Radio Script #1322

Little Talks on Common Things
October 10, 1982

This program has from time to time given attention to what seems to many of us to be extravagant government expenses. Today let us consider what it costs merely to run the White House.

Everyone expects a U.S. President to live in a modern style befitting the office and consistent with the standing of our country among the nations of the world. No one expects a President to walk to engagements
about Washington or go on horseback as every President from Washington to Lincoln once did. The days when First Lady Abigail Adams hung her washing in the East Room are long past. The White House must be respected as the nation’s foremost residence.

Although the figures I shall now give you concern the Reagan White House. the Reagans are no bigger spenders from the national purse than were the Nixons, the Carters, the Fords or the Kennedys. White House
costs had mounted long before Ronald and Nancy came into residence.

In light of salaries in the corporate world, few people begrudge an American president’s $200, 000 salary and ordinary living expenses. because there are many other items a president must pay for out of his own income.
But it is other expenses. including fringe benefits to the president and his family that make White House annual charges a huge amount.

Recently it occurred to Jack Anderson the always inquisitive and controversial Washington columnist to find out just what that total is. To his own surprise he failed. He could only make a reasonable estimate based on what he did learn. These expenses are distributed among so many departments and agencies of the government that Anderson found getting an accurate total was impossible.

For fiscal 1982 Congress appropriated four million dollars for White House expenses in addition to the President’s salary, but many expenses are not paid out of that account. The public press has long enforced
us that White House state dinners with more than a hundred guests are lavish and costly affairs. but they are paid for by the Department of State.

Transportation of the President. Mrs. Reagan and members of the White House staff costs a lot of money. The President’s frequent use of Air Force I costs $5,600 an hour every hour the plane is in the air plus costs of the crew and maintenance when it is on the ground. That plane must be available for the President with its crew in readiness, on instant call. Anderson found that the expense for Air Force I comes to $4,000 an hour around the clock all the year.

Wherever the President goes. there is available an armored red White House limousine flown to the place however distant it is from Washington even to China. In fact there are always two limousines, one as a backup in case of the other’s failure. The same is true of helicopters, two of which must always be at hand. Planes and copters are paid for by the Air Force, while the limousines are furnished by the Army, of which the President is Commander in Chief.

Limo services are not only for the President, but also for the heads of the White House staff. When the President is frequently at his ranch in California, it would be unthinkable for Meese, Baker, or Deaver to use a taxi or rent a car. His Washington chauffeur-driven limousine must be there at their command. When there is added the expense of the secret service men who guard numerous persons besides the President, the total cost of transportation alone is $750,000 a year.

For use of the staff the White House operates a cafeteria called the White House Mess. Staff members pay a small charge for meals, but nowhere near enough to meet costs. The deficit amounts to $200, 000 a year and, for some inexplicable reason, is met by the Navy. The White House account does not even pay for upkeep for the grounds. That is met by the National Park Service. Anderson says that the total cost of running the White House instead of being the $4 million that Congress appropriates comes nearer to $50 million a year.

Now for another subject.

On this program we have often remarked that one can get information about living and behavior in years of long ago by reading the printed advertisements of the time. So I recently ran through the ads that appeared in the Maine Register for the year 1874.

There were ads for a number of school books. Parker’s “Progressive Exercises in England Composition” contained 240 pages and sold for one dollar. The ad said it had already been adopted in the schools of Lewiston, Auburn, Gardiner and Bangor. In the early 20th century it would become common for textbook publishers to give free copies to teachers in hope that the recipient would persuade school boards to buy in quantity; but in 1874 teachers were offered only a discount. They could obtain a sample copy of that dollar book for 90 cents.

The time was a bit too early for the dominance of the Wentworth books in mathematics that prevailed well into the second quarter of this century. The math texts advertised iQ 1874 were by Greenleaf, and included
arithmetics, algebras, and geometries. The ad claimed that more than a Ddllion and a half of Greenleaf books were in use from Maine to Louisiana. The books for algebra and geometry were in use at such Maine academies as Hebron, Monmouth, Kent s, Hill, Gorham, Farmington and Westbrook Seminary. Religious books were popular. One ad said: “Now ready. The Psalter or the Book of Psalms. Complete with selections from the
prophesies. 90 cents. Two hymnbooks were advertised: The Church Hymn Book and the Chapel Book of Hymns. The days when hymn books contained only words and no music, and the tune had to be what was called “lined out”” by a song leader were now past. and these 1874 books had both words and music.

Of one the ad said: “In musical arrangement this book is as near perfect as we can expect to come.” The Church Hymn Book was priced at $2, but could be purchased in quantity at liberal discounts. Another book published in 1874 at $1.25 a copy is now a rare collector’s item. Its title was “Sketches, Historical and Descriptive, of Noted }faine horses.” Most people today do not know that Maine was once as famous for breeding racehorses as Kentucky is today. This book contained a full description of Maine-bred stallions, mares and geldings and their track records. An interesting sidelight is that breeding stallions had to be recorded at each county’s Registry of Deeds.

Despite the coming of factories, the old-time individual artisans had not entirely disappeared in 1874. C. H. Hamlin of Portland has this ad in the-Register: “The subscriber is prepared to furnish anyone on short notice with nicely fitted boots and shoes in the latest styles and of correct measure. Don’t send your measure to New York. Send it to me.” F. O. Bailey and Co., a Portland firm still doing a large business in my own boyhood days early in this century, was active in 1874. It had a full page ad offering show cases, counters, and tables for stores, and all kinds of furniture for offices.

An ad that especially interested me was by the Hussey Plow Co. of North Berwick. That is the company that is still owned today by the Hussey family, and is nationally known as maker of public seating, such as grandstands, also fire escapes and other iron facilities.

I first knew the company in 1909 when Phil Hussey and I were freshman classmates at Colby College. Phil became President of the company, but has, since retirement, been succeeded by his sons, who are the fourth
generation of Husseys to operate the business.

That Hussey ad in 1874 said: “The Hussey Plow. Timothy Hussey, manufacturer, North Berwick, Maine. These plows are noted for their superior turning capacity, easy draft, ease in holding, steadiness on the ground, strength and durability. We are making 140 a week of these celebrated plows. We also make cultivators, harrows, and road scrapers.”

This Register contained an ad for the first broad-gauge railroad on which I ever had a ride, the Portland and Ogdensburg that ran from Portland to the White Mountains. Ten years after this ad appeared, the line would connect at Hiram with the two foot narrow gauge that ran to my native town of Bridgton. The ad gave no timetable, but it did list the stations with distances from Portland. At that time the road had not penetrated
the difficult grades at Crawford Notch, but ended at Bemis. N. H., where stages ran to the Crawford House and Fabyans. With that salute to the ads in an old Maine register, we say goodbye until next week.

Year: 1982