Harry S Truman

Harry S. Truman never sought the presidency. A Missouri farm boy, failed haberdasher, and product of machine politics, he entered the White House in April 1945 after only eighty-two days as vice president. Over the next eight years he made some of the most consequential decisions of the twentieth century: the use of the atomic bomb, the Truman Doctrine and Marshall Plan, the creation of NATO and the modern national security state, the desegregation of the armed forces, and the commitment of American forces to Korea.

This biography follows Truman from the dirt roads of Lamar and Independence through World War I service, county politics, the Senate, and the sudden elevation to the Oval Office. It examines the plain-spoken style and personal sense of responsibility that defined his leadership, the institutional foundations of the Cold War he helped build, the 1948 upset election, and the hard limits of power he confronted in Korea. The book closes with his return to Independence, the building of his presidential library, and the long reassessment of a presidency that began in obscurity and ended by reshaping the postwar world.