Alexander Haig, Jr., dies on February 20. Haig, Jr., served in several capacities in the Nixon administration, including as Deputy National Security Adviser (1970-73), Vice Chief of Staff of the Army (1973), and White House Chief of Staff (1973-74). He later became Secretary of State in the Reagan^∇ administration (1981-82).

Haig appears frequently on the Nixon tapes, and we've put together a selection of notable instances. 

Through their interactions with the White House while Congressmen, Senators, or Governors, several future presidents have been captured on the White House tapes. For Presidents Day, we have pulled together some of the recorded conversations with Gerald Ford^∇, Ronald Reagan^∇, and Richard Nixon^∇ before they moved into the Oval Office.

Former Senator Charles "Mac" Mathias, Republican of Maryland, has passed away. Mathias was frequently at odds with his fellow Republicans--not the least, President Richard Nixon^∇--something reflected in the conversations in the Nixon tapes in which he is mentioned. Below are some Nixon tapes conversations in which he is mentioned.

To coincide with Australia Day (26 January), we have released some new transcripts related to Australia.

This collection includes a rare recording of a private long-distance between world leaders. Australian Prime Minister Harold Holt called President Johnson shortly after LBJ's visit to the region and just over a year before Holt himself mysteriously disappeared while swimming off a beach in southern Australia.

Other recordings include President Nixon reflecting on gender and foreign relations and LBJ's conversations touching on topics such as Australian elections, the Vietnam War, and trade.

For Black History Month we have released some new transcripts of conversations between Dr. Martin Luther King and President Johnson from 1965.

We have collected transcripts and summaries of conversations recorded on the Nixon tapes involving or mentioning former Virginia governor Linwood Holton. When he assumed office in 1970, Holton became the first Republican governor of the state since 1874.

On December 1, 2009, President Obama addressed the nation on the issue of troop levels for the war in Afghanistan, announcing that he was sending around 30,000 more troops Afghanistan, a move that amounts to a significant escalation of the U.S. military presence in the region.

Sending troops into harm's way is arguably the most difficult decision a president confronts. The White House tapes of presidents Kennedy, Johnson, and Nixon capture remarkably intimate and candid behind-the-scenes views of presidents agonizing over this decision in another war fought in distant lands for complex geo-political reasons.

47 years ago today, President John F. Kennedy was assassinated in Dallas, Texas. During the course of our work we have accumulated a wealth of material related to the aftermath of JFK's assassination. Below are some highlights, including a selection of calls from Air Force One enroute from Dallas to Washington. The plane was carrying a newly sworn-in President Lyndon B. Johnson along with the slain former president's body. 

The National Archives has announced that it is convening a group of forensic experts to examine the paper trail of the Watergate-related meeting between President Nixon and his chief of staff Bob Haldeman^∇ on June 20, 1972, the recording of which famously includes an 18 1/2 minute gap.

We have posted two newly declassified documents created by the Secret Service in late 1973 providing detailed and new information on the installation, operation, and logistics of the Nixon White House Taping system.

The JFK Library has released new White House tapes from August 1963. The JFK Library's press release is below.

Drawing on Nixon tapes, Professor KC Johnson of Brooklyn College has a new posting on Edward Korry, former ambassador to Chile, and his ties to the Allende coup. Read the post here: http://hnn.us/blogs/entries/119111.html

We have posted new Nixon tapes transcripts from January and February 1973 dealing with topics such as the Vietnam peace agreement, former President Lyndon B. Johnson's death, CIA^∇ Director Richard Helms's reassignment to Iran, antisemitism in the United States, the visit to Washington of Israeli Prime Minister Golda Meir, preparation for Nixon's second inauguration, and a presidential ban on access by Time magazine reporters to the White House.

William Safire, former speechwriter for President Richard Nixon^∇ and New York Times columnist, passed away on September 27, 2009. We have a selection of conversations from the Nixon tapes involving and about Safire available here and here. 

Former Secretary of Defense Robert Strange McNamara passed away on July 6, 2009. He was one of the most frequently recorded participants in the Kennedy and Johnson tapes. Of particular note are discussions recorded during the Cuban Missile Crisis and Vietnam War. Below is a small sampling of the hundreds of recorded conversations that involved or discussed McNamara.

The Nixon Library has this morning released 154 hours of recordings from January and February 1973 along with about 30,000 of pages of documents.

SOUND FILES: The sound files in MP3 format can be downloaded from the Nixon Library site. Broadcast quality sound files are available here (under "Chron5").

TRANSCRIPTS: 036-053 | 036-091 | 036-018 | 043-191 | More coming soon.

PRESS COVERAGE: New York Times | LA Times | Politico | USA Today | Agence France-Presse.

PRP Research Fellow Ken Hughes will be covering the release and blogging about the new material.

PRP's other Nixon tapes transcripts and sound files are available here and here.

On June 23, the Nixon Library will be releasing 154 hours of recordings from January and February 1972 along with thousands of pages of documents. PRP Research Fellow Ken Hughes will be covering the release and blogging about the new material.

These tapes were secretly recorded by John D. Ehrlichman, President Nixon's chief domestic policy adviser, in his office on the fourth floor of the White House. The collection consists of 88 Dictabelt recordings and one double-sided audio cassette recording. So far, the Nixon Library has processed and released only the two conversations recorded on the audio cassette; we have now made these files available for download.

We have posted a collection of transcripts of conversations involving and directly related to the long Senate career of Senator Edward "Ted" Kennedy. Drawing from the JFK, LBJ, and Nixon tapes, it includes calls between the newly elected Senator and his older brother, President John F. Kennedy; calls with President Johnson during the 1964 election campaign while bedridden recovering from a broken back suffered during a plane crash; and President Nixon's efforts to spy on Kennedy in the leadup to the 1972 election.