Springs, we even went to Uncle Raymond’s church, First Presbyterian, though Mother was at least a nominal Baptist. The pastor back then, the Reverend Overholser, was a remarkable man who produced two equally remarkable daughters: Nan Keohane, who became president of Wellesley, Hillary’s alma mater, and then the first woman president of Duke University; and Geneva Overholser, who was editor of the
Notwithstanding Mother’s reservations, I liked Raymond. I was impressed with his strength, his influence in town, and his genuine interest in his kids, and in me. His egocentric foibles didn’t bother me much, though we were as different as daylight and dark. In 1968, when I was giving pro–civil rights talks to civic clubs in Hot Springs, Raymond was supporting George Wallace for President. But in 1974, when I launched an apparently impossible campaign for Congress, Raymond and Gabe Crawford cosigned a $10,000 note to get me started. It was all the money in the world to me then. When his wife of more than forty-five years died, Raymond got reacquainted with a widow he had dated in high school and they married, bringing happiness to his last years. For some reason I can’t even remember now, Raymond got mad at me late in his life. Before we could reconcile he got Alzheimer’s. I went to visit him twice, once in St. Joseph’s Hospital and once in a nursing home. The first time I told him I loved him, was sorry for whatever had come between us, and would always be grateful for all he’d done for me. He might have known who I was for a minute or two; I can’t be sure. The second time, I know he didn’t know me, but I wanted to see him once more anyway. He died at eighty-four, like my aunt Ollie, well after his mind had gone.
Raymond and his family lived in a big house on Lake Hamilton, where we used to go for picnics and rides in his big wooden Chris-Craft boat. We celebrated every Fourth of July there with lots of fireworks. After his death, Raymond’s kids decided with sadness that they had to sell the old house. Luckily my library and foundation needed a retreat, so we bought the place and are renovating it for that purpose, and Raymond’s kids and grandkids can still use it. He’s smiling down on me now. Not long after we moved to Park Avenue, in 1955 I think, my mother’s parents moved to Hot Springs to a little apartment in an old house on our street, a mile or so toward town from our place. The move was motivated primarily by health concerns. Papaw’s bronchiectasis continued to advance and Mammaw had had a stroke. Papaw got a job at a liquor store, which I think Daddy owned a part of, just across from Mr. Brizendine’s barbershop. He had a lot of free time, since even in Hot Springs most people were too conventional to frequent liquor stores in broad daylight, so I often visited him there. He played a lot of solitaire and taught me how. I still play three different kinds, often when I’m thinking through a problem and need an outlet for nervous energy.
Mammaw’s stroke was a major one, and in the aftermath she was racked by hysterical screaming. Unforgivably, to calm her down, her doctor prescribed morphine, lots of it. It was when she got hooked that Mother brought her and Papaw to Hot Springs. Her behavior became even more irrational, and in desperation Mother reluctantly committed her to the state’s mental hospital, about thirty miles away. I don’t think there were any drug-treatment facilities back then.
Of course I didn’t know anything about her problem at the time; I just knew she was sick. Then Mother drove me over to the state hospital to see her. It was awful. It was bedlam. We went into a big open room cooled by electric fans encased in huge metal mesh to keep the patients from putting their hands into them. Dazed-looking people dressed in loose cotton dresses or pajamas walked around aimlessly, muttering to themselves or shouting into space. Still, Mammaw seemed normal and glad to see us, and we had a good talk. After a few months, she had settled down enough to come home, and she was never again on morphine. Her problem gave me my first exposure to the kind of mental-health system that served most of America back then. When he became governor, Orval Faubus modernized our state hospital and put a lot more money into it. Despite the damage he did in other areas, I was always grateful to him for that.
FIVE
In 1956, I finally got a brother, and our family finally got a television set. My brother, Roger Cassidy Clinton, was born on July 25, his father’s birthday. I was so happy. Mother and Daddy had been trying to have a baby for some time (a couple of years earlier she’d had a miscarriage). I think she, and probably he too, thought it might save their marriage. Daddy’s response was not auspicious. I was with Mammaw and Papaw when Mother delivered by caesarean section. Daddy picked me up and took me to see her, then brought me home and left. He had been drinking for the last few months, and instead of making him happy and responsible, the birth of his only son prompted him to run back to the bottle. Along with the excitement of a new baby in the house was the thrill of the new TV. There were lots of shows and entertainers for kids: cartoons,
Elvis’s first movie,
I never quite escaped Elvis. In the ’92 campaign, some members of my staff nicknamed me Elvis. A few years later, when I appointed Kim Wardlaw of Los Angeles to a federal judgeship, she was thoughtful enough to send me a scarf Elvis had worn and signed for her at one of his concerts in the early seventies, when she was nineteen. I still have it in my music room. And I confess: I still love Elvis. My favorite movies during this time were the biblical epics:
