This week in 1970: Nixon stumps in St. Pete

Fifty years ago Wednesday, St. Petersburg was visited, for the first time, by an incumbent American president.

Richard Milhous Nixon gave a speech to a capacity crowd of 7,000 in the Bayfront Center Arena.

Both Nixon and the Bayfront are gone now, consigned to memory and the history books, but on Oct. 28, 1970, they were the talk of the town. Public schoolchildren were issued free tickets and given the day off.

This was part of a Republican campaigning swing through Florida, as Nixon stumped on behalf of Governor Claude Kirk, angling for a second term, and U.S. Rep William C. Cramer of St. Petersburg, who hoped to land a Senate seat.

The election was to take place on Nov. 3 (both Kirk and Cramer would lose).

The “biggest, loudest and most colorful political rally” in city history, as the St. Petersburg Times called it, began at 1 p.m. Another 5,000 people, denied entry, listened to the president’s 27-minute speech via loudspeakers in the parking lot.

“Most of the youngsters packed into (the) Bayfront Center wore their hair short and waved American flags to cheer on the chief executive,” the Times reported.

Following the speech – reports said it was virtually the same one he’d given the night before – Nixon waded into the crowd outside the arena, shaking hands and answering questions.

The presidential motorcade was besieged by supporters as it drove up State Road 688 (Ulmerton Road) back to the St. Pete-Clearwater Airport. The presidential helicopter departed at 2 p.m.

Nixon had been in Pinellas County for just over two hours.