President Harry S. Truman!

Project By: Cassandra Marie Hall Dr.Mash American Government 03/22/2011
Harry S. Truman was born Missouri on May 8, 1884, His father and mother were John Anderson Truman and Martha Ellen (Young) Truman. He had also had a brother Vivian Truman and a sister Mary Jane Truman Young Harry attended public schools in Independence, graduating from high school in 1901. After leaving school, he worked briefly as a timekeeper for a railroad construction contractor, then as a clerk in two Kansas City banks. In 1906 he returned to Grandview to help his father run the family farm. He continued working as a farmer for more than ten years. The religious background of President Truman, the 33rd president, was the second Baptist president. Truman did not attend a traditional school until he was eight Truman had three main interests: music, reading, and history, Truman enlisted in the Missouri Army National Guard in 1905, and served until 1911. Truman rejoined the Guard. Before going to France, he was sent to Camp Doniphan, near Lawton, Oklahoma for training. He ran the camp canteen with Edward Jacobson, a Kansas City clothing store clerk. Truman became an officer, and then battery commander in an artillery regiment in France. His unit was Battery D, 129th Field Artillery, 60th Brigade, 35th Infantry Division, known for its discipline problems.[25] During a sudden attack by the Germans in the Vosges Mountains, the battery started to disperse; Truman ordered them back into position using profanities that he had "learned while working on the Santa Fe railroad." On November 11, 1918 his artillery unit fired some of the last shots of World War I into German positions after the armistice was signed at 5 am but before the ceasefire took effect at 11 am. In a letter he wrote, "It is a shame we can't go in and devastate Germany and cut off a few of the Dutch kids' hands and feet and scalp a few of their old men".1922, with the help of the Kansas City democratic machine led by boss Tom Prendergast, some of Truman’s political experience was elected as a judge of the County Court of the eastern district of Jackson County — an administrative, not judicial, position similar to county commissioners elsewhere. Truman wanted to run for Governor or Congress, but Prendergast rejected these ideas. In 1934, Pendergast's aides suggested Harry Truman as a candidate for Senator; after three other men turned him down, Prendergast reluctantly backed Truman as the candidate for the 1934 U.S. Senate election for Missouri. On June 23, 1941, the day after Nazi Germany attacked the Soviet Union, Senator Truman declared: "If we see that Germany is winning we ought to help Russia and if Russia is winning we ought to help Germany, and that way let them kill as many as possible, although I don't want to see Hitler victorious under any circumstances. Neither of them thinks anything of their pledged word.” Truman was selected as Franklin Roosevelt's vice presidential candidate in 1944 as the result of a deal worked out by Hannegan, who was Democratic National Chairman that year. Roosevelt's physical condition deteriorated in mid-1944. Key FDR advisers, including outgoing Democratic National Committee Chairman Frank C. Walker, incoming Chairman Robert Hannegan, party treasurer Edwin W. Pauley, strategist Ed Flynn, and lobbyist George E. Allen worked to keep Henry Wallace off the ticket in the summer of 1944. Truman married his girlfriend, Bess Wallace, on June 28, 1919.] The couple had one child, Mary Margaret (February 17, 1924 – January 29, 2008). Some of the people Truman ran against was Truman replaced vice president Henry A. Wallace as Roosevelt's running mate in 1944. Some political information about the candidacy is Truman's candidacy was humorously dubbed the second "Missouri Compromise" at the 1944 Democratic National Convention in Chicago, as his appeal to the party center contrasted with the liberal Wallace and the conservative Byrnes. Truman was vice president for only 82 days when President Roosevelt died, April 12, 1945. After Roosevelt died he resided in office taking over were Roosevelt left off. Some supporters would have to be Truman asked all the members of FDR's cabinet to remain in place, told them that he was open to their advice, and laid down a central principle of his administration: he would be the one making decisions, and they were to support him one action he took in place while in office was the morning of August 6, 1945, at 8:15, the B-29 bomber Enola Gay dropped an atomic bomb, Little Boy, on Hiroshima. Cruiser USS Augusta (CA-31) on his way back to the U.S. after the Potsdam Conference. The Japanese agreed to surrender on August 14. His second term was grueling, in large measure because of foreign policy challenges connected directly or indirectly to his policy of containment. He quickly had to come to terms with the end of the American nuclear monopoly. With information provided by its espionage networks in the United States, the Soviet Union's atomic bomb project progressed much faster than had been expected and they exploded their first bomb on August 29, 1949. On January 7, 1953, Truman announced the detonation of the first U.S. hydrogen bomb. Also Truman was a strong supporter of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), which established a formal peacetime military alliance with Canada and many of the democratic European nations that had not fallen under Soviet control following World War II. June 25, 1950, the North Korean People's Army under the command of Kim Il-sung invaded South Korea, precipitating the outbreak of the Korean War. Before Truman’s death In Britain he received an honorary degree in Civic Law from Oxford University and met with Winston Churchill. On returning to the U.S., he supported Adlai Stevenson's second bid for the White House, although he had initially favored Democratic Governor W. Averell Harriman of New York. December 5, 1972, he was admitted to Kansas City's Research Hospital and Medical Center with lung congestion from pneumonia. He developed multiple organ failure and died at 7:50 am on December 26 at the age of 88. His wife died nearly ten years later, on October 18, 1982. They are buried at the Truman Library in Independence, Missouri. Bess Truman opted for a simple private service at the library for her husband rather than a state funeral in Washington. Foreign dignitaries attended a memorial service at Washington National Cathedral a week later. Harry S. Truman was one our finest president he was a great man who was harsh at times but saved us from disaster.