President harry truman like to refer to his wife as the boss. Family was their number one priority. Destroyed many of her letters and spend a good part of her white house years home in missouri. Truman served as true first lady on her own terms. Cspans continuing series first ladies, influence and image. Tonight, story the 33rd president of the United States, this truman. Here to tell us more about her, we are pleased to welcome back to our set the white house historian, his latest book called the imperial season. And the history professor and author of a biography of harry truman called the coming of the cold war. Thank you for being here. Where we left off last week was the death of Franklin Roosevelt. April 12th 1945. The call comes into harry truman. Where is he . He gets the message that he is needed. He is having a drink with his cronies as he often was known to do. A lot of politics was accomplished by relaxing and having somewhat more cordial atmosphere. He received a phone cal
Pr hesident harry truman lid to refer to bess as the boss. Family was the number one priority. He had little to say to the media, destroyed many of her letters and spent a good part of the white house years at home in missouri. Bess truman served as first lady on her own terms. Welcome to first ladies influence and image. Tonight the story of the wife of the 33rd president of the United States, bess truman. Here to tell us more about her are two guests were pleased to welcome back to our set. Bill seal, and nicole anslover. Nice to meet you. Thank you. Where we left off last week was the death of franklin roosevelt. April 12, 1945. The call comes in to harry truman, where is he, then he gets the message hes needed. He is having a drink with his cronies as he was often wanting to do. He thought a lot of politics was accomplished by relaxing and having a somewhat more cordial atmosphere. He received a phone call and said he just knew. The story goes that he ran to get to his car and get
I know she still loved him why didnt you do it . But for him i would want to understand why he could not him share himself more fully with anyone the most charming and thoughtful personality but underneath there was such reserve in him and i want to understand why he couldnt give himself more to the people who loved him. And to understand not only franklin and eleanor but in many cases to understand the whole extended family that surrounded them in the white house and that these two characters really needed other people to meet those needs left over at the end of their troubled marriage so the second family quarters of the white house was like a hotel and there was about seven People Living there all intimate friends that was new and fun for me. Cspan if you had ask a question about personal relationships that theyve had with other people, who would you be most interested in . Frankly it would be franklin. Not just because he had an affair with her and almost broke up eleanors marriage
Returned to the farm. Thats a theme that this country was founded on. If you go up to the rotunda in the capital and you look at the great painting of the tremble of George Washington turning over his powers as commanderinchief and the Continental Army to the congress, the cincinnatus symbols are all do that painting because the Founding Fathers really believe this is what democracy entails. It meant that citizenship met any citizen should be called, could be called upon any time to serve his country or her country and any capacity including the greatest power. In the power belong to the people, therefore, power would be returned by those who held it for a time. Truman liked to say i try never to forget who i was, where he came from, and where would go back to. Thats the cincinnatus Team Obviously but it also shows that he knows who he was. He knew who he was and he was proud of who he was and the return to independence after he left the office of the presidency in 1953 was his way of
Cspan why wouldnt the government at that time have protections for him . Guest why wouldnt the government have a pension. There were for pensions for nobody else and not a penchant for the present in effect he had very little money. He had to borrow money quite secretly which dean acheson cosigned to pay for the move back home. This is not wellknown and it doesnt mean he didnt have any money. He did have money but he needed cash to cover all the expenses coming out of the white house. When he got home in order to provide himself some income he undertook the writing of his autobiography, his memoirs which no other president had ever done except for herbert hoover. Hoovers time in office was much briefer than was trumans presidency and covered far more tumultuous history so to undertake the 2volume memoir was a very major ambitious task and then he build his library. There had been a previous president ial library, Franklin Roosevelt library at hyde park established after roosevelt had d