The most common aspect of Truman's career people tend to recall is his role in the dropping of the atomic bomb on Hiroshima. Although after light research it has become clear that President Truman was known for a lot more than just the atomic bomb, good or bad his unwavering legacy holds even to this day. When learning about Truman in class I took an immediate interest in not just him as a president but in him as a person, as Mr. Stewart likes to remind us these figures were not just presidents they were real people, and Truman was very much his own person.
Truman had not even intended to become president and for a time he resented it, but when Roosevelt died of a massive stroke eighty-two days into their term Truman became the thirty-third president of the United States. This is also when Truman became the poorest president in the history of America, with a net worth well under one million. Despite his unfortunate financial situation Truman had a strange calling to fashion and was well known for his unique and stand out shirts, typically adorned with every pattern one could fit on a shirt. Although what people really took to about Truman was his liking of hats, his favorite hat was so well known that it even received its own name, "Truman's Open Road." Although this was his most famous hat by far and is what he's wearing it most photographs of him he was also known for changing out his hat styles to fit the seasons wherever he went.
Truman loved fashion so much that prior to his presidency he had opened his own men's clothing store. He opened his store back in his home state of Missouri in 1919. Truman's store was a haberdashery meaning it is a men's clothing shop or a men's department inside of a larger store. Truman's store sold lots of hats and other fashionable items for men of the time. Unfortunately, his store went bankrupt sometime later in the recession and Truman gave up his dreams of selling men's fashion.
Truman was one of the most interesting presidents in my personal opinion that we have learned about, but not just for his term as president but for his personal hobbies and for the person he was outside of presidency and in life.
After reading your post and learning that Truman adorned “strange fashion” as seen through his choice of hats and shirts, and his decision to run his own haberdashery for a period of time before going bankrupt, I couldn’t help but search up what other things he enjoyed. It turns out that Truman was considered one of the most musical presidents in American history. From a young age, Truman started learning how to play the piano, but at the age of fifteen, he quit after deciding that he must "go to work and earn a living.” However, Truman never lost his passion for music; during his presidency, Truman had a piano and radio by his desk and couldn’t help but play any piano he came across. He preferred the classical music he grew up with over the newer forms of music, in which he called “modern noise.” Truman especially loved Mozart’s A Major Sonata and performed it during large events, including the first televised tour of the White House in 1952 for 30 million Americans and the Potsdam Conference for Stalin and Churchill. It’s quite interesting to see what Truman was like outside the realm of politics.
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