THE PRESIDENCY by HUGH SIDEY: The Man in the Plaid Coat

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One day that week came a summons to go to the office of Ron Walker, director of the National Park Service. The meeting exploded. Walker turned over color pictures showing that Cecil and his $19.95 coat were in the background for the official photos of Richard Nixon's swearing in (see cut). How could he? stormed Walker. The White House was raging. Nixon's moment in history had been desecrated. These were the pictures that would go into the books. These were the photos that Nixon's children would have to look at. And there was Stoughton and his plaid coat.

Walker cooled down. Stoughton went home and pondered it all. He decided he had been an intruder. So he returned to his office near midnight and typed out a profound apology to Nixon. He laid it on Walker's desk.

There was silence for a few weeks. Then Stoughton was caught up in Nixon's bureaucratic housecleaning. It had been determined that his $25,000 a year was far too much for his responsibilities. His job was abolished. So after 31½ years of Government service, with commendations for quality work and with a portfolio of some of the most historic pictures ever taken, Cecil Stoughton, who began his remarkable journey in Oskaloosa, Iowa, 53 years ago, was on the move again. But, suggested one colleague, shouldn't he burn that coat?