January 23, 2005

R.I.P. Rose Mary Woods

Dropping like flies today... NY Times has the obituary: bq. Rose Mary Woods, Nixon's Secretary, Dies Rose Mary Woods, the devoted White House secretary to Richard Nixon who found herself at the center of one of the great mysteries of Watergate after 18 minutes of a crucial White House tape were somehow erased, died Saturday near her hometown in northeastern Ohio, her family said through a local funeral home. She was 87. And the 18-minutes: bq. In one of the most memorable photographs of the era, Miss Woods is shown attempting to recreate the awkward scenario in which, she said, she could have accidentally erased part of the tape as she was transcribing it on Mr. Nixon's orders in 1973, after the scandal had broken. The photograph shows Miss Woods at a desk, reaching far back over her left shoulder for a telephone as her foot hits a pedal controlling the transcription machine.
rose-tape.jpg
A more plausible explanation is that offered in the movie Dick Posted by DaveH at January 23, 2005 5:25 PM