Martha Mitchell's Telephone

Martha Mitchell's Telephone
Type	Princess Phone
Effects	Compelled Veracity
Downsides	Effects are Consumptive
Activation	Use
Collected by	Warehouse 13
Date of Collection	28 November 2019
[Source]

Origin

Martha Mitchell (1918 - 1976) was an American socialite, political figure, and outspoken critic of the GOP. Married to John N. Mitchell, who was the Attorney General to President Richard Nixon and eventual head of the Committee to Re-Elect the President (CRP), Martha was largely regarded as one of Washington D.C.'s most controsversial figures in her day. Her frank and uncensored comments on the political climate in Washington earned her the the unfavorable reputation as "Martha the Mouth." She was usually characterized by her habit of drinking and calling up reporters late at night, dishing gossip she had learned.

However, she is perhaps most known for her part in the Watergate Scandal in 1972. James W. McCord Jr., one of the first convicted burglers involved in the theft at the Watergate Hotel, was a former bodyguard to the Mitchells and then security officer to the CRP. As part of the cover-up, John N. Mitchell publically denied any of the burglars' (and thus, McCord's) involvement with the CRP. Aware that this was exactly the type of thing his wife would publically call out, Mr. Mitchell hired FBI agent Steve King to keep Martha away from all newspapers and distracted from the news in LA while he ran damage control in DC. However, Martha nevertheless discovered the connection the following Monday after the break-in, correctly surmised that her husband was involved in a major cover-up, and attempted to contact her favorite reporter and friend, Helen Thomas. 

During the phone call, Martha was interrupted by King, who ripped the phone from the wall, and imprisoned her in her hotel room in California for four days. She attempted escape by climbing the outside of the hotel building, but was recaptured by King, restrained, and sedated. She was eventually moved to a country club in New York, where Helen Thomas tracked her down. Though Thomas published the story, it was put in the ladies section of the United Press, and largely ignored. That didn't stop Nixon from initiating a smeer campaign against her, accusing her of being a drunk and delusional attention-monger, and he hired psychologists to diagnose her as mentally unsound. Her story was discredited until 1975, when McCord confirmed her kidnapping and the presence of a smeer campaign against her. The "Martha Mitchell Effect," or the misdiagnosis that someone telling the truth is delusional, is named after her mistreatment, and without her the truth of the Watergate Scandal may not have been exposed.

Effects

Imbued with Martha's core (and eventual desperate) desire to expose scandal, her princess telephone compels any who utilize it to spill secrets to the person on the other end. Unfortunately, the effect is largely consuming; users become so focused on convincing the person on the line of the truthfullness of their secrets that they lose their ability to focus on anything else, or even move, until they are rendered catatonic.

Collection

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