The Original Presidential Gatecrasher – An Adventist
The Chattanooga Times Free Press tells the classic Adventist tale.
Dr. George Akers’ strong resemblance to President Richard Nixon has earned him curious stares and “has anyone ever told you” conversation starters throughout much of his adult life.
It also embroiled him in a controversy not unlike to the one faced by the couple accused recently of crashing President Barack Obama’s first White House state dinner.
Dr. Akers, who at 43 was a newly-installed president of Washington Adventist University at the time, said there was no plan at all when in 1970 he ended up behind the gates of Camp David, the Maryland presidential retreat where President Nixon was writing a speech at the time.
Our school was having its annual picnic nearby … and some of the kids said let’s go over and chat with the guard,” Dr. Akers recalled this week from his Ooltewah home. “The next thing I know I was in the middle of the front seat.”
Their plan was to roll up to the U.S. Marine guard shack, wave at the guard with the expectation that they would be turned away. Laughs all around, and a good time would be had by all.
But when the party pulled up in their green Cadillac hard-top convertible, a passenger told the guard, “Our president is ready to go through,” Dr. Akers said. “Seeing me and hearing the word president, the guard arched his back, saluted, clicked his heals, pressed a button and waved us through.”
Click here to read the rest of the story at the Times Free Press.
Photo courtesy of Daneen Akers.
