Oliver Sipple

Oliver "Billy" Sipple (November 20 1941 – February 2 1989) was a decorated Marine and Vietnam War veteran widely known for saving the life of U.S. President Gerald Ford during an assassination attempt in San Francisco on September 22 1975.

Early life

Sipple was born in Detroit, Michigan. He served in the United States Marines and saw action in Vietnam. Shrapnel wounds suffered in December 1968 caused him to finish out his tour of duty in a Philadelphia veterans hospital, from which he was released in March 1970. He later spent six months in San Francisco's VA hospital, and was frequently being readmitted into the hospital in 1975, the year he saved Ford's life.

Listed as being totally disabled on psychological grounds, he was unable to hold a job and was receiving disability pay. He lived, with a merchant seaman roommate, in a fourth-floor walk-up apartment located in San Francisco's Mission District. Sipple was active in local causes, including the historic political campaigns of openly gay City Council candidate Harvey Milk.

Ford assassination attempt

Sipple was part of a crowd of about 3,000 people who had gathered outside San Francisco's St. Francis Hotel to see President Ford on September 22, 1975.

Ford, just emerging from the building, was vulnerable despite heavy security protection. Sipple noticed a woman next to him had pulled and levelled a .38-caliber pistol as Ford headed to his limousine. Reacting instinctively, Sipple lunged at the woman, Sara Jane Moore, just as her finger squeezed the trigger. While the gun did go off, the impact was enough to deflect her aim and cause the bullet to veer five feet wide of its mark. Had it not been for Sipple's action, the bullet could have struck the president.

Outing by Harvey Milk and the news media

The police and the Secret Service immediately commended Sipple for his action at the scene, while Ford thanked him in a letter. The news media portrayed Sipple as a hero but would eventually report on his outing by Harvey Milk and other San-Francisco gay activists, thus disclosing his private life. Though he was known to be gay by various fellow members of the gay community, Sipple had not made this public, and his sexual orientation was a secret from his family. He asked the press to keep his sexuality off the record, making it clear that neither his mother nor his employer had knowledge of his orientation; however, his request was not complied with.

Despite his wishes, gay activist and politician Harvey Milk publicly proclaimed Sipple a "gay hero" and said his act "will help break the stereotype of homosexuals." Gay liberation groups petitioned local media to give Sipple his due as a gay hero. Then columnist Herb Caen published the private side of the former Marine's story in the San Francisco Chronicle. Six other papers ran the column as well. After discovering her son's secret, Sipple's mother reacted to the knowledge of her son's sexual orientation by cutting off contact with him. Sipple's mother was reportedly harassed by her neighbors. When her son called to talk to her, she hung up on him. According to a 2006 Washington Post article, Sipple went through a period of estrangement with his parents, but the family later reconciled with his sexual orientation. Sipple's brother, George, told the newspaper, "(Our parents) accepted it. That was all. They didn't like it, but they still accepted. He was welcomed. Only thing was: Don't bring a lot of your friends."

Later years and death

Sipple's mental and physical health sharply declined over the years. He drank heavily, gained weight to 300 lbs, was fitted with a pacemaker, became paranoid and suicidal. On February 2, 1989, he was found dead in his bed, at the age of forty-seven. Earlier that day, Sipple had visited a friend and said he had been turned away by the Veterans Administration hospital where he went concerning his difficulty in breathing.

His $334 per month apartment near the Tenderloin District of San Francisco was found with many newspaper clippings of his actions on the fateful September afternoon in 1975. His most prized possession was the framed letter from the White House.

Sipple's funeral was attended by 30 people, and he was buried in Golden Gate National Cemetery south of San Francisco.

A letter addressed to the friends of Oliver Sipple was on display for a short period after his death at one of his favorite hang outs, the New Belle Saloon.

"Mrs. Ford and I express our deepest sympathy in this time of sorrow involving your friend's passing..." President Gerald Ford, February, 1989.

In a 2001 interview with columnist Deb Price, Ford disputed the claim that Sipple was treated differently because of his sexual orientation, saying, "As far as I was concerned, I had done the right thing and the matter was ended. I didn't learn until sometime later — I can't remember when — he was gay. I don't know where anyone got the crazy idea I was prejudiced and wanted to exclude gays." [1]

Media ethics and privacy litigation

Sipple's outing by the Chronicle remains a controversial subject in journalism ethics, raising questions about the appropriateness of reporting on his personal life.

Sipple filed a $15 million invasion of privacy suit against Caen, seven named newspapers, and a number of unnamed publishers, for publishing the disclosures. The Superior Court in San Francisco dismissed the suit, and Sipple continued his legal battle until May 1984, when a state court of appeals upheld the original dismissal.

Cultural References

In the movie Absence of Malice (1981), which came out eight years before Sipple's possible suicide, actress Sally Field's character Megan Carter writes a story that reveals tangential, but very personal and embarrassing information about her source (Melinda Dillon), causing the already disturbed woman to commit suicide. Carter's editor (Josef Sommer) consoles with a story, apparently about Sipple:

"Look, people get caught up in things. Remember the woman in San Francisco, a few years ago, took a shot at Ford, and the guy in the crowd grabbed her arm, saved the president's life, was a hero? Turns out he was gay. Now the whole country knows that, too."

"Did he kill himself?" Carter asks, sardonically.

See also

• List of U.S. Presidential assassination attempts

External links

• Oliver Sipple (1941-1989)
• Oliver Sipple and Mark Bingham: Heroes a Quarter Century Apart
• American Century article
• Oliver Sipple Saves President Ford's Life