Friends, Patriots, and Scoundrels

Senator Robert F. “Bobby” Kennedy had just lost the 1968 presidential primary election in Oregon to Senator Eugene McCarthy when Elvin Bell, Fresno, California’s Mayor Pro Tem, hosted him for a breakfast meeting. As an exhausted Kennedy approached the podium to speak, Bell watched in amazement as Kennedy transformed from a frail man into a powerful speaker. Moments later as Bell rose to his feet with other audience members in a rousing standing ovation, he had no idea that he would never see his friend Bobby again. Bobby was shot the next day in Los Angeles and died within hours. Bell, a retired public official and USAF colonel, shares a compelling compilation of anecdotes that highlight the iconic personalities he has known and worked with during his assignments in the White House and the Pentagon, as well as during official foreign travels and various activities throughout America. In addition to the everyday characters and scoundrels he has encountered in his lifetime, he features nearly eighty personalities that include Gregory Peck, John Wayne, John Lennon, Eleanor Roosevelt, General Alexander Haig, Frank Sinatra, and Presidents John F. Kennedy, Lyndon B. Johnson, Richard Nixon, and Ronald Reagan. In this fascinating memoir, a former political figure takes a look back at the true-life characters he has encountered and how they made a difference in his life and the world.