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That Sky. Through all the fun, the President sipped beer from his paper cup. Eventually, he ran dry, refilled once from Marianne's supply, emptied his cup again, and took off at speeds up to 90 m.p.h. to get more. Reporters in the cars behind could scarcely keep up, and all kept a wary eye on their speedometers. In the President's car, someone gasped at how fast Johnson was driving. Quickly, Lyndon took one hand from the wheel, removed his five-gallon hat and flopped it on the dashboard to cover the speedometer. Later, White House Press Secretary George Reedy—in a statement almost as foolhardy as the President's driving—tried to deny that Johnson had exceeded Texas' 70 m.p.h. speed limit.
At sunset, after two hours of hair-raising sightseeing, Johnson sped to a lonely granite knob that overlooks miles of ranchland. Suddenly meditative, he gazed at the stunning panorama before him. "Look at that sky," he said. "Why would anyone want to leave here and go back and fight."
*Other U.S. Presidents were high-velocity types too. Ulysses S. Grant was fined for driving a horse-drawn carriage down M Street at an "unreasonable" rate of speed. Woodrow Wilson's driver scared the daylights out of newsmen by "reckless driving and excessive speed." In 1919, two reporters died in crashes while trying desperately to keep up with Wilson's car. In 1921, state cops clocked Warren G. Harding's car at 38 m.p.h. as it zipped through Hyattsville, Md. The speed limit was 15 m.p.h., but no arrest was made. After he left office, Harry Truman was stopped for cutting in front of a patrol car on the Pennsylvania Turnpike. And Dwight Eisenhower used to be in such a hurry to get from Washington to his Gettysburg farm that reporters insisted they sometimes hit 100 m.p.h. on narrow Maryland highways trying to keep up. In 1957, vigilant state cops ordered part of the presidential motorcade to pull over, told trailing reporters they would have to obey the 55-m.p.h. limit, but allowed Ike's car to whip along up to 70 m.p.h.