Farther and higher than any person is expected to climb
By MARISA MATA, Student Writer
In 1955 Elvin C. Bell was a freshman at Fresno State, riding the bus seven hours a day to get to class and freelancing magazine articles, among other part-time jobs, to pay for school and support his family. Now, at the age of 78, Bell is retired from a multifaceted career involving military, business and politics, and has recently published his 11th book, Friends, Patriots, and Scoundrels — a memoir composed of short stories featuring high profile politicians and celebrities Bell met and/or worked with during his career, including Ronald Reagan and the Kennedy brothers.
“I was the fifth of 10 kids, and my parents were migrant farm workers, so we followed the crops. I went to at least 16 different schools, but most of the time I grew up around the cotton fields of Cantua Creek,” Bell said. “From Cantua Creek, my dad ran off and my older brother joined the Air Force, and then the first three children my mother had died of childhood diseases — that left me the oldest one…I had to work part-time jobs to support my handicap mother and my younger brothers and sisters.”
Needing another job, Bell joined the National Guard as a junior in high school. In 1954 Bell became a company clerk in the guard, and worked his way through the ranks, eventually serving as an intelligence officer in the 1965 Watts Riots.
“They sent a plane here to pick me up and I flew down there. As we got over the Grapevine, you could see — it looked like all of Los Angeles was on fire. You could see a huge red ball of flames coming up and around. It was a scary time — about 120 people were killed, about $250 million in property damage and I still have a bullet wound above my left knee from small arms fire down there.”
After graduating from Fresno State in 1959, Bell was hired as assistant manager at a bank.
“The first week, I was doing all kinds of jobs that I didn’t like at the bank, and I went out for lunch and I was walking down the street and Gordon Nelson, the city editor of the Fresno Bee — I worked at the Fresno Bee also, part-time — he stopped and picked me up. He said, ‘what are you doing working at a bank?’ He had just quit the Bee and opened his own business, and he said, ‘why don’t you work for me? You and I will be partners.’ So I quit the bank and got involved in politics. My clients were State Senator Hugh M. Burns, Assemblyman Burt De Lotto and Congressman B.F. Sisk. I wrote speeches, wrote letters for them, handled press conferences, wrote press releases, reviewed bills, if they needed to make a statement, I’d write the statement. And I’m 22 years old doing all this stuff.”
In 1961 Nelson joined the Peace Corps and Bell went to work for the Chamber of Commerce, writing for Fresno Mayor Arthur Selland. In 1964 Bell quit the chamber, won a seat in City Council and opened his own business managing political campaigns.
“Reagan met me in Fresno in early ’66 and he wanted me to help manage his campaign for governor. I helped him, I wrote all his speeches for him, and then four years later, helped him again for reelection. It was fun when he was governor, and it was even more fun when he was president!”
During this time period Bell was still active in the guard, commanding the Fresno air base and writing classified top secret books about countries in Africa and Eastern Europe. When Reagan was sworn in as president in 1981, he promoted Bell to colonel and had him flown to D.C. to work in the White House and the Pentagon.
“We’re in the Pentagon, having this conflict in Grenada, I was the planning officer for that invasion, and our troops are going in, SEALs are on a boat, they’re about ready to go off, swim under water for half a mile, emerge and attack the bad guys, and I’m at the meeting and the phone rings. It was [my mother’s] cardiologist, [who] said, ‘[she]has just a few hours, maybe days. I suggest you come out and be with her.’ I resigned everything, packed a bag and flew out. I got to her house and I thought she had died — she lived another four years. I stayed here, one of my clients years earlier had been American Ambulance, so I went back with them and became a partner in the business.”
In 1986, while getting American Ambulance up and running, Bell had his first novel published. That same year, he had an official retirement ceremony at the Pentagon and was promoted by Reagan to brigadier general.
Bell sold his share of American Ambulance in 1988, went back to managing campaigns and continued to write books. In the early ’90s, Bell was offered a job as a city manager in Florida. He took the position in 1995.
Four years and two class-five hurricanes later, Bell decided he had been in Florida long enough. He moved north, negotiating construction contracts for military bases. Bell continued this job until moving back to Fresno at the beginning of 2016. During this time, he published four more novels, including Friends, Patriots, and Scoundrels.
When asked if the stories in the novel are fictional, Bell replied, “Oh no, don’t even use that word…I’ve kept notes, and in law school you learn to remember things. One of my favorite ones is Dr. Edwin Teller, the father of the hydrogen bomb. I was his host several times. He was quite the pianist.”
Bell, now retired, spends his time doing charity work, keeping active in his church and writing. Though his career has come to an end, people he has met along the way continue to speak highly of him, including former US Ambassador Phillip Sanchez, who said, “Elvin’s enthusiasm for new frontiers propelled him farther and higher than any person is expected to climb, especially one who was the fifth of ten children born into a migrant farm labor family.”
Read about Old Glory, a unique flag Elvin Bell donated to Fresno State on July 4.
