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years about this form, you know, paying for memoirs of historical figures. Was there any conflict with any of the mores of journalism in that, or not? Buying the material.

No, it was an issue that was raised by people--

Hold on one second. [end of side one; beginning of side two of tape one]

Go ahead.

It was an issue raised by people; I never took it very seriously. I guess my pragmatic view was that a lot of these people had done an awful lot of work for very little money, and here they were at the end of their regime, and they might as well get their reward. As you know, the issue was raised in the Congress, and various tax laws were changed to make it less possible for people to make money off their careers.

One that we've left out is the astronauts. What memories have you of that contract?

That was an enormous undertaking. We, in effect, were attempting to acquire exclusive rights to the astronauts over the protests of practically all the rest of the press. [laughs] And Ed Thompson and who? I can't remember who spent all that time negotiating, working on this, but it turned out to be the most complicated set of negotiations, because there had to be a clear line