It was August 1976. The Reagan people in the balcony would not shut up. Roberts' Rules of Order could go to hell. The Californians on one side of the hall screamed, "!Viva!" and those on the other side howled back, "!Ole!" The convention nominated Gerald Ford anyway. Reagan would have to wait four years. I smoked three or four packs that day and, in the bluish cigarette haze of a room in the Muehlbach, wrote TIME's cover story: dreary convention, dismal story; hot, clear Kansas City summer outside. At least that's what I remember of it now.
As I finished writing...
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