To have to wait on them to call you and while youre waiting youre going to have to find a job. Ave to f you are saving a lot of money in you picked up a few bad habits so youre going to have to get yourself together. So i said yes, sir. So i went to work at a restaurant in the northwest. They wanted me to be the busboy which i have never known a thing about being a busboy other than wash and desist home. So i started washing the pots in the pants and when people finished eating i would go outsh and pick at the dishes with my train bring them back to the kitchen where i can wash him. So i didnt really know that ive seen all of this money land on the table by the plates and things and i thought it was for me. So i started started picking up some of it putting it in a tray and taking it back. So the girls got the hollering about their not get tips. So one of the girl said, i just seen the busboy pick up some tips. Ai so they called me and told me and said youre not supposed to pick up the tips, you just pick up the dishes and wipe off the table. But you dont pick up the tips. I said oh okay. So i stop picking up the tips. But i think it along to good there. So i left and i told dad and i said im not making it at this restaurant because on picking up peoples tips not known and theyre getting excited. So this is not great to work. So so my two brothers came by and my dad was telling to them and said your brother tried to get a job but hes not been able to get a job can you help him get a so m job . So my two brothers didnt have anything like a business but they were trying to do some work for themselves like going to peoples houses or washing windows are going to a store washing storefronts. Finally they said well will take them with us and show them how to wash windows. So they did. They taught me how to wash windows. So not too long after that i was down at the executive Office Building and i was cleaning the front of the building which was 30 feet high. I had six pieces of ladder and each piece was 6 feet. So they were sectioned where you could put them together. So i got up there and started cleaning the glass and i was doing good because i like the job pretty good. And the mr. Rogers came out of the building i did note the time. Time. And he stood back and watch me when i got done he said young man, i see youre doing a a good job washing the windows. And i said yes, sir. Ive been doing it a long time. And he said have you been in the military . I said yes, sir. Have you ever been in trouble . And i said no, sir. He said well, we have a gentleman over at the white house that will be washing the windows but we need somebody to wash windows that note theyre doing. He said what im going to do, going to give you a pass and im going to give you a stack of paper for you to take home and fill them out, every line, you fill them out. Ill chec because the secret service is going to check everything and if we find everything wrong then you cant work at the white house. I wasnt worried about that because i know i had it when i was coming up i mightve did a few crooked things but nobody did know nothing about it. I didnt have to go to court. It did mess up my record. R so i took my paper so mom and dad looked over the papers and t went back at the old elb and i asked the secret service they came to me and gave me a position and permission to see mr. Rogers. I talked to him and he said okay what im going to do, going going to take her to the whitent house and let you meet mr. Wilson, the fellow that is washing the windows. And i said yes or. So i get over to the white house and i was nervous. When i see mr. Wilson. He was actually cutting the putty out of the windows to hold the glass into the fray. E and he didnt know, he had a razor blade was cutting the putty out. So i told them i said mr. Stevens, mr. Roger sent me over to help you. Because im a window washer. And he said well im glad to sez you because theyre trying to make a window washer out of me and im not a window washer. And he said said im glad to see you. Ad and i said well one thing whene you clean and a window you cant cut that putty out of the because thats whats holding the class in the window. I started working the new Press Building and so my job was to wash all of the windows. So after a got there had been there for a while started washing the window but i was working for contractors i was real fast because when you work for contractors they get paid by the work you do. That is how you get paid, by the work that you do. So i was real fast. So i started cleaning all of the windows and cleaning them fast and i seen a lot of the guys that work there, some of them are goofing off somewhere going to the locker room playing chess and throwing darts and all that junk. I was not into that. I got a family here. I have have to support my family. I knew if i lose this job i havt to go back in the cold and wash windows. So i said okay, he said mr. Wilson says steve, you do whatever you want to do, you can have because im through with it. So he left and i cleaned the windows and then one day i cleaned all the windows size Walking Around trying to keep from getting into trouble. So i went to the garden that one time he was secret service. He said that you got your your permission at this point to work in the white house, had your papers gone through a new bank bank cleared in . Not at that time. Ha i had my temporary pass and i went up i told him i said he had his glass down over his nose in his head down and he said what can i do for you . And i said well, i have been use to working fast and getting wora done and i am doing it too fast here. So i dont have enough to keep me busy. And i dont want to get in no trouble. So he said what you have in my question work i said i see a lot of dirty chandeliers and light globes and they have cobwebs all over them. Some are so dusty they really dont look like chandeliers. So he said, so you want to start trying to clean the chandeliers . And i said yes, yes, sir. Ive had a little experienceer with that because i worked in the conference for a little while they had chandeliers there and ahead clean some of them there. So he said we will give you a try. And he said these are the most expensive chandeliers so you have to be careful. If you get to break in the he said, you are gone. So. So i said yes, sir. No problem. So they came and put up a scaffold for me. I was in the hall where the redn rug comes down the main entrance of the white house. Right that is where i started that, right there. They put up scaffolding and i started cleaning chandeliers. There was two, two main one and they were there prettiest chandeliers in the house. I really think they was it real crystal. They was like diamonds and they were flashing all kinds of color. When i started cleaning them i made up my own solution. A lot of it was 100 ammonia with no grease, no sides, this is clear ammonia and i would take a little bit of ammonia, just a little bit, put it in the hot bucket of water, by the water be in hot it made the geta ammonia get that much harder because the warmer the water the stronger the ammonia gets. So i got up on the scaffolding and i started cleaning the chandeliers. I had a chamois and i have myrag cleaning rake and then i had a dirty rake. Not a clean break, but one but one that i could lay the crystals on so i can put them in the bucket and i would take it out of the bucket and ip would polish them with my chamois and then i would lay them there so after i got some money clean like that then i would put up some pieces and take down some more pieces. So finally i went around the chandelier and then i had the painter come over and move me over to the next one. It took me 6 8 hours to clean the first chandelier. 6000 pieces. Not that one yet. Hannah got to that when you. These were just the two in the hall. I didnt mind working overtime because i needed the money for my family. So i started on the other one and i cleaned that one. When i finish cleaning them they really were like true diamonds. You cannot diamond that looked any better. They were picking up the flake, the rugs, all of the color all around. And then i told him and said i was finished in a got the painters to come and take the scaffolding down. I went back and started washing the windows. Somebody asked somebody, who is cleaning the chandeliers . And he told them steve. The word got around the white house that steve was cleaning chandeliers and you should see how they look. Everybody Start Talking about how bright the chandelier was. How clean they were in, tell me you really did a good job in the chandeliers. At that time i didnt know what i was asking for. But they said sometime what you ask for you might not get it. Theres so many chandeliers in light globes. What made you write your books, the white house chandelier . Guest to be honest with you i had all of my pictures and things in the closet and boxes and they had been in there for a while. My wife passed and my daughterht come to me and she said daddy what he going to do with all that stuff . She said what you write a book about your white house experience. So i said yeah i would like to write a book but but im not all that good at writing a book and i didnt do that good in school. I picked up up a lot of stuff w from working in different places when i says i really dont know how to write a book. And she said well ill tell you what. You tell me what happened, everything and i will write it down. So i will call my daughter and i was Start Talking just like i was talking to you and i start telling her everything and she started writing everything down. And she just kept writing and writing. So we started another day, same thing. I would drive back to her and she wrote it all down or would type it down. And i did that i guess for about four or five weeks, i took that long to tell her everything. I was trying not to leave out nothing. But i left out some things because i didnt think it was appropriate to put in the book. What happens at the white house stays at the white house. Absolutely. Just like in vegas. What happens in vegas stays in vegas. Speaking of that, when i first started we were to sign papers of that effect. We signed papers about finances, everything that you can think of medical records, tax papers, we had to sign everything. So even if they wanted to they could go and pull your records out. As a security check. So you were started working when Richard Nixon was president. You remember the first time he saw him in the white house . Guest yes or. The first time i seen him he didnt come down early like the other president s. And come through around 6 00 oclock. So it was a good while before acing him. I think he came in august like at eight or 9 00 oclock. But he came through and i was working in the flower room. You come out of the main resident and there is a coupleed of doors that you go into this flower room and then you are going to another set of doors to go up along hall to go into the oval office. So he came through one day when he did not seem like he was too friendly of a guy to me. When i first met him. And i said say good morning mr. President s and he said good morning. Even but we got along good because he was a nice president. He was. One thing he believed in doing, he asked everybody he wanted to know the name of your children and how old they were in a christmas time he would send presence to everybody. All of my children. He sent some expensive gifts. I mean robots and all of that kind of stuff. I never really had a good conversation with him but i had worked in his office when he used to go upstairs and study most of the time. He had a special room that he would sit and he would study him he wasnt the type of president to be disturbed. He act like he mostly wanted to be to himself. He wasnt happy and jolly like the other president s but that was not for me to judge. My thing was to do my work and get out of his way and just get out of the way. So i seen him a couple of times after that and he finally got so he would throw his hand up and say good morning and i was a good morning mr. President. Mornn i remember one morning about president carter and he came through about 6 00 oclock in the morning like he did every morning, he had his bible in his hand going to the oval office. W him and i got to be real good because he said good morning and i say good morning mr. President. Id and he said what is your name . And they looked at my belt buckle because i kept it it was a brass kept it shining. Everybody seen in and they say good morning steve, i didnt know none of their names and i would say say hi my man, how is everything. We got to talking, but anyway president carter, him and i got to be very good friends. We talked a lot. Did it ever occur to you that there you were standing there with the president of the Unitee States having a conversation . Guest and hit me when he said and i said good morning mro morning steve. Thats when it hit me and said you know your talk into the top people in the United States and they recognize your name. And that really made me feel good. And i made sure that i was going to be there when they came through there at that time. President reagan and all of them. And everybody seen me and they see my name so i was just a regular person would my job andi minding my business. With enough work to keep me busy. You said very kind things about both Hillary Rodham clinton and nancy reagan. What was your interaction withn the first lady . Guest will the main ones that notice the chandeliers first. Women, they pick up a lot of stuff that men passed right on by. Ive always said, to me andaid o myself that how smart, much smarter women are than men because ive seen a lot of smart ladies at the white house and mrs. Reagan and mrs. Clinton, they were a couple of very smart ladies. Also. Also miss barbara bush, she was really a smart lady. The only thing i either heard bad about missing Hillary Clinton was one night they were in the bedroom on the second floor and they had a big storm a big bulletproof glass that slides back and forth. Sometime it got a little warm in there so they would let an office of president to her but there was slide that window backing crack the window as they could get some air. The secret service was right under their and they were down there talking and hooting and hollering and having a good time kiss it was at night. Ent coul the president supposed to be going to sleep. So they made so much noise and miss hillary she went to the window as she hollered out the window as she said if you all dont cut that noise out and dancing im trying to get some sleep. Ys if you dont cut the noise out you will be working there no more. And i didnt see them at that job no more. I dont where they went. But anyway miss reagan, we would describe her as a person that was very much in love with her husband. I mean very much in love with her husband. I would see them all the time they used to have to go out to a diplomatic Reception Room to go out on the lawn to make the speeches and to get on the plane or wherever. They always went out to the diplomatic Reception Room. A lot of people thought that the white house front door the back door. He did have a front door. Door because there think about dignitary would come so they named it the north door and the south door. And thats where the name come from. It is a beautiful place. Anyway miss reagan was a very nice lady but she kind of stayed to herself. Should always speak and laugh and she was so crazy about ronnie. Everything was ronnie. She would talk ronnie all over the white house. She loved him that much. He was the same way. And thank god that he did not get killed when he had the attempted assassination on his life. Were you at the white house that day . Yes sir. I was there that day. What happened was the president went up to make a speech in the secret service were around him like normal. When he came out they fired two or three shots and secret service guys right away they grabbed the president , pushed him into the limousine, the secret service good, they had to get there is one that got shot in the head they had to get mr. Brady got shot in the head. Where were you at the white house that day . I was at the white house doing windows. I dont know what part of the white house i was at but i heard it from the office that the president has been attempted assassination on president reagan. So i was really told everything that went on because when the secret service grabbed him and pushed him into the automobile, they push them too hard and he wanted to know why are you pushing me so hard and he looked down and said hurry up get them out of there when a president is in danger right away they get an russian right out of there. Ed so what they did was he said i want to go back to the white house and one of the secret service guys notice that he has some blood out of his nose. And they said mr. President were not taking you back to the white house he said were going to take you to the hospital. So they took him to the hospital and they examined him with examination being president , the best examination you could get. They found out that he had a bullet somewhere in his long. They told him that he was going to have to have surgery. By that time time were to get back to mrs. Reagan. She come in and she was sowo upset. She was worried and scared and crying. She ran over to ronnie and she asked him how are you doing ronnie . I said im doing fine nancy, doing fan. Im doing great, everything is all right. So the doctors come to him and told him that he was going to have immediate surgery. But what was it like at the white house when this was going on . Everybody was scared to death. Like i said with a happy feeling , everybody knew everybody. Everybody concentrated concentrated on doing things for the president. Whatever the president wanted he got it. Were right there. We did everything he needed, everybody did everything they needed. For instance, patricia got married in the rose garden, man we went wild, but anyway let me get back to the story, anyway they rushed him to the hospital, the doctors found out that he had to have emergency surgery and mrs. Reagan, she had came in and she had to step back and he said ronnie he said im going to be all right. Im going to be all right. So he looked at the doctors that was getting ready to perform surgery and he just looked at him and said are yall democrats or republicans . And they all kind of smiled and they went on with their work. So after they did the surgery and everything he stayed in the hospital for a day or two but nobody knew just how serious it was because it was so close to him losing his life. To remember when he came back to the white house . Guest i surely do. I remember everybody welcomed him there we were all standing outside and we were hollering for him. He was a tough man. He was a movie star, he just waved like he was all right. He had a wheelchair wheelchair they rolled them in the door and they went upstairs and he was upp there for a few days and then he had everybody outside clapping and hollering form