During my freshman year in college, there was a presentation on campus by some of the folks whose research inspired Oliver Stone’s JFK. I went to see it, and got in line to ask a question to the panel. I asked my question, they answered it, and then I sat back down.
Thought nothing else of it for a week or so. Then, I got a phone call from my mom, asking me if I was at that presentation. My grandmother, slightly insomniacal, was channel surfing late at night, stumbled upon the presentation on CSPAN, watched it, and saw her grandson stand up and ask a question. She freaked out. She didn’t get a chance to wake up my grandfather in time to show me to him, but she did have my mom ask me the next day if it was me, lest she suffer from illusions. It was me. I was famous. Whoo.
I was on TV first in 1982 when I was helping to built an addition on CBS between 11th and 12th avenues on 57th Street. It was just a quick shot but the folks back home saw it and told me about it. The times after that were many, our local TV station carries our city council meetings so I was on TV for about two years every other week. During that time I was trying to close down a nude juice bar and REALLY became a town hero. The town wanted it banned and others in city government were opposed to closing it as they were connected to the mob and and on the take along with the cops. Lots of laws were being broken but what moved me into action was running into a dancer while on patrol with one of the police. She was nearly raped that night by a customer who followed her home. I investigated the place and found it was covert prostitution with girls who were 18-23 years old. They got addicted to crack by the owner of the place who was on parole at the time. He later went back to prison for a parole violation. Anyway, I made myself the point person of all of this and was on TV in two major cities because of it. They came to our town to do an expose’. The last time I was on TV was in 1995 at John Lennon’s 15th anniversary of his death at Strawberry Fields in New York’s Central Park. The TV crews came and filmed us singing Beatle songs and ran a short clip of it later that night. I was right in front of the camera singing my heart out. It was a close up shot from about 8 feet away. I was so proud, I bought a copy of it. I still miss John.
In 1987 the Minnesota Twins were playing the St. Louis Cardinals in the World Series. I had created a poster that showed the Metrodome in the shape of a big pie with red feathers and bird legs hanging out. The caption: Four and twenty redbirds baked in a pie. The guy from Sports Illustrated asked if he could take my picture. I said sure! Then the bastard plagiarized me, didn’t reference me at all, and used the quote as if he had made it up himself.