Dodging the Dragon's Tail: The Advance Man's Work

There is no such thing as a spontaneous campaign appearance. Every candidate has his advance men, the harried unsung experts who go from town to town to make as sure as humanly possible that the crowds will be out, the schedule smooth, the publicity favorable. Here is TIME Correspondent Ken Danforth's portrait of one of them:

Kingsley Hopkins Murphy climbed off a plane in Hartford and wearily wondered what perils awaited his boss, Hubert Humphrey, in Connecticut. Murphy had a week to "run the traps," as every advance man should, and his brain was abuzz with the axioms of his craft: "Make them come to you; get typists and a legman quick; be anonymous; don't spill news--dribble it out; stress unity; keep calm; avoid nonunion bands; don't make cameras shoot into the sun; be ready to pick up strays; beware of national committeewomen."

To the standard list Murphy added the Humphrey postulates--no feasts in his room, "just cheddar cheese, saltine crackers, diet root beer, Canadian Club and soda, 'wine of the country,' usually ten bottles of beer." Most of all, Murphy dreaded the "dragon's tail effect"--that frightening phenomenon in which a mere twitch at the tail's base can be come a paroxysm by the time it reaches the tip. By lingering an hour over schedule in one place, the Humphrey cavalcade can make a shambles of a whole day's tight schedule.

Too Good to Believe. Murphy, 38, smokes a pipe, has red hair and is nicknamed "the Crimson Fox." He has handled 40 advance assignments for Humphrey since 1964, eleven of them in this campaign. Last week he felt "like a man in the middle of the Atlantic in winter in a 3-ft. canoe." Experience warned him that the simple scheduled plans were too good to believe. Humphrey was to arrive in Hartford after midnight, catch some sleep, and next morning chat with suburban housewives in nearby Bloomfield. Then he was to fly in his Boeing 727 to Stratford for a speech at the Avco Lycoming plant, ride in an hour-long motorcade to Waterbury for a rally on the green, and finally return to Stratford for a flight to New York. Murphy had seven days to make that plan a reality.

So he walked into Hartford's Hotel America, ready to confirm reservations for up to 200 rooms that he would need by the end of the week, and found there were none. There had been a mixup, perhaps because of a rumored "collection problem." Keeping calm, he telephoned Humphrey's Washington headquarters. "Get John Bailey," he was told. The former Democratic National Committee chairman was out. Murphy and an aide solved the hotel dilemma with a $5,000 check. Bailey appeared and provided him with a secretary, typists and a driver. Murphy set up his headquarters in the hotel, where he could be, as he put it, "a spider in the center of my web." Only the strands seemed to be smothering the spider.

Don't Be Late. Stratford's airfield proved too small for the big jets. Murphy arranged to switch Humphrey and his entourage to smaller Electras. Word came that 150 New Left students at Trinity College planned to disrupt a noon appearance in Hartford's Constitution Plaza. Calls went out for 200 Yale and Mount Holyoke students to get between Humphrey and the hecklers. The Connecticut General Life Insurance Co., hosts for the housewives' chat, did not have enough mikes or telephones. Murphy arranged to have the equipment installed.

Worst of all, local politicians warned that the Waterbury speech would be a disaster. United Auto Workers local chief Frank Santiquido had promised a crowd of 10,000 and wanted Humphrey to speak from a U.A.W. balcony. But George Wallace's appeal among the auto workers clearly precluded any such turnout. Murphy, fearful that Humphrey would be shouting down from a balcony to a handful of people, drove to Waterbury and moved the speaker's platform down to the green.

Lashed to a Halt. Bunting was ordered, signs made, mikes arranged, reception committees organized. Then the dragon's tail effect lashed out. On the morning before Humphrey was to arrive, Murphy got a call from Detroit. Humphrey had helped the cause too long and well at a discotheque fund-raising fete the night before in Manhattan. His doctor-mentor, Edgar Berman, had prescribed a good night's sleep. Humphrey would spend the night in Detroit. There went the schedule: scores of hotel rooms, the airport greeting, even the suburban housewives waiting for their chat. What about all that equipment? What about Waterbury? For that matter, what about Connecticut's vote? Murphy got Bailey and Orville Freeman to call Humphrey.

They waited for a reply while all sorts of rumors rose in Hartford and Murphy's office staff drooped in depression. Phones jangled. Strangers asked questions. Murphy kept mum. At 2:28 p.m. the call came through: "Humphrey stays in Detroit overnight." Scrap the airport greeting. Organize a daytime rite. At 3 p.m. came another call: "Humphrey arrives in Hartford at 11 a.m." Scrap the housewives. Goodbye, Connecticut General. A fuming Bailey reached Humphrey again and growled: "You're going to stand up 300 women and 2,000 insurance people because you want to sleep one more hour?" Then came the final call. "Hold everything." Humphrey might make the housewives' chat after all.

And he did, zooming down through the fog to land a mere 40 minutes late. Though his talk ran longer than planned, Bailey, Murphy and Senator Abraham Ribicoff gradually pushed him back on schedule, and the Connecticut foray turned into a success. The Constitution Plaza hecklers were gentle, Waterbury's workers turned out in droves, and Humphrey finally flew to New York in high humor. Murphy, relieved but exhausted, boarded a plane for San Diego to handle this week's set of traps.

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