Truman by David McCullough was a fantastic, fun, detailed and treasured telling of President Truman's life. I wish i could have met him & had been alive during this time period. David McCullough is so good at telling a story for the biography instead of drab details listed as an encyclopedia. Its a great read!

I'll be honest, when the book opened with Truman's grandparents settling in Missouri, I almost gave up. Presidential biographies are long enough (this one clocks in at over 1100 pages) without giving extensive family history. But I'm glad I stuck it out. I'm pretty foggy on American history of this period (I barely knew Truman was the one to drop the bombs on Nagasaki and Hiroshima), so it was a really good way to close a few loops.

The Truman years were an interesting political moment for a variety of reasons. Not only did they mark the beginning of American global dominance, but they also saw the beginnings of the Cold War. So much of his administration was dedicated to preserving the hard won peace of WWII, but it's important to note that Truman thought of peace on a global scale. Clearly, he was willing to go to war in Korea in hopes of containing Communism in Asia.

Additionally, the post-war period was probably the last time somebody could get away with claiming they were for civil rights in public while in private writing things like this: One man was as good as another, he thought, “so long as he’s honest and decent and not a nigger or a Chinaman.”... “It is race prejudice I guess. But I am strongly of the opinion that negroes ought to be in Africa, yellow men in Asia, and white men in Europe and America.” Which is not to suggest that Truman was soft on civil rights. He actually did a lot on that score (desegregating the armed forces and civil service, for instance), even if in later years he allowed his private feelings to occasionally be made public, a development that led his former Secretary of State and close friend, Dean Acheson, to caution him to consider his legacy before speaking on race issues. For what it's worth, Truman was progressive enough to prompt a third-party challenge from Strom Thurman, the famously racist and long-lived senator from South Carolina, in the '48 election. As we know, Truman famously won that contest, beating out both Thurman and Dewey.

We can also thank Truman for getting the ball rolling on health care. This being an election year, we're hearing a lot about the Affordable Care Act and as Hillary Clinton rightly pointed out in the Democratic debates, the party has been striving for something like Obamacare since Truman's day. Though he would ultimately be unable to make much progress on health care during his administration, Medicare (and later the ACA) is certainly part of the Truman legacy.

There's a lot more to discuss about Truman, but I think I'll stop there. This was a good read, if a bit over long. In the end, I wouldn't say that I "like" Truman, but reading about him and his time in office has certainly given me a better perspective on the post-war period and a taste of how modern American politics works out. I'm hoping to tackle Robert Caro's behemoth, multi-volume biography of LBJ later this year, so stay tuned.

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Harry S. Truman inherited the presidency upon the death of one of the most popular presidents in history, Franklin D. Roosevelt, during the climax of one of America’s greatest struggles. He made the difficult decisions that brought World War II to a close with the bang of nuclear power. He propelled George C. Marshall, the nation’s best, but least known, General, to the success that won him a Nobel Peace Prize and fired the nation’s best known general, Douglas MacArthur, for the insubordination that nearly brought on World War III. These and other big decisions were unpopular when made, but indisputably correct in hindsight. He was the man for the moment, and he was a values based leader. It was against his principles that he measured his actions, and not against popular opinion. He was a leader that gained his perspective by a lifetime of studying finliterature and serving the public he loved. David McCullough did a spectacular job in this biography of providing insight into the life experiences that shaped President Truman. This read is another must in a study to understand what it means to be a values based leader.