New York- Busty actress Sally Kirkland tattles that curiously-coiffed "Nightline" anchor Ted Koppel was the first man to lay a hand on her ample bosom.
Kirkland, 60, says Koppel made his move when he was a 17-year-old senior at Manhattan's McBurney HS and she was 14-year-old freshman at Nightingale, when they were riding in the back of a horse-drawn carriage after his prom.
"Ted had those huge ears, which stuck out so much and everyone called him 'Dumbo,' " Kirkland recalled to Webster Hall curator Baird Jones.
"He certainly was not a looker. But I didn't care because he was so smart . . . I had made up my mind that I would let him do what he wanted with my body, which for a ninth-grader meant going to second base. I wanted the experience of being a full woman.
"But I only let Ted touch my breast on the outside of my prom dress. Fortunately the buggy driver was discreet and did not look back. I had pecked other girls at all-night parties, but this was the first time I had let someone else's tongue in my mouth.
"I wanted it to be so intense and exciting. Instead the buggy ride made it into this awkward screw-up, and then we were dumped on our rear ends trying to still appear sophisticated, which was impossible. So we had to stop kissing, which was infuriating. I am certain it was his first kiss, too."
An ABC spokesman told PAGE SIX that a "laughing" Koppel responded, "Please! I have impressionable grandchildren."
But kooky Kirkland wasn't finished dishing about her prom night experiences.
"The crazy thing is, just a few months later I did bite off my tongue completely on a date with a boy at another prom," she said.
"I was in a head-on car accident. I was in the passenger seat without a seat belt. The boy had been drinking and lost control of his car. I was in a coma for days. I was lucky I even lived. It was a head-on collision. They rushed me and my severed tongue to the emergency ward where they reattached it. I had to have a 100 stitches.
"To this day I have trouble saying certain sounds. When I say 'Sally,' there is a slight lisp and it comes out 'Shally.' The right side of my tongue is a bit numb because half of the nerves did not grow back. So my tongue karma was ill-fated, and Ted Koppel got off lucky that night in the buggy."
