Nixon White House Tapes › Tape 21 › Conversation 021-089

Nixon phone call with an unidentified caller on Ronald L. Ziegler

Thursday, March 16, 1972 · 9:17 PM–10:27 PM ET · White House Telephone

ParticipantsNixon, Richard M. (President); White House operatorConversation021-089 on Tape 21 (tape position 03:20:57–03:21:06)StartThursday, March 16, 1972 at 9:17 PMEndThursday, March 16, 1972 at 10:27 PMRecording deviceWhite House TelephoneSourceNixon Library record for 021-089 ↗

President Nixon contacted the White House operator to facilitate an urgent communication with Press Secretary Ronald L. Ziegler. The brief interaction served as a logistical request to establish a telephone connection with his primary spokesperson. No further substantive policy matters were discussed during this operator-assisted call.

Download MP3 (part 1) · 111.8 MB ·Download MP3 (part 2) · 71.1 MB

This conversation has not yet been cut into its own clip, so the player above contains the full tape segment shared with neighbouring conversations. It begins about 03:20:57 into the tape and ends around 03:21:06.

No transcript is available yet for this conversation. The recording may contain no audible speech, or it may not have been processed.

On March 16, 1972, President Richard M. Nixon and the White House operator talked on the telephone at an unknown time between 9:17 pm and 10:27 pm. The White House Telephone taping system captured this recording, which is known as Conversation 021-089 of the White House Tapes.

Conversation No. 21-89

Date: March 16, 1972
Time: Unknown between 9:17 pm and 10:27 pm
Location: White House Telephone

The President talked with the White House operator.

     Request for a call to Ronald L. Ziegler
  • 021-087 8:47 PM · 10 sec — President Richard M. Nixon and the White House operator talked on the telephone at an unknown time between 8:47 pm and 9:14 pm.
  • 021-088 9:14 PM · 3 min — President Richard M. Nixon and H. R. ("Bob") Haldeman talked on the telephone from 9:14 pm to 9:17 pm.
  • 323-025 9:14 PM · 3 min — President Richard M. Nixon and H. R. ("Bob") Haldeman met in the President's office in the Old Executive Office Building from 9:14 pm to 9:17 pm.
  • 323-026 9:17 PM · 12 min — President Richard M. Nixon met in the President's office in the Old Executive Office Building at an unknown time between 9:17 pm and 9:40 pm.
  • 323-027 9:17 PM · 3 min — President Richard M. Nixon met in the President's office in the Old Executive Office Building at an unknown time between 9:17 pm and 9:40 pm.
  • 323-028 9:17 PM · 1 min — President Richard M. Nixon and Manolo Sanchez met in the President's office in the Old Executive Office Building at an unknown time between 9:17 pm and 9:40 pm.
  • 687-001 9:42 PM · 37 min — President Richard M. Nixon, Mark I. Goode, and unknown person(s) met in the Oval Office of the White House at an unknown time between 9:42 pm and 10:20 pm.
  • 021-090 10:27 PM · 2 min — President Richard M. Nixon and Ronald L. Ziegler talked on the telephone from 10:27 pm to 10:29 pm.

Conversation 021-089, March 17, 1972. White House Tapes, Richard Nixon Presidential Library and Museum, National Archives. Audio and AI transcript via Easy Nixon, https://www.easynixon.org/tapes/021-089 (accessed October 3, 2026).