TN Week: Elvis, Cash, and Tricky Dick (1972) w/ Jane Carr

This Day in Esoteric Political History

Jody Avirgan & Radiotopia

History

4.6 • 982 Ratings

🗓️ 9 August 2022

⏱️ 21 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Big news! Niki Hemmer is moving to Vanderbilt University to teach and found a center on the presidency. To help her get up to speed, she’s hosting “Tennessee Week” on the show with a few conversations around some key and fascinating moments in TN history.

Today, Niki and Kellie are joined by Jane Carr, editor at CNN and Memphis native, to discuss the strange ties between Richard Nixon and two musical icons — Elvis Presley and Johnny Cash. They break down Nixon’s understanding of the role of pop culture, and the details behind Elvis’s notorious visit to the White House.

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Transcript

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0:00.0	Hello and welcome to this day in esoteric political history I'm
0:08.0	Nicole Hemmer.
0:10.0	We are back for our final day of Tennessee week and today we are talking about two
0:16.2	Memphis singers and their relationship with one very controversial president.
0:20.9	On this day August August 9th, 1972, Johnny Cash was preparing for his
0:25.9	appearance just a few weeks later at the Republican National Convention
0:30.1	where he would support the re-election of Richard Nixon.
0:34.0	Just two weeks earlier, he had met with President Nixon at the White House to talk about prison reform.
0:40.0	That was not the first time Cash had appeared at the White House. He was there in April 1970
0:44.7	to sing for Nixon and invited guests. And nor was he the only Tennessee singer
0:49.6	gracing the halls of the White House that year. In December 1970, Elvis Presley made his famed visit. the 45 pistol not the kind of thing you normally walk into the Oval Office with but hey that's all this
1:06.2	So today we are going to discuss that the king the president and the man in black and to help us do that here as always is Kelly Carter Jackson of Wellesley College.
1:16.2	Kelly hello.
1:17.6	Hey there!
1:19.6	And back to talk about her hometown of Memphis Tennessee Tennessee, CNN editor, and all around amazing human being,
1:26.0	Jane Carr.
1:27.0	Jane, welcome back.
1:28.8	Thanks so much for having me.
1:30.5	So Jane, you grew up in Memphis.
1:32.4	I mean, how big were Johnny Cash and Elvis Presley in your day-to-day life?
1:38.0	Well, just to say they were part of an enormous just atmosphere I think growing up in Memphis you're surrounded by music
1:47.4	it's everywhere it's in every crevice and I think Johnny Cash and Elvis Presley are two iconic figures who on their own represent such a huge piece of that but they also I think bring into the forefront the more unseen pieces of that that come from just the huge tradition of black music, blues
	...

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