Truman (174 page)

“I really thought once I’d be”: HST to EW, May 23, 1911, ibid., 36.

“I am like Mark Twain”: HST to EW, May 17, 1911, ibid., 34.

“You know a man has to be”: HST to EW, July 12, 1911, ibid., 41.

“who knows, maybe I’ll be”: HST to EW, May 23, 1911, ibid., 36.

“Sucker! Sucker!”: HST to EW, October 22, 1911, ibid., 53.

three hundred bales of hay: HST to EW, August 12, 1912, ibid., 93.

“I have been working like Sam Hill”: HST to EW, September 30, 1913, ibid., 137.

father in a “terrible stew”: HST to EW, postmarked November 11, 1913, HSTL.

“Politics is all he ever advises me”: HST to EW, August 6, 1912,
Dear Bess,
92.

“I don’t think we would have traded him for anybody”: Slaughter, author’s interview.

“I never understood”: Ibid.

“Politics sure is the ruination”: HST to EW, postmark illegible,
Dear Bess,
132.

“I told him that was a very mild remark”: HST to EW, May 26, 1913, ibid., 126.

He was the one person: Noland, Oral History, HSTL.

another try in an Indian land lottery: HST to EW, September 30, 1913,
Dear Bess,
138.

“all puffed up”: HST to EW, November 4, 1913, ibid., 141–42.

“How does it feel to be engaged to a clodhopper”: HST to EW, November 10, 1913, ibid., 143.

“I know your last letter word for word”: HST to EW, November 19, 1913, ibid., 145.

“Oh please send me another like it”: Ibid.

“Mrs. Wallace wasn’t a bit in favor of Harry”: Ardis Haukenberry, author’s interview.

“We have moved around quite a bit”: HST to EW, February 16, 1911,
Dear Bess,
24.

“Yes, it is true that Mrs. Wallace did not think”: May Wallace, author’s interview.

mother’s operation for a hernia: HST to EW, March 20, 1914,
Dear Bess,
161.

“I hope she lives to be”: HST to EW, January 26, 1914, ibid., 157.

Mamma gave him the money for an automobile: HST to EW, May 12, 1914, ibid., 168.

“Harry didn’t like onions”: May Wallace, author’s interview.

“I started for Monegaw Springs”: HST to EW, no postmark.
Dear Bess,
183.

“Imagine working the roads”: HST to EW, August 8, 1914, ibid., 172.

“If anyone asks him how he’s feeling”: HST to EW, September 28, 1914, ibid., 176.

“good letters” helped “put that backbone into me”: HST to EW, September 17, 1914, ibid., 175.

his father, who refused to let the nurse: HST to EW, November 1914, ibid., 178.

“I remember the Sunday afternoon”: Slaughter,
History of a Missouri Farm Family,
71.

“I was with him”: Daniels, 74.

“Harry and I often got up”:
Parents Magazine
, March 1951.

“An Upright Citizen”: Independence
Examiner
, November 3, 1914.

“I have quite a job on my hands”: HST to EW, November 1914,
Dear Bess
, 178.

“quiet wheat-growing people”: Cather,
One of Ours
, 143.

“gave it everything he had”: Quoted in Miller, 90.

“I almost got done planting”: HST to EW, April 28, 1915,
Dear Bess
, 182.

“It’s right unhandy to chase”: HST to EW, Grandview, 1915, ibid., 181.

he traveled to Texas; HST to EW, February 16, 1916, ibid., 185.

“There’s no one wants to win”: HST to EW, February 19, 1916, ibid., 187.

“This place down here”: HST to EW, date illegible, ibid., 193.

“I don’t suppose”: HST to EW, June 3, 1916, ibid., 201.

“I can’t possibly lose forever”: HST to EW, April 24, 1916, ibid., 198.

“The mine has gone by the board”: HST to EW, May 19, 1916, ibid., 199.

He could “continue business”: HST to EW, May 23, 1916, ibid., 200.

“It’s about 111 degrees in the shade”: HST to EW, July 30, 1916, ibid., 206.

“Wish heavy for me to win”: HST to EW, July 28, 1916, ibid.

“Keep wishing me luck”: HST to EW, August 4, 1916, ibid., 207.

buying and selling oil leases: Steinberg, 39.

“signed also by Martha E. Truman”: Ibid, 39.

“came up every time with something else”: HST to EW, August 5, 1916,
Dear Bess
, 209.

“Truman was surrounded by people, people, people”: Daniels, 81.

“If this venture blows”: HST to EW, January 23, 1917,
Dear Bess
, 213.

“In the event this country”: Daniels, 83.

Teeter Pool discovered: Memoirs, Vol. I, 127.

He said $11,000 at the time: Truman,
Bess W. Truman
, 56.

If his part in his father’s debts: HST to EW, April 28, 1915,
Dear Bess
, 182.

he was never meant for a farmer: Noland, Oral History, HSTL.

“Riding one of these plows all day”: HST, “Autobiographical Sketch,” HSTL.

“It takes pride to run a farm”: HST to MET and MJT, September 18, 1946, in Ferrell, ed.,
Off the Record
, 96.

4. Soldier

“It is the great adventure”: HST to EW, September 15, 1918,
Dear Bess
, 271.

“we got through”: Quoted in Miller,
Plain Speaking
, 93.

Some people thought her the best looking: Gaylon Babcock, Oral History, HSTL.

“It was quite a blow”: Steinberg,
The Man from Missouri
, 42.

She must not tie herself: HST to EW, July 14, 1917,
Dear Bess
, 225.

the reasons to go to war: HST to EW, January 18, 1918, HSTL.

there wasn’t a German bullet: HST to EW, February 1, 1918,
Dear Bess
, 242.

“Galahad after the Grail”:
Autobiography
, 41.

passes eye exam: U.S. Army Medical Records, August 9, 1917, HSTL.

On July 4, 1917, when Harry turned up: HST to EW, July 4, 1918, HSTL.

“It was sure enough cold”: HST to EW, October 9, 1917, HSTL.

“A tent fifty yards away”: HST to EW, October 18, 1917,
Dear Bess
, 231–32.

“all the Lillian Russells”: HST to EW, September 30, 1917, ibid., 228.

artillery terms: Lee,
The Artillery Man
, 326.

“I have been squads east”: HST to EW, February 3, 1918,
Dear Bess
, 242.

“I learned how to say Verdun”: HST to EW, October 27, 1918, HSTL.

“He made us feel”: HST to EW, January 27, 1918,
Dear Bess
, 241.

“one of our most effective officers”: Thomson,
Virgil Thomson
, 35.

“I have a Jew in charge”: HST to EW, October 28, 1917,
Dear Bess
, 233.

“Each day Harry would write a letter”: Mayerberg, “Edward Jacobson: President Truman’s Buddy,”
Liberal Judaism
, August 1945.

“I guess I should be very proud”: HST to EW, February 3, 1918,
Dear Bess
, 242.

“real good conversation”: HST to EW, February 23, 1918, ibid., 245–46.

“Jacobson says he’d go”: HST to EW, November 24, 1917, ibid., 238.

“I didn’t know how crazy”: HST to EW, January 10, 1918, ibid., 240.

Tiernan provides whiskey: HST to EW, October 23, 1917, ibid., 232.

“We elected Klemm”: Truman interview with Jonathan Daniels, November 12, 1949.

“He taught me more about handling men”:
Autobiography
, 44.

“You speak pretty good English”: Ted Marks, Oral History, HSTL.

“No man can be that good”:
Memoirs
, Vol. I, 128.

Berry would stalk up and down: Steinberg, 43.

“I suppose you will have to spend”: HST to EW, March 16, 1918, HSTL.

“I’d give anything in the world”: HST to EW, March 20, 1918,
Dear Bess
, 251.

“The phone’s yours”:
Memoirs
, Vol. I, 129.

“On leave in New York”: HST to EW, March 24 and March 26, 1918,
Dear Bess
, 252–53.

a “Kike town”: HST to EW, March 27, 1918, ibid, 254.

“Israelitist extraction”: HST to EN, ca. 1918, HSTL.

“I imagine his vision”: Harry Vaughan, Oral History, HSTL.

“There we were watching”:
Autobiography
, 45.

He ached for home: HST to EW, April, 1918,
Dear Bess
, 256.

arrival at Brest:
Autobiography
, 45.

At the hotel in Brest: HST to EW, April 14, 1918,
Dear Bess
, 257.

The whole surrounding countryside: HST to EW, April 23, 1918, ibid, 260.

“The people generally treat us fine”: HST to EW, April 12, 1918, ibid, 259.

“I’m for the French more and more”: HST to EW, June 27, 1918, ibid, 264.

They also knew how to build: HST to EW, May 19, 1918, ibid, 262.

“They are the most sentimental people”: HST to EW, June 2, 1918, HSTL.

“
Je ne comprends pas
”: HST to EW, April 17, 1918,
Dear Bess
, 259.

determined to drink France dry: HST to EW, April 14, 1918, ibid, 258.

“Wandering through dark streets”: Quoted in Freidel,
Over There
, p. 80.

“Personally, I think Harry”: Edgar Hinde, Oral History, HSTL.

“Wish I could step in”: HST to EW, April 17, 1918,
Dear Bess
, 259.

the first-class coach: HST to EN, May 17, 1918, HSTL

account of château: HST to EW, April 28, 1918,
Dear Bess
, 260.

“You’d never think that a war”: HST to EN, May 1, 1918, HSTL.

“and then the clock on the Hôtel de Ville”: HST to EW, April 28, 1918, HSTL.

“I’ve studied more and worked harder”: HST to EW, May 26, 1918, HSTL.

“We had a maneuver yesterday”: HST to EW, May 26, 1918, HSTL.

Sundays at church: HST to EW, April 28, 1918,
Dear Bess
, 261.

“and I’m for helping them”: HST to EW, May 5, 1918, ibid.

discovered volumes of music: HST to EW, May 19, 1918, HSTL.

“He had maps”: Arthur Wilson, Oral History, HSTL.

“I just barely slipped through”: HST to EW, June 14, 1918,
Dear Bess
, 263.

“old rube” from Missouri: HST to EW, June 27, 1918, ibid, 263.

value of a university education: HST to EW, July 22, 1918, ibid, 267.

“No I haven’t seen any girls”: HST to EW, June 27, 1918, ibid, 264.

“I look like Siam’s King”: HST to EW, June 19, 1918, HSTL.

“That was one of the things”: Cather,
One of Ours
, 319.

“Dear Harry, May this photograph”: EW inscribed photograph, HSTL.

“They were a pretty wild bunch”: Hinde, Oral History, HSTL.

“a sitting duck”: Eugene Donnelly quoted in Miller, 97.

“a stirring among the fellows”: Ibid, 96.

“a rather short fellow”: Vere Leigh, Oral History, HSTL.

“You could see that he was”: Edward McKim, Oral History, HSTL.

“I could just see my hide”:
Autobiography
, 46.

“Never on the front”: “Pickwick Papers,” HSTL.

Ridge recollection: Miller, 96.

“He was so badly scared”: “Pickwick Papers,” HSTL.

“And then we gave Captain Truman”: Leigh, Oral History, HSTL.

“He didn’t hesitate at all”: Ibid.

“I didn’t come over here”: Daniels,
The Man of Independence
, 95.

“Well, I would say”: Wilson, Oral History, HSTL.

“You soldier for me”: Ibid.

“soldier, soldier, all the time”: Lee, 33–34.

“Talk about your infantryman”: HST to EN, August 5, 1918, HSTL.

“You’ve no idea what an immense responsibility”: HST to EW, August 13, 1918, HSTL.

train passing close enough to Paris: War Diary of Captain Keith W. Dancy, Battery A, Liberty Memorial, Kansas City, Missouri.

“It was just a quiet sector”: Frederick J. Bowman, Oral History, HSTL.

“It was surely some steep hill”: HST to EW, November 23, 1918, HSTL.

“we were firing away”: Leigh, Oral History, HSTL.

“gasping like a catfish”: Columbus (Kansas)
Daily Advocate
, August 16, 1950.

“I led the parade!”: Walter Menefee, Oral History, HSTL.

“I got up and called them everything”: Daniels, 96.

“The men think I am not much”: HST to EW, September 8, 1918, HSTL.

“It was literally true”: Lee, 67.

Bennett Clark incident: Steinberg, 47.

“Well, I was scared green”: HST to EW, November 23, 1918, HSTL.

“September 10. Leave Coyviller”: HST War Diary, HSTL.

“Who can ever forget”: Lee, 75.

“So slow was our progress”: Ibid, 72.

“American drive begins”: HST War Diary, HSTL.

“The great adventure”: HST to EW, September 15, 1918,
Dear Bess
, 271.

“We were doing our best to finish”: HST to EW, September 15, 1918, HSTL.

“And there was an order out”: Floyd Ricketts, Oral History, HSTL.

“like a crazy man”: McKim, Oral History, HSTL.

Tiernan’s coat: Ibid.

“The Colonel insults me shamefully”: HST War Diary, HSTL.

“The weather was bad”: Ricketts, Oral History, HSTL.

“the history of the world”: Miller, 101.

“If all priests were like him: Ibid, 103.

“I stripped the battery for action”: HST to EW, November 23, 1918, HSTL.

“Everything was now in readiness”: Lee, 93.

“Just a word to you”: Toland,
No Man’s Land
, 403.

Captain Eddie Rickenbacker, who took off: Ibid, 432.

“That gun squad worked”: Harry E. Murphy, Oral History, HSTL.

“My guns were so hot”: HST to EW, November 23, 1918, HSTL.

“confusing in the extreme”: Marshall,
Memoirs of My Services in the World War
, 160.

At a crossroads near Cheppy: Truman, “The Military Career of a Missourian,” HSTL.

“Truman didn’t panic”: Leigh, Oral History, HSTL.

“Truman sent back the data”: McKim, Oral History, HSTL.

“You know…when you’re in the artillery”: Leigh, Oral History, HSTL.

“The artillery fire has been something”: Minder,
This Man’s War
, 328.

“Well, men,” Miles said: Lee, 167.

“The coolness, the steady courage”: Ibid., 168.