#34 Dwight D. Eisenhower : We All Like Ike Because He Liked it That Way

Eisenhower: Soldier and President by Stephen E. Ambrose, 1990.

As a lifelong Kansan, I wanted to be overwhelmed by our favorite son, Eisenhower.  And there is so much to like and respect about the man.  He is credited with the reemergence of fiscal conservatism and the republican party after a generation under

Roosevelt and Truman. However, in light of today’s party extremism, he is now considered a moderate.  And while he had few major accomplishments for his eight years in office, he still ranks in the top third of presidents based on the high respect people have for the man personally and the idolized image of the stability and prosperity of the 1950’s. 

So everyone still likes Ike, even today.

Every Kansas kid visits here in Abilene

Dwight was born in 1890 in Denton, TX but his family moved to Abilene, KS before he was two years old.  He father was a mechanic at a dairy and worked very hard to support the family which grew to include six boys.  They were devout Mennonites and strict but loving with their kids.  Dwight was always close with his brothers, especially Milton who became a career diplomat. When Dwight got a massive infection in his leg during his

Making my son Caleb appreciate Ike!

freshman year, he almost died and the doctor wanted to amputate it even though Dwight refused.  So his brother Edger laid in front of the door to stop the doctor from entering and Dwight recovered slowly.  The boys were tough and competitive with each other, leading Dwight to be a star football and baseball player in school.  He was an average student but very popular and good-looking, with a big grin and bright blue eyes.  He wanted to play football in college but was not really big enough to get a scholarship.  So a friend convinced him to take the exam to go to the Naval Academy.  However, his score was only good enough to get into West Point and off he went.

Odd stance for a running back

Dwight enjoyed West Point and played varsity football, until a horrible knee injury ended his playing days.  Dwight’s academic ranking fell from the middle of the class to near the bottom as he was so depressed.  However, he became the coach of the junior varsity football team and a cheerleader and that turned it all around.  He was good at encouraging his team and gaining their respect, future general skills.

Wedding pic, he is a hunk.

After he graduated in 1915, he was stationed in Texas and met 18-year-old Mamie Doud, from a wealthy family. Mamie was a bit spoiled, having grown up with a private maid. However, she worked hard to support him as a military wife but never really learned to cook.  The Eisenhowers moved 35 times in the first 35 years of their marriage.  Their first son, Dwight Doud was nicknamed Icky, but he died at the age of 4 from scarlet fever, an illness that also impacted Mamie and made her health always somewhat fragile. While they did have one other child, a son John, the loss of Icky was never forgotten and he is buried with them in Abilene. 

My favorite quote from Mamie is when she said no woman over the age of 50 should have to get out of bed before noon. She would sit in her bed half the day, dictating to her staff from her “Mamie pink” princess bed.

When World War One broke out, Ike was a captain in charge of training recruits in the use of a new weapon, the tank! Thousands of men passed through his training center and the army would not let him leave it to go to the front lines.  Finally, in 1918, Ike was set to go to France but the war ended. 

Ike is often stuck between Patton and Bradley

After WW1, Ike was sent to Panama as a chief of staff for a general and several other postings.   He also became good friends with George Patton and Omar Bradley, a former classmate at West Point. Eventually he was made a major and was sent to work at the war dept in Washington DC. 

Eisenhower disliked working for MacArthur

 Ike was then assigned to work for General Douglass MacArthur as his chief of staff.  Eisenhower described him as “a peculiar fellow” and he frequently clashed with the publicity hound, MacArthur during their almost 10 years together.  Five years of that time were spent in the Philippines trying to train and strengthen their army against the budding Japanese threat.  Eisenhower was miserable there; Mamie was frequently ill and he asked many times for MacArthur to let him transfer stateside. MacArthur thought he was irreplaceable and would not let him leave. 

Finally in 1939, he returned to the states to command a battalion and was promoted to colonel.  When the war broke out, he went to Washington to work directly with George Marshall, the Army chief of staff.  His hard work and ability to get along with everyone, especially the prickly British General Montgomery, caused Marshall to promote him to General and make him the US commander in Europe.  The British insisted on invading North Africa, Sicily then Italy.  While allied victories occurred, they were slow and costly, especially in Italy. Eisenhower’s cautious approach was intensified by his frequent need to push Montgomery to speed up his advances.

Roosevelt appointed Ike as Supreme Commander of Allied Europe Forces for three main reasons. First, he had the most experience in organizing major offensives using multiple nations, like the North Africa campaign.  Second, he was the only man who seemed to work well and be liked/respected by Churchill, DeGaulle and the Soviet General Zhukov. Third, his ability to deal with the temperaments of Patton and Bradley was crucial.   Eisenhower’s ability to coordinate so many plans with such a vast and diverse group far exceed any military genius of strategy that he possessed. His insistence on the massive use of air power and his choice of the date of the D-Day invasion were perhaps his greatest direct contributions.  However, his failure to push for Berlin and allow the Russians to take it first, was probably the worst decision he made.

Ike with the troops, wearing the Eisenhower jacket. He always asked if anyone was from Kansas.

After the war Eisenhower continued to be the military overseer of Germany but by 1945 he returned to serve as the Army Chief of Staff for Truman, replacing Marshall. Truman offered to hand the Democratic presidential nomination to Eisenhower for the 1948 election and offered to serve as Ike’s vice president.   Eisenhower insisted for many years he had no interest in the presidency, in fact no one even knew what party he would pick.  But he began to hang around almost exclusively with a group of very wealthy republicans who helped him get a job as the president of Columbia University in 1949. 

Ike was rude to Truman.

When the US joined the Korean War in 1950, Eisenhower was sent to Europe to be the commander of NATO- a post he loved.  However, he was frustrated by the lack of funding and troops the US and other nations would commit to NATO. Also, Eisenhower’s insistence that the German military needed to participate in NATO to hold back the Soviets angered the French and Brits.  In 1951, his gang of wealthy friends started making a serious push for him to run for president.  When Truman submitted a budget with a huge deficit in February 1952, that seemed to be what made Ike decide to run as a Republican.

Ike: "Dick , your name fits you!"

Ike ran on a platform of balancing the budget and getting the troops out of Korea. Nixon was selected as his running mate to add some youth to the ticket (at 62 Ike would be the oldest president) and to appeal to the western states, even though Ike was not really a big fan of Nixon.  He also had to walk a fine line between looking tough on communism without being pulled into the McCarthy witch-hunt by the far-right Republicans.  Eisenhower won easily over Adlai Stevenson but his harsh campaign rhetoric about Truman ruined any sort of relationship.

Ike’s consistent goal was always to have a balanced budget, a difficult task when both parties wanted to massively increase defense spending on nuclear weapons during the cold war.  Ike did oversee a massive build up of ICBMs but managed to reduce other

military expenses. Ike knew that the use of nuclear weapons would

just lead to our own destruction.  His refusal to use them at anytime and his attempts to limit testing and set arms limits with the Soviets was an impressive accomplishment considering how many times he was advised to use them against China. Instead he greatly increased more covert methods, expanding the use of the CIA worldwide.

Eisenhower oversaw a truce with North Korea even though he was the first to use the “Domino theory” about the fall of countries to communism. Only his own military and personal reputation could make this solution not feel like a defeat.  But it just postponed this problem to our current times. 

Relations with the Soviets continued to get worse during his terms due to the U2 spy plane scandal and the Soviet launch of Sputnik. With all the worry over communism, Ike refused to openly confront Joe McCarthy,who he personally hated.  Ike thought McCarthy would just fade out if he was ignored.  This lack of action by Ike just allowed McCarthy to run amok for years and launch attacks on friends like Marshall and Bradley. In fact, critics have called Ike’s presidency, “the great postponement” as Ike liked to avoid conflicts, a reason that everyone liked him.

Ike’s creation of the Interstate highway system and the post war economic boom, (while not a direct result of anything he actually did) made him even more popular.  And he refused to cut taxes unless spending was cut an equal amount... I love this idea! However, his greatest failure as president was his refusal to  actively endorse or support civil rights legislation and desegregation.  Ike needed the support of southern democrats on many issues in congress and would not upset them.  Until the federal govt was forced to intervene in Little Rock, he was very non-committal and tried to avoid the issue saying it was up to the states.  His own views on race were pretty bad by today’s standards. However, he inadvertently did one of the best things ever for civil rights when he appointed Earl Warren as chief justice of the Supreme Court.

Eisenhower was always very active playing golf, hunting, fishing but for most of his life was a chain smoker with up to four packs per day. (He played golf 150 times a year as president- WHAT!) However, he had a large heart attack in 1955 that sidelined him from running the country for months and then a mild stroke in 1957 in his second term.  Eisenhower’s wishy-washy support for Nixon contributed to Nixon's loss to Kennedy in 1960.

After his presidency, he and Mamie retired to their farm in Gettysburg.

Ike had been catered to for so many years he did not know how to make a phone call, pay a toll or by clothes at a store.  He made a lot of money writing his memoirs and continued to advise presidents Kennedy, Johnson and Nixon on foreign and military issues. He supervised the creation of the Eisenhower library and burial site in Abilene.  In the 1968 election he was more vocal in his support of Nixon and his grandson soon married Julie Nixon.

By April 1968 Ike had experienced his third major heart attack and knew his heart was failing. He continued to become more frail and died March of 1969 with Mamie and his son John by his side.  She survived ten years after his death.

Ike's ability to hold down military spending  and to foresee the rise of the powerful "military industrial complex" is almost spooky.  One of his greatest worries about his predecessors was  that "Some day there is going to be a man sitting in my present chair who has not been raised in the military services and who will have little understanding of where slashes in their estimates can be made with little or no damage.  If that should happen while we still have the state of tension that now exists in the world, I shudder to think of what could happen to this country."  WOW, this sounds like almost every president since Ike.

Ike would be horrified at our current debt, tax cuts, $700 billion military budget, and lack of dignity in politics. 

Another accurate prophecy.

#8 Martin Van Buren: He Should Have Stayed in the Senate (1836-1840)

"Martin Van Buren" by Ted Widmer, 2005.

Martin Van Buren’s most lasting impact on American history

actually happened when he was a senator. His creation and master manipulation of the two-party system, still has a stranglehold on our political system to this day.  With nicknames like “sly fox” or “little magician” you can picture him wheeling and dealing his way up the political ladder.  Ironically, his other lasting impact resulted from his nickname “Old Kinderhook” which became the basis for the word OK! But he is a hard guy to pin down and even harder guy to get interested in… trust me.

Martin Van Buren was born in Kinderhook, NY to a Dutch family.  He is the only president to have English as a second language and the first president actually born in the U.S.  His father and mother ran a tavern/inn with the help of their 8 kids and six slaves.  Since there was little money, after he was grown, Martin apprenticed with a lawyer.  When his boss commented on his “poor clothing”, Martin immediately went and bought the fanciest suit in town. For the rest of his life he became a flashy, dresser… often called a dandy. Van Buren was always described as a bit of a flirt and considered good looking.  (HUH??!)  He was always a bit self-conscious about his lack of education or family money background.  He joined the Democratic-Republican party and was a huge fan of Jefferson (and ironically also Aaron Burr). He believed in a very limited government and states’ rights.

After passing the bar, Van Buren opened a law office in Kinderhook and did pretty well, not the most intelligent lawyer but always the best prepared. He married a distant cousin, Hannah, and they had four sons.  There is virtually no information about Hannah since she died after their first 12 years of marriage. However, Martin must have loved her as he spoke fondly of her and never remarried.

VB wearing the sorting hat.. I bet he was a Ravenclaw.

He started in politics at the state level and discovered he had a knack for creating coalitions of people- using wealthy donors, local party bosses and newspapers to create a group known as the “Albany regency”.  While it has always been a historical mystery how he did this, he traveled to and wrote to people constantly.   He was also quick to switch sides so he could be on the winning side. Van Buren was a master at not giving away his opinions (political double talk), often accused of refusing to take a stand on issues. He even convinced New York to rewrite their state constitution.

Jackson's Kitchen Cabinet- VB  in there

In 1821, he was elected to the US senate and quickly worked his wiles again, becoming the chairman of the finance and judiciary committees. Andrew Jackson, who’s forthright personality and quick temper were the exact opposite of Van Buren, was impressed with Van Buren’s ability to get things done in the Senate.   The combination of Jackson’s popularity and Van Buren’s coalition of power led them to split the democratic-republican party to create the Democratic party, based on southern slave/economic issues joined with northern “plain men”.   Van Buren also created the nominating convention, party caucus and worked the electoral college like no one else had. So, when Jackson won the presidency in 1828, he made Van Buren his Secretary of State, a job he only kept for 43 days.  Jackson wanted to do a whole “cabinet shakeup” but Van Buren became Jackson’s closest informal adviser in his “kitchen cabinet”.

For the 1832 election, Jackson dropped Calhoun as his VP and added Van Buren to the ticket. They won by a landslide.  Together they worked to dismantle the national bank and any government constraints on the banking or financial sector… a move that would bite Van Buren in the butt later. When Jackson’s second term was ending, he anointed Van Buren as his successor, certain that Van Buren would do exactly as he had.

Van Buren won the presidential election in 1836 with a lot of help from his home state of NY and the southern states.  While he never openly supported slavery, he did believe that it was constitutional and legal, a stance that tried to please northern and southern voters.

Less than three months after Van Buren took office, the Panic of 1837 happened.  This was our nation’s worst economic disaster until the Great Depression.  Jackson’s freewheeling, hands off approach to the banking sector led to massive borrowing and banks began to fail.  Van Buren spent most of his term trying to create an independent treasury system, finally succeeding in 1840, but it really was too little, too late.  He did almost nothing to alleviate the misery, starvation and unemployment during the Panic. Meanwhile, he was criticized for his lavish entertaining at the White House and fancy, expensive clothes.

Other dubious events in his presidency were the Trail of Tears removal of the Cherokee… something he seemed pretty proud of.  He also helped eliminate/exterminate most of the Seminole Indians from Florida. Van Buren also got involved in the escaped slave case of the Amistad ship, favoring the return of the slaves to their owners in Spain.  Thank goodness John Quincy Adams prevented that by arguing their case in the supreme court.

I think Anthony Hopkins is VB

In 1840, the Republican half of the old democratic-republican party, now called the Whigs, nominated Harrison to run for president.  But really Van Buren lost almost all support from his own party because the economy was so crappy. After losing a second term to Harrison, Van Buren returned to his overly fancy house in Kinderhook called Lindenwald.

Through the years he became more and more openly opposed to slavery, alienating his southern supporters.  He actually accepted the 1848 presidential nomination of a group call the “free state party”- losing badly in the election.  (It is soooooooooooo ironic for a man who created the two-party system to be defeated by his own creation.) He spent his remaining years trying to influence slave laws and traveling extensively to Europe to search for a cure for one of his sons who eventually died.

#33 Harry S. Truman: The Most Honest and American of all Presidents

“Truman” by David McCullough, 1992.

I miss Harry Truman, an honest, forthright, plain speaking, hardworking self-made man. Ironically, he is also the least educated modern president and the poorest president ever.  The adversities he faced in life would have made many give up, but he always believed in himself and his country.  You do not find anyone who did not like or respect him- even if they disagreed with him. Opponents, press, foreign leaders, and critics admired and respected him personally.  While history does not revere him as the most innovative, accomplished, or inspirational of presidents, if you google “character of presidents”, his name is at the top of the list.   Of all the presidents I have studied, he is the one I truly wish was president today.

Harry Truman’s parents were farmers and his father traded livestock.  The oldest child, he had very poor vision and was not that physically strong.  Harry was a mama’s boy who liked to help in the kitchen more than the farm.  But his mama was one tough mother and made him into a kind, honest man.   Harry excelled at playing the piano, having dreams of becoming a concert pianist.  He was sort of a bookish, nerdy kid but everyone liked him because he was so friendly and helpful. College was not affordable and West Point rejected him due to his poor vision.  So after graduating high school in Independence , MO he went to work at a bank in Kansas City. Harry progressed very well at the bank and continued to study the piano.  But 5 years later, he father’s trading business failed and forced the family to return to farming on his mother’s family farm near Grandview, MO. Harry returned to farming the 600 acres and for the next 10 years worked hard to scrape a living for the family. This was plowing with mules, sun up to sun down in a house without running water or electricity. But Harry never complained and after his father died, assumed the role taking care of his grandmother, mother and sister.

Harry, Mom and sister on family farm

The bright spot of Harry’s time on the farm was his frequent drives to Independence to visit Bess Wallace.  They had gone to school

See if you can spot Harry and Bess

together and friendship blossomed very slowly (7 or 8 years) into

romance.  Part of the problem was that Bess’s mother was a cranky,

controlling old woman who did not think

Harry and his family were good enough for her daughter.  When Bess’s father committed suicide, her mother just sucked the life out of Bess.  Even after they were married, her mother insisted that Bess stay with her.  Bess and Harry never owned their own home, living with cranky old Mrs. Wallace in her big Victorian house in Independence their whole lives, staying in that home even after her death.  Their daughter Margaret was born, when Harry was 40 years old, and she was also raised in this house.

When WW1 erupted, Harry memorized the eye chart so he could pass the physical exam and joined the army at the age of 33.  He was promoted to captain of an artillery unit and adored by his men. His troop became life long friends.  After the war, he and Bess

married and he needed to find employment that allowed him to live in Independence with cranky Mrs. Wallace.  The farm was now mostly run by his mom and sister, but he still helped out as much as he could.  He started a men’s clothing store in Kansas City with an army buddy- a natural business for Harry who was always a sharp dressed man. However, as the economy soured in the 1920’s, the store failed.  Harry refused to take bankruptcy and spent many years to pay it off. 

Harry and Tom Pendergast

Needing a job, Harry approached the Kansas City democratic party boss, Tom Pendergast, to gain his support for a run as a county judge.  (This judge position is actually more like a county commissioner, overseeing roads, construction, county functions etc) Pendergast supported him so Harry won. But when Harry was awarding road contracts, he was shocked to find Pendergast cronies stealing from the county.  He had to ignore the theft of 10K$ of highway funds in order to get funding and support for a new courthouse and six-million-dollar road package.  This is the one time Harry let Pendergast pull one over on him and it always bothered him. But Pendergast knew in the future he could only count on Harry’s support for honest contracts so their relationship continued. As a county judge, Harry was instrumental in the building of the Nelson Art Museum, city auditorium and Power and Light building in KC, all iconic structures in KC today. 

After eight years as a county judge, Harry wanted to run for governor but Pendergast convinced him to run for the senate. After he won, some referred to him as the senator from Pendergast.  Harry always defended him as a friend and justified it by saying a party leader is only a leader if he has the support of the people so Pendergast must be doing what the people wanted. Harry never personally profited from any contract or political connection or decision. A fact undisputed by his critics and opponents.Harry struggled in Washington at first, but quietly developed the respect of fellow senators.  

Bess hated living in Washington and for years just spent most of her time in Independence with her mother and Margaret.  They also struggled financially as Harry was probably the only senator to actually live on his salary and refused any sort of graft.  Harry finally made a name for himself by investigating the corruption of defense contractors during the war, saving untold millions during WW2.  This committee got his name in the newspapers a lot. 

Harry’s squeaky-clean image and the fact that everyone liked him, lead FDR’s team to pick him to be the VP for Roosevelt’s fourth term.  Truman did not really want the job but wanted Roosevelt and the democrats to win, so he agreed.  Truman barely knew FDR and due to FDR’s poor health, Truman did the majority of campaigning for them. The few images of them together show how healthy and robust Truman was compared to FDR.  In fact, Truman was worried that FDR was dying.

After the election, Roosevelt’s cabinet pretty much excluded Truman from anything, he wasn’t even allowed to know about the Manhattan Project.  In fact, FDR and Truman only met twice in person after the election.  When Roosevelt died in April after only 82 days of his fourth term, Truman took office and had to get up to speed on the war, the development of the bomb and foreign affairs.  Slowly Truman would replace most of Roosevelt's cabinet

members. After the victory in Europe in May, Truman participated with Churchill and Stalin in the Potsdam conference. Ironically, he kind of liked Stalin on a personal level and found Churchill too slow moving in decisions- a big contrast to Truman’s decisive nature.

While he was at Potsdam, Truman made the decision to drop the atomic bombs on the Japanese.  History has often second guessed this choice, but Truman never wavered in defending this choice.  He saw it as the fastest way to end the war with the least loss of life- both American and Japanese. 

After the war, Truman had to deal with the shortage of housing and jobs for returning soldiers.  This stress caused strikes in the rail and steel industries.  Once again Truman was decisive and planned to

draft all railway workers into the army so he could order them back to work.  This tactic led to a quick settlement. He also racially integrated the military and federal work force.

 Foreign affairs became a real strength for Truman. Rebuilding Europe after the war was a giant task, and Truman selected a giant of a man for the job- General George Marshall, former army Chief of staff.  He became Truman’s secretary of state and developed the Marshall Plan. The formation of Israel was a very tense, controversial move

but Truman made the US the first to recognize the new nation. Truman also confronted the Soviet’s blockade of Berlin by instituting the Berlin Airlift. Truman’s tough stance against the Russian’s was very popular.

In 1948, Truman decided to run again.  No one thought he could win and all the polls showed him losing to republican, Thomas Dewey.  Even the democratic party offered minimal support. Southern democrats were upset with his progress on civil rights and put forth their own candidate, Strom Thurmond.   So Truman decided to appeal to the people.  His massive, exhausting whistle stop train campaign was wildly popular.  Truman was never a dynamic speaker but when he

could improvise with a group of regular folks, he became so

relatable to people.  Their chants of “Give em hell, Harry” were signs of affection and respect. Dewey barely even spoke when campaigning since he thought he had it won.  The final tally showed the president had secured 303 electoral votes, Dewey 189, and Strom Thurmond only 39.

Truman’s next term was dominated by the involvement of the US in the Korean War.  He struggled with the prima donna General MacArthur, who so blatantly disrespected and disregarded Truman

and his policies, that Truman was forced to fire him--- a very unpopular move. This war would end in basically a stalemate at the 38^th parallel, but not until Eisenhower’s term.  The unpopularity of a lengthy war led to the end of Truman’s political career, just as Vietnam did to Johnson’s.

Other foreign policy successes of this term involved the careful approach to the Chinese communist revolution and the

establishment of the NATO treaties.  The continued suppression of eastern European countries by the Russians, led to the development of the cold war and hysteria about communism.   While Truman insisted on a “loyalty program” for federal workers (something he later called “a terrible mistake”), he was disgusted by the tactics of McCarthyism.  Truman’s secretary of state was now Dean Acheson, a great diplomat who would become Truman’s closest, lifelong friend.

Truman chose not to run for re-election in 1952- a wise choice since the wildly popular republican Eisenhower won in a landslide. Harry and Bess headed home to move back into his mother in-laws house that they had now inherited.  Harry refused to take any money or gifts from donors, accept speaking fees or work as a lobbyist.  He made a small amount of money writing his memoirs but really needed the presidential pension of $25,000 per year which was passed in 1957. Harry worked very hard fundraising for and organizing the Truman Presidential Library, keeping an office

there until his death.  When President Johnson signed the bill for Medicare in 1965, he did so in Independence at the Truman Library as a tribute to Harry who had first proposed the idea of healthcare for all.  Harry and Bess received the first two Medicare cards. He died in 1972 and Bess died ten years later.  They are both buried at the Truman Library.

Harry Truman could be impulsive, quick tempered and stubborn.  But he was always honest with the press, people, politicians and other leaders. He always accepted responsibility for his mistakes- “the buck stops here”. His humility also led him to credit much of his achievements to Marshall and others. He worked 12 hours a day 6 and a half days a week as president.  His lack of a college education made him determined to study every issue more than any other

president.   He was completely faithful to Bess his whole life- never the slightest whiff of scandal. His enduring popularity and respect have always placed him among the greats. Because Harry Truman was always just completely himself, the best of American men.