Citizen Hughes - Michael Drosnin [81]
Now, after nine months of toying with alternatives, Hughes was ready to return to his first love.
“I have finally decided to go on ABC,” Hughes exulted in late March of 1969. It was, of course, a secret enthusiasm. “Now, if this is permitted to leak out, even a tiny bit, it will bounce the market up and I will have to cancel out. So I beg you to be careful whom we trust.”
Secret or not, Hughes could hardly contain himself. It was technological ecstasy. With a passion he could feel for nothing human, Hughes now coveted the network he had so recently rejected.
“Bob,” he wrote, “what appeals to me about ABC is its tremendous mechanical machine. There is an ABC outlet in almost every city in the US that has a CBS or NBC station.
“This tremendous giant of mechanical and technical perfection is just lying there going to waste. Being used daily for the transmission of the biggest pile of pure undiluted horse-shit that was ever assembled on one role of tape.
“Bob, ABC can only go one way, and that is up.
“I promise you that a 7 year old child could do a better job of running it than is being done today. That is what intrigues me—this huge slumbering giant of technical perfection that needs only to be waked up to come to life.”
Lost for a moment in his dreams of arousing this genie, Hughes did not lose sight of the mission he had in mind for the “slumbering giant.”
“Dont forget that every Whitehouse or congressional press conference will, by custom, require the issuance of an invitation to the ABC News correspondent in co-equal position,” he concluded. “And also a co-equal position in reporting every election from now on—not after you build a network up, but right now.”
The White House. Congress. Every election. A network of his own. Right now. With renewed and growing excitement, Hughes again began to plot his takeover of ABC.
This time, he would not try to seize control. That would only mean another round of trouble, new court fights, further demands for his appearance before the FCC. All of it unnecessary. With the right approach, Hughes was certain he could arrange a friendly business deal—“a completely non-hostile take-over with Goldenson’s complete consent.”
And if ABC, still in dire financial straits, would go along quietly, so might the FCC. There was a new administration. Nixon wanted an “elevating” Hughes network, and now he could have one. Besides, some of the commissioners were afraid that without an immediate infusion of capital, ABC, which had already been forced to cut back its programming, might actually go under.
Unfortunately, Hughes too was in something of a bind. With his Nevada business turning sour, the helicopter losses mounting, and a new TWA judgment for $137 million hanging over him, the besieged billionaire was no longer able to blithely consider a cash investment of $200 million.
But he wanted ABC, and he wanted it badly.
“We have got to dig up some money from somewhere,” he wrote Maheu. Perhaps the TWA case could yet be salvaged. Perhaps the disastrous helicopter enterprise could be unloaded. But, if not, Hughes was still determined to get his television network.
Indeed, he wanted ABC so much he was willing to surrender his birthright. He would sell the Hughes Tool Company—the golden goose he had inherited, the foundation of his entire fortune—in order to control television once and for all.
Then, just a week after announcing his final decision to “go on ABC,” Hughes suddenly changed his mind.
It was Saturday night. His penthouse retreat was filled with the sound of raucous laughter. Not that Hughes was happy. The laughter was booming from his TV set, tuned to the network he had decided to buy.
“Welcome back to The Dating Game’!” said the grinning host, his arm around the small black child standing beside him. “It’s time for Marc to choose a delightful gal to share a ‘dream date’ with his dad! All right, Marc. Who will it be? Bachelorette number one? Bachelorette number two? Or bachelorette number three?”
The camera cut to the three