Harry Truman was the thirty-third President of the United States, from April 12, 1945, until January 4, 1953. He was Vice President during Franklin D. Roosevelt's fourth term as President, and became President when Roosevelt died. He was re-elected in November, l948, but refused to run for another term in 1952.
President Truman was in office at the conclusion of World War II and the first man to authorize the use of the atomic bomb in warfare. After his term in office, Harry Truman retired to his home in Independence, Missouri where he wrote his memoirs regarding his political career during one of the most troubled and eventful periods of United States history.
Harry Truman was born in Lamar, Missouri, a town of about 3,000 in the southwestern corner of the State, on May 8, 1884. His middle name caused a family problem: Should it be Shippe, for one grandfather, or Solomon, for the other? They decided to use only a middle initial to stand for both names. His father was a farmer. When Harry Truman was a boy, he moved to a farm at Grandview, Missouri, near Independence, Missouri, a few miles from the big city of Kansas City, Missouri. He attended schools in Independence. He met his future wife, Elizabeth Virginia Wallace, in high school. They were not married until about twenty years later.
After he finished high school, Truman had several jobs. He worked for the Kansas City Star, then as a railroad timekeeper, and then as a helper in a Kansas City bank. He tried to obtain an appointment to West Point, but was rejected because of his poor eyesight. At the age of 2l, he joined the National Guard.
In 19l8, Harry Truman and a friend from his Army days opened a haberdashery shop in Kansas City. The business failed. His first election to any public office was in 1922, when he was elected a county judge in Jackson Count, Missouri. He attended the Kansas City School of Law from 1923 to 1925 and continued to serve as judge throughout this period. He was defeated in his campaign for re-election to the judgeship in 1924, but won the election of 1926 and became presiding judge. He remained in this position for eight years. In 1934, he was elected to the United States Senate on the Democratic ticket, and in 1940, he was re-elected. He won national fame as head of the Senate Committee to Investigate the National Defense Program and was instrumental in saving the taxpayers of the country millions of dollars by pinpointing the cause of wasteful and inefficient methods that hindered the war effort. He was later chosen by the Democratic Party as its candidate for Vice President when Franklin Delano Roosevelt was seeking his fourth term as President in that election. Both Roosevelt and Truman were elected.
When Roosevelt died, Truman became President. He was faced with a tremendous responsibility at a time when the country was engaged in war. People were under the impression that he was not equal to the task, but he proved them wrong. Less than a month after he took office the German forces surrendered in Europe (May 8, l945). But the war with Japan was still raging. He was confronted with a decision that might affect the future of the whole world. He authorized the dropping of the first atomic bomb on the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, causing Japan to surrender and bringing about the end of World War II.
After the surrender of Japan, Truman was confronted with yet another problem. In Europe, the Communists of Russia (who were friendly as long as the war was in progress) suddenly turned unfriendly toward the United States, siezing control of several small countries of Eastern Europe, while threatening other countries, such as Turkey and Greece. At this time, Truman began extending aid to Greece and Turkey. The aid resulted in the enactment of the Truman Docrine. At the same time, Truman began facing problems at home after he vetoed the Taft-Hartley Labor Act. The head of the Railroad unions branded him as an enemy of labor, threatening to abandon him in the next election. Then came the Korean war. South Korea was invaded by North Korea.
In March, l952, Truman announced that he would not be a candidate for the Presidency again.
and retired to his home in Independence, Missouri. A library was built in his honor. He died on December 26, l972.