Heroes

Watergate whistleblower Mark Felt, aka “Deep Throat,” remembered by the co-author of his autobiograqphy

Bill Thompson

It is notoriously difficult to keep a secret in Washington DC. But there was one political mystery that went unsolved for 30 years.

Until finally in 2005 a former top FBI official named Mark Felt revealed that he was the secret source dubbed “Deep Throat” who guided Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein of the Washington Post in uncovering the Watergate scandal.

Working with veteran attorney and former prosecutor John O’Connor, Felt published his memoir in 2006, a book called A G-man’s Life.

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Drawing on his notes, letters, and diaries over the years O’Connor helped Felt assemble a portrait of a man dedicated to law enforcement but conflicted about going outside regular channels with his Inside information.

Mark Felt was 93 when the book was published, and was unable to go on a book tour or do interviews, so his publisher sent John O’Connor in his place. That’s when I met John.

So here now, from 2006, Mark Felt’s co-author John O’Connor.

Mark Felt died two years after this interview, in 2008, at age 95.

A Split Second to Act: Secret Service Agent Dennis McCarthy

Bill Thompson

Until the attempt on Donald Trump’s life last summer, the most serious assassination attempt in recent American history came on March 30, 1981.

President Ronald Reagan had just emerged from a speech at a downtown Washington hotel. From behind a nearby rope line emerged a young man with a gun. John Hinckley Jr fired six shots, hitting Reagan and three other people before he was subdued.

And the Secret Service agent who subdued him was 46-year-old veteran Agent Dennis McCarthy.

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McCarthy spent the next several hours guarding Hinckley, who was, of course, later found not guilty by reason of insanity. You’ll hear Dennis McCarthy’s take on that in the interview just ahead.

Get your copy of Dennis McCarthy’s book

I met agent McCarthy in 1985 when he wrote a book called Protecting The President. And he had a startling Revelation in that book, which you’ll hear about.

So here now, from 1985, Dennis McCarthy.

Dennis McCarthy died in 1993. He was 58.

The Last War Chief: Joe Medicine Crow’s Life and Legacy

Bill Thompson

Many of us have grandparents who can tell us stories about the old days, the “old days” usually being the 1930s, maybe the ‘20s.

But imagine being able to sit down with an old relative who could tell you firsthand about General George Custer, or even Lewis and Clark.

For several decades, starting in the 1940s, Joe Medicine Crow was the historian of the Crow Indian tribe. And much of the history he wrote down came from those aging family members he had known.

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His step-grandfather, for example. Known as White Man Runs Him, he was a scout for General Custer, and as such was an eyewitness to the Battle of Little Bighorn.

But Medicine Crow had many stories of his very own to tell. He was a noted scholar, World War Two hero, and Native American leader. He was, in fact, the last war chief of the Crow tribe.

I met him in 1993, when, just shy of age 80, he published the first of what would be several books about the Crow tribe. The book was called From The Heart of The Crow Country.

So here now, from 1993, Joe Medicine Crow.

Joe Medicine Crow was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2009.

He died 23 years after our interview, in 2016, at age 102.

Hiding in Plain Sight: Edith Hahn Beer’s Holocaust Survival Story

Bill Thompson

Have you ever heard the phrase “hiding in plain sight”?

At the age of 25, an Austrian Jewish woman named Edith Hahn and her mother were sent to the Jewish ghetto in Vienna by the Nazi regime.

Two years later she was moved to work in a German factory – and never saw her mother again.

But a Christian friend gave Edith copies of her own identification papers, With which she was able to return to Vienna – and ultimately travelled to Munich.

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Carefully concealing her true identity, Edith Hahn volunteered as a German Red Cross nurse.

And that’s where she met a Nazi party member, who married her – even after she revealed to him her Jewish identity.

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Their daughter Angela was born in a Nazi Hospital. Their marriage ended soon after the war, and so did Edith’s lifesaving charade.

She lived the rest of her life in Israel and London. And in 1999 told her story in a book called The Nazi Officer’s Wife.

It was a book that her daughter Angela had urged her to write, soon after Edith’s letters were sold at auction and ultimately donated to the Holocaust Museum in Washington.

I met them both when Edith’s book was published. So here now, from 1999 Edith Hahn Beer and her daughter Angela.

Edith Hahn Beer died in 2009. ten years after our interview. She was 95.

Remembering the Ia Drang Valley: The Battle That Changed Vietnam

Bill Thompson
Gen. Hal Moore. Photo by Ahodges7

It’s been almost 50 years since the last American soldier came home from Vietnam. But the memories of the 10-year war that tore the nation apart still color the U.S. today.

On this Memorial Day I wanted to bring you an interview I did in 1993 with retired Army Lt. Gen. Hal Moore and war correspondent Joe Gallowaty. They had recently returned from a visit to Vietnam.

Joe Galloway. Photo by Cmichel67

They had gone back to the Ia Drang Valley, scene of the first major battle of the war in 1965, with Gen. Moore in command. On their visit, they met with some Vietnamese veterans who, nearly 30 years earlier, had been determined to kill them.

Get your copy of Joe Galloway & Hal Moore’s book

Moore and Galloway wrote a book about the historic battle, called We Were Soldiers Once… And Young. When it was made into a movie in 2002 the title was shortened to “We Were Soldiers.” Mel Gibson portrayed Gen. Moore.

So here now, from the fall of 1993, Lt. Gen. Hal Moore and Joe Galloway.

Gen. Hal Moore died in 2017, three days before his 95th birthday.

Joe Galloway died in 2021 at age 79.

How a Navy Cross Hero Fought PTSD After Fallujah

Bill Thompson

Veteran’s Day reminds us that combat is not an isolated event in a service member’s life. It is often a psychological wound that is slow to heal.

Serving in Iraq in 2004, Marine Sgt. Jeremiah Workman earned the Navy Cross for gallantry under fire, after a ferocious firefight in Fallujah in which he killed 20 enemy combatants.

But Workmen returned home with post traumatic stress disorder, or PTSD. Protecting his mental health proved to be as big a challenge as protecting his men in Fallujah was

In 2009, the year he was medically discharged from the Marines, Workman wrote a memoir called Shadow Of The Sword. That’s when I met him.

So here now, from 2009, Jeremiah Workman.

Jeremiah Workman announced last spring that he will run for Governor of his native Ohio in 2026.

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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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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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Lisa Beamer

Bill Thompson

On that terrible day 20 years ago, September 11th, 2001, countless Heroes emerged.

Some wore police, fire, or military uniforms.

Some will be forever anonymous.

But many were just ordinary Americans. Like Todd Beamer, a passenger aboard United Airlines flight 93.

Their plane was already in the air that morning when the other planes went into the World Trade Center and the Pentagon.

And as the passengers learned what was happening, terrorists took over there playing. And soon, a group of passengers formed a bold and audacious plan to take over the plane and support the terrorist plot to slam that playing into the US Capitol or the White House.

Beamer and others made a last phone call to their loved ones. Then Beamer Was Heard telling his fellow passengers, Let’s Roll.

Their plans succeeded, with predictably tragic results – the plane crashed at 500 miles an hour into a spot near Shanksville Pennsylvania. Everyone aboard, including Todd Beamer, was killed.

The next year, with the first anniversary of the attacks approaching, Todd Beamer’s Widow Lisa published a book about her husband, and his role in that heroic day.

So here now, from August 2002, Lisa Beamer:

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Chuck Yeager

Bill Thompson

He was a farm boy from Hamlin, West Virginia. Chuck Yeager join the Army at the outset of World War II, Have it wasn’t long before he became a fighter pilot.

Two years after the war ended, in 1947, Chuck Yeager became the first test pilot to break the sound barrier.

He rose through the ranks to become a general, before retiring.

By the time I met him in the fall of 1988, Yeager was still finding new adventures. He and his longtime friend Bud Anderson co-wrote a book about their adventures hiking in the High Sierras.

So here now, from 1988, Chuck Yeager and Bud Anderson:

Chuck Yeager died last December. He was 97,