NOTICE
This is a transcript of a tape-recorded interview conducted for the Harry S. Truman Library. A draft of this transcript was edited by the interviewee but only minor emendations were made; therefore, the reader should remember that this is essentially a transcript of the spoken, rather than the written word.

Numbers appearing in square brackets (ex. [45]) within the transcript indicate the pagination in the original, hardcopy version of the oral history interview.

RESTRICTIONS
This oral history transcript may be read, quoted from, cited, and reproduced for purposes of research. It may not be published in full except by permission of the Harry S. Truman Library.

Opened December, 1964
Harry S. Truman Library
Independence, Missouri

[96]

FUCHS: All right, Mr. McKim, if you want to go ahead with that story on the vice-presidential candidacy.

MCKIM: Well, in the latter part of June or the forepart of July, 1944, Mr. Truman had suggested to me that I arrange to be at the Democratic National Convention in Chicago as he said he was having John Snyder and me there to block any attempts to make him the vice-presidential nominee. I had made my plane reservations and on the evening of July 12, which was the wedding anniversary of my son, Ed, and my daughter-in-law, Franny -- Ed was overseas -- we gave a little dinner for Franny at the Blackstone Hotel in Omaha.

During the course of that dinner, I got a long-distance call from Mr. Truman telling me to be sure and be at Chicago; that the pressure was getting a little greater on having him become the nominee, and he didn't want it. I assured him that I would be there Monday morning of the convention, as I had my plane tickets in my pocket at that time.

I arrived in Chicago that Monday morning, went

[97]

immediately to the suite in the Stevens Hotel. There was quite a bit of political activity, of course, all during that day. And during the day, John Snyder and I went into one of the bedrooms and discussed the situation. It looked to us like Truman was the only one that could be nominated. We decided that we'd better tell him about it because we didn't want to be in the position of blocking something that would interfere with a man's destiny. So we told him how we felt, and he said, "No," he still didn't want it. Then on, I don't recall whether it was Monday night or Tuesday night, about 11 or 12 o'clock, Roy Roberts, publisher of the Kansas City Star, talked to me and he thought that Truman should be the nominee because it was all in the cards for him to be. At that time, you may recall, that there were three candidates that came out to Chicago each thinking that he had the blessing of President Roosevelt. Jimmy Byrnes, when he arrived, thought he had been tapped, and he asked Mr. Truman if he would make his nominating speech for him and Mr. Truman agreed. Then Mr. Barkley arrived and he thought that he had the nod from the President. Later, Mr. Wallace arrived and he thought he had the nod from the President. Mr. Truman didn't

[98]

want to get mixed up in a deal of that sort. Here were three men apparently having the blessing of the President. Mr. Truman didn't want to get mixed up in a deal of that sort. Here were three men apparently having the blessing of the President of the United States to be his running mate. Mr. Truman had already agreed then to make the nominating speech for Jimmy Byrnes. It put Truman in kind of a fix. But from all the reports that we were getting, labor would not have any part of either Byrnes or Barkley. They wanted Wallace. However, Bob Hannegan, chairman of the Democratic National Committee, had made a tour around the United States prior to the convention, and the consensus of the state chairman around the country was, "Wallace won't do; he'll have to go! It will have to be somebody else."

Well, we knew this, but Truman was still a little wary of giving his assent to running for the vice-presidency. I think it was either on Monday night or Tuesday night that Roy Roberts, John Snyder and I got Truman in a room and it was around midnight. We explained the situation to him and he said, "I'm still not going to do it."

We all three urged him to get into the race, but

[99]

he refused. Finally, I said, "I think, Senator, that you're going to do it "

And he got a little belligerent with me and said, "What makes you think that I'm going to do it?"

I said, "Because there's a little, old ninety-year old mother down in Grandview, Missouri, that would like to see her son President of the United States."

And with that the tears came in his eyes and he stomped out of the room; he wouldn't speak to me.

FUCHS: Did you say "President of the United States?"

MCKIM: I said, "President of the United States," because it was the consensus of opinion at the whole convention, that whoever was nominated for the vice-presidency, would be the President of the United States.

FUCHS: Was this talked of?

MCKIM: This had been talked of in party circles all around. Everybody felt that whoever was nominated for the vice-presidency, would be the President.

So, all the next day, Tuesday (I think it was Tuesday), Mr. Truman refused to speak to me. I think

[100]

it was late that afternoon that I got him in one of the bedrooms and I told him, I said, "I don't care whether you ever speak to me again or not; I merely told you what I believed, and I think you should take this nomination. I think you're the only one that can be nominated. If that's the way you want it, why, let's call it quits right now."

And he said, "Well, I apologize for my action; I was mad at you, but I'm still not going to do it."

I said, "Well, now, my wife has tickets for the play Oklahoma on Thursday night. I want you to tell me whether I got to see Oklahoma on Thursday night or whether we go to work."

"Well," he said, "I can't tell you now. I'm going to have breakfast with some of the boys in the morning and I'll know more about it then."

The next day, I keep thinking it was either Wednesday or Thursday -- one or two days in there, they escape me at the moment...

FUCHS: Excuse me, was Tom Evans up there at this time?

MCKIM: No, not at that time.

FUCHS: Did you know Tom Evans then?

[101]

MCKIM: Yes.

FUCHS: How long had you known him?

MCKIM: Oh, I'd known him for several years before that.

FUCHS: On a first name basis?

MCKIM: Yes. Fred Canfil was there; John Snyder and myself; Senator Carl Hatch was wandering around there quite a bit of the time; Senator Lister Hill -- oh, lots of the senators came in to say hello to Senator Truman.

The next morning, anyway, Senator Truman went to breakfast with Sidney Hillman and some of the labor leaders. Bob Hannegan showed Truman a note that he had from President Roosevelt and he said, to Hannegan, "Truman is the man." And Truman still wouldn't believe it, and they got Franklin D. on the phone and he confirmed it.

FUCHS: Did you see the note?

MCKIM: No, I didn't see the note then.

FUCHS: You did see it?

MCKIM: I did see it, but it was several years afterwards,

[102]

when Bob was postmaster general, he showed me the note.

FUCHS: Did Mr. Truman talk to President Roosevelt on the phone?

MCKIM: I wasn't there, but I understand that he did, because this meeting was held over in another hotel. So, I think it was Thursday afternoon, or Thursday morning, Wallace was to come in. He hadn't planned on coming to the convention, but his campaign manager in Chicago was Senator Joe Guffey and Joe got ahold of him and suggested that he better get out there to the convention; things weren't going too well for him. So that's the time that Wallace left his Wardman Park Hotel and ducked some reporters, I think, had a little altercation with some photographer, and headed for Chicago. Well, an amusing thing happened. I was sent over to the Sherman Hotel, which was to be Wallace's headquarters, to observe what was going on. What actually happened was, Joe Guffey organized quite a demonstration of young people and the liberal element carrying placards and everything, and it was to meet Mr. Wallace at the railroad station. Well, the reporter for the Times got on the train at either South Bend or one of the prior

[103]

stations to Chicago, and talked to Mr. Wallace and told him he knew of a quick way to get Mr. Wallace down to the Hotel. He talked him into taking a car at the 63rd Street Station with him, and brought him into the Sherman Hotel. All of his welcoming delegation was down at the railroad station!

I saw him when he came into the hotel and he looked like a man in a daze; he didn't know what had happened to him. Then it made Joe Guffey a little mad too, that his well-laid plans were loused up by his candidate.

So, I reported back, and that afternoon the Wallace delegation tried to stampede the convention. That was when Bob Hannegan, and mayor Ed Kelley, had Senator Jackson, who was the permanent chairman, adjourn the meeting. And that left the Wallace campaign high and dry.

On Friday, Truman was nominated on the second ballot, and I was sitting in the box there with them, and I was kind of keeping a tally of the states, but it went pretty fast.

After the nomination, Senator Truman came back to the box, and we all cleared the way with policemen

[104]

to get Mrs. Truman and Margaret and the Senator out of the hall. We all took cars down to the Stevens Hotel. While we were there, the Senator had another suite of rooms over at the Morrison Hotel, and he asked if I would take Mrs. Truman and Margaret over there. He went first to the Morrison Hotel, and I took Mrs. Truman and Margaret down in the elevator; and they were unknown to the general public at that time, I took them in a taxicab over to the Morrison. We went up to this particular suite and there were quite a number of policemen and Secret Service men, I presume, and they were halting everybody that came through. And I said, "We want to see Senator Truman."

And the officer in charge said, "He's receiving nobody."

And I said, "I think he'll receive these people; may I present Mrs. Truman and their daughter Margaret."

They got in. So that's that story.

FUCHS: There was a reception in the White House for the cast of the movie, Woodrow Wilson, and I believe you attended that?

MCKIM: Yes, I was in Washington at the time. It was after

[105]

the nomination, and Truman asked me one morning, he said, "What are you going to do today?"

And I said, "Well, one of the first things I'm going to do is go to the barbershop." And I said, "I may go to see one of our congressmen or senators."

But he said, "I want you back here this afternoon. We're going over to the White House, to a tea, and I'm taking you."

So, I think the time of the tea was around 4 o'clock. Anyway, we drove over there and we walked up the long walk to the West Executive entrance. Right ahead of us were two men, one in uniform, and the other one in civilian clothes stopped and introduced himself as Governor Jimmy Davis, of Louisiana and his adjutant general. We all went in together. Bob Hannegan and Ed Pauley, who was then the national treasurer, were kind of overseeing things there. The President sat out on the South Portico, in a wheel chair, and the cast of this picture, Wilson. The leading lady was Geraldine Fitzgerald. The leading man who played the part of Wilson was not there. Darryl Zanuck, the producer of the movie was there.

Anyway, after meeting President Roosevelt, I stood

[106]

over against the wall, and for an hour or more I had a chance to observe his physical being, and he laughingly asked me if Mr. Truman owed me any money.

And I said, "Yes, Mr. President, he owes me three dollars a month for the duration of World War I."

He said, "Why was that?"

And I said, "Because he wouldn't make me a first-class private, and I'm hoping, Mr. President, that when he gets this new job with you, that he'll have enough money to pay me off."

Well, Roosevelt laughed at it. When we left we walked down to the other gate and that's when I stopped Senator Truman and told him to turn around and take a look at that place; that was where he was going to be living.

And he said, "I'm afraid you're right, Eddie." And he said, "And it scares the hell out of me."

We went on then to discussing the thing. We went on then over to a cocktail party which I think was given by Vic Messall. Anyway, we met the famous or infamous Drew Pearson there.

From there we went, the Senator and I, went around to a little French restaurant and had dinner, then over

[107]

to this movie house where the premier of the picture Wilson was to be shown. While I was in there I thought, "This is the funniest thing. I'm sitting right next to the man who may have the same problems that Wilson had. He's going to inherit a couple of wars." Because looking at Roosevelt at that time -- he didn't look good to me. The questions that entered my mind then, "Will he live long enough to be inaugurated?" We would have had a proposition there, "Here's the man that is the nominee for the vice-presidency; we have another man who is the Vice-President, but who had been rejected for re-election and there was always the possibility that between the time of election, even after they were both elected and before they took office, what's going to happen." Naturally, in that time, Wallace would have become President, if it was before, until -- it's still a question, "Who's going to be President?"

FUCHS: Do you recall anything else about that party that Vic Messall gave?

MCKIM: No, it was just another party. The only thing that I recall about it was that we met Drew Pearson there.

FUCHS: Did he seem to be on good terms with Mr. Messall

[108]

at that time?

MCKIM: Who?

FUCHS: Senator Truman.

MCKIM: Yes, yes.

FUCHS: What do you recall of the campaign in '44? I believe you went on the tour with Mr. Truman. Who was there and so forth?

MCKIM: Well, the original idea of that campaign was that, Senator Truman told me, he was to go to the West Coast and make three speeches. And he said, "Why don't you get on the train with me at Omaha and go out to California" -- I had some business interests out there at the time and it would have been very easy for me to consider it as a business trip -- and he said, "I'll come through Omaha on such-and-such a date and you get on the train and we'll go out and I'll make the three speeches, and we'll have a little fun together."

About that time the St. Louis Browns and the St. Louis Cardinals won their pennants in their respective leagues and they were to play the World Series in St.

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Louis. I figured that I could see two or three games of the series there, and get back to Omaha in time to meet Senator Truman, and go to the coast with him.

I went down to the games taking only enough clothes for a two or three day trip. I went out to the ball park and the first person I ran into was Senator Truman. "Say," he said, "we're going to New Orleans."

I said, "Who's going to New Orleans?"

He said, "We are."

And I said, "Why are we going to New Orleans?"

He said, "The trip starts there."

I said, "What trip? You were going to come to Omaha in a few days and I was going to join the train there and we'd go to the coast and you'd make three speeches."

"Well," he said, "that's been all changed now. The train is being made up at New Orleans and we're going."

And I said, "Senator, I don't have enough clothes to make a trip like that."

"Well," he said, "we'll go back to the hotel tonight and we'll call Mary up and we'll tell her to

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send your clothes down to the Roosevelt Hotel in New Orleans."

So, that's what we did, and I got to see another game. He had to leave and go down to this annual shindig at Cape Girardeau, Missouri. Fred Canfil drove him down there. I think that that must have been on a Saturday or a Sunday. Anyway, I said, "I'll meet you in Memphis on about Monday morning." I saw another game and I took the night train out of St. Louis for Memphis and met him at the Peabody Hotel the next morning. Fred drove us on down to New Orleans then. We had time to go over to that strip between Gulfport and Biloxi and visit the family with whom Margaret and Mrs. Truman stayed that year on account of Margaret's health. We also stopped at a Naval Base down there and saw one of Mr. Truman's nephews who was in the Navy there. Then we went back to New Orleans. We had been assigned a room and a parlor at the Roosevelt Hotel and the manager, after we were in the room, came up very apologetic and wanted to move us to another room. It seems a mix-up had occurred and that room was reserved for Secretary of the Treasury Morgenthau. We had to move into some other suite.

[111]

The train -- it wasn't a train -- we had a private car called the "Henry Stanley" and attached to this car was another Pullman car for some newsmen. Now, Tony Vaccaro of the Associated Press, Eddie Lockett of Time magazine, a fellow named Bell, from one of the New York papers, the Herald, I think, and Harold Beckley, who was in charge of the press room of the United States Senate, were in this other car. In our car we had two stewards and a cook. The trip started in New Orleans and headed west through Louisiana, Texas, and we got in Texas and Mr. Truman suggested that I somehow get in touch with former Vice-President, John N. Garner at Uvalde. From one of the stations there, I don't know which one, I sent Mr. Garner a wire and signed the Senator's name to it and when the train pulled into Uvalde, Mr. Garner was there. So the two of them got on our special car and had to have a little "Bourbon and Branch" to celebrate the occasion, and we held the train a little while longer there so they could have a little more of a visit.

From there, we went on our -- understand that almost every place the train stopped, the Senator was making back platform talks, you know, people would come down.

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We had a loud speaker system set up on the back platform with microphones so he could make a nice little talk there for whoever showed up and goodly crowds were on hand all the way through. I know his favorite speech was to get up to the microphone and grin at people and say, "It's awfully nice of you folks to come down to see the next Vice-President of the United States."

We went on to Los Angeles and we had a big meeting in the Shrine Auditorium there. George Allen joined us there. From there we went on up to San Francisco, had a big meeting up there and went all around through Chinatown. From San Francisco we went up to Oregon; and at Portland, Mon Wallgren, who was then governor of Washington, came down and joined us for the trip back to Seattle. We went on to Seattle and from there we went to Spokane and at Spokane, Judge Schwellenbach, who had been a senator from Washington, sworn in at the same time with Mr. Truman, met the train. From Spokane we went to Butte and from Butte on over, oh, we went through North Dakota. Somewhere up in there, I think it was at Bismarck, the Sioux Indians made Senator Truman a chief, and I don't know how to spell it, but they gave him the name of Wa Ha

[113]

Chan Kahopi. I don't know what it means, but he was Chief Wa Ha Chan Kahopi.

Then, we went into Minneapolis to some meetings there and from there to Milwaukee. From Milwaukee to Chicago, and from Chicago down to Peoria and through the caterpillar plant.

I might digress for a moment and give the names of the other people on this private car. There was Hugh Fulton, who had been counsel for the Truman Committee; then there was Matt Connelly, who had been an investigator for the Truman Committee. At Los Angeles, George Allen joined the party. From Peoria, we doubled back to Detroit and from Detroit we went into New York at Albany. From Albany, we went into Boston and we spent about a week touring around Massachusetts with Maurice Tobin, who was running for governor of Massachusetts at the time. We appeared in, of course, Boston, Worcester, and we went over to Providence, Rhode Island, and then down into New York. There was to be a big meeting in New York of the ADA; I think it was the ADA; anyway, it was David Dubinsky's political organization that was staging a meeting in Madison Square Garden. This, as you might recall, was

[114]

the organization which was really the backbone of the Wallace movement. Truman didn't want to go into New York, but President Roosevelt ordered it. This was really Wallace's home ground and we would have to play according to his rules. We were asked to present ourselves at the front door of Madison Square Garden at a certain time. We allowed ourselves sufficient time to leave the hotel and be at the Garden, so that the police escort and all would take over. We were ushered back into the offices of the Garden. The Garden was filled with the crowd, but no Mr. Wallace. They were trying to find Mr. Wallace at his hotel. They had the whole New York department looking for Mr. Wallace, and they finally located him over at a little political meeting in Brooklyn. The police, knowing that he was to make a scheduled appearance, at the Garden, wanted to take him in the police car direct to the Garden, "No," he said, "I got over here on the subway and I'll go back the same way."

Well, they followed him, and then he had to walk from the subway to his hotel, then he had to walk from the hotel over to the Garden. Well, all this time, we were holding the crowd there in a kind of a state of

[115]

flux as it were. David Dubinsky wanted Truman to go on, but George Allen said, "No, Mr. Truman goes on when Mr. Wallace goes on;" because we thought it was the idea of that crowd to, right in the middle of Mr. Truman's speech, to have Mr. Wallace come down the center aisle and stampede the meeting. But we refused to go on until Wallace came in. Finally when Wallace came in and was shown back into the Garden offices, he was mad as a wet hen. The only one he spoke to was Truman and he was in a very sour mood. Finally they walked out through the entrance onto the platform, arm and arm, and smiling at each other, but I think they were about ready to cut each other's throats.

During the meeting, Frank Sinatra appeared and made a little speech, and so did Bill Robinson, the dancer. I nudged Truman and said, "It's time we got out of here."

He said, "Do you think we can make it?"

I said, "We can make it. Come on."

So we went out, and we got in a cab and drove down to the station where our private car was parked. We talked over the events of the evening and Truman asked me, "Do you think that thing was planned, staged deliberately? "

[116]

And I said, "I think it was."

"Well," he said, "that's a funny deal, but it didn't work."

From New York we went down to Washington. Harry Vaughan was down at the station to meet us, and Mrs. Truman and Margaret got on then, and we went down into West Virginia, Clarksburg, and from there over to Pittsburgh. I got sick at Clarksburg and I missed the parade and meeting at Pittsburgh entirely. I was laid up. Anyway, we got back to Kansas City the night before election, and I took the night train from Kansas City into Omaha and got to vote the next day. So the newspapermen said I started out to go to the World's Series and it ended up being the longest World's Series in history.

FUCHS: Was Tom Evans on this train?

MCKIM: Tom Evans joined us, but I don't know just where -- and his wife. I know they were at Clarksburg because Tom Evans went to a drugstore and got me some medicine; but that's been twenty years ago and my memory is not too fresh on just every little incident that happened. But they were on the train and they ended up in Kansas City.

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FUCHS: They didn't start at New Orleans?

MCKIM: They didn't start in New Orleans.

FUCHS: What were the capacities or duties of these people you've named, as nearly as you can remember?

MCKIM: Well, I was supposedly in charge of the train, and I was also kind of in charge of Mr. Truman. I had to see that he got to bed on time, that he ate the proper food, and when he would go out meeting the crowds, I always walked to his left and immediate rear, the idea being that so many of these politicians have the idea that they've got to slap the candidate on the back. Well, after a few of those during the day, you know, you can knock a fellow out. And I got rather adept at knocking off those big hands in air. Another thing, I usually wore a top coat and, of course, a vice-presidential candidate is not entitled to any Secret Service protection. I always carried one hand in my left pocket with the knuckle sticking out like I had a gun there, and nobody knew whether or not I was a Secret Service man; but I was along for the protection of the candidate, to keep him from being hit. You

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get up in that Northwest country, some of those big lumberjacks, they've got hands like hams. Two or three of those, and a candidate would be hors de combat.

FUCHS: What about Tom Evans?

MCKIM: Well, Tom didn't join the trip until later. George Allen knew a lot of the politicos along the way. Hugh Fulton was assisting with the speech-writing. In fact, I think that was his main function. Matt helped with it. That was about the general arrangement.

FUCHS: Was Leonard Reinsch on the train?

MCKIM: Leonard Reinsch? We picked Leonard up somewhere along the line, just where I don't know. He was looking after the radio coverage.

FUCHS: Does anything stand out in your memory about the inauguration, which I assume you attended?

MCKIM: I did attend. I had a suite of rooms at the Statler with Fred Bowman, who had been a sergeant in D Battery and was then vice president of Wilson's Sporting Goods Company. He and his wife and my wife and I had a suite

[119]

of rooms there. We attended the inaugural on the south grounds there. President Roosevelt was wheeled out in the custody of his son, Jimmy; and it was a cold day; there was snow on the ground. Afterwards, there was a reception inside with Mrs. Roosevelt and Mrs. Truman in the receiving line. That was it. I got to know the Massachusetts crowd pretty well, when we were up in Massachusetts, so that that crowd kind of made our suite their headquarters. Maurice Tobin, "Sonny McDonough," who was the head of the CIO, and Roy Green, who was the secretary of the city council of Boston (whatever it's called), and Eddie McLaughlin, who was an insurance man there, former pitcher for the Boston Red Sox -- Bill Burke was collector of the Port of Boston -- and those people that we had met on the trip through Massachusetts. We got to see them all again.

FUCHS: Did President Roosevelt look better to you on this occasion than he did in September at the reception?

MCKIM: No, he was wrapped up in a cape, and had on his old gray hat. No, he didn't look too good, he was getting rather gray, getting a gray pallor then.

FUCHS: Will you recount the events of April 12, 1945, as

[120]

you remember them?

MCKIM: Yes, I had been in St. Louis and I had taken the B & O to Washington. I went over to the Senate Office Building...

FUCHS: For what purpose were you going to Washington at that time?

MCKIM: I had a little business up there of my own, I was on a business trip. So, in the morning Mr. Truman said, "What are you going to do today?"

And I said, "Well, I think I'll go over and see some of my Republican senators and congressmen from Nebraska."

He said, "I think that would be a good idea." So he said, "I want you back here at 12 o'clock."

I said, "What's on?"

He said, "Well, we're going to lunch over in Les Biffle's office."

Well, I was back at 12 o'clock and we went over there to lunch in Les' office. Senator [Alben] Barkley was there, and Senator [Allen Joseph] Ellender, and Senator [Donald Hammer] Magnuson of Washington -- oh, I don't know, half a dozen more. I think we had a

[121]

drink or so before lunch. Then going back from Les Biffle's office to what President Truman then called his "gold-plated office," which was the Vice-President's office right behind the Senate Chamber, he said, "Don't you think we ought to have a little game tonight?"

I said, "Yes, I think so. Where do you want to play?"

He said, "Down in your room."

I said, "The room I've got I have to have a shoe horn to get in it myself; it was the only thing I could get, but I'll go see Bill Davis, the manager of the hotel, and see if I can get some bigger quarters."

"Well," he said, "you do that."

And he gave me a list to call to get them for the game.

And he said, "How's your whiskey supply?"

"Well," I said, "it's non-existent."

"Well," he said, "I've got some new whiskey over in the Senate Office Building office," and he said, "you go over there and get what you think we'll need. There's a case of Scotch there that Jimmy Cromwell sent me" (he was then the ambassador to Canada), "and there's a case of bourbon there," and I think he said

[122]

it was Barney Baruch who sent it to him.

Anyway, after I left Vice-President Truman there, I went over to the Senate Office Building and got the liquor and took a cab down to the Statler Hotel. I went to the manager, Bill Davis, and told him my story, and that I'd have to have more room. So, he gave me a suite. He sent a bellboy up to transfer my stuff from the room I was in. He sent up a green poker table, I got all the mix and the ice and everything up there -- got all set for it. Then a friend of mine, Fletcher Neal from Omaha, quite an ardent Democrat, came by to see me and was sitting there, and we were talking over the events of the day. So. Harry Vaughan called me and he said, "The V-P says to tell you that the Senate has adjourned. He is going over to Sam Rayburn's office, then he's coming over here to the Senate Office Building and sign the mail. He's got a call from the White House, he'll have to answer that, and after that we'll be down, but we'll be a little bit late."

So that was O.K. I was sitting there talking to Mr. Neal when the phone rang again, and it was Bill Davis, the hotel manager. And he said, "I don't want

[123]

to start any rumors and I don't want to spread any. I just thought I'd tell you that one of our maids was cleaning up the room of a Government man, he had a short wave radio and it could be that you won't have any party tonight."

Well, then the thought struck me, "He had a call from the White House."

And Davis said, "If there's anything to it, it will be on the radio."

And when I put down the phone I walked over and turned on the radio and they're swearing in Mr. Truman at the White House, because the White House had caught him in Sam Rayburn's office and hustled him right down there. So I want to tell you, I got the jitters right then and right quick. I tried to get Neal to take a drink with me, but he wouldn't, but I took a good stiff one. In a little while, Neal left and Harry Vaughan and Matt Connelly came in. We're sitting around there wondering what to do. We had to make some calls and call off all the poker party and finally my phone rang another time, and I was getting a little fed up with answering the phone, having the jitters anyway, and this voice said, "Eddie?"

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And I said, "Mr. President. "

He said, "I guess the party's off. They've got me fenced in out here. Have you seen Matt or Harry?"

And I said, "They're both sitting right here."

He said, "Well," he said, "I want one of you to go over and take charge of the Senate Office Building office tomorrow, and I want the other two of you at the White House."

I said, "We've discussed that and Harry Vaughan will go over to the Senate Office Building."

And he said, "You and Matt show up at the White House at nine o'clock."

And I said, "How do we get in?"

And he said, "You'll get in."

So Matt came down to the hotel the next morning and we walked over there together. Incidentally, we had no trouble getting in.

So we were shown into the Presidential Office and the President got up from this big desk and walked over to me and he said, "Eddie, I'm as sorry as hell about last night."

And I said, "Why?"

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He said, "Well," he said, "you've been in on everything else and you missed the big event, and I thought somebody had called you but nobody had."

And I said, "Well, Mr. President, it doesn't count what's gone before, what counts is what happens now."

So he walked back to his desk and sat down and I stood right where I was.

He said, "Do you have to stand there?"

And I said, "Well, Mr. President, I suddenly find myself in the presence of the President of the United States and I don't know how to act."

And he said, "Come on over here and sit down."

I sat down and he said, "Do you have to go home?"

And I said, "Well, you know that I was leaving this afternoon for Omaha."

"Well," he said, "I need you. Stick around awhile; I need some help."

I said, "O.K. sir, I'll stay here as long as you want."

So, that was that.

FUCHS: You said you turned on the radio and they were

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swearing him in, did they announce that?

MCKIM: They announced that he was being sworn in.

FUCHS: They announced it, they didn't actually have the swearing in ceremony?

MCKIM: They had a swearing in ceremony.

FUCHS: But not on the radio?

MCKIM: No.

FUCHS: What happened next? For instance, Hugh Fulton, they...

MCKIM: Hugh Fulton, when I went into the President's office that morning, Hugh Fulton was already sitting in there. He had come down from New York and I think that he was the first one who saw the new President. What transpired, I don't know.

FUCHS: You don't have any idea why he never took a position in the White House?

MCKIM: I have no idea.

FUCHS: Do you have any vivid recollections of President

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Truman's first days in the White House?

MCKIM: Well, those were hectic days. For me to try to recall twenty years later just everything that happened there, I just couldn't do it. Some things stick out in my memory, and others, we'll just have to gloss over.

FUCHS: Did you know about the atomic bomb before it was exploded?

MCKIM: No, I did not.

FUCHS: I noticed that your papers showed that you had a poker game with Mr. Truman the night of the false V-E Day, which occurred in 1945, and also at one of the George Allen parties. Do you recall anything about those games?

MCKIM: Yes, I do. The night of the false armistice, we had a little poker game up on the third floor of the White House. Present, of course, were the President, Harry Vaughan, Frank Walker, Bob Hannegan, George Allen, Steve Early, oh, several others. I know we were going along pretty good. I had a pair of sixes back to back on the first two cards, and I was about

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ready to do a little raising when Jonathan Daniels burst in the room and said the report was out that the Germans had surrendered. Well, we knew that negotiations were going on, but we felt that we would know about it before anybody else. Daniels said there were a lot of reporters outside the White House clamoring to get in; they wanted a report on whether or not the rumor was true. Well, you never saw a poker game break up so fast in your life. We left the cards just as they were and we all went down to the President's office, and they let the newspapermen in. Truman, of course, scotched the story, that there was no truth in it. After they had filed out, we sat there for a few minutes talking and finally the President said, "Well, I'm not making any money here;" so, we went back to the game just as we left it. And I started to do my raising with my pair of sixes back to back, and I never helped them. Well, it just so happened that the President had sevens back to back; that's another pot that I lost. That's about the end of that story.

FUCHS: Do you recall anything about the party that George Allen gave, when that would have been?

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MCKIM: Yes, that was on a Sunday afternoon after I had left Washington, but I was back there on a trip and the President said, "What are you doing tomorrow afternoon," that would have been a Sunday.

I said, "I'm available. Where's the game?"

He said, "Never mind where the game is. Harry Vaughan will pick you up around three o'clock," which Harry did, and we drove out to the Wardman Park and up to George Allen's apartment. I think I was the only one in Washington that didn't know where the game was being played because certainly everybody around the hotel knew that there was something going on, on account of all the Secret Service men around.

Well, we had a nip or two and started the game. It was one of these wild games, dealer's choice, and I know at one time the game was "Spit in the Ocean" where there's a wild card out in the center and you get four cards. Well, I happened to have an ace among my four cards, so I threw three away and drew three. The President was sitting just across the table from me. Well, about that time, John Snyder came in with General Eisenhower, and the General pulled up an ottoman and sat right at my left to kibitz the game. So,

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without even looking, I just passed over my four cards to him and I said, "Here, General, you provide the strategy and I'll do the tactics."

And somebody on my left started out and opened with openers and the President said, "Have you looked, yet?

And I said, "No, I haven't looked."

So, he said, "I'll bet two dollars."

So, they got around to me and I said, "General, how do they look?"

And he said, "Well, if it was my hand it would be worth a raise or two."

And I said, "That's all, don't tip my hand off, I'll just raise it two dollars."

It got around to the President again and he said, "Have you looked yet?"

I said, "No, the man said it was worth a raise or two, that's why I raised."

He said, "Well, I'll raise you right back."

They stayed and it got to me and I said, "Well, the third and last raise, ‘worth a raise or two,' and here's my second raise."

He said, "What have you got?"

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And I said, "General, show them our four aces." And Ike got up and just laid the cards out in the middle of the table -- four aces. And I said, "General, stick around here. I think we've got a bunch of chumps in this game; we can do pretty good here."

The President said, "Ike, you get away from him. He's doing all right on his own hook, and if you don't, you're going to be a corporal tomorrow."

FUCHS: You held one and drew three?

MCKIM: Yes. I held one and drew three."

FUCHS: And you had the one in the center wild.

MCKIM: Yes, I got another ace and I got a wild card with my down card.

FUCHS: Do you recall talking to Mr. Truman about the representative to the Vatican, whether he felt that we should reappoint a representative to the Vatican?

MCKIM: Well, the only time we ever talked about it was when I was going to Europe; I told him I was going to go see the Pope, anything he wanted to find out, or anything that I could do, and he said, "No, not in

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particular except I would like to know one point," and that one point I took up with Pope Pius XII and I don't think I should mention what it was.

FUCHS: This was in '50?

MCKIM: This was in 1945.

FUCHS: You went over there in 1945 and saw the Pope. You mainly went over on a...?

MCKIM: I went over on several points. I went over attached to the Army and Navy Surplus Property Board which was then headed by Thomas McCabe, President of Scott Paper Company. There was a lot of surplus property in Europe after the war and this Board was set up to dispose of it. The European manager of it was to have been Jim Knowlson, who was president of the Stewart-Warner Company in Chicago, and a group went over and I was attached to them. My purpose really was to report back as to just what that Board was doing, and when I got back -- of course, in the course of it, I flew down to Rome and saw the Pope. I had a forty minute private audience with Pope Pius XII. We discussed those things which the President asked me to discuss and which the ban of

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silence had been put on me -- on them.

FUCHS: This was after you served with John Snyder in the Federal Loan Administration?

MCKIM: Yes, I was over there temporarily, just for a while.

FUCHS: Were you considered a Government employee at that time?

MCKIM: Yes.

FUCHS: When you went to Europe?

MCKIM: Yes, I was. And when I got back it was around -- well, I retired from Government employment on September 1.

FUCHS: What were you considered then? You weren't a member of the Board; were you a special representative of the President?

MCKIM: Well, when I got back from there, I reported to the President my impressions of the Army and Navy Surplus Property Board and what they were doing, which was absolutely nothing. There was a lot of surplus property in

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Europe; it could not be brought back to the United States because of the original agreement with the manufacturer. We were the guests of Charlie Sawyer, who was then the Ambassador to Belgium, at the Embassy in Brussels, one of the evenings when we were in Europe. The Minister of Economics of Belgium were there at the time, also a guest. He took me aside and told me that Belgium needed a lot of rolling stock, a lot of trucks, and it was his idea that we could appoint a commission of a number of men from Belgium and from the United States, who would decide on the prices for certain types of trucks, would place them in about three categories of "good," "fair" or "poor," also to agree on a price for the replacement parts and on tires. They also needed a lot of Bailey bridges because all of the bridges in Belgium, practically, had been blown out. And I said, "O.K., what are you going to use for money; how are you going to pay for this?"

He said, "Well, it may surprise you to know, that the credit balance is in our favor of a hundred and fifty million dollars."

And I said, "Mr. McCabe over there is the man you can talk to. He's head of the Army-Navy Surplus Property

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Board." Well, he talked to McCabe, nothing ever came of it.

But that to me was a chance to really do something for Belgium, a war-ridden country who needed this stuff and needed it right then, and we needed to dispose of it. But on the other hand, they had a number of employees in the Paris office and they were just sitting around and doing nothing and taking sightseeing trips, for the reason that neither the Army or the Navy would declare this property surplus. They had nothing to do about it until it was declared surplus. And the Army and Navy said, "Well, we've got to inventory it first before we'll turn it over." Well, they were just reluctant to turn it over and I don't know whether it was ever turned over or not. When I came back, I rendered my report to the President, as to the personnel of that property board and also as to what, if anything, they were accomplishing. I told him that I felt the chairman of that board was a dodo. I told him, furthermore,, that they were doing absolutely nothing and that we were maintaining them over there for no purpose whatever. I told him that the Army and Navy were both reluctant to declare any of this property as surplus. And he said, "Well, I

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want you to tell that to John Snyder."

So, I got ahold of John Snyder and we went to lunch up in John's office. He was then Federal Loan Administrator, and Stu Symington was also present. I gave them the whole story at that time. And I said, "Now that I've told my story I'm going to Omaha; I'm all through, see."

So, they wouldn't believe what I had to say about the chairman of that board, and he was afterwards appointed chairman of the Federal Reserve System. Since then, they have agreed that it was a great mistake and that they should have taken my word for it.

The next morning after that luncheon, about seven o'clock I got a phone call and it was Stu Symington, and he had been appointed the new Surplus Property Administrator. And he said, "Are you going to Omaha?"

And I said, "Yes."

He said, "Do you want a ride; I'm going to Chicago. I'll take you as far as Chicago."

I said, "Fine."

He said, "Meet me downstairs in an hour."

And he picked me up and we drove out to the field and we took off. At that time, I gave Stu a further

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briefing on the surplus property situation in Europe, and he suggested that maybe I would go back and run it over there.

And I said, "No, not for me; I've had a bellyfull. I’m going for home."

And I left Stu in Chicago. He had some business to transact, I think, with Sears-Roebuck and I caught the next plane out of Chicago for Omaha. I terminated my connection with the United States Government.

FUCHS: Who was the administrator that Symington succeeded?

MCKIM: Former Senator Guy Gillette of Iowa.

FUCHS: Would you care to comment on the story in the Congressional Record, where [Charles A.] Halleck said there was undue influence exerted on a Montana election from the White House?

MCKIM: Yes, there was undue pressure, probably, and it was all created by Senator Mike Mansfield, who is now the Majority Leader in the Senate. Mike was then a congressman. There was a district out there and Mike kept besieging the White House about a veterans hospital. It was the question of whether it was going to be located

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where there is plenty of outside medical facilities to take care of these boys.

FUCHS: You mean where there are doctors and consultants?

MCKIM: Halleck called me up about it, and I said, "Well, a telegram was sent, and I sent it." Afterwards I guess the President didn't remember telling me that; anyway, I took the blame for it.

FUCHS: This was the telegram saying...

MCKIM: The Veterans Administration advised that the location probably would be in Montana. Mike Mansfield was using that for publicity purposes to elect a Democratic congressman in a Montana district and the Democratic candidate was defeated.

FUCHS: They hadn't as yet made any decision or advised anything?

MCKIM: No, and I don't know if it was ever built in either place. It made no difference to me where it was. I had no interest in the matter.

FUCHS: Who were your mutual friends, Albert Chow and Bob

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Kenny?

MCKIM: Albert Chow was the "king of Chinatown" in San Francisco. He was head of what they called the six companies or rather, it's really the six tongs. Albert was quite a Democratic politician among the Chinese, and as I say, as head of the tongs there. But you looked him up in the phone book and he was listed "Albert Chow, Notary Public."

And Bob Kenny at that time was Democratic attorney general of California, later a candidate for governor, and was defeated.

FUCHS: They were both friends of yours and Mr. Truman.

MCKIM: Yes.

FUCHS: You mentioned that Frank Pace had written a mean letter about General Pick in 1953, and I think back through the correspondence over the years, there was considerable about General Pick? Just what was the story there, as you recall?

MCKIM: Well, General Pick was a very close, personal friend of mine. I knew General Pick when he was a colonel in charge of the Missouri River Division for the Corps of Engineers and located in Omaha. General

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Pick then was sent over to the Far East in World War II. General Pick is the man who built the Ledo Road. That was the road to circumvent the Burma Road, as you recall, which was in Japanese hands. That was a terrific job. I don't know how many bridges they had to build, and they had to build everything under gunfire. Oh, I think the road ran a thousand miles or so -- something like that. They built it right through the jungle. General Pick was not a West Pointer; he didn't belong to what we officially refer to as the WPPA, known as the West Point Protective Association. General Pick was given that job, as he told me later, "when all the West Pointers were looking out the window." None of them wanted that. Well, he built that road and he came back; and he was then the Division engineer in Omaha, and then was busted back from a major general to a brigadier general. General Pick was in charge in Omaha at the time of "Operation Snowbound." I don't know whether you'd recall that or not, but it was a terrible disaster for Nebraska, South Dakota, all through that area.

FUCHS: What year was that?

MCKIM: Oh, you got me now; I don't know. Val Peterson was

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governor of Nebraska at the time. The day that everything had been cleared up on "Operation Snowbound," well, before that, General Pick called me to his office and asked me to come up, and he said: "Ed, we're facing a disaster here. Everything is snowbound. The state of Nebraska authorized $500,000 disaster fund, but that's gone already. The job isn't started to be done. I would like for you to get in touch with the President and have this area declared a disaster area."

He got Governor Val Peterson on the phone and I talked to Val, and I called Washington and explained the situation to the President. Pick had had so many contacts with contractors all through that area that he had them all ready with their tractors, bulldozers, and everything else ready to go in there. Out in Colorado, for instance, they started an operation airlift, airlifting hay to drop it to these cattle; the cattle were frozen standing up. There was another case where the Burlington Railroad went into a cut with a snowplow and stopped it, just grinding, and they went in there to see what it was and there were a lot of cattle chewed up, and they backed off and over a

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hundred head of cattle came out of that cut that had been all covered over with snow.

Pick was ordered to Washington, then, and I gave a party for him the night he was to leave; and as he came down the street to the dinner I was giving, he said, "Ed, the job is done," and he left for Washington the next morning.

Then President Truman wanted Pick to be Chief of the Corps of Engineers, and at that time General Eisenhower was Chief of Staff, and Ike brought over a bunch of names for the President to select one, and the President looked at it and said, "Well, where's General Pick's name on here?"

"Well, Mr. President, his name isn't on there."

Well, the reason his name wasn't on there, he wasn't a West Pointer. So the President handed the list back and he said, "Bring me back a list with General Pick's name on it." He didn't like that. Then he sold him on the idea to let General "Specs" Wheeler stay one more year on the job.

FUCHS: Eisenhower sold Truman on the idea?

MCKIM: Yes, sold Truman on the idea of leaving "Specs"

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Wheeler on the job for one more year. He was a lieutenant general. I guess the President agreed to that but the next list that came over he said, "General Pick's the man." He appointed him and he was made a lieutenant general then and Chief of the Corps of Engineers. Then later I was on the board of the Panama Canal Company and General Pick was appointed to that board upon his retirement as Chief of the Corps of Engineers. We were the first two Democrats fired from the board when Ike took office. In fact, we were the only two Democrats on the board. Pick did wonderful work on the Panama Canal Company too.

FUCHS: What would the letter that Frank Pace wrote...?

MCKIM: I don't recall that now. I don't remember what it would be about.

FUCHS: Do you recall a "doublecross by Royall," which would have been Secretary of the Army, [Kenneth C.] Royall, I presume.

MCKIM: Yes, it was Royall, but I don't recall the incident now.

FUCHS: You mentioned that you had read George Allen's

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article in the Saturday Evening Post and got quite a chuckle out of it, and you said that coupled with Jim Farley's story, you thought you ought to write a book. Do you recall that?

MCKIM: Yes, that's the time I said, "Mine will be just all blank pages." I have Jim Farley's story here and I think I've got George Allen's book here. His book was Presidents Who Have Known Me. I think President Truman finally caught up with George Allen.

FUCHS: Can you elaborate on that a little bit?

MCKIM: I won't elaborate on it. I think that George Allen was quite an opportunist, one of the best. I know that when Truman announced that he wasn't going to run for re-election, I think it was John Snyder made the remark that the scuttlebutt around Washington was that if you want to know who the next President is going to be, just find out who George Allen's running around with. He seemed to have the faculty of picking them.

FUCHS: In 1948, you wrote Mr. Truman, the President, about a War Assets deal in connection with eighty-seven DC7 caterpillar tractors. Do you recall anything about that?

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MCKIM: Yes, I don't recall so much about it now. I think they were out somewhere in a field in California and somebody was going to buy them for damn near nothing, and I got the scuttlebutt on it and I said, "For that kind of money, I'd buy them; I don't know what I'd use 87 tractors for;" but there was a lot of that stuff that went on, a lot of it was pure rumor (scuttlebutt as we call it), and some of it was in fact. What was needed, really, was another Truman Committee after the war.

FUCHS: You don't recall the outcome of that tractor deal?

MCKIM: No, I don't.

FUCHS: In June, 1948, when Mr. Truman was making his so-called non-political tour and came to Omaha, what is that story as you remember it?

MCKIM: Well, that was an unfortunate happenstance there and I think it started to be fouled up right in Washington. I was in Washington on a visit and talking to Harry Vaughan and he said, "What are you fellows doing out in Omaha for the President's visit?"

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I said, "When is he coming to Omaha? I don't know anything about it?"

He said, "Well, he's coming out there for the 35th Division Reunion to be held in Omaha."

I said, "This is the first I've heard of it." So I said, "I'll go home and find out."

Well, I found out that the reunion was to be held in Omaha. Then two representatives, a fellow named Colonel Joe Nickel and another fellow from Kansas came up. The other one of them was the publisher of a newspaper, publisher of the 35th Division newspaper or booklet or whatever it was, and they wanted quite a sizeable sum of money to bring the convention here. I said, "Well, hell, take the convention some place else if we've got to pay you fellows that kind of money." But I got ahold of the Chamber of Commerce and explained the situation, and I said, "The President is coming out here and it's purely a meeting of the old soldiers, the old Division, and he's going to fly out in the morning and fly back that night. It's non-political."

Well, I don't know whether you know it or not, but the Chamber of Commerce in Omaha is mainly Republican and all of the money in Omaha is Republican

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money. So, I got pledges; I got enough money pledged to stage the convention, and then I got word from Matt Connelly. He called up and said, "While the President is there, I think he should make a trip out to Boy's Town." Father Flanagan had just died and he said, "It would be pretty good politics for the President to lay a wreath on his tomb." Then they went on talking about the speech he was going to make there, that it would be one of his major campaign speeches. "Well," I said, "I thought this was non-political?"

He said, "No, we've changed it."

Well, they changed it after I had assured everybody that this was a non-political visit, coming there just for the old soldiers.

So, I went back to the Chamber of Commerce, then, and they appointed a fellow named Bob Drum, who was president of the Metz Brewing Company and a former 35th Division man. In fact, he was a captain in the 128th Field Artillery. We were made co-chairmen. If I had had any sense, I would have said, "No, make Bob the chairman, or make me the chairman, but none of this divided responsibility."

Well, the divided responsibility went haywire. Bob

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was doing a lot of things that I knew nothing about. In fact, he hired a man, one of his army buddies, who had been recently discharged from the army, to handle some affairs. He gave him $500.00 and after he gave him the $500.00,he said, "It's all right isn't it, Ed, if we have Jim McCrory look over all of this stuff. I gave him $500 out of the fund here to look after things.

Well, we had paid an advertising agency in Omaha to publicize the affair. I don't know whether it was malicious or not; I wouldn't want to say even at this late date, but sufficient unto itself was the fact that they put a young fellow on handling the publicity and they goofed it up someway. All of the entire day was marvelous; it was estimated by the Omaha World Herald, which was a predominately Republican paper, that there were at least 180,000 people lined the route of march to see the President. On the trip out to Boy's Town that afternoon, the crowd lined the highway both ways for the ten miles out there and back to see the President. That night at the Ak-Sar-Ben Coliseum I drove out with the President and I noticed the lack of cars around (it should have been jam packed) and I said, "Mr. President, there's no crowd here;" I said, "I don't know what's happened." Later I discovered

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that none of the radio stations or the newspapers had mentioned specifically that the meeting was open to the public. They left the impression, throughout, that the meeting was confined to the members of the 35th Division, the old soldiers. The President said, "Eddie, I don't give a damn whether there's nobody there but you and me. I am making a speech on the radio to the farmers. They won't be there; they'll be at home listening to that radio. They're the ones I'm going to talk to."

Well, Life magazine, of course, went way out. They had pictures of everything, the lack of people in the hall. Later, in fact, just about a year ago, the President told me, "That was one of the best things that happened to me in my whole campaign. It made a martyr out of me."

And also shortly after that, the head photographer of the Omaha World Herald, John Savage, told me, he said, "Ed, I'm going to tell you something, but if you ever quote me on it, I'll call you a damn liar. Henry Doorly, the publisher of our paper, called the reporters and the photographers in and said, 'Truman is coming to town; don't write a good story, and don't take a good picture."' And if John Savage is alive yet and that is brought up, he'll call me a damn liar. I took

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the brunt of it. As co-chairman of it, I took the brunt. I never bothered to explain to anybody; it happened, and what the hell good is an explanation. I never bothered to explain it to the President. I started to on one or two occasions and he said, "Eddie, it made no difference at all." He just brushed it off.

FUCHS: He stayed overnight in Omaha, didn't he?

MCKIM: Yes, he stayed overnight in the Fontenelle Hotel in Gene Eppley's suite. Gene was the owner of the Fontenelle Hotel. He had that whole floor, the fifth floor, for the staff and the Secret Service men accompanying Truman. And later a columnist on a Minneapolis paper wrote a story to the effect that no hotel wanted Truman or his party there because they had to cut off the floors above and below for the President, and that it was all on the cuff and they made no money on it and they didn't want the Presidential parties. I answered this fellow. I sent the letter to the managing editor of his paper. I explained to them that there were no vacancies above or below; that the Truman party had one floor, and I said, "Furthermore, with the exception of Gene Eppley's private

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suite, which Gene gave to the President, the rest of it was paid for and I paid for it. You can call Joe Dailey, the manager of the Fontenelle and verify this. You'd better be sure of your facts when you published a story of that sort."

He did print my letter, then, the columnist; but the World Herald had picked it up when it was first printed, but they never printed the retraction.

FUCHS: Did you join the campaign tour there?

MCKIM: No. I didn't go any farther. The President that same day dedicated Memorial Park, which was a park dedicated to the dead of World War II from Omaha, and there was a big crowd out there for that. He was out at my house for a brief visit. I wanted him to take a nap for an hour or so but there was just too much going on and he wouldn't do it.

FUCHS: Did you go on any of the campaign with him in '48?

MCKIM: No. He was the President then; he could get all the help he wanted.

FUCHS: I gather you were in Omaha on election night?

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MCKIM: Yes. Some folks have said I was with him in his suite in the Muehlebach Hotel, but I was not.

FUCHS: Good. There is in your papers a vote tabulation, one column headed "HST" and the other column headed "T.D.," Tom Dewey, I assume. It's on White House stationary and the states are listed and placed under...

MCKIM: Well, that was coming back from Boy's Town on this trip. He told me, "Eddie, I'm going to be elected. I'm going to give them some of those big states," and he started outlining all the states and counted up and he said, "I'm going to be elected; this is the way it's going." Later -- I think somewhere I have the letter, but I've been unable to find it -- I was in Washington and the President was out of Washington; I was to leave the same afternoon he was coming in. I left a little note on his desk and I said, "Keep punching. They can't beat a man who won't be beaten." I got a reply to that in which he expressed regret that he wasn't there when I called. He found the note and he said, "You know and I know, that no election is ever won or lost until all of the votes are counted. The complacency

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with which the Republicans are entering this campaign will be their downfall."

And that was dated about the 20th of October, 1948. Somewhere I've got that letter, but I just can't find it now. It's probably with some stuff that I left in my daughter's home.

FUCHS: What was the approximate date of this undated vote tabulation and when did you receive it?

MCKIM: I thought I received it from him; no, I guess I got it from Harry Vaughan later, but this was essentially what he had sketched for me driving back from Boy's Town, that he could give them some of the larger states and still win.

FUCHS: I believe you attended the inaugural in 1948. Does anything stand out in your memory about that?

MCKIM: Oh, yes, sure. I was going to it and Governor Val Peterson called me up and he said, "Ed, are you going to the inaugural?"

And I said, "I am."

He said, "Well, I can't go. Would you fill in for the Governor of Nebraska?"

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I said, "I certainly shall. Send me all the papers."

He said, "I can't send them to you. I'll send them to the President."

I said, "Well, you send them and I'll act as the Governor of Nebraska in the official ceremony."

So, the Battery was back there to act as honorary guard for him, which they did, but I had a couple of cars assigned to me with chauffeurs and a naval aide, who turned out to be a pretty good friend of mine. He's a retired captain in the Navy living over in France.

FUCHS: What was his name?

MCKIM: Captain C. A. Messenheimer. He got to know the French area over there when he was on duty; he was the chief supply officer, G-4, I think it is, of the Mediterranean Fleet, the 6th Fleet. After retirement he just stayed over there. He was a boy, I think, from Lawrence, Kansas, originally. He was a fine fellow. He made a very good aide for me. He'd been an aide for an admiral and you never got to see the bottom of your glass. We made a lot of official functions together and my friend Major General Everett Hughes was

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throwing a party out at Fort McNair and invited me, and I told him I had these others and he said, "Bring them along."

So we were just a little bit late getting in, but Everett went in and he said, "Ike, come on out. Ed's finally gotten here."

And Ike came out and he said, "You holding any four aces?"

FUCHS: Do you think there was anything political about Governor Val Peterson not being able to attend?

MCKIM: No, no, none of that. It was just that he was unable to get away at the time. But I didn't ride in the parade; I marched with the Battery. Messenheimer rode.

FUCHS: In May, 1949 , you wrote the President about some ad lib remarks that Governor Peterson had made in a De Kalb, Illinois speech. Do you recall anything in connection with that?

MCKIM: Yes, I do. Val was making a speech over there at a Republican rally, and he made some reference that the President was born and raised in the sewers or the gutters

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of Kansas City, tainted by the Pendergast machine; and I took exception to the gutter and sewer remarks, and I called him up and I said, "Val, what in the hell is the matter with you making a speech like that?"

And he said, "Ed, I don't know; I don't know what got into me. It was an ad lib and I should never ad lib, but I said it. Will you apologize to the President for me?"

And I said, "No, I will not; you'll do your own apologizing to the President about that."

Well, Val was a reserve officer in the air corps and he was up for a promotion to brigadier general. And he called me up and said, "Ed, my commission as brigadier general in the air corps has been turned down; do you suppose the President had anything to do with it?"

I said, "Val, I don't think he ever knew you were up for promotion."

He said, "Do you think he would hold it against me, those remarks I made?"

I said, "I don't know. Did you ever apologize to him?"

He said, "No, I never got around to it."

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And I said, "You better get around to it. First of all, regardless, the man you spoke about was the President of the United States. There's no use dragging stuff down into the gutter and you know it. It's all right to play politics, and that's the way the game is played, but no sewer politics." Whether he ever apologized, I don't know.

FUCHS: Was he quoted correctly in the paper?

MCKIM: He said he was. At least he didn't deny that that's what he said.

FUCHS: What do you know of Carl Rice from Kansas?

MCKIM: I don't know Carl Rice -- didn't know him. I think he's dead now, but he was the Democratic National committeeman from Kansas and he made a remark one time that Truman was not fit to be vice-presidential candidate; in fact, that he was not fit for any office. And, of course, that was widely quoted in the newspapers. Later, I think Mr. Rice wanted to be a Federal judge out there, but I don't think he made it. You know, the things you don't say are the things you don't have to take back.

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FUCHS: Is there anything that might be of interest in regard to your position on the Board of Directors of the Panama Canal Company?

MCKIM: Not particularly. I was the President's representative on the Board. Originally I was appointed to the Panama Railroad Company; at that time the Railroad company handled all of the commercial aspects within the Canal Zone -- operated the railroad and also all the commissaries, exchanges, etc. Before that, Congress used to allocate the funds for the operation of the Canal so that there were two separate entities. Then they decided they would combine them and the Railroad Company had the United States charter, owned one share of stock (that's all there was). The Canal and the Railroad were combined and made the Panama Canal Company. And we had the job then of combining it. There were two sets of books and neither one of them were worth a damn. For instance, neither in the Panama Railroad nor the Panama Canal did they ever capitalize any expenditures under a thousand dollars. So these "birds" down there used to make a lot of expenditures under a thousand dollars and didn't have to put it in capital

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expenditures. On the Board at that time was T. Coleman Andrews, who was afterwards collector of Internal Revenue and later was a third party candidate for President. Coleman was a certified public accountant and we worked together pretty well on getting the Panama Canal Company on a businesslike basis. There was one item that they had down there, an eighty million dollar housing project for the Panamanian or what they called the "silver" labor. In the old days they used to pay the American laborer in gold and the rest of them in silver, so they were the "silver" labor. There were East Indian Negroes, there were some Panamanians in there, the unskilled workers. Well, eighty million dollars is a lot of money. And Panama at that time was complaining that there were too many of these people living within the zone when they should have been out on the economy of Panama; they wanted their trade out there. Of course these people had relatives outside the zone, and they used to trade in the commissaries and cart the stuff into Panama. So Panama had a legitimate gripe there. I was in favor of putting them all out on the economy of Panama because when you have them inside the zone, you have to provide housing for

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them, you have to provide recreational facilities, you have to provide schools, and it ran up the cost. If Panama wanted them, I was in favor of giving them back, but of course a lot of them were not Panamanians. They were the descendants of West Indian labor that was brought in there.

FUCHS: You made several trips to Panama?

MCKIM: I made several trips. I was on not only the Board but I was a member of the three man executive committee of the Board which consisted of Karl R. Bendetsen, who was Under-Secretary of the Army, and T. Coleman Andrews, and myself. We were on the executive committee of the Board because we could meet pretty fast, you see. I made trips to Panama and I was on the Board about four years. I was down there at least twice a year. It was a no-pay job, I might also add. When the President appointed me on there he called me up and caught me in Kansas City, and he wanted to know where I was and I said, "I'm in Kansas City."

He said, "What are you doing there?"

And I said, "Well, I'm getting fitted out with some golf clubs."

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He said, "I just called to tell you that the Panama Canal is going to hell."

I said, "What's the matter with it; what happened?"

He said, "I just made you a member of the Board of Directors."

I said, "What's it pay?

He said, "Nothing."

I said, "I'm worth every cent of it."

FUCHS: There is some discussion in your correspondence with the President about the President-elect, Colonel Jose Remon, I suppose it is

MCKIM: Yes, "Chi Chi" Remon.

FUCHS: ...and his proposed visit to America. Whatever happened to that?

MCKIM: The time wasn't right for him to visit us. He wanted to come very much. He wanted to come in the summertime. He was a great baseball fan. "Chi Chi” -- I got to know "Chi Chi" very well. He was the strong man of Panama. He had been chief of police and the chief of police in Panama really runs the country. They have no army but they have a police force of

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about 3,000 men who are armed only with handguns. "Chi Chi" made and unmade presidents. He was built like a Notre Dame fullback, but he was on our side. He used to get these Communist agitators when they would come in by plane, loaded with a lot of propaganda, and he'd take them off the plane, destroy the literature, and put them back on the next plane out. He didn't let them light. He was very much for the United States; but he was assassinated at the race track and the ringleader of the crowd that knocked him off was the Vice-President. The Vice-President of the country was tried for it and convicted, and I think was given a six month sentence on the basis, now you mind this, on the basis that it was his first offense. There's no capital punishment in Panama.

FUCHS: I noticed that after November 9, 1950 , in your correspondence with the President in your files, you addressed him as "Dear Mr. President," where previously it had been "Dear Harry."

MCKIM: Well, in the meantime he had become President of the United States. I still call him "Mr. President." Once in a while he'll sign a letter to me as "Captain

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Harry," which he says is one title that he really earned. You just don't -- we dropped that Harry stuff the day he became President. My kids still call him "Uncle Harry," you know. I think he gets a kick out of it.

FUCHS: Do you have any clear recollections of the farewell dinner in the White House on December 18, 1952?

MCKIM: I was there. Nothing startling happened. It was a dinner given for anybody who had ever served on his staff, and I went back to Washington and sat next to George Allen. George Allen was very much for Eisenhower. He had picked the right man, again.

FUCHS: Do you recall Matt Connelly at that dinner?

MCKIM: Matt was at the dinner, sure.

FUCHS: You don't remember any anecdotes other than George Allen being for Eisenhower?

MCKIM: I sat next to George at the dinner.

FUCHS: Did you go to Chicago in 1956?

MCKIM: What was that?

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FUCHS: That was the second nomination of Stevenson when Ike was running for a second term.

MCKIM: Oh, yes, yes I was there. In fact, I took one of my daughters, Jane, with me, and she acted as receptionist in Truman's headquarters in the Blackstone Hotel. Yes, I remember that very well. We had a parade of celebrities in and out of there all the time, but Paul Butler was then chairman of the National Committee and he was very much a Stevenson man. I thought Paul's treatment of Truman was disgraceful. He didn't give him very many tickets, in other words, just almost totally ignored him. Well, Truman had come out for Averell Harriman there and, of course, I don't think Averell was the man either, and I certainly couldn't give Stevenson very much, can't yet.

FUCHS: Who would you have favored in '56?

MCKIM: I don't know. Whoever I would have favored wouldn't have had a chance. Truman took an awful licking and I got pretty disgusted with the whole Democratic Party about that time, including Mr. Stevenson and particularly Paul Butler. I do recall that Senator John F.

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Kennedy came up one afternoon, and Truman wasn't in, and I ushered him in the front parlor and sat down and talked with him a while until Truman arrived. He was a candidate then for Vice-President and almost made it; he almost beat Kefauver. In fact, if Tennessee hadn't gone for Kefauver, Kennedy would have been nominated for Vice-President because the peculiar thing about it was the Tennessee delegation didn't want Kefauver, but they felt pledged to go with him.

FUCHS: What was your impression of Senator Kennedy at that time?

MCKIM: Well, I thought he was a nice young fellow. He had had a good record; he'd been hurt in service; he had a bad back. They put on a movie film to the convention that was absolutely a marvelous piece of work and that is what practically stampeded the convention, nominating him for Vice-President. It was really a marvelous piece of work. I hope that that film has been saved.

FUCHS: You mean the Kennedy backers put this on about Senator Kennedy?

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MCKIM: Well, I don't know who put it on, but it would have had to have been thought about a long time, before it could be made; but it was a marvelous film and it was narrated by John F. Kennedy. Somebody spent some money on that film; it almost stampeded the convention. He lost to Kefauver by just a narrow margin.

FUCHS: Did you have any advance idea or knowledge that Mr. Truman would not run again in '52?

MCKIM: He told me that he wouldn't.

FUCHS: How early did he tell you that?

MCKIM: Before he announced it, and I was at the dinner in Washington when he did announce it, much to the consternation of a lot of Democratic office holders.

FUCHS: You were at the convention in '52?

MCKIM: No, in Philadelphia?

FUCHS: Yes, when Stevenson was nominated the first time.

MCKIM: No, no. When Stevenson was nominated...no, I was there the second time. Stevenson couldn't carry Illinois.

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FUCHS: Mr. Truman made a visit to Creighton University...

MCKIM: ...a year ago last April. An honorary fraternity, Alpha Sigma Nu, had invited him up and invited me and I went up. I flew up from here as sort of an advance man and Truman came up with Wally Graham, Dr. Wallace Graham. The Jesuits put on quite a party; they had a guard of honor out at the airport to meet him on a Saturday afternoon. I was invited with Wally Graham and the President to a cocktail party and dinner in the Jesuits' Community House that evening. Then from there, there was a cocktail party at the home of Tom Walsh, president of the fraternity. There were a lot of people invited. Early the next morning they were there to take the President up to see their new library and to visit around Creighton University. He talked to the members of this honorary fraternity.

Then he was to make his main speech that Sunday afternoon at Joslyn Memorial Hall, it's sort of an art museum and auditorium. I think they can seat about 1,200 people in that auditorium but there were over 3,000 people there, hanging from the rafters. He spoke on the duties and responsibilities of the Presidency.

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Then they scheduled him for a receiving line . Well, he had had a hard day. He had a hard night the night before, and he'd had a hard day up until then, so I stood behind him in the receiving line. Finally, he said, to me, "Eddie, get me out of here."

So I told Father Lynn, President of Creighton U., "The President is tired and I've got to get him out."

And he said, "Well, there's 2,800 people here who haven't shaken hands with him."

And I said, "Well, they can wave at him as he goes by because I'm taking him out." They had some R.O.T.C. honor guards there, and I had them form a flying wedge and got him out. I took him back to the hotel and -- oh, before that, we had lunch out at Boy's Town and Monsignor Nicholas Wegner had us out there for lunch. I knew that Archbishop [Gerald T.] Berg of Omaha was not scheduled to be there; they felt he'd be out of town. I was in another room when I heard him come in and he went over to the President and said, "Oh. Mr. President, it's a great pleasure to meet you; I've heard so much about you from our mutual friend, Ed McKim. It's a shame that he isn't here to see it."

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The President looked at him and said, "Well, he's standing right behind you."

Then there was another Democratic reception at the Fontenelle Hotel that Sunday night. Truman made an appearance there, made a little talk, and shook hands with a lot of people. Afterwards, Governor Frank Morrison of Nebraska came up to the room. We still had the same old Eppley suite. It was a hard day. I put him to bed about 10:30, and I told him, "Now, stay in bed. There's no use of you getting up, prowling around here at the wee, small hours of the morning. We don't have to get up until about seven o'clock."

There was about half a bottle of bourbon and about a half a bottle of scotch on a little bar that Gene had in his suite. The door to my room opened right almost into this bar. The President's room was through the living room and then to the right down to another bedroom.

So, about -- oh, it must have been about five o'clock in the morning, I left my door open a little bit, and I heard somebody fumbling around out there in the semi-darkness, and I looked through the door and I said, "What are you doing out there?"

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The President said, "What did you do with that bottle of bourbon?" I had taken it the night before and hid it.

I said, "What do you want with it? It's early in the morning; it's five o'clock."

He said, "Oh. Ed, I've had a hard day, let's have a little nip of that bourbon."

So. I said, "All right."

He said, "Aren't you going to have one?"

I said, "Well, I'll have one of the scotch."

He was all dressed. He'd been up and shaved, bathed, and dressed. I said, "I'll shave and bathe -- do you want a little breakfast?"

He said, "Well, I don't think we can get any."

I said, "We might be able to get some orange juice and coffee."

So, I called downstairs and they said, "No, there's nobody in the kitchen until six o'clock."

I said, "The President wants some orange juice and coffee."

And they said, "Well, we'll do our best to get it up there. They had it up there in about fifteen minutes.

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So, I rode with him to Kansas City. As he went through the airport terminal, I said, "Let me have your tickets and baggage checks." I checked his baggage and I had his ticket, so when he went through the gate, he just went right on through, just like he was used to doing as President. So, the stewardess and, I guess, one of the airport employees kind of looked at him, and I said, "Pay no attention to him, here's his ticket right here."

So, we got up and got seated and the plane took off and the stewardess came up and apologized for not recognizing him.

And he said, "Oh, that's all right. I'm just a Missouri farmer now."

She said, "The boys up front -- we're all Democrats -- the boys up front would like to have you come up at your convenience."

He said, "Tell them I'll be up there pretty soon. How about that breakfast we're supposed to have?"

So, she brought some breakfast right quick.

Finally, he turned to me and he said, "Let me out."

He was sitting next to the window. He started

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up front and he turned around and he said, "Fasten your seat belt; I'm going up front and run this damn thing."

He came back in about five minutes and he said, "Everything is all right; everything is under control. The pilot is from Moberly, Missouri. Everything is all right."

FUCHS: I believe you mentioned to me a visit you had overseas with General [George S., Jr.] Patton, after the war. Could you recount that?

MCKIM: Yes, I was in the George Cinq Hotel. Major General Everett Hughes, who was afterwards Chief of Ordnance of the Army, was then commander of the Seine Base. He called up one afternoon and he said, "What are you doing?"

I said, "I'm just waiting for you to call me."

He said, "Come on down. There's a friend down here that I want you to meet."

I said, "I think I know who it is. I've got a bottle of Haig & Haig pinch I'll bring along with me."

And I went down, and it was General Patton. So

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we had a little cocktail party. General Patton had a nephew there with him named Fred Ayer, who I think was either with the CIA or FBI, or one of those organizations. Ayer went downstairs and he came back up with a newspaper, a Paris edition of one of the papers, announcing, "MacArthur Made Supreme Commander."

And Georgie Patton had a high, squeaky voice and he said, "Look at that, look at that. Well, I'll say this, there's one s.o.b. who'll show Hirohito how to be an emperor." And he did! I think Georgie was killed just a few months after that.

FUCHS: Didn't Drew Pearson come into your conversation?

MCKIM: Yes, yes, Drew Pearson came in. Drew Pearson had taken a pop or two at me in his column and, of course, he had publicized that slapping incident on Patton, and Patton had no use for him. I had no use for him either, but in a joking mood I said, "I think, General, we should propose a little toast to Drew Pearson." He shied away from me and I said, "I'll give the toast."

He said, "I'll trust you, but I wouldn't trust him."

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So, I gave the toast; I said;

"A man may kiss his wife goodbye,
The rose may kiss the butterfly.
The sparkling wine may kiss the glass,
And you, Drew Pearson -- happy days."

Patton said, "I'll drink to that."

FUCHS: How have you looked on Mr. Truman as being on the scale running from liberal to conservative?

MCKIM: Well, he's a liberal Democrat. He's more of a liberal Democrat than I am, but he played the game as he saw it, and that's all you can do.

FUCHS: Do you think he became more liberal in philosophy after he became President?

MCKIM: I don't think so, not necessarily. He had a lot of advisers around him that were really liberal. I won't say a lot, he had some.

FUCHS: I'll put it the other way. Would you say he was more conservative as a senator than as President?

MCKIM: No. I wouldn't say that, I wouldn't say that. I think when he took office, he followed President

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Roosevelt, and he felt somewhat of an obligation to carry out some of the things that were started by Roosevelt. It was perfectly natural that he would do that. I told him, I said, "People are not going to remember how you carried out Roosevelt's policies; they're going to figure on the Truman Administration. I think you better do what you think is right to do."

He said, "That's what I'm going to do." And he did. I think he believed in everything he ever did in the White House, or any time in his life. At the time he did it, he was absolutely right. History may come along and say, "Well, he was wrong here and he was wrong here." That may be. Neither Ty Cobb nor Babe Ruth ever hit a home run every time at bat. What most people seem to overlook is the fact that the President, after all, is a human being. And there's no chance in the world for any man to ever train for the Presidency; there's just no school for that. He's got to have the experience in other lines. He's in the greatest job in the world and I say, I've said this before, that if you take the smartest man in the world, and everybody agrees that he is the smartest man in the world and you put him down in

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the Presidential chair, he's going to be there a couple of years before he knows where he's sitting! There are no minor problems that come to his desk; they are all major. Each day President Truman saw many delegations; I think every fifteen minutes. Everybody was there on appointment, they had to be there on a major problem or they wouldn't get in. Now in fifteen minutes he'd have to find out the answer, and every one of those problems was a major problem and there was no two of them alike. That's the Presidency.

FUCHS: You ran for lieutenant governor in '38?

MCKIM: In '38.

FUCHS: Then what was the rest of your career. You stayed in Omaha for some years after that?

MCKIM: I stayed until I retired seven years ago.

FUCHS: You retired in 1957, and you came here.

MCKIM: I came to Phoenix -- this is my fourth winter here.

FUCHS: You stayed in Omaha until '61.

MCKIM: Yes, came out here January of '61.

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FUCHS: Well, that's all I have.

MCKIM: That's all I have. I guess you've picked what few brains I have.

FUCHS: Well, I've enjoyed it very much and I thank you.

MCKIM: Well, I can go back to my golf game now?

FUCHS: Yes, sir.

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