Nixon White House Tapes › Tape 886 › Conversation 886-018
Nixon & Woods on Office administration and White House logistics
Wednesday, March 21, 1973 · 1:06 PM–1:20 PM ET · Oval Office · 14 min
AI Summary
President Nixon met with his personal secretary, Rose Mary Woods, to address a variety of administrative, logistical, and personal matters. The conversation covered routine office business, including the handling of official correspondence, the coordination of travel arrangements for family members, and the acquisition of gifts for supporters. Additionally, the pair discussed private financial matters and scheduling concerns regarding the President’s upcoming trip to Florida.
- Rose Mary Woods
- Office administration
- White House logistics
- Presidential travel
- Gift procurement
- Personal finances
Audio
Transcript (AI-generated)
This transcript was generated automatically by AI (WhisperX) and has not been reviewed for accuracy. Names and numbers are often wrong; speakers are not identified. Do not cite it as authoritative — verify against the audio and the finding aid.
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Hi.
Hi, tell me about the accessibility.
Sure, yes.
I just want to ask you about that.
I think it's a really important fact, but thank you to Nancy for this.
Thank you for the glasses here that you've been using now.
Sold.
And part of the pandemic, our old friend, Dan Parker, had taken over a new company.
They would get us into this kind of a ballroom.
These glasses, which is X and Y will come out in the next motion.
And it goes where it all comes from.
And none of the black box has 8.50 for 8 in box.
The others are 8.50 for 6 in a box, and not this kind of box.
You need to get 8 glasses for $8.50.
With this edged off.
The glasses are, the glasses are $8 a piece.
No, no, no, this is $8.50 for this box.
Great.
Do you buy them?
No, no, I don't think they do.
Do you buy them?
Those guys change.
They have something different.
Yeah, and then they really will last forever.
Sure, sure, sure.
I need to buy them because they're $8.00.
$9.00.
$9.00. $9.00.
Those were such nice things.
I remember I could kick the people.
And then most of the time, I was retiring from that committee.
And he didn't want to even hear it.
Yeah.
He really didn't spend the time on reserved things because he had quit.
There's a beautiful package, which I think you want to read at the end of time.
Okay, I'll put Pat's letter in there.
I have sent out some of those.
There are some that are legal in the current law.
I'm going to take you to a nutrition and a trip to Europe.
It was about an hour before the trip.
And, um...
What's your office?
Well, I work in the transportation office.
Good.
Good.
Yeah.
Let me ask you something.
I was, uh...
Uh... We... First time they had the papers...
It would be reversed at a later time, but I don't know.
I don't know.
I don't know.
I don't know.
I don't know.
I don't know.
I don't know.
I don't want to have this, but I'm not the right person to do this.
I'm not the right person to do this.
I'm not the right person to do this.
I'm not the right person to do this.
I'm not the right person to do this.
I'm not the right person to do this.
I'm not the right person to do this.
I'm not the right person to do this.
I'm not the right person to do this.
We may have to call I don't know
Let me ask you, is that it?
What kind of, uh... That's why I didn't want to leave it to the others.
Oh, let's see what you're writing.
I didn't know where it was.
I don't know.
I don't know.
I can't get it.
We have to use it for, you know, for you to say.
Okay.
Okay.
Okay.
Okay.
Okay.
Well, I know.
I know what it is.
It's all supposed to be a campaign.
We are going down to the first party.
Well, when I'm going to, it's Friday night.
I'm going.
I had raised the salute to the Air Force Ball in New York.
Since I remember he's going to be up there, I thought I'd go, try to go early to the truck park, although it might be a little, probably till 30 or 1, but go by and just say hello.
Or just the other way around, I don't know what to tell you.
Oh, yeah, I see.
Sure, I appreciate that.
Well, at least I've got the letter.
Bristlehead called me, and he wrote a letter to say, command to form me.
You know what was happening?
We didn't realize how big and crowded the yard was until I went back again.
So I watched the door against the room that I had.
That's the room I had a picture of.
It was that bigger room we had.
Better space.
Tom, that was the size of the room we had on the other side.
Well, that was one of the directions we were going to be going.
Yeah.
But they're just jamming through the water.
Most people are, yeah.
But space is very short.
Well, it's very expensive.
They have to do that.
In New York, there's now a space that's one bay, because they've got those two big... Big toilets.
Well, it's just so expensive.
And now we can drop some of the people in New York who can get more.
Is that right?
Okay, let's just work more.
You told me that.
That's inevitable.
Some business person can't do that anymore.
I am tentatively planning tomorrow, including Florida, for three days.
I'd like to be ready for a possible speech on the extramural or a possible press conference on the extramural, which will come to an end just as quickly.
We would have to return, and they will return the horses.
You will not have to go, because that's not something I'm going to be doing.
We did not try to return.
I can do it better there in the actual city, but you can't be over here in that event.
I work in the occupation, but you've got to work there, sure.
I'll be out there writing stuff.
It's only been 33 days.
They didn't bring him back to the project in that three days.
Well, and the weather, if they could correct Jack Sherwood, has finally gotten very, very nice and smart.
He should have called me.
He told me that yesterday.
Yeah.
He said that it's been awful for him since when he'd come back.
But the last couple of weeks have been very, very nice and great.
Thank you.
Thank you very much.
I was going to say, what I was thinking is, so that it's much less than, rather than us each stopping and making her about it for her, you know, right?
That would mean, it would be my thought to the back, on Monday night, probably.
Okay.
Okay, those glasses are nice.
Whenever you think of somebody that you really care about, you need Rossi.
I didn't know why you hated Rossi because of that.
Well, he's very thrilled about me and that he came in to see me.
Yeah, I didn't mention it because I didn't want to hear it.
Well, I don't know.
The other one may or may not be an officer.
Rossi would be an officer in the event that we would be in later if we can't go.
And it's the weeks that went by when these things arrived.
And he also said, he told me, please, if there's anything else that you want, you know, just to let him know.
Because he said, no, no, you know, don't say something to me.
That's what he came in for.
So we'll put it down on the list for anything special we can have.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
She's here?
Yeah.
She's still in Minnesota?
Uh-huh.
Still present at the University of Minnesota?
What did she become from her?
Apparently so.
The last few years... She had a problem.
Oh, yes.
A very big problem.
Apparently so.
She's been just fine.
She got out, you know, out into the...
I'm going to go with you and me, so if you'd like to bring her in here.
Okay.
Well, I...
The door's open.
Well, yeah, right.
She's still on that floor.
That one.
NARA Description
On March 21, 1973, President Richard M. Nixon and Rose Mary Woods met in the Oval Office of the White House from 1:06 pm to 1:20 pm. The Oval Office taping system captured this recording, which is known as Conversation 886-018 of the White House Tapes.
Nixon Library Finding Aid
Conversation No. 886-18
Date: March 21, 1973
Time: 1:06 pm -1:20 pm
Location: Oval Office
The President met with Rose Mary Woods.
******************************************************************************
[Begin segment reviewed under deed of gift]
Anthony T. (“Tony”) Rossi
Glasses
-Dan Parker
-Etching
-Costs
-Gifts
[End segment reviewed under deed of gift]
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John S. D. Eisenhower
-Resignation from Interagency Classification Review Committee
-Acceptance of Army Reserve Command post
Patricia R. Hitt
-Letter
******************************************************************************
[Begin segment reviewed under deed of gift]
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
--
BEGIN WITHDRAWN ITEM NO. 2
[Personal returnable]
[Duration: 21s ]
-33-
NIXON PRESIDENTIAL LIBRARY AND MUSEUM
Conversation No. 886-18 (cont’d)
END WITHDRAWN ITEM NO. 2
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
--
[Begin segment reviewed under deed of gift]
******************************************************************************
Hitt's letter
-Copy to Bruce A. Kehrli
******************************************************************************
[Begin segment reviewed under deed of gift]
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
--
BEGIN WITHDRAWN ITEM NO. 3
[Personal returnable]
[Duration: 30s ]
END WITHDRAWN ITEM NO. 3
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
--
Trip to Europe by Tricia Nixon Cox and Edward R. F. Cox
-White House Transportation Office
-Wilbur Jenkins
[Begin segment reviewed under deed of gift]
******************************************************************************
Cash finances
-Fund
-Needs
-Woods' fund
-34-
NIXON PRESIDENTIAL LIBRARY AND MUSEUM
Conversation No. 886-18 (cont’d)
-Inquiry and response
-Amount
-Lack of record
-Charles G. (“Bebe”) Rebozo
-President, Thelma C. (“Pat”) Nixon
-Transfer
-Needs
-Knowledge of existence
******************************************************************************
[Begin segment reviewed under deed of gift]
New York City
-Party
-Woods’s attendance
-Salute to the Air Force Ball
-[First name unknown] Rickel [?]
President’s former law office in New York
-Office space availability
-Tom Evans
-World Trade Center’s impact
President’s schedule
-Trip to Florida
-Speech
-Press conference
-Prisoners of War [POWs] return
-Return of US forces from Vietnam
-Woods’s presence
-Mrs. Nixon’s and Tricia Nixon Cox’s trip to Camp David
-Return to Washington, DC
-Weather
-Jack Sherwood, Julie Nixon Eisenhower
-Meeting with George P. Shultz
-Walker’s Cay, Florida
-Camp David
-Mrs. Nixon, Tricia Nixon Cox
-35-
NIXON PRESIDENTIAL LIBRARY AND MUSEUM
Conversation No. 886-18 (cont’d)
-Transportation arrangements
Glasses
-Possible gifts to friends, supporters
-Rossi
-Service to President
-Special gifts
-Book, plaque
Malcom Moose
-President of University of Minnesota
-Wife’s health
-Tour of Oval Office
-Executive Office Building [EOB]
[End segment reviewed under deed of gift]
******************************************************************************
Woods left at 1:20 pm.Also recorded on March 21, 1973
- 886-015 12:54 PM · 8 min — President Richard M. Nixon and Stephen B. Bull met in the Oval Office of the White House from 12:54 pm to 1:05 pm.
- 886-016 1:05 PM · 9 sec — President Richard M. Nixon and unknown person(s) met in the Oval Office of the White House at an unknown time between 1:05 pm and 1:06 pm.
- 886-017 1:05 PM · 10 sec — President Richard M. Nixon and Stephen B. Bull met in the Oval Office of the White House at an unknown time between 1:05 pm and 1:06 pm.
- 037-183 1:21 PM · 12 sec — President Richard M. Nixon and the White House operator talked on the telephone at an unknown time between 1:21 pm and 2:23 pm.
- 421-001 1:21 PM · 55 sec — President Richard M. Nixon and Manolo Sanchez met in the President's office in the Old Executive Office Building at an unknown time between 1:21 pm and 2:23 pm.
- 421-002 1:21 PM · 15 sec — President Richard M. Nixon and unknown person(s) met in the President's office in the Old Executive Office Building at an unknown time between 1:21 pm and 2:23 pm.
- 886-019 1:21 PM · 9 sec — President Richard M. Nixon and Manolo Sanchez met in the Oval Office of the White House at an unknown time between 1:21 pm and 11:59 pm.
- 886-020 1:21 PM · 13 sec — United States Secret Service agents met in the Oval Office of the White House at an unknown time between 1:21 pm and 11:59 pm.
Cite this conversation
Conversation 886-018, March 21, 1973. White House Tapes, Richard Nixon Presidential Library and Museum, National Archives. Audio and AI transcript via Easy Nixon, https://www.easynixon.org/tapes/886-018 (accessed October 12, 2026).