Author: Bill Thompson

Oliver North

Bill Thompson

In the 1980s, the presidency of Ronald Reagan was facing two distinct foreign policy challenges.

Members of Hezbollah had taken several Americans hostage in Beirut, Lebanon.

And in Central America, a rebel group known as the Contras was trying to overthrow the socialist Sandinista government in Nicaragua.

To free the hostages, the Reagan administration undertook a secret plan to sell military missiles to Iran, in hopes that the Iranian government would persuade Hezbollah to release the hostages.

In Nicaragua, meanwhile, the U.S. was funding, arming, and training the Contras. That is, until Congress abruptly cut off the entire funding.

Oliver North with Bill Thompson’s daughter Jennifer

That’s when someone had the idea to take the money that Iran was paying secretly for those missiles and hand it secretly to the Contras. The plan became known later as the Iran-Contra affair.

When this plan became public in 1986, Congress was outraged. Hearings into the Iran. Contra affair began 35 years ago this week, May 5th, 1987.

And witness testimony quickly pointed to one man who seemed to have all the answers to the scandal.

Oliver North was on assignment to the National Security Council, and became the central figure in the Iran Contra scandal.

In July 1987, North appeared before I congressional committee, offering testimony that was at once defensive and defiant.

North was convicted on three felony charges but his convictions were vacated, and the criminal case against him was dropped in 1991.

And a short time later, North published a book called Under Fire. And that’s when he and I had the first of what would be several conversations over the next few years.

So here now from 1991 Lr. Col. Oliver North

Oliver North is 78 now. He lives in Virginia, just outside Washington, DC.

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Edie Adams

Bill Thompson

Edie Adams was a very popular movie and television star in the 1950s, known widely for her comic impersonations of sexy singers, and her own wonderful singing voice.

But eventually she became even more widely known for being the wife of legendary television comic Ernie Kovacs. The two of them were a hugely popular comic duo.

But their story had a tragic end. In early 1962, Kovacs was killed in an auto accident. He was the only occupant of the car, and it was never known precisely what happened to cause the accident.

I met Edie Adams in 1990, when she finally wrote the book that publishers had been after her to write ever since Ernie kovacs’s death.

So here now, from 1990, Edie Adams.

Edie Adams died in 2008. She was 81.

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Cliff Stoll

Bill Thompson

Many people think we’re on the verge of another Cold war, a cyber war, in which skilled hackers will break into systems abroad and wreak havoc with them.

But back in the 1980s, such a concept was still such a novelty that intelligence agencies and police didn’t pay much attention to it.

That is, until 1986, when an astronomer at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory made a startling discovery.

Cliff Stoll was a systems administrator at the lab, and noticed an unusual pattern of usage in the lab’s computer network.

In a groundbreaking game of cyber cat and mouse, stole eventually traced the activity back to a KGB recruit in Germany named Markus Hess.

Stoll told the amazing story in his 1989 bestseller The Cuckoo’s Egg. I spoke with him about that book, and again a year later when they paperback version came out.

So here now, from 1990, Cliff Stoll:.

Cliff Stoll will be 72 in June.

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Sergei Khrushchev

Bill Thompson
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At the very height of the Cold War, in the late 1950s and early ‘60s, one of the most vilified man in the world – at least in the U.S. – was Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev,

For 11 years the USSR was led by this brash, arrogant, often angry man.

You may have heard that he wants. Famously said the Soviet Union would “bury” the United States. That, however, was a mistranslation, and it was not something Khrushchev ever actually said.

Khrushchev’s second son, Sergei, was in his 20s, watching closely as his father guided the USSR. Sergei eventually became a highly educated, and well-respected, engineer in the Soviet Union.

But finally, in 1991 — the same year the Soviet Union crumbled apart — Sergei Khrushchev emigrated to the United States, and became a naturalized US citizen in 1999.

I met him two years later, when he wrote a book about his father.

So here now, from 2001, Sergei Khrushchev”

Sergei Khrushchev died just days before his 85th birthday in 2020 at his home in Rhode Island. He died of a gunshot wound to the head, but an investigation found no signs of foul play, and no criminal charges were ever filed.

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Gloria Gaynor

Bill Thompson
Photo: Rob Mieremet / Anefo

Gloria Gaynor began her professional music career in the early 1960s, when she was barely out of her teens. She was recording by the time she was 22, and had a couple of albums by the time she was 30.

But her songs and albums didn’t really have great success- until 1978, when she went into the studio and recorded a song that became a defining moment in pop music.

“I Will Survive” became a smash Hit, and inspired millions.

But, of course, Gloria Gaynor’s life was more than just one hit song. In her 1997 autobiography, also called. I Will survive, Gaynor told her life’s story, with all of its ups and downs.

So here now, from 1997, my conversation with Gloria Gaynor.

Gloria Gaynor is 78 now. Her most recent album was released in 2019, and won the Grammy for Best Roots Gospel Album.

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Colleen McCullough

Bill Thompson

Let me take you back four and a half decades, and tell you about one of the most popular books of the late 1970s, a family saga said in Australia, called The Thorn Birds.

But if you happened to miss the book, The Thorn Birds was also a hugely popular TV miniseries in the early 1980s .

The author of The Thorn Birds was Australian-n-born Colleen McCullough.

Just 4 years after the TV miniseries, I first met Colleen McCullough when she wrote a novella called The Ladies of MIasslonghi.

And I was as enthralled as I’m sure you’re about to be by Colleen McCullough’s Witt and Good humor.

So here now from 1987, Colleen McCullough

Colleen McCullough died in 2015. She was 77.

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Gilbert Gottfried

Bill Thompson

We got sad news last week but comedian Gilbert Gottfried had succumbed after a long battle with muscular dystrophy.

Funny and controversial, by turns relatable and outrageous, Gilbert Gottfried built a fan base of millions.

In 2012 while he was on a whirlwind book tour, I had a few minutes with Gilbert.

And I found him to be exactly the kind of guy you would hope that he would be- the kind you’d love to sit down and have a few beers with.

So here now, from 2012, my interview with Gilbert Gottfried, as we talked about his book called…

Gilbert Gottfried was 67 when he died last week.

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Sy Montgomery

Bill Thompson
Photo: Larry D. Moore

We all know what dolphins look like, right?

Well maybe we don’t know what all dolphins look like. Have you ever heard of Pink dolphins? Shape-shifting, human-like pink dolphins?

Renowned naturalist Sy Montgomery had heard of pink dolphins, deep in the Amazon River basin in Brazil. So she went to check them out.

What resulted was her 2000 book The Journey of the Pink Dolphins. That’s when she and I had one of our many conversations over the years.

So here now, from 2000, Sy Montgomery

Sy Montgomery is 64. She lives in New Hampshire.

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Rachel Robinson

Bill Thompson
Photo: Kingkongphoto & www.celebrity-photos.com

A few days ago Ketanji Brown Jackson made history as she was confirmed as the first black female supreme Court Justice.

But 75 years ago today another African American made history, in a way that may have been nearly as significant.

On April 15th. 1947 Jackie Robinson took the field as a member of the Brooklyn Dodgers, the first black man to play in the Major leagues.

And Jackie Robinson was no token. He was voted Rrookie of the Year that year and was the National League’s Most Valuable Player two years later.

By his side during his historic baseball career was his wife, his college sweetheart, Rachel

In the decades after Jackie Robinson’s death in 1972, Rachel Robinson has been a prominent andd influential active and leader in her own right.

In 1996 Rachel Robinson published a book about her late husband and their life together and that’s when I have the chance to meet her, the eve of the 50th anniversary of Robinson’s Major League debut.

So here now from 1996. Rachel Robinson

Rachel Robinson will be 100 years old in July. She lives in Connecticut.

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Jose Eber

Bill Thompson

Do you remember the 1970s TV show Charlie’s Angels? And do you remember one of the stars,Farrah Fawcett and her magnificent iconic hairstyle?

If you do then you know the work of stylist Jose Eber.

During the ’70s and ’80s, Eber established himself as one of the premier hair stylist to the stars.

And today he is known for his luxury salons as well as a line of hair care products.

I met him in 1990 when he published his second book called Beyond Hair.

So here now from 1990 Jose Eber.

Jose Eber is 72 now — and still making women beautiful.

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