James Woodrow "Bud" Porter Oral History Interview

Notice
This interview was conducted by William D. Stilley and Jerald L. Hill as part of a intern and independent study project at William Jewell College in March 1976, under the direction of the Political Science Department of William Jewell College. 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 transcript may be read, quoted from, cited, and reproduced for purposes of research. It may not be published in full except by permission of William D. Stilley and Jerald L. Hill.

Opened July, 1985
Harry S. Truman Library
Independence, Missouri

[1]

HILL: Mr. Porter, when did you first meet President Truman?

PORTER: I met him in the fall when he was running for Vice President with Franklin D. Roosevelt. The Democratic Convention had nominated him and he came to Independence and had a final rally as part of the Democratic campaign at the Memorial Building in Independence, and that's the first time that I had met him. I guess this was in, what I don't know the date. It must have been

[2]

1943 or ‘44. It would have had to have been '44 wouldn't it, because he ran again in '48. Yes, the fall of '44 is the first time I met him.

HILL: Were you working for the Star at that time?

PORTER: yes.

HILL: When you met him this time was it in an interview situation or how did you meet him, just introduced to him, or . . .

PORTER: No, just introduced to him. It was a formal meeting. They had speakers and a rally where they had invited the public. Before they had the rally they had a parade and that sort of thing. He then spoke and several of his associates in Congress were here; Speaker [Sam] Rayburn was here and Champ Clark was here, and a lot of his old friends who had known him. The crowd--I guess that old building then would hold about 1,300 people, and even at that time I don't think Truman ran it over. There wasn't people

[3]

standing to the aisles or standing outside or anything like this, But you know the old adage, "The prophet is unknown in his own town." That was true with him even on through the years. But that's the first time I met him.

HILL: What was your first impression of Mr. Truman; what did you first think about him?

PORTER: Well, of course, I was a young man and I had just started working for the Star. I had been formerly a police officer, before I went to work for the Star, on the Independence Police Department, and I had been involved in local politics. I hadn't come in contact with Truman in this area, but when I met him I just thought, "Well, here's another politician trying to get elected." That was kind of my impression. He didn't impress me too much. I thought, "Well, he doesn't speak too eloquently. He meets people and he has a nice personality." That was a secret probably of his success, was his ability on a

[4]

one to one basis oar in small groups. But he was not an eloquent speaker and he didn't make an eloquent speech that night in his closing campaign.

It became necessary for me to get some background on him and I found out that he had many friends in Independence and they all considered him honest and hardworking, and you found out that he had a lot of longtime friends. If he made a friend, they were friendly to him. This was part of his character, too, I think, that he remembered names, he remembered people. Many times in later years he'd walk down the street and see somebody he knew in their car, "Hi, John," and this sort of thing. He never was one to pass up an old friend, or a crony or anything, or one of his World War I buddies or anything 1ike that.

HILL: What were your duties at the Kansas City Star at this time?

PORTER: Well, at that time when he was elected

[5]

Vice President we had a one man bureau out here. This was during World War II and I had had a serious operation, and because of that I was classified 4-A. The Star had prior to that needed someone in the bureau and I was young and had started a family at that time and I figured that I didn't want to be a policeman for the rest of my life, so I applied for the job; and they took me in. We didn't have a teletype or we didn't have two. way radios and that sort of thing, this was later we got this sort of equipment. Most of our duties was going around the town, and the county, and interviewing people and collecting news and telephoning it to the Star. I would tell them who I was, that I had something, and they'd say, "Okay, I'll give you so and so on rewrite." Well, you'd either dictate or give the bulk of the story to this person and he would take it and write it, and that's the way the paper operated at that time. Later we had a teletype where you'd go out and interview somebody and come

[6]

back and type it out and sit down at the teletype, and then you'd send it over there and they'd tear it off the teletype then, just like a wire copy, UP and AP and this sort of thing. But when we first started out it was all telephone.

STILLEY: What was your relationship with President Truman?

PORTER: Well, it was very limited. The only time I saw him for the first, what, eight years I knew him, he was on his visits home and at various functions that he would attend. He usually tried to spend a part of the summer in Independence when he was President, and they always sent thirty or forty guys from Washington to cover him and they stayed in Kansas City. I had some friends across the street from the Truman home and they had a nice screened-in porch and the Star ran a telephone line in there, and whenever Truman would come to town, we'd plug in the phone, and that was kind of an unofficial press headquarters. The guys hung around there, and if we weren't

[7]

using the phone, they'd use the phone. The Star tried to be very cooperative with visiting news-men. I didn't actually have any close contact with him. It was just like you would be in a group of reporters and we'd walk around with him or we'd go someplace with him, and we'd stop and we'd ask him questions, and he'd talk to us. There wasn't any personal one-to-one, we didn't sit down and I didn't go in his house and interview him. This never happened at his home, because of Mrs. Truman's attitude, which everybody admired, and after they understood it they admired her more, because she didn't want the privacy of her home disrupted with this sort of thing. When they went in the house their life was their own, and most of us just laid off and let them. When he got out on the street, or he would go to functions, we'd cover him in that.

After he came home from serving as President, it was a different sort of thing. You had more opportunity to be with him alone. The first four

[8]

or five years he was home, of course, he was very interested in--he had one great goal when he came home from the White House, to found the Library for his papers and that sort of thing. And you must understand, up to that time, this was an innovation in the thinking of the Presidents. Some of President Roosevelt's heirs had started a Roosevelt Library in an old house up in Hyde Park where he had lived, where the family had lived, and they had collected some of the items that he'd had, and some of the papers and that sort of thing. This was a deep concern of Truman's, that all of his stuff, and he felt that all the papers that he had acquired, and all the gifts that he had acquired, they were all given to the President of the United States and not to Harry S. Truman. He figured that if they were given to the President of the United States they belonged to the people of the United States, not to Harry S. Truman. So for two or three years this poor old man--he wasn't a poor old man then, he was quite active--traveled

[9]

all over the country making speeches anyplace they wanted him to make a speech, or anyplace where he could pick up $500 or $1,000 for a speech, why, he would go. And this guy collected, what, over two million dollars, built this building, and said, "Here's the building I want to give the Government to house all my papers and memorabilia." This was one of his prime objectives after the White House, this Library. Then it came to the point where they were going to locate it.

Am I talking too much? Do you want to ask something?

STILLEY: No. Did you have more contact with him then?

PORTER: Yes, you had more contact with him then. You got to know the guy. You knew this was a great desire of his, this was what he wanted to do. When they started the building, he’d go out there almost daily and talk to the workmen and check and see what was going on. He had a deep concern about everything that was going on. Of course,

[10]

the Government archivists, and all the people who had been keeping records in the Government, were interested in this project too, because this was the first time that they would have an opportunity to initiate programs and to develop programs that they had been thinking about, for the maintenance and care of this sort of material. And it was a great development, I think, coming in for the community, for the United States, and especially for Truman. He enjoyed it, and in those years I think he was probably the happiest that he was any time in his life. I mean he seemed happier to me. When he was President, he had a lot on his mind and was up tight most of the time. Sometimes he would try to get away and have a little fun, but this was hard to do. But when he was building this building and active in this, it was something that he wanted to do, he was a happy, relaxed man, enjoyed life, and he was very affable. I

[11]

mean I walked around with him day after day through that Library and through the town, and everyplace, and he was just like an ordinary man; but his concern was the construction of that Library in those years.

HILL: What was the relationship between President Truman and the press as a whole during his Presidency?

PORTER: His press relations were very good, I thought. He had some trouble with some of the larger newspapers because some of them were ultra-conservative and others were ultra-liberal and he was kind of a middle of the road guy; and he didn't have any great love for the Kansas City Star. In his years in politics in Jackson County, the Star had fought him on several occasions, and he didn't have--I've heard him tell--and he's told me on many occasions--"The working press is fine, I like you guys and I'll do everything I can for you." He said, "It's your bosses that I can't get along with." He always

[12]

had great relations with the press.

I remember around Christmastime when his mother was still alive--he didn't do this very often either--but Christmas morning, of course, I was out there, being a local guy, but the guys from Washington had kind of slept in. Well, the Noland sisters, Truman's cousins, lived across the street and about 9 or 9:30 in the morning here he came out with a whole armload of Christmas packages, walking across the street towards the Nolands, all by himself, no Secret Service men, nobody, and Dave Cothern and I were Dave is a photographer for the Star--and he greeted us and talked to us and Dave got a great picture of him with an armload of Christmas presents, bows on them and everything.

Well, Dave, of course, knew that he had a great picture, so he goes zipping down to the Star and said, "Here, I've got page one for this afternoon." So about 2 o'clock when the papers came out these guys looked up and here's Truman

[13]

with all these gifts and they start getting stuff from Chicago, "Where's our picture of Truman?" And Los Angeles, "Where's our picture of Truman with the packages?" So it caused quite a furor and some of the guys got some real hard times over that,

I think Truman's press secretary at the time was Charlie Ross (it might not have been), but anyway, the Press Secretary told Truman the working guys were getting a hard time about missing that picture in the morning. So about 3 o'clock in the afternoon, he put the word out, here came old Truman out again with an armload of packages and he was going someplace, he didn't care where, he just came out with them and got into the car so they could get a picture.

Now, I know dang well that Truman didn't have any idea of coming out in the afternoon with another armload of packages, but he just did it so the guys could get a picture. And he just, this gives you--I mean he had a warm feeling for, I think, the working press,

[14]

I related one time about snow on the ground and there was a gal reporter, I don't know whether she was from Life or AP from Chicago, and she came down here and there was snow on the ground, a little more snow than this, and she had on some real frail. black shoes and no galoshes or nothing; and Truman used to take that morning walk and all, us guys would follow him, and this gal felt obligated to do that, too, and she struggled around with us and she got back to in front of the Truman home where, why, he'd go in the front gate and we’d just all tell him good-by and he'd go on in the house. Mrs. Truman saw this gal out there with these little old shoes on and she came to the door and she said, "Come on in," and told her "Come on in here,"-- I can hear her yet--"and get those feet warm." She said, "You've been out there in that snow I know for two hours and your feet are cold." And she took this poor girl in the house and warmed her feet. Now, this is pretty home townish but

[15]

it shows the kind of people that the Trumans were, I think. And those are two incidents I relate.

The Star required me to cover him. They wanted to know everything he did. They'd call me up in the morning, "What did Truman do at 6 o'clock this morning? "What's he going to do at 10 o'clock this morning" Truman came home one time, and they had had a picnic in the backyard or something, and I had a line on a story about Vietta Garr, the negro cook walking up and down the table with a tree branch brushing the flies off. People were eating on the picnic table, and of course, that was a good little homey line, local news story. Well, he, Truman, I don’t know why, he got a little upset and he called me, and that's the first time that he and I ever had any harsh words, I think; but he tried to tell me I was covering him too closely. He liked to have some privacy and he didn’t think I ought to look into his backyard. And so I told him

[16]

that I was just doing my job, but if he had any complaints, just call down there at 18th and Grand and talk to the people who tell me what to do. From that time on this improved our relations, too. He’d beller, and I told him I was doing a job and he found this out.

As the years went by, and he got in his office out there at the Truman Library, he used to have an electric lock on the door, and he used to have guards there. If you wanted to go in you had to see the guard and tell him who you were and they'd check inside and see. But after he got into that office out there at the Library, I could walk in the door and that guard would hit that lock and unlock the door, and I walked in and didn't say hello, good-by, I want to see anybody. I walked in there and if I wanted to see him, why, I'd go in and see him; and if he was talking to somebody I would stop and see Rose Conway. I wouldn't disturb him if he was talking to somebody, but if it was somebody I knew or

[17]

if he saw me he’d say, "Come on in, sit down." We had that kind of relation. I could go and come out at the Library and do anything I wanted to do. Oh, I've been in his home on several. occasions, but not for any specific interview. I've gone in to take pictures. I've gone in to oh, when Margaret's wedding was here, and I was one of the few reporters that got to go into the reception at the Truman home. And then they wanted pictures, and I delivered pictures and that sort of thing, I always observed their confidence, but I wouldn't intrude into their home life and I didn't, and they appreciated that. Even now, I could probably call up Bess on the phone and say, "How are you doing?" and that's the way it is. I'd never inquire "Are you sick?" or "What's Margaret,"--try to pry or anything. If she wants to give me information, fine. We've had mutual respect, let's say.

HILL: During some recent administrations, the President and his staff have complained about leaks

[18]

from the White Rouse, information to the press, and that it disturbed the White House. Was there any problem about that during the Truman administration?

PORTER: No, no. 0f course, at that time about the only person who--Drew Pearson was real strong and active at that time, he was the one that ran a real sometimes nasty column. The Trumans were kind of skittish about Pearson. I don't think that during the Truman administration they had any problem with any leaks that they didn't initiate themselves. You understand politicians have to do this sometimes. I don't think that there was any great problem of news leaks. I don't know if there was any problem during the Nixon administration. Maybe it was a good thing that it happened, and maybe people in the White House were warning the people outside to know what was going on, and sometimes they'd serve a good purpose. But I don't recall any incidents like that where there was any concern

[19]

about leaks from anything that happened in the White House.

Truman was pretty forthwith and point blank. If you found out anything and wanted to ask him a question, just ask him, and if he didn't want to tell you, he wouldn't, and if he did he would tell you, or he'd say, "No, I don't want to talk about that," or "That's none of your business."

But as I say, I think people admired Mrs. Truman the way she ran her home, because she figured that this was nobody's business but hers and Harry's, and that's the way she wanted it. I think people admired her for this. They did initially, and then they got a little huffy. They said, "Well, who does she think she is?" But then in later years, the pendulum swung clear around again, Everybody now thinks that Bess Truman was great in this attitude, because she did maintain this stature, And I guess Truman admired her for it, too, because he didn't force her to, or try to force her to do anything otherwise, and he probably could have if he had

[20]

insisted, but . . .

HILL: When President Truman gave a speech, did he give the press the text of the speech in advance?

PORTER: Usually that's what happens, yes.

HILL: Did he follow this text pretty closely?

PORTER: Pretty closely. That's one of the things we had to do when you got a handout, then sometimes you had to file your story before the speech happened and say, "Release it at 2 o’clock." But then one of the duties you had was to watch him and see if he did change anything, and you'd have to make those changes yourself; but usually, he stayed pretty close to the text that was prepared for him.

HILL: With the new popularity of President Truman, there has been quite a bit said about the language that he used., the profanity and this type of thing. Would you comment on the type of language he used? Like in those walking conferences

[21]

he had?

PORTER: I think this has just been, this activity, this bad language deal. that he used, I think was just promoted to sell books, Now, I've heard Truman cuss, and I won't kid you, but I never have heard him in any kind of a formal meeting, or where he was talking to somebody, ever cuss like they say, just "hell no," and "damn this," and "hell yes;" he didn't talk like that, And that's all just been blown clear out of proportion. I think Merle Miller just did it to sell his book. I know how Miller sat down with one of these things up in Truman's office--in Truman's room in a hotel in New York--for two or three days, and nobody is going to deny that Truman didn't take a nip or two, and got him into this situation. He can probably back up these bad language statements with some bad language; but the worst language I ever heard Truman use was in a joking manner.

Ned Trimble, who lived in Liberty, had started to work for the Star. He had known, as a

[22]

young man, Truman as president, and in World War II, and this sort of thing. And six or eight months or a year after he came to work for the Star he wanted to go out to meet Truman. So one morning--I used to take--like I'd say, "Come out at 8:30 in the morning and I'll take you in and sit down and talk with the gentleman." I used to do this all the time. So I told Ned to come out, and he came out about 8:30 in the morning. There was nobody in the Library, just Truman and me and the guard. Rose Conway his secretary didn't get there until 9 or 9:30. I introduced him and Truman said, "Oh, you're one of those Clay County Trimbles aren't you?"

And Ned said, "'Yes. "

And he said, "You Clay Countians are the ones that got history all jacked up about Jesse James," and he just started giving Ned and Clay County hell and all this. He said, "You all got history messed up," and he said, "Of course, that blankety-blank Kansas City Star don't help anything either."

[23]

He knew Ned worked for the Star because I told him Ned did. He said, "They compound all this stuff, and they makeup all these lies," and just cussed, and Ned was sitting there turning red, white and blue. Here was the guy he felt was upset. So Truman harangued at him for about five minutes about this history, Clay County and Jesse James home and this sort of thing, and he got through and Truman laughed and he started out the door, and Ned knew he was just kidding with all this, just a big put on, trying to shake him up a little bit, and shook hands with Ned, I explained to Ned afterwards what had happened, and he understood it all, too, and got a big charge out of what Truman had done to him. And that's the one time that I heard Truman use the name of God, in a cuss word, or anything like that, and I’ve been around him a lot.

Boy, I've sat down in a room with him with Jack Kennedy and Bobby Kennedy and with some of the Kennedy advisors-- this was after Kennedy was

[24]

going for the nomination, they wanted to pump the old man. And this was just not going to be anything formal. Bobby would say, "What about the guy, so and so down in Arizona?"

And Truman would say, "Well, you had better get ahold of this guy. He knows enough people down there," and Truman, I heard him go through like twenty-five or thirty states, and if there was ever going to be any cussing, here was three politicians, and three pretty good drinking buddies, The Kennedys were no sissies on the drinking situation, and so if they were ever going to get upset or cuss anybody, they would have done it then. But there was nothing like that, It was all just a real, businesslike conversation. And Truman sat there with them for hours talking about politics, all over the Southwest and South, and who he knew down South and that sort of thing, just named off people. But, as I say, I think that report of the letter that he wrote to the music critic criticizing Margaret's singing, and that sort of thing, why, sure, I mean

[25]

he probably sat down at 6 o'clock some morning and scribbled this note out by hand, and stuck a stamp on it, and mailed it to the guy. A personal thing between him and the music critic, He didn't dictate it to any secretary, I'll bet, and probably if it is found, this is how the thing will be. But I think that cussing--and he was a plain spoken man--he might use damn or hell, or something like this, but not any great harangues of profanity, no.

HILL: Okay, and these walking interviews that you had, did he ever--this was after he was President, did he ever say what he would do if he were at that time President? Or take exception to the policy of a current President from time to time?

PORTER: No, he was pretty careful about things like that. The Star always wanted comments, if there was a bill in the Senate doing something, or if Eisenhower had done something, why I'd say, "Well, we got something on the wire," He'd say, "Well, Bud, I don't want to comment on it." He said,

[26]

"I'd like to if I could sit down and look at it and read it, I'd make some comment on it, but I don't just want to do it off of my head." And he was pretty careful about things like that. He made some comment about things that they did. But this was the way that he did it. He did it a after thought. And he wasn't too critical, he didn't like Ike and there was no love lost there. Well, he just didn't like Republicans, period. He was a Democrat, and the Republicans are--they were all crazy or something else. But he didn't make many comments like that on situations, or what he would do if he was there, until he could see it in writing or until he knew more about it than you call him up on the phone and give him two or three sentences out of a story or out of a speech. He didn't want anything out of context like that; he liked to see the whole picture.

STILLEY: Did he make decisions fast or did you think he studied things a lot more than . . .

PORTER: I think he was pretty good at snap decisions,

[27]

but I think he had some major decisions to make and I think he took some care. I think that many times he consulted his wife. He admired Mrs. Truman greatly. She was well-educated, and probably better educated than he was. She probably had a lot of insight to things, and I'm sure that he conferred with her on many things before he made a decision. And he usually had some pretty good advisors sitting around. He would check with somebody. Of course, he had been in politics practically since he was a mature man, twenty-five or thirty years old. He knew from the practical standpoint that a politician has to be pretty careful what he says. He, I think, adhered to this.

HILL: Okay. Did he ever make an attempt to tell the press that he thought they were playing up an item too much, or that they shouldn't play up another item or policy of this type?

PORTER: Never that I heard about, no.

[28]

HILL: Did he ever criticize the press by saying that that's not that important, this thing that you're talking about

PORTER: Oh, yes, I've heard him say that. Here then again he would qualify this, he said, "I'm not criticizing you guys, but it's the guys who are making decisions up here on the desk and your editors. I think this is going too far, They could lay off of this a little bit, and things might quiet down a little bit." He knew people in this business and he's probably made personal criticism to them, I think, but I don't think he made any loud vocal protest that they were doing it wrong.

HILL: After he came back and you had your most contact with him, did he ever discuss decisions that he had made and how he might have made them differently, or why he made them this way?

PORTER: No. Of course, one of the favorite questions that people always wanted to ask him was this

[29]

decision about the atomic bomb. And of course, when he became president the atomic bomb was already made, and ready to go. Of course, it was his decision, but he felt anything at that point that would shorten the war was the right decision, and that's what he did it for. He didn't want to kill a million and a half or 50,000 Japanese, but anything to end the war, make the war shorter, that was the goal of that. They had made bombs, they could have wiped the whole Japanese island off of the map in a matter of days if they had wanted to. I've heard people ask him about this decision about MacArthur, it's the same thing there. He said, "I was the commander in chief, he was a general, and he disobeyed my orders." Of course, MacArthur wanted to go across the 38th parallel and go on up and invade China, and Truman--that was the decision there. Of course, that upset a few people, but he felt like he was commander in chief and that this guy was under him and that he should take orders from him, and if he didn't he should be removed. That's why he did it.

[30]

PORTER: No, not a bit. I mean he, as I said, had his own world, his own friends. At the time this could have worried him less; he didn't care about his popularity. No, I don't think it ever bothered him. He had great confidence in himself and in his beliefs. I mean he showed this in the campaign of '48, The popularity polls in that summer, in the spring, were way down on him, too, but this old man got on the train and traveled ten or twelve thousand miles and shook hands with all the old country people and talked to them; and when they woke up the next morning they found out that he was still President, and that's all it was. And I'm sure that the popularity polls at that time would have reflected that he was not too popular probably, but this didn't bother him a bit.

HILL: Did he ever express any regret to you that he

[31]

had not gone ahead and run for reelection again in '52?

PORTER: No. As I say, he was a great party man and he felt like he had done his job, and if they wanted him, okay, and if not, he didn't push the situation.

HILL: Did he ever express any overall feelings to you about different Presidents like Eisenhower and Kennedy and Johnson?

PORTER: No.

HILL: What was your last contact with President Truman?

PORTER: Oh, I guess this was about a year before he died, not quite a year, ten or twelve months. I was going up to the Post Office, I think, and where our office is you have to go by the Jackson County Library which then was up at Osage and Maple (they've since moved, but he and Mrs. Truman and Mike Westwood had gone up in a car. Mrs. Truman was a great reader, and she'd get stacks

[32]

of books up there once or twice a week and read. The car was parked over in front of the Public Library, the Jackson County Public Library, and I walked up there and he saw me walking up the street. When I came back Mike came out and got out of the car and said, "Come over here, the Boss wants to talk to you." Mrs. Truman was in the Library, and I got into the back seat of the car and sat down and visited with him, like five minutes. By this time he was pretty senile. He was having a hard time getting around and he was pretty senile. I had a leg problem--still got it--and he had noticed me walking before and he'd told Mike to take me out to the Library. He had about thirty or forty canes in a closet out at the Library that were just his personal canes. He said, "Take Bud out there to the Library and let him pick out a cane, he needs one to walk with."

Well, anyway, he inquired about my health and I inquired about his, and we just sat there and talked. I didn't attempt to pump him about anything. I didn't know that that would be the last time I'd get the chance to talk with him,

[33]

but I will remember this. He said, "Bud, you and I have always been friends, I've tried to be honest with you, and," he said, "you've tried to be honest with me." He said, "That's the reason we've been good friends." That kind of made me feel good. But that's the last time I saw him alive. I mean I saw him alive after that, but never spoke to him or visited with him.

STLLEY: What one quality about President Truman would you say you admired the most? His direct speaking, honesty, or just what?

PORTER: I think his honesty and forthrightness. I mean he was just--he hated phonies. As I started to relate a while ago, in picture taking you'll see guys at ribbon cutting ceremonies or something like that. They used to have Truman do these sort of things. The photographer would say, "Well, do it again." And he said, "No," he said, "if you didn't get it the first tide,

[34]

I've done it, so that's it." And he wasn't a great guy to put on a show, or to reenact or do anything like that, He was very honest about it, I think everybody admired him for it.

HILL: What one event, or time when you were with President Truman do you remember the most?

PORTER: Oh, I don't know.

HILL: Did you go on quite a few of these walking interviews with him?

PORTER: Oh, yes, most of them.

HILL: What would you discuss? I mean, at that time that was after he was President, wasn't it?

PORTER: Oh, usually just generalities. If we were out at the Library we'd talk about the progress. 0r if there was somebody working, he'd stop and chat with them, and he knew most of the construction people. He got to know them by his visits out there, If the plasterers were working

[35]

out there--I remember when the plasterers were working on that Oval Room up in front, and there must have been 20 plasterers out there, they said, "How about a picture?" And they all got lined up and Truman stopped, had his picture taken with the guys in there plastering,

He walked for relaxation. He was informal, He wasn't one to discuss great world problems while he was walking. He walked for enjoyment and for exercise and I think that was--he didn't discuss anything like world events or Senate Bill 122 that was going to stop picketing on the ,jobsite, or anything like this. He'd talk about these things if you'd go in his office and sit down and say, "What do you think about this" He'd give you some ideas about what he thought about it, but when he walked, this was a kind of relaxing exercise thing for him.

STILLEY: Did the attempted assassination on him ever seem to bother him? Was he fearful . . . .

PORTER: The what?

[36]

STILLEY: The attempted assassination on him at the Blair House, did that bother him?

PORTER; No, I don't think so, didn't affect him at all. 0f course, he would joke about how the Secret Service was watching closely, and how they would go in and check the toilets before he could use them and this sort of thing. He used to make a big joke about that. He said, "When you get to be President you can't even go to the bathroom without someone going in before you and checking." But I don't think that the Blair House incident bothered him. It bothered him that somebody got hurt, the human side of him; but I don't think that it bothered him that there was an attempt to get to him. If he had concern that that might happen again--I don't think he did he--never did voice any concern, or indicate that he did.

STILLEY: Your personal relationship, was it ,just mainly as a reporter, or would he invite you over just as a friend . . . .

[37]

PORTER: No, just as a reporter is all, As I say, I've been in his home and that sort of thing, but it was still in a role as a newsman. I can't say that I was a longtime personal friend of Truman's, but I did spend ten or twelve good years with him, and I figured that I was lucky to be at the right place at the right time. I think he was a great guy. I think that history is going to probably prove this to everybody, that he was one of the stronger Presidents. Roosevelt went to Yalta and nobody knew this until years afterwards. He was pretty kinky; he had to have a lot of help, mind-wise and physical wise, and everything else. And Truman stepped into a pretty delicate situation, and I think took hold of it. In comparison, I think he took hold of it much better than Gerald Ford did of the Nixon administration.

We were down--I think we're still down. I think we were down at that time, but I think our recovery from Truman was much greater than it's been

[38]

under Gerald Ford. I have nothing against Gerald Ford, but his attitudes and his decisions have just--I don't think that he has got the understanding of the people that Truman got almost immediately, I think he did this probably in his early speeches to the Senate, and his speeches to the nation, he just laid it out and said, "Fellow, I'm just an ordinary guy trying to do a job, and we've all got to sit down and do it now;" and I think that people understood that kind of talk, and appreciated it.

STILLEY: There was one news columnist that asked him about wiretaps, and he said it was directly against the Constitution, that he was opposed to them. Then recently the CIA Senate Committee has come out where he allegedly had used the FBI for political information. Do you think that he was misrepresenting the position, or . . .

PORTER; No I don't think he was. I think he answered it probably in the context of wiretaps in trying to

[39]

blackmail somebody or this sort of thing, I don't know. Of course, we've learned now that the FBI did a lot of wiretapping, and in anticipation of probably situations that somebody wanted to know some information about, they just went ahead and did it on their own. And probably, I don't know, Truman never told me this and I wouldn't want to be quoted, but I think that anything of this sort was probably done in that manner, that they might anticipate that he might want to know something about Joe Blow and if they had a chance to tap his lines, fine. I don't think it was done to the extent that it was done in the last ten years when Truman was President. They didn't have the delicate effective equipment that they have now, and it was very easy to detect a wiretap and that sort of thing. I don't know of anybody around here that would think--I don't know that they would think that Truman would use a wiretap for any other reason. I mean, he may have found out some things if he were living now that he didn't know about

[40]

probably that the FBI and the--of course the CIA was founded at his direction, and he put of course, they got clear out of hand too after he got out of there. They're being used now for many things that he had no idea, or had no indication that they would be used for. But as I say, I don't think you could compare his administration to even twenty years later, because things that have become--well, our attitudes have changed and everybody's has.

STILLEY: Maybe one final question, were there any particular jokes you've always remembered that he would like to tell you?

PORTER: Oh, yes. The one particular joke, one great joke, that he used to tell--have you been out to the Library?

STILLEY: Yes, I have.

PORTER: Have you been back in the back where the Board meets, and where the study room is for students?

[41]

STILLEY; I don't know where the Board meets, but I've been in the study room.

PORTER: A11 right, that big long room.

STILLEY: Yes.

PORTER: Up at the south end there's a picture of Truman in his Masonic regalia, and he used to, when people would come out, take them through on tours of the Library; this used to be one of his favorite places to stop. He'd tell the story about the salesman down South who sold the man the uniform, some kind of Irish thing, what was it, Catholic--no, he sold it and said it was the Pope, that's what it is. A11 these southern Catholics thought it was the Pope, and it was Truman in all this Masonic regalia. And, of course, Catholics are not Masons, and he used to get a big kick out of that.

I got a great picture of--who's the gal that used to be in "Gunsmoke?"

STILLEY: Kitty?

[42]

PORTER: Kitty [Amanda Blake] and Doc [Milburn Stone] came out to see Truman one day. And this was one of Truman's favorite programs. Kitty and Doc came out there, I think they were over at the Royal or something and they came out there; and he took Kitty and Doc on a tour of the Library and he liked them both. I mean if he liked somebody, why, you knew it. And I got a great picture of Kitty. I knew what was going to happen when they stopped there, and so I waited until the punch line came, and I've got a great picture of Truman standing there, and Kitty just laughing with her mouth, a big, "Ah, ha, ha!" just like this.

Atomic bomb, decision to use against Japan, 29

Blake, Amanda, 41-43
Blair House, 36

Central Intelligence Agency, 38, 40
Clark, Bennett C., 2
Clay County, Missouri, 22, 23
Conway, Rose A., 16, 22
Cothern, David, 12

Eisenhower, Dwight D., 26

Federal Bureau of Investigation, wiretapping activities, 38-40
Ford, Gerald R., 37, 38
Franklin D. Roosevelt Library, 8

Garr, Vietta, 15
"Gunsmoke" TV program, 41-42

Independence, Missouri, rally for Vice-Presidential candidate H.S. Truman, 1-3

Jackson County Library, Independence, Missouri, 31-32
James, Jesse, 22, 23
Japan, atomic bombing of, 29

Kansas City Star, 2, 3, 4-7, 11-12, 15, 21-23, 25
Kennedy, John F., 23-24
Kennedy, Robert F., 23-24
Korean War, 29

MacArthur, Douglas, 29
Masonic Order, 41
Miller, Merle, 21

Pearson, Drew, 18
Polls, popularity, 30
Presidential campaign, 1944, 1-2
Presidential campaign, 1948, 30

Rayburn, Sam, 2
Roosevelt, Franklin D., 1, 39
Ross, Charles G., 13

Secret Service, U.S., 36
Stone, Milburn, 42

Trimble, Ned, 21-23
Truman, Bess Wallace, 7, 14, 17, 19, 27, 31-32
Truman, Harry S.:

• • attempted assassination of, 36
    character of, 33-34
    decisions of, 26-29
    evaluation of, 3-4, 37-38
    popularity polls, and, 30
    Porter, James, first acquaintance with, 1-2
    Porter, James, last visit with, 31-33
    Porter, James, visits with at Truman Library, 16-17, 22-23
    press coverage as President, Independence, Missouri, 6-7
    press, relationship with as President, 11-15, 19
    profanity, use of, 20-25
    speeches, adherence to text of, 20
    Truman Library, and establishment of the, 8-10, 34-35
    visitors at Truman Library, and, 40-42
    wiretaps, opposed to use of, 38-40
• Truman Library:
  • establishment of, 8-10, 34-35
    research room, 40-41
    visitors to see President Truman, 16-17, 22-23, 41-42

  Westwood, Paul (Mike), 31, 32
  White House, news leaks from, 18

[Top of the Page | Notices and Restrictions | Interview Transcript | List of Subjects Discussed]