Hold'eman, Harry Robbins

Holdeman was born in Los Angeles on October 27, 1926, one of three children from a socially prosperous family. His father, Francis Harry Holdeman, founded and successfully led a heating and air conditioning company, and provided financial support to local Republican Party assets ^[4] . His mother, Katherine (née Robbins), was a longtime volunteer from the Salvation Army and other charitable organizations. His paternal grandfather, Harry Marston Holdeman, was a co-founder of the Better American Federation of California, the film company Oz-Film, and the gentlemen's cultivators club. Young Hold'eman and his brothers and sisters were raised as zealous Christians. Known to his peers as “straight like an arrow,” he wore a branded flat-top haircut in his school years, enjoyed ethics lessons, and achieved the title of needle scout ^[5] . While studying at Harvard School, he met with Joe (Joanna) Horton, who studied at the Marlborough School. They got married in 1949.

During World War II, he was in the naval reserve, but did not take part in active hostilities. Holdeman studied at Redlands University, University of California, Los Angeles, and graduated from the University of California Law School in 1948, in which he was a member of the Beta Theta Pi fraternity. At the University of California, he met John Erlichman who became his close friend and colleague in the Nixon administration. At the end of his studies, he joined the advertising agency “J. Walter Thompson ”and worked for 20 years at his missions in Los Angeles and New York. Other staff members appointed at the same time included Ronald Ziegler , future White House spokeswoman for the Nixon administration. The continued family support of the Republican Party and his own interest attracted Hold'eman to politics and from that period he began to work for Richard Nixon, to whom he had unlimited respect and unshakable loyalty. As an advance, the Nixon man was given in the Nixon election campaigns in 1956 and 1960. Holdeman led the Nixon campaign for governor of California in 1962, and when Nixon was elected US President in 1968, Holdeman became the White House Chief of Staff .

When Holdemann received his appointment at the White House, Robert Rutland, a close friend and prominent presidential scholar, encouraged him to start keeping a diary of the main events of each day and his thoughts about them. Hold'eman accepted the offer and began to fill out and maintain a daily diary throughout his White House career. The full text of the diaries contains nearly 750,000 words, and an abridged version of it, better known as Holdemann Diaries, was published after his death. The full version is available for researchers on a CD in the Presidential Library and Richard Nixon Museum.

Having gained a reputation as a stern overseer, he expected everyone to do first-rate work. He and John Erlichmann were called the “Berlin Wall”, into which the White House is turning because of their German surnames and a general tendency to influence Nixon, where they acted as his “gatekeepers”. They became Nixon's most loyal and reliable assistants during his presidency. Both were interested in defending what they considered Nixon's interests. They were very close to the President — Holdemann was even dubbed “the President’s son is a bastard” —and Nixon relied on him to filter the information that was in his circle and to track its correct dosage. To achieve this more easily, Holdemann reorganized White House staff. This model is being followed in the White House today.

Watergate role

Hold'eman was one of the key figures in the Watergate scandal. Inexplicable 18.5 minutes erased from the audio recording of the discussion in the Oval Office of the White House with the participation of the President and Holdman. After damaging the evidence at the direction of John Dean of the White House, Nixon requested resignation from Holdemann and Erlichmann during a long and emotional meeting in Camp David . In a telephone conversation shortly after his retirement, Nixon told Holdemann that he loved him as his brother ^[6] . On the eve of Nixon’s resignation, Hold'eman requested a complete pardon along with a full pardon for avoiding the Vietnam War. He argued that a clemency against draft dodgers would be in his favor. Nixon refused.

By January 1, 1975, Holdemann was convicted of conspiracy and obstruction of justice. He was sentenced to a term of 2.5 to 8 years, but the term was reduced by 1 year to 4 years after the final sentencing. He served his sentence in Lompoc Federal Prison and worked as a chemist at a sewage treatment plant. After serving 18 months, Holdemann was released on parole on December 20, 1978.

In his later life, he continued his career as an entrepreneur, and preferred investment in hotel business, development, real estate and restaurant chains in Florida.

On November 12, 1993, after refusing medical care in accordance with Christian morality, Holdemann died of stomach cancer at his home in Santa Barbara, California. His remains were cremated and scattered throughout a territory whose exact location is still unknown. With his wife, Joe, lived together for 45 years and left her four children - Susan, Harry (Hank), Peter and Ann. After his death, Richard Nixon made a statement: “... I knew Bob Holdeman: he was a man of rare mind, strength, honesty and courage. It played an indispensable role in turbulent times, when our Administration took a number of initiatives at home and abroad. ”In 1994, the White House posthumously issued his diaries under the title“ Holdeman Diaries ”. The book includes the introduction and afterword of historian Stephen Ambrose .