An Archbishop Here, a President There
‘SINGING IS A MEANS OF UNIVERSAL COMMUNICATION’
What’s the most unlikely photograph of a Motown performer you’ve ever seen?
Granted, it’s not the most pressing question to ask anyone at the moment, but this came to mind recently when fellow music writer Danny Kelly tweeted a 50-year-old shot of the Temptations in England with none other than the Archbishop of Canterbury.
Meet the Temptations, Your Grace
The image originates from January 22, 1970, when the Tempts were in the U.K. for a two-week run at London’s The Talk of the Town nightclub. British Prime Minister Harold Wilson had drafted archbishop Michael Ramsey to head a committee looking into race relations, and someone at Lambeth Palace evidently thought that connecting him with the Motown stars would make sense in that context.
“It was a meeting of minds and interests that had great meaning for the archbishop and the entertainers,” declared a subsequent Motown publicity handout, noting that “he discussed with The Temptations the work they had done with various groups in the Detroit area, the problem of racially integrated housing in Detroit, the effect on Americans of the death of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., and the problems of school integration in both the North and South.”
The press release concluded, “Both sides learned much from each other,” adding a comment from the archbishop: “Singing is a means of universal communication. No doors are closed to those who sing.” (I wonder if he asked for the Temptations’ autographs?)
One year earlier, the doors of the White House were opened to Stevie Wonder. The occasion yielded another unlikely photo for your consideration, showing the 19-year-old in the Rose Garden, shaking hands with President Richard Nixon, who had taken office just a few months before.
FINE-TUNING THE APPLICATION
Wonder was in the nation’s capital to receive the Distinguished Service Award of the President’s Committee on the Employment of the Handicapped. This was at an evening banquet on May 1, 1969; he met Nixon at the White House earlier that day. The honour had been initiated by an organisation in Michigan which supported individuals with disabilities; one of its members was a friend of Wonder’s tutor, Ted Hull. “For weeks the two of us fine-tuned the pages and pages of material required with the application,” recalled Hull in his entertaining, insightful autobiography, The Wonder Years. “We never said a word to Stevie.”
Congratulations, Mr. Wonder
Clearly, their diligence paid off, and Wonder was invited to Washington to receive the award, a few weeks before graduating from the Michigan State School for the Blind. “Stevie was really nervous,” his friend Lee Garrett told author Constanze Elsner in her biography of the star. “Steve kept saying he didn’t know what to say to them. After all, he felt that he hadn’t done anything really for anyone yet.” Among those accompanying him were his mother, Lula Hardaway, and Motown’s public relations director, Junius Griffin.
Thus, the photo of Nixon offering congratulations. According to Hull, Nixon told Wonder that he “served as an inspiration to all handicapped citizens – particularly the younger ones.” Five years later, the musician was inspired by that same president to compose a message of his own: “Why do you keep on making us hear your song/Telling us how you are changing right from wrong/’Cause if you really want to hear our views/You haven’t done nothin’.”
The third unlikely photo in this round-up features another politician, this one with Diana Ross, Mary Wilson and Cindy Birdsong. It was taken on July 23, 1968 at New York’s Waldorf-Astoria Hotel, where the Supremes publicly endorsed Vice President Hubert Humphrey for president of the United States. (As a Democrat, he ran against, and was defeated by, Republican Nixon.)
According to Mary Wilson in her autobiography, Dreamgirl: My Life as a Supreme, the group had already been contributing to Democratic causes, mostly at fundraising events. “The Gordys were always politically active, especially Esther Edwards, and when the idea of endorsing Humphrey was presented to us, we thought it over carefully and were glad to do it.” She continued, “We certainly could have refused, and we would have if we had been asked to endorse someone we did not believe in.”
The happening: Vice President Hubert H. Humphrey with Mary, Diana and Cindy (photo: Getty Images)
The group’s support was announced at a press conference at the Waldorf-Astoria – and was received with some skepticism. A friend of mine, Richard Nusser, was present, reporting for the Village Voice. “I and a couple of Japanese and Brit reporters showed up,” he told me. “Humphrey was so out of his depth he barely knew what to say. He joked around and made some remarks about the politics of joy. The Japanese were speechless. It was embarrassing, to say the least.”
WHAT THEY WORE, NOT WHAT THEY SAID
Remembering that day, Mary Wilson conceded that the press were unimpressed. “In several published accounts, more space was devoted to what we wore than what we said,” she wrote.
Motown, too, was bothered by the tone of the coverage, and set about trying to get more relevant publicity. “This marks the first time in history that a presidential nominee has ever personally shared a major press conference with a star from the world of show business in support of his campaign,” declared the Pittsburgh Courier, a newspaper often receptive to Motown’s publicity priorities, several weeks after the July 23 endorsement. To Diana Ross, Humphrey was quoted as saying, “If I am elected, you will have front seats at my inauguration and you will be invited to the first dinner at the White House.” Diana replied, “Soul food?” Said Humphrey, “You betcha.”
‘Miss Ross won’
The ultimate irony: after Richard Nixon won the general election that November, who should be among the singers invited to perform during the inauguration ceremonies on January 20, 1969? Former Supreme Florence Ballard.
Actually, there is a fourth unlikely photograph to mention here (and you, doubtless, will have selections of your own). It dates from October 1967, when the Supremes were in Mexico, filming a guest spot for an episode of the popular TV series, Tarzan. The plot cast them as nuns striving to have a medical facility built in a jungle village, with the help of the title character. “The nuns get their hospital and the Supremes break out in song,” ran the Variety review when the show was aired the following January, “which is what they were there for in the first place.”
Photos from the set were distributed to media to promote the episode, including now-familiar shots of Tarzan – actor Ron Ely, wearing not much – with the group in their habits. “There were plenty of reporters and photographers on the set,” Mary Wilson recalled, “and they got some funny pictures of us, including one of me sitting with my habit pulled up over my knees, smoking a cigarette and drinking beer.”
But the image which caught my eye? Why, that of Diana Ross, in costume, pensively playing chess with Berry Gordy – who considered himself a fanatic at the game – between Tarzan takes. Added the caption in Jet magazine, “Miss Ross won.”
That’s also a pretty good career summary: queen takes king.
Diary notes: 1) The Temptations may have been in the Archbishop of Canterbury’s company at the beginning of 1970, but Live at London’s Talk of The Town wasn’t blessed with U.K. chart action when the album came out later in the year. 2) The month after he was honoured by President Nixon, Stevie Wonder returned to the capital to perform at a “Summer in the Park” concert by the Washington Monument, at which First Lady Pat Nixon was present. 3) The endorsement by Diana Ross & the Supremes of Hubert Humphrey can be viewed, after a fashion, here. The sound quality is variable and drops out at several points, but you’ll get the gist. And perhaps also get a chuckle from the inevitable Edward Kennedy questions aimed at the Vice President. After the press conference, the Motown trio returned to New Jersey for the second show of a six-night run at the Garden State Arts Center in Holmdel Township. 4) From that January ‘68 Tarzan episode, here is why the Supremes were recruited, for the most part.