A look back at Watergate

The Watergate scandal in pictures, from the break-in to the congressional investigation to President Richard M. Nixon’s resignation.

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The Watergate, situated along Washington's Potomac waterfront and home to the Democratic National Committee offices. Police interrupted five burglars attempting to break into the DNC offices on June 17, 1972.

/ AP

President Richard M. Nixon talks with H.R. "Bob" Haldeman in the Oval Office. Haldeman, Nixon’s chief of staff, spent 18 months in prison for his role in Watergate.

/ National Archives

Workmen remove a desk from a Democratic National Committee office in the Watergate complex. Even though Nixon was headed to an easy reelection in 1972, a plan was hatched to bug the DNC offices in an attempt to gain an advantage.

/ AP

Washington Post Publisher Katharine Graham with Post reporters Carl Bernstein and Bob Woodward, who pursued the Watergate story, in 1972.

Mark Godfrey

G. Gordon Liddy renders a salute on arrival at U.S. District Court for an appearance in connection with the Watergate trial on Jan. 15, 1973. Liddy, a former FBI agent who helped plan the break-in, spent about four years in prison for his role in Watergate.

/ AP

President Nixon tells a White House news conference in 1973 that he will not allow White House Counsel John Dean to testify on Capitol Hill in the Watergate investigation.

CHARLES TASNADI / AP

John Dean, former White House counsel to Nixon, is sworn in by the Senate Watergate Committee. Dean, who had spent four months in prison after being charged with obstruction of justice for refusing to testify, ultimately told investigators that he discussed aspects of the Watergate coverup with Nixon or in his presence on at least 35 occasions.

/ AP

White House special counsel Charles W. Colson, shown here giving congressional testimony in 1973, served seven months in prison in 1974 after pleading guilty to obstruction of justice in the Watergate-related Daniel Ellsberg case.

/ The Washington Post

Former attorney general John Mitchell, right, served 19 months in prison after being convicted of conspiracy, perjury and obstruction of justice for his role in Watergate.

/ UPI

Archibald Cox is sworn is as special Watergate prosecutor by Judge Charles Fahy during a ceremony in May 1973 at the Justice Department, as Attorney General Elliot Richardson looks on. In October 1973, Richardson and Deputy Attorney General William D. Ruckelshaus resigned rather than follow Nixon’s order to fire Cox.

/ UPI

Reporters Bob Woodward, right, and Carl Bernstein in the newsroom of The Washington Post in May 1973. Their reporting on Watergate would win the pair a Pulitzer Prize.

/ AP

Nixon sits in his White House office Aug. 16, 1973, as he poses for pictures after delivering a nationwide television address dealing with Watergate. Nixon repeated that he had no prior knowledge of the Watergate break-in and was not aware of any coverup.

/ AP

FBI official Mark Felt, left, was the anonymous source known as Deep Throat who helped steer Woodward and Bernstein's reporting.

/ The Washington Post

Rose Mary Woods, Nixon's secretary, sits at her White House desk, demonstrating the movement that could have resulted in the erasure of part of the Watergate tapes.

/ AP

The original Nixon White House tape and original tape recorder.

/ AP

Nixon points to the transcripts of the White House tapes April 29, 1974, after he announced in a nationally televised speech that he would turn over the transcripts to House impeachment investigators and make them public.

/ AP

President Nixon walks toward the Oval Office before his televised resignation.

/ AFP

Nixon announces on Aug. 8, 1974, that he will resign the office of president, effective noon Friday, Aug. 9, 1974.

/ AP

Nixon's letter of resignation to Secretary of State Henry A. Kissinger.

/ AP

Richard Nixon says goodbye with a salute to his staff members outside the White House as he boards a helicopter after resigning. Nixon was the first president in U.S. history to resign the nation's highest office. His resignation came after approval of an impeachment article against him by the House Judiciary Committee for withholding evidence from Congress. He stepped down having served as the 37th president for 2,026 days and urging Americans to rally behind new President Gerald R. Ford. Ford fully pardoned Nixon one month later.

/ AP

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