0:00

Hi everyone, it's Moe. We'll

0:02

be back with an all new episode of the podcast

0:05

next Wednesday, but this week

0:07

we're reaching into our archives

0:09

all the way back to season one to

0:12

share the very first episode of

0:14

Mobituaries, Von Meeter

0:16

and the Death of a Career. This

0:19

November twenty second marks sixty

0:22

years since the assassination of

0:24

President John F. Kennedy.

0:26

Pretty Much anyone who is alive on that

0:29

day remembers where they were when they

0:31

heard the devastating news out

0:33

of Dallas, Texas. But

0:35

no one experienced that day or

0:37

its aftermath in quite

0:39

the same way that von Meeter did.

0:42

He was the comedian who'd skyrocketed

0:45

to fame with his uncanny

0:47

impersonation of jfk In

0:50

an instant that dark day, his

0:52

livelihood ended and his life

0:55

radically changed. It's

0:57

an episode we're proud of. We hope

0:59

you appreciate it, and be sure

1:01

to tune in again next week for

1:03

an all new deep dive into the people

1:06

and things who never got to send

1:08

off they deserved.

1:15

I think we have time for one final question.

1:18

In the late fall of nineteen sixty

1:20

two, one of President John F. Kennedy's

1:22

closest advisors Arthur

1:24

Schlessinger Junior was driving

1:27

in his car when all of a sudden, he

1:29

heard the following question come over the

1:31

airwaves.

1:32

That's in office.

1:33

What do you think the Chans offer Jewish

1:35

president?

1:36

A familiar voice answered.

1:38

Well, I think they're pretty good.

1:40

Now, let me say, I don't see why a president of

1:42

the Jewish faith not be President

1:44

of the United States. I know,

1:46

as a Catholic I could never vote for

1:48

him.

1:48

But other than that, his

1:52

confusion was cleared up when he learned

1:54

the voice belonged to Kennedy impersonator

1:57

Vaughon Meeterer, but was

2:00

concerned enough that when he returned to the White

2:02

House he drafted a memorandum

2:04

to the President. He

2:07

wrote the following, This raises

2:09

the question of what in hell a president

2:12

of the United States ought to do about

2:14

mimicry. I'm

2:17

guessing many of you have never heard of von Meder,

2:20

but for one brief shining moment, Okay,

2:22

a twelve month period between late nineteen sixty

2:25

two and late nineteen sixty three, he

2:27

was a really big deal. He

2:30

had this parody album called The

2:32

First Family, a spoof of the Kennedys.

2:34

In old video clips, he looks like a distant

2:37

Kennedy cousin, young, clean cut

2:39

with a thick head of hair, and his JFK

2:41

impression he's uncanny.

2:44

Just listen today will be in nuclear de Shamelin,

2:46

followed by the un bond issue and a matter

2:49

of the trade agreement. Now first, there is

2:51

a most important matter to settle, mister

2:54

gall yours was the chicken, Salad and coffee.

2:56

That's a dollar forty.

2:59

Family well in five weeks,

3:01

this album has broken all records

3:03

in the history of the recording business.

3:05

It's sold well.

3:05

Get this, three and a quarter million copies

3:07

in five weeks. It took My Fair Lady

3:09

album five years to sell that many

3:12

copies. I had.

3:13

That was late night King of his day, Jack

3:15

Parr marveling at the popularity

3:18

of this one album. And the

3:20

star of the album, Von Meeter, was

3:23

just about everywhere until

3:25

all of a sudden he wasn't.

3:28

From Dallas, Texas. The flash apparently

3:31

official President Kennedy died

3:34

at one pm Central

3:36

Standard time.

3:38

I'm Morocca and this is mobituaries.

3:48

This mobent jfk impersonator

3:51

von Meeter November

3:54

twenty second, nineteen sixty three.

3:57

Death of a career.

4:04

Oh are we recording.

4:05

Now, Okay, I've worked across

4:08

the street from this building, and I

4:10

had no idea. I thought it was maybe some NSA

4:14

storage unit. I don't know how people's final

4:16

It's okay.

4:19

The CBS News.

4:20

Archives, O lock, Hey,

4:23

it's Joe.

4:24

N That's Joe Alessi.

4:27

He's managed the CBS Archives

4:29

for twenty two years now. He's

4:31

the go to guy if you need anything that was shot

4:34

by CBS News during the twenty first,

4:36

twentieth century. Even the nineteenth.

4:38

First thing we have is eight from eighteen ninety

4:40

seven, and that's William McKinley's inauguration.

4:43

You're kidding, Let's go to the back.

4:45

And then when I say to the back, we're going to the vault.

4:47

Are the vault?

4:48

Vault?

4:48

It's the vault.

4:49

It sounds it sounds very mysterious.

4:52

It smells like pastrami or something.

4:55

Well, I've realis lunch.

4:56

So you're correct on that.

4:58

No, what that is?

4:59

That's sometimes all right, Let's

5:01

go this way.

5:05

What are CBS's sort

5:07

of greatest hits.

5:09

Well, the thing that people ask

5:11

for most is the

5:13

assassination of President Kennedy. That

5:16

seems to be a story that fascinates people from

5:18

the beginning right up until today, people

5:20

ask for at least once a week.

5:22

And for good reason. That

5:24

horrible day in November nineteen sixty

5:27

three ended the president's life and

5:29

changed the life of the nation. That's

5:31

what mister Oakes taught us in high school. There

5:34

was America before the assassination and

5:37

America after and before

5:40

comedian Vaughan Meter was a household

5:42

name, So surely the CBS

5:45

archives would have something on the man. My

5:48

friend Joe did not disappoint.

5:51

Three tapes of a von Meter interview

5:54

sounds promising, because that's unless

5:56

those tapes are super short.

5:58

That's a significant interview.

6:00

Yeah, I think it's a good find.

6:05

And so I took a look. But

6:10

what I saw and heard wasn't exactly

6:13

funny.

6:14

So it looked like, you know, I could do this forever.

6:16

There was no end to the thought of gold,

6:18

but there was no rainbow either. It was had

6:20

no idea it was gonna be that

6:24

months.

6:27

This is von Meter in nineteen ninety

6:29

eight. On these tapes he looks

6:31

haggard and shake him sixty

6:33

two years old, but a rough sixty

6:35

two. This was all recorded

6:37

for a short lived CBS cable network

6:40

called Ion people. Meter

6:42

was being profiled as part of a where Are They

6:44

Now? Type series. Little

6:46

of this footage made it to air.

6:50

Well.

6:50

I was born in Waterville the Night

6:52

of the flood.

6:54

Abbot von Meeter was born in nineteen

6:57

thirty six in Waterville, Maine,

6:59

and by all accounts, had a harrowing

7:01

childhood. His father drowned

7:04

when he was one, and his young mother

7:06

moved from Maine to Boston to work

7:08

as a cocktail waitress. Meeter

7:11

had to shuttle between Maine and Massachusetts

7:14

for much of his youth, spending some

7:16

of that time in children's homes.

7:19

He says he started entertaining people to

7:21

avoid punishment. When he got into trouble near

7:24

the end of high school, his mother was

7:26

institutionalized and Meter

7:29

ran away to the army. He

7:31

ultimately was stationed in Germany, where

7:33

he met the first of his four wives and

7:36

played in a band. After

7:38

his time in the service, he did a risque

7:40

piano act around the New York City area

7:43

and then moved on to Greenwich Village, where

7:45

he owned a politically themed comedy

7:48

routine.

7:53

It was at this point that he dropped his first

7:55

name, Abbott. He became Vaughan

7:58

Meeter and then one

8:00

fateful night, a voice came

8:03

out of Meter. It was

8:05

the President of the United States,

8:07

John F. Kennedy.

8:10

Yes, the gentleman over there, sir, When

8:13

are we going to send a man to the moon?

8:14

Whenever, mister Goldwater wants to go right with.

8:19

Meter started to reserve the last ten

8:21

minutes of his routine for an impression

8:23

of Kennedy's live television press

8:25

conferences.

8:26

My name is Bob Booker. I've

8:28

just been in the entertainment business all my life,

8:31

and I've been very lucky. And I also

8:33

forgot to turn off my phone.

8:34

Now, that's fine.

8:35

If it's a gig, pick it up.

8:37

I don't even know this Bruce.

8:38

Back in the nineteen sixties, Bob Booker

8:41

was a disc jockey who, along with his

8:43

partner Earl Dowd, wanted to capitalize

8:45

on the fascination with the new president

8:48

as well as the popularity of comedy

8:50

albums. These were the days of Stan

8:52

Freeberg, Shelley Berman, Nichols

8:54

and May, and the great Bob Newhart,

8:57

who had just won Album of the Year at

8:59

the Gram's, a first for a comedy

9:01

album. That classic bit with Newheart

9:04

as President Lincoln's press agent still

9:06

holds up.

9:08

I sweetheart, how's

9:13

jEdit Bert.

9:15

Sort of a drag?

9:18

So we were looking for the next thing

9:20

to do, like, you know, so we

9:23

could have a meal the next day.

9:25

We said, you know, Kennedy make a great

9:27

album.

9:28

So what was your concept for this album.

9:31

You've got this giant star.

9:35

He's a movie star, he's a political

9:38

star, he's he's a world

9:40

star. I got in such a good looking man

9:43

with this beautiful wife. Right. We

9:46

said, if you take this character

9:48

and the family and put

9:50

them in everyday situations,

9:53

that's funny.

9:54

This was the beginning of what would become the

9:57

First Family album. The

9:59

only problem was they had no idea

10:01

who could play the head of this First Family,

10:04

That is until they turned on the TV

10:06

the evening of July third, nineteen

10:09

sixty two.

10:09

No, but he's from the New school and

10:12

has served his apprenticeship in the little clubs

10:14

that feature you know, the topic of comedians,

10:17

the kids with the rye offbeat comments

10:19

on life today.

10:20

Does that voice sound familiar? It's

10:22

Jim Bacchus aka mister

10:25

Magoo aka Thurston Howl,

10:27

the third from Gilligan's Island. He

10:29

was hosting a summer replacement show called

10:32

talent Scouts on CBS.

10:33

And I know, I know you're going to be delighted

10:36

with the TV debut of mister

10:38

Vaughan Meeter.

10:41

Meeters started off with his take on the news

10:43

headlines of the day.

10:45

There's one that might be a little more

10:47

familiar to you. Congressman read Write of

10:49

Alabama was quoted as saying, literacy

10:52

test ain't proven nothing.

10:56

Listen, I have no idea how funny or

10:58

fresh is topicals stuff actually was.

11:01

There's that old quote from playwright George S. Kaufman,

11:04

satire is what closes on Saturday

11:06

Night. But his impression of Kennedy

11:09

was and is nothing short

11:11

of sensational.

11:12

He's doing my act, he's doing

11:15

my gestures, and he's using my lines.

11:17

Do not ask what this country can do for you.

11:19

That's one of my original lines.

11:23

When he did Kennedy, it was perfect,

11:26

absolutely perfect.

11:28

Bob Booker and Earl Dowd had

11:30

found their man. But there was

11:32

something else striking about that performance,

11:35

A kind of disclaimer he made at the end

11:37

of his starmaking routine, something

11:39

I can't imagine any comic doing

11:41

today.

11:42

Yes, I'd like to make one final statement at this

11:44

time, and I would

11:46

like to make that final statement as myself

11:48

von Meta, and that is the thing. Thank

11:51

you for the United States, a

11:53

country where it is possible for a young comedian

11:56

like myself to come out on television before millions

11:58

of people and kid leading citizen,

12:00

thank you good night.

12:04

It was very interesting to me because he was to

12:06

me non controversial.

12:08

I wanted to get the perspective of a modern

12:11

day presidential impersonator.

12:13

I decide how big my failures

12:15

are, and they're.

12:17

The biggest way Meet

12:19

Anthony Tammanik. He impersonates

12:21

President Donald Trump, most

12:24

recently on Comedy Central's The President

12:26

Show.

12:27

I wonder if that caution

12:29

was sort of to say, listen, I'm

12:31

making fun with him, not of

12:33

him.

12:34

This is a telegram that

12:37

right after von Meter made his television

12:39

debut, he wrote a telegram of the

12:41

White House.

12:42

He wrote this to you President. Yeah,

12:45

dear mister President, I respectfully call your

12:47

attention to the Talent Scouts Show, which

12:49

we taped last night for viewing on CBS

12:51

Television Tuesday night, July

12:54

third, at ten pm. I impersonated

12:56

you, but I did it with great affection and respect.

12:59

Hope it with your approval, respectfully.

13:01

Von Meter. Wow, that

13:04

is wild.

13:05

We actually went through eleven I think turned

13:09

down.

13:11

Booker and Dowd had their concept,

13:14

their Kennedy, and a demo of the album.

13:17

No One was biting, though. Booker remembers

13:19

one meeting at ABC. In the room

13:22

that day was Jim Haggerty, who was

13:24

the vice president of News and a

13:26

former White House Press secretary under

13:28

Eisenhower, Kennedy's predecessor.

13:30

He said, I think the Communists will

13:32

love it. I think Russia will love it, and

13:35

every communist country in the world will

13:37

love it. And he slammed

13:39

the door behind him and going out. He

13:42

was outraged, right, So

13:45

we were just insulting the president

13:47

and his family. He was not

13:49

a man with a great sense of humor.

13:51

Mister, it doesn't

13:53

sound like it. But did it give you any doubt?

13:56

Did you for a moment, go, boy, maybe

13:58

this is disrespectful. Maybe we should didn't

14:00

do it. This was place

14:02

number twelve that we'd been thrown in the street.

14:05

Okay, didn't discourage

14:07

us at all.

14:08

We knew we had a hit record.

14:10

I would have bet anything on it. We

14:12

did bet everything on it.

14:14

While ABC passed, the president

14:17

of the network suggested they try a smaller

14:19

label called Cadence, run by

14:21

Archie Blyier.

14:22

Picked up the phone, called him set

14:24

the meeting. The next morning. We went over

14:27

and they bought it instantly.

14:28

They'd overcome one hurdle getting a record

14:31

deal, but as it turned out, recording

14:33

the album before a live audience came

14:36

with its own set of challenges.

14:38

This is a special report from CBS

14:40

News the Cuban Crisis.

14:43

Talk about an evening. Oh

14:45

what an evening.

14:46

That's the night of President Kennedy's big

14:48

speech about.

14:49

The Cuban crisis. And we had the

14:51

TV sets in the back room and

14:53

we watched the speech where everybody

14:55

believed going to.

14:57

War within the past.

14:59

We unmistakable

15:01

evidence has established the fact that

15:03

a series of offensive missile

15:06

sites is now in preparation

15:09

on that imprisoned island.

15:10

So the show starts.

15:12

The audience has no idea that President

15:14

Kennedy is on TV addressing

15:16

the nation about this.

15:18

Really terrible crisis. Yes it was,

15:21

And how does the show go?

15:23

Perfect? And I

15:25

did have a fear that the cast had

15:28

heard this speech also, so

15:30

we did. We did a quick little speech

15:32

right before Hey, it's showtime.

15:35

We're going out there and kill okay,

15:37

and everybody did it.

15:40

Didn't affect anybody.

15:42

After making it through that crisis within

15:44

a crisis, Bob Booker handed off

15:46

the album to a DJ friend at WIS

15:48

Radio in New York, and.

15:55

He was going on the air in ten minutes, and

15:57

I said, look what I've got and

16:00

he looked at it and he played one cut and he said, Jesus,

16:02

Pob, that's a satial. He went on

16:04

the air for three

16:07

hours. He played the album continuously.

16:10

No more Family for a while. Now, I promise, now

16:13

turn off the light.

16:15

Good Night, Jackie, good night, jack Night,

16:18

Bobby night, ethel.

16:24

Every light in the place lit

16:26

up. I mean it was crazy. The

16:29

phone calls from the other stations were

16:31

coming in, television bookings

16:34

for all in three hours,

16:36

broke it wide open, wond Jockey.

16:40

The First Family album took off

16:42

like a rocket, and Von

16:44

Meeter was in for the right of

16:46

his life.

16:55

Von Meeter was playing a gig in Detroit

16:58

and didn't know what hit him.

17:00

I couldn't leave until I get back to New York. And I

17:02

walked down the street and heard my voice being

17:04

broadcast and I just couldn't

17:06

keep up.

17:07

With it, man, I mean, it was on fire.

17:08

Can give me a sense of what that felt like? What

17:11

did you think?

17:11

No, there's

17:13

no way insanity.

17:15

Everyone wanted von Meeterer to appear

17:18

on their show, including beloved singer

17:20

Andy Williams, who was hosting a popular

17:22

new variety series on NBC.

17:25

Welcome to our show.

17:26

Thank you very much, Andy.

17:27

It's a pleasure to be here. You know, I've been looking.

17:29

Forward all week to working with Vron because

17:31

I wanted to sit right next to the guy who.

17:33

Was sold well.

17:35

He's had the most successful album in the history

17:37

of the recordiness, the First Family Album.

17:39

Okay, there's

17:42

a good reason The First Family was

17:44

the best selling album of its time.

17:46

It's a total blast. It's

17:49

not really a sad tire. It's parody

17:51

the kind of fun zany takeoff that I used

17:54

to love reading in Mad Magazine when I was

17:56

a kid, Like when they turned chips into

17:58

chimps, or the Godfather into the Odd

18:00

Father. That kind of a thing. It's not really meant

18:02

to make you think, it's meant to make you

18:04

laugh. Okay, so some

18:07

references may not play for today's

18:09

audiences.

18:10

Eva, you drive a hard bargain.

18:13

Like monopoly with Republican Senate

18:15

Minority Leader Everett Dirkson.

18:17

I'll show you a boardwalk and park place,

18:21

but.

18:22

A surprising amount of it really holds

18:24

up.

18:24

I'd like to ask the following question,

18:27

faultois philipp.

18:29

Now speak English? Jackie?

18:30

Sure, the

18:32

Jackie sounds more like Marilyn Monroe,

18:35

which probably didn't make the first lady very

18:37

happy. But come on, to be fair, who

18:39

didn't think the real Jackie sounded a

18:41

little like Marilyn during that famous TV

18:44

tour of the White House.

18:45

Yes, this room is everything

18:47

in it really is from the time of President

18:50

Monroe.

18:50

Of course, the album does its own take on

18:52

that.

18:52

Tour and left at the Dai

18:55

Madison Pinakorom.

18:57

While most of the jokes are pretty gentle, there

19:00

are a few digs.

19:01

Ask the Richard Nixon dam way.

19:05

One of the biggest laughs comes here when

19:07

the President divvies up Caroline and John

19:10

John's bath.

19:11

Tool nine of the pet Boach,

19:13

two of the Yogi Bear of beach Balls,

19:15

the Yah Ball of Hilly Putty belonged

19:18

to Caroline, nine of

19:20

the pet Boach, one.

19:21

Of the Yogi Ya bearra.

19:23

Beach Balls, and the two Howdy

19:26

Duty plastic bouncing clowns, Ah

19:28

Baby Johns.

19:29

The rubbishwan is mine.

19:33

I'm imagining people everywhere look

19:35

at home, around the water cooler, at work,

19:37

repeating that rubber Swan line,

19:40

and apparently they did.

19:41

I thought it was pretty funny.

19:43

Anthony A. Tamanik, who impersonates President

19:46

Trump, knows the album well. His

19:48

grandfather played it for him when he was growing

19:50

up. But I also wanted his take

19:52

on how Meeter looked as Kennedy. Is

19:55

it a good impression?

19:56

Yeah, it is a good impression.

19:58

It's a good impression, becau because a good impression

20:00

doesn't require any

20:03

makeup or accoutrement.

20:07

The idea should be that the presence

20:09

of the person is what you feel like.

20:11

There's a will that presents Kennedy

20:14

in that moment.

20:15

There is not, and I say this with a great

20:18

pride. There is not one

20:20

ugly joke in the entire thing.

20:23

There's not even a really nasty

20:25

political joke anywhere in the album.

20:28

Yes, it's all very safe from

20:30

today's vantage point. Turns

20:32

out, and this was a surprise to me. The

20:34

producers in cast were pushing the

20:36

limits of comedy.

20:38

I had the first I must level with you, I

20:40

had some misgivings about this

20:44

idea for reasons

20:46

of my own.

20:47

That's late Night host Jack Parr again

20:50

he was Johnny Carson before Johnny Carson,

20:53

issuing a disclaimer before inviting

20:55

von Meeter on stage. Parr

20:57

then goes on to quote famed Anthwer

21:00

apologist Margaret Meade. She

21:02

too had weighed in on the First Family album

21:05

because well why not, she told

21:07

Life Magazine quote, this making

21:09

fun of people in authority is very

21:11

healthy. It is the difference between democracy

21:14

and tyranny. End quote.

21:17

The album continued selling like crazy.

21:20

But what was the White House thinking? Remember

21:25

presidential advisor Arthur Schlessinger,

21:28

who was so concerned about that voice

21:30

on the radio that he wrote a memo

21:32

about the dangers of impersonating

21:34

the president. He wrote, the

21:36

radio listener twirls his dial, comes

21:39

in in the middle of things, and rarely listens

21:41

with full attention. Anyway, Schlessinger

21:44

concluded on an ominous note,

21:47

remember Orson Wells and the

21:49

Martian invasion. Again,

21:53

this comedy seems completely benign

21:56

today. But boy, it raised an alarm

21:58

in the president's inner circle.

22:00

Well, it got dangerous because

22:03

the people around Kennedy, around

22:05

any president, are so protective

22:08

the minute they heard someone

22:10

doing Kennedy on the air so accurately,

22:13

Because Vaughan was really good with it. They

22:16

went screaming. They even went to the FCC

22:18

to try and stop the album.

22:20

Clearly and thankfully, those attempts weren't

22:23

successful. But I was fascinated

22:25

to learn that Schlessinger took the time to

22:27

go back to the days of FDR to

22:29

seek out some kind of precedent with regard

22:31

to presidential impersonations. It

22:34

turns out Franklin Roosevelt's press secretary,

22:36

Stephen Early, had directly asked

22:39

media outlets not to give airtime

22:41

to Roosevelt impersonators.

22:43

It's been a long time since a president

22:45

and his family have been subjected.

22:48

It was such a heavy barrage of teasing

22:50

and fun poking and satire. And

22:52

there have been books on backstairs at

22:54

the White House, and cartoon books

22:56

with clever sayings, and

23:00

photo albums with balloons

23:02

and the rest.

23:03

And now I smash hit

23:06

for record.

23:07

Can you tell us whether you read and

23:09

listen to these things and whether they produce annoyment

23:12

or enjoyment.

23:15

Annoyment, No, they yes,

23:17

I have read them and listened to them.

23:19

Actually I listened to mister Meta record, but

23:21

I thought it sounded more like Teddy than it did me.

23:23

But that's

23:26

not von Meter as JFK. That

23:28

is the actual President of the United States

23:31

talking about von Meter in one of his live

23:33

press conferences. According

23:35

to many accounts, the President did enjoy

23:38

the album and even gave out copies

23:40

for Christmas.

23:41

Do you know why he loved it? Made a human

23:43

being out of him, took

23:45

him down off the pedestal. He was

23:47

one of us. He just

23:50

looked a lot better than all of us.

23:55

Von Meter went on to win a Grammy

23:57

for Best Comedy Performance and

24:00

First Family one Album

24:02

of the Year. The First

24:04

Family beat out the likes of Tony Bennett

24:06

and Ray Charles. Von Meeter

24:09

was living the dream, right.

24:12

It just took over.

24:14

The voice you're hearing now is the older

24:16

Meter from that nineteen ninety eight interview

24:19

that I got from the archives.

24:21

You know, I go on Sullivan. I'd asked him

24:23

if I could play a sing a song. I wanted to desperately

24:25

play some music, sing some songs. No

24:28

no chance, no chance, no chance. So

24:30

I just sell in line, you know, and

24:34

did it. And I

24:37

had to get sued to do a volume two

24:39

because I didn't want to do a volume two. They

24:41

sued me for a million dollars.

24:44

In early nineteen sixty three, while

24:47

Meter was on a concert tour of the album,

24:49

Bob Booker and Earl Dowd began developing

24:51

fresh material for a second volume

24:54

of the first Family album.

24:56

At twitch time, Vaughan said, I

24:58

don't want to do Kennedy anymore.

25:00

You heard that, right? Meeter, who

25:02

almost overnight went from barely

25:04

scraping buying clubs just storing

25:07

in the country's most popular album,

25:10

was sick of the Kennedy act.

25:11

But I wasn't very content with any

25:14

of it, and maybe it was the Kennedy thing that

25:16

I couldn't get out of.

25:18

But album producer Bob Booker was

25:20

having none of it.

25:21

I said, we have a deal to do it. He said,

25:24

I don't care about that. I don't want to

25:26

have to do Kennedy the rest of my life, he

25:28

said, I want to do my act. And

25:30

this is the time I had to save on. You

25:34

don't have an act, you never

25:36

had an act. If

25:38

you give this up, you not gonna be working

25:40

anywhere.

25:41

Was that hard for you to say no?

25:43

Because it was the truth, and I

25:46

wanted the album and just do

25:48

what we have contractually and then go

25:50

do anything you want in your life. If

25:53

I never see you again, that's fine, and

25:56

just do what you promised you would do.

25:58

How did he take it when you told him

26:01

you don't have an act?

26:02

How did he? Oh? No, he was offended by that.

26:04

He said, no, so I can go do my act.

26:06

Said there was no act. There was no act

26:08

in Talent Scouts right, it

26:11

was Kennedy, that was it.

26:13

Volume two was released in the spring

26:15

of nineteen sixty three and sold

26:17

fairly well, but nowhere

26:19

near the original album. One

26:21

of the sketches, which today seems

26:24

pretty haunting, imagines the

26:26

Kennedy's enjoying retirement in

26:28

nineteen ninety six.

26:30

I shertinly enjoyed being president. Bobby

26:33

enjoyed being president. Jeddy

26:36

enjoyed being president. Then

26:38

I enjoyed being president again.

26:42

Once I was in, I couldn't find the way

26:45

out. And yeah,

26:49

I'm sorry, he found the way.

26:56

On the morning of November twenty second,

26:58

nineteen sixty three, the Associated

27:00

Press published a story by veteran

27:03

Hollywood columnist Bob Thomas,

27:05

which started as follows, It's

27:08

always a bit surprising to find a new star

27:10

in show business trying to run away

27:12

from the thing that made him famous. Today's

27:15

example is von Meter. Thomas

27:18

then goes on to write he also is

27:20

searching for ways to destroy his image

27:22

as a jfk imitator. Meter

27:27

didn't have to search much longer.

27:41

Here is a bulletin from CBS News

27:44

in Dallas, Texas. Three shots were

27:46

fired at President Kennaday's motorcade

27:49

in downtown Dallas. The first

27:51

reports say that President Kennedy.

27:53

Yeah, that's

27:57

the older Von Meter.

27:59

Well, I just got booked at the Democratic

28:01

Club and in Wisconsin. And

28:04

I flew into Wisconsin

28:06

from New York. And

28:09

when I got in the cab, the cab

28:11

driver said, you hear Kennedy got

28:13

shot in Dallas? And

28:15

I said, no, how does it go? Because I

28:17

thought it was another Kennedy joke because people, you know,

28:19

everywhere I went, people say, oh, do you hear about jack

28:22

who did this? And Jackie out of the punchline,

28:24

you know, So I thought it was just another being

28:27

set up. Somebody recognized me, was setting me up

28:29

for another Kennedy joke, you know. I said, how's

28:31

ago? And then I heard on the

28:33

taxi cab radio that

28:36

that's what happened. So I went

28:38

to the hotel, got drunk, got

28:40

the next plane out and went back to New York, and

28:44

I guess they stayed drunk.

28:46

Bob Booker was having lunch in Greenwich

28:48

Village when he heard the news.

28:50

The phone rang and it was my secretary and

28:53

she said, Kennedy's been shot. And

28:55

I just threw some money on the table and left.

29:00

It was devastating, absolutely devasating. If

29:02

I called Archie Bleyer the minute I got back,

29:05

and I said, get the albums

29:07

wherever they are, because they're out with distributors

29:10

all over the gun. I said, get your hands on all

29:12

of them. We're going to chop them up. I want

29:14

no part of cashing in on

29:17

this man's death.

29:18

And just like that, Vaughn meeters

29:21

meteoric rise to fame was

29:24

over. Did

29:27

you ever see Vaughan again?

29:29

Well, I talked to him a couple of times. I don't

29:31

think I ever did see him again.

29:35

Well, it was over. It's

29:38

over over. You know, John's

29:42

gune. So I

29:44

don't want to hear me playing

29:46

him

29:49

if it isn't me, I don't want to, you know, I

29:52

don't want to be him. Let's

30:00

say I am.

30:07

I think his issue on this armchair

30:09

analysis was that he did not have

30:11

a good division between the character and himself.

30:14

Trump impersonator Anthony and Tammanik.

30:17

But he basically doesn't know where he ends

30:19

where Kennedy ends. And he begins, yeah.

30:22

He might have just been a person who just

30:24

didn't think about his psyche before

30:26

he got into it.

30:28

Well, it broke my heart really at

30:30

the time. But I thought

30:32

to myself, well, now I can go on to something

30:35

else. But I couldn't. It was I mean

30:38

that they didn't want nobody else. Nobody wanted

30:41

nothing else from me. That's what they wanted, and they couldn't

30:43

let go of that. I'll never

30:45

forget New York City, as cold

30:48

as it is. I'm walking down Second Avenue

30:50

and a steel riveta, a riveta with

30:53

a hard hat, sees me and stops

30:55

his rivet and walks over and squeezes

30:58

my hand. It's says, oh so sorry,

31:00

man, And like, you

31:02

know, I was getting that, you know, like

31:04

almost pity. And I think

31:06

I had to go to a great extent.

31:09

I know I did. I stayed drunk, and after

31:12

that I stayed drugged to

31:14

get away from pity feeling

31:17

sorry for me, you know, so then

31:20

I get to feeling sorry for myself.

31:22

I don't know, so imagine

31:24

if like the one thing that you were getting your momentum

31:26

on just got pulled from you, and

31:28

then everyone's like, oh, that's so bad, almost

31:31

as if also it's like everyone was like, your career

31:33

is over.

31:34

And maybe almost like he wants to shout, I'm not

31:36

dead, right, yeah.

31:37

And also I thought this, maybe

31:39

I'm wrong. But they would also be like, I don't

31:41

want this. I don't show your pity

31:44

and love for him, don't don't put it

31:46

to me.

31:47

Meeter would go on to say that he seemed

31:49

to be a living reminder of a

31:51

tragedy. It's worth remembering

31:53

that in November of nineteen sixty three,

31:56

he was just twenty seven. I

31:58

mean, that's usually the start of a career. One

32:01

week after the assassination, comedian

32:03

Lenny Bruce was back on stage in New York.

32:06

Bob Booker saw him and says he remembers

32:08

a moment that has since become legendary.

32:11

And he grabbed that microphone and

32:13

he said, boyd did Vaughan

32:16

Meter get screwed? Not

32:19

exactly that word, Okay.

32:21

And you're free to say it if you want to say.

32:23

Oh, he said, boy did Vaughan Meter get

32:25

fucked now. The

32:28

critics took him apart for this. I

32:30

have never heard a laugh that

32:32

big in a house in my life, because

32:35

Lenny had the ability to

32:38

say your most inner thought

32:40

in public that you would never dare

32:43

say. Everybody in that theater

32:45

had thought that. I had gotten

32:47

calls from people saying,

32:49

poor Vaughn. I said,

32:52

poor Vaughn. How about poor jack

32:54

Kennedy? For Christ's sake, right, I

32:56

think about poor Vaughn. One

32:58

of the best presidents we ever had, in my opinion,

33:01

was dead, assassinated?

33:04

Is that a sort It's not about von Meeter

33:07

guy?

33:08

No, Von Meder hadn't died, but

33:10

he was collateral damage. Another

33:13

line attributed to Lenny Bruce was

33:15

that they should put two graves in Arlington,

33:18

one for Kennedy and one for Meter.

33:21

After the president's death, Meeter wrote

33:23

a condolence letter to Jackie Kennedy.

33:26

Although we never met, He wrote, I felt

33:28

as though I had known him all my life. I

33:31

was given by fate the ability to impersonate

33:33

his voice and to copy his gestures.

33:36

I sincerely hope that a part of what I

33:38

did found its way to him and gave

33:40

him and his family a few pleasant

33:42

moments.

33:44

Yes, beautiful letter, handwritten.

33:46

It's in two different books.

33:48

Actually did he get a response?

33:51

She hated it.

33:52

That's von Meeter's widow, Sheila. She

33:55

holds a copy of the letter. Missus

33:57

Kennedy did hate the album when

34:00

it first came out. She referred to meet her

34:02

as a rat in a memo.

34:04

And here's her conversation with Arthur Schlessinger

34:07

a few months after the assassination.

34:09

What did you think of all these skits about himself,

34:12

like the First Family and so on?

34:16

Do you ever listen to them?

34:19

I think he listened.

34:20

I'm not sure he listened to all of that record.

34:22

I listened to one side and then I threw it away

34:24

because I didn't want my children to see it.

34:27

And well he wasn't.

34:29

I guess he sort of took it.

34:33

You know.

34:33

I thought it was so unfair

34:35

of those things.

34:36

She went on to say, I mean, I thought

34:38

it was so mean.

34:39

I didn't care if they make fun of me or anything,

34:42

but when they make fun of little children.

34:45

In the year after the assassination, Meter

34:48

didn't disappear completely. He

34:50

popped up on television a few times in nineteen

34:52

sixty four, but never again as

34:54

JFK. That same

34:57

year, he put out his own album called

34:59

have Some Nut Unts later another

35:01

one called if the Shoe Fits

35:04

So pick up.

35:04

Your phone right now and contribute, contribute

35:06

the name of a Communist and put us over the top.

35:10

While they received some nice reviews, they

35:12

just didn't sell. He traveled

35:14

the country for the next decade, but,

35:17

as Sheila Meder recalls, the man

35:19

she called by his birth name, Abbot, never

35:22

found that second act.

35:23

He insisted on writing his own stuff,

35:25

and it didn't He needed

35:28

a writer, you know. That's he would

35:30

never have succeeded in

35:32

something like the First Family

35:35

if there hadn't been an

35:37

Earl Dowd and a Bob Booker to

35:39

write it. He was a delivery

35:41

man. Abbot delivered, Abbot

35:44

spoke. Abbot had a voice that

35:46

felt like warm oil was

35:49

being rubbed into your skin.

35:51

It was beautiful.

35:52

I mean, that sounds

35:55

great. I mean there's no shame in being,

35:57

as you say, well, put it a delivery man.

35:59

That's what he wants, right, that's what.

36:01

But so why wasn't he okay with that?

36:04

I don't know, I don't know.

36:06

He turned to a variety of substances.

36:09

Was the cocaine There was the

36:11

LSD, the was a psilocybin,

36:14

there was the

36:16

the rom and coke. That was

36:18

the marijuana. And they all

36:20

had their effects, every one of them.

36:23

You know, he was a different person with each one.

36:26

Why do you think he've used so many substances.

36:30

Escape, running away, getting getting

36:34

into, going toward

36:37

a new life, a new reality

36:40

for him.

36:41

I think.

36:44

One of the characters inspired by these substances

36:47

was a blue bunny. Yes,

36:50

that's correct, a blue bunny. Meeter

36:53

also had a messianic complex, which

36:55

led in nineteen seventy two to a production

36:58

of a Jesus comedy album called

37:00

Wait for It, the Second Coming.

37:03

I tell parables?

37:04

Would you care to hear something? What I you're on?

37:06

Make me laugh?

37:07

I'm afraid they are.

37:09

I'm very humorous.

37:10

I'll be to judge and I'd run it down.

37:13

So he's playing Jesus, Yeah,

37:16

is it funny? Kind of did

37:18

it so well?

37:19

No?

37:20

He pursued his passion for honky tonk

37:22

music and even appeared in a few movies

37:24

in the nineteen seventies, including the

37:26

commercial flop Linda Lovelace

37:29

for President. Eventually,

37:31

he moved back to his home state of Maine.

37:34

And you know, I should apologize. I'm on television.

37:36

I really should apologize to every woman that ever

37:38

knew me, because I really didn't know how to treat women.

37:44

Something we haven't talked much about is Meter's

37:47

personal life. As mentioned

37:49

earlier, he was married four times.

37:52

Sheila was number four. They

37:54

met in the early nineteen eighties in Maine.

37:57

Sheila was running away from her own addictions

38:00

when she came across a flyer advertising

38:02

Von Meeter playing piano at

38:04

a nearby inn. Did

38:07

you know who that was?

38:08

I did, but you know, it didn't really register.

38:11

He was only a voice, you

38:13

know, a voice, that's all.

38:14

He was from that comedy outbum.

38:16

Yeah, from the First Family, And I really

38:18

didn't register

38:21

him as a living, being, visible,

38:24

touchable person.

38:27

They would be together for twenty years. Sheila

38:30

describes a controlling relationship

38:32

with highs and lows, and a man

38:34

deeply conflicted by the thing that had

38:36

once made him so famous. Was

38:39

he haunted by the whole experience?

38:41

Awful awful, awful

38:44

awful, But he also

38:46

didn't let anybody know it. At

38:49

the same time he was letting everyone know it.

38:51

He was a dichotomy.

38:54

I've never known anyone who

38:57

could be so many things to say

39:00

time.

39:01

And as far as how he looked back on the

39:03

first family experience, was there a

39:05

dichotomy? There was he haunted by it,

39:07

but then also wanted people to know he was

39:09

vond Meter, or well he did that.

39:11

That's he wanted to be known

39:14

as von Meter. But on the other hand, he

39:16

didn't want anything to do with von Meter.

39:18

He was abbot and he wrote his

39:20

music, and he entertained people, and he

39:22

played the piano, and that's what he wanted.

39:26

They say every man must

39:28

face rejection, they

39:34

say.

39:34

Every man must

39:37

fall. But

39:42

I swear I've seen

39:44

my reflection.

39:49

Somewhere upon

39:52

the wall.

39:55

Coming up von Meter as

39:57

Kennedy one final time.

40:20

In February nineteen ninety eight, von Meter

40:22

was wintering with friends in Florida. He

40:25

seemed happy playing piano at a local

40:27

bar. He hadn't been a star for years,

40:30

and then out of the blue, he got a call

40:32

from CBS producers

40:35

wanted to profile Meter for a new

40:37

cable show hosted by Paula

40:39

Zah coming

40:42

up on PS. He

40:44

sounded like JFK, he

40:47

looked like JFK. It

40:49

made him world famous. Now, while you've

40:51

been listening to von Meter speak It's

40:53

important to note that back in ninety eight, there

40:56

was a producer sitting across from him asking

40:58

him the questions.

41:00

I was struck immediately by

41:02

his you know appearance. He you know, had

41:05

full head of gray hair and a big

41:07

beard.

41:08

This is Kevin Hoffman. He was a young

41:10

CBS producer at the time.

41:12

Wait, what do you think his self image was

41:14

when you were sitting there?

41:15

Oh, he was one of the least confident

41:18

people.

41:19

You know, it's all this bravado like, on

41:21

the one hand, he's aggressive, and if you look

41:23

at you know, the tape, sometimes he looks at

41:25

me. And I watched it just

41:27

now, and I could see the aggression

41:30

on his side, like, you know, what are

41:32

you going to ask me next? You

41:35

know, I've got my story to tell

41:37

and I'm not quite confident here. But I also

41:40

noticed that when he does go into bits,

41:42

his eyes darted around a little bit, like he's

41:44

looking for an audience, very

41:47

much like the camera crew

41:49

you know behind me were part

41:51

of the audience. You

41:53

know. When he finally kind of shed

41:56

the act, that's when I felt like I

41:58

was starting to get to the real guy.

42:00

Sheila revealed to me the reason for her husband's

42:02

weariness, his defensiveness.

42:05

What do you remember from nineteen ninety eight

42:07

when CBS came down to

42:09

do an interview of him in Florida

42:14

his disappointment. Meeter

42:16

had boasted to Sheila and his friends

42:18

that TV anchor Paula's On would

42:20

be coming down to do the interview. When

42:23

he opened the door to find Kevin.

42:25

I think that broke his heart. Broke

42:27

his heart, it did, It embarrassed

42:30

him, and he didn't tolerate embarrassment.

42:33

What happened at the end of the interview, this

42:36

was said, you

42:38

know we I think toward the end

42:40

of the interview is when I asked him to do the voice,

42:43

and which I felt was kind of a big

42:46

moment for him, Like him

42:48

doing the voice to me was

42:51

like a really cathartic and

42:54

possibly damaging thing. I don't

42:56

know, it messed him up.

42:59

I want to play this moment in its entirety

43:01

because more than anywhere else

43:04

you can hear what a struggle it was

43:07

just being von Meter.

43:09

I wouldn't be doing my job as I didn't ask

43:11

you if you would do the voice for us, you

43:13

wouldn't be doing your job. I'd

43:19

have to think of a clever line well, I do the

43:21

voice, you know, save

43:23

up that voice. All these years we

43:26

did not have a punchline, not

43:28

have the line to use the voice for no,

43:31

look at the brain. The brain doesn't react

43:33

to to It just shuts

43:37

off with the switch. My on and off switch

43:39

went on. I used to do the voice. My

43:41

switch went off. I can't.

43:44

I'm not kidding.

43:52

Two hundred years ago and conquered Massachusetts.

43:56

Hey, I shot was fired that was heard around

43:58

the world. Thirty

44:03

something years ago in Dallas, Texas, another

44:06

shot was fired that was heard around the world.

44:09

The first bullet fired from the conquer

44:12

bridge signaled the birth of

44:14

the American Spirit. The

44:16

second bullet fired from the Texas book

44:19

Depository attempted

44:21

to.

44:21

Win that spirit.

44:22

And we have seen in the last thirty something

44:25

years how nearly successful

44:28

that second bullet was. But

44:34

in the final analysis, there

44:36

is no bullet, there is no bomb.

44:39

There is no power on the face of

44:41

this earth that can destroy the

44:43

American Spirit. Maybe

44:48

he'd say something like that.

44:49

I don't know.

45:00

What he's saying here. It's a little bit

45:02

dark, but it's also thoughtful,

45:05

kind of deep, even I don't

45:07

know, optimistic, A totally

45:10

different JFK. Impersonation once

45:13

again, Anthony Tammanik.

45:16

It was interesting because in a weird way, I watched it

45:18

and aligned with it. I was like, oh,

45:20

it's you. You are

45:23

doing the same thing. You're using this

45:26

vessel to make

45:28

a greater point.

45:29

Right, So we

45:31

you know.

45:32

We wrapped up the interview and

45:34

he got up immediately and

45:37

I followed him. But he went right into the kitchen

45:40

and grabbed a cord of vodka,

45:43

cracked opened the lid and just

45:45

started chugging. He said,

45:48

look, I needed this. You know I couldn't.

45:52

I got through your whole interview. I

45:54

did everything, but this is

45:56

you know, I have to do this. I

45:59

wasn't judging him.

46:04

I can't help but wonder if Van Meter

46:06

would have been better off if he'd never discovered

46:08

he could imitate Kennedy. But

46:11

what do I know, maybe after a very

46:13

tough childhood he was

46:15

simply faded to have a rough go of it

46:17

in life. If

46:19

you could get into a time machine and you could

46:22

go back to the moment that

46:24

he's approached by Bob Booker and Earl

46:27

Dowd to do the first Family album, what would

46:29

you tell him as a time traveler from the future,

46:31

do.

46:32

It, dear, and I'll be right here. I'll

46:34

be in the background. No one will see

46:36

me, no one will hear me, But I'll be

46:38

here for you. I would say, do it

46:42

sure?

46:42

Why not? That

46:52

Vaughan Meter interview from nineteen ninety

46:54

eight was the last the public would hear

46:56

from him. He died six

46:58

years later on a twenty ninth,

47:01

two thousand and four, just

47:03

one day after my father died. Pop

47:06

always talked about the time before Kennedy

47:08

was shot as a more innocent time.

47:12

He heard the news on the car radio and

47:14

pulled the late blue VW Bug he was

47:16

driving, the first car my parents ever

47:18

owned, over to the side of the road

47:21

and wept. It was

47:23

a different time, one where

47:25

the presidency was held in such regard

47:28

that von Meter would end his routine with

47:30

the assurance that it was all in good fun.

47:33

We're never going back to that time, and

47:36

I'm not saying we should try, but

47:38

that doesn't mean we shouldn't pay our

47:40

respects, not just to

47:42

von Meter, but also

47:45

to that time before

47:47

that horrible day. So

47:49

I want to end this mobituary with

47:52

some sound from near the end of the first

47:54

Family album, Sweet

47:58

Disarmingly Innocent and

48:00

Yes Funny.

48:03

No Everybody taking it together with Viga

48:16

Shop.

48:36

Be sure to rate and review our podcast.

48:38

You can also follow Mobituaries on Facebook

48:41

and Instagram, and you can follow me on

48:43

Twitter at Morocca. For

48:45

more great content, including video of

48:47

the older vond meter, please visit

48:49

mobituaries dot com. You can

48:51

subscribe to Mobituaries wherever you

48:53

get your podcasts. This

48:59

episode Mobituaries was produced

49:01

by Megan Marcus. Our team

49:03

of producers also includes Gideon Evans,

49:06

Kate mccauliffe, Meghan Detree, and

49:08

me Moroka. It was edited

49:10

by Kate mccaulliffe and engineered by

49:13

David Herman. Indispensable

49:15

support from Genius Denesky, Kira

49:18

Wardlow, Zach Gilcrest, Richard

49:20

Warrer, the team at CBS News

49:22

Radio, the JFK Presidential

49:24

Library, and Joe Alessi

49:26

at the CBS News Archives. Our

49:29

theme music is written by Daniel

49:31

Hart and, as always,

49:33

undying thanks to Rand Morrison

49:35

and John carp without whom Obituaries

49:39

couldn't live