Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, November 6, 1994 TAG: 9411070067
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: A5 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: FROM STAFF REPORTS
DATELINE: URBANNA LENGTH: Long
The contest that officially began on Labor Day in the mountain city of Buena Vista neared the finish line Saturday at the Urbanna Oyster Festival.
All three candidates - incumbent Democrat Charles Robb, Republican Oliver North and independent Marshall Coleman - were on hand to work tens of thousands of revelers under the influence of blue skies and cold shellfish.
This was one last chance to get at the still-pure heart of what it's all about: going out among the people and asking for votes.
There were people in tie-dyed T-shirts and torn jeans, in clown costumes and neon wigs, in red fezzes and miniature sports cars, in khakis and polo shirts. They lined the narrow streets of this Rappahannock River village and crammed the roads for miles in all directions.
And as each candidate made his way among them, he offered a glimpse of the style and message that has brought him to the brink of the election.
Oliver North
A surge of humanity pressed forward, six deep, engulfing the man of the hour. Arms aloft, hot breath on necks, the crowd jostled for an autograph, nearly tipping over the canopy under which the magnetic celebrity stood calmly.
A passer-by looked in amazement at the spectacle: "Who's in there?"
"Ollie North," her companion said, matter-of-factly.
She nodded. Of course.
Forget the Oyster Festival. It was Ollie's show on Saturday.
With a tight smile, North raised his hands, facing outward, politely motioning the crowd to give him some breathing room.
But he wasn't complaining, despite an arsenal of cameras trained at close range and photographers' flashes bursting in his face.
North, the communist-crushing, rebel-aiding conservative icon, just went about his business, signing T-shirts and pamphlets, flanked by a white-maned personal bodyguard in a gray suit.
"Y'all back up!" one autograph-seeker hollered. "You're squishing the people out front!"
They waited: toddlers on dad's shoulders. A man with a Rebel flag tattoo on his right shoulder and a T-shirt that read "Oliver North for President." An otherwise distinguished elderly woman with a bumper sticker plastered across her forehead, "Ollie North."
Elvis should have had it so good.
North just stood there under the crush, a figure bigger than himself. That gap-toothed grin, that blue flannel shirt he always wears, those khakis, those black boots. Without pause, he scrawled his John Hancock with his favorite fat, blue indelible marker.
"Americans are enthusiastic people," said Murray Happ, an Australian government official, traveling across the United States to learn about the political system.
The North apparatus knows it well.
Avoiding bumper-to-bumper traffic five miles long, North jetted in a Cessna Citation from Richmond to West Point, hopped into a white Chevy station wagon to Saluda and boated to Urbanna in a Sea Ray sports fishing boat. Sheriff's deputies escorted him through the throng.
"Let's just walk," North said, plunging through the festive streets lined with well-wishers, many trailing after him whooping and shouting, "Good luck, Ollie."
A woman called out: "Ollie! Ollie!" North turned, winked at her with a thumbs-up and said, "I love it."
- ALEC KLEIN\ Charles Robb
Robb was prepared for the worst Saturday when his helicopter touched down in Urbanna.
His campaign aides told him to forget the adulation showered upon him earlier in the day during homecoming parades at two predominantly black schools, Norfolk State University and I.C. Norcom High School in Portsmouth.
The Oyster Festival had the makings of an Ollie fest.
Ollie North had arrived a few hours earlier like the general of a liberating army. His supporters mobbed him for autographs and photographs.
``There's a lot of nasty Ollie North people here,'' Democratic congressional candidate Mary F. Sinclair whispered to Robb.
The Democratic incumbent had one advantage: Festival organizers allow only elected officials to ride in the parade.
Robb shucked his coat, saddled up in a red Mustang convertible and cast his fate to the sun-drenched parade crowd lining the narrow streets of this Middle Peninsula village.
There was a steady stream of catcalls.
``Had a massage lately?''
``Chuck Robb, you're out of here on Tuesday.''
``Break out the mirror, Chuck.''
But the cheers easily outnumbered the jeers.
Robb - who appears more confident each day - dished out some pithy retorts when he encountered North supporters.
When a red-faced man shook an upside-down North poster in his face, Robb said calmly, ``Upside-down is a distress signal.''
When he encountered a woman who clutched three autographed copies of North's 54-point ``Agenda for Change'' as if they were made of gold, Robb said, ``You ought to hang onto those like Confederate dollars.''
After the parade, Robb said the unexpectedly warm reception he received mirrored recent polls that show him pulling ahead of North as the campaign enters its final 48 hours.
``I was told this was Ollie country,'' he said. ``I'll take my chances with the vote here.''
- DAVID M. POOLE\ Marshall Coleman
U.S. Sen. John Warner had been campaigning with Coleman all morning - all week, for that matter - and now he was being whisked away in a golf cart to his place in the Oyster Festival parade.
Only incumbents allowed; Coleman and his wife, Patty, would have to stay on the sidelines.
So Coleman started walking along. He waved to the throngs by the road leading into Urbanna, and finally caught up with the assembling parade. Warner was in a red LeBaron convertible, followed by Robb in a Mustang.
As the parade started moving, Coleman kept walking. He fell in beside Warner's car. He moved out to the middle of the road, waving and smiling.
And the people were responding. Unlike the Labor Day parade in Buena Vista, where Coleman was virtually invisible, he was getting some notice.
"Yea, Coleman! Yea!" came from somewhere; later: "Good luck, Marshall!"
Finally, at a pause in the parade, Warner motioned over to Coleman. "Jump in!" So Coleman vaulted up into the back of the car, next to the craggy-faced senator.
For a few moments, they were side by side in the sun, the crowd cheering, as if they were both C-Span regulars with nothing to worry about but doing a little shopping after the parade.
Then Charles Bristow showed up with an orange jacket, a name tag and a walkie-talkie. Get out of the car, Bristow said to Coleman. "You can't ride unless you're an incumbent."
Coleman got out. "I'll be here next year," he told Bristow.
Coleman gamely walked on, Bristow always near to nudge him over when he got too far out into the parade. Some cheered; some jeered. "Hi, how are you?" he said to one woman as he shook her hand.
"Who was that?" she said as she passed.
By the end, Coleman felt great. He had gotten more warmth than he expected. Whether it was spillover from Warner or Robb, or whether it was simply that the dominating presence of Oliver North was confined to a nearby tent, was unclear.
Warner gave his protege a hearty handshake at the finish. "Ol' Ollie sat in his tent. Sat in his tent and sulked," the senator barked at Coleman. "But Marshall got out and looked 'em straight in the eye."
- GREG SCHNEIDER
Keywords:
POLITICS
by CNB