My mother shook hands with Milton Berle once, outside the Hot Shoppes Cafeteria on Grace Street which was across the street from Thalhimer’s. This was 1967. The building is a parking lot now.

I saw John Warner crossing Franklin Street in 1978 after he was first elected to the Senate. He was married to Liz Taylor then. I said ” Congratulations, Senator.”

I once asked a bunch of questions to J Kenneth Galbraith, one of which was, “Did you ever have to meet a payroll?” I don’t remember his answer. I was drunk. This was 1987, I think.

When I worked at a kitchen store, The Rolling Pin Kitchen Emporium, in Regency Square Mall, Jerry Lewis came into the store. It was 1995. He was touring with a production of Damn Yankees. He needed a knife to slice his bagels. He wore a red polo shirt with JL monogrammed on the left breast (where you normally see the crocodile in a LaCoste shirt). This was 1995. The shopping mall owners just announced that part of the mall would be converted to a multi-pool natatorium. Nobody shops much there anymore. Jerry Lewis died a couple of years ago.

I once saw Justice Antonin Scalia at the Red Mass offered for canon and civil lawyers by the Thomas More Society.

I once saw Mitt Romney’s motorcade and security detail go by on Interstate-64 during the 2012 Presidential Campaign. These guys would never in a million years think of going back to being “nobodies” after getting the attention they get. Maybe that’s while they all seem to hang on to fame like grim death.