You just never know who's watching.
With the all-seeing eye and limitless reach of the World Wide Web, that's especially true here in the 21st century. Small-community news outlets, like the Richmond Observer, have quite a megaphone, able to reach anywhere on the globe there is a computer or smartphone.
Folks in high places understand this, too. There are, for instance, few names in the national entertainment arena bigger than Bill Maher. Not very long ago, RO publisher Kenny Melvin snagged an interview with the iconic comedian and political observer.
I once got a taste of this myself. While traveling in 2015, Robin and I met comedian Dick Curtis during a layover at the Minneapolis, Minnesota airport.
From visiting the "Enola Gay" bomber as a young Marine in 1945 before its WWII-ending mission to Hiroshima, to being questioned by the FBI in the wake of JFK's 1963 assassination, to starring in a famous episode of the “Dick Van Dyke Show” designed around his talents, the comedian/actor had stories to tell.
After I wrote about the experience in a local newspaper, Robin and I traveled to Sedona, Arizona, months later, and stayed at the inn owned and operated by the 87-year old Curtis, and his wife. We found that my story had reached Curtis — 2,000 miles away. It didn't get there by carrier pigeon.
Roaming through old newspapers recently, I discovered the reach of one Richmond County news outlet decades before the general availability of the internet. This involved a nationally renowned celebrity not held in high repute in some quarters. It was a curious episode.
Styled as a "visual artist," photographer Bob Guccione founded Penthouse magazine in 1965 to compete with Hugh Hefner's iconic Playboy publication. Guccione presented interesting, sometimes incisive, articles and book excerpts by the likes of Seymour Hersh, Philip Roth, Joyce Carol Oates, Stephen King, et al. All of that high-brow content was sandwiched around more prurient matter that involved young women clad in nothing at all.
Now, I doubt the scholarly offerings of Messieurs Guccione and Hefner ever, really, satisfied any adolescent boy's mother. "Gee, mom, there's an excerpt of the new Philip Roth novel in this one, and John Updike has a swell essay in that one," never fooled her. Which is why, I'm told, covers of those mags were polished by the undersides of more than a few mid-teen males’ mattresses.
In all-male environs of the military in the distant past, Guccione's and Hefner's monthly offerings were not often very far from CQ desks of those pulling after-hours watch in combat arms units. Be assured that while I pulled a generous share of that duty a half-century ago, I was much too busy shining combat boots, or reading up on "The Care and Cleaning of Your M-16 Rifle" to engage in such monkeyshines.
Penthouse never really matched Playboy's circulation, but Guccione was always in search of, at least, a veneer of respectability for his magazine.
During the Six Day Arab-Israeli War of June 1967, Israeli forces attacked the American warship USS Liberty off Israel's coast. Nearly three dozen U.S. sailors were killed, and more than 170 others were wounded. To say the least, the incident sparked controversy that has reverberated for years, with Israel claiming they believed the Liberty to be an Egyptian ship.
For his gallantry in securing his wounded and controlling his ship under fire, Capt. William McGonagle, severely injured in the attack, was awarded the Medal of Honor. Highlighting the incident's controversy, McGonagle's MOH was presented in secret by the Secretary of the Navy rather than by President Lyndon Johnson.
Penthouse articles by the noted British war correspondent Anthony Pearson in the spring of 1976 questioned the official explanations by U.S. and Israeli governments, and called for a fuller investigation. A Richmond County Daily Journal editorial at the time praised the articles, backing the magazine's call for further investigation.
The Journal's piece reached none other than Guccione himself, prompting a letter to then-editor Glenn Sumpter. Guccione's letter in the June 11, 1976 RCDJ commended that paper's editorial. Before his signature the controversial publisher closed with: "We applaud your editorial calling for an explanation of the Israeli attack and your comment, 'This question must be answered.’"
The editorial and front pages of the Journal during that long-ago spring reveal an interesting local scene, including some home-grown contretemps, among select county leaders, a judge, and a self-appointed local government critic. After the critic, a businessman, was put on notice by a local judge, Sumpter did not back away.
Questioning a possible threat to the right of free speech, the Journal's long editorial about the matter ended: "In short, what happened to [the critic] in court the other day may be legally proper, but it rubbed a lot of people in this county the wrong way — and we're among them."
Sumpter must have been tickled to find that letter from the Penthouse publisher in his desk's in-box — a spicy aroma connected with the Guccione name among the county's colorful goings-on.
In his As It Looks From Here ... column one day, Sumpter commented on receiving attention from Penthouse's leader: "I was a little surprised to get a letter from Guccione. After all, he is not a subscriber to the Daily Journal and I am not a subscriber to Penthouse." And: "Just as this newspaper is not composed entirely of editorials, so Penthouse is not composed entirely of naked ladies."
Sumpter acknowledged that, likely, some clipping service sent the editorial to Penthouse, "but it was kind of flattering to find that Guccione had seen it and found the time to comment on it."
Eight years later, Guccione and Penthouse stoked, arguably, their biggest controversy when the magazine published nude photos of the current Miss America 1984, spurring her resignation.
Alas, the internet, with its plethora of X-rated sites, proved to be the undoing of the Penthouses and Playboys of the world. That's a shame, if you stop and consider it. I doubt there is much Philip Roth, John Updike, Joyce Carol Oates, or much of anything edifying sandwiched around those “X” videos on the net.
