| Interment Location | Visited | Sequence in Graves I Have Visited |
|---|---|---|
| Timonium, MD | April 22, 2010 | 23rd Vice President visited |
If Spiro Agnew knew of my vice presidential gravesite quest or that my father and I were visiting his burial plot in 2010, the alliterative-speaking politician might have praised us as “the Dynamic Duo of deceased destination odysseys.” On the other hand, if he were miffed that we visited football legend Johnny Unitas before him or he disapproved of my mission altogether, Agnew might have acerbically assailed us as “a gaggle of ghoulish grave-goers.”
Richard Nixon’s first vice president, a conservative media-maligner, is interred in the Garden of the Last Supper at Dulaney Valley Memorial Gardens in Timonium, Maryland, 15 miles from downtown Baltimore. Second Lady Judy Agnew was buried with him following her death in 2012, which came two years after I took this photo. Spiro Agnew was a polarizing partisan, but like any person he had multiple facets. My acquaintance Donald M. Stinson, who worked for Agnew as a teenager in 1973, recounts his positive experiences with the VP and Mrs. Agnew in his humorous memoir, Downstairs at the White House: The story of a teenager, an Oval Office, and a ringside seat to Watergate. Click here if you are interested in Don’s book, which I found endlessly entertaining. I promise that is the end of the alliteration.
Agnew could have been Nixon’s successor as the leading figure of the Republican Party, but any possibility of that was dashed in fall 1973. Since the year prior, Agnew had been under criminal investigation for allegations of corrupt actions conducted when he was governor of Maryland in the late 1960s. As time went on, it became evident that he would be indicted and he negotiated a plea bargain. On October 10th Agnew pleaded nolo contendere to a tax evasion charge and resigned as vice president, joining John C. Calhoun as the only people to leave that office in such a manner.
Fast Facts
Born: November 9, 1918 in Baltimore, Maryland
Spouse: Elinor Isabel Judefind Agnew (m. 1942-1996)
Political Affiliation: Republican Party
Gubernatorial Tenure: 1967-1969
Vice Presidential Tenure: 1969-1973 under Richard Nixon
Died: September 17, 1996 in Berlin, Maryland
Cause of Death: Leukemia
Age: 77
Interment: Dulaney Valley Memorial Gardens, Timonium, Maryland
"Every age in American history has had its crises and upheavals. They all must have seemed like massive earthquakes to those who stood at the epicenter of the movement, but they all left the foundations of the Republic secure and unshaken when history moved on."
- Spiro T. Agnew
October 15, 1973 in a television and radio address delivered in Washington, D.C., five days after his resignation as U.S. vice president
Sources Consulted and Further Reading
New York Times. “Transcript of Former Vice President Agnew’s TV and Radio Address to Nation.” October 16, 1973. https://www.nytimes.com/1973/10/16/archives/transcript-of-former-vice-president-agnews-tv-and-radio-address-to.html.
Podair, Jerald, Zach Messitte, and Charles Holden. “The man who pioneered Trumpism.” Washington Post. November 15, 2018. https://www.washingtonpost.com/outlook/2018/11/15/man-who-pioneered-trumpism/.
