Big Viva?

The prospect was unnerving, even for a seasoned cultivator of U.S. tribal manners like the State Department's Protocol Division. In March, Mexico had nearly blown Harry Truman's hat off with a welcome heard round the hemisphere. This week, Mexican President Miguel Aleman was due north on a return call. To keep U.S. face, Washington's plain citizens would have to step out of character and match, or better, the Mexican enthusiasm. The Protocol Division's patient, able Stanley Woodward was worried. He called on the Army, Navy, Marines, school officials, the Washington Board of Trade and even New York's master greeter, Grover Whalen, to plan a spectacle that Latin American and even Hollywood itself might whistle at.

The Capital Transit Company agreed to fly small U.S. and Mexican flags from its streetcars and buses; the Pan-American Union donated 250 blow-ups of Mexican scenes for store windows; and signs shouting "Viva Mexico," "Welcome President Aleman," and "Bienvenido Don Miguel" were readied for hanging on lampposts. The Fire Department planned to arch two 100-ft. ladders in an inverted V over the Memorial Bridge, deck them in the red, white and green of Mexico, tack on huge pictures of President Aleman, and hang a giant Mexican flag from the point of the V. Some 18 bands were assigned stations at Washington's National Airport and along Constitution and Pennsylvania Avenues.

President Truman had already sent his personal plane, the Sacred Cow, to Mexico City for President Aleman, and arranged to have an escort of twelve 6-293 pick it up at New Orleans. He would greet the Mexican party at the airport with most of his Cabinet, an honor guard from the 82nd Airborne Division and a 21-gun salute. President Aleman would address a joint session of the Congress, stay at least one night at the White House, travel to Mount Vernon on the presidential yacht Williams burg, and use the presidential Pullman for a trip to New York (which also planned an oldtime, ticker-tape reception).

Army troops at parade rest, Scouts (boy & girl), and high-school cadets were to line the route of march from the airport to the White House, and Government workers were to be dismissed at 4 p.m. on arrival day--to beef up the sidewalk crowds. All in all, on paper at least, the party would be as hearty a greeting as Washington had ever given anybody--if the citizens would only show up and yell.

But indications of the old, District-wide apathy toward visiting dignitaries had the planners resorting to psychological stratagems. Schoolchildren were told that if they got a note from home okaying their attendance at the reception, they would get a small Mexican flag. The reasoning was that, since no parent would let his child venture into the welcoming crowd alone, and no child would give up the flag without a prolonged and deafening squawk, the whole family would have to turn out.

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