United States Marine Corps War Memorial

Two very important memorials were unveiled on this day, November 10. In 1954, the United States Marine Corps War Memorial was dedicated in Arlington, VA.  The bronze sculpture by Felix de Weldon depicts Marines raising the flag over Iwo Jima during World War II and is based on a photograph by Joe Rosenthal. 

In 1982 the Vietnam Veterans Memorial Wall was opened to the public.  This haunting monument contains the 58,267 names of those killed or missing in action from the conflict and along with Three Soldiers statue, the Vietnam Women’s Memorial make up the Vietnam Veteran’s Memorial National Memorial.

Vietnam Veterans Memorial Wall

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In addition to being Election Day 2010, November 2 is also the birthday of two of our presidents, James K. Polk and Warren G. Harding.
Polk was our 11th president, a Democrat and was born on this date back in 1795 in North Carolina. However, he represented Tennessee as Governor and later as a Congressman, and served as Speaker of the House. Polk was known for his strong foreign policy, threatening war with Britain and leading the country to victory over the Mexican American War and the Mexican Cession increasing the size of the United States by nearly one third with California, New Mexico, Arizona, Colorado and Wyoming. It was during Polk’s single term as having promised he would not run for re-election, that the US Naval Academy and the Smithsonian Institute were opened and ground was broken on the Washington Monument. Polk generally thought of as one of our best presidents for creating an agenda and accomplishing it.

Warren G. Harding was our 29th President. He was born in Corsica, Ohio in 1865. He was a newspaper publisher by trade and served as an Ohio State Senator, Lt. Governor of Ohio and later in the US Senate. Unfortunately, while Polk is always favorably rated, Harding is not, mostly due the the numerous scandals that marked his brief presidency. He was often associated with the Ohio Gang, a group of politicians and industry leaders from Ohio that were responsible for the Teapot Dome Scandal, and acts of corruption. Harding died of a heart attack two years into his term and was succeeded by Vice President Calvin Coolidge.

James K. Polk

Warren G. Harding

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Dwight David Eisenhower, 34th President of the United States

Today, October 13 marks the 110th anniversary of the birth of our 34th President, Dwight David Eisenhower. President Eisenhnower visited the Little White house twice, once for meetings in 1955 and to recover from a heart attack in 1956. The Eisenhower’s list of accomplishments are long: Supreme Commander of the Allied Forces in Europe, Chief of Staff of Staff of the US Army, President of Columbia University and Supreme Commander of NATO. And this was before becoming President of the United State of America.

Eisenhower was elected president in 1952 and is one of only 5 other presidents to have never held political office prior to being president. At the time of his election he was the second oldest person (after James Buchanan), at the age of 62, to be elected president. Eisenhower was the first president to be televised on color television, the first president to be constitutionally prevented from running for re-election and the first president fall under the Former Presidents Act, giving presidents a pension and Secret Service protection upon leaving office. Eisenhower was the last president to be born in the 19th century.

The last two American states were admitted to the Union during Eisenhower’s presidency and he appointed five justices to the Supreme Court include Earl Warren as Chief Justice in 1953. One of the greatest accomplishments of the Eisenhower Administration was the creation of and Interstate Highway System. Eisenhower also created the Department of Health, Education and Welfare (today known as the Dept. of Health and Human Services and the Dept. of Education created in 1979) into a cabinet level position.

After retirement, Eisenhower and his wife, Mamie, retired to their farm next to Gettysburg Battlefield and after his death donated the farm to the National Park Service. Eisenhower died of congestive heart failure on March 28, 1969. At his funeral, President Richard M. Nixon, who had served as vice president under Eisenhower said,

“Some men are considered great because they lead great armies or they lead powerful nations. For eight years now, Dwight Eisenhower has neither commanded an army nor led a nation; and yet he remained through his final days the world’s most admired and respected man, truly the first citizen of the world.”

Eisenhower is buried next to his wife Mamie, who died in 1979 and his son Doud, who died at the age of 3 in 1921 at the Eisenhower Presidential Library in Abilene, Kansas.

The Harry S. Truman Little White House currently has an exhibit, We Like Ike, Too, that is free and open to the public, featuring photos and memorabilia from Eisenhower’s time in Key West. It runs through December.

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William Jefferson Clinton

Today is the 64th birthday of our 42 president, William Jefferson Clinton. Clinton was born in Hope, Arkansas. Clinton is a graduate of Georgetown University, Yale Law School and is a Rhodes Scholar. He is married to Hillary Rodham Clinton, the current United States Secretary of State. Their only child, Chelsea, was married on July 31 of this year to Marc Mezvinsky.

Clinton was elected president in 1992 beating incumbent George H.W. Bush. At the time of his election he was the third youngest man ever elected to the office. Prior to being elected president, he was Arkansas Attorney General (1976-1978) and twice elected Governor of Arkansas (1979-1981, 1983-1992).

During his the inauguration speech in 1993 Clinton said, “Our democracy must be not only the envy of the world but the engine of our own renewal. There is nothing wrong with America that cannot be cured by what is right with America.” While in office, Clinton signed the Family Medical Leave Act of 1983, the North American Free Trade Agreement and the Brady Bill.

Clinton appointed two United States Supreme Court Justices, Ruth Bader Ginsburg in 1993 and Stephen Beyer in 1994.

Clinton’s job approval rating ranged from the mid 30’s to the high 60’s to a high of 73% when in 1999. His overall rating for his two terms averaged about 68% which matched those of Regan and FDR.

Since leaving office, Clinton has devoted himself to working towards humanitarian causes such as HIV/AIDS, worked with former President George H.W. Bush on the Bush-Clinton Katrina Fund and Bush Clinton Tusnami Fund and worked as a tireless campaigner on his wife Hillary’s senate and presidential campaigns. It was during the Hillary Clinton’s senate campaign that the Little White House had the good fortune to host the Clintons.

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Gerald R. Ford

Gerald Ford has a couple of unique bits of trivia tied to him. He is the longest lived president in the US history (he was 93 years old). He is also the only President of the United States to have never been elected to that position (or vice president for that matter).

Born on July 14, 1913, Ford was born Leslie Lynch King, Jr in Omaha, Nebraska. His parents divorced shortly after his birth. His mother remarried, Gerald Rudolff Ford, and raised him and his three half siblings in Grand Rapids, Michigan. Leslie was renamed Gerald Rudolff Ford, Jr, although his stepfather never legally adopted him. However, Ford had his named legally changed (with a slight variation on the spelling of his middle name) in 1935. Ford did not meet his biological father until he was 17 and maintained a cordial, if sporadic, relationship until Mr. Lynch’s death.

Ford at University of Michigan

Ford was an Eagle Scout and remained involved in scouting throughout his life. Ford was an outstanding athlete in high school and captain of the football team. Ford was a star linebacker and center at the University of Michigan winning national titles with the team in 1932 and 1933. A dedicated Wolverine throughout his life, prior to state visits, Ford would often have the Navy Band play the University of Michigan Fight Song, The Victors, instead of Hail to the Chief. Following college Ford was drafted by both the Detroit Lions and Green Bay Packers, declining both because he wanted to attend law school. He went to Yale working as a football, boxing and cheerleading coach while trying to get admitted to Yale Law School. In 1941 he graduated from Yale Law in the top 25% of his class.

Ford in 1945

In 1942, Ford was commissioned an ensign in the United States Navy and served on the USS Monterey during World War II. In 1946 he left the Navy with the rank of Lt. Commander.

Betty Ford

1948 was a big year for Ford. He ran for the first of his 13 terms in the US House of Representatives and got married. On October 15, 1948 he married former model, dancer and divorcee Elizabeth Bloomer Warren. The would go on to have four children. Mrs. Ford was an ardent feminist, which often times did not sit with the conservative Republican Party and was never afraid to speak up on the controversial issues of the 70’s including drugs, ERA and abortion. Mrs. Ford became quite famous in her own right for her not only for her very very public struggles with breast cancer and alcoholism, but for opening of the Betty Ford Center in Rancho Mirage, California in 1982 that treats people with chemical dependency. Until 2005 she was chairman of the board of the center. Time Magazine called Betty Ford the most politically active First Lady since Eleanor Roosevelt.

Gerald Ford with his wife, Betty, being sworn in by Chief Justice Warren Burger in 1974

Ford served nearly 25 years in the House of Representatives and was minority leader for eight of them. After his service in the war, he called himself an internationalist in his view of the world. Ford was known to his colleagues in the House as a “Congressman’s Congressman.”1 In 1973 following the resignation of Vice President Spiro Agnew, President Richard M. Nixon tapped Ford to be replace Agnew as vice president. Less than a year later, on August 9, 1974, President Nixon resigned and Gerald Ford became the 38th President of the United States. On September 8th during a televised broadcast to the nation, Ford gave Nixon a full pardon. The pardon was extremely controversial at the time. However, in 2001, Ford was awarded the John F. Kennedy Profile in Courage Award from the John F. Kennedy Library Foundation for his pardon of Nixon.

Ford’s cabinet contained many folks held over from the Nixon administration who would go on to serve the presidencies of Ronald Reagan, George H. W. Bush and George W. Bush: Dick Cheney, Alexander Haig, Donald Rumsfeld, Henry Kissinger and Brent Scrowcroft, who was a speaker at the 2003 Harry S. Truman Legacy Symposium. George H. W. Bush served as the Director of the CIA under Ford.

1976 was an election year and Ford reluctantly agreed to run. First he had to face a challenger in his own party, former actor and California Governor, Ronald Reagan. The Democratic nominee was another fellow Navy man (and frequent Little White House visitor) Jimmy Carter, the former Governor of Georgia. Ford lost in one of the closest presidential elections ever 50.1% vs. 48%.

Following his departure from the White House, Ford created Gerald R. Ford Institute of Public Policy at Albion College in Albion, Michigan. He also worked on the Gerald R. Ford Library at his beloved alma mater, the University of Michigan, and the Gerald R. Ford Museum in Grand Rapids. Always the athlete, Ford also indulged in his passion for golf and often participated in pro-am tournaments with his good friend comedian Bob Hope.

On December 26, 2005, Gerald Ford died at his home in Rancho Mirage, California. He had surpassed Ronald Reagan as the longest-lived president by 45 days. He is one of two presidents to have died on December 26, the other being our own Harry S. Truman. Ford is interned at his presidential museum in Grand Rapids, Michigan.

President Ford's tomb at the Gerald R. Ford Presidential Museum

1. Celebrating the life of President Gerald R. Ford on what would have been his 96th birthday, H.R. 409, 111st Congress, 1st Session (2009).

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We just got word from CSPAN3 that more of the 8th Annual Truman Legacy Symposium will be airing this weekend on CSPAN3. More of the Symposium is airing this weekend on C-SPAN3 and will be streamed live on the web. On Saturday, June 26 Truman and Japan will air at 12:25 pm, 6:35pm and on Sunday, June 27 at 12:35 am and 6:35 am. Also on Sunday, June 27 will be Harry Truman and Korea at 12:50pm, 6:50pm and on Monday, June 28 at 12:50 am and 6:50 am. Harry S Truman and China will be coming soon!

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