Truman, Bess (1885–1982)

views updated

Truman, Bess (1885–1982)

American first lady from 1945 to 1953. Name variations: Bess Wallace. Born Elizabeth Virginia Wallace on February 13, 1885, in Independence, Missouri; died on October 18, 1982, in Independence; oldest of four children of David Willock Wallace (a merchant and politician) and Margaret Elizabeth (Gates) Wallace; attended Barstow School for Girls in Kansas City, Missouri; married Harry S. Truman (president of the United States), on June 28, 1919, in Independence, Missouri (died December 26, 1972); children: (Mary) Margaret Truman (b. 1924).

Although Harry S. Truman is now regarded by historians as one of the more esteemed presidents of the United States, Bess Truman remains one of the least-known first ladies in modern times. While he credited her as "a full partner in all my transactions—political and otherwise," he admittedly guarded her from public attention, because he did not want her to face the criticism so often leveled against presidents' wives. In his book Mr. Citizen, Truman wrote, "I hope some day someone will take time to evaluate the true role of the wife of a President, and to assess the many burdens she has to bear and the contributions she makes."

Elizabeth "Bess" Wallace was born in 1885 and grew up with Truman in Independence, Missouri, the privileged daughter of a well-to-do merchant. She was outgoing and athletic, easily the best tennis player in Independence, and not a bad third baseman. When she was 18, her life dramatically changed when her father committed suicide, after years of financial woes and bouts with alcoholism. Afterward, her mother became increasingly reclusive and dependent on her children, and lived at various times with Bess after she was married.

Bess was Harry's "first and only sweetheart," the girl he wooed for 30 years, through Sunday School, grammar school, and Independence High School. Shy and bookish, Harry later kidded that if he were allowed to carry her books, it was a big day. It was not until after high school, when he went to work in Kansas City, that he began commuting back to Independence to take Bess out on Saturday night. Though their engagement was announced in 1917, Harry postponed the marriage until after his service in World War I; he wanted to save her from possible widowhood. They married in 1919, when Bess was 34.

Harry Truman's first business venture—the Truman & Jacobsen Haberdashery—floundered and then went bankrupt in 1922, with subsequent business attempts faring little better. His early political experience was gained under the auspices of the Pendergast brothers, who ran the powerful and corrupt Kansas City and Jackson County political machine during the war. Afterstints as a county judge and presiding judge of the county court, in 1934 Truman was offered support by the Pendergasts for a United States senatorial nomination.

During the early years, Bess Truman worked with her husband in his store and cared for their daughter Margaret Truman , born in 1924 after a number of miscarriages. Though Bess usually took care to avoid the political arena, she was reluctantly drawn into his run for the Senate, working at campaign headquarters and advising on speeches. Harry called her a shrewd judge of character and relied on her intuition. When he won the Senate seat, she agreed to divide her year between Washington and Independence. Harry eventually put Bess on the payroll as secretary and researcher, at a yearly salary of $4,500, not an uncommon practice at the time. When Clare Boothe Luce accused them of wrongdoing and leaked stories to the press referring to "Payroll Bess," Harry sent her a blistering letter and later banned her from White House social events.

Margaret Truman, who has written several biographies of her parents, recalls that when her father was selected as the running mate for Franklin Delano Roosevelt, Bess was "bitterly opposed." She watched the convention "looking tired and worried and as if she had been crying all night." Bess, along with the rest of the country, was no doubt aware that Roosevelt's ill health might prevent him from completing a fourth term. Already wary of the reporters and Secret Service men surrounding them, she is said to have asked her husband, "Are we going to have to go through this all the rest of our lives?"

When Harry Truman succeeded to the presidency after Roosevelt's death on April 12, 1945, less than three months into the term, Bess Truman entered the White House hesitantly, but determined to hang on to her privacy. Feeling that she was not elected to anything and that no one should be interested in what she had to say, in one of her first official acts she canceled the weekly press conference in favor of informal teas, held with the understanding that anything she said was off the record. If her public persona was practically non-existent, privately she was capable and efficient, accomplishing all of the duties that were customary or necessary to her position, and carrying out every protocol precedent set by her predecessors. With her daughter's welfare at heart, Bess made an enormous effort to maintain the quality of home life the Trumans had shared before coming to the White House. She oversaw household expenses, clipped coupons, played ping-pong with Margaret in the basement, addressed her own Christmas cards and drove herself around Washington, until the Secret Service complained that they could no longer keep track of her. She spent hours on the phone chatting to her bridge buddies back in Independence, and once got so lonely for them that she had them flown to Washington to visit her in what she called the "great white jail."

Bess Truman tempered her husband's "shoot from the hip" responses and his notorious public swearing. Once, when someone complained to her that he had used the word "manure" in public, Bess retorted that it had taken her some 20 years to get him to say manure. She also acted as his sounding board for some of the most important decisions in American history—whether to drop the A-bomb, the commitment of troops to Korea, the firing of General MacArthur, the Berlin blockade, and the Marshall Plan.

By 1948, Bess had had enough and was ready to retire to Independence. She agreed to another campaign, because she knew her husband wanted to finish what he had started—and probably because she believed, along with many others, that he could not possibly win reelection. Republican nominee Thomas E. Dewey was so sure of victory that he embarked on a campaign so low key as to be virtually nonexistent. Harry Truman undertook an ambitious family whistle-stop tour, winding up each speech by introducing Bess and his daughter as "The Boss" and "The Boss that Bosses the Boss." The crowds warmed to him, handing Harry S. the win in one of the major upsets in American political history.

Most of the Truman second term was spent in Blair House, the presidential guest house, due to extensive renovations to repair the "state of irreversible structural decay" of the White House. It was there in 1950 that an assassination attempt was made on the president by two Puerto Rican nationalists, who killed a guard and wounded another. When Harry decided he would not be a candidate for a third term, it was no wonder that Bess looked "the way you do when you draw four aces," said a friend.

They retired to Independence, where, after a European tour, Bess settled in to help edit and organize her husband's memoirs and set up the Truman Library. She was a doting grandmother to her four grandsons, who visited often. In 1959, she underwent a mastectomy to treat breast cancer.

After her husband's death in 1972, Bess Truman lived quietly. She was honorary chair of the Thomas Eagleton 1972 Senate campaign. Her later years were plagued by arthritis and poor eyesight, but she was the longest surviving of any first lady. She died on January 20, 1982, age 97, and was buried next to her husband in the Truman Library courtyard. Harry Truman's final tribute to his wife's contributions was his order for her tombstone, which reads "First Lady, the United States of America, April 12, 1945–January 20, 1953."