How America Works

I’m not telling you anything new here, but this is how America works. This is how America has always worked.

Let’s not fool ourselves.

In the early 1940s Lyndon Johnson and his wife Lady Bird were able through political chicanery to gain control of radio station KTBC in Austin.

The following is from Robert A Caro’s‘s book, Means of Ascent, Tthe Yars of Lyndon Johnson.

Read it and weep.

What Johnson wanted was advertising revenues; what Clark wanted was recognition as a lawyer with influence in Washington-and both got what they wanted.

One of the powerful Texans with whom Clark would be associated for years was Howard E. Butt, of Corpus Christi, owner of the statewide H.E.B. chain of grocery stores. “I knew Mr. Butt’s interest in politics,” Clark says, and, he recalls, he knew Butt needed someone to help with problems he was having with federal agencies in Washington-particularly, during those wartime years, with the Office of Price Administration.

So, Clark says, he advised Mr. Butt to advertise on KTBC. Because the station’s records have not been released, it is difficult to learn any details about Butt’s advertising, but it may have been done through companies whose products were sold in H.E.B. stores and who would advertise on KTBC and mention H.E.B. in their ads. In a letter written on October 27, 1943, Clark told Johnson, “I am today writing to Corpus so that Howard Butt will contact the advertisers whose products he sells at his stores in Austin so that he will have an opportunity to get coverage here.” 

Butt soon found out how wise Clark’s advice could be. In 1944, when the OPA was limiting each distributor’s number of cases of grapefruit that could be harvested and packed in the Rio Grande Valley, Johnson intervened and persuaded the agency to allocate Butt 150,000 extra cases. “I was happy to be able to call Mr. Howard Butt after our conversation (about the grapefruit) today,” Clark wrote Johnson on February 3, 1944, and, indeed, everyone involved got something out of this arrangement:

Butt got 150,000 extra cases of grapefruit, and the profits from selling them; Clark got recognition as an attorney with influence in Washington;

KTBC got advertising revenues.

Butt’s was not the only company that Ed Clark advised to advertise on KTBC. 

Are you surprised?

Copyright 2024 Archer Crosley All Rights Reserved