Richard F. "Dick" Celeste part 3

CW: So in your second term as state rep. how did you decide, when you had a real hard decision to make what was your process of making those decisions?

RC: One of the lessons that my mentor shared with me quite out of the blue I was sitting in front of Chester Bowles in his office one day. And he asked me. Do you have a traffic light? And I said what do you mean by a traffic light. And he said inside, he said inside do you have a light that flashes green or red when you confront a certain issue? And I obviously looked puzzled. And he said Look Dick there's gonna be times when you can take as much time as you want to reach a decision. You can get more information. Talk to more experts. Sleep on it. But he said there are gonna be times when you're confronted with a decision that you have to make on the spot. And you have to have a traffic light that flashes red or green. And that notion that was something I reflected on as I watched him at work. And then it became much more real to me as I moved into a situation where I was making a leadership decision on behalf of the state reps from the Cuyahoga County delegation or I was involved in a often a debate with Vern Riffe about how we should be handling a particular issue on the floor. By the way my decisions there were generally overruled. By the man who went on to be speaker for so many years. But it was important to me as I looked at key issues in the legislature. A question of where do you stand up and vote on a particular issue. We were revising the Ohio code. At one point during a service in the legislature and several of us wanted to eliminate the death penalty from the revised code. And so there was a motion on a floor to strike the death penalty language. And it was a chance to go on record on an issue that I suppose if you're thinking about your long term election prospects you might not want to go on the record on. And so that was a decision that came to me pretty quickly because my green light said vote in favor of eliminating the death penalty. So I'm not sure that Chester Bowles saw himself always as a teacher but he certainly was. And that second term in the state legislature was where I began to practice it in a public policy arena. And then the big decision really in 19 in the summer of 1973 I asked my brother to gather a group of people. Folks who'd worked principally on the McGovern campaign or in other political campaigns to consider running for statewide office. And I had one person make the case for running for secretary of state and I had another person make the case for running for lieutenant governor. And we gathered at one of the state parks. We spent a couple of days. We would take breaks and play touch football, but this was. Okay, Dick is not going to run for state rep again. What does he do in 1974? And in the end I decided that while I would have had more responsibility as secretary of state at that time we had a Democratic governor with a Republican lieutenant governor we did not elect governor and lieutenant governor in tandem and I felt it was important for Jack Gilligan to have a right strong what I called a strong right hand that he could count on. And so my green light flashed on the lieutenant governor's race and that was a decision that was made probably in August of 1973. Not announced then, but that was when we began to think about a strategy to win a statewide race. And it was a good time to move on from the legislature for me. So by putting together a campaign that extended beyond the one of ninety nine House districts was a significant challenge.

CW: Are these? Is this the start of the meetings that kind of continued throughout your career?

RC: Well, yes we did an annual meeting. Well meeting we did an annual gathering which we called the Willaloo and a Willaloo was a weekend at a state park with probably anywhere from when we began 15 or 16 friends who were also active in the political arena and supportive of my efforts. And it probably grew to an invitation list of 40 and we would take over a good chunk of one of the state parks. We, it was modeled really or inspired by again by something that Chet and Steb Bowles did. They had a reunion weekend on Memorial Day every year and a reunion at their home in Essex, Connecticut brought together probably 50 or 60 folks who had worked for them in various stages and Chet's career. Going back to when he was in the OPA with Franklin Roosevelt and then up through Doug Bennett and Dick Celeste and people who'd been with him toward the end of his public service career. But it was a it was called the Chet Set a take off on the jet set. And we had our Memorial Day reunions with songs and barbecue and shad and shad roe from the Connecticut River and that was very good. We didn't for the Willaloos we did not have shad or shad roe. But we usually had plenty of food. And the highlight even in that very first meeting when we were trying to decide what to do state wide. The highlight was Saturday evening devoted to charades. And Tom Sawyer who later went on to be Mayor of Akron and a State Representative, a Congressman and State Senator. Tom was probably, Tom Sawyer and Tom Meyer who is for longtime an aide in the Ohio Senate and had been a driver for me on several of my campaigns. The two Toms were maybe the most outstanding charades performers in those meetings. So we always combined kind of serious work with a chance to enjoy each other's company.

CW: Does the name Willaloo have a meaning?

RC: No, it was made up.

CW: It was made up?

RC: It was made up. Dagmar, I think Dagmar and Joyce Sawyer may have worked on the first one and they needed to give it a name and so they decided to have something that sounded kind of like it might have been a Native American ritual I think. Willaloo just happen then. So twenty years, twenty five Willaloos later.

CW: Do you continue to have them?

RC: No. Although as I went through my papers I saved all the files from our Willaloos and I thought it would be really fun to have a Willaloo reunion. The problem is or problem. The reality is that there are a handful of people who aren't with us anymore and so it wouldn't be quite the same.

CW: You think, how essential to like the decision making process for some of your big decisions was the Willaloos.

RC: Well the Willaloos were important occasionally for decision making purposes. For example after I was elected lieutenant governor Jim Rhodes put four issues on the ballot in Ohio and there was a question about whether we should support whether we should oppose those issues. Two issues 2, 3, 4 and five they were very big bond issues and they had strong support from the chamber of commerce, organized labor. There wasn't really I think there were many Democrats who wanted to oppose Rhodes on this. I was inclined to oppose him because as I have put a burden on future governors. That wasn't fair. I mean when you borrow to pay these things and then use general revenue funds you have to be mindful of the commitment you're making for the long term. And four issues seemed to me to be over the top. And so we had a kind of interesting debate about what to do on that because if we oppose them and he won substantially it would be. Well who's this right. On the other hand if we could defeat them it would A) it would kind of give our the field organization that we had kind of folks around the state who were dedicated to helping me and helping a vision for a Democratic Party. We'd give them some sense of hey we can make a difference. And so there was a vigorous debate about that but often it was more like OK how do we want to organize the governor's race. Do we, how do we divide up the state? What kind of tactics should we use? And it wasn't so much of a here's a decision that we have to make let's get input from everybody. And sometimes it was more of a kind of reporting session. Let's hear from people around the state in terms of what they're involved in what's going on. Are there races candidates that we should be helping in an upcoming race and so on. And there was always plenty of food and plenty of fun, Serious touch football we sent a couple of people to the hospital from touch football games. I have a vivid recollection of what happened we had we forgot the football from one Willaloo .And I forgot, I think we were at Salt Fork State Park. And so we sent my brother and David Hetsler one or our super volunteers to find a football. And they went wherever they needed to go to find a football and we were all waiting for some time. It was probably an hour hour and 15 minutes and as they drove in the park road to where we were in our cabins in the field where we were going to play they were in a hurry and Hetsler had his arm out of the car waving this football behind them. There was a highway patrol car with its red flasher flashing and they got ticketed for their enthusiasm as they brought the football to our game.

CW: So, as much about relaxing and connecting as it was.

RC: It was you know in my very first state rep campaign the volunteers the young volunteers asked the question you know are we having fun yet. And that became kind of a standard test of how it was going. I came to feel that if a campaign wasn't having fun along with everything else then it wasn't on track. And in fact in the lieutenant governor's race I think it was Bonnie Milenthal who had T-shirts made saying which they broke out at the Willaloo. Are we having fun yet? You know as a prompt for how we should be thinking about a good campaign.

CW: So obviously there are quite a few children at these Willaloos.

RC: There were children remember we had kiddie activities. We had on Sunday morning two or three the folks put together a worship service that people could come to if they wished. My big contribution was always pancakes, blueberry pancakes and bacon whatever I did a pancake breakfast on Sunday or pancake brunch on Sunday for the gang. And that was the tradition.

CW: So in 73 you decide you're going to focus on lieutenant governor.

RC: Right, right.

CW: As opposed to secretary of state. You've been through enough campaigns to know how to announce yourself.

RC: I did. I did know how to announce myself. Yeah. We weren't sure how many people would run for office. It became a very crowded field. I think there were nine candidates in that race. And Jerry Austin made a point early on that this was an election that would begin with one vote. And by that he meant if Jack Gilligan made an endorsement in the primary as the sitting governor that would have a substantial impact and therefore he said the first campaign is for one vote. And we developed a strategy to engage Governor Gilligan in the process of choosing me. And from the governor standpoint we knew he was concerned about ethnic voters. Tony Calabrese who'd been the nominee in 1970 was a candidate again. He was not a strong candidate but he had an ethnic name. There was a member of Gilligan's cabinet Phil Richley from Youngstown who is also an ethnic Italian American and was interested in running. But Phil had never been a politician really. So he had some support and I think Gilligan thought of him as a pretty strong candidate. And I think Jack wasn't sure that I was A) Italian enough or B) and maybe more importantly strong enough outside of Cleveland that to really be a help. So we went back to this notion of guerrilla tactics how do you kind of change the rules or how do you do something that is out of the box. And the first step was to create the appearance of a very strong vigorous statewide organization. So we had some early campaign literature. This is in the spring of 1974 relatively early in the spring in 1974. And we identified the precincts of each political reporter in the major metropolitan newspapers and Jack Gilligan's home precinct. And there were, that was perhaps 10 or 12 precincts out of 12,000 across the state. And we canvassed on a Saturday morning. We canvassed each of those precincts. We knocked on the doors and distributed literature in each of those precincts and within a couple of days there were stories being written. Hey the Celeste organization is everywhere. I mean because these political guys got back to the office in Columbus and you know what. Celeste canvassed our district our precinct today. Yeah, well he canvassed, he had canvassers in my district too. And there were canvassers in Jack Gilligan's district. So step one was to spread a little fairy dust on our field organization right. And then the second thing we did was to identify what the say the 20 or 25 people we thought were Jack Gilligan's closest friends and advisers. People he might talk to about politics but people who were also folks in Cincinnati he spent time with and so on. That included his dad who had the funeral business in Cincinnati. Included a couple of other business guys and politicians in Cincinnati that he knew. And I met with each of those individuals to describe my desire to be lieutenant governor to be Jack's running mate and why I thought I could be helpful. And the talk was as he seeks advice if he just asked two or three these people you know what do you think about the field. I wanted them to be able to say well you know Celeste is serious and we think he he's got a point. We think he can be valuable and so about halfway through the primary season maybe a little longer than that. The state Democratic Party leadership was getting together to consider endorsements and at a minimum I would have been happy if Jack didn't endorse anyone because I felt I could win in an open race. At a maximum I wanted him to endorse me and we won that vote. He endorsed me and it was my first statewide race and in that race there was a Brown. Jim Brown who I think sold carpets in Steubenville or something like that. There was a woman Lucille Houston from Cleveland. There was an African-American from Akron. Tony Calabrese. It was a crowded field and I think I did very well. And then we turned to the fall .

CW: Did you feel like you had it nailed down once you got his endorsement or how did you feel in that moment? Once you got the endorsement from Jack.

RC: Well the endorsement felt like you know. You. I won one election but there was another election coming up and you can't you can never really predict for sure polling at that time for a race like the lieutenant governor's race was incredibly difficult and probably not reliable. We had we raised enough money I think for that race we raised ninety thousand dollars as I recall and we were able to do one television commercial, which was one more than John Brown did. I mean you know John Brown had never lost an election I think he felt that he was kind of bulletproof in that job. And the Brown name was in 1974. I mean Bill Brown was the Attorney General, Ted Brown was the Secretary of State, Brown was the Lieutenant Governor, two members of the state Supreme Court were Browns I mean it was the name if you wanted a name. So, the general election was a serious challenge. We did not, we we had a coordinated campaign with the Governor and with the Democratic Party, but we did not depend on them alone. And we organized the state with our own field organization. We campaigned targeted counties. We had a boat budget for every county. What I thought I needed to get in every county. I campaigned in every county and then in an election I took my kids and put them in an RV and we traveled to every county. I went probably three quarters of the county fairs in the state. We put them in bib overalls and it was a complete hoot. And you know I enjoyed it. I loved it. I loved it. There wasn't a part of Ohio I didn't love and I learned something everywhere I went, but I didn't want people to think that I was just you know riding on Cleveland as the reason to get elected. I wanted people in Washington County to say you know Celeste was here or in Scioto County. Celeste took an interest in us and I enjoyed it. I mean I had a great respect for Jack Gilligan so I was excited to be working with him. Jack had some, he had two big he really really three obstacles. I'm not sure they were clear to him but I think everyone thought because he was running against Jim Rhodes and Jim Rhodes said you know I'd been caught up with. You know, he was the governor who sent the troops in to Kent State that was still fresh in people's minds. Life Magazine had him on the cover with pardoning or commuting the sentence of a guy who was a mob character. You know Rhodes can't win, right. And so they began the election taking an awful lot for granted. One of the decisions that Jack had to make as governor was a political decision. When Bill Saxbe went off to India to be Ambassador, Jack had to appoint a United States senator. And there were a number of people who wanted to be senator A.G. Lancione wanted to be Senator. Jim Stanton, City Council President of Cleveland, wanted to be senator. But the two front runners were Howard Metzenbaum and John Glenn. Jack chose Howard Metzenbaum and John Glenn who did not take that lying down he felt really upset. My sense is that Jack. I never, I can't say this was a fact because I never discussed it with either the principals. I have a hunch that that Jack said to John look I want you to run with me in 1974 and we can be a great ticket. And in 1976 I'll run for president. And you can become governor of Ohio. I don't know whether that conversation ever happened, but I think there were certainly people around Jack who had that scenario in mind. Keep John available for a running mate. John had no interest in that. He wanted to be a United States Senator so he in the primary in 1973 the real attention wasn't the lieutenant governor's race. It was Glenn versus Metzenbaum. And and John won the primary. So Howard was a lame duck senator John was on that ticket. And we campaigned together that you know there was within the party there were some bruised feelings around how all that played out. Jack had had as a consequence of the you know the he was successful in getting the income tax adopted I voted for it and I defended it in my district when it was on the ballot. We fortunately were able to keep the income tax. Jack concluded that the vote to keep the income tax was an affirmation of his leadership. But there were two problems with that. Number one a lot of people misunderstood the vote. If you voted no as if you were going to vote no on the income tax you were actually voting no on the repeal of the income tax. So my hunch is that a fair number of no votes really were I yes I'd like to get rid of the income tax. They didn't understand the issue but the other wrinkle occurred in the run up to the election. Chuck Kurfess announced in the general assembly in early 1974 that the state was going to realize an 80 million dollar surplus and that the income tax had been set too high. And Gilligan asked his staff whether that was true. And his staff said no. And so Jack said that Republicans were chasing moonbeams that there wasn't going to be a surplus. Well the truth of the matter afterwards we learned was that the staff tax commissioner understood there was going to be a surplus. I mean there were people in the tax department obviously who are Republicans who passed that word on into the Republican caucus but Gilligan's chief of staff Jack Hanson said we can't tell him that there is a surplus because if he knows there's a surplus he'll tell the legislature and the legislature want to spend it. So staff prevented Jack Gilligan from knowing the facts and of course by June of 1974 the tax commissioner had to certify it was the end of the fiscal year. There was a surplus of 80 million dollars. So Jack became Governor Moonbeam and Jim Rhodes had an issue to a substantive issue to tackle him on. And you know it was a hard fought election toward the end. Gilligan understood that it was a whole lot closer than anyone had anticipated. He needed to get more umph from his base. But I don't think he quite figured out how to generate it. So on election night Jim Rhodes went to bed thinking he'd lost Jack Gilligan and knew it was gonna be close. We knew from because we our field organization was counting votes county by county. We knew it was going to be by an eyelash one way or the other. And I think the margin was twelve or thirteen thousand votes out of over three million it was about one vote per precinct and you know I said the next morning I said I ran to be the governor's strong right hand and the people of Ohio did a body transplant. I beat, I think I beat John Brown by almost 90 thousand votes. So, I, one of the lessons I drew from that experience was that you can't always win a campaign but you can always lose one. I don't think Jim Rhodes really won that. Jack Gilligan really lost that. My only take a contemporary look and I think Donald Trump won the election I think Hillary Clinton lost. There are you know elections you have to be fought and won and you make decisions along the way that may or may not benefit you in the race. I went to see Jim Rhodes after the election in his office in LeVeque Tower and he's very congenial and he said you know Governor I don't suppose either of us expected this outcome. He laughed and he said no. And I said well the people of Ohio elected you and the people of Ohio elected me. So I just want you to know that I'm prepared to help you in any way I can. I'll do what I can to be you know supportive of what's good for Ohio. And he looked at me for a moment he said Do you play golf. I said, No I never played golf in my life. You said you should take it up and I said why. And he said cause I'm not going to give you a damn thing to do. And he didn't mean it in any mean way it was like he was giving me good advice right. How do you react. I'm not going to give you anything to do. Get a golf game.

CW: So when you hear that what is your emotional response? Is it frustration? Is it anger?

RC: No, I wasn't surprised. I mean you know, look I would have been more surprised if he had said you know what Dick I've got an idea how I can use you and let's pursue it right. I mean he had run against Jack Gilligan and it didn't take long for me to realize that he saw me and the state Republican Party saw me as a threat. And so they were going to play hardball with me. And during that transition between the election and taking office I'd ask John Brown if I could sit down with him and look at the budget for the lieutenant governor's office, get his advice on how to think about that responsibility. And he refused to see me. He was he didn't see a defeat coming at all. I never had a chance to talk to him about it personally. He is he would not have anything to do with me. So I said, I explained this to Governor Gilligan and I said you know I would be really helpful to me if I could have two or three people to work on transition activities for me. And so he said well talk to Pete O'Grady who was the director of I think the bureau motor vehicles one of one of the cabinet positions but he said talk to Pete see what he can arrange. And so we've had either three or four people who went on the state payroll with the knowledge of folks what they were going to actually work on was the transition for the lieutenant governor. Putting together a budget, thinking about how he'd staff an office, what is the what are the personal things, and so on. And we had to do all of our work on our own. I mean it was as far as I was concerned a transparent and an appropriate thing to do, but I'd been in office for maybe six weeks. And one of the reporters came to me one day and said well what are you going to do about the phantom employees. And I said What do you mean phantom employees. Well Jan Allen and Bill Flaherty and Jerry Austin or whoever I think those were the, maybe Austin maybe wasn't. A couple of you know phantom employees and I said I don't know what you're talking about. Well they weren't supposed to be on the payroll. They didn't, they were in no show jobs. I said well no I mean the directors and I explained how they were hired. I ended up in front of a grand jury on this matter and you know it was a hardball to the head, alright. A brushback pitch maybe a knockout pitch if they could have hit me. And I just I was completely honest about what happened. Grand jury came back and said nothing. It was a Democrat, Tom Ferguson, who is the auditor who said well there's no justification in the state law for this. So they have to pay back their salaries. So I ended up paying that back to the state. I didn't want them to have to come up with the money was thirty thousand dollars or twenty three thousand dollars or seventeen whatever it was it was three months of activity, but it was. That was my if I needed a reminder about how serious the business is and how tough politics can be that was that was a good reminder.

CW: Do you think it was a level, a step up from your state rep days?

RC: Oh yeah sure. I mean nobody would worry about a state rep. You're not. If you're in the leadership I mean Vern Riffe was a force to be reckoned with A.G. Lancione was a force to be reckoned with. Kind of first or second term state rep was not on anybody's radar screen. And I think the fact that I'm sure the fact that I put together a good campaign and I defeated a name a statewide name at a time when the top of the ticket lost. I'm sure that the folks over in Republican headquarters are scratching their heads and saying wait a minute this we gotta look out for this guy and we got to stop him now, you know, when we can. He's 37 years old. He's got a future let's make sure that that future is yeah. Let's see if we can show we can put a detour in front of him right.

CW: Looking back on it. Do you think you could have been satisfied staying becoming like a powerful state representative?

RC: No. No I wasn't inclined. I love the people I was with in the legislature. I mean I found they were fascinating. And one of the things that you learn is that every, anybody who wins an elective office is there for a reason. Now, some of them the reason may be bent a little bit right. But everybody there's a story and there's a you know you just don't get there by accident. And I think it's easy to dismiss you know politicians as a kind of shadowy. We've got a stereotype of them, right? But Tony Russo representing Little Italy in Cleveland or Lenny Ostrovsky representing the racetrack districts of Cuyahoga County were as interesting as Tory Lee James representing inner city Cleveland right. A John Sweeney or Harry Lehman or Dicks Celeste we brought different kind of perspectives and skills and when I got when I sat with Lloyd George Kerns when I sat with Carlton Davidson I was introduced to this world of of conscientious, interesting, dedicated, Republican legislators. So I enjoyed the folks I was with. I get frustrated sometimes because I thought we would be treated unfairly. I thought that Chuck Kurfess as speaker wouldn't let Democrats have a voice in what was going on basically because we were a serious minority. We weren't even close to the majority at that point in time. And I think they were frustrated that the governor's office was occupied by a Democrat and that meant patronage and things like that were not going their way. But you know by and large my experience with the folks who were in the legislature was very positive. The process I found very frustrating it just it takes a lot of time. I would rather be making decisions. I'd rather be leading a team and trying to make things happen. And so my decision to run statewide was to say look if I have the capability of operating on a statewide basis and can begin to assume some executive leadership that's what I should do. And if I fail I'll go back to my Cleveland family business and the world will be fine and I'll be fine. So I sort of took the 74 race as you know this is a chance for the good Lord to tell you whether you really are cut out for politics or not. Whether you have the appetite for whatever it takes to be successful. And you know it was a good experience. I remembered this story mentioned my Super Volunteer Danny Heffernan right. Danny Heffernan, When I decided to run statewide I was and won the nomination I was invited to the Democratic dinner in Wayne County. So it was my first County Democratic dinner it was an important speech for me and an important evening. And Danny went with me to Wooster outside of Wooster where the dinner was being held and he said listen you've got to shake every hand here. Oh that's a challenge I have 200 or 240 people there right. So I went around and I shook every hand and when I got back I was very proud of myself he said that was a complete waste. I said what do you mean I shook every hand. He said you may have shaken every hand but you didn't connect with a single person. He said I want you to go around again. Once you introduce yourself and I want you to make sure you connect with everyone. You approach and I realize that what I have done is I'm just I'm shaking hand I was looking at the next person just going around as fast as I could. I stop each person I held their hand I said you know tell me your name. I know. Is this person your husband? You know like a whole thing I went around and I realized it was a big difference between just shaking hands and connecting with people and I liked connecting with people. I enjoyed it and I was good at it and I got better at it. And that was I think that was part of what I had to learn about myself. In order to feel like this is something I'd like to do over the long longer haul.

CW: Now Danny would he have been? When did the term Celestial come about?

RC: Well that was something that the press I think you know initiated probably a year or two into my Lieutenant Governor service. You know what had happened over the course of the first couple of Willaloos the way we developed the campaign we had people who were really committed to me. I was committed to them. We didn't know if I could be helpful to them on family things or things like that I have nothing to do with what I was doing politically. That was a part of it. So we had a very strong commitment mutual commitment. And you know my early team Jan Allen, Bill Flaherty. These are people who were with me virtually throughout my public life. Jan was the very first person the very first volunteer that I had in that statewide race. When I was I wanted to see what it was like to be to campaign statewide. So Ted and I said Listen we're gonna drive around Ohio for a week and get a feel for what it's like. Then we're gonna go do we're gonna drive down to Bellaire and we're gonna go along the Ohio River we'll stop and talk to Democratic Party leaders and the newspaper editors then we'll come back up and stop a New Boston and see Verne's place in Portsmouth and then come up through Chillicothe and come back. And I got invited. I offered to the Democratic Party that I would do some speaking. So I was invited to a Democratic dinner in Chillicothe. Actually that's right Wayne County wasn't my first Democratic dinner anyway. So we get the Chilicothe and there. It's at the at one of the motels there let's called it the Best Western Motel whatever and there's a big sign out front. Welcome State Representative Richard Celeste was the first time my name was that any. So Ted and I go in and Jan Allen was in charge the party had asked Jan Allen to organize all of this. So she was in charge of putting press together she had a little room for me to meet with press. She had a wonderful little briefing thing forming on each of the party leaders and candidates who were there. I mean she had it down pat. I said to Ted find out who put who got my name on that marquee because I want that person to work for me. And it was Jan. I said to Jan if I run statewide I want you to help me. And so she became the very first person to help me. And Jan and others who came along Dora Globe and Bill Flaherty and a team were devoted supporters. And I think sometimes they gave off a kind of worshipful air that invited the term celestial. It just worked for the press right. And I don't know that any of them would be happy to be called celestials but it's a little like a Chet Set. You know you could take the Chet Set with a grain of salt and that was yeah ok fine or you could see it sort of look down your nose at it. I think the celestial felt the same way you know.

CW: How did you feel about when you first heard the term?

RC: I thought it was pretty funny. I mean the the implications were really inappropriate for politics. I mean there's nothing celestial we aren't we aren't working with heavenly materials in the political arena we're working with mud and stone and mundane stuff right. But I think another aspect of this was I believe strongly then I believe today that the challenge of leadership is to build a constituency for change. That if you want to move anything forward you don't do it by yourself and you need a constituency that is prepared to help you do that. And constituency building is the most interesting and the most challenging part of good politics because you have to nurture that constituency you have to take them seriously when they have something they want from you. But you have to also engage them and use them. It's, my idea was that you didn't have people volunteer for the campaign and then you forgot them for four years you engaged them in work that was ongoing. So we had newsletters that went out and so on and in there was a sense of vision that goes with this. What is the vision that you have for your state rep district but as you move into the state arena what is your vision for the state. How do you want to see the state change whether it's changed the way we support education and breathed new life into our public schools or fundamentally reform our mental health system which is something that we were able to do when I was governor. And so I think maybe a piece of the kids maybe the piece of the celestial nomenklatura came not so much from that kind of starry eyed looks in the eyes of these folks but in the fact that we shared a kind of vision right. And and we were idealistic in that respect and to a cynical press that isn't necessarily something they are prepared to take at face value they're going to look at and say yeah yeah right. And look for where you fall short in this is another thing that you learn in public life the higher you raise expectations the more likely it is that the press is going to hold you to the highest expectations. And every place you fall short is going to be the place where you make news. And I said shortly after I became governor I my. I said Well the old adage is no news is good news. The new adage is good news is no news. Everybody focuses o shortcomings but you know that we invite that when we set high expectations.

CW: Your kids have been kind of vocal about their experience growing up kids of the governor. Have they ever mentioned anything about those trips?

RC: Oh sure I mean I think they have mixed feelings. They you know it was fun for them to march down the Midway with a mini van behind them. With Celeste literature they were exposed to a lot of things that they enjoyed. But I think they also felt often that they were treated as props. You know that there were several reasons for this and it was hard if there were five kids or six kids to feel that you really got the attention you deserve because attention of parents was divided, inevitably. You know it's interesting because the older you, each of them each of my children reacted a little bit differently. And my two oldest Erik and Christopher by the time I was running for governor were old enough to really play a substantive part in what I did. And then by nineteen eighty six eighty seven they were not only working on campaigns they were thinking about they were doing the research on a presidential race. For example my daughter Noel who was a very sort of precocious and observant. She is my middle daughter. She wrote this one pager when I lost the governor's race in 1978 about what that evening was like. Her last line is my dad is not a quitter. She knew I was going to run again even if anybody else wasn't sure. My oldest daughter. Her reaction was to stay as far away from all of that stuff as possible. When I was elected governor she was going into her senior year that next year Magnificat in Cleveland and she refused to move to Columbus. She said I'm not going to move to Columbus period. She's like dad I'll run away before I move to Columbus. And she meant it. And she was you know stubborn enough just like her mom she was stubborn enough that she would have done it. So we ended up arranging for her to stay with the nuns who rented our house in Cleveland for her senior year in high school. So each them in a way responded differently to that process. But I think the interesting thing is that all of my kids are very politically aware and in most cases involved locally in campaigns and supporting candidates and so on. None of them have run for office. And I don't think I mean one or two of may have entertained the thought at one point or another but I think they knew enough about what it takes that they just decided you know what I'm going to continue to do what I'm doing. I think it'll be my next generation. I wouldn't be surprised to see one or two grandkids get into the public arena. But you know it's a good question. My daughter Noel wrote a paper which is part of the record about what it's like, life in a fishbowl. She interviewed a number of other children of governors and so on public, senior public officials. I think she got a pretty good grade on her paper.

CW: Where was the, while you were lieutenant governor where was the family living? Were you in Columbus?

RC: No. We yes we were in Central Ohio. When we moved down here Dagmar said I want to see water. We could see Lake Erie when we our house in Cleveland. And so we ended up living in Delaware County up next to the river and the Scioto at little just before the city of Delaware a place called Bellepoint. And we had you know a couple of acres of land and a barn and we got a donkey and we became sort of we didn't become farmers but we had a rural life. The kids were going to the Buckeye Valley School District which was the most geographically just the biggest geographically distributed school district I think in the state of Ohio. So I commuted into to Columbus every day.

CW: Did you get to work on you golf game?

RC: I never played golf. I did. I did two things. Essentially I presided in the Senate and I campaigned for governor. I mean I just got around the state. I did a lot of sort of party building and I used to we'd do a we developed a display at county fairs with a red. We call it the red tape cutting competition. We ask people for their suggestions about how to cut state government red tape and we would give prizes for the best suggestions. It was interesting. People had really good suggestions and it was a way of sort of raising my profile and and keeping in front of people during that period of time. Presiding in the Senate was quite interesting. I was I made a point of always being in that chair. I never handed the gavel to someone else. And at the time the Senate was divided seventeen sixteen Republicans had a majority. I'm sorry the Democrats had a majority we had a one vote majority and twice during the four years I broke tie votes, which was unusual. I mean it's certainly within the authority of the presiding lieutenant governor presiding officer to do that. I think John Brown had made a decision not to do that which is in effect is casting a no vote on whatever this subject is. I mean it's not as if you're not voting if you have that authority. It becomes a tie. Then what you do is a vote one way or the other at least that's how I viewed it. And the issues were very interesting one of the issues was a bill to decriminalize possession of an ounce or less of marijuana. This is in nineteen seventy five or six and a Democratic member of the Senate who I shall not name took a walk and the vote was sixteen/sixteen. And this bill it already passed the House and I felt that was appropriate to be enacted into law so I cast a vote in favor of the legislation. Several of the members of the Senate were very dismayed that I would vote. I don't know whether they're troubled by the fact that I meant that the bill passed. I think it was more that here I had sort of intervened right into this process in about a year later a bill came up that was a pay raise bill for state and county employees. And again that same Democrat happened to stay in the bathroom. And so the vote was sixteen/sixteen and I cast a vote in favor of the pay raise. And there were people who criticize that you're raising your own pay and I pointed out anyone to anyone who voted on that would not enjoy the pay raise you had to be elected again before that pay raise became effective for you. But it touched all of the county office holders which was my biggest concern for county office holders who weren't getting what they were entitled to. So that was interesting. I often wondered whether those votes would come back in future campaigns. They never did. Interesting. I mean maybe today where there's more serious opposition research and everybody's looking for negatives maybe if that were to happen to a candidate today those votes would be more talked about let's say the only time it came back this is very interesting in 1978 when I was running for governor I was in Ironton and at the invitation of Carlton Davidson my old friend from the General Assembly. And he had invited me to come by when I was campaigning in that neighborhood. So I arranged for us to get together and he said I want to take you to the county courthouse which is all Republican. And he introduced me to each of the office holders. He made a point this is the county recorder, the county treasurer, county auditor. I want you to meet this guy our lieutenant governor is down here running for governor he's a Democrat. You should know that he's the reason you got your pay raise. And they said what do you mean. He said on a vote to raise your pay. It was a tie vote and he cast a vote in favor of it. So you owe your pay raise to this man. He was very generous with his introductions. When we finished he invited me come over to the house he shared with his sister. That's where he lived. And it's a nice lovely little ranch type house. His sister made some lemonade for us and we sat and the three of us visited and she asked me whether you know everybody called him Pappy like Carl Davidson was Pappy Davidson and Pappy was behaving himself in Columbus. I said well not if he can help it but you know we had some laughs and as I was getting ready to leave he said hey I want to show you my birds. I said What do you mean. And he took me out behind his house, behind his garage and there was a big Coop and he had fighting cocks in this coop which he took across the river to Kentucky for cockfights. And I'm thinking to myself OK this is the dimension of my pal that I didn't know about but just one more you know. Who would have guessed it. He was so proud of beautiful birds I couldn't imagine putting them in a ring and let them go at each other. But want to see my birds.

CW: So definitely you found them to be characters and your fellow legislators and the people you work with not the cynical self-interested?

RC: Some of them were I mean you know there were folks who were, who had a narrow view of why they were there. And the interesting thing is I would say that was more characteristic of the lawyers in the legislature than the non lawyers, I mean. And it certainly wasn't true for Lloyd George Kerns who was a you know he he had his law practice at home and it was a it was a kind of personal thing and it didn't get reflected in the legislature. But there were some people there who practiced the kind of corporate law or who had clients whose interests might be affected by votes in the legislature. And they I think it well I ask. I told the story of Sam Bradley who asked me to help him explore why the contract hadn't been awarded for kitchen equipment when he put in a bid. And when I would told them I wasn't going to take any money. He didn't give me any information when I went back down to Columbus after that conversation. I talked to a member of the legislature who was on one of my committees a very respected lawyer later became a judge here in Franklin County. And he chaired the Judiciary Committee and I said to him here's the situation let me describe it to you. I didn't know he wanted to give me a commission if that if he got the contract would that have been legal for me to do that. And he said no not for you but if you were an attorney and he were paying your law firm it would have been legal. And I thought to myself. Well that's pretty you know that's pretty wrong. So you know I think people came in with different motivations and a lot of a lot of folks start out very idealistic and then probably ended up a little more pragmatic or in some cases cynical. But I find cynicism was not widespread you know and when you were up against a really serious crisis, as I was with the Savings and Loan crisis cynicism was gone at that point. Everybody said What have we got to figure out how we do what's right. And I think and in fact on I was a rookie. I was a freshman when Jack Gilligan wanted to get the income tax passed. I am sure that the conversations of leaders around that issue were not cynical if they were cynical. I don't know that we would ever have enacted an income tax. I think there were enough Republicans who said OK we're going to have an income tax how do we make how do we make sure it's the best approach to income tax possible. Let's work with the governor's office and achieve it. And you know they did a good job.

CW: When things are running smoothly people could look a little more to their self-interests but when really got down to business people put aside those things?

RC: On big issues and tough issues. I would say by and large the response was I want to do what I believe my constituents sent me here to do. I remember when I was being educated by Lloyd George Kerns and Carlton Davidson I asked what was the most what was the most difficult vote you ever witnessed. And it had to do with a bill that Ron Mottl had introduced to change the law in Ohio so that banks could not vote the stock their own stock held in trust and trust accounts of the bank. It was basically a bill aimed at about four banks in Ohio particularly the Cleveland Trust Bank in Cleveland because the Cleveland Trust Bank had a number of trust accounts. Those trust accounts were invested in Cleveland Trust bank stock. They could vote that stock they could control the fortunes of their bank and a very wealthy man named Cyrus Eaton kind of Cleveland millionaire who was unlike most of the business leaders of kind of liberal. He is Canadian originally thought of as kind of one of these liberal reformers bought stock in the bank and wanted to be able to. He owned a big block of stock. He thought he should have a dominant voice but the bank would out vote him because of stock that was owned in 10 or 20 or 30 different trusts. Mottl proposes to eliminate that rule. It was incredibly hard fought apparently and it was nip and tuck all the way down to the end the bank had hired the vice chair of the county Democratic Party to lobby Democrats from Cleveland even though it was a Democrat from Cleveland Ron Mottl who had offered this bill. But it was going to come down to one or two votes and Pappy Carlton Davidson was an amateur cartoonist. And apparently he drew according to Lloyd George Kerns he drew the most famous cartoon on the floor that ever circulated on the floor of the house during a vote. And it showed vultures sitting on the brass rail in the balcony overlooking the legislature. He depicted each of the lobbyists who was up there as a vulture looking down on this vote. And they said they didn't know until it came down to the final vote how it would go. That bill lost by one vote. Cleveland Trust retained its ability to vote the stock they wanted but they said that was the hardest fought vote that they had ever seen. My guess is the vote on the income tax which was repeated several times lost, lost, and then finally won. Was one that would go down in the books as well similar to that. And something like that savings and loan crisis the legislature was, many members of the legislature because of their relationships with Marvin Warner folks from Cincinnati were reluctant to really take a position one way or the other. And it really fell to the governor to take the lead on that. That was a little different situation.

CW: You mentioned the lieutenant governor you spent a lot of time beginning to campaign for governor. Had already made the decision to campaign for governor before you became lieutenant governor?

RC: Yeah, I mean I my own calculus was that Jack Gilligan would get elected governor in 1976 he would run for president. And if you know if he was successful I would be Governor. Truthfully I wasn't ready then to be governor. I mean I needed to learn more I needed to grow more. But that was probably my you know the kind of unspoken thought in my mind. But I certainly ran for lieutenant governor because ultimately I did want to be governor and I felt that more than being a secretary of state or an auditor or whatever was the right step in the direction of the governor's office. I assumed at a minimum I would have a working relationship with the governor. I'd learn a lot about that process in and Jack would be term limited at the end of another four years in any event. As it happened that was the only, I point out to people in 1978 was the only race in which I didn't have a primary . It's the only race in which I didn't run against Brown. And it was the only race in which I lost.

CW: Looking back on it up until that point do you consider your kind of rise through the ranks as being unusually quickly or do you think of it being?

RC: I think it was unusually quickly. I mean I think and I think there was you know most surprising resentment and I think some of the old timers felt you know who is this guy. Downstate there was a resentment about Cleveland. You know I had a very interesting relationship with Vern Riffe from the get go. I was a vote for Don Pease. When Riffe was counting votes for A.G. Lancione. So I think he probably viewed me as if we were gonna divide his kind of guys in the Democratic Party and the other kind of guys in the Democratic Party. I was one of the other kind of guys right. But like everything else I spent a lot of time with him and I worked hard to have a relationship with him and I was very honest about how we would relate. And you know he entertained thoughts of running for governor often but he was never prepared and I always anticipated this. He was never prepared to give up the sure power he had as speaker of the house for the uncertain outcome of a race. Somebody from Scioto County, New Boston. Probably not the best candidate statewide for governor. So you know he and I figured it out. And there are stories about you know that began even before I. Well in 1978 when I ran for governor against Jim Rhodes I did not carry Scioto County. If Vern had been really for me I would have carried Scioto County. He had enough chits to call in Scioto County that he could have if he wanted to but he you know he and Rhodes were old buddies. They were both good ole boys and I understood that I respected that. It was one of those you know he didn't cost me the election I cost me the election I was ambivalent on the education issue in 1978 in a way that I shouldn't have been. And I guess in my own mind I guess I wasn't really ready. You know you have to be one of things I think you have to believe that you are the best person for this job that you're ready for it and you're going to be on top of it. And if somehow you have any ambivalence at all on that it impedes your message and impedes your energy. You just don't you know when you don't connect as well right. I was connecting as well in 78.

CW: What were your what were you what was your platform in 1978?

RC: The chant we did was Jim Rhodes pack your bags. What was the platform Celeste and Dorian and we had a good ticket. I think it was time for a change that we needed real leadership in Columbus and Jim Rhodes is kind of going through the motions. He'd put these big four issues on the ballot and they had lost. He didn't really have a vision for the future. He was making lots of promises and not delivering on the promises. But he was canny. I mean he we became friends. He you know he knew the state and he had helped people all over the state. And so he had he knew exactly where every vote was. And I lost by maybe it was twenty three thousand votes right two votes per precinct, two. So it was a serious it was a serious contest.

CW: If he had lost his kind of vision for the state why do you think it was that he came back he ran?

RC: In 86?

CW: Well for the third and fourth term?

RC: Well I mean I think when you're an incumbent you. I don't know why an incumbent wouldn't run for re-election. I mean you've got things in motion your you know you're surrounded with a team that you have confidence in and you know a lot about where things are and where things are going. So I think that Jim Rhodes felt that he you know. Look that was what he loved to do. He was first and foremost governor of Ohio in many respects that was his identity you know. His wife understood, she sort of forgave him that enthusiasm that he had. What he tried to come back again. And I think the other thing is he had he there was no one in the Republican Party that he had respect enough respect for to say well I can step aside and so-and-so can do the job well he never felt that the reason reasoning ran in 86 is because he had no respect for the. You know Paul Gillmor or whatever these guy there who are they. I'm the horse. All right. Even if he had a hard time getting out of the starting gate, I'm the horse and that was kind of the way he thought about it. And the people around him of course they loved him they loved the fact that he was there that he was predictable. He, I don't think he anticipated the kind of problems that occurred with the economic challenges in 81-82. A downturn in the economy, terrible promise with revenues and a need to raise taxes and stuff. Howard Collier his finance director was very responsible and public minded individual who wasn't. Well the funny thing is in some respects Jim Rhodes wasn't that partisan. He just, he was for Ohio and Ohio and Rhodes were synonymous in his mind.

CW: He was Ohio

RC: He was. And he didn't, his ambitions weren't a whole, didn't go, it wasn't like he was going to run for President or run for the Senate. Those things didn't interest him.

CW: He's famous for loving the state fair and spending a lot of time there. Did you end up spending any time there with him?

RC: With him?

CW: Yeah, or around him.

RC: I went to a state fair and I was there I kind of studied his moves but I with him, no. We didn't do anything together. I mean but I watched him and you know with the sale of champions right. And one of that one of the things I determined to do when I became governor was we were going out we were gonna raise more money for that steer than Jim Rhodes ever raised right. And I think that Walker boys got involved more than they thought they would because they ended up having to bid a whole lot of money for that steer that first year. We worked hard on it. No, I that was one of the differences again between me and Jack Gilligan. Jack always felt uncomfortable at the fair. I loved the fair. I loved the fair because again there are the folks who we work for right. And whether it's you know talking to the women about their flowers or their pies or talking to the kids about their sheep or their steer. There was always something to do

CW: Do you find that the connections you make at the fair with people are less about they're more about just who they are as people and what they enjoy. Rather than being about the issues?

RC: Well it's about, the fair is a place where we're people everybody is showing something they're proud of right. And that's a wonderful venue when you can say this gives you a lot of pride. Tell me about how you raised this animal why you name the animal this. W hat's going on in your 4H club. And the parents are proud of their kids. It's a celebration of positive attributes from music to the entertainment. You know I don't know, I just I thought it wonderful. I'd be worn out at the end of the fair. When I was governor I moved my office and I put my office on the fairgrounds for 22 days and I literally I worked out of that office. You want to see me. Oh come and meet me at the fairgrounds. Oprah Winfrey. Oprah Winfrey came to see me on the fairgrounds when I was governor. Nobody knew who Oprah was. She was there at some regional thing and you know you just have fun. Willie Nelson played he wanted to get on a golf course so I called Jack Nicklaus and I said you gonna let Willie Nelson play golf over the airfield. Oh yeah. Oh yeah sure. Willie was so happy you played the airfield man. I could. I saw him in Texas a couple of years later he still was talking about. You got me on the golf course.

CW: So that's a good place to have your office for a while.

RC: It is. I mean it was. I figure a couple million Ohioans go through the fairgrounds over a period of time. Those are my constituents you know. And whether they voted for me or not I'm working for them. So it was good. Every so often you know the public addresses and say you know Governor Celeste is having office hours in between one and three today if you want to check in with the governor go by. Blank Blank Blank. That's not bad either.

CW: Did you have a favorite fair food while you were there?

RC: I would try that. I mean I didn't eat a lot of the fair food but I always had champion pies and I would have a little bit of it then I'd share it with my visitors or my staff.

CW: There's always the odd food every year.

RC: Oh yeah.

CW: Did they wrangle you into trying those things?

RC: Not particularly.

CW: Getting back to the election. What was your for lieutenant governor your strategy was first to get Gilligan's vote and the you.

RC: Win a primary.

CW: Win a primary and then go on to the rest. What was the, what was your build up to running for governor?

RC: Well you know because I was the senior Democrat. Even though a Bill Brown or Tom Ferguson have been around longer than I had as the lieutenant governor I really had a kind of free ride to run for governor once I declared. Nobody else was going to compete with me. And I think that you know when we had a strong ticket Mike Dorian was highly respected. We did a lot of campaigning together as a team from the get go. Mary Ellen Withrow had no competition. Bill Brown had no competition. Tom Ferguson had no competition. It was a good really good team. John Glenn, I'm trying to remember whether we cause Glenn got a shortened term. Howard I can't remember exactly whether he was on it. He campaigned I think he had to run in in 76 rather than 78 for the full term. So we did you know we did bus travel. We did a lot of campaigning as a team because we didn't really have a primary worry about it. And for me I think that in retrospect I'm a believer that primary campaigns actually are good for candidates because you learn where your strengths and weakness is. For example Jack Gilligan had a primary in 1974 and if he had paid attention to where he lost votes to a guy who was not he didn't have any money and didn't really have any. Jim Nolan was his name. Didn't have any real state profile. It could have helped him understand where he needed where his folks needed to do work where he needed to do work in the general election. And I think they were dismissive of Nolan and Nolan votes. I had these primaries and so at a big primary so I knew I could go back to Jim Williams who was the candidate for Akron an African-American and say Jim I need your help here in Summit County will you and some of your people helped me. And there were places where folks did well against me. One of the guys was a guy named Don Hanni who had run from Youngstown, which was the occasion of one of my favorite conversations with a county chairman during that 78, 74 race. I went to Youngstown to meet with the county chairman Jack Sulligan was his name. And Sulligan presided over the Democratic Party at an office on the ground floor of a building but upstairs the second floor was a card room where they had card tables set up and from 11:00 in the morning till 2:00 in the afternoon the county officers had come over and play cards with the lobbyists. And that's how they would exchange a few dollars back and forth. So Sulligan's on the second floor. The card games haven't begun and I introduced myself. I'm Dick's last night I'm running for lieutenant governor I think here are three reasons why I think I'd be a good candidate. I'm hopeful that Jack Gilligan will support me. I'd like to have your support. I can't help you kid. What do you mean you can't help me. I got my own, put in a an expletive, I got my own guy in the race right. I got to support him. And I was dismayed but I continued to make my case and we talked for 10 or 15 minutes he's very pleasant and he he kept saying look I got my own jerk in this race right. I got to be I got to support him. I got to support him. Finally Sulligan says listen I like you kid and I don't want to hurt you too bad. I'm going to give you Patty Colian. I said Patty Colian? Patty Colian. She's she's active in the young Dems. She's a go getter. I'll have Patty Colian work on your campaign here and you'll do all right. And Patty Colian became my county coordinator for Mahoning County and she recruited other young Dems. She clearly worked closely with Sulligan and the results of the primary election Don Hanni carried Mahoning County. I was 200 votes behind him. They didn't hurt me in Mahoning County. And you know that was the ongoing lessons of going around the state talking with people. So I think primaries helped and I think the lack of a primary may have cost me twenty five thousand votes. It should have been enough to win in 1978.

CW: You could just walk up to the election rather than fight your way up?

RC: Well you know I was. That's right. I mean I everybody figures well Celeste is lieutenant governor he's going to run for governor he's gonna lead the ticket. You know I had made friends with Tom Ferguson and Bill Brown. I mean these are folks I work with and we respected each other and you know I was an energetic campaigner so I'd go out and get the crowd riled up and I, you know, I boost each of the candidates. And so that was you know the way it went in 1978. And I, what I liked about it. The thing that appealed to me and the reason why a lot of candidates don't like primaries is I didn't have to spend money on a primary campaign. All my money could be focused on a general election race.

CW: Having an easy build up and then losing by only 25,000 did that dent your confidence at all?

RC: No I gave, I felt in my concession speech in my speech to the folks on an election night that it was really the beginning of a successful campaign. And I you know it's one that we put a little C.D. with a campaign song on one side and the speech from the election on the other side from election night. You know if I said we're going to build and build and build some more. That's what we have to do. We're building a constituency for change and that work was going to go on. It would've gone on whether I ran or not. But clearly the implication was it was going to go on with me as a candidate. And Noel certainly understood that at age 9 or whatever it was when she wrote her one pager. My dad is not a quitter. So I wasn't sure know what was gonna be next. I have family moved back to Cleveland. I joined my dad and my brother in the real estate business. But I was only back a month or so when I got a call from a woman named Mary King in Washington saying would I come to Washington to interview for a job as Peace Corps director which came totally out of the blue. I said to her I think you have the wrong Celeste. My brother was the Peace Corps volunteer in the family and my brother was the Celeste who ran Jimmy Carter's successful campaign in Ohio in the primary. Oh no she said you're the former lieutenant governor. I said yes. She's you're the one I want to talk to. My brother was a little taken aback. I think by the fact. Here I was getting this this opportunity.

CW: When you got that call were you excited about that opportunity?

RC: I was curious. I was, I really didn't, I certainly didn't have on my mind. OK. Next step is the peace corps. Right. I was thinking real estate, I was thinking how do you keep a campaign organization together. So going to Washington was not at the top of my list. You know we had at this point all six kids. Stephen who was born in nineteen seventy seven. We had gone through a serious mental health crisis with Dagmar. Which was a challenge in the run up to the campaign in 78, but she was better. We had moved back to our house in Cleveland and sort of were settled and part of me was kind of looking forward to a quiet quieter time to catch my breath. So this was really out of the blue. I would say more curiosity than excitement and I had not been following the fortunes of the Peace Corps. I went down there for a session with the I don't know whether they called it the search committee but the group that was interviewing candidates. And it was fascinating I had no sense of it was like dropping in off another planet into a place and it was from their questions that I got a sense of what the challenges were. And because I was so ill informed I was very candid in my responses or sometimes I'd ask them a question in return. And I came back to Cleveland pretty confident that they were not going to ask me to do this job because the one thing I knew. When Nixon became president he took the Peace Corps out of its independence as an agency in second in the middle of an organization called Action. Action had this the Peace Corps foster grandparents and so on. And the goal was to neuter the Peace Corps in a way to reduce its profile and so on. And I knew that that had happened. And so there was a part of me that believes strongly one thing I took to Washington was the conviction that the Peace Corps needed to become an independent agency again or as autonomous as possible. So that was the perspective I brought to the table. And I wasn't clear to me as a result of these kind of this conversation back and forth. That was really what people wanted. Right? Because the person presiding was the number two person in Action and she was very close to President Carter and so I came back and I told my dad and my brother don't worry I'm here for the long haul. Three days later I got a call from Mary King, from this woman saying we want you to do this job. You know. We'd like they get you going as quickly as possible we can't you know it takes a while you're gonna have to go through that confirmation process in the Senate but we can hire you as a consultant. So I was hired as a consultant before I became director of the Peace Corps and I started commuting from Cleveland to Washington. By this time Danny Heffernan was married and he and his wife lived in a beautiful townhouse on 2nd Street right behind the Supreme Court and they had a basement apartment and I lived in their basement apartment for the next year, two years while I worked at the Peace Corps. There was never any discussion about moving the family number one it would have been enormously expensive. We had kids in school and I was gonna run for governor again. So I wanted I wanted to be clear to everyone that I was still in Ohio and I had not moved to Washington. I was working in Washington, but I hadn't moved there. I was home every weekend. I would typically I'd go to Washington on Monday morning and I'd come back Thursday night. And then I'd have a long weekend in Cleveland. And you know I use those long weekends sometimes to make political speeches someplace or whatever. But yeah. The Peace Corps was a terrific experience in preparation for the next race for governor. I had to deal with a whole series of decisions. For the first decision is how much autonomy could we achieve. The head of Action was a guy named Sam Brown. He'd been the treasurer of Colorado he was kind of a rising star. I knew him well as the kind of fellow liberal Democrat. He was very at that time he had both the title of director of Action and director of the Peace Corps. The person running the Peace Corps wasn't even called the director of the Peace Corps. And so I had to it determines through conversations with President Carter how far he was prepared to go and he gave me authority to negotiate with Sam as much autonomy as is possible. But he made it clear that in the end Sam had to signed off on whatever was workable. So we got back our budget authority. We got back our legislative authority. We got back our marketing and communications authority. And I got the title as director of the Peace Corps and essentially we became an autonomous agency within Action and that had consequences all of a sudden the budget director was reporting to me not somebody in Action. So every night I would study the budget carefully and over a period of a month or so I got to know more about the budget than anybody except the budget director and I could ask him questions that he had never been asked before and I could find out where he was hiding money. And I could find out where we had some authority and he hadn't made clear to my predecessor. And that was interesting I brought back the original Peace Corps the lawyer who had been Sarge's lawyer when the Peace Corps was established a man named Bill Josephson. Who helped negotiate this new arrangement on my behalf just bringing Josephson into the building was a potent symbolic act. I brought Bill Flaherty and Dora globe from Columbus to work for me. That gave me some loyal folks very close to me who would work at least as hard as I did. And we had a good team whenever there were good people there. My predecessor had some challenges and she was an African-American woman and as a consequence when she was really asked to leave. There was a morale problem. There were people who thought she'd been unfairly pushed out but there were other personal issues that were involved. And so I had to deal with the moral problems without being able to explain to people that there were other reasons why. And I think that change was justified but it meant that I had to. I wanted to recruit a deputy who would be strong capable of me helping to manage the place but also who would be a minority. The White House personnel kept sending me you know other politicians who'd lost elections who wanted to be someplace and I kept refusing and they got, there was push back. But finally we got a one I got a wonderful wonderful guy. His name was Bill Sykes. He had run the model cities program in the city of Baltimore. He was on the State Board of Education by gubernatorial appointment. A gifted manager in his own right. And when Sykes came along he's about the fourth or fifth recommendation. I was delighted to hire him. He had never been out of the country before and I sent him on a trip to West Africa right away. It was a challenge for him. I found a wonderful budget director a woman named Chris Sale who is Puerto Rican a Puerto Rican American and she was on loan from a federal agency. And so she helped me organize the budget. Sykes helped me organize the operation in a place better. Flaherty, He helped me find key personnel and kept me focused on what we need to do. But you know that involved congressional testimony, congressional hearings, dealing with the Office of Budget Management, all of these were exercises that developed muscles that were important for being confident that I could be a governor that would work. And in year two with the Peace Corps when I was at my desk one day. Bill came to see me and said we've had a Peace Corps volunteer kidnapped in El Salvador. It was a woman named Deborah Loff. She was working with a women's marketing cooperative in the city in the capital city in San Salvador. And she had helped to develop a daycare center for these market women who previously had no really good way to take care of their kids while they were selling in the city market. And she'd been in El Salvador for about a year and a half. And apparently what happened was a group of young rebels or young antigovernment types came in and took over the market you know had automatic weapons and so on. And (they) herded a couple of the staff people into the manager's office and held them there as hostages demanding changes by this municipal government in how the market operated. Saying they were they were going to help these women improve their lot, their circumstances. Initially they didn't realize that a peace corps volunteer in the midst I mean Deborah was fluent in Spanish and she was just seemed like one of the women maybe a little lighter skinned than some of them. Because they were locked up in the office they had access to a telephone and so we were actually in phone contact with her for a part of the time. But she was held for four or five days. It was a very tense situation. Things in El Salvador were not they were increasingly turbulent. The eventually we were able to secure her release. It turned out that the market women kept a vigil around the office overnight to make sure that none of these guys went in and harmed Deborah or the market manager who were there. It turned out that they felt Deborah was more in their corner than these guys who claimed to be working on their behalf. When she was released we had to bring her home and she wanted to go back right away and we said no. She ended up getting a Masters in Public Health at Ohio State and going into USAID. But we were in regular contact with her parents. And when I was running for governor in 1982 she made a very effective spot on my behalf. It was Bill Flaherty's idea that we do this spot just asking her how she felt about Celeste as a leader. And she talked straight to the camera about how you know I trust him. He freed me when I was taken hostage by these guys. you know, one of those things. So, that two year period was kind of interesting during that when Carter was running for re-election. I was asked to accompany his mom who'd been a Peace Corps volunteer. She was a Peace Corps volunteer in India some years earlier. And she was gonna come speak at a big senior center in Cleveland Ohio. And they asked if I would introduce her at that senior center. And I said sure. So I was back in Cleveland anyhow it's the weekend and I was gonna be there. Miss Lillian she was called, Miss Lillian is in Cleveland and we sat in a kind of holding room before we went out to visit with these folks. And she said it's good to meet you. I said it's very good to meet you I was lying. I didn't support you for Peace Corps director you know. Well I heard rumors that you had another candidate. Oh I liked that Larry Brown. He was a Peace Corps volunteer with me when I was in India. She said Larry would have been a really good director. But Jimmy tells me you're doing all right too. I didn't support you as director. I loved it. She was a hoot. And you know in the end, well the Debra Loff incident occasioned a tough exchange with the secretary of state because the ambassador and the secretary of state wanted to pull the Peace Corps out of El Salvador. And I thought that was wrong at the time. And I said I felt that if the Peace Corps volunteers and the country director felt they were safe then we should respect that. If we turned it into a kind of political thing it would expose the volunteers more because their safety depended on their relationship with host country nationals not on their relationship with the U.S. embassy. And it's a probably two or three page case that I make which was not persuasive with the secretary of state. In the end we were they stayed in El Salvador until Archbishop Romero was assassinated and then at that point our country director said Yeah we needed. But I wrote a memo to my successor I didn't have any idea who that would be. And I was you know here are three suggestions for the Peace Corps. When you sit in this chair and I left it on my desk and on the 20th of January 1981 I came you know I said farewell to my colleagues at the Peace Corps. They all did a very funny farewell party in which again the theme was political and they made fun of me and I came back to Ohio and back to my dad's you know back to our housing business, but not really because I was going to run for governor again.

CW: So how was the relationship with the family during that time when you were spending a lot of time in Washington D.C.? And as you mentioned Dagmar just had issues.

RC: Yeah, mental health, yeah it was pretty good. I think that the kids. You know Steven was very young and so I took him with me on occasion and he would just come to the office and he would play around in my office and he had he became kind of the mascot of the Celeste leadership of the Peace Corps right. And all of the senior staff got to know him and he had his favorites and some of the older kids came with me a couple of times. Christopher, Gabriella was never around. She was gonna do her own thing no matter what. Eric was also finishing up college stuff. I think you know the fact that I was back on weekends it was kind of a regular rhythm to what I was doing. Dagmar wasn't working the kids were in school other than Steven. And so it was it was a good time. When I was back on weekends I wasn't the only, the hardest, the hardest job in the Peace Corps was when we had a volunteer die usually as an accident although we had one murder and I would call the family to inform them. And that was, that's the hardest thing I've ever done in my life. I would sit by the phone and I would all I could feel was what how I would feel if I got that call about one of my kids. And it was it took every ounce of energy I could muster to pick up the phone and make that call. There's no good way to tell a mother or father that their son or daughter has died. And you know if it was a drowning or if it was a car accident or if it was whatever doesn't it doesn't make it any less painful. And so you know that was my only fear, the phone ring if I was in Cleveland. And I did not want it to be the division of volunteer support telling me that we lost a volunteer. Because then I have to pick up the phone and call a family. And so I you know I think between that and then Debra life thing and negotiating with Congress and negotiating with you know going to the Oval Office and sitting with the president to report on how the Peace Corps was going when I ran for governor in 1982 I felt totally comfortable that I could handle the job of governor. I didn't get was gonna be anything that would come at me that I wasn't prepared to face directly. And I'm not sure that I had that feeling going into the 78 election.

CW: For a guy who love politics. Whose grown up in politics was living in Washington D.C. has to be. How did you feel about it.

RC: Well that was the only place I could do my work but I and I love the city. The city is a beautiful city and the Peace Corps office at that time was across Lafayette Park from the White House. It was the office that Sarge Shriver had chosen for the Peace Corps when he started the Peace Corps. And he could keep an eye on his brother in law. Over in the White House. Right. So it was a building I worked in back in 1963 I just moved from the second floor to the eighth floor. All of that felt really good. I love the Peace Corps. I spent a lot of time on the road I visited 26 countries. I slept with volunteers in every circumstance you could imagine around the world. But I never you know I was living in the basement of Danny's house. It was not, this wasn't home for me right. And I had I didn't have a fully blown antipathy toward Washington at that point. That grew when I became governor but it felt right to commute. I mean the truth is it felt right to commute. I was glad to be going back to my home on the weekend. I get to Washington and then I could focus on the job. I didn't have family distractions which was for a lot of my staff. They wish I had family there because you know I'd stay in the office until 7:00 or 8:00 or 9:00 at night dreaming up another task for them to do or going over the budget and asking another question about why we're doing this or why we're doing that. But I think it's significant you know when I became governor that two of my key appointments were people who worked for me at the Peace Corps. Bill Sykes And Department of Administrative Services and Chris Sale as the budget director for the State of Ohio. And you know I was, I had already begun to identify talent that I wanted to bring along.

CW: It seems like a large part of what people who are successful are able to do is to identify and utilize talent that they find. Do you think you're skilled at that?

RC: I, yes and no. Yes. I recruited some really gifted people and the most gifted was a woman named Pam Hyde who became my Director of Mental Health which is a story in itself. There were others Bill Denihan was extraordinary, Rick Seiter was our Director of the Department of Corrections who was on loan from the federal government was another. But I made some mistakes and Jim Rogers who ended up going to prison for a kickback scheme was a mistake and a couple of cases I knew and respected individuals who for one reason or other got out of sync with their responsibilities and in the end the toughest case of that was Roberta Steinbacher at the Bureau of Employment Services. Roberta was somebody I knew very very well. She was a dear friend of Dagmars but you know she had run the Urban Studies program at Cleveland State, a former nun, totally honest and she was totally honest. But she was confronted with a series of issues at Bureau of Employment Services that where the advice she got from Hearst her team was not always the best advice and she got crossways with things and I let that go on too long for her good or my good. And only when she became blind in one eye did I say to her it's time for you to go. And I should have I should have cut her loose much earlier I should have said look this is you got problems here that are not of your making but they're going to sink you and I didn't recognize that. So I you know I give myself high marks for most of my budget for most of my choices Joy Lynn Bach was another example was tax commissioner who was terrific. But the best of all was Pam Hyde. She was she was my say my champion recruit of new faces somebody I didn't know at all and emerged in a talent search process.

CW: I had on my list I was wondering if you thought we should jump back to talk about but you traveled to West Africa in 76.

RC: I did travel to West Africa in 1976.

CW: For food production is that?

RC: You know I suppose maybe in a way you wouldn't think of a lieutenant governor doing foreign missions right. But I was invited by a not for profit in Washington D.C. to join in this delegation that went to look at food issues in Senegal and Mali. And it was fascinating because what they wanted to do was to put together kind of a cross-section of American opinion makers people in state government and local government, a woman who was a staffer on the Senate Agriculture Committee, LaDonna Harris a leader in the Native American movement who is married to Fred Harris who was a senator at that time, city councilman from Atlanta, a city councilman from Missouri. And it's was a very diverse group that went and a woman who was a farmer from Texas, this tough bird. Yeah, she was probably in her early 50s. She had more energy than any of us. She asked better questions than any of us. But we it was I think it was like for me it was a way of sort of stretching my mind around issues that weren't just focused on hey I'm going to run for governor in a couple of years. To take a look at kind of what was happening in a larger perspective. I'd been a student of Africa a long time ago and this was an opportunity to see on the ground what was happening in an area that I always considered important. So I think that it was it was a helpful perspective kind of in the mid 70s. It was helpful in thinking about you know what do we want to accomplish as a state. What does leadership mean. Do we value agriculture enough here at home in the context of what it means for the livelihood of all of us. And it probably was you know a karmic connection to the Peace Corps leadership that followed unexpectedly in 1979. So I was always collecting friends so there were people on that in that group like LaDonna Harris who became supporters when I decided to run for governor and beyond.

CW: So what did the, what was the outcome of that trip?

RC: The outcome from that trip was a set of kind of observations that we shared with people who were making Foundation decisions about where to invest foundation money and particularly focused on the young woman who was the staffer from the Senate Agriculture Committee. With some thoughts about the U.S. role both the public policy role I think direct government investment in agriculture in countries like Senegal and Mali but also the opportunities to use the private sector. So our friend the woman who was the farmer from Texas said you know we had to get the farm bureau federation of Texas and some of these other states interested in having partnerships or like sister cities but these would be sister farm bureaus with agricultural organizations in places like West Africa. I would say it was not an exercise directly related to Ohio or what I was doing in Ohio but more indirectly.

CW: I know you said it but did it feed into the Peace Corps?

RC: It did feed in the Peace Corps and it didn't you know it didn't remind me if I do if I needed reminding. I don't think I did but it did remind me again of how important agriculture is across the globe. We do it differently in that cultivators in West Africa don't have 600 acre farms, they don't have you know massive irrigation systems, they didn't have a grain storage, and grain processing opportunities that we had. But you know they played a central role in our communities.

CW: When you were in the Peace Corps did you ever end up working back in that area again or have any? I mean you're a director now so you're not working directly in the field.

RC: No, absolutely we had a number of programs. Our programs are always in response to priorities that were set by host countries but in many host countries ways to increase agricultural income were important. So two of the major initiatives that we undertook were helping farmers understand how to raise chickens as a supplemental source of income because many of these farmers didn't if they did they had chickens just ran around loose and they didn't really pay attention to breeding them or taking care of how to raise them properly for market purposes. And fish farming which could be a relatively easy initiative to undertake in country in countries where you had access to water either through tube wells or nearby rivers and things like that and you could create fish farms that produced a really good source of nutrition and income. And so those are two agriculture initiatives that we had a number of Peace Corps volunteers involved in across the world.

CW: So when you were at the Peace Corps and you left, was it always kind of understood that you would leave at this certain time?

RC: If Jimmy Carter had been reelected I probably would have stayed another six months or so. But not much more than that because I did want to get back to Ohio. And I understood that it was not going to, I wasn't going to have a free ride in a primary in 1982. There were people who felt well OK Celeste has had his turn. Now it's somebody else's turn. Both Bill Brown and Jerry Springer thought they were entitled to be out and they were better, you know I'm sure they believed they were a better positioned. to run for governor in 1982. So I was I wasn't glad that Jimmy Carter lost but I was comfortable coming back and in January of 81.

CW: So you said in your first run for governor that you did not get the support of Vern Riffe. Were you able to get it in your second run?.

RC: Well that's an interesting. I mean Vern would say he supported me in 1978 and he did endorse me. I'm what I said is you know if you look at the numbers he didn't deliver what I think he could have delivered had he really wanted to. Okay.

CW: He didn't go above and beyond.

RC: He didn't he didn't go all out for me. In the run up to 1982 is very interesting because Vern Riffe held a press conference with Marvin Warner in 1981 announcing that they were gonna be a tandem team running for governor. And the press was very interested in that announcement but of course being good journalists they ask which one is gonna be a candidate for governor and which is going to be a candidate for lieutenant governor? And the reality was there was two candidates for governor and they could never decide who would be the lieutenant governor. And when several of my friends contacted me in Washington with you know concern. I guess I was back in Cleveland. Called me with concern. Say oh my gosh. Riffe and Warner they got all the money, they've got all the political clout. I said who's gonna be a candidate for governor and they said well we don't know. And I said they never will run. It won't work. And it didn't. So then the question was would Vern endorse someone in the primary and would Marvin Warner endorse someone in a primary. And so I went to see Vern and I made a pitch to him as I'm sure the others did or at least this bill Brown I'm sure did. I don't think I don't know whether Jerry ever bothered to do that. And Vern gave it some thought and then Vern decided to endorse me and he did work. Worked hard for me in the primary and worked hard for me in the general election. Yeah. You know I think he realized that I would be. Bill Brown had a cadre of people around him who were very much focused on south eastern Ohio and kind of what came out of that part of the state. And I think Vern felt that he and I were kind of complimentary somebody out of Cleveland and somebody out in New Boston or Portsmouth or southern Ohio. And we had worked together for four years in the legislature and Bill kind of ran his own shop and kept his own counsel. I don't know what the conversations were behind and I didn't you know I never asked Vern you know what did Bill offer you in return for an endorsement or what kind of conversation did you have. So

CW: Were there things that he wanted for his endorsement?

RC: Well I think what he wanted was it was a confidence that I would respect him and would respect the position that he held as Speaker and I would consult with him on things like appointments and the rest. And you know I said Absolutely you're you know if you have people recommend I'll give it serious consideration I'm not going to commit everyone's a Vern Riffe appointee any more than you would expect me to. And so we had in that respect we had a very good relationship.

CW: Were there any that were hard sells or outright noes that you were surprised by?

RC: In that period of time. No I don't think so. I mean I the early stage was was kind of touch and go. I said that I am proud of guerilla campaigning right. And in that lieutenant governor's race it was trying to figure out how to persuade Jack Gilligan to endorse me. So the first challenge in 1982 when I was running for the nomination was fundraising because I'd been out of state and because Springer had a base in Cincinnati and Bill Brown had his base in a base in A.G.'s office. Both of them were very effective fund raisers and so approaching in the first filing deadline for your campaign finance reporting in this in the fall of 1981 Larry McCartney and Jerry Austin came to me and said You've got a problem. You've got ninety thousand dollars in the bank. Bill Brown is gonna file a report that shows more than a million dollars. Jerry Springer is going to file a report that shows more than a million dollars and people going to say you're nowhere. You've got to, you've got to show nine hundred, eight or nine hundred thousand dollars, a million dollars to be in the ballpark. And I said Well how am I going to do that. We've got five days and Larry McCartney said I have an idea. He said Can you get a group of people to lend you eight or nine hundred thousand dollars. And we file a report that shows you have nine hundred and fifty thousand dollars in the bank on the filing deadline and then two days after the filing deadline you pay the money back and we go out and raise our money. And so I went to my dad and I went to Ted Bonda and I went to Danny Heffernan and I went to I don't know whether there were some but Peter Lewis I know there were three or four people. And I said Look I need to raise eight or nine hundred thousand dollars I need maximum loans that you can give me. You'll be out of pocket for four days. Once Monday comes we'll send it back to you. And that's what we did. So I filed a report that showed nine hundred fifty thousand dollars most of it was as loans. But the press never asked me what was the significance of the loan. And there were several people who said hey you know you don't have a million dollars in each of the other guys have a million dollars I said That's right. They raised a million dollars in a year. I raised nine hundred thousand dollars in a week. So what does that say about us. They took my word for it right. And then I had to set out I'm really raising the money and I had a fascinating experience I asked the man I respected most and he was a dear friend was Milton Wolf a developer in Cleveland who'd been a friend and a supporter for some time. And Jimmy Carter he'd raise money for Jimmy Carter and Jimmy Carter appointed him ambassador to Austria. And because I'd worked in the embassy in India he asked me for advice on you know what he ought to do as an ambassador coming in and because Dagmar was from Vienna she gave him thoughts about Vienna and Austria. And so we'd become close. So I went to him shortly after this interesting guerrilla tactic and said Mr. Ambassador I'd like to recruit you to be my finance chair for the governors race. I need to raise six million dollars. I'd like to raise the first million dollars in ten 100,000 dollar commitments. I think you know put a million dollars in the bank to get up a head of steam. And I explained why I thought I could win and why I wanted to run again etc.. He asked me some questions and they said you know Dick I'm worn out I did fundraising for Carter. I and there's John Glenn's effort to run I was his finance chair and I'm just worn out. I'll do one hundred thousand for you, but you need to ask somebody else why don't you go ask Albert Ratner. So I went to see Albert Ratner who's a friend and actually a cousin or a cousin in-law of Milt's. Went through my spiel I'm going to run for governor again and he's raised six million dollars that I'l like to do a million in ten 100,000 dollar contributions. And I really need a finance chair and I'd like you to be my finance chair. Ratner said Well that guy I'm an admirer of yours I support you and I'm happy to support you in this race but I can't be your financier chair. I'm doing some projects here in Cleveland. And we've got a Republican mayor. I just don't feel like I can be effective. I'll do 100,000 dollars but I can't be financed here. So I went back to Milt. Well Albert turned me down I'm starting to feel discouraged. Go see Bob Tomczak. He's an admirer of yours I know and he's I think he'd like to be a player. So you oughta talk to him. So I went to see Bob Tomczak give him my spiel and Tomczak said you know Dick I really want to support you but I'm not comfortable being a finance chair. So I'll do 100,000 dollars but I can't be your finance chair. So I'm back to Milt Wolf and he said well go see Peter Lewis. And so I went to see Peter Lewis who was a very good friend of mine. Peter and I shared a birthday he was five years older than me. But we were both November 11th babies. And I saw Peter in his in his penthouse on Cedar Avenue in Cleveland. Went through my pitch. Peter is a really good friend Peter said you know Dick I'm glad to hear you're running again. I'm excited for you he said but I can't be your financial chair. He said I'm a giver I'm not an asker. In fact you didn't ask for enough from me. He said I'll do 100,000 in the primary and I'll do 100,000 in the general. And he took out his checkbook and he wrote me a check for a hundred thousand dollars as I sat there. I'm disappointed because I don't have a finance chair. I go back to Ambassador Wolf. I said I don't know I must be doing something wrong. He said why? I said I asked Peter Lewis to be my finance chair. He said now he's a giver not an asker. What about the 100,000 he wrote a check for a 100,000 dollars. I have a 100,000 he'll do 100,000 in the general election and Milt Wolf said I'll be your finance chair. I said why did you have me go to all those people. He said you know. He said I love John Glenn and I worked really hard for John. But we would set up appointments for John to ask for money and he would talk all about his experience in space. He would talk about being a Marine and a test pilot. He could never get himself to ask. He always felt that people should know why he was there and they should just volunteer the money. And I didn't want to go through another campaign where I had a candidate who wouldn't ask. So it was a test he wanted to make sure I was prepared to ask for money. And once I had demonstrated that he was ready to come on board. He was very helpful. And we didn't have to fudge the next campaign finance things. But it was a real primary. And that was a serious primary. The Democratic Party wasn't going to make an endorsement. I think Paul Tipps if he had you know if it had been left to him he probably would have chosen Bill Brown. But he played it straight in. He let us all you know compete. That for me it was very interesting because the big issue was you know what do you do about the finances here in Ohio and how do you get people back to work. I focused on you know getting Ohioans back to work. And we had the best song and a really good set of advertising. One of the mistakes I made 1978 was in having an out-of-state media team and media advisers. They didn't have a good feel for Ohio. And so in 82 Jerry Austin ran the campaign. 78 My brother ran that campaign a lot of people blame my loss on Ted which was unfair but for some of the county chairmen and the rest when 82 rolled around I think I talked to several of them and they made it clear to me that I needed to have a change in my team. And they tended to I think they were being nice to me but they tended to blame Ted for the loss. And so I said to my brother listen I don't think it's fair, but I think I need a different campaign chairman in order to persuade these key county chairmen that I'm serious. And so this is a decision that I need to make and I need your help. I'm want you close to me but I need you. So Jerry who ran my lieutenant governor's race came back in and Jerry worked very well with David Milenthal. And so on so they did media and Dagmar worked with a guy and David Schock to write this song which is a birthday present to me. And "Do you care enough to care about Ohio" became background music for our ads and music we played at events and again that was a that was a helpful distinguishing characteristic of the campaign but the big thing was you know the question would be asked here's an example of how I could position myself between Bill Brown and Jerry Springer. OK your Governor are you going to raise taxes. What the How are you getting into the tax issue. Bill Brown I never raise taxes. I'm just not going to raise taxes period. Jerry Springer oh I'm going to raise taxes. We have to raise taxes. Dick Celeste I want to know what the facts are when I'm governor. I want to know what the facts are. If the facts are we have to raise taxes I'll go to the legislature and ask for additional taxes. I don't want to promise that I'm going to raise taxes because if we can avoid it I'd rather not. So I had the whole middle of the road to myself in the campaign and it proved to be the winning space in that primary election. But I had to beat a Brown again. Nine hundred eight or nine hundred thousand dollars, a million dollars to be in the ballpark. And I said Well how am I going to do that. We've got five days and Larry McCartney said I have an idea. He said Can you get a group of people to lend you eight or nine hundred thousand dollars.

CW: And you did.

RC: And I did. And then I faced another Brown in the general election. Clarence Brown congressman from Springfield, Ohio.

CW: So after winning the primary does it becomes easier to find support once you've won the primary once the party's nomination or is it about the same?

RC: Oh no, I think once you win the nomination. Well it would depend. I mean I didn't. I never ran negative ads against my opponents. And so I think that helped. Bill Brown was a was a team player he turned out he had a serious heart condition and which actually took him much too young. But he was working out after the primaries working out and suffered a heart attack and his wife said to me you know if he'd won that nomination he would have died on the campaign trail. You saved his life. I don't know whether that's true. But he became a very good friend as a result of the campaign Jerry Springer had a small debt when the campaign was over he was like sixty thousand dollars he outstanding bills. And I said Jerry I want you to help me in the fall. And like you they get around and campaign for me. He is a very effective campaigner. And I said let me help you pay off your debt. And so part of what I did going into the general election campaign was raise money not only for my campaign but to pay off Jerry's debt. And it enabled him to go back to Cincinnati and get a job on television and the rest is history. I met him. I met him many years later long after I had finished as governor. It's probably 15 years after this campaign. And I was in this airport in Chicago and I ran into him. He said You know I've never thanked you enough for beating me. He said You've made all of this possible. I don't know whether I wanted to take credit for the Jerry Springer Show or not. But anyway.

CW: Well I'm certain he's made money off it.

RC: Oh he could buy and sell my campaigns a number of times over, yeah.

CW: Not having known him before my familiarity with Jerry Springer from obviously the Jerry Springer Show. Do he always have that that kind of he's got a certain personality on the air. Was he always able to?

RC: Well I think the personality on air is a little bit hyped. He was all. He's there's a little bit of the fast talker in him. But he is very smart. He was sort of a Bobby Kennedy Democrat. He had a lot of energy and a kind of charisma that enabled him to overcome. Who writes a check to a hooker right? And he does that while he's mayor of Cincinnati and it's front page news and he resigns and then he runs for council again and wins. And I think he felt like look I faced up to what I did it was stupid and wrong. And he persuaded people to support him. And he was very I always found him to be enjoyable. I mean I think I'm not a fan of his show and I'm not a fan of the kind of, well it doesn't matter. It's his thing right.

CW: So you you've won the primary you're facing off against another Brown. What was your platform at this point?

RC: I have. I have failed in my description of these campaigns because the best introduction I ever received was during my campaign for governor in 1978. We had a fabulous State Senator named Bob Secrest. In fact Bob Secrest should have a place in historical society of his own because he I think he is the only person to have been elected to Congress and three different times resigned from that seat. Each time being re-elected. The first time was the fight in WWII and wants to join in the DiSalle cabinet. Now there were different reasons for it. Bob's Secrest became known as the strongest voice on behalf of veterans in the United States Congress and in the period from post-World War Two through 1960. I would imagine that almost every piece of veterans legislation had Bob Secrest's name on it. He was tall lanky had a kind of country preacher's style about him. Chewed tobacco carried a Maxwell House coffee can with him as a spittoon and he was the only person who could rise on the floor of the state Senate which he was he'd sort of relax then become a state senator he didn't want to commute to Washington any longer. So when I was lieutenant governor he was in the state Senate. If he rose to speak people would come from all over the capitol building because they heard Secrest was going to speak and he gave these great. I mean every time he spoke he was great. In any event I am going to Washington County. I think it was Washington County to speak and he was going to introduce me. And the it was the Democratic county dinner being held in Churchtown, Churchtown called Churchtown because that's where the Catholic church was and there was a Catholic school and Churchtown had the only precinct in the county that carried from McGovern in 1974 because the nuns thought McGovern was Catholic and didn't know he wasn't. Any event of that Secrest was going to introduce me at this dinner and we're in the gym in the school and there are 200 people gathered out on the floor of the gym. And at the we were lined up on a platform on the stage with you know the big long table Secrest is in the middle of county officeholders and the rest. And I was actually the curtains weren't couldn't open all the way so I was kind of hidden from the audience until I got introduced. Anyway it comes time for the speaker to be introduced Secrest stands up you know the trouble with us Democrats is that we're always nominating old men from Cleveland and they never leave Cleveland and we lose the election. Well guess what. This time we nominated a young man from Cleveland why he's traveled all over the state. I know because he brought his family, all his kids, wearing their Dickies and they were in an RV and they slept outside my house. Why he's traveled to all parts of Ohio. This time we've nominated a young man from Cleveland and he's traveling all over the state of Ohio. Why if this keeps up we will have him smoking or chewing mail pouch tobacco. I give you a Dick Celeste. If he keeps this up we'll have him chewing Mail Pouch Dick tobacco I give you Dick Celeste. Didn't say a word about my education, didn't say I had been a state rep, didn't say lieutenant governor. He had everybody on their feet cheering. You know and I come out from behind the curtain to speak. He was fabulous. If I could have taken him with me every time I traveled I would have. The stories this is maybe legend but I can believe it. Bob Seacrest had lost his wife some time ago so he was single oh and he was in it and it's probably early 70s. He liked to play cards and he liked his whiskey. And so he pretty regularly would get into a card game that began Friday and carry through Saturday and finished about sun up on Sunday morning. And Bob would brush his teeth shave and go to one of his country churches and preach. And that was a Bob Chris weekend. How you could play cards for 36 hours drinking along the way and you know he'd go into the churches with his Mail Pouch tobacco can tor his spittoon. We had we had so much fun. There was.

CW: So it wasn't all work?

RC: No, it wasn't all work. The most famous speech he gave for not for me on the floor of the Senate when I was lieutenant governor was a speech having to do with regulating fox hunting in Ohio. And this is a bill some funny little bill that had come across from the House to the Senate and whoever the senator was doing a favor to the House member tried to explain the bill to the members of the Senate. They didn't get it and the bill. Clearly the bill was in trouble. So Bob Secrest stood up the place begins to fill up. You know I think I may be the only one in his chamber that's actually been on a fox hunt. You know how Fox hunt works. Well here's what Fox is like boys and girls. All the old guys get together with their dogs and they let this little cute little fox out and this little fox starts running away saying I don't like the sound of these dogs. And they give the Fox a little bit of a head start and then they let their dogs loose and you'll hear a dog go yip, yip, yip, and a guy will say that's my dog. And then another dog go woof. And the guy will say that's my dog. And then another go arf, arf, arf and he'll say that's mine dog. And then the boys have to stop and rest and lubricate themselves. And you'll hear a dog go ypi. yip, yip and a guy will say that's my dog. And then you'll hear a dog go arf, arf, arf and a guy will say that's mine dog. Well after a little while longer you know the boys will have to stop again for a rest and some lubrication. That cute little fox has gotten down to the end of the hunt. And the dogs are bark bark barking and the guys are sitting under a tree saying that's my dog. That's my dog. That's what a fox hunt is. I think we should pass this bill. All those in favor say aye. Aye. Any oppose I mean I'm doing it in two minutes. It was about a ten minute fox hunt that he took us on verbally and you know maybe they don't make legislators quite the way they used to. You think about Bob Secrest he's got there's a Joe Secrest who is the nephew of his but not in the same league. And I didn't get an introduction like that anytime during 1982. The theme in 1982 the theme the whole thrust of 1982 is to stand up for Ohio. The notion was if you know I would ask the question if we don't stand up for Ohio who will. In that sense I ran against Washington in 1982 and that was partly because of the economy. This was the Reagan recession at that point in time and I had an opponent who and we knew the opponent was gonna be Clarence Brown was the clear candidate. Who was associate with Washington has his whole life had been in Washington. And so we now we did things like you know Dick Celeste fought for seniors and blah, blah, blah. Meanwhile in Washington Clarence Brown voted against the increase in Social Security benefits or something like that. So there was a whole series of meanwhile in Washington ads and it would end up stand up for Ohio if we don't stand up for Ohio who will right. And that theme resonated very very effectively. I announced that campaign in the home of an unemployed auto worker in Cleveland and which was in the primary and my whole focus during the primary was really on getting the economy working again. I developed what I called an action agenda and the action agenda was you know I had things like I was going to fire the public utilities commission and appoint people who would pay attention to what was happening to consumers and not just the electric companies. I was going to declare a buy Ohio policy there were kind of Trumpian themes that what I ran on in 1982. I showed an ad we did a, we shot an ad in Lordstown standing next to one of the Chevys off the Lordstown line. And I said This car sells for twenty thousand dollars in the United States but it has to sell for thirty thousand dollars in Japan because they've put a tariff on our cars. Meanwhile, Toyota comes to the United States and it sells for twenty thousand dollars. That's not fair. As governor I'll fight for fair trade. Well a governor can't do much about trade but I understood that that was an issue. And so it was it was basically to try to contrast a Washington that wasn't really helping us in Ohio on a policy. I didn't run against Reagan but I ran against the consequences of Reagan policy. And it was really effective and you know toward the end of that campaign it was clear that I was going to win substantially. And so I actually took money that I had raised and put it into a couple of states Senate races particularly Eugene Branstool's race because we felt we could win. And on Election Day it paid off because we took the Ohio Senate by one seat. And so it was not just my victory but a really strong Democratic victory across. It was hard for I mean when the unemployment rate is at 14 percent it's hard to feel any lift from that you know.

CW: What were your concerns coming in to the governor's office. What were those things you had to clean up?

RC: Well I knew that we had. I mean the biggest issue is going to be the finance that was going to be what we do about money. No question about that. And then how do we get people working again. How do we generate jobs. So I did a couple of things that early on. I mean the first appoint the first cabinet appointments I made were what I call tax and spend my budget director and my tax commissioner and they were both women which stunned people. One was Chris Sale from Washington. My budget director and the other was Joanna Lynn Bach down on tax a county commissioner from Tuscarawas County. And they were terrific. They were both very professional, very focused, and it turned out to be very persuasive with the legislature which helped. And we with encouragement from Bill Flahrety and others reached out to Howard Collier to help us in the transition because he'd been Rhodes forever finance guy and Howard Collier chaired. A group that Gilligan appointed a committee to look at the hospitals the number of hospitals in Ohio back when he was governor. And the co-chairs of that group were my dad and Howard Collier. So Collier knew my father and as a consequence he was willing to be supportive of me as best he could. So focus on money was number one, second big thing was how do you generate economic activity. And I sat down, I asked at the end of November I ask a guy named Rube Mettler who was the chairman of TRW a very big company in Cleveland, very progressive company in Cleveland. And he was one of say 20 of the top business most respected business leaders most thoughtful business leaders in the country. So I ask to see him and we sat down in the office in the Cleveland State office tower in Cleveland and I said to him I want you to tell me what would cause you to invest in a particular state over other states. And he said he didn't. And it was wonderful. Because I remember vividly. There was about a four minute silence not a one minute silence about four minutes. He just sat and thought he didn't feel any need to say something. He just sat and thought he was completely composed. And then he said Dick there are two things that would make me take a state seriously. He said the first is most states, most politicians only think in two year and four year terms but as a business I can't think in two years and four years I've got to think in five years and ten years. So if there were a state with a ten year plan some vision for how they'd move forward over 10 years I would take that state assuming the plan made some sense I would take that state seriously. He said the second thing that would interest me in a state. He said there is a misconception in the United States that the Japanese are out inventing us. He was the president of the US Japan Business Council among other things. There's a misconception that the Japanese are out inventing us they aren't. We are the most innovative nation in the world. But the Japanese are faster at taking new knowledge to market than we are. We take a long time to figure out how to take an invention from my university laboratory or wherever it happens to get it into the market. The Japanese move it out much faster if if there were a state that had a system for moving innovation from into the market quickly that state would get my attention. Now it's really thoughtful advice right now. It had nothing to do with party or budgets or anything else. So the next key set of decisions I made was very unconventional. I asked Warren Smith to become director of transportation. Warren was the secretary of the state AFLCIO not an engineer. And I asked Al Dietzel who was at that time President of the Chamber of Commerce in Columbus and a Republican to become my director of development. And I sat the two of them down and I said so here is what I learned from my conversation with Rube Mettler. Ten year strategy, strategy for moving innovation into the market as quickly as possible. I want you to develop a 10 year strategy and I want part of that to be how do we innovate rapidly. And I added for Warren's benefit I said Look my impression is that there are probably 50 million dollars worth of highway construction projects designed and sitting on shelves. I want to get them off the shelf. I want as much highway construction going as fast as possible and because Warren was interested in jobs and not engineering designs. He brought a whole different attitude to the Department of Transportation so two things happen in that we had to pass an interim budget because we had a half a million half a billion dollar deficit five hundred million dollar deficit. We raised taxes and we cut spending at the same time in that interim budget right after I took office that was the project that Chris and Joanne worked on and then we had to get people back to work. Part of that budget included a nickel increase in the gasoline tax which was matched 9 to 1 by federal money. So every nickel meant 50 cents of additional money we had to spend on highway projects. And Warren got them to review highway projects and we started building their orange cones were out on highways within about three months and we were putting people back to work there. And as soon as he got that started he and Al Dietzel went around the state talked to business leaders, education leaders, union leaders what can we do as part of a strategic plan for Ohio. And you know we would put a plan together talked about toward a working Ohio and it was a 10 year plan. Here are the things we need to do over the next 10 years to get Ohio working. And in the meantime Bill Colter who is the chancellor of the Board of Regents not an appointee of mine but very very thoughtful leader for higher education. Came to me with some ideas for initiatives in higher education that were aimed at enhancing research capabilities and also thinking about ways in which those research results could be moved into market. And so we built around that and some other thoughts. The Thomas Edison program that got us going.

CW: Can't imagine that increase in taxes made you very popular early on.

RC: No, it went on the ballot. We had to defend it. When we defend it and we defended it successfully. You know it's an easy target to be against taxes. But by and large if you explain where the money's going and if people can see it at work. I mean if we hadn't been able to get orange barrels out, if we hadn't been able to identify initiatives in virtually every metropolitan area that would be visible whether it was a university based program or some other initiative that people could identify with we would have had problems. But you know we. One of the things I did as I know Jim Rhodes promised a bypass everywhere including his hometown a Jackson bypass right. But he never budgeted any of them. So part of what I started doing is this. I'm the keeper of Jim Rhodes promises. And you know we did the Stubenville bypass. We did the Jackson bypass. These were all highway projects that had been promised by my predecessor but never delivered. And we did have you know Honda came to me one of the big issues at that time when I took office was Rhodes had promised Honda 30 million dollars of incentives to build the assembly plant in Marysville. At that time there was just the motorcycle plant. And the assembly plant was supposed to be going on with 30 million of incentives. I had campaigned against that basically I said look it's not fair to make a promise to a foreign company when we have domestic auto companies Ford and General Motors and Chrysler here in Ohio that can use the help. And so the Honda folks called me right after I took office and said we want to come see you. We're not sure you know whether you're going to honor the commitment. And I sat with Honda leadership and I said you tell me what your commitment is and I'm going to tell you what my problem is. So they said our plan is if we get a green light we will build a plant in 20 months and we will hire 2,000 people. Well when unemployment is at 14 percent and you can get a substantial commitment like that it's good. I said I don't have 30 million dollars. I have a deficit. I'm going to raise taxes and cut spending. So let's look at what we can do and it turned out that what they needed was an expansion the highway passed the plant in Marysville. They needed an extension of the railroad spur that went out to the plant. Both of those I could do within the transportation budget and they needed some help because they were going to use the wetlands for part of the sites and they needed permission to replace it with something somewhere else. So we worked out an arrangement and within 20 months we had two thousand people working in that plant. Mr. Honda came personally to open it and he went around at age 80 and shook the hands of every single person working in that plant. Interestingly I had hired as my director of industrial relations a UAW leader from Lordstown which was one of the most militant plants in the state. And I took him with me to the opening, the dedication of that Honda factory and he looked at this and he turned to me at the end of it and he said you know Dick if every automobile plant was designed like this and run like this we wouldn't be able to organize. I mean they did a good job. And within the course of my eight years in office they went on to build an engine plant and a transmission plant and a second assembly plant. So we ended up with 10000 direct jobs from Honda plus about 40,000 supplier jobs.

CW: Those are the wins where do you think you had losses there?

RC: Well, I think that the biggest loss was having Jim Rogers within a year, year and a half indicted and convicted of the kickbacks that he was doing in the Department of Youth Services. That was really tough. We were fortunate you know in the election is in 82. There was an issue on the ballot to create a housing finance agency. We didn't have that before. And I ask an attorney from Cleveland Ray Sawyer to come down and help get that started. He was somebody I knew young, enthusiastic, smart and he worked with. He was savvy in bond finance arena and I think we got the housing finance agency up and funded within 12 or 14 months. And that was another important stimulant to the economy. So I think substantively the first few years were very productive. I think that the biggest challenges were personnel. And if anything anytime something went wrong even if it wasn't within the administration if they were somebody who was associated with me and end up with a nasty headline. I mean there was a guy who I liked a lot named Sam Lucarelli who had a very successful temporary help business in Cleveland. He was one of my one hundred thousand dollar contributors. And about I don't know maybe in the first or second year that I was in office he was arrested. The feds had put somebody inside a gambling operation that he had going in the back of his place in Cleveland. He turned out, he was a, he loved cards and they had a high stakes card game that he ran regularly at the back of his place. I didn't know that when I got a contribution from him. The headline in the Plain Dealer is Celeste supporter arrested by Feds. Right. What is his gambling hav to do with the governor right. But it was that way. So those are the kinds of things that were really tough. And I didn't you know I don't know whether I didn't handle that very well. I got very sensitive about it and kind of started off pretty long running feud with the Plain Dealer for much of my life. Although they endorsed me for re-election when that time came. Now we were rolling really well and then in March 1985 hit and a little thing called Home State.

CW: Was run by Marvin Warner.

RC: Marvin Warner. Who Marvin was another one of my one hundred thousand dollar contributors. So there are a lot of people who thought well the reason why Marvin Warner was able to do whatever he did was get Celeste cut him slack. I had and you know in the federal grand jury in Cincinnati took every one of my day timers that had all of my schedule for the first two years or three years in office to see how often Marvin Warner met with me and then asked me what those meetings were about. Cutting him favors? I said No I actually put him to work for the state of Ohio. I asked him to head up to the Ohio building authority because I wanted to make sure that it was well-run you know. Which reminds me of a story. It is four days before my inauguration as governor and a little birdie came to me and said Jim Rhodes is going to break ground on a state office tower the morning of your inauguration. The state had begun acquiring land for the building that is now the Riffe Tower. There was talk of building a 60 story building or something like that on the property and was gonna be the Riffe-Gilmore building and that had been much discussed but no work had been done and the state hadn't really acquired all the land. But I got word that they were going to let a contract for the construction and they were going to have a bulldoze over there or something to break ground while I was being sworn in and absolutely no way was I going to let that happen. Now as part of my action agenda I was going to fire the public utilities commission and what nobody knew at that point in time is I had been successful at getting letters of resignation from all three members of the public utilities commission. Two of whom were Republicans and one of whom was Mike DelBane my friend from when I was in the state legislature and a very close associate of Vern Riffe's. So when I heard that this ground was going to be broken and I had told Vern about my plan to replace the PUC and Vern said well you know you ought to really keep Mike DelBane on there. So I'm going to take his resignation but I will appoint him to the new PUC because it's gonna be a five member public utilities commission and there has to be a senior citizen member and he would be a perfect senior citizen member. So Vern and I had that understanding. I hear that they're going to, that Rhodes is gonna try to pull one fast one on Inauguration Day. So I called Vern and I said Mr. Speaker I need to share a concern with you he said what's that. I said I've heard this rumor that my outgoing predecessor your pal Jim Rhodes is planning to break ground on this office really across the street on the morning of my inauguration. And I said that isn't going to happen. It can't happen. That's wrong. And I agree that's not a good idea. I said Well let me just share with you this if that groundbreaking happens I won't be able to reappoint Mike DelBane to the Public Utilities Commission. He said what do you mean? You said you were going to appoint Mike and I said well I'd like to appoint Mike but if Jim Rhodes breaks ground on that office building across the street I won't I just. Mr. Speaker I won't be able to reappoint Mike DelBane. I already have his resignation letter. And I could hear the wheels of Vern's mind going around. He said well partner now let me let me see what I can do. I just needed to get Vern's attention right. I had his attention. He called me 24 hours later and he said Governor can I call you Governor. I said I guess you can Mr. Speaker. He said Well I just am calling to tell you that there will be no groundbreaking tomorrow at your inauguration. I said well that's good news. I said I'm sure Mike DelBane will be grateful to hear that. And so and the morning I was inaugurated was very cold. It was really cold. There was no groundbreaking going on across the street. One of the things, one of the reasons why I wanted Marvin Warner to head the Ohio Building Commission was because the notion of a 60 storey building didn't make any sense. It wasn't related to how the building would be used or the rest. So I ask Marvin to take a look at this and I say here's what I want you to do I want a realistic budget. I want this to be built properly. I want us I want everybody to be proud of this when it's done. And then I called Vern and said Vern this should not be the Riffe-Gilmore Building. There's no reason why Paul Gilmore should have his name on a state office building. You, I mean he's he's been President of the Senate for maybe four years or six years. It just doesn't it doesn't compute. You have been in legislature for twenty four years or twenty five years you've been speaker for. And he went on of course to be record length of Speaker. I want it to be the Riffe Building well Vern and I knew how to get along. He was very brunt and I called Paul Gilmore I said Paul listen I want to talk to you. I don't mean this in any disrespect but I think if we're going to name a building for a living person it's got to be an unusual situation. And I think Vern Riffe deserves it. I think it should be the Riffe Building. You know maybe there'll be a Gilmore building someday we'll see. But you know he wasn't happy about it. But that was it. Marvin Warner and I had an understanding. He called me he woke me up at 5 o'clock in the morning on a March day. Told me he had a problem and he wanted my help. And when he described the problem I realized it was serious. He wanted to state basically he wanted the state to bail him out. He couldn't say how much that bail out would cost. And I said I'd have Ray Sawyer talk to him. By this time Ray had become my legal counsel. And that was the last conversation I ever had in my life with Marvin Warner. That was it. Because I couldn't, there was no way I could handle that and negotiate with Marvin. Ray Sawyer was the person to talked to him. He spoke with Milt Wolff regularly because they hadn't worked on my campaign together. Milt would talk to me. I'd listen to what they had to say. (unknown) I said look I have one responsibility that's to protect the depositors in these institutions period. My interest isn't in protecting the owners of the savings and loan. Some of more mutual where the owners were really the depositors. But and to be concerned about the taxpayers dollars.

CW: Looking back on it they credit you were saving a lot of peoples' money, you declared the bank holiday. How did it feel at the time?

RC: Well, you know, this is this could be an answer that takes an hour it could be an answer that I'll try to do it really quickly. Fortunately I didn't listen to Chester Bowles. Fortunately I wanted to get experience in business. Fortunately that business is real estate. Fortunately I knew something about banks and savings and loans and I wasn't intimidated by them right. And you know. But this was a big problem. It started out small. It was one institution and it really wasn't it wasn't it didn't happen in Cincinnati it happened in Florida because what happened was Marvin Warner because he really controlled that place moved more money than he should have. He violated our regulations to put a big chunk of money in an investment in Florida that his son-in-law was running that investment failed and that cost Home State all of its equity and then some. That son-in-law eventually committed suicide and it was a terrible situation. And there were two or three days where they tried to figure out what to do with Home State between my phone call and at the end of the week they declared that they were going to close temporarily to get things in order hoping to reopen the following Monday. And you know I talked to Karen Horn who was the head of the Federal Reserve Bank in Cleveland to see what help the banking system could provide. I tried to reach a guy who was the head of the Federal Home Loan Bank Board which really supervises the federally insured savings and loans. He was very political very close to Reagan and he wouldn't help me. So Karen said well ideally you'd get a group of banks to buy Home State. They didn't, none of the banks were interested in buying Home State unless the state would guarantee to cover whatever the shortfall was between the obligations of Home State and their assets. That was an unknown number it could have been 50 million dollars it could have been two hundred million dollars. And I wasn't prepared to recommend to the legislature that we put an unknown amount of money on the table for one institution that was politically connected to me to Speaker Riffe and to Stan Aronoff the President of the Senate at the time. And I just said we can't do that unless you know there's unless there's some way to share the risk unless whatever. And so Home State never reopened. And by the next week that the disease of Home State infected the other, some of the other state regulated savings and loans. There were 59 other savings and loans that were regulated by the state of Ohio. Most of them in southwest Ohio. A few, just a couple, outside of the Cincinnati-Dayton area. And there were people who promoted runs and those savings and loans and so during the during week two it got sufficiently bad that people were calling for help. The Federal Reserve was providing cash wherever they could to these institutions to meet the pressure on them. But on a Thursday afternoon the second week I called and actually Karen. Karen Hornet put people outside of these savings and loans that had particular lines to count how many people were going in and tell me which places seem to be you know the most the focus of the withdrawals. So I called four CEOs on a Thursday afternoon the second week. And I said do you have, are you going to be able to get to the weekend. Do you have enough cash to survive continuing withdrawals. All four of them said no we won't, we won't make it through Friday. Meanwhile I had gotten Jan Allen and I'd gotten a couple of pro bono lawyers and Jerry Holton and I don't remember who all took kind of a look at what are the alternatives. And the one option that we well there were two options that we talked about one was to impose limited withdrawals to say you can only take out five hundred dollars a month let's say from your savings and loan but because of ATMS and the rest it was almost impossible to impose a limited withdrawal and make it work. Or we could close the savings and loans and require them to get federal insurance. I have reviewed audited on an expedited basis and then when they get approved come back and create a fund that would help cover the gaps on those that had some gaps. But we would have to close them until we could enact that legislation. I called, I had a 3 a.m. conversation with Chairman Volcker of the Federal Reserve who was very good. He said this is he'd just gotten back from California. He says governor you've succeeded in doing what I can't. I said What's that. He said you've the value of the dollar and the European exchange is going down because of a bank crisis in Ohio. I've been trying to get the value of the dollar down but this is not the way I want to do it. He said I have one piece of advice for you and one observation that is no matter how bad a bank looks from outside it looks a whole lot worse when you get inside. I said Mr. Chairman that's not very encouraging. He said Well I'm not sure there's much encouraging news I can tell you. What are your options? So I said my options are. Let the run continue which is the classic response in a bank crisis. The problem is I've talked to four CEOs and they won't make it through the bank. And Volcker said well the system can't stand the failure of one bank, but when you have more than one it gets to be a serious problem. So what else can you do. I said we could do partial withdrawals. The problem is going to be administrative I said or we can close the banks and require them to come back with federal insurance. And he said well the problem with that is it's going to take time. I said so in his estimate was that was going to take two years and two hundred and fifty million dollars. This is 1985 I'm running for re-election in 1986, right. So I told Jerry Austin I told Jerry Austin that at dinner that night before I talked to Volcker that I was going to make a decision that might jeopardize my re-election. It's going to have to face it. I have my, I invited my father to come down to Columbus to advise me. I asked Don Shackelford who is head of the biggest savings and loan here in Columbus and Jack Kessler who was a member of the Federal Reserve Bank Board in Cleveland to be with me. And they were with me when I talked to Volcker when I finished the call with Volcker I asked them you've heard the options what do you recommend. And they looked at each other and they looked at me and they said you know Dick this has to be your decision. There is no good answer. It has to be your decision. So I sent them out. I was pigging out on Girl Scout cookies and back and forth to the bathroom and all I could think about was Franklin Roosevelt and the banking crisis in the 1930s. And I thought you know what did he think. And I said to myself you know you've been elected for one reason and that's to make this decision. This is why you're here. Nobody else can make this decision right. You've got to make this decision. And so I said we're gonna close them. It's the only way I know that make sure we've got our hands around this issue and then we're gonna figure out how to reopen them down the line. So I called the lawyers in and Jan Allen brought the lawyers in 4:30, quarter of 5:00 in the morning. I said I'm gonna have an executive order I'm going to sign it. I gonna sign it at nine o'clock this morning on television in Cincinnati. And I had arranged for Karen Horn to be picked up by the state plane flown to Columbus, get me we're going to fly down to Cincinnati together. Fine they went out to write the executive order. They came back 45 minutes later and said we have a problem. It's now 5:30 I said what do you mean you have a problem. You don't, we don't think you have the authority to sign this executive order. And I said wait a minute. When we started thinking about options on Monday you told me I had this authority, on Tuesday you told me you had this authority, on Wednesday you told me. Yes yes yes. Yesterday getting ready for my call with Chairman Volcker you told me I had this authority and now you're telling me I don't have this authority. Well governor we don't think you have this authority. These are fancy hired lawyers from a firm I won't mention here in Columbus. And I said I'll tell you what you write that goddamn executive order and be prepared to defend it at 9:00 in court because I'm going to sign it in Cincinnati. So they wrote an executive order they didn't think I had the authority to sign. I signed it in Cincinnati. Two savings and loans were ready to challenge us in court. And when they announced that they were gonna stay open people began to line up outside their doors and with within two hours they closed and we never got challenged on that executive order. That was when my traffic sign flashed green. I knew what I had to do and you know and that's when there were demonstrations out in front of the statehouse people protesting I can't get to my money. My father would. My father went over to some place and he bought sandwiches and he brought all these brown bags back and he was giving them out to the demonstrators saying you need some food. By the way my son is the governor and he's trying to protect your money I just want you to know that. He's going to do whatever he can. In the end the only person who lost money in the savings and loan crisis was Marvin Warner. And he went to jail. Every other depositor was protected and the institutions either merged or reorganized or reopened once they were cleared. We got all of the all of the 59 savings and loans were open within three months. We we ended up, we created a fund which the head of one of the insurance companies here chaired Jerry, I've forgotten Jerry's last name I'll come up with it, but this was a fund that would help fund these S and Ls where there was a gap that was about a hundred and twenty five million dollars. Those were either loans or investments in stock and all of that money was recovered with interest within four or five years it was probably the most successful response to a banking crisis anywhere in the country.