Visitors to Nixon Library to Meet President Electronically

Designers of Richard M. Nixon’s presidential library in Yorba Linda say that visitors will be able to question the former President and get an answer from his own lips--through the miracle of video.

With the latest in computer wizardry and more than 400 video clips, the questioner will touch a screen and trigger an answer from Nixon’s video image.

“It’s as if by some form of fortune, you actually met the President,” said designer Alex Cranstoun.

On Tuesday--Nixon’s birthday and the first time it has been celebrated as a city holiday in the Orange County town where he was born 77 years ago--officials at the Nixon library unveiled new architectural drawings and described plans to develop Disneyland-style exhibits with the latest in so-called “interactive multimedia.”

Cranstoun said “The Room of World Leaders” should appear as a “cocktail party after a major summit meeting” in which visitors can touch a video screen and hear comments about Nixon from the participants.

The Vietnam War is displayed in an exhibit that duplicates the living room of a 1960s “middle-American home,” where for the first time a war unfolded on television.

The museum also has a room dedicated to the Watergate scandal that drove Nixon from the White House. The room will include elements from all sides of the issue including a machine that will play excerpts from the famous tapes, said Hugh Hewitt, director of the library foundation.

The events of the scandal that brought down Nixon’s presidency will be displayed in chronological order starting with the break-in of the Democratic headquarters at the Watergate Hotel and ending with a large photograph of Nixon waving from the steps of a helicopter as he left the White House after his resignation.

“We understand the greatest court of public opinion will focus on this room and, therefore, there is the need for full and fair treatment,” said Hewitt.

Cranstoun, who has worked on both the Lyndon Johnson and Jimmy Carter presidential libraries as well as the 1992 World’s Fair planned in Spain, added that Nixon wanted the library to include a section on Watergate and that he has not put any restrictions on what it should contain.

The library will also include a research area that will maintain original documents from before and after Nixon’s presidency. Unlike other presidential libraries that maintain records from the White House, however, the documents from Nixon’s presidency were turned over to the National Archives and Records Administration by an act of Congress.

Nixon’s $20-million library is also unique in that it is being completely funded by private contributors more than 15 years after his resignation. It is scheduled to open July 20 at a ceremony that the former President, who now lives in New Jersey, is expected to attend.

In addition to the construction of the library, the project also is renovating, at a cost of $400,000, the Yorba Linda home in which Nixon was born.