In 1974 Dick VanderVeen made national news when he became the first Democrat from Grand Rapids elected to Congress in 60 years. His campaign calling for President Nixon's resignation had turned the race into a referendum on Watergate, and the victory was a historical turning point in that national drama.
From his journals:
"What was happening in our special election became political news all around the country. In the last days of the campaign reporters and TV crews from Washington, New York and around the world began to appear. Marion fed a BBC television crew in the kitchen on Edgemere. Mary McGrory, Jack Germond, NBC, CBS and ABC appeared. . . ."
From Newsweek, following the election upset:
"Worst of all for the president was the damage done his reduced base of support by the Grand Rapids returns-the second straight GOP defeat in a run of five special congressional elections this winter and spring. The first, in Pennsylvania two weeks earlier, was widely termed too ambiguous to read, since the margin was only 400 votes and Watergate was not overtly an issue.
"But Democrat Richard F. VanderVeen's convincing victory in a district that never gave Ford less than 60 per cent of the vote occasioned no such bewilderment; he made the election a referendum on whether Mr. Nixon should stay or go, and the answer, by 51 to 44 per cent, was go."
