Wrapped in the Flag (13 page)

The Birch stories unleashed a firestorm from pundits and politicians across the political landscape. Criticism from the Republicans was particularly brutal, not a shock as Eisenhower was a Republican. Barry Goldwater and William Buckley, who had received copies of the manuscript years earlier, distanced themselves from Welch immediately.
Time
labeled the response “Thunder Against the Right” and called opponents “The Birch-Barkers.”
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Those articles were just the first in what would become a multiyear effort to neutralize the Birchers.

Long after the Mabley columns had appeared, I learned more of the mystery surrounding the infamous book. Like all the other folks who had a copy of
The Politician
, my father had signed a confidentiality agreement stating he would never reveal the book’s contents. Dad made one exception to this rule: my mother. But, in every other case, he kept his promise to Robert Welch by lying, even to me.

I never found out who the woman in Glenview was or how she got a copy of the controversial manuscript. My father swore he’d never seen her before that meeting, and he never saw her again.

In 2007, I discovered that the FBI had investigated the John Birch Society as part of its Subversive Trends of Current Interest Program. In a report filed on September 16, 1960, agent J. A. Meyertholen described not only the Glenview meeting but a later one where my father threatened another woman who asked about the same book. According to the agent, “If she ever revealed the nature of the book, he [Conner] would promptly discredit her and deny the existence of the book and its contents.”
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The agent hinted in the comments section of his report that “there is an element of deceit in the manner of recruiting people” into the Birch Society and that “fortuitous revelation” of
The Politician
could have been deliberate.

Years after the controversy around the book subsided, Robert Welch admitted to a Birch audience that he had really wanted the manuscript to “gather dust.”
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The uproar around
The Politician
had a brutal impact on my parents. The Birch Society acknowledged that reality in the 1965 publication of their pamphlet
Responsible Leadership through the John Birch Society
. “Since the very early days of The John Birch Society, Jay Conner and his wife, Laurene, have been two of its most knowledgeable, unwavering and dedicated members. They have probably suffered more personally harmful effects from their unceasing support of the Society than any other member of our COUNCIL, and they have taken it all in stride without a word of complaint.”
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What happened to us kids . . . not on anybody’s radar.

Not only did the newspaper attacks cause acute embarrassment to many of our members in the areas affected; but to some it caused serious distress, danger to their jobs, and many reactions from neighbors and relatives for which embarrassment was too mild a word. Some of our staunchest friends and strongest supporters, especially among our Coordinators and members of our COUNCIL, were badly hurt. . . . Nor is the end of such cruel unfairness . . . even foreseeable
.

—R
OBERT
W
ELCH,
S
EPTEMBER
1960
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A week after Jack Mabley’s articles were published, I woke in the middle of the night with a terrible headache. I tiptoed into the bathroom for aspirin, swallowed three, and inched my way back down the hall. An hour later, I was still staring at the crack that snaked across the ceiling. “You have to talk to them,” I told myself. “It’s August.”

Two months earlier, my parents’ textbook antics had gotten me kicked out of Regina, but, as yet, they had not said a word about a new school. All summer long, I’d been fantasizing about Carl Schurz, the public high school closest to my house. What the place was like, I had no idea, but I found one compelling reason to enroll. “They never expel anyone,” Jay R. told me. “No matter what you do.”

Schurz High had one other positive characteristic—it was really, really big. Hardly anyone would know me or my parents. As the weeks rolled on and the John Birch Society attracted so much publicity, anonymity became more and more appealing to me. “There could be lots of kids named Conner,” my brother said. “No one will connect you with Dad.”

The next day, I broached the subject. But the minute I mentioned Schurz, Mother and Dad erupted. They decried the abominations in the “godless, co-educational public schools.” They yelled about hoodlums in leather jackets, boy-girl parties without chaperones, and (gasp) sex education.

My public-school fantasy died in an avalanche of “no daughter of mine”
and “you be careful, young lady.” A few days later, I was enrolled at Marywood, a small Catholic girls’ school in Evanston. Luckily, it was an easy commute for me: eight miles on the #10 bus.

The first day of school was like all the other first days I’d experienced; I was nervous and worried. Luckily, the “Marywood ladies,” as the nuns dubbed their students, had little interest in the new kid. Only a few pointed and giggled and one person whispered, loudly, about the “Birch kid,” but on the whole it was bearable.

On day two, three girls made space for me at their lunch table. Mary T., Kathy, and Pat carried on a lively conversation about the most pressing topics of the day: boys, boys, and, well, boys. I loved those girls instantly.

Those three precious girls were my best friends for the rest of high school. Despite the Birch scandal, which made me a target for criticism in school, my friends stood by me. They defended me, fixed me up on dates, loaned me clothes, and cooked up elaborate schemes to get me out of my house whenever I was grounded. Thanks to them, I survived three of the most tumultuous years of my life.

When I graduated from Marywood, in 1963, I swore that I’d never lose track of those “forever” friends. But I was seventeen; I had no idea how life would shove all of us in different directions. Today when I think of those girls, it’s with gratitude and great big smile.

One Friday evening in September of 1960, the seven Conners sat at the dining room table gobbling halibut, rice, and green beans. The scratching of forks on china was the only sound until the grandfather clock in the hall chimed seven times.

As soon as we finished our plates, Mother directed Janet and me to clear the table. “Don’t dawdle, girls,” she said. “Scrape and rinse. You can do the rest later.”

“Why isn’t anyone talking?” Janet asked as we piled dishes on the counter.

“I don’t know, but let’s not rock the boat,” I said.

“Get back in here, girls,” Mother called. “Your father has something to say.”

We had barely slid into our seats when Dad started in. Despite the valiant efforts of the Birchers, Dad announced that the United States was lost. “We’ve only got two years, tops, before the Commies are in complete control,” he said.

I looked across the table at my brother Jay R. He was looking down, but I could still see him roll his eyes and grin. I put my hand in front of my mouth to hide my yawn, before floating away into an afternoon on West Egg with Nick Carraway and his friend Jay Gatsby.

Mother’s voice shook me out of my daydream. “Get going, right now. Our guest will be here in the morning,” she said.

“What?” I asked Janet as we hustled out of the room.

“The big muckety-muck is coming,” she said. “We gotta move the boys.”

On that note, Janet and I helped our brothers transport their belongings to the basement, the move we made every time overnight company came. Up and down we went, carrying pillows and sheets, blankets and books, and several changes of clothes.

“Lucky ducks,” Janet said. “They’ve got TV and a fridge.”

“Maybe we’ll be able to sneak down for a show with them,” I told her.

“
Lassie
?” she asked.

We’d barely cleared breakfast the next morning, when Mother called me into the living room. “Your father and I have serious issues to discuss with Bob. You’re on deck.”

“But I have plans with my friends,” I said.

“Your friends can wait.” She turned on her heel and marched to the front door. Over her shoulder, she called, “Get the coffee ready.”

A minute later, I got my first look at Robert Welch. He wore a charcoal-gray fedora that almost covered his eyebrows and a baggy, beige trench coat—I guessed it was a London Fog, just like my dad’s. In one hand, he carried his overnight grip and a briefcase. In the other, his cane. I figured he’d be all decked out in a white dress shirt and striped silk tie, and when his coat came off, that’s exactly what he was wearing.

After introductions, my father took Welch and his belongings up to the boys’ room while Mother and I arranged coffee, cookies, and clean ashtrays in the living room. “Stay and listen,” Mother said. “And don’t interrupt.”

While we waited for the men, Mother reminded me of Welch’s personal achievements: home-schooled child prodigy; lover of ancient languages, higher mathematics, and poetry; college graduate at sixteen; midshipman at the Naval Academy with a perfect 4.0 grade point average.

She retold the story of little Bob, the precocious child, who’d devoured nine volumes of
The History of the World
by age seven and become a chess master not long after.
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It was that boy who’d grown into the candy man who’d invented the Sugar Daddy and become the world’s foremost expert on the international Communist conspiracy.

Over the next few hours, the idealized Welch gave way to the sixty-one-year-old man coughing and hacking in my living room. He had to be very allergic—a situation not helped by the smoke haze that hung from the ceiling. My parents, unfazed, puffed away on their cigarettes. Every so often, Welch lit his cigar and belched out some smoke of his own.

Smoking and coughing did not deter conversation. The three adults seemed to talk constantly and often at the same time. I had nothing to add, which was just as well; I had not been invited to contribute anyway. Welch barely acknowledged my presence, except for a thank you when I passed cookies or freshened his coffee.

By the end of the first day, when my parents and Welch left for dinner at Edgewater Golf Club where Dad was a member, I thought about what I had heard. That’s when I realized that Welch’s visit was an effort to bolster Dad and Mother in the face of Jack Mabley’s attacks.

Conversation continued after they returned from the club, and when I fell asleep, the meeting downstairs was still in full swing. Several times, I was awakened by raised voices, one of them belonging to Welch. I was surprised. Up until then, I’d only heard the intellectual Welch. That night, another side appeared, the aggressive Welch.

I figured out very quickly what the argument was about. Welch did not want anyone from the Birch Society giving interviews; my father disagreed, quite vehemently. I fell asleep while the arguing continued.

In the morning, there was not a hint of the night’s disagreement. The adults ate breakfast, chatted about Bob’s wife, Marian, and his golden retriever, and skimmed the newspaper. In the middle of the morning, Welch packed his grip, wished me well in school, and thanked my mother for her hospitality. While I helped wash dishes and straighten the house, Dad drove Welch to Midway Airport, where he boarded his flight back to Boston.

I never heard a word about the Welch-Conner argument. But in a few months, I’d know the winner.

Until the fall of 1960, my parents pretended that the John Birch Society was not political. “We’re all about education,” Mother said.

“The society does not endorse candidates,” Dad added.

These claims seemed pretty far-fetched to me. From the beginning, the society had been up to its neck in politics, something Robert Welch himself did nothing to hide. “We would put our weight into the political scales in the country just as fast and far as we could,” Welch said when he founded the society
in 1958. Those words were no secret; they were in every edition of
The Blue Book
since its publication in 1959.
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