Shaking hands with LBJ: 60 years later, Michael Howlett recalls encounter with a president

WORCESTER — On a Wednesday morning in June six decades ago, with Worcester schools closed, 10-year-old Michael Howlett embraced what looked to be another carefree day.

Maybe he'd ride his bike around his West Tatnuck neighborhood. Perhaps he'd look in on an old tree fort. Or maybe he'd see if there was baseball to be played at the park off Prouty Lane.

His mother had a better idea.

"Mike, the president will be at the airport," he recalled her saying. "Why don't you take your bike and ride up there?"

Got nothing else to do, the youngster figured, so he grabbed his 24-inch Schwinn and made a beeline for Worcester Airport, less than a mile from the Howletts' house on Bainridge Road. He pedaled hard up the Airport Drive hill.

He was eager to get a look at Lyndon Baines Johnson. He didn't know much about the man, beyond him being the person who replaced John F. Kennedy. A year earlier, sitting in a classroom at West Tatnuck Elementary School, Howlett and his classmates listened to an announcement that Kennedy had been shot. It wasn't until he got home that he learned JFK had died.

Kennedy's successor, LBJ, was honoring a commitment by Kennedy to deliver the commencement speech at the College of the Holy Cross. It was June 10, 1964. Schools in Worcester were closed for the day in recognition of the special visitor.

More: Then & Now: LBJ motorcade, Chandler at Main Street, Worcester

The president's plane touched down in Worcester about 9:30 a.m. Twenty minutes earlier, Howlett arrived at the airport to find hundreds of others seeking to get a glimpse of the president. There was a heavy police presence.

But being a kid on a bike, tassels on the handlebars, somehow exempted Howlett from any significant scrutiny. He approached the rear of a crowd that had gathered along a fence near the runway. He wouldn't get a decent look from there, he thought.

"So I zigzagged in between the crowd and got to the front," he recalled, still amused at how a hip-high kid outdid the adults in the crowd. He then hopped the short fence and positioned himself just on the other side.

Howlett, now 70, has recounted that day in June 1964 many times. It was a thrill at the time. A great memory to share in the years since.

Last week, with Presidents Day nearing, in an interview with the Telegram & Gazette, he reflected on his impromptu bike ride to the airport nearly 60 years ago.

The big highlight would come minutes after he made his way to the front of the crowd. After watching the president's plane land and taxi to the terminal, Howlett looked on as Johnson descended stairs to the tarmac. Secret Service agents approached the crowd. Excitement built. The crowd cheered. Cameras flashed.

Johnson soon made his way toward the crowd. Hundreds of hands reached out to the president, including the right hand of a kid in a crew cut.

"He's walking along the line," Howlett recalled. "He's reaching out and he's trying to shake as many hands as he could."

The president, getting closer to Howlett, was now shaking hands with both hands. Howlett waited.

"He grabbed my hand and gave it a quick shake, and that was it," Howlett said.

Johnson didn't say anything to Howlett, but the handshake was enough to find a permanent spot atop his childhood memories. He refers to the LBJ encounter as his "15 minutes of fame."

Howlett, a Worcester resident for much of his life, lives in the house on Bainridge Road where he grew up. He and his late wife, Lynne, raised two children in Northborough — Jeffrey and Christina. Howlett enjoys sharing the story of his LBJ handshake with his three grandchildren.

Howlett has been in the auto parts business for nearly 50 years, most recently the manager of commercial accounts at Advanced Auto Parts on Grafton Street.

To hear Howlett tell it, having his photo in the newspaper was as exciting as meeting the president.

After the Johnson motorcade left the airport for Holy Cross, traveling a 6-mile route that drew thousands of well-wishers, Howlett was approached by two newsmen from the Telegram, reporter Jack Tubert and photographer Edward A. Cournoyer.

As Howlett sat on a curb, an awestruck look on his face, he studied his right hand.

"The president of the United States shook my hand," he said, the photographer capturing the image.

Howlett grabbed his bike and hurried home, downhill this time, and shared the exciting news with his family. Not only did he have an encounter with the president, his picture might be in the Telegram.

He was up early the next day. "My mother gave me money to go to the drugstore," he said.

He was one of the first customers at the store. He grabbed a copy of the morning Telegram. Nothing on the front page about him, just a story about the president at Holy Cross. A little disappointed, he started turning the pages. Nothing. Nothing. And then, there it was, page 13: A large photo of him looking at his hand, accompanying a Tubert story.

"A once-in-a-lifetime handshake," read the cutline below the photo.

"I ran like heck back to my mother," he said. "She was so excited about it."

The photograph is part of a collage that hangs in the Howlett home. A copy of the Tubert story and a printout of Johnson's intinerary while in Worcester are also part of the layout.

In the coming years, he'd like to visit the LBJ Presidential Library in Texas, he said.

In the days after the LBJ meeting, Howlett joked with his friends that he was never going to wash his hands again. He did, of course. But often, while telling of the encounter, in a gesture intended to let others get a sense of what he felt that day in June 1964, Howlett will extend his right hand, smile and say: "You can shake the hand that shook the hand."

This article originally appeared on Telegram & Gazette: 60 years later, Michael Howlett recalls encounter with LBJ