AGNES M. WALDRON FILES, 1976-77

The Waldron files cover her work form June 1976 to the end of the administration. The bulk of the collection documents the production of "News & Comment", the White House news summary, but some materials on her research work are also included. The news summary was a compilation and distillation of printed and electronic media news articles, distributed daily to ca. 150 White House staff.

The first three series consist of news summaries, draft news summaries and clippings. The news summaries, which appear to be complete, allow researchers to study editorial opinion on the Ford administration from a variety of sources, and to ascertain how the media covered various issues and activities of the President and administration officials. The drafts and clippings are useful for studying the editorial process involved for only part of the period in which Waldron served as editor.

Although some of the material in the subject file relates to the operation and administration of the news summary, the bulk of that file concerns Waldron's research projects on the 1976 campaign. Many folders contain nothing but printed materials, especially political newsletters, or such routing materials as summaries of previous party platforms and state of the union addresses. Some folders, however, contain memoranda and briefing materials for the President, David Gergen or Michael Raoul‑Duval (who coordinated preparations for the debates) that she wrote after completing her research. These materials will allow researchers to study this one aspect of the White House effort to win the 1976 campaign.

Waldron held several positions with research institutions and the government doing research and editorial work before joining the White House staff in June 1970 as an assistant to press secretary Ronald Ziegler. She spent four years with the White House press office doing research on such topics as congressional activities and legislation and then became director of research for the White House Editorial Staff in July 1974. In this position she directed and conducted research for presidential speeches, public statements and veto messages.

In June 1976, Waldron returned to the press office as director of research for the Office of communications. She continued to direct and conduct research used in the preparation of some Presidential speeches and public statements and provided a factual basis for the President's question and answer briefing books. Around August 1, 1976, she also assumed the position of editor of the President's daily news summary. Waldron inherited editorial duties for the news summary from James B. Shuman, who shifted to other responsibilities within the office. In her work Waldron was responsible to David Gergen, who headed the Office of Communications, although she was not directly supervised by him in her day‑to‑day duties.

Since Waldron re‑joined the press office in the midst of the 1976 election campaign, much of her research work involved proving the accuracy of statements by President Ford and the inaccuracy of some statements by his rivals, Ronald Reagan and Jimmy Carter. She also researched the records of these two men and supplied background material on issues and on members of the media who served as panelists for the campaign debates.

In her role as news summary editor Waldron was aided by a staff of from three to five assistants and a typist. The staff edited news wire stories, wrote summaries of television news stories, and excerpted newspaper and magazine articles to compile the news summary. Each staff function, including editing, was rotated among the staff. The editor of each edition reviewed excerpted articles, corrected errors, rewrote stories if necessary, and assembled the edited articles and cartoons into the news summary. During the fall campaign they produced two editions a day on weekdays and one on saturday.

Related Materials (January 1982)
Related materials from the press office include the files of David Gergen (director of the Office of Communications), James B. Shuman (former editor of the news summary), and Wanda Phelan (who maintained clippings and research files for the press office). Other related materials include: the files of Charles H. McCall, who succeeded Waldron as director of research for the Editorial Staff and inherited her files from that office; over a foot of material in the Barry Roth Collection relating to a lawsuit against the Ford administration by a former member of the news summary staff; and White House Central Files subject file category PR 16-3 (Presidential News Analysis).