On This Day in History: September 22

Oliver Sipple saves President Ford

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On September 22, 1975, Sara Jane Moore attempted to assassinate President Gerald Ford. And she might have succeeded if not for the heroic intervention of Oliver Sipple, a former Marine who was disabled while serving in Vietnam. Sipple was hailed as a hero, then he was outed as gay. The media attention surrounding his sexuality ruined both his relationship with his family, and his life.

--On This Day in History, Shit Went Down: September 22, 1975--

The Secret Service fucked up on this one, as did the SFPD. Seventeen days earlier Lynette Fromme, a member of the Manson family murder cult, had tried to assassinate Ford. The protection detail had evaluated accountant Sara Jane Moore earlier in the year, but they said nah she’s fine no worries here. The day before the assassination attempt the San Francisco cops picked her up for illegal possession of a handgun, a Dirty Harry style .44 Magnum revolver. They confiscated the gun and let her go.

For the assassination attempt she bought a .38 revolver that morning but didn’t test fire it. The sights were off, and she narrowly missed Ford. She was about to fire a second time when Sipple grabbed her arm, causing the shot to go wide, ricochet, and hit a cab driver (he survived). The Secret Service said hey thanks for doing our fucking job for us, and the media was all hey he’s a marine and a war hero hooray for Oliver Sipple! Then Harvey Milk stabbed Sipple in the fucking back.

Milk was the first openly gay elected official in California’s history. Sipple was known to the San Francisco gay community, but his family and employer didn’t know he was gay. Both Milk and another gay activist contacted the San Francisco Chronicle to out Sipple to the press. Milk saw his betrayal of Sipple as “Too good of an opportunity” to be kept secret. “For once we can show that gays do heroic things.” Yeah, that was a dick move.

Probably not at all coincidentally, the president’s appreciation of Sipple’s heroism was muted. He got a letter from Ford expressing “heartfelt appreciation,” and that was it. No visit to the White House. No commendation. Just a thank you note like the kind you send your grandma for the underwear she sent you for Christmas.

The media went apeshit, harassing Sipple and his family. His parents disowned him and Sipple went into hiding. He filed a multimillion-dollar lawsuit against the media for invasion of privacy and lost. His mental and physical health went into a tailspin; he became a heavy drinker. He later expressed regret over grabbing Moore’s gun because of how the attention upended his life.

Oliver Sipple died alone at home in 1989 at the age of 47, with a bottle of Jack Daniels next to him and the TV still on. The coroner estimated he’d been dead for 10 days when an acquaintance found his body.

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