What It Takes

by Richard Ben Cramer

  The other thing was, the moms loved Joey: as long as young Biden was along, the thing was okay. ... Part of it had to be, he was so nice to them—he seemed to know how they would feel about things. They might have seen, too, how he was about his own mom—so sentimental. (The way to get a punch in the nose was to say anything about Joey’s mom. BANGO! Right in the face.) But what those ladies saw most clearly: here was a boy unswayed by peer pressure, who always seemed to have his own idea—such a sense of himself. ...

  Yes, and that’s why it mattered so much to Joey to get into Archmere—Wilmington’s smallest, most serious, preppiest Catholic high school. It was crucial to the picture he had of himself—in the future, which was so real, so present, in Joe.

  He was so happy when he got to go—so grateful. (He knew it was a strain. He’d heard his parents talk at night about the bills ... he knew.) But Archmere held its terrors, too. There was speech class—required for all ninth- and tenth-graders—and weekly Tuesday assemblies, where four underclassmen would each have to make a speech, in front of the whole student body, and all the teachers, and Father Diny, the head man.

  What could he do but scheme ahead, and dread the day, and practice? He went into training. If memorizing helped, then he would train to memorize: he used to time himself, committing to rote stock pieces, like the Declaration of Independence. He’d grab the text and peer at it, like he wanted to bore holes through the page, and then he’d put it down and try to say it, whole. ... How fast could he get the thing in his head?

  Someone said a stutter was caused by facial muscles seizing up in nervous convulsion. So Joey stood for hours in front of a mirror, reading aloud or simply talking to his own image, while he tried to relax the muscles in his face, to attain that droopy, logy, sloooow eeeease that he thought would solve his problem.

  And in class, he read about Demosthenes, who made himself the greatest orator of his day by putting pebbles in his mouth and declaiming to the sea, above the roar of the waves. So Joey Biden, of Wilson Road, would stand outside at the wall of his house, the blank wall that looked out toward the fence and Mom-Mom’s roses, and with stones in his mouth, he’d try to read aloud, until he could read that page without a miss, and then he’d go to the next page, and the next ... until it was the book in one hand and a flashlight in the other.

  And he got through: ninth grade, he had to stand up at assembly and give a talk, like the rest ... but the rest could not have known such triumph. His speech was not perfect, no ... but it was a great day. And like a kid who beats his big brother at a footrace, and devotes himself to running ever after, Joe Biden decided he would be a speaker. He would be the best goddam speaker at Archmere.

  So he trained. That summer, after his job on the school grounds crew, in the hours till dinner, after which his friends would show up, he’d practice. He’d read aloud. He’d speak aloud. ... And that was the same summer he grew so much, came of age and of size ... and still good-looking—a wonderful smile—and plenty smart, and less wary now when he came back to school, which wasn’t a new school anymore, but a small place, really, where everybody knew him ... or thought they did (He’s changed somehow, hasn’t he?) ... and that was the same time that girls got important, and Joey was always sweet and serious with girls—they loved him—and his sister knew plenty of them ... and that size made a difference on the football field, and Joey could run, and he could catch, and most important, he believed he could catch anything ... and that was the difference, really: he believed he could master ... anything. It seemed he could: he was in just the right circle, with the athletes, and the cool guys, and when the question came up—what’re we gonna do?—well, still, it was Joe who had an answer. He was a leader—that’s what his teachers said. And a player—that was from his coach. And the other guys, his classmates, they remember those things, too ... but what they all say about Biden at Archmere:

  Joey Biden, he could really talk.

  20

  1955

  HE CAME OUT AS a mother’s idea of a perfect kid: Dick was an Eagle Scout, obedient and helpful at home, respectful to his elders, a quiet and-steady success at school, confirmed in his belief at Third Baptist Church (he’d been dedicated in his cradle). The church financed his summers at Camp Minnewonka, a Christian leadership camp on the shore of Lake Michigan, where the four-square (physical, mental, social, and religious) life of Christian virtue was developed by dividing the camp into tribes, each identified by a different-colored headband, each competing in disciplines like swimming, archery, and Bible history. Dick was a Tribal Chief. (The head man, named Steiger, was a square-jawed, inspiring, evangelical type. He was the Big Chief. At the Great Council Fire, if you wanted to speak, you had to raise your hand and call out, “O Big Chief!”)

  Back in St. Louis, Dick evinced an interest in current events. Both of Loreen’s boys used to pop out of bed and run downstairs by 7:00 A.M., to get the paper. They’d have it read before school. Dick tried to talk to his friends about the wider world, but none of them knew what was going on ... so, in eighth grade, his last year at Mason School, Dick started his own paper, The Voice of Mason. Much of the mimeographed sheet was taken up with school events, PTA news, and honor rolls, but Dick wrote the world news column. For instance, he analyzed the Army-McCarthy hearings, and concluded with this declaration:

  “Throughout the history of the United States the greatest men we have known were those who were the most criticized and discussed. A good example is that of Abraham Lincoln, who during his time as President, was probably the most hated man in the United States. Now he is recognized as a great man, in fact, one of the greatest men the world has ever known.

  “Will this be McCarthy’s case? Only time will tell.”

  See, Dick was not going to offend anybody—that was not the system, at all. With Loreen a quiet Democrat and Lou a loud Republican (and his grandma, Stella Cassell, writing letters to the Globe-Democrat about the menace of Godless Communism at home and abroad), Dick could discuss almost any political question as an ally of the adult involved. In fact, there was no adult he knew who did not regard Dick as a boy with exceptional judgment, sound information, precocious understanding. ...

  In short, he was sort of a nerd—even by standards of the mid-fifties, when he entered Southwest High—or as they said in those days, in South St. Louis, kind of “fruit.” Actually, he wasn’t total fruit, because he was good in drama, and that counted for something—though being in a play didn’t automatically make you “neat,” like being on the football team. For example, the football guys always put up the student council president—and Dick never did get to run for council president, or any other office. He was a bit small (he’d skipped half a grade), and with kids his own age, he was shy. He didn’t have a girlfriend, though his neighbor, Carol Rauscher, was one of his oldest friends—the girl Dick would go to when the Scouts had an outing: “Hey, Carol, we gotta go on a hayride ...” She wasn’t a girlfriend, in the high school sense of the word.

  What made matters harder was, the Mason School kids were joined at Southwest High by kids from St. Louis Hills. And St. Louis Hills was money—mansions!—a different world. That’s where the cheerleaders lived, and the neatest guys, the social stars. They had cashmere sweaters, and Spalding saddle shoes, and the girls had dyed-to-match sweaters and skirts, and big bobby sox (that cost two dollars a pair). There was no way kids from Mason could keep up with that ... so, they were not neat.

  Anyway, Dick was too neat to be neat. He came out of the house on Reber Place, every day, looking like he’d been inspected, which he had. In school, Dick was mannerly, his locker was impeccable, with his books in order and his jacket hung up. He did not use bad words, never drank, never smoked. He had oversized hands, a nice, firm handshake, like a little man ... but his face looked so young—red hair, blond peach fuzz (he was still years from his first shave), no pimples, freckles in the summertime ... and always spanking clean, with his wash-pants and socks matched to his Oxford shirt, wh
ich showed the creases on the sleeves where Loreen had pressed them.

  He had none of the sloppy excess requisite to teenage elan. True boppers, in those days, were moving on to sideburns, skinny ties, and blue suede shoes, as affected by his brother, Don, the saxophone man, when he formed his combo, the Aristocats, which played for teen parties and talent shows. Dick’s talent entry had nothing to do with hep: he’d dress in a suit and hat, with spectacles, a white goatee and mustache, to perform Senator Claghorn, a drawling and bombastic character who strolled and preened before the crowd, making speeches and telling jokes about politics, school affairs, and the vagaries of life. Loreen helped him get the costume together. Helen Baldwin helped with the writing. But then it was up to Dick (or rather, Rich, as he’d started to call himself) to hold the stage in this seventy-year-old southern solon persona. The amazing thing was: he could do it. He seemed to have no teen self-consciousness about sticking out, looking weird, being seen. It was as if Uncle Bob had told him, one day, on the boat: Okay, now, act like you’re a self-important fifth-term Senator ... and Dick could just do it. No problem!

  Here’s the opener:

  “I was down to th’ fillin’ station, this mornin’ ... you know what th’ fillin’ station is, don’t you? ...

  “It’s where they fill up th’ car ... and drain the family!” (Ka-thump)

  And people loved it—thought it was great—especially his teachers. Miss Meenach, the drama teacher, thought that darling Rich Gephardt walked on water. ... That was the year, sophomore year, ’55, when he enrolled in drama class. And that’s where it happened, in Miss Meenach’s class, where Rich became such a star. ...

  Gould Meenach had her eye on everything happening in her field. Every year, ever since they were young, she and her sister traveled to New York, to see what was what on Broadway. That was something, in South St. Louis. She started the school’s radio workshop, with full sound effects, and scripts from the networks. Of course, she didn’t have the budget for video, so she made cardboard dummy cameras and started a television workshop. And, of course, every year, there were the junior and senior plays, and the drama workshops, and the sophomores in drama class—and Miss Meenach was not young: she must have seen a million kids perform. But seldom did she get one like Rich Gephardt. That boy was a natural! She’d tell the class: “All right, now, I want you to act like you’re in an elevator ...” And that Gephardt boy could just do it. Not a moment’s pause, no giggling, no unease ... he’d back right up against a wall, stick a hand in his pocket and gaze up toward the ceiling, like he was watching the lights of the floors flash by, then lower his eyes, just at the right time, just as the cab was slowing to a stop, and then he’d walk off ... and hold the door to let an imaginary lady by! ... He was impeccable! And the way he listened, she never had to tell him anything more than once.

  Of course, some things about Gould Meenach were very much of the old school—seating, for one. None of this open-classroom-sit-anywhere-you-please for Miss Meenach, no. Students sat in alphabetical rows, which was why Gephardt was next to Hahn. ... That made all the difference.

  Carol Hahn was a big girl, stylish, athletic. She was a cheerleader, pretty, with dark hair cut short in just the right style, and she hung out with football guys, the neatest guys. She came from St. Louis Hills, had the right clothes, the right friends. She belonged. But she did not belong in drama class. See, in sports, or even cheering, where Carol excelled, she was on a squad, part of the team ... but this, this acting, she was all alone, with everybody watching her. It was ... so awkward. She couldn’t figure out how anyone could do it ... until she looked to her left, and there was this red-haired kid, who could do ... everything. Miss Meenach adored him. He was a star!

  She’d met Rich Gephardt as a freshman, of course, but she never paid attention. He was fruit, wasn’t he? But now, in drama class, she decided he wasn’t fruit. He was neat. So, she started to talk to him. And pretty soon, he wasn’t so shy. And as social girls could do, she gave him to understand that if he asked, she would go out with him. So, one day, blushing to the roots of his strawberry hair, he asked ... and she said yes.

  They went to a play, which was kind of his turf, and it was fun ... so they went out again, and again. And all at once, that freckle-nosed Rich Gephardt had a girlfriend, who was a cheerleader ... who hung out with football guys. And who dressed right, and was rich, and popular ... it was so neat. Oh, it took some adjusting: he had to tell Loreen he needed new clothes—Spalding oxfords, different sweaters. ... But Loreen was working, and she made sure he got the clothes ... just as she made sure Lou took the trolley to work when Rich needed the family car for a date. And she’d have gas in the car, too, and she’d iron and lay out his new clothes, and leave money for him. And he was neat.

  Anyway, Carol always had a car. The Hahns’ house in St. Louis Hills had seven bathrooms. It was another world. And Rich loved it. Carol’s parents belonged to the country club, and they took Rich and Carol there for dinner. And Rich drank that in like a thirsty man. Carol couldn’t stand the people at the country club—they were drips. But Rich thought they were neat. And Carol’s father was a talker—talked forever, to hear Carol tell it—but Rich was great with her dad ... he’d just sit there and listen, for hours. Both the Hahns thought Rich was just the nicest boy. ...

  And he was—even as he grew into his neatness. Sometimes, Rich would take Carol along on his private errands to an old-age home, where he’d dress in his suit and hat, with the goatee and glasses—Senator Claghorn. Rich would tell his jokes for the old folks, and they loved it. Meanwhile, Loreen introduced Carol to a life of faith, the Christian life that centered around Third Baptist. One New Year’s Eve, Rich and Carol’s date was a service at church ... it was beautiful. But Carol would not tell their neat friends where they’d gone for New Year’s. People would think she’d changed ... maybe she had.

  So had Rich, in some ways. He was not so shy about himself. For the talent show on their last Hello Day (an annual program of welcome for new freshmen), Rich did not do another Senator Claghorn, but instead, in his own clothes, alone on the stage, he acted out a long verse about the creation of the world.

  And God stepped out on space.

  And He looked around, and said,

  I’m lonely ... I’ll make me a world ...

  And Rich stepped out on stage, and looked around, and said ... “I’m lonely ...” and then with a gesture, he rolled the light up one side of the stage, with the darkness still cloaking the other, and Rich said (as did God, in the poem), “That’s good!”

  ... this Great God,

  Like a mammy bending over her baby,

  Kneeled down in the dust,

  Toiling over a lump of clay,

  Till He shaped it in His Own Image.

  Then into it He blew the breath of life ...

  And there was Rich, on his knees, center stage, forming with his hands God’s own image in clay ...

  And the audience was silent, and Carol was in tears. And Loreen had come to school, too, and snuck into the back, and she was crying. (Helen Baldwin was backstage, doing the props and lights.) And the whole thing was a huge success.

  And in his last summer at Southwest, Rich did not go back to Camp Minnewonka; instead, Miss Meenach proposed him for a special drama workshop—just one Southwest student each year—at Northwestern University, in Evanston, north of Chicago.

  And there he got to measure himself against students from everywhere in the country—and it was fun! It was just like Uncle Bob’s boat, or Miss Meenach’s class. And when he came back, he’d found his college—and his course of study: drama at Northwestern. See, he’d been there, he knew he could succeed: there were not too many kids who could take a role, or an improv, and just do it ... who could be any way they told him to be. But Rich Gephardt could. And that could take him a long way.

  21

  Like They Always Did

  IT WAS SORT OF A good-news-bad-news thing. No one picked up on t
he Kennedy stuff in the California speech ... because no one was listening: Joe still couldn’t say if he was running. That’s all anyone would ask him, for months: Could he do it all—be a candidate and a chairman? He was already taking heat in the press about the Judiciary Committee: Why were they off to such a slow start? And any time he’d show his face, doing politics, some sonofabitch was sure to ask: Wasn’t that taking time from the Senate?

  How about candidate, chairman, and family man? Jill still regarded the campaign with dread. What about her life? What about their life together? What about Ashley? Ashley was only six ... didn’t know anything about Neilia. (In ’84, when Joe ran for reelection, his media gurus made a fine bio ad—cost a fortune—but Joe had to kill it, afraid that Ashley might see the part about Neilia.) And Hunter, Joe’s second son, was at that shy and tender teen age where he didn’t want everybody looking at him: didn’t want interviews, pictures of the family—didn’t want life turned inside out ... so, he talked to Jill.

  The gurus took Jill for a political infant, or a problem to be circumvented. But Jill Biden was a woman of realistic judgment: she’d been around politics for a decade now, and she had good eyes. She didn’t think about songs, sleeping generations, or movie titles. She thought about how it was going to be. What if Hart was too strong, and Joe couldn’t break out of the pack? What if Cuomo decided to run, and there were two brilliant speakers in the race? (Two Catholic brilliant speakers, one with New York money.) What if Joe did break out and made a run for the finish, and came in ... just short. Then they’d run again ... and again. That was her nightmare: that he’d run, come close, and then it would never stop. Why did it have to start now?

  That’s not how Joe talked about it. No, Joe mostly talked about time: like he knew he could do all those things—hell, he was doing all those things—if he could find the time. He talked about it that way for so long, so often, that the staff came up with the brilliant idea that Joe must want to see a schedule. They would put all the dates into the computer, see ... the days in Iowa, days in New Hampshire, and committee hearings, Senate sessions, fund-raisers, trips around the country ... and then the computer would print out a schedule. And then they’d know, right? The problem would be solved! ... Like McNamara’s computers were going to win the Vietnam War.