Nixon Presidential Library & Museum

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June 23, 2009 Materials Opening

The Nixon Presidential Library has opened approximately 154 hours of tape recordings from the Nixon White House recorded in January and February 1973 and consisting of approximately 994 conversations. The conversations cover topics such as the conclusion of a peace settlement between the United States and the Democratic Republic of Vietnam and the return of American POWs, President Nixon’s second inauguration, the U.S. and Europe, the Supreme Court’s Roe v. Wade decision, energy policy, the reorganization of the executive branch, the creation of a “New Majority” for a reinvigorated Republican Party, and the first Watergate trial. Listen to the new tapes. (See below for a chronology of events addressed in the new tapes release.)

The opening also consists of approximately 10.5 cubic feet of previously restricted materials from the White House Special Files, Staff Member and Office Files; the National Security Files; and the Henry A. Kissinger Files, and 12,000 newly released pages from the White House Central Files, Staff Member and Office Files of Kenneth Cole. The Nixon Library has scanned and posted 41 documents that represent the variety of subjects and wealth of historical information included in the new textual release.The release includes significant material on the formulation of the Nixon administration’s foreign and domestic policy, covering subjects such as the environment, Title IX, Detente, US-Israeli relations, the standoff at Wounded Knee, the invasion of Cambodia, the so-called Plumbers unit, the Saturday Night Massacre, the geo-political consequences of the opening to China, and the investigation of the Bureau of Labor Statistics. View representative documents from the textual collections.

You may also read the Press Release or examine a fuller listing of newly released materials.

Chronology of Events Addressed in the New Tapes Release

January 5, 1973

President Nixon met with Israeli President S. Zalman Shazar, South Korean Prime Minister Kim Chong-pil, Prime Minister of Ireland John Lynch, Philippine Foreign Affairs Secretary Carlos P. Romulo, and the Taiwanese Vice President Yen Chia-Kan during their visits for former President Harry S. Truman’s memorial service

January 8, 1973

US-North Vietnamese negotiations to end the Vietnam War resumed in Paris

January 10, 1973

Watergate break-in trial began

January 20, 1973

Presidential inauguration

January 22, 1973

Supreme Court decision in the Roe v. Wade abortion rights case

January 22, 1973

Former President Lyndon B. Johnson died

January 23, 1973

Announcement of Vietnam War settlement agreement

January 23, 1973

Announcement of new Iranian policy on the nationalization of its oil fields

January 27, 1973

Peace treaty ending the Vietnam War signed in Paris

January 30, 1973

James McCord and G. Gordon Liddy convicted of conspiracy, burglary, and wiretapping in connection with the Watergate break-in

January 30, 1973

Senator John C. Stennis was shot during a robbery outside his Washington, DC home

February 7, 1973

US Senate created the Senate Select Committee on Presidential Campaign Activities

February 12, 1973

First group of US prisoners of war (POWs) return

February 21, 1973

Israeli Air Force shot down a Libyan Arab Airways Boeing 727 passenger jet

Exhibit Title: Man on the Moon: The Fortieth Anniversary
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The Move!

Information about Moving the Presidential Records to California and Reference Closures at College Park

In 2010 the Nixon Library will move presidential documents and audio-visual materials from its stack areas in the National Archives facility in College Park, Maryland to the Library campus in Yorba Linda, California.

On-site reference services on the Nixon Presidential textual collection in College Park, Maryland, will be suspended on February 19, 2010 to prepare the boxes for delivery to California. Email, telephone and mail assistance for researchers interested in these records will continue on a limited basis during the transition of the materials.

On-site reference on Nixon presidential documents will begin in Yorba Linda, California, in late May or early June 2010. The precise date of opening, which will depend on the arrival dates of the textual shipments, will be publicized as soon as possible in early 2010.

On-site reference services on the Nixon presidential audio-visual collection in College Park will be suspended in August 2010 to prepare the materials for shipment later in the year. The precise date of reopening in Yorba Linda will be publicized as soon as possible in 2010.

All reference services on the textual and audio-visual collections currently in Yorba Linda will be unaffected by the move and will continue throughout this period.

Until the completion of the tape review program, which encompasses review of the tapes from January-July 1973 and additional releases from the first four chronological segments, primary reference service on the White House tapes will remain with the Nixon Library unit in College Park. As of May 2010, the Library campus in Yorba Linda will have copies of all publicly-released tapes. Eventually all opened tapes will be available online at www.nixonlibrary.gov. Digital copies will always be available for research in College Park.

This timetable assumes completion of the archival addition on the Library's campus in Yorba Linda in late 2009. Construction and move timetable updates will be available at www.nixonlibrary.gov. Please send any questions about the move or reference closures to nixon@nara.gov.

	The Nixon Library and Museum is part of the presidential libraries system administered by the National Archives and Records Administration, a federal agency. View our Privacy Statement. View our Accessibility Statement.
18001 Yorba Linda Blvd., Yorba Linda, CA \| 8601 Adelphi Rd., College Park, MD