Harry,
You said you attended the Senate Watergate hearings in our nation's Capitol.
With the infamous 18 minute gap in the Watergate tapes, it still is unknown whether Nixon "ordered" any crimes.  Most people believe Nixon committed crimes as well as creating the "plumbers" team to cover them up.
Ford's pardon of Nixon was unique.  It was unconditional and applied to "any and all crimes in the past as well as in the future".  So even after Nixon's resignation, his other crimes that may come to light will be pardoned--an unprecedented presidential pardon in American history.  That was the Ford pardon deal Haig presented to NIxon to get him to resign to "end America's long national nightmare" peaceably.
There have been hundreds of presidential pardons but none like Ford's pardon of your hero, Richard Milhous Nixon.