By Scott A. Grant
mail@floridanewsline.com
In my younger years, my family traveled around central Europe. My father had gotten a gig teaching at the University of Graz and the job afforded us the opportunity to see things we otherwise would not have seen.
One side trip took us to the Jungfrau in Switzerland, the tallest mountain in Europe. I was standing at the bottom with my mother, and she pointed to a tall man about 25 yards away and said “I think that is someone famous, go ask him who he is.” I demurred, but my mother insisted, so I walked over.
“My mother says you are someone famous,” I announced. “She wants me to ask who you are.”
The guy was standing there talking to one of the most beautiful women I had ever seen at that point in my life and he looked and sounded a little put out. “Have you ever been to the Sunoco station at 164th in Oakland? I work there.” I turned to leave and then it struck me that this guy did not work at a Sunoco.
So, I turned back and told him I did not believe him, and he said, “Tell your mother, I’m Clint Eastwood.” It turns out he was there filming a movie called “The Eiger Sanction.”
I have always been a Clint Eastwood fan, and I am not sure which of his films is my favorite, but a grade school friend recently posted about “The Outlaw Josey Wales.” Which is certainly entertaining and a favorite of many and the subject of this story.
The book that the movie is based on was written by a man named Forrest Carter. Carter claimed to be a native American. He wasn’t. He was a white guy from Alabama and a devout segregationist. He founded his own KKK group and committed some violent atrocities, including an attack on singer Nat King Cole. In the early ‘60s, he became a speechwriter for George Wallace. His most famous work was Wallace’s 1963 inaugural address as governor of Alabama.
Some accounts have Carter, who went by the name Asa Carter at the time, huddled in a hotel room, chain-smoking cigarettes and possibly drunk, feverishly working on the speech for Wallace. When he emerged, he shared the signature line of that speech with Wallace, “Segregation now, segregation tomorrow, segregation forever!” Carter insisted it would be the line that people remembered. He was right.
Asa Carter was a gifted writer, once referred to as “the poet laureate of the Old South.” Wallace would often deny that he knew Carter. The two had a falling out and Asa ran against the governor and lost badly in 1970. After that, he moved to Abilene, Texas and changed his name to Forrest. He wrote two books that became movies, “Josey Wales” and “The Education of Little Tree,” which was billed as autobiographical.
Forrest Carter later moved to St. George Island in Florida and continued to write Westerns. He always denied he had once called himself Asa Carter and had once written speeches for George Wallace. Eastwood produced the film not knowing about Carter’s past. The full story did not come out until a 1976 NY Times article following the success of “Josey Wales.”
Scott A. Grant is a writer and historian who delights in telling obscure stories that you may never have heard. He welcomes your comments at scottg@standfastic.com.
