Out of the Archives 14: Footage of Vice President Richard Nixon, Martin Luther King Jr attending Ghana’s 1957 Independence ceremonies
The US Information Agency (USIA) was a Cold War propaganda and public diplomacy agency. The National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) contains a large collection of USIA’s film, photography, and textual records, with many of these holdings still to be explored. As I make research visits to NARA, I’ll be sharing occasional updates of my discoveries, especially those materials related to post-independence Africa, from the USIA archives.
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In March 1957, Vice President Richard Nixon and his wife, Pat, went to Ghana for five days to attend the country’s independence ceremonies that marked the handover from British colonial rule to self-governance under independence leader turned first prime minister Kwame Nkrumah. A 4 minute and 43 second, silent black-and-white clip titled Vice President Nixon in Ghana in NARA’s USIA holdings contains footage of the visit.
According to Richard Nixon Presidential Library and Museum records, “The Vice President’s 1957 trip to Africa began with a departure from Washington on February 28. Accompanied by Mrs. Nixon and a four member official delegation, the main stop was at the Gold Coast to attend March 6 ceremonies converting this British colony into the independent nation of Ghana. The Nixon party also attended Morocco’s and Tunisia’s first anniversary independence celebrations. Other countries visited were Liberia, Uganda, Ethiopia, Sudan, Libya, and Italy. The trip included an audience with Pope Pius XII, discussions with Ethiopian Emperor Haile Selassie and Liberian President Tubman, and an unexpected meeting with Martin Luther King in Ghana. The Nixons returned to Washington on March 21, 1957.”
The unexpected meeting of Richard and Pat Nixon and Martin Luther and Coretta Scott King happened at a reception on the evening of the 6th and was captured in a photograph by Black American photographer Griff Davis. Historians describe this encounter as having laid the groundwork for cordial relations between Nixon and King.
A recent article about Davis’ career noted that he “was assigned by U.S. Information Service headquarters in Washington, D.C., to be the official photographer for the U.S. delegation led by Vice President Richard Nixon to Ghana’s Independence Day celebrations on March 6, 1957. He was one of only 20 photographers in the world granted official credentials to cover this historic event.”
This particular film footage does not contain scenes of Nixon and King interacting. However, it seems to capture activities up until only the morning of the 6th.
The New York Times described the trip, the Nixons’ first to the continent, as a “three week goodwill mission through the awakening new nations of Africa. . . that constitutes a dramatic gesture of Washington’s realization of this new mood in Africa.” The article also noted that this assignment gave Nixon some domestic political credibility, and was a sign the vice president was tipped to be the Republican presidential candidate in 1960.
This footage is not particularly well shot — occasionally blurry and with uneven lighting and shot composition. The style and content of the visuals suggest the footage was intended for a newsreel-type production. The footage contains little contextual information of the included places (no real establishing shots), people, and events
Based on my research and comparison with the independence commemorative film Freedom for Ghana produced by the Ghana Film Unit in 1957 and Universal Newsreel 30–21 dated March 7, 1957, I surmise the footage includes shots of:
- A ceremony at the University College of the Gold Coast on March 5th (the day the Nixons arrived, though neither of them are shown at the event) attended by several Black Americans, including what appears (to be confirmed) to be Horace Mann Bond, the President of Lincoln University (Nkrumah was an alumnus); King on his first trip abroad; Democratic Representative from Michigan Charles Diggs who was part of Nixon’s delegation; and diplomat Ralph Bunche.
- Nixon and his wife arriving at a secondary school and Nixon delivering a speech to a full auditorium, presumably on the 5th.
- A motorcade bringing Nixon and his wife on the 5th to greet a traditional leader who research suggests is Nana Osae Djan II of Aburi and various local dignitaries and to be entertained by traditional dancing and drumming. A Time magazine article described the scene thusly: “That afternoon, to savor the exotic culture of the back-country people, the Nixons drove 20 miles from Accra to the hill town of Aburi. The colorfully dressed tribesmen assigned Nixon a mahogany throne. Pat, dandling a native infant on her knee, sat beside him on a smaller throne, watching as the tribal drums thrummed and the natives danced their age-old rituals.”
- The night-time speeches of what appears to be Nkrumah and the Duchess of Kent (representing Queen Elizabeth II) at the unveiling of the Black Star Gate monument (inscribed “FREEDOM AND JUSTICE”). Apparently, though not shown in the footage, the British flag was lowered and the Ghanaian flag raised as the clock ticked over midnight to the 6th, the official day of independence.
- The Ghanaian flag flying over the Parliament House on the morning of the 6th, with a military band and soldiers’ parade in the yard in front. Entering the building for the Parliamentary opening the following morning appear to be judges wearing white wigs, the Nixons, Nkrumah, and Duchess of Kent and the then Governor-General of the Gold Coast, Charles Noble Arden-Clarke.
- The Nixons greeting Nkrumah, and the Vice President in discussion with Nkrumah and Minster of Finance Komla Agbeli Gbedemah.
I am still in the process of identifying additional unedited footage in the USIA archives from the Nixons’ trip, not only in Ghana but other stops in Africa like Ethiopia, and any resulting finished film products.
