Theodore M.
controversial subject. I guess I realized that I was the only one could have done
that, and so I did it, but I ended up working
hours a week or more. I was
working all day Saturday and all day Sunday that whole spring to get that
report done. With everybody's cooperation we finally got agreement on
everything. Then I had the commercial service cut up the galleys and put the
report into page proofs mounted onboards, mostly double pages, with spaces
for pictures.
I had asked members of the staff to find pictures as we went along, so I had a
whole raft of pictures from which to choose. We had pictures from many
sources including the Corps of Engineers and the Soil Conservation Service and
the Bureau of Reclamation. Every agency was eager to give me pictures
because they knew they would get credit. We had been collecting pictures as
we went along, but finally, in the end, I had to pick out the pictures and write
Flo stayed with me until the end and I would have never been able to do so
much without her. She was much more efficient than I. My other secretary had
already left, and we had a very small staff at the end. I finally got the
approvals of all the commissioners and got them to sign the front letter to the
President and the Congress and had it set up for publication in the front of the
report.
When I took the page proofs to the Government Printing Office all mounted on
boards, they were somewhat upset, but I told them that because our computer
was all set up to move right into typeface, we had done it that way to save
money and time because it was the only way we could have it ready for a
meeting with the President.
In the meantime, we had set the date for presenting the report to the President.
It was to be June 14, 1973. I took the boards over to the Government Printing
Office about May 25 and told them that we had a meeting set with the
President for June 14 and that we had to have copies by then. It was the day
before the three-day holiday weekend. I thought sure that they would start to
work on it on Saturday, but apparently didn't even look at it until Tuesday.
They put it out for bids on Wednesday. They had several bids and got a
company out on New York Avenue to print it. Nobody would ever believe that
the Government Printing Office could work that fast, but they did. I can't
remember the name of the
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