Saturday, March 8, 1997 | 11:59 a.m.
I recently thought about trying that miracle hair grow tonic called Minoxidil, but thought: If it will grow hair on your naked scalp after you vigorously rub it in, what's to stop it from growing hair on your bare fingertips?
I asked my wife of 11 years, "Cindy, will you still love me when I'm old, ugly and bald?" She responded: "Of course I do."
According to recent news reports, President Clinton is going bald.
Gee, I wonder why?
When I came to Las Vegas in 1978, a wide-eyed sports writer of 21, my dark brown mane was thick and lush. Today, graying and a few weeks away from my 40th birthday, there is a bit more skin atop my scalp than hair, and the frontal hairline also is receding at a significant pace to meet my baring skullcap.
It's called aging, folks, and it sure as hell beats the alternative.
We seem to have this certain image about what a president should be, especially when it comes to head and facial hair.
Presidents should have a nice head of hair. Isn't it amazing how Ronald Reagan's coif remained so naturally dark through his eight long years in office? Jimmy Carter, John Kennedy and Clinton all had nice hair.
But, we've had some pretty decent bald or balding presidents too -- Dwight Eisenhower, who was president when I was born and died on my 12th birthday, and Lyndon Johnson.
When I got started in this business, grizzled veteran reporters told me stories of how Johnson would show his impressive surgical scar to scribes he liked. Unfortunately for the reporter, that meant LBJ had to open his shirt and drop his drawers. Now, there's a Kodak moment.
Our first two presidents wore white powdered wigs -- a practice that is highly discouraged for today's office seekers -- but, under those lids, they were balding.
We are reminded of George Washington's receding hairline every time we look at a dollar bill. John Adams compensated for his crown of skin by sporting thick, bushy sideburns. That is a feature no president since Chester Arthur has displayed, and he left office 112 years ago.
While hair is apparently preferred atop a president's head, it is definitely discouraged on other parts of his face.
No president since Willaim Taft has had a moustache, and that was in 1913. Just before him, Theodore Roosevelt also had a moustache.
No president since Benjamin Harrison, who left office 104 years ago, has had a full beard. His grandfather, William Harrison, U.S. president No. 9, was clean-shaven.
President James Garfield also had a full beard, but someone assassinated him in 1881, 80 days after he entered office.
With the exception of sideburns, clean-shaven faces were the mode for U.S. presidents until Abraham Lincoln came to office in 1861. He grew his beard, legend says, on the advice of a little girl who told him he would look better.
Lincoln may have been one of our greatest presidents, but he also was one of our homeliest.
On that note, we don't seem to elect ugly people to the presidency anymore.
Some would argue that Richard Nixon, who undoubtedly suffered some hair loss over the Watergate scandal and his subsequent flight from office, was ugly. But I don't think he was all that bad looking.
However, when you compare him to a hunk like Kennedy, Nixon didn't stand a chance of getting elected in 1960.
Carter, who had beaten a balding Gerald Ford in 1976, wore his hair Kennedy style in his re-election bid against Reagan. But, it didn't work.
Certainly Clinton was much more handsome than his 1996 opponent Bob Dole and a balding incumbent George Bush in 1992.
A recent Associated Press story on the thinning of the president's hair noted: "In the right light -- and on certain camera angles -- the pink flesh of Clinton's head shines through his feathered hairdo. Thick thatches of hair in front and on the sides give way to thinner trails atop and back."
Sad, isn't it? Not that the president is going bald, but that we are so fascinated by this very natural process.
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