for four years, majored in mathematics. Then went to Northwestern and got a masters in business, and I came back here to Washington, I worked for the federal government for 17 years at mainly what was called the National Bureau of Standards.

A Ockershausen: I remember that so well, my god.

Marty Aronoff: Then I started doing the statistics part-time as sort of a hobby with a friend of mine, Warner Wolf, and loved it so my I decided to see if I could be maybe the first person to make a full-time career out of it.

A Ockershausen: Why would you go to Penn State? Does that offer some course that, obviously is has nothing to do with statistics, but you picked Penn State, obviously.

Marty Aronoff: Well, having lived in the city all my life and my closest friend who I was with in high school had been admitted to Penn State. He said, "You know, Marty, you might like to go to this school." I went up there with him and loved the campus.

A Ockershausen: You could ride back and forth together.

Marty Aronoff: Yeah.

Guido Adelfio on his passion for travel -

"It's hard work. It's a lot of energy to fly to Europe for three days, do stuff the whole time, and fly home and head right back to the office, but I love it. The beneficiaries of that are our clients."

Guido Adelfio, Global Travel Expert, Bethesda Travel

A Ockershausen: We have a special guest here today for Our Town. A man who knows Our Town and probably knows your town and their town and every town. It's Guido Adelfio from Bethesda Travel, a very, very dear friend of WMAL for so many years. Guido, where did Bethesda Travel start?

Guido Adelfio: Good morning, Andy!

A Ockershausen: We did that already.

Guido Adelfio: We did that?

A Ockershausen: It's not morning, it's night.

La Familigia, Antonio and Margaret Adelfio, and Bethesda Travel

Guido Adelfio: Thanks for having me. Bethesda Travel started in a dream of my parents. In 1961, my father was working for Air France.

A Ockershausen: He had been in the Italian Air Force.

Guido Adelfio: He had been in the Italian Air Force. He was trained as a lawyer. They met in Capri, believe it or not. Got married here in the States. Went back to Italy. I was born. Back to Canada.

A Ockershausen: I've been to your place where you were born, if you remember that.

Guido Adelfio: That's right. That's true.

A Ockershausen: I loved it.

Guido Adelfio: Then, we stayed a few years in Canada. He got his law degree. Came to the States, practiced as a lawyer then started working for Air France. He was doing very well. The way I heard it, I was a child at the time, there was a promotion. Well, the French guy got the promotion and the Italian guy was left sitting at the desk. He said, "The heck with this. I'm going to start my own business." That was in December of 1961.

A Ockershausen: Oh my god . . .that's 70-some years ago.

Guido Adelfio: Well, not quite, but ...

A Ockershausen: Feels like 70 years.

Guido Adelfio: Almost 60.

A Ockershausen: Guido, but did he start in Bethesda?

Guido Adelfio: In Bethesda, right on Waverly Street. If you're familiar with the Vamoose Bus?

A Ockershausen: Yes.

Guido Adelfio: Where it stops on that same block, we had a rented office. In the day, it was the Suburban Trust Bank Building. Nearby, you had the Hot Shops. No metro yet. Bethesda's really changed.

A Ockershausen: You mentioned two businesses that don't exist anymore.

Guido Adelfio: Correct.

A Ockershausen: Suburban Trust and Hot Shop.

Guido Adelfio: There was also a Dart Drug.

A Ockershausen: That's what happens.

Guido Adelfio: There was a Dart Drug and a Grand Union. There was a Grand Union. A lot of stuff.

A Ockershausen: Guido, when he started in the business, it was a different world, of course. He was on the ground floor of what was going to be the future, is travel.

Guido Adelfio: Correct.

A Ockershausen: I mean, people who help other people travel.

Guido Adelfio: Absolutely.

A Ockershausen: He was really on the ground floor.

What Stamps Had to Do With It

Guido Adelfio: When he was in University, he had two experiences, actually, three. One as a child. His uncles had a shipping agency. They used to bring home, this was a kid in the '30s in Italy, Mussolini was in charge. They used to bring home stamps from all over the world, decorated stamps. Sri Lanka, Brazil, Finland. As a child, that wakened him up that there was a world outside of Palermo, Sicily.

A Ockershausen: Amazing.

Guido Adelfio: Absolutely. That woke up his imagination. Then, after the war, he went in the Air Force. Then, he was in University. At that time, he had two jobs. One was, I think he thought he would meet more girls, but he got a job at the fledging Club Med that started right after the war as a tour gu...

"Often imitated, never duplicated, where the elite meet to eat." ~Tommy Jacomo of The Palm Restaurant

Tommy Jacomo, The Palm Restaurant, Washington DC

A Ockershausen: This is Our Town with Andy Ockershausen. I'm delighted to have a man here that I've known since he came to Washington, and I remember in 1972, Tommy. Tommy Jacomo, as far as I'm concerned, is the mayor of the D.C. restaurant world, and certainly knows more famous people than any ten people I know. Tommy, welcome to Our Town.

Tommy Jacomo: Pleasure, thanks for having me Andy.

Beginnings

A Ockershausen: It's a long way from New York, New York.

Tommy Jacomo: It's all downhill.

A Ockershausen: You grew up in the Queens, right?

Tommy Jacomo: Correct.

A Ockershausen: Went to school in New York City?

Tommy Jacomo: Yeah, very little schooling, I was hustling most of the time.

A Ockershausen: Your family was in, was your family in the restaurant business?

Tommy Jacomo: My father was a bartender at Waldorf Astoria for 40 years. He started in the men's bar, in the Waldorf Astoria, those days, no ladies were allowed in the bar.

A Ockershausen: Men's bar only? Is that right? Can't do that now, of course.

Tommy Jacomo: No. Then he came ... [crosstalk 00:01:05]

A Ockershausen: I think that bar on the Mayflower was a men's bar.

Tommy Jacomo: Maybe, then they turned it into the Bull and Bear. That's where he worked until the end of his career.

A Ockershausen: Your father ran that restaurant all those years? Well that was a great, great place. The Waldorf was the place in New York, correct?

Tommy Jacomo: One of the best hotels in the city, yeah.

A Ockershausen: I love the Waldorf. We used to go up with Sonny and Margo Jurgensen to the Giants game, Janice and I did, and stayed at the Waldorf, but they were the good old days. Tommy, you worked in New York then, you got into the bar business in New York?

Tommy Jacomo: It was 1993, I got a job in the New York Hilton hotel as a barback, that's where you just prepare for the bartenders. You cut the fruit, get ice.

A Ockershausen: Was that a new hotel at the time?

Tommy Jacomo: Brand new, just opened up, 1963.

A Ockershausen: Wow.

Tommy Jacomo: Yep.

A Ockershausen: I remember the great, great, New York Hilton was a great hotel when it opened. It was one of the jewels in the Hilton crown, along with the Waldorf and so forth. Was anybody else in your family in the bar business? Your dad, of course.

Tommy Jacomo: No, my brother's in the catering business.

A Ockershausen: Which brother?

Tommy Jacomo: Raymond.

A Ockershausen: My friend Raymond? He was in the catering business in the city?

Tommy Jacomo: Yes.

A Ockershausen: Or in Queens?

Tommy Jacomo: In Queens, Flushing.

A Ockershausen: Very successful, I would imagine. Raymond knew the business side of it, right?

The Palm Restaurant - Getting Started, Washington Intelligentsia and Competition (Then and Now)

Tommy Jacomo: Yes. I came down to be his personality.

A Ockershausen: Then this thing happened, because I lived through part of it with your people. A friend of mine came to me and said, we're putting a group of people together to entice a New York restaurant to open a Washington division. It was, what did he call him, Peter Palm Tree?

Tommy Jacomo: Mark Sandground. They put the group together.

A Ockershausen: Mark Sandground, and what's I'm thinking, Dickerson, Wyatt Dickerson was in that group.

Tommy Jacomo: That's correct, yes.

A Ockershausen: That's where I first got close to him. I knew his wife, because she had worked as Nancy Handsman, and then she became Nancy Dickerson. She had worked at WMAL at one time, and Wyatt asked me to get in a group, and I met all you guys,

"There are a few people in the world you can say you’ve known for over 50 years and Donald Dell is one of them." says Our Town host Andy Ockershausen.

Donald Dell, Tennis Icon

Andy reads a description of Donald Dell from a Washington Post article that pretty much sums up who he is:

Arguably the most powerful man in his sport, Dell is a political animal. He was an advance man for Robert Kennedy in 1966 and in RFK's presidential campaign in 1968, and in style and substance he remains a Kennedy man, equally idealistic and well-versed in practical politics. He has Establishment credentials - Landon School '56, Yale '60, Virginia Law '64 - but can wear brass sknuckles with his Ivy League suit. He is polished, sometimes charming, but not bashful about using strong-arm tactics.

As a sports agent and founder of ProServ (now known as SFX), he’s represented some of the biggest names in sports such as Michael Jordan, Arthur Ashe, Moses Malone, Stan Smith, James Worthy, and John Lucas . . .In 1972, Jack Kramer and Donald Dell founded the Association of Tennis Professionals (ATP). The bylaws were written in Dell's offices, and he was the first Executive Director. He ran the ATV and was the general counsel for eight year.

Donald Dell as a Tennis Player, Advance Man for RFK and Lawyer

As the youngest captain ever of the US Davis Cup Team, Donald talks about the early years and how he got started in tennis. He was fortunate to have lived across the street in Bethesda from Edgemoor Tennis Club. “I lived about 50 yards away from the club and I’d play all day long, all summer long.” Andy added that Edgemoor was a hotbed of good players like Fred McNair and Fred Kovaleski. One of the great things about Edgemoor was that they had a rule, if you were a good player - highly ranked, you could get right in without having to wait, so that great players wanted to play there and Donald got the benefit of playing with the best in the sport.

Playing championship tennis opened the world up to Donald to associate with movers and shakers which allowed him to take advantage of opportunities he wouldn't have otherwise. He tells a funny story about his experiences as a player in Russia, over the course of 4 years, Donald went to Russia 8 times. He was approached by the CIA to help with the defection of two top Russian players. Just as he was about to close the deal to help one of the players defect, his Russian player came home to find his beautiful wife in bed with the gym teacher. The player pulled a gun out of the night stand and shot the teacher dead. The Russian was sentence to 8 years in jail.

The late Robert Kennedy was a very dear friend of Donald's. Kennedy hired Donald as his advance man of his 1968 presidential campaign. Donald was responsible for hiring Rosie Greer and other football players as part of his security detail. Bobby and his wife Ethel loved tennis and Donald played with them on a regular basis and taught him how to hit a backhand.

Andy asked about Donald’s decision to go out on his own after his former law firm invited him to set up shop at Hogan & Hartson representing top tennis players. Donald said, “I decided to do my own thing with one other person."

"I was really ironically the first tennis agent anywhere in the world January 1970, when I retired from the Davis Cup. . . what really helped me the most was having been a player, and being a winning captain on the Davis Cup Team."

Gonzales v. Pasarell, Wooden Tennis Rackets

Andy and Donald swap stories about the two day, no tie breaker Wimbeldon match between 41 year old Pancho Gonzales and a much younger Charlie Pasarell. At the time it was the longest match in history of Wimbledon. Donald and Andy continue to discuss the way tennis has changed in the past 40 years.

"The firecrackers go all over the place. . .one of those photographers that just drove around, his name was Bill Beall, a nice guy, he took a picture when I was talking to the child, the child was with his mother. His father was in the military and was out of the country." ~Maurice Cullinane

Andy Ockershausen: We are delighted, exceptionally delighted, in Our Town to have a special guest that I've known for more years than I hate to admit but he's a special man, Maurice Cullinane, former Chief of Police of the Metropolitan Police Department, who is a native Washingtonian.

Maurice Cullinane - Retired, Chief of Police, Metropolitan Police Department

Andy Ockershausen: Maurice Cullinane was a Navy veteran, got out of the Navy in 1951 and became a cop or a policeman as we call them now but when he grew up they were cops and they were great and things were different but they really weren't, Cully.Your years in the force saw a lot of changes, a lot of things happen. They were tumultuous in the seventies and I recall people saying this is great, we've settled all the problems now and look what we're facing.

1977 Hanafi Siege

Andy Ockershausen: Cully was the first police chief to face the so-called terrorists, Hanafi Muslims, and I don't know what year was that Cully. 77?

Maurice Cullinane: 1977.

Andy Ockershausen: And they were doing serious, serious threat to our city.

Maurice Cullinane: Actually, they came into the B'nai B’rith at ten-thirty in the morning seven gunmen they took a hundred and twenty some hostages there.

Andy Ockershausen: At the B’nai B’rith?

Maurice Cullinane: At the B’nai B’rith and I went up and was trying to talk to them, find out what that was their complaint and we were just yelling up and down the steps and I got notified several hours later that they took over the Islamic center up on Massachusetts Avenue. There was three gunmen in there and so we went back and we had a command center setup because we were having so many demonstrations and I tried to talk to them and then they took over the district building and that's where shots were fired. A young reporter, his name was Maurice Williams, was killed and…

Andy Ockershausen: Was he the only fatality?

Maurice Cullinane: He was the only fatality during the whole time but the Marion, who, Marion Barry, who was later then called the mayor for life, he was shot, he was on the council at the time, and he was shot and the bullet hit him in a place that would have killed him but the bullet bounced off of the walls before it hit him and it was spent (Note: It is reported on Wikipedia that "The gunmen also shot D.C. Protective Service Division police officer Mack Cantrell, who died a few days later in the hospital of a heart attack.")

A: And he was not a target then it was an accident almost?

M: They were just shooting at random it was something, just an unusual situation. Back in 1973 the black Muslims had been attacked up on 16th street and there was a fellow, his name was Hamaas. This wasn't actually his name, he could have changed it legally I don't know, but his name was McGee. He was 54 years old and he had been in the Army and he got discharged for mental instability and he was with the black Muslims. The black Muslims just appeal to a very small number of blacks because they were advocating . . .

A: very militant group

M: they were extremely militant and he was not so he dropped out of black Muslims to be in just an orthodox Muslim but he did it with the letter that irritated the black Muslims and they came in 1973 to a house that was owned by Kareem Abdul-Jabbar and they killed five of his [Hasaam's] children, one of whom was just months old, 2 to 3 months old, and they killed a total of seven people and so the homicide squad came and locked them up.

"I'm waiting, Andy . . .for the day in a few years not too long when my grandchildren and I will jump on a ferry in Georgetown take it down to the stadium, and before we go into the stadium, on a saturday afternoon game, we're going to change into our bathing suits, dive into the Anacostia, swim and have lunch that's what I'm looking forward to." ~Mark Tuohey

Ernie Baur, Wendy Rieger, Mark Tuohey and Lucille Baur

Mark Tuohey - a name not well known to the average citizen of Our Town, but he is a key player in the law of some of the most visible trials in local politics over the past 30 years and is one of the people responsible for bringing baseball back to Washington.You’ve probably seen Mark Tuohey sitting in the second row in box seats at the Nats games, in the "Halls of Justice" for some of the city’s more interesting cases or sitting next to the Mayor of our Nation’s Capital, he’s the venable Mark Tuohey and he’s Andy’s guest on Our Town.

Born in Rochester, NY, the home of America’s most recognizable brands like Kodak, Xerox and Wegman’s, Mark Tuohey is the son of an FBI agent. He attended Bonaventure and went to Fordham University Law School. In talking to Andy O during this interview, he shared some incredible stories about growing up in upper state New York, sitting next to America’s most famous coach Vince Lombardi and prosecuting such cases as the Columbus Day Bombing Case, White Water, Enron and representing Congressman Bob Ney in the Jack Abramoff Indian lobbying scandal. He’s been referred to as one of Washington's "go-to" white collar defense attorneys.

Andy asked Mark Tuohey about current projects he’s working on for Our Town in the Mayor’s office. Mark shared a few thoughtful ideas about RFK stadium - as a great location for the Washington Redskins to return to Washington, bringing to mind the fact that RFK is the very best place to serve the tri-state area. Other places like Sterling or FedExpress Field don’t satisfy the criteria as well as RFK has done. Andy and Mark both agreed that rebuilding the RFK complex is a fantastic idea. The old St. Elizabeth’s site is now going to be the home court facility of the Washington Mystic’s and a practice facility for the Wizards.

The soccer stadium is also in the works for completion in the next couple of years. Once completed, Tuohey suggests that the city will see the improvement and development of the community just like the Lerners and the Pollins did with the Nationals' Stadium and the Verizon Center, which will also rejuvenate the Anacostia area in and around the Southeast and Southwest waterfront. Mark gives most of the credit to Mayor Tony Williams who was committed to seeing an area of the city transform.

Most recently Mark Tuohey talked to Andy about his decision not to pursue his run for DC Attorney General but dropped out of the race to endorse his friend Karl Racine who he felt was a better fit for the position. Shortly after that he was hired by newly elected Muriel Bowser as her General Counsel.

Andy and Mark turned to personal matters acknowledging that Mark has been married to his wife Marty for close to 50 years and they have three boys who have started a foundation using sports to bring young folks between the ages of 8 and 18 together using the notion that if you learn to play together you can live together. It’s a program that is now all over the world in Israel, South Africa, Northern Ireland and on the West Bank and Cyprus. He’s very proud of his boys.

We hope you have enjoyed this all new episode of Our Town with Andy Ockershausen and Mark Tuohey. We invite you to listen to each new episode of Our Town as they roll out over the next several months. You can subscribe to the Our Town podcast on iTunes, Google Play, or if you complete the subscription form in the sidebar to the right,