Summary of Albert J. Baime's The Accidental President

By IRB Media

Please note: This is a companion version & not the original book.

Book Preview: #1 Harry S. Truman was the president of the United States from 1945 to 1953. He was elected to the Senate in 1922, and in 1934 he was elected to the position of presiding judge of Jackson County, Missouri, due to the patronage of Tom Pendergast, the corrupt boss of Kansas City’s Democratic machine.

#2 On May 4, military leaders from the United States, the USSR, Britain, and France met in Berlin to begin the process of occupying Germany, which was to be sliced into occupation zones, one for each of those four nations.

#3 On July 6, Truman left the White House by car and headed for the ship passage to the Potsdam Conference in Soviet-occupied Germany. His approval rating in the United States was 87 percent.

• Language: English
• Publisher: IRB Media
• Release date: Mar 2, 2022
• ISBN: 9781669355007

IRB Media

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Insights on Albert J. Baime's The Accidental President

Contents

Insights from Chapter 1

Insights from Chapter 2

Insights from Chapter 3

Insights from Chapter 4

Insights from Chapter 5

Insights from Chapter 6

Insights from Chapter 1

#1

Harry S. Truman was the president of the United States from 1945 to 1953. He was elected to the Senate in 1922, and in 1934 he was elected to the position of presiding judge of Jackson County, Missouri, due to the patronage of Tom Pendergast, the corrupt boss of Kansas City’s Democratic machine.

#2

On May 4, military leaders from the United States, the USSR, Britain, and France met in Berlin to begin the process of occupying Germany, which was to be sliced into occupation zones, one for each of those four nations.

#3

On July 6, Truman left the White House by car and headed for the ship passage to the Potsdam Conference in Soviet-occupied Germany. His approval rating in the United States was 87 percent.

Insights from Chapter 2

#1

On April 12, 1945, the day the whole weight of the moon and the stars fell on Harry Truman, began as a normal day for the vice president. He woke up at sunrise, and did not just get up at the crack of dawn. He was a man who suffered loneliness with intensity, so he enjoyed waking up next to his wife.

#2

Truman had walked the Senate Office Building’s hallways for nearly a decade now. The building’s striking symbols of power were commonplace to his eye: the Corinthian rotunda with its coffered dome, the nearby twin marble staircases that led to the Caucus Room.

#3

Truman had almost nothing to do as vice president. He had to attend to his duties as president of the Senate, which usually consisted of cracking his gavel to signal the recess. He had only voted against a bill amendment once, two days earlier.

#4

On April 12, the American media was given access to the Ohrdruf death camp, which was the first concentration camp liberated by the Allies. The visuals and testimonies of starvation, cruelty, and bestiality were so overpowering that they left Eisenhower a bit sick.

#5

The war was raging on Okinawa, a Pacific atoll less than half the size of Rhode Island. On April 12, Curtis LeMay was preparing to unleash a mission of B-29s over mainland Japan, to strike the heart of Tokyo with incendiary bombs.

#6

In Washington, DC, on April 12, armies of workers were shuffling through the offices of innumerable federal buildings, fighting their own private wars. The city had changed vastly during the war years.

#7

Harry Truman was the vice president of America in 1944. He was chosen for the position by Roosevelt, who hardly knew him. Truman had served commanding troops in the field in Europe during World War I.

#8

Truman was vice president for just 82 days before becoming president, and he was terrified by what he saw. He knew that he would be the president of the United States, and it scared him.

#9

On April 12, Truman entered the Senate Chamber and began writing a letter to his mother and sister. He was presiding over the Senate while a windy senator from Wisconsin was making a speech on a subject he was not familiar with.

#10

On April 12, Franklin Roosevelt was lying in bed with a breakfast tray when he heard loud laughter outside his bedroom door. It was his maid Lizzie McDuffie, who wanted to know if he believed in reincarnation. He replied that he didn’t know if he did or not, but if