Before anyone knew Donald Trump as a presidential candidate, my family was at home watching him on our big box TV, creating large marketing challenges, making difficult business decisions and giving celebrities a taste of the real world. I remember sitting in front of the screen in the early 2000s, not missing one episode of "The Apprentice" or "Celebrity Apprentice," where he pushed people to their limits when it came to business challenges. I looked up to him and dreamed of some day being able to compete on the show. His business skills were impeccable, and he stood out with confidence, firing people on the show when a costly mistake was made.
It wasn’t always like that. Back in the late 1970s and early 1980s, all the publicity on Trump was about real estate. Donald started out at his father's relatively modest real-estate firm, before creating The Trump Organization in 1981. It was his own real estate firm, created when he was a mere 35 years old. During the '80s, New York developers referred to him briefly based on his various high-priced deals around town. The ultimate symbol of his success comes in the form of a tower. The Trump Tower, built on fifth avenue in midtown Manhattan, is a 68 story building with mostly condos and apartments, finished in January 1983. Saying they were in demand would be an understatement. Of the 263 apartments, there were 17,000 applicants before it even opened.
Trump was being referred to as a tycoon by the end of the year. By 1984, he owned one billion in New York real estate, including the Trump Tower. Did you know that in 1989, Time Magazine declared the idea of Trump running for president as far-fetched? Yeah, in the January of 1989, Donald Trump landed on the cover of Time Magazine as he rose to fame in the 1980's. Trump made his first appearance on "60 Minutes" in 1985. He complained to Mike Wallace about the press: “I believe they make me out to be something more sinister than I really am.” He also proposed a giant Manhattan project called Television City, that would have included the world's tallest building. That plan did not go through, but it did make the papers. It was a segway that helped him get his name out there and noticed. In 1987, he considered a presidential run, but later decided not to. He made his way into national politics as his fame increased through his reality TV appearances.
Here he appears on the Late Show with David Letterman back in 1988:
On "The Oprah Winfrey Show" in 1988, Trump complimented presidential candidates George H.W. Bush, Michael Dukakis and Jessie Jackson. He also complained that Japan is beating the United States, and declared that while he didn’t plan to run for president, he wouldn’t rule it out (and would probably win the office if he were to mount a candidacy). “I really am tired of seeing what’s happening with this country,” he said, “how we’re really making other people live like kings, and we’re not.”
In 1988, Trump attended the Republican National Convention as a guest of Vice President George H.W. Bush, whom he supported in that year’s presidential contest. While there, the businessman sat down with Larry King for a CNN interview. “Are you a Bush Republican?” King asked.
Trump answered: “No, the people that I do best with drive the taxis. You know, wealthy people don’t like me because I’m competing with them all the time. And I like to win. I go down the streets of New York and the people that really like me are the workers.”
Later on in the interview, Letterman asked him if he’d ever consider running for office. Trump said he was enjoying his work as a real estate developer too much. "What about eight or twelve years in the future", Letterman pressed. “I don’t know,” Trump answered. “Do you want to see the United States become a winner?”
In many ways, the Donald Trump on display in the 1980s seems preferable to the one now running for office, but the 1980's Donald Trump is long gone.
