Genre: Biography
Publisher: Simon & Schuster Audio, 2015
Pages: 5 discs
Rating: Recommend
The life of Harry S. Truman is one of the greatest of American stories, filled with vivid characters - Roosevelt, Churchill, Stalin, Eleanor Roosevelt, Bess Wallace Truman, George Marshall, Joe McCarthy, and Dean Acheson - and dramatic events. In this riveting biography, acclaimed historian David McCullough not only captures the man - a more complex, informed, and determined man that ever before imagined - but also the turbulent times in which he rose, boldly, to meet unprecedented challenges.
The last president to serve as a living link between the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, Truman's story spans the raw world of the Missouri frontier, World War I, the powerful Pendergast machine of Kansas City, the legendary Whistle-Stop Campaign of 1948, and the decisions to drop the atomic bomb, confront Stalin at Potsdam, and send troops to Korea, and fire General MacArthur.
Drawing on archival material and extensive interviews with Truman's own family, friends, and Washington colleagues, McCullough tells the deeply moving story of the seemingly ordinary "man from Missouri" who was perhaps the most courageous president in our history.
Review: First, full disclosure. I started reading this book in the gift shop at Truman's home in Independence, Missouri over the summer. When we returned home, I checked it out from the library and read a few hundred pages. However, I wasn't completely absorbed into it so when it was due back, I returned it. I finished the abridged audio version for this review.
We visited Truman's home and presidential library because we were in Independence (mainly as a stopping point on our way to Kansas City from St. Louis). Knowing virtually nothing about Harry Truman prior to our visit, I found him to be a fascinating guy. His library was the first we'd ever visited, and all of us, even the kids enjoyed the experience. My favorite part was his re-created Oval Office. We've since visited Kennedy's library in Boston, and I still prefer Truman's.
All that said, this book was interesting. Truman was a popular president, and just your average American when he entered politics. The abridged version was well-done, and I don't feel as though I missed anything by choosing this format.
Oddly enough, in yet another fact-is-stranger-than-fiction moment, I finished this book on December 26, the day of Harry's death (1972).
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