Rufus B. Burrus Oral History Interview, October 22, 1985

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 It may not be published in full except by permission of the Harry S. Truman Library.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 1986
Harry S. Truman Library
Independence, Missouri

[1]

JOHNSON: I'm going to start out, Colonel Burrus, by asking you to give me your full name, where you were born, and when you were born.

BURRUS: My name is Rufus Bell Burrus. I was born April 1, 1900 in Blue Springs, Missouri. My father was Olney Francis Burrus, the son of James M. Burrus, Jr. of eastern Jackson County in Blue Springs. My mother was Sadie Bell, who married my father in 1898. She and he had met at Park College. He was a student and she was a student at Park College at Parkville. My father went to Park College at the instance and suggestion of his grandmother, Harriet Noland. She wanted him to go on to higher education and he said, "Well, I don't know where."

She said, "Well, there's a good school over at

[2]

Parkville, Park College."

He said, "Well, whereabouts is Park College, where is Parkville?"

She said, "That's just north of Kansas City."

And he said, "Well, how do you get there?"

She said, "Why, you can get on the train at the station I think, and the train takes you up to Parkville."

Well, he said he'd see, and he found out the date that it was going to be starting. He got his valise together with his personal items, went down to the station and got on the train and got off at Parkville and walked up the hill, as he said. When he got up there and presented himself to the folks about enrolling they said, "Well, have you got your first enrollment?"

"Oh no, I just came on up. My grandmother said all I had to do was come on up and enroll."

He said, "Well, that's just too bad."

Then he started visiting, as he said, with the other folks that were already there, and had been admitted. In the conversation he learned about one young man that had indicated that he was going to come

[3]

but something had happened in the family so he couldn't come. So he got his name and he went back over to the registrar and he said, "Now, so and so is not coming, and I'm here to take his place."

And they said, "How do you know he's not coming?"

He said, "Well, the young fellows told me he wasn't going to come; he had some other things happen to him in the family."

The registrar said, "Well, all right, we'll put you down; if he doesn't come we'll take you."

So sure enough he didn't come, and that's how my dad got started at Park College.

My mother had come from a family that had lived first down in the Joplin area, and then up in Iowa, and then in Norwich, Kansas. That is where she came from to go to Park College. So that's where he met Sadie Bell.

JOHNSON: She started college the same year?

BURRUS: The same year as my father, that's right.

JOHNSON: Park was a Presbyterian college, as I recall, at the time.

[4]

BURRUS: That's right, and my folks were Presbyterians, all of them.

JOHNSON: On both sides? Your mother's and father's families were Presbyterians?

BURRUS: That's right. My Grandfather Bell had been disabled at the time of the war. He couldn't serve, because he had an injury to his foot.

JOHNSON: What was his first name?

BURRUS: His name was Harvey Bell.

JOHNSON: Where was he living at that time?

BURRUS: He was living in Pennsylvania.

JOHNSON: This was during the Civil War period?

BURRUS: During the Civil War, yes. So, he worked with the railroad there upon the Erie Canal, driving mules and the like of that. Then he finally came out to this area, and he found my grandmother, and her name was Aseneth Benton. She was not any kin to the Bentons in Missouri, but that same name.

[5]

JOHNSON: They came from what area of the East?

BURRUS: She came from Pennsylvania too.

JOHNSON: Oh, they were both northerners?

BURRUS: That's right. So, in time father met mother and married and they lived down at Blue Springs. My father was admitted to practice the law at that time. He went to school a little time. There was a place over in Kansas City that the lawyers got together, and more or less by his own study and also with the help and tutoring of some of the lawyers, he got admitted to the bar. I think that was in 1896.

JOHNSON: Was that the forerunner of the Kansas City School of Law?

BURRUS: That's right. He has always been referred to as an alumnus of the Kansas City School of Law, because those were the folks that met down at 9th and Baltimore. One of them was a man named Adams, who became counsel for the Kansas City Title and Trust Company. My father also went down for a little time to the school at Columbia, but he really spent most of his time in law

[6]

offices and learned by just being there.

In addition to that, when he was in Blue Springs he became the owner of the newspaper called the Sni-a-Bar Voice. He was the editor and the owner; he would set type and he solicited ads and wrote articles, and did the various things that you have to do to run a newspaper.

In addition to that he was an agent for an insurance company, life insurance and fire insurance, and he brokered a loan or two. He helped to manage some property that had to be looked after, just as a person would that had a degree behind him, and people knew he knew what he was doing. At the same time he was the principal of the school and he taught a class at the school. Mother was also a teacher in the school in Blue Springs when I was born.

JOHNSON: He's done all this and the law besides?

BURRUS: That's right. All of it. That's a "big town" down there and it wasn't hard to get that done.

JOHNSON: Maybe just a brief question here about your grandparents. Do you know what brought your grandparents out here to Missouri from Pennsylvania?

[7]

BURRUS: My grandparents Bell were down in the Joplin area where there were some mines that they had worked in. Also he had gone up to Iowa because there were some agricultural things up there, and he got in agricultural work there.

JOHNSON: Was he an investor or was he a worker?

BURRUS: A worker. He also rented land and operated that. In addition to that, he began to see that wheat was an item to be sold, and he began dealing in it in a small way there. Then he went to Kansas because wheat was more of an item there, and he had a mill, an elevator, that he operated there in Kansas.

JOHNSON: Whereabouts in Kansas?

BURRUS: Norwich, Kansas, in Kingman County. So that's where he was, and that's where mother had come from, Kingman County, to go to Park College. When they were in Blue Springs when I was born, L.F. Blackburn was one of the teachers. He later became the county superintendent of schools, with an office here in Independence. Professor Blackburn--everybody knew

[8]

him. He was always elected without any trouble, and he was just a good sort of a fellow to have the schools operate under, and the teachers were good.

JOHNSON: Was he a Presbyterian?

BURRUS: He was a Presbyterian, too, that's right. My mother and father were both Presbyterians as was my grandfather; and my grandmother Noland was Presbyterian also. My father-in-law went to a church in those earlier days that was called the Shake Rag Church, which is today just south of Truman Road, and up on the hill from the road that runs by the ordnance plant.

JOHNSON: At Lake City?

BURRUS: Lake City. It runs south, and up on the hill there is a Presbyterian Church that they called the Shake Rag Church because they had itinerant preachers and whenever the preacher was going to be there, they put a white rag upon a pole and that's when people knew this was going to happen. So, that's how it got its name. That's where my father-in-law became a Presbyterian, Cumberland Presbyterian it was.

[9]

JOHNSON: Is there a church on that site now?

BURRUS: There's a church on that site now; it has a pastor and regular services.

JOHNSON: But it's not the same building?

BURRUS: Not the same building. It's been replaced a time or two I think.

JOHNSON: So your parents met at Park College. This would be in the 1890s I suppose. And they got married, you say, in 1898.

BURRUS: "'98"--I think it was.

JOHNSON: Was that right after they got out of school, do you recall?

BURRUS: It was after he got out of school. He and mother didn't graduate, but they had enough that they could get qualified as teachers. Both of them wanted to be teachers, and that's why they departed from the school up there.

JOHNSON: Did your mother begin teaching as soon as she

[10]

got out of Park College?

BURRUS: That's right. She taught school in Kansas before she came to Missouri.

JOHNSON: So she went back to Kansas and taught school there, and then your father got into law and newspaper work...

BURRUS: And also school.

JOHNSON: Teaching out here at Blue Springs?

BURRUS: He had a country school which was south and east of Blue Springs. It was called Tarsney School.

JOHNSON: A one-room country school?

BURRUS: That's right.

JOHNSON: So they apparently had fallen in love while they were in college, and managed to get back together.

Where did they get married?

BURRUS: In Norwich, Kansas. Grandmother and Grandfather's home.

[11]

JOHNSON: Do you have brothers and sisters?

BURRUS: I had a brother Harvey. He was just about a year younger than I am, and he died a few years ago. I had three sisters; Helen was the oldest one. She was a school teacher, and she passed away last. Before that there was my sister Sybil, she had been a school teacher too.

JOHNSON: She was next to the oldest?

BURRUS: She was next to the oldest. She married Floyd Snyder, who lived here in Independence. She was involved in the abstract business with Snyder. Their operation became the Land Title Company. They sold that to the Kansas City Title Company. She then retired. She had emphysema, and she finally passed away in Arizona.

JOHNSON: But she grew up here and lived in this area.

BURRUS: That's right.

JOHNSON: And then your youngest sister, what was her name?

BURRUS: She lives here in town now. She and I are the two left in the family. I'm the oldest and she's the youngest.

[12]

JOHNSON: What's her name?

BURRUS: Anna Margaret McConnell. She lives up on North Main Street, within a block of where they had lived for so many years on Liberty Street.

JOHNSON: Your father's name again is...

BURRUS: Olney. Olney Francis.

I would like to go back a little bit more in the family though. Grandfather Burrus was a descendant of William and Rhoda Harris. William and Rhoda Harris are a well-known family. They had 17 children; 15 of them lived. They first were in eastern Jackson County, in Blue Springs, and then in the Lee's Summit area. Her father, that is Rhoda's father, was Jeremiah Burnett. He was a Revolutionary soldier from New York. His family died, and he came here to Missouri to live with his daughter Rhoda Harris. He is buried at Blue Springs, and there's a marker there by the Daughters of the Revolution showing that he was a veteran of the Revolutionary War.

The father of William Harris was Reuben Harris, and he was a Revolutionary soldier, too. He was buried around

[13]

39th and Lee's Summit Road. That gravesite got obliterated as time went on. So, last September we dedicated a monument at Blue Springs in an area next to where William and Rhoda Harris are, and also where Jeremiah is. They are the two grandparents of Revolutionary vintage, and I'm on a direct line from them. My Grandfather Burrus' family comes from one of the first daughters of Rhoda and William Harris.

JOHNSON: Yes, I've heard about the Harrises and the big reunions that they have every year.

BURRUS: That's right. We have had a big reunion the second Sunday in September every year for 75 years. Back then when they were looking for a place to have it, they thought Lee's Summit would be the best place because that's where most of the Harrises lived. There was going to be a park bought by the Lee's Summit folks. So the Harrises joined along with them on the project and got $1,000 to help pay for the property that would be the park area. They provided in the deed that I typed, and my father had written the language for, that in perpetuity the Harris family reunion be held on the

[14]

second Sunday in September beginning that next year. We've always had it that way. That old deed was copied and put out a few days ago when we were there at the occasion.

JOHNSON: They have lived up to that.

BURRUS: That's right. That's how it was done. When the time came to pay the money, they wanted to be sure that they were going to have that done. I said, "Well, I'll tell you how to get that done; put that in the deed." So, he gave me the information written down in longhand, and I typed it on the typewriter for them.

JOHNSON: The Harrises might come up again as we get into your career.

Would you tell us where you grew up and where you went to school?

BURRUS: We lived at Blue Springs for a year, and then we moved to Independence. We lived on South Pendleton here in Independence for a little while, and then my father bought a place at 801 N. Spring Street in Independence, a five-room house, a cottage we called

[15]

it. It's on the east side of the street. I lived there and went to school at the Ott School. From there I went to the Independence High School, and graduated from Independence High School.

JOHNSON: What year?

BURRUS: In 1918. I also began working in my dad's office in 1916. He said, "You get your studies and your lessons set in the morning so you've got the afternoons free and you come to the office." He said, "I can use you here at the office." I did, and the first thing I knew I was learning to run errands, sweep up the floor and wash the windows.

JOHNSON: Where was this located?

BURRUS: It was on the north side of the square, over what was the Knoepker store for many years.

JOHNSON: So he looked at the Courthouse everyday.

BURRUS: That's right. First we were over the east part of the building, for two or three years, and then dad finally got into what had been the office of James M.

[16]

Callahan. Callahan had a law library and my father was able to get that and move from the two rooms he had next to it, to this one that had the library room, a private office, and a reception room. So that's where I began learning about practicing law.

JOHNSON: Were there several other lawyers in that area at that time?

BURRUS: Around the Square, that's right, there were several of them. I got to know them all. I got admitted to the bar in 1921. I went to law school at the Kansas City School of Law. Meanwhile, when I graduated from high school, my mother learned that I would be of draft age and she felt I should do something to get myself prepared so if I was called to duty I would be able to equip myself, as I should. Kansas City had the Kansas City Polytechnic Institute, which was at 11th and Locust Street, so I went over and enrolled in that. They had a company of the student army training corps, called the SATC. I had to enlist in that through the draft board. I had a little trouble getting the draft board to get my papers transferred over there, so I was about a month or six weeks

[17]

without having any of the papers, but they still recognized me and I still did my duty there and I finally was discharged from that in December 1918 after the war was over.

JOHNSON: So it was not a very long tour of duty.

BURRUS: That's right. But by having done that I qualified as a World War I veteran. Later, Mr. Truman would say, "By reason of having been in that student training course, you are a veteran and you can get into my enlisted regiment and go to school and come out and have an examination and get to be a Second Lieutenant in the Artillery."

JOHNSON: We'll have to get into that, but where were you living at the time you graduated from high school?

BURRUS: We lived at 503 North Delaware in Independence. We moved from 801 Spring Street to the Delaware house.

JOHNSON: About when was that move?

BURRUS: In 1917, I think.

JOHNSON: So you moved over into what is now the Truman

[18]

Heritage District.

BURRUS: That's right. The house still stands. It's on the northeast corner of Farmer and Delaware Street, just two blocks down the street from the Trumans at 219. There's no street that runs in between but two numbered blocks.

JOHNSON: Of course, the Trumans were married here in 1919 in June.

BURRUS: That's right.

JOHNSON: Did you know Bess before you knew Harry?

BURRUS: I knew her, yes, and I knew her brothers. Frank was the ward leader, a Democrat; he was her older brother. I knew the younger brother, Frederick Wallace. He was in school with me, in high school, and also in grade school.

JOHNSON: So that's how you knew Bess, through her brothers, before you heard of Harry?

BURRUS: That's right. I didn't know her very well because she was older than I was. But I did know her because

[19]

she was a neighbor and we knew the whole family there.

JOHNSON: So her youngest brother was your peer.

BURRUS: He was just a little younger than I.

JOHNSON: When would you say that you were first a friend, either of Bess or of Harry?

BURRUS: I'll get it back a little bit further. My father's parents in about the middle of the 1890s came to Independence, and they finally moved over on Waldo Street, the second house east of the River Boulevard intersection. There on the corner was where Harry Truman and his mother and father and his brother and sister lived. So, my grandparents were next door neighbors, and they knew the Trumans, but I, of course, didn't know them then. I never did get the chance to know Harry except as I just incidentally knew him by his marrying into the family of Wallaces. Then one day in 1921 in the early spring, in front of the Bank of Independence on the northwest corner of the Square, I met Frank and his brother-in-law Harry, whom I didn't yet know. There at the corner, why, Frank motioned to me, "Come here Rufe, I want you to meet my brother-in-law Harry Truman. He's going to be the next

[20]

eastern judge of the Jackson County Court."

I smiled and said, "Mr. Truman I'm surely glad to know you, and you will be the next Judge of the Jackson County Court, because Frank always picks the winners." And he did. He was a good leader, and I carried a precinct book and had one for a couple or three years, since we lived there.

That's how I first knew Harry.

JOHNSON: In 1921. Do you remember the month?

BURRUS: It was in the spring. I don't know, it was in the spring. He was out campaigning, visiting with people, as a prospective candidate, and that's how Frank introduced him to me.

JOHNSON: That was the first time that you saw Harry Truman?

BURRUS: That's right, to know him.

JOHNSON: In the spring of 1921 you're saying. This would be like May or June?

BURRUS: Earlier than that, I would say early spring.

JOHNSON: Maybe April.

[21]

BURRUS: Someplace around there, yes. I was 21 years old, and I worked in my dad's office. I was also going to law school. I was admitted to the bar on April 1st, 1921. I took a bar examination in December, and I passed the examination. They sent me a certificate before the April 1st birthday, but I couldn't accept that because I wasn't 21 years old. So I sent it back to the Court Clerk, and I said, "Would you please hold this and keep it, and then send me one that's dated the first day of April so I can be able to accept it?"

Captain Allen was the clerk, and he wrote me back, and said he would. Sure enough, on the first day of April at 7 o'clock in the morning a special delivery document came to me in one of those wound-up folders, you know, wrapped up. I proceeded with my dad to go up to the courthouse. Dad had alerted the other members of the bar that I was going, and they were present, some twelve or fourteen of them, when I was sworn in a lawyer.

That's how I happened to become a lawyer. Before that, I knew that I was going to be a lawyer because I had passed the examination, but I hadn't had a chance

[22]

to be sworn in. And that's when I knew Harry Truman.

Then I got married in June of 1921.

JOHNSON: So you got married right after your graduation from law school. What was the date?

BURRUS: June 11th.

JOHNSON: And you married whom?

BURRUS: Ila Beets. She came from a family at Atherton. Her father's name was James D. Beets and her mother was Margaret Hifner; her maiden name was Hifner.

JOHNSON: How did you meet her?

BURRUS: I met her in school, high school.

JOHNSON: Here at Independence High School?

BURRUS: She and her brothers and sisters came to the high school, and that's where I got to know her.

JOHNSON: Was she in your class?

BURRUS: She graduated in 1918 when I did.

JOHNSON: Did she take up a career before she married?

[23]

BURRUS: No, she was a piano pupil, and she did work a time or two for some stores up around town.

JOHNSON: Which reminds me. Was Florence Burrus your aunt?

BURRUS: Aunt Florence was father's oldest sister. She also was a music teacher, and I learned from Harry that she gave him his first piano lesson and taught him to play the piano.

JOHNSON: Did you ever talk to your Aunt Florence about Harry?

BURRUS: Yes, that's right.

JOHNSON: What did she have to say about him?

BURRUS: She always admired him and knew him. I'll give you another incident. When I was counselor to the county court in Kansas City in the 1930s, people that had property were having trouble getting some of the taxes taken care of. My Aunt Florence, much to my surprise, appeared one day in the county courthouse; at first I didn't see her, because I had my back to the audience. But she was out there and Mr. Truman looked out and said,

[24]

"Rufus, your Aunt Florence is out there; go out and see what she wants."

I said, "Yes sir." I went out, and said, "Aunt Florence, Judge Truman says for me to find out what you want."

She said, "Well, Rufus, I'm kind of half ashamed to tell you, but I had two or three pieces of property with mortgages that I had to take over, and they had taxes on them. I just don't think I ought to have to pay all the penalties, and I want to see if I can't get those taxes taken care of."

I went up and told him, and he said to members of the Court. "You know, Rufus' Aunt Florence was my first music teacher, she taught me to play the piano. I want Rufus to be authorized to go out and talk to Aunt Florence, and come in and tell us what he thinks we ought to do concerning her payment of taxes." And that's how it got done.

JOHNSON: He undoubtedly was the best piano player we've had as President.

BURRUS: That's right. He played our piano at home several times. He'd come to our place and visit with us.

[25]

JOHNSON: After that first meeting in 1921, what would be the second occasion? When did you meet him the next time?

BURRUS: At various gatherings of Democrats. They'd be together and he'd be along and I would see him.

JOHNSON: Now were you involved in that campaign in '21?

BURRUS: Sure, I worked. He carried my precinct. One of my duties was to see that the people who lived in the three blocks or so, that I had the books for, were informed about who the candidates were and I would try to persuade them to vote.

JOHNSON: You were precinct captain?

BURRUS: No, I was precinct worker. Frank was the captain of the ward.

JOHNSON: Which ward are we talking about?

BURRUS: They called it number one, in the northwest part of Independence.

JOHNSON: You decided to get into local politics right

[26]

after you became a lawyer, I guess.

BURRUS: I was working in my dad's office and that's one of the things that I happened to do with him, too.

JOHNSON: Your dad was a precinct worker?

BURRUS: No, he wasn't a precinct worker, but he was active. He was the city's attorney, had had various attachments to the Democrats particularly.

JOHNSON: How did they become Democrat? They came from Pennsylvania originally, you said.

BURRUS: Well, my father didn't, but my grandmother and grandfather Bell were Republicans from Pennsylvania. But in my father's family, his father had been a member of General Price's rebel forces. He was a southern retired soldier.

JOHNSON: Now what was his name?

BURRUS: His name was James M. Burrus, Jr.

JOHNSON: Was he involved in the Battle of Independence or the Battle of Westport?

[27]

BURRUS: No, he would have been down farther south at that time. After the war he was a commander in the Sons of the Confederacy.

JOHNSON: So he was the one that influenced your father's politics more than the others did?

BURRUS: That's right. We had been Democrat, and the whole family had been Democrats. They were southern folks and maybe that was the reason why.

JOHNSON: Was he a Democrat even when Teddy Roosevelt came in?

BURRUS: I can tell you a story about that too, because my grandfather had a great liking for Theodore Roosevelt, the Rough Rider. My grandfather had ridden horses as a cavalryman when he was in the service. So he knew about Roosevelt and learned that he was a Bull Mooser and all that. So he became enamored of him, and he joined up with his group, and worked for him to be nominated.

JOHNSON: That would be 1912 when he ran as a Bull Moose.

[28]

BURRUS: That's right. I can't think now who it was that was the candidate for Governor, but anyhow he was Republican. Grandfather had been a Democrat but that didn't keep him from being out and being active. So they nominated him to be the candidate for Lieutenant Governor of the State of Missouri.

JOHNSON: Was that James M. Burrus?

BURRUS: That's right.

JOHNSON: And he was nominated to be Lieutenant Governor of Missouri?

BURRUS: On the Bull Moose ticket, along with Teddy Roosevelt. Of course, the Roosevelt ticket lost and grandfather lost, but that was how he got to working with him.

JOHNSON: Was that the only time he defected from the Democrat ranks?

BURRUS: He came back into the Democrat fold.

JOHNSON: With Wilson?

BURRUS: That's right.

[29]

JOHNSON: And you probably were a Wilson supporter.

BURRUS: Sure.

JOHNSON: You started out in local politics in the precinct, and you worked for the election of Truman then as Eastern Judge in the election of 1922?

BURRUS: That's right.

JOHNSON: What kind of promotion, what kind of work, did the precinct people do in those days?

BURRUS: Well, I had to know all the people that lived and moved from one precinct to another because they began to have to be registered. I kept up on that and kept in contact with them, and let them know who the candidates were that we liked for them to be favoring. We would tell them why and sometimes would pass out cards, campaign literature. Occasionally, we would invite them to come to the Democrat precinct activities.

JOHNSON: The Republicans rarely had a chance to win an election. Of course, they had their own primary, or

[30]

caucus. Was it a primary or a caucus in those days?

BURRUS: Well, it was caucuses to start with. But then later it became a primary system. In 1922 it was a primary election.

JOHNSON: The question of who would be elected was really a question of who the Democrats would nominate, wasn't it? Did Harry Truman tell you how he decided to get into politics? He was a businessman; he ran a haberdashery. He was co-owner of a haberdashery when you met him. Did he say, at that time, why he was apparently going to give up business for politics?

BURRUS: Well, as Frank said, the vacancy was for the Eastern Judge, and Eastern Judge was the most important office from the patronage standpoint that we had in the eastern part of the county. The road overseers and the various deputies and the various offices had to be staffed generally through the county judge, who was the elected representative of that whole area out of the eastern district.

JOHNSON: That was everything outside of Kansas City, wasn't it?

[31]

BURRUS: That's right.

JOHNSON: What was the impression that you got as far as his motives were concerned?

BURRUS: He wanted to see to it that they had elections, the kind of elections that should be indicative of what the people wanted, and not just push something over on them. He would have to give them the reasons why they should be in favor of him, in favor of the folks that he was supporting.

JOHNSON: Was it Miles Bulger that was one of the people that they were trying to displace?

BURRUS: Bulger had been a previous judge of the county court and he was one that was in disfavor really with Mr. Truman the most. Bulger was not the kind of a man that Mr. Truman would want to have any contact with as a political candidate.

JOHNSON: Did he tell you what Pendergast had to do with his nominations? What did he have to say about that?

BURRUS: I re-read in the book here about Mr. Truman.

[32]

JOHNSON: In the Memoirs.

BURRUS: That's right.

I learned from him--and also from Frank Wallace--that Mike Pendergast, the brother of Tom, was allotted to look after eastern Jackson County, which included Independence. He was somewhat of a leader, and Frank knew him and he was a part of his organization. So in time, when Mr. Truman was urged by folks out of the artillery outfit that he was with, and his Masonic folks, and also from people over at Grandview, to run for office, that's when he began to be active. I knew Mr. Truman had been a road overseer in the Grandview area and also had been postmaster there. That wasn't a very large sort of a job, but was one that he had had some activities with before the war.

Then he came back from the war. The folks in the 129th Field Artillery were mostly Democrats, although a few of them were Republicans, such as John Miles, a major. He was Republican; he had been with the Republicans there in the Post Office. Harry Sturgis also was a Republican; he had been one of the lieutenants in the outfit. And Eddie Carrol had been a Republican. They all got along

[33]

very well, but they would have their allegiances to the different groups. Truman then had the Democrats that were his friends and all the ones from the outfit [129th], and the members of the Army Reserve. That's where he got his real support.

JOHNSON: Are you saying that the Battery D people that he served with and the Reserve Officers people that he was acquainted with, were the first ones that got him interested in running for office?

BURRUS: That's right. Jimmy Pendergast was the son of Mike Pendergast, and a nephew of Tom. He was a lieutenant in the 129th Field Artillery, and then later got into the 130th. When Truman went into the haberdashery, why, Jimmy would come by over there and visit with them. He went up to Truman and said that his Uncle Tom, his father's brother, was looking for someone to help to be a Democratic candidate in the eastern part of the county. He wanted to have Harry enter himself into it and to get active. Already many other folks in the outfit had asked him to do it. Well, he also was a Masonic master of the lodge at Grandview; he organized it. So he had so many folks

[34]

that knew him in that fashion, as well as being a Democrat. His father was a Democrat. His father had been a road overseer first and also had been active as a Democrat and so this just came natural to him.

JOHNSON: How about Eddie Jacobson? Do you think he had any influence on Truman's interest in politics? Was he interested at all in politics?

BURRUS: He wasn't interested in politics, except as a Democrat and supporting Truman.

JOHNSON: Jim Pendergast was a veteran and he was part of this group that were friends of Truman's, served with him, and so he was just one of a number of 129th Field Artillery people who talked politics to Truman.

BURRUS: That's right. Edgar Hinde was another one that was one of Truman's friends; he was a Democrat. His family had been Democrats. His father had been the secretary of the school board, and things like that that showed that they were active in affairs. Hinde was in there with him, and Hinde became the Postmaster of Independence. His son became the Postmaster after him.

[35]

JOHNSON: Truman gave his first speech, apparently, his first political speech, at Lee's Summit.

BURRUS: At Lee's Summit.

JOHNSON: Were you there when he gave it?

BURRUS: No, I wasn't there.

JOHNSON: I think some of the Harris people did have something to do with that. Do you recall the first political speech you heard Truman give?

BURRUS: No I don't. We had meetings, just where he was visiting with people and made himself known, in Independence. I was in Raytown a time or two with him. But that was just out to meet the folks that were there. I remember one time we went out to visit with the editor of the newspaper.

JOHNSON: In Raytown?

BURRUS: In Raytown.

JOHNSON: You say that he campaigned in 1922 mostly by going around and meeting with small groups?

[36]

BURRUS: In 1921 and 1922. It was '22 when he was nominated and elected. That was a personal campaign as he went around to all the different areas and people. He'd let them know who he was and why he wanted to be elected.

JOHNSON: Did he go from door to door at all?

BURRUS: Oh yes, he did, sure.

JOHNSON: Oh, he would knock on doors and hand out leaflets?

BURRUS: That's right. Whenever he would meet anybody the first thing he would say, "I'm Harry Truman, I'm going to be a candidate for Eastern Judge," or "I am a candidate."

JOHNSON: What kind of public events would a politician like Harry Truman, one running for local office in those days, want to be sure to attend, where they could get exposure?

BURRUS: That would include Democrat rallies, as they called them. Horseshoe Lake was another place where they had gatherings quite often. That's out here just east of Independence and close to Blue Springs. And then on Highway 50, where the battle of Lone Jack was fought--

[37]

the Lone Jack picnic was another one.

JOHNSON: So these were mainly picnics where they...

BURRUS: Or gatherings.

JOHNSON: How about fairs, did they have a county fair?

BURRUS: They had fairs, yes, and they'd go around to those. You didn't often make a speech, but they had chance to meet people at those county fairs. The Independence Fair was one of them.

JOHNSON: I see. Did you go with him to some of those events?

BURRUS: No, no I didn't go with him.

JOHNSON: We're talking about that campaign in '22. You passed out literature for him?

BURRUS: Yes.

JOHNSON: And did that sort of thing.

BURRUS: I carried the precinct book and saw to it that the folks were informed, and got them to be ready to vote. I checked off when they did vote, to see that they did vote.

[38]

JOHNSON: What kind of argument did you use to get them to vote for Harry Truman?

BURRUS: I said he's a neighbor up here of ours and he belongs to the Wallace family. His wife was a Wallace and he lived over here as a younger fellow. Independence is his home now. He came from down at Grandview and he was a farmer down there.

JOHNSON: Did you say anything about his virtues at that time, about being an honest type of person?

BURRUS: Yes, and I said he served in the military service, and he was a captain of a battery and he got the respect of his men. They're all of them for him. And they were.

JOHNSON: And he was running against...

BURRUS: Emmett Montgomery. He was a banker from Blue Springs.

JOHNSON: So you apparently were a Goat, so to speak.

BURRUS: With Frank, that's right. He was aligned with Mike Pendergast and what's later called the Goats.

[39]

JOHNSON: So that identifies you with the Pendergast organization I suppose.

BURRUS: I never did join any Pendergast organization, as such.

JOHNSON: So you helped him win that first election.

BURRUS: That's right.

JOHNSON: And then what was your next association with Harry Truman?

BURRUS: In the next election I was for him too, when he was running in '24. He was nominated again. The Republicans were trying to find somebody to run against him, but nobody was willing to run. They looked around and tried to find somebody. Henry Bundschu used to tell me the story. He was a Republican worker and he was one of John Miles' friends. Of course, Miles was Republican but Miles and Truman were personal friends. Miles supported Mr. Truman individually and covertly without being obvious about it, and Truman also supported Miles when Miles was running for sheriff. This was a personal relationship; it wasn't really political. Anyhow

[40]

that was what happened then.

During the two years that Truman was eastern judge, he was able to get some of the jobs for folks and some of the Rabbits thought they ought to have more than they had gotten. A few of them got to the point where they made it a feud as far as Truman was concerned. There were only a few of them.

So as time went on when it came time to have the election, the Republicans, with the assistance of Henry Bundschu had wanted to fill the place for that eastern judgeship, because nobody was willing to be nominated, and accept it and work for it.

So finally, Mr. Bundschu knew Henry Rummell who had a harness shop on the north side of the Square and he visited with him and wanted him to run. Rummell said, "Oh, I don't think I want to run; I don't want to have to work at it."

Bundschu said, "Well, we want to put you in. And you can withdraw after we find somebody else to take your place." Well, upon that, he was willing to do it, but he wouldn't pay the docket fee to file it. Bundschu told me, "And I paid the docket fee, $10; he never did

[41]

pay me back." They wanted to have him withdraw later, and he wouldn't withdraw. He stayed and, of course, he was nominated and he was elected.

JOHNSON: They were two Germans too, I guess weren't they? Rummell and Bundschu were both of German background?

BURRUS: Yes. Truman was defeated that time, 1924.

JOHNSON: Yes. You have just read this excerpt from the book by Richard Miller and I understand you are challenging some of the statements and conclusions.

BURRUS: Yes.

JOHNSON: We were talking about the Journal, Kansas City Journal, which supplies much of the information for these statements and judgments. What do you know about the Journal and about the first two years of Truman's service?

BURRUS: The Journal became the property of Walter S. Dickey. Dickey owned the W.S. Dickey Clay Pipe Company. They sold pipe to the public for sewers and for street uses and public places, and it was a rather lucrative

[42]

business for him. He wanted to have more say. He was at loggerheads with William Rockhill Nelson of the Kansas City Star and Roy Roberts who was one of Nelson's associates Dickey took the Journal for the avowed purpose of making attacks upon the Star. See, the Star supported not only Mr. Truman but they supported, later, Henry McElroy for Western Judge of the County Court.

Dickey began saying things that would be harmful and hurtful that he would print in his newspaper. The stories didn't have any foundation in fact. But he'd have them shaded so that people would think they did. They also wanted to get Mr. Rummell to withdraw and have somebody else take his place. The Rabbits wanted to feed Dickey, and the Rabbits were the ones that wanted Rummell to withdraw so that they could endorse somebody else and not have the campaign where it would be hurtful. Yet they would help defeat Truman, if they could. They did take enough votes, 800 and some odd votes, that caused Truman not to be elected.

Two years after that, Truman became associated with the Community Savings and Loan Association. I helped organize that company. It only had $5,000 to

[43]

start with. We were able, with Truman's help, to sell stock to the people that would make deposits of $25 a month, or some other amounts. He was working with that. At the same time he became associated with the Kansas City Automobile Club. And he got to know a fellow named Elliot that was active in the association from Nevada, Missouri, the Farm and Home Association. That's where he got really the idea about getting active in the building and loan company. So that was where he came in. I was counsel for the building and loan company, and I got to know him and we were quite often together. And a time or two I went with him to a dinner at 5 o'clock or 6 o'clock in the evening, when he was with the Reserve Officers, and we sat around and visited with them. I got to know him in that fashion as well.

JOHNSON: Did you join the Reserve Officers Association in Kansas City?

BURRUS: In 1926 or '27 Mr. Truman wanted me to join him and go to camp at Ft. Riley with him. He said, "You get your boots and riding britches, and spurs, and campaign hat with no insignia, and I'll pick you up

[44]

and take you to Ft. Riley."

JOHNSON: Did you have anything to do with Mr. Truman during the first two years that he was in office?

BURRUS: He needed somebody to give him advice as to what the law was, to help him know what was being done by the county, and how they operated. They had a county counselor but he wasn't friendly to him, so he wanted me to do research and do the things I could.

JOHNSON: So you were giving legal advice.

BURRUS: Just friendly counseling.

JOHNSON: During the first two years he was county judge?

BURRUS: Well, no, when he was the Presiding Judge.

JOHNSON: Oh, after he became Presiding Judge.

BURRUS: That's right.

JOHNSON: Did you have anything to do with him in those first two years, in '22-'24?

BURRUS: Just what I said. He would come to me and want

[45]

to know how it was that they got these various officers that were elected, and how you would be able to keep track of the money, and so on. There were something like fourteen or fifteen elective officers that drew warrants against the county funds. Nobody could tell them that you had to have a certain ceiling, on a certain budget, and the result was that they overdrew the treasury to the point that there were millions of dollars in what was called "protested warrants." He said, "That's no way to run a business, or run a government." I explained to him how it was, and why it was that they could do all that. I pointed out to him those things that were hurtful and harmful, noting that nobody could say you had to have just so many deputies and so much money and that's all there was to be had. Instead, they'd overdraw the accounts and have these overdrawn warrants that they were paying interest on.

JOHNSON: So this was one of his main concerns?

BURRUS: That's right.

JOHNSON: Overdrawing the county warrants in those first two years.

[46]

BURRUS: Also he was interested about the roads that they had, because the roads under Bulger's court were what they called "piecrust roads" and they had to be worked on. He wanted to know what could be done by the county on that. I explained to him that there was a county levy, a capital road fund, and that it had to be spent on the roads and it should be operated so as to make the roads useable. They needed to have some real work done on them.

JOHNSON: Did he show an interest in roads even in that first term?

BURRUS: That's right.

JOHNSON: He didn't wait until he was presiding judge.

BURRUS: No sir.

JOHNSON: And he was interested, as you say, in a balanced budget?

BURRUS: That's right.

He wanted to be sure that the court could have some way to hold the budget down so they wouldn't be overdrawn.

[47]

JOHNSON: Did he ever mention the Pendergasts, or Tom Pendergast in particular, having anything to do with the decisions made by the County Court?

BURRUS: Not at all. Not at all. They didn't have any thing to do with his decisions, but they did have something to do with other members of the Court. Truman was able to get quite a few offices for Eastern Jackson County people that were helpful to him.

JOHNSON: Was that one of their main jobs, to take care of patronage, in those days?

BURRUS: That's right.

JOHNSON: That was a rule of the game, so to speak?

BURRUS: That's right.

JOHNSON: That's different from the way it is supposed to be today.

BURRUS: Yes, because today they have a charter and there are no Democrats or Republicans under it. It's non partisan they say, but that's not really the way they have it now.

[48]

JOHNSON: He mentioned the problem of overdrawn warrants. You mentioned the problem of roads that were breaking up, or of poor quality. Was there any other problem that he mentioned in that early period?

BURRUS: Yes. They had a home for the folks that were indigent and poor; they called it the poor farm. He said, "That's not the poor farm; that's not going to be known as the poor farm; it's going to be known as the home for the aged, or the old folks home." And that's what they did. They got rid of that name, "poor farm." And he saw to it that they had little more than just custodial care; they had a doctor assigned to help take care of them. He had a regular time to go out to meet them, but he wouldn't be there every day. There was no hospital in connection with it, no nursing care, just a place to take care of them. So he thought that was something that was wrong, that the county had ought to have a hospital in connection with the old folks home.

JOHNSON: We've mentioned something else, patronage and getting jobs for people.

BURRUS: He did. He helped get the workers in the old folks

[49]

home; helped take care of them. He took care of some of the Rabbits with it too.

JOHNSON: How about road overseers?

BURRUS: They parceled them out between Democrats and Republicans.

JOHNSON: As far as you can tell, they simply did it by the rules of the game?

BURRUS: That's right.

JOHNSON: When did you first become employed by the Court?

BURRUS: In 1926, when Truman was elected Presiding Judge, I worked for him and helped get him nominated and elected. Also I was active in my law practice and had plenty of things to do.

After he was elected in November, about three days later, he called me one day and asked me to meet him at the Teacup Inn. I said, "Yes." The other times I had met him at lunch over at 9th and Baltimore, where we had a delicatessen. They had rye bread and cheese and sandwiches and things of that kind. But the Teacup

[50]

Inn was a sit-down place with white table cloths and chinaware and silverware, glassware --a rather swanky place. I didn't know what would be the reason for going over there, but I didn't question it. I said I'd meet him there.

I went over and he just was a few steps ahead of me, and he saw me and said, "Come on, join us." There was some gentleman with him that I didn't know, a stranger to me. He went over to the table that was set up for him, and he hadn't anymore got set down and I got set down, and the gentleman with him got set down, that he turned to this man with him and said, "Fred, you're going to be my County Counselor. That's a Rabbit job, and you're my kind of Rabbit, and I want you to be the County Counselor."

Well, I afterwards learned that he had been a great friend of Truman's in the National Guard and in other ways, and he said, "Burrus is going to be the Assistant Counselor. That's a Goat job, and he's my kind of a Goat." He said, "I want to tell you that I understand from some of my Republican friends that they haven't been taking care of some of the lawsuits against the

[51]

county and they're going to be coming up in court pretty soon. If you're going to have to take care of them you can't wait until January when I take office to get to work on it." He said, "I want to tell you now so that you can get out and get in contact with these Republican counselors and find out about these lawsuits so you can get acquainted with them and be able to take care of them."

Well, Mr. Boxley, Fred Boxley, I later learned was with the law firm of Humphrey, Boxley and Reeves, and they were insurance lawyers. Senator Humphrey came from Kansas and was a State senator, and later Judge Reeves became the judge of the Federal Court in Kansas City. So Boxley said, "Rufe"--he called me Rufe because Truman called me Rufe--he said, "Rufe, I can't get along with the Republicans very well; they won't give me anything, I don't think. I just couldn't do any good with them. Can you make any contact with them?"

I said, "I think I can," and I did. I had friendly relations with them and they understood professionally what was going to have to be done and they told me and gave me the files. They showed me the lawsuits, and on several of them we did have to have briefs

[52]

filed in the early part of January. We wouldn't have had time if I had waited too long to get to them. So that's how I first got in with him.

And then after a time Truman visited with me and said, "We want to find some way we can take care of the funds, so we have a budget set up for the various offices. That's going to be a hard job, but we're going to have to see about getting that done. In addition to that, I have in mind a program for bonds for roads so we can have money to build some roads that will be lasting. Then we need to have a new courthouse in Kansas City, and I want to have some bonds for that. I want to have the courthouse in Independence rebuilt, worked over, and also the hospital set up with the home for the aged at Little Blue." He said, "We're going to have bonds for those." And he said, "You know, to get this done, I can't just go out and tell people that we have to have it; we've got to have workers in the precincts and have them alerted to the fact that we need to have it. The workers, both Goats and Rabbits, have to do it, and the Republicans have to do it, and I'm going to help sell it." He said, "Also, I have already talked to

[53]

Mr. Pendergast and let him know what I want to do, and he said, 'Harry, it's your job, you're running it, don't worry about me.'" Truman said, "I'm not worrying about you; I just wanted to let you know so you would know what I've got in mind, before you have any reason to make any question about it. Let me know if you've got any questions about it."

"Why, no," Pendergast said, "I told you that you run this job down here and that's what you're going to do. That's what I want you to do."

And then,Truman got around to the point and place of getting the bonds set up and he pointed out that he wanted to have 6-1/2 million dollars for road bonds. He told Mr. Pendergast that they were going to have two engineers, bipartisan engineers, a Democrat and a Republican, to oversee and see to it that the funds were spent like they should have been and that they had plans and specifications for getting the best program they could for the roads. And he said, "I don't want to have somebody say that I'm getting direction from somebody else."

"Why," Pendergast said, "I told you you could do

[54]

that." He said, "In the first place I didn't think you could get those bonds carried, but you did; you go ahead and do it," and he did do it. And Mr. Pendergast never said a single word against what Truman did or what he wanted to have done.

He named the two engineers. One was Colonel Edward M. Stayton of Independence, who had been with the 110^th Engineers, and had been in the National Guard before that, and Truman knew him. The other was a Republican, N.T. Veatch, commonly known as Tom Veatch in those earlier days. He was from the firm of Black and Veatch. That was a new firm without much background and much experience. Mr. Truman told Mr. Pendergast again that he was going to name them, and Pendergast said, "Why, I know Colonel Stayton and I know that he's a good engineer. That's fine. And I know of Mr. Veatch." He said, "Sure, I've told you that this is your show, you're running it, don't worry about me."

Truman said, "All right." And then told both of them what Mr. Pendergast had said. Stayton already had had a chance to be known by Mr. Pendergast from activities that related to the streetcar company. Stayton said,

[55]

"I want both of us to go down to see Mr. Pendergast to be sure that he doesn't have any reasons to oppose us or anything like that."

So they went down, and had a most friendly visit with him. And Pendergast said, "Yes, I told Harry that was his show and he said that he wanted to have you, and as far as I am concerned, you're going to run it the way he wants to run it. You'll never hear anything from me."

Stayton said, "Well, we're going to have roads and we're going to spend money for roads."

Pendergast said, "That's right, and if anybody who belongs to my group wants to have any roads they'll have to bid for them. If they don't bid for them, they don't get them, that's all there is to that.

They said, "That's right." And that's exactly the way it was.

Mr. Truman had me designated to be the counsel for the road program to acquire the right-of-way and to oversee the contracts and have the contracts properly bid for. They were to go to the bidders which were the lowest bidders, and I was to see to it that they carried out the bids under the direction of Stayton and Veatch.

[56]

It was done that way.

Later I learned that the contest for these bids was rather heated. Several bidders came in and bid for them, and one firm bid for them and had their bond put up and was about ready to go to work. But the bonding company wouldn't let them go through, because the contractor wasn't financially able to do it and they took it over themselves to carry it out because they wouldn't want to have this contractor get in there and run it in the hole. So they took it over. So that's the first thing that shows you how Stayton and Veatch operated. Then, there were two other contractors, I don't remember the names of them, but they got into financial trouble and weren't getting all of their bills and jobs paid for and so the bonding company had to take them over and see it through. Again, this is a demonstration that the roads were built according to the plans and specifications that Stayton and Veatch wrote up and provided for. The contractors did the work according to the way it should be done without getting additional monies left over if sometimes they had changes, which might add, say 10, 12, 20,000 dollars or more. Nothing like that happened at all; they just got exactly what they bid for and

[57]

that's all they got.

JOHNSON: No money under the table as far as you know?

BURRUS: That's right. And the same thing for the court house. They wanted a courthouse in Kansas City, and Mr. Truman wanted to put it where it is located now. There was another group that wanted to put it up where the Pickwick Hotel is located. Truman didn't want it there and they challenged what Truman was doing to the point that we weren't able to get all the ground assembled on time. So it caused a little delay, but it finally was done and the architects were the ones that made the plans and specifications and that was let for bid, and it was built as it should have been. In that whole program the architects had to pass upon the validity of the contracts and the way that they were carried out. That never exceeded the amount of the money that was appropriated for each one of them.

JOHNSON: There is a story about two contractors who supposedly were friends of Tom Pendergast, and they met with him down on Main Street one day and they said, "Now we want this job, part of the roads project." Then he brought in

[58]

Harry Truman, and he introduced these two and said that they're demanding part of the work. Then Truman was supposed to have replied, "Well, if they're low bidders, and if they meet specifications, they probably will get the work, but you know we're playing no favors." Do you recall anything about that incident?

BURRUS: I know about it by reading about it, but it never was anything we talked about because Truman always said that Mr. Pendergast wasn't in any way taking any part in it. That would be one of the things which showed that he wouldn't have done it, and didn't do it. I read what this fellow [Richard Miller] writes [in the Sunday supplement to the Kansas City Star]. He wasn't there when it happened and he doesn't say that he knows anybody that ever said that they were present when that happened.

JOHNSON: The Kansas City Journal seems to be a major source, but you're saying the Kansas City Journal is not a reliable source.

BURRUS: They weren't reliable because they were out just to hurt and destroy the Star and especially Mr. Truman, and also particularly McElroy. McElroy was vouched

[59]

for by the Kansas City Star and also the J.C. Nichols Company, I remember particularly. The Star was Democrat and they supported him, the Star did.

JOHNSON: He came in in '22 also, didn't he, McElroy? Wasn't he elected in '22?

BURRUS: He was elected a judge of the County Court Western District, served only two years and then he got out and got to be the City Manager of Kansas City. That's where he rode himself high with them.

JOHNSON: If we can back up just a little bit, you said that after Truman lost the election in 1924, you moved into a new kind of association with Truman; that is, you were involved in helping establish this Community Savings and Loan.

BURRUS: That's right. He was the one that sold the stock.

JOHNSON: Were you an officer in that?

BURRUS: I was attorney for them.

JOHNSON: You were attorney for them.

[60]

BURRUS: I was a member of the board, yes.

JOHNSON: So that's when you and Truman got much better acquainted I suppose.

BURRUS: That's right.

JOHNSON: Did you have many meetings together?

BURRUS: We'd go out together and see property that he was going to make loans on and they wanted to make loans on.

JOHNSON: So you and he would go out to look at properties?

JOHNSON: That's right, and see some prospective folks that he wanted to get them . . .

JOHNSON: Were these mostly real estate loans?

BURRUS: Real estate loans, that's right. They were real estate loans.

JOHNSON: Would that just cover this area, or did he . . .

BURRUS: The Independence area generally.

JOHNSON: Did this expand his circle of acquaintances, so to speak?

[61]

BURRUS: That's right.

JOHNSON: Get his name better known, or more widely known?

BURRUS: That's right.

JOHNSON: So it would serve him later on in his political career, along with the National Roads Association?

BURRUS: It did serve him, that's right.

JOHNSON: Did you have anything to do with the roads association?

BURRUS: No.

JOHNSON: Did you ever go out with him when he dedicated some of these Madonnas of the Trail?

BURRUS: No. I took care of things at home; I had plenty of things to do. In the first place, I wanted him to know I wanted to keep my own private practice. I said, that, hopefully, no more than one-third of my time would be devoted to the County Court and I thought I could do it in one-third of the time. But I wanted to be independent and if anybody wanted to relieve me of

[62]

my duties with the county, they could do that, and I would still have a law practice. He said that was a good thing to do, and just go ahead and do it. That's why I did it, and I didn't negotiate particularly just for that purpose. I could limit myself to the point where I could take care of the things that I wanted to do in the time that was available, personally. I didn't go out on some of these things that we had out of town.

JOHNSON: One of the people that really became kind of publicly known as an enemy of Truman was Spencer Salisbury. What happened there? They apparently were both involved in setting up the Community Savings and Loan.

BURRUS: Salisbury was a battery commander in the 129^th Field Artillery, and Truman knew him. Truman had him in his administration when he became Presiding Judge, as one of the purchasing agents, to purchase things for the county. In time he got to learning that Salisbury was not exactly doing the best job he should do in getting the best prices. He called Salisbury in and told him that he wasn't going to have him any longer. Salisbury got uppity, and Truman said, "Well,

[63]

just pick up your papers and leave." He just relieved him of the duty; that's what he did with him. That's how that happened. Salisbury then always carried a vengeance against Truman.

JOHNSON: That happened after Truman was elected Presiding Judge?

BURRUS: That's right. And he had been named as assistant purchasing agent.

JOHNSON: Well, how did they get together in establishing this Community Savings and Loan? That was kind of a joint venture?

BURRUS: That's right. Salisbury helped him to get the money, and Truman was helping to get money to run it. For the day-to-day operation Salisbury was there, and there were a couple of other clerks, and that's where they got along. But finally Salisbury came up with the idea that especially after he was relieved from being county purchasing agent, he was going to take over all of that and he just edged Truman out of it.

JOHNSON: Okay, he kind of forced Truman out of this business,

[64]

out of the Community Savings and Loan.

BURRUS: That's right. Not only out of that but out of the insurance agency that they had.

JOHNSON: Was that doing Truman a favor in that the Depression came soon afterwards?

BURRUS: That's right. He was able to get out of all of that, and he had plenty of other things to do.

JOHNSON: What happened to the Community Savings and Loan after that?

BURRUS: Well, Salisbury was the cause of it having to be liquidated.

JOHNSON: The stock market crash and the Depression --wouldn't you blame it on that?

BURRUS: No, that wasn't all of it.

JOHNSON: That wasn't the key.

BURRUS: Salisbury had done some things that he shouldn't have done with respect to the families that had difficulties with him. He was indicted on Federal offenses,

[65]

which neither Truman nor I had anything to do with. It was just Salisbury, that was all. As far as Salisbury and I are concerned, we never had any difficulties. I knew him and it made me sad though to see things happen, that I know he shouldn't have done. He didn't lean on me and didn't ask me, and I didn't try to tell him any thing because he just wasn't going to listen to anybody I knew. He didn't listen to Henry Bundschu. Henry Bundschu had gotten things to the point and place where he could patch up the troubles Salisbury had with a family, about some funds, and also things involving the Federal Government. But Salisbury would have to do certain things, and he said, "I won't do it."

Henry said, "Well, Spence, I'm sorry if you won't. I can't help you anymore." He had to fade out of the picture too.

JOHNSON: Of course, another issue and that's come up again in this new book, was Mr. Truman's debts from the haberdashery. Did he ever talk to you about these? How do you recall that he handled the situation?

BURRUS: Of course, I read in his book which goes into great length, specifically.

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JOHNSON: His Memoirs.

BURRUS: That's right.

He and Jacobson had a good business, and they had a good inventory of merchandise that they were stuck with when the crash came in the twenties, and they couldn't sell it, just couldn't move it. So they finally had to dispose of it at a loss. The loss was considerable, and Jacobson finally went into bankruptcy but Truman wouldn't go into bankruptcy. He said, "I want to keep on paying." Truman assured me and I did know that he had been paying. According to his book he said he had been paying, and I knew that there was a note that was floating around that he had signed that had to do with, I think, a lease on the property that was in a bank that had failed. I knew that his brother, Vivian, bought that note from the bank receivers at the price they would sell it for, because nobody wanted to buy it. It just wasn't salable. And that was how that was all taken care of, and so there wasn't any bankruptcy. There wasn't any threat of bankruptcy, just the mere fact that he wasn't able to pay. He paid quite a lot of various payments according to what he says in his

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Memoirs, and I take that as being more authentic than what some other fellow writes.

JOHNSON: In his book, Richard Miller says that since Truman was a judge on the County Court his salary could not be garnished.

BURRUS: That's true.

JOHNSON: And therefore the creditors couldn't hound him like they hounded Jacobson.

BURRUS: That's right.

JOHNSON: What kind of weight do you give to that?

BURRUS: I don't give it any, because as Presiding Judge, Truman earned $6,000 a year, $500 a month. He had his family debts and family members to take care of and he had obligations like that. So he did not leave a lot of money, but he did take part of it and did apply part of it, making it unnecessary to be garnished.

JOHNSON: Do you know if he ever had to help with a mortgage on the farm? That farm was mortgaged apparently to pay off claims of his mother's brothers and sisters.

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BURRUS: The farm was in the family name, his mother and his sisters and other folks. There would have been times when they didn't have any profits from crops, and still there would have been interest to pay on the loan that they had against the property, and they couldn't pay it. And they couldn't pay the taxes.

So Vivian made an arrangement for a loan from the school fund. Harry had nothing to do with that; he was in the Senate. It had to be administered by the County Court, and an award on that had to have two signers that were individually said to be worth the amount of the money besides the value of the property itself. And it was worth it. But the interest grew and the mother wasn't able to pay, because there wasn't the income to pay for it. So the result was that they foreclosed that mortgage, the county did, after Truman had been a Senator for several years.

JOHNSON: They foreclosed in 1940.

BURRUS: That's right. So in the process of making the sale, they tried to say Mr. Truman was the one that was the cause of it and hadn't paid it. Truman wasn't; he had nothing to do with it. He wasn't the county judge at the time;

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it was Vivian that made it with the school district.

JOHNSON: So it's your impression that farming was not very profitable in the 1920s, that prices were low?

BURRUS: That's right, that's right. Prices were low, the lowest we ever had to that time. Some of them today are getting close to what it was then.

JOHNSON: Yes, it's getting bad today. As far as you could tell, there was no real income from the farm that went to Harry Truman.

BURRUS: No. No.

JOHNSON: All of his income was from the county court job?

BURRUS: When they foreclosed the mortgage, friends of Vivian's and also Harry's bought the property at the sale, paid off the loan, and finally the mother and her family were able to pay it off and dispose of it. But it wasn't anybody except friends that did it for him, and they knew the value of the land. The land was worth it and finally the time came when you could sell land, and you could get something out of it. Development

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began in that neighborhood in Grandview, where they had the farm, and part of the farm became the Truman Corners shopping center.

JOHNSON: Instead of declaring bankruptcy, he settled with each of his creditors. But that doesn't mean he settled dollar for dollar does it?

BURRUS: Most of it was; some of it wasn't. For instance, the note of whatever was left over was in the hands of a bankrupt bank, and the trustee was wanting to sell it. Vivian bought it, and paid the price the bank wanted for it. I would say that it wasn't Harry that was able to gain from it; it was that the bank wasn't willing to hold it until Truman could pay it all, but he paid most of them.

JOHNSON: Well now after 1930-31, there was kind of deflation; that is, the value of the dollar actually went up, so I suppose it would be true that if you were paying 1920s debts in the 1930s you were paying in more expensive dollars. That would make it even harder, I suppose, to repay debts that had been incurred before 1930?

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BURRUS: That's right. That's right.

JOHNSON: As far as you understand, when did he finally finish payments on his debts?

BURRUS: He tells in his book here that that last note was with Vivian, when Vivian bought it at the sale of that bankrupt bank.

JOHNSON: Were you ever a patron, or a customer at the store --at the haberdashery?

BURRUS: No. I stopped by there, I guess but never . . .

JOHNSON: Never bought anything there? No souvenirs that we could have?

BURRUS: No.

JOHNSON: So then in the '26 election you helped get him re-elected as Presiding Judge.

BURRUS: Yes.

JOHNSON: Was your campaigning any different from 1922 when it was on the precinct level? Were you more involved in the '26 campaign than you had been in '22?

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BURRUS: No. I was surprised though when he called me in and had me made assistant county counselor. I had no idea that he was going to do that. I didn't do it for any other purpose, than that it just was the ordinary thing to do. He knew that I was able and he learned what I knew about the county government in 1922 when he was there. And I kept track of things as we went along, because I'd have matters that came up before the County Court.

JOHNSON: You had a general practice in your legal work?

BURRUS: That's right.

JOHNSON: You were named Assistant County Counselor in 1927.

BURRUS: I was what they called the assistant, because there was only a counselor and one assistant for two years, and I was the assistant. Then later they commenced to have others put in as assistants. They were just assistants, not the assistant.

JOHNSON: Did you later become chief counselor?

BURRUS: No, no.

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JOHNSON: Did you sit in the County Court room during the sessions?

BURRUS: Yes, that's right.

JOHNSON: You had a chair and a desk over on the west side?

BURRUS: That's right.

JOHNSON: So you got in on those sessions then?

BURRUS: And before the sessions, he would discuss and see what agreements and contracts were proper and right and whether or not the action that was going to be taken was legal. I would give him advice on whether it was legal for them to do what they wanted to do.

JOHNSON: They had an agenda, I suppose, for each meeting, and then they opened up for questions from the people that were there?

BURRUS: Well, it wasn't called an agenda. They just said that they were going to open up court, and if people wanted to come in that were there, why, they would listen to them. In the meantime, they had various vouchers that had already been seen, and Truman had learned that these

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associate judges had seen them and passed them over, and all he had to do was put his name on them. That made it official for them to have warrants, and then they would have the warrants issued and he would sign the warrants. And he had to sign the county ledgers or the county records about what was done each day that the clerk put into the record.

JOHNSON: The clerk did keep the minutes of these sessions?

BURRUS: That's right.

JOHNSON: Where are these minutes?

BURRUS: They're in the county courthouse. I guess they're still there.

JOHNSON: Was a lot of what went on not predictable? Are you saying that they weren't sure what kind of questions were going to come up, and they would refer to you frequently then for a legal opinion?

BURRUS: That's right. The folks in the audience that had something that they wanted to take up before the county court were told to come on up. They would then tell

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the Court what they wanted to have done or want them to do.

JOHNSON: Beforehand?

BURRUS: You might have known it beforehand, but they were up there making it public what they wanted to have done. The other two judges, or all three of them, would either agree, or else they would take it under advisement and discuss and see what should be done. Especially if you had to have some actions or contracts made, why, we'd have to see to it that the contracts were properly documented and properly advertised, and weren't just spontaneously given to somebody.

JOHNSON: Now somewhere there's a statement that supposedly Truman made, that he was the one that had to do most of the responsible work, that the other two would even play craps behind the table. Is that just a rumor, or is there any fact to that?

BURRUS: I never saw them shooting craps. They may have, but I never did see it. I don't know anything about it except what I've been reading later about it.

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The Clerk, being authorized by the vote of the three judges, made the minutes, and he wrote the record up and it was circulated to the other two judges and Truman for signature.

JOHNSON: The usual business involved warrants apparently, and signing these warrants. What kind of incidents, or episodes, might come up?

BURRUS: On the road contracts, the vouchers made by the contractors had to be submitted to the engineers to be approved. The engineers had to audit them to see to it that the quantities were proper, and the price was proper, that the work was approved, and it was within the amount of the contract. Well, that was more or less bookkeeping. Finally Stayton and Veatch had the responsibility of seeing to it that they were proper and put their endorsement on them. Truman, as Presiding Judge, and the other two judges of the Court could then approve and write warrants for what they were entitled to have.

In addition to that, it was necessary to get the right-of-way for widening a lot of roads, because

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some of them were too narrow. Some of them had to go through virgin land. It was my job to see to it that the engineers got the descriptions of the land that had to be taken for the right-of-way for widening. Then the county had to negotiate with the landowners. After negotiation, they could arrive at what they thought was reasonable, and if it was they would submit it to me and I'd look at it too. We'd then talk with the Court and they'd know what was being done. Sometimes we had to go with eminent domain proceedings to acquire the right-of way. I had to prepare the documents for acquisition and filing and so on, and to have documents published in the papers like they should be, to see if there were claims. If claims were made, why they had opportunities to have hearings. Finally, I had to get the thing resolved, to get the widening that they needed to have, and to get the new roads that they needed to have.

JOHNSON: The point is made sometimes that the Trumans were not paid for the right-of-way through their farm. I suppose this is that Blue Ridge Boulevard Extension.

BURRUS: No, they were not paid.

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JOHNSON: Were farmers in general not paid for right-of-way?

BURRUS: That's right. Most of them were wanting the roads because it was something that was of benefit to them. They could be paid in kind, which increased the value, or paid in cash if there were actual damages.

JOHNSON: Well, who would you pay then for the right-of-way? What kind of businesses or individuals?

BURRUS: Well, for instance, if you had a business property and you had been up close to where the business was located, and they diminished your ability to have their right-of-way, the rights to use your land, they would pay them whatever would be the difference. But generally that was only done in cases where the advice of engineers and also of realtors was that the property had suffered damages. Occasionally, we had some lawsuits to handle.

In addition to that, the State Highway Commission was in charge of the state highways, and they wanted the county to furnish additional right-of-way for them. Mr. Truman said, "If I'm going to furnish you the right of-way, I want that to be done under my counselor's direction." He wanted to know that the work needed to

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be done and that we paid only what was proper for us to pay. That was my job. There was Highway 24, Highway 40, Highway 50, and Highway 71--those were the state highways. I maintained all those actions for them under the name of the State Highway Department. The State Highway Department named me to represent them but I was being compensated by the county for it. We did that. Mr. Truman would say that what we need to do with these people is not to give them the least dollar, but give them the best dollar that we could. We don't want to take something away from them.

We only had to try five cases, involving all these various roads. And on all five of them I won no-damage verdicts, except for one that resulted in an award of $500. In that case, a fellow had a barn on 50 Highway and we didn't think his barn was hurt like he said it was. But the jury allowed him $500.

JOHNSON: So you were able to get by without paying very much for the right-of-ways?

BURRUS: That's right, because they were benefited. Some cases were held over though for a long time. When I came back home from duty in World War II, some of those

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cases were still on the docket.

JOHNSON: Did this become full-time work?

BURRUS: No, that was only part-time.

JOHNSON: You're still doing your general law practice in addition to this.

BURRUS: That's right.

JOHNSON: How many hours a day would you be working on that?

BURRUS: Oh, it would be different by the day, but it didn't have to be more than one-third of my whole time.

JOHNSON: You had some long days I would suppose.

BURRUS: That's right.

JOHNSON: A lot of people were unemployed or underemployed, but maybe you were "over-employed."

BURRUS: Well, I was gone five years, you know, and I came back home and I noticed that some of these lawsuits were still here. And they said, "Yes, why don't you take them over?" One of them, in particular, involved Number 7 and 40 Highway. There was a man named Speas,

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the Speas Vinegar Company, that had the land. He didn't want them to take the site distances off of his corner. He didn't want that to happen, and he opposed it and litigated, and said we didn't have the right to take it. So I filed the suit, and finally it went to the appellate court and I won it, although R.R. Brewster's firm was on the other side. It was not hostile by the way, but just had to go through that process. Finally, it did, and they said that we should have it.

Well, there was another one that nobody took over; the thing was left to lay there, and hadn't been finished. When I came back they wanted me to finish that one. I said, "All right!" and I got hold of Mr. Speas and the vinegar people and I told them what I was representing. I said, "Let's see if we can settle this. Could I come down and see you?" "I wish you would." And so I went down to see him and we talked it over and agreed on a few hundred dollars, and we paid it and got rid of it. So that's just how we got some of them taken care of. We didn't really take his land, because they didn't need it. They changed the right-of-way because of

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other things that happened. But I did represent the county to that extent through the Highway Commission.

JOHNSON: We mentioned a little bit about your military career, but I think we need to pick up on that. You said that you were classed as a veteran because of your involvement with the training corps.

BURRUS: I attended the troop school that Truman had and I had to also make up lessons, or correspondence lessons, necessary to complete requirements for second lieutenant and first lieutenant.

JOHNSON: What did Truman have to do with this?

BURRUS: He was commander of the 443rd Regiment that I belonged to, as an enlisted man.

JOHNSON: An Army Reserve unit.

BURRUS: It was in the Reserve, yes.

JOHNSON: When did you join up with that?

BURRUS: That was in 1927, I think it was.

JOHNSON: Okay, when you became Assistant Counselor you got

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into the military and there you had another connection with Harry Truman.

BURRUS: That's right. And so I did the work, and got commissioned as a second lieutenant. Then I had to do further work to qualify myself as a first lieutenant, and I did that.

JOHNSON: Where did you do this training?

BURRUS: Well, we had meetings where the 110th engineers met over on Main Street, about 35th and Main.

JOHNSON: Was this an armory?

BURRUS: An armory, yes. We had a building right next to it, that we had our activities in.

JOHNSON: Was this just in the summer?

BURRUS: No, it was in the fall and winter; in the summer time we went to Ft. Riley.

JOHNSON: Was that two weeks?

BURRUS: That's right.

JOHNSON: During the rest of the year how often were your meetings?

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BURRUS: We would meet once a week.

JOHNSON: What night of the week?

BURRUS: It was Monday nights mostly.

JOHNSON: You would go down to the armory and you'd work on whatever you needed to do to qualify. First you were a second lieutenant and then you were promoted to first?

BURRUS: Yes. I was first lieutenant when I was called to duty in 1941. I was still a first lieutenant because I hadn't gotten all my correspondence lessons done to qualify me for a captaincy.

They notified me with a letter in April that I was called to duty, and I said, "All right." But I again knew that I was going to have to get this done, so I started to get a good many of my lessons finished.

Well, I was called to duty and went down to Jefferson Barracks, in St. Louis. At the headquarters down there was an officer from Kansas City, and I went to him and said, "I've got to find these lessons and they don't seem to be in print. Can you find them so I can get them and get my lessons done so that I can

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get qualified?"

He said, "Sure we can," and they did. I used those when I was down there and I got qualified for captain after I had already been transferred to Ft. Leonard Wood. At Ft. Leonard Wood I was first assigned to be adjutant of the 6th Division Artillery; that called for a first lieutenancy. After I got my work done, they gave me a captaincy and then they said, "You're entitled to a battery now." They tied me to Battery C, 51st Field Artillery, which I commanded until I was transferred from there to Boston, to the first service command.

JOHNSON: When did you take command of this battery?

BURRUS: In 1942.

JOHNSON: After Pearl Harbor.

BURRUS: Yes.

JOHNSON: After Pearl Harbor you became captain and commander of this battery and that lasted how long?

BURRUS: Until sometime in the fall when I was sent to Boston. I was sent to Boston with the purpose of

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being sent overseas, but they changed the plan and they kept me there for a time. But I did go overseas, and I got there I think in 1943. I spent altogether over seas 27 months--13 months in Africa and 14 months in Italy.

JOHNSON: What outfits were you with then?

BURRUS: I was with what they called the Service Commands in North Africa, which were furnishing all the things that they had to have, rations and . . .

JOHNSON: Was this with the 35th Division?

BURRUS: No, just the headquarters of the whole regiment. We were the housekeeping outfit that was in charge of it.

JOHNSON: But you were attached to various commands.

BURRUS: We had the area command, and that was under a general. Each one of the services was under that, but I was an artilleryman so they transferred me to the Quartermaster Corps.

JOHNSON: In North Africa you mean?

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BURRUS: In North Africa. When I got over to Italy, I was transferred and assigned to the Transportation Corps, to ports and harbors.

JOHNSON: To back up a bit. When did you first go to Ft. Riley for a summer session?

BURRUS: That was as a civilian with Truman in 1926 or '27, I forget which.

JOHNSON: You went out there as a civilian with Harry Truman?

BURRUS: That's right.

JOHNSON: And what was the reason for that?

BURRUS: Well, he wanted me to get qualified so I could become an officer, and that was what he was doing. He was to get me started into the classes. That's how I met John Snyder, Harry Vaughan, and . . .

JOHNSON: How about Edward McKim?

BURRUS: Eddie McKim. Truman picked Ed McKim up on the day he took me out as a civilian to Ft. Riley. He was a lieutenant, first lieutenant. He was from Kansas City.

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JOHNSON: He was from Kansas City at the time. He moved up to Omaha later I guess.

BURRUS: Right.

JOHNSON: So, he picked you up and then he picked up McKim, then you went out to Ft. Riley. You spent two weeks out there kind of following the drills?

BURRUS: Right.

JOHNSON: Was Truman an instructor in artillery methods?

BURRUS: He was the commander of the unit but they had also instructors, Regular Army instructors, a couple of them, and also the other officers would act as instructors.

JOHNSON: What outfit was this again?

BURRUS: I think they called the 443rd. It was a regiment.

JOHNSON: He was in command of that?

BURRUS: That's right.

JOHNSON: Did they still have the horses and horse-drawn caissons?

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BURRUS: That's right, that's right.

JOHNSON: You had to know how to handle horses then, too.

BURRUS: That's right.

JOHNSON: Was that new to you?

BURRUS: It was. I learned to ride and in draft with a colonel who was from Nebraska. His associate was with him too; he was a colonel and the other one was a lieutenant colonel. The lieutenant colonel was Dwight Griswold. He became the Governor of Nebraska, and later Mr. Truman named him to be in command of the mission to Turkey and Greece. And he did that because he was a good officer and he was doing a good job, and he was a Republican and didn't have all the things that would slop over, with people saying Truman was favoring Democrats. But he was good. The other colonel was a newspaperman up there in northwestern Nebraska, and I got to know his nephew who was a lawyer. He became the counsel and later head of the Government agency that had to do with price control, I believe it was.

JOHNSON: OPA, Office of Price Administration?

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BURRUS: No, it was under the price control. I don't remember what it was, but he was in charge of that.

JOHNSON: Were you at Ft. Riley almost every summer after that?

BURRUS: Yes.

JOHNSON: Did they go-to Wisconsin, just once?

BURRUS: They went up to Camp Ripley, in 1933 I think it was.

JOHNSON: Were you up there for that too then?

BURRUS: That's right, two weeks up there.

JOHNSON: But the rest of the time it was . . .

BURRUS: Ft. Riley. One time, I think we were at Leavenworth.

JOHNSON: When you look back on that training what do you think you got out of it, your training in the Reserves?

BURRUS: First thing, I think I learned a lot of things that had to do with how you get along with people, that

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was one thing. The next thing I learned was how to take care of myself and keep myself in good physical condition, which I prided myself in doing then, and I still do because I have to be able to do things today at my age that most folks don't do.

JOHNSON: Was it just general training or did you specialize?

BURRUS: Well, at Riley you had to do all those things that had to do with battery commanders --selection of positions, conduct of fire, the ability to see that you have your men at proper places, see that they put out the wires that you had for telephone and all that. One summer I said I wanted to get away from the telephones at home and the office; I went out there and was put in charge of land telephone wires and establishing phone services.

JOHNSON: Communications.

BURRUS: That's right. It took us a whole day to get the wires and stuff picked up again and to get rid of it.

JOHNSON: As well as driving or riding horses, and firing--being able to plot your fire.

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BURRUS: That's right. Being able to conduct the fire in accordance with the instructions that you were given; to have a bracket forward and back and laterally and then when you get the brackets down to the lowest equivalent, then you fire for affect.

JOHNSON: Was there talk about tactics that were changing? You know, the Maginot line was a failure in Europe in the late thirties. Was there much talk about Blitzkrieg tactics? Did they realize the role the tanks would play?

BURRUS: Not until I got called to duty in 1941 did I learn about that. I remember on one occasion that they had us assembled for the purpose of giving instruction about the conduct of the fire of anti-aircraft. You were supposed to set up a battery that you could fire from a distance away and control the fire without being presently with the guns. That was explained to us in great detail and so we used it. The next day we were assembled again and they said, "Forget everything you've learned over here the other day; you never saw it or heard it." They said, "That was secret, you're not supposed to know anything about it." Then I got overseas and then I began to see what was going on over there, and I knew what to

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expect from the batteries that were protecting our installations where we were in North Africa and in Italy.

JOHNSON: How long were you in Boston when they transferred you there?

BURRUS: I went there just before Armistice Day in November 1942 and I got out of there in January following, and went over to North Africa.

JOHNSON: Where did you land in North Africa? Was it Oran, Casablanca, or . . .

BURRUS: At Oran. Then up finally to Latour and . . .

JOHNSON: Did you ever see General Patton?

BURRUS: No, but I remember an instance with him. He was there with his outfit and they had guns and trucks and vehicles, and these were needed for forward use. So the theatre commander took all of them away from Patton, because they had some more coming that was going to be delivered to him, and the commander had us take charge of giving materiel to those going to the front. We had

[94]

to get those from Patton, and somebody said, "Well, we won't take Patton's away from him." But Patton said, "Yes, you take mine too, take them all, take them all." And they did; they took his equipment and he was without a vehicle for two or three days before they finally got some of them issued out to them. That's how I knew about Patton.

JOHNSON: I suppose now we could get back to Truman's run for the Senate. First, is there anything more about his years as Presiding Judge that you think that we should mention? We talked about roads and right-of-way, about a new home for the indigent . . .

BURRUS: I'll give a little story about that because I say that's one of the things that signifies that Truman had compassion for people. Those poor folks that were in the home out there didn't have a hospital. And he wanted $500,000 used to establish a hospital, and they did. That was the nucleus of what today is the Truman Medical Center East. They also have what they call Bess Truman's wing or some such thing.

JOHNSON: That's off of south Noland Road, isn't it?

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BURRUS: Out there at Little Blue, that's right. As I say, in those days we didn't have Medicare, and you didn't have Social Security. That's what finally was developed, but before they could do that he established what was like Medicare himself for folks that had to be taken care of, and was needing it. Those that needed the care got it.

JOHNSON: Where do you think he got this compassion or sense of compassion?

BURRUS: He was naturally that way. It was just a natural trait with him. That came from his mother and his father and his brothers and his sisters, the family.

JOHNSON: Do you think the Baptist . . .

BURRUS: The Masonic Lodge was another place that he got it.

JOHNSON: The Masonic Lodge. Did he impress you as a fairly committed or active Baptist Church member?

BURRUS: He kept his membership always at Grandview, but while he lived there on Delaware Street he would go over to the Baptist Church there on . . .

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JOHNSON: Oh, the First Baptist.

BURRUS: Yes, there on the end of Pleasant Street and Truman Road. He wasn't a regular member, but he would go in. Also that minister was one that officiated at his last funeral service. He was the one that was on the plat form and officiated for Truman; also he had the chief of chaplains, and he had the Masonic chaplain.

JOHNSON: Were you there when they dedicated the courthouses and Truman gave speeches?

BURRUS: Yes, that's right.

JOHNSON: What was your first impressions of him as a speech maker?

BURRUS: I really had been with him when we would more or less informally talk about things, but I don't remember any particular things about his speeches.

JOHNSON: Of course, you were in the courthouse when he would talk to the public there. And that was more or less informal too.

BURRUS: There wasn't any formal speech that he would make.

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JOHNSON: What seemed to come across to his audiences when he spoke?

BURRUS: It would be that he knew what he was speaking about, and that he was sincere in what he was trying to impress upon them. He wanted to help people come to a viewpoint that he thought would be good for them, and show them why they should arrive at that viewpoint.

JOHNSON: Would you say that he did his homework well, that he had the facts?

BURRUS: He had the background and the facts, and all that sort of thing; there wasn't any question about it.

JOHNSON: So they didn't just judge him by his oratorical abilities; they were judging by content more than style, I suppose.

BURRUS: That's right.

JOHNSON: He went to law school for two years at the Kansas City School of Law.

BURRUS: That's right.

JOHNSON: And you were acquainted with him at that time.

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Did you ever help him with his homework?

BURRUS: Well, I'll tell you this. You know he used the library at the courthouse in Independence for his work that he had to do for the school. People would see a light up there and the folks knew that he was up there and they'd come in the courthouse and bother him, and he couldn't get his work done. They would just harass him to the point he couldn't get the homework done. I said to him one day, "Here's a key to our office; come across the street and use our library over there, my dad's and mine. Nobody will know you're over there and you can get the same books and you can work on it and get it done over there." And he did. Then it got to the place where he couldn't go over there without people coming over and bothering him. While he was going to school, the work that he needed to have researched he did there in my own library, where we have the Missouri Reports and the Court of Appeals Reports and the statutes and the digests and things.

JOHNSON: So that's another way in which you got better acquainted with him.

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BURRUS: That's right. And another thing, he learned that I had my petition into the Masonic Lodge, McDonald Lodge 324. My next door neighbor was the master of the Lodge; he and I were in school together. He was just a year ahead of me. We also were in the Army in 1918 together.

JOHNSON: What was his name?

BURRUS: Caldwell, Thomas Caldwell. I got my first and second degrees and was up to get my third degree. I was sitting there and I heard the voice of Truman, who I didn't know was going to be there. And I said, "Oh, oh, I expect he'll confer that third degree for me." So sure enough, he had claimed the privilege of conferring the third degree on me and he came in and did that for me and conferred that third degree on me.

JOHNSON: Where did that happen?

BURRUS: The McDonald Lodge in Independence.

JOHNSON: In Independence here. So, you became a Mason, became a fellow officer in the Reserve . . .

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BURRUS: And then after that I made my petition to the Scottish Rite, and became a Scottish Rite Mason. I got a petition to be a Shriner, and he was active in all of those too.

JOHNSON: What year was it that you joined the Masons?

BURRUS: I think it was 1927.

JOHNSON: So a lot of things are happening right around then.

BURRUS: That's right.

JOHNSON: I suppose you did visit the Trumans in their home at 219?

BURRUS: Yes.

JOHNSON: Do you recall your first visit inside the house?

BURRUS: It was in the 1930s, I think, that I was there first.I went there because the nurse who was taking care of Margaret was going to be the nurse to take care of Mrs. Burrus with our son. So I went by to see her and let her know what was going on and all of that. Mrs. Truman knew what was going on, and Harry knew that we were going to have this good lady.

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JOHNSON: What was her name, the nurse?

BURRUS: We called her KiKi, Edna Kilnoman.

JOHNSON: Was Margaret sick at this point?

BURRUS: She took care of Margaret as a child and also when she was ill a few times.

JOHNSON: A nursemaid.

BURRUS: That's right. My son was born in February.

JOHNSON: Of what year?

BURRUS: Of 1933, I believe it was.

JOHNSON: What was his name?

BURRUS: Rufus II. Just have the one son. One child.

JOHNSON: One child and how many grandchildren?

BURRUS: Three grandsons. The oldest one is 22 now; he's in school in New York at Columbia University. The middle one--he's 21 now--he is in the Parsons School of Art and Design. He went last year to a school in Paris for them; he's back now.

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JOHNSON: What's his name?

BURRUS: His name is Daniel Madison.

JOHNSON: How about your oldest grandson?

BURRUS: James Monroe. After my grandfather.

JOHNSON: How about the youngest?

BURRUS: His name is David Andrew. He's a junior in school this year, high school.

JOHNSON: Were you ever invited over to the Trumans for dinner?

BURRUS: Well, I think a time or two for lunch. We'd sit in the kitchen at the breakfast table, and many times I'd come in in the morning and he would say, "Sit down and I'll give you rolls and coffee." I'd say, "All right," and I did.

JOHNSON: Does the kitchen look the same now as it did the first time you remember seeing it?

BURRUS: I haven't seen it lately, since they've been doing things to it.

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JOHNSON: Haven't you toured that house?

BURRUS: No, I haven't gone there since she died.

JOHNSON: Is that right?

BURRUS: The reason I don't want to is because I just feel like it won't quite be the way I want to see it.

JOHNSON: It's a very plain kitchen.

BURRUS: Just plain.

JOHNSON: And a very nice dining room.

BURRUS: That's right. When I'd go there to see him during the time that he was here as President, on Saturday he'd be there. He first was up here, and I'd come up here to the Library and see him. But then it got to the place where he didn't come to the Library, and was at home and I went on Saturdays to see him, 11 o'clock in the morning. I'd come to the back door, generally, through the back door from the back yard, and come through the kitchen, through the breakfast room, and over to the north room where he and Bess would be. We'd visit there. And then, after he was gone, I went back because Bess

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was there and I'd be with her.

JOHNSON: In 1934 he ran for the Senate. Did you have any advice for him, or did he ever ask you for advice on whether or not to run for the Senate?

BURRUS: Later on he did. When I was on military duty at Ft. Leonard Wood, and other places, he would write me letters about what was the activity down there. What did I know about what the carpenters were doing, what the contractors were doing. He said to just take a look around, and write me a letter. And I did. To that extent I'd give him advice. He'd ask me to go look for him.

JOHNSON: Is this after he became chairman of the Truman Committee investigating the defense program?

BURRUS: Some of it was and some of it was before that time too. I always remember that one time he wrote me a letter and said that there was a captain that was the son of a friend of his in Kansas City, a doctor by the name of Wallace Graham. He said his father knows he's out there at the 6th Division and he's

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taking care of the sick, lame and lazy, and it happens to be a colored regiment. He said they don't think that he's been given the opportunities to act in his best capacity. He's a good surgeon, and he ought to be in a hospital. So look around and see what you can about what is happening down there.

So I went over and got acquainted with Wallace. He was looking after those folks over there, taking care of them like a doctor would do. I didn't tell him what I was doing down there except just let him know that I came from Independence, and knew Senator Truman. He smiled about that. I said, "Heck, I knew your father too; he was active in the Reserve over in Kansas City that I was with."

"That's fine."

Well, I wrote back and also went to the Post Commander. The Post surgeon was in charge of the hospital, Vandenboget was his name. I said, "Now, you've got a captain over there that's a good surgeon and he ought to be over with you." He said, "I know him; he's going to come over here in a little while. We're going to have some folks transferred away. I have him over there because I need him over there,

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but he will be coming over here." And sure enough he did. He just turned out to be one of the best surgeons under Vandeboget. Vandeboget finally was sent to the Philippines and he was on the death march over there.

JOHNSON: Was this at Leonard Wood now?

BURRUS: Yes.

JOHNSON: Where Wallace Graham was a surgeon working with a Black outfit.

BURRUS: That's right. They were just new recruits.

Another thing that happened involved the colonel of the regiment that I was with; it was Battery C of the 51st, and Alexander Quintard was his name. He came from Sewanee, Tennessee; he was a Regular Army officer. He was a lean sort of a fellow and he smoked a pipe and he was a good battalion commander. I was battery commander of C Battery for him. In time he was called to go away, and was sent to the Philippines. I helped him get his things together and get on the train, and bid him good-bye. I never heard about him for some little time after that. Then I learned that he had been

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on the death march. I happened to run across Mike Quinn in Kansas City, who was the Quartermaster Depot commander over there, and he had been in that death march. One day I had lunch with him and I said, "Mike, did you ever know Alexander Quintard, Colonel Alexander?"

"Did you know him?"

"Well, where did you know him?"

I said, "Well, he was my battalion commander in the 6th Division, and I helped put him on the train and sent him overseas."

"Yes," he said, "he and I were bunk mates." He said he stood that ordeal better than anybody else because the matter of dirt and filth and things didn't hurt him because he was impervious to all of that. He said, "He did well with that."

And I said, "Well, what happened?"

And he said, "He went back to Sewanee, Tennessee."

Well, I wrote to him and never did get any answer back from him. Whether he was there or not I never did find out, but that was what happened to Quintard. That's how you happen to remember people.

Another one of our officers was over in Kansas

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City in the Reserve. He was a lieutenant colonel and he wanted to be a star general. He was an artillery officer. He transferred from the artillery to the infantry, and he got to be an eagle colonel. He then was transferred and went over to the Philippines, and he was in command of a group of natives over there, about a thousand. They went out on one occasion, on a foray to make contact with the enemy, and they just absolutely disappeared. Nobody saw them or heard from them, didn't know what happened to them. It was nearly a year after that that finally it came through the Red Cross that he was over there in that fight and lived. He finally was able to get back to the States after the surrender.

JOHNSON: Was this a guerilla action against the Japanese?

BURRUS: That's right.

JOHNSON: Was Truman still attending the summer training camps?

BURRUS: He did as a Senator a time or two, but he didn't do it too many times. He just couldn't get around to

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get it all done. Also, he didn't think he ought to be doing that when he had some other officers that had ought to be in charge. That's what he did really after he came to be a Senator.

JOHNSON: Did Truman ever say that Pendergast had anything to do with influencing his decision to run for the Senate in 1934?

BURRUS: No. He knew if he was nominated, Democrat organizations would all support him.

JOHNSON: Of course, he was already known for supporting the New Deal at this point.

BURRUS: Yes, that's right. I went with him when he was campaigning for reelection to the Senate, after his first term.

JOHNSON: Did you have any involvement in that first campaign that he ran for the Senate, in 1934, the hot summer?

BURRUS: No.

JOHNSON: You were not involved in that particular campaign?

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BURRUS: No. I say not involved. I think I did go down to Sedalia and help run the office down there once in a while, but not really involved with it.

JOHNSON: Did you know Fred Canfil pretty well?

BURRUS: Yes. I knew him as well as anybody knows Fred.

JOHNSON: Is that right? What do you remember about Fred Canfil?

BURRUS: Well, we knew him first out at Ft. Riley. He was a cavalryman, and he was a loudmouth sort of a fellow, sort of officious, and he latched on towards Truman. Truman paid a little attention to him. Then when Truman got to be Senator, he needed somebody to be sort of a "hatchetman" for him. Canfil's the kind of fellow you'd sic off on to them and he'd get it done. He wouldn't do it the most kindly sort of way, and the way that would be non offensive, but he would get the job done. So that is what he did with Canfil.

JOHNSON: I guess Canfil was sort of a chauffeur for him; he drove him around in that campaign of 1934.

BURRUS: He drove around with him, that's right.

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JOHNSON: And he became marshal of the Federal Building.

BURRUS: United States Marshal of the Kansas City District. That's when Truman was over as President and he had an occasion to be with Marshal Stalin; he referred to Canfil as a marshal, and that made Stalin perk up because marshal to him was way up above a general. But then Truman had a great lot of fun kidding Canfil about being marshal.

JOHNSON: Did you ever visit Truman in Washington when he was Senator? Did you ever go out and visit him in his office while he was Senator?

BURRUS: I did. Right after he got in his office, I went there to Washington and went to his office. He had a stack of photographs that he opened up and he said, "This just came in." He said, "I'll give you one off the top," and he did; he autographed it and I've got it on the wall now.

JOHNSON: One of his campaign portraits?

BURRUS: It was one after his campaign. When he autographed it he said, "I made a mistake on that; I should have

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put the date on," but he never did put the date on it.

JOHNSON: But you weren't there for his swearing-in?

BURRUS: No. I sent him a boutonniere that I wanted him to wear.

JOHNSON: Did you have some correspondence with him while he was Senator?

BURRUS: Yes.

JOHNSON: Do you have those letters at home?

BURRUS: I think I have them at home or in the office.

JOHNSON: Are you thinking about giving them to the Library?

BURRUS: Yes. There are quite a few of them in there that I just didn't want to part with because he made some remarks about some people that I didn't think it would be necessary to broadcast yet.

JOHNSON: One of the reasons we're so interested in correspondence during that first term is that we don't have very much here in the Library. The last that we know of the files that he had in that first term, they were

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apparently in an attic in a building in Washington during the war and then disappeared. Whatever correspondence we can get, especially for that first term as Senator, it will help our collections a good deal.

Did you ever talk to him about policies, about New Deal policies or about more local kinds of issues, that you felt he should give support to or take positions on?

BURRUS: Well, no I didn't do that because I didn't have any reason to. He never had me give any advice about those kinds of things. I do remember on one occasion that I was going back to Washington on the train, and I got on at the Independence station. I was going to get off at St. Louis and go on to Washington, be there the next day; it was on a weekend. At the Independence station I ran across a gentleman that I knew that was with the Kansas City Railroad Company. His name was William Deramus. He said, "Where are you going?"

I said, "I'm going out to St. Louis and then go on to Washington."

He said, "You're going to Washington?"

I said, "Yes."

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He said, "Well, I'm going to Washington too." It was snowing and raining and thawing and freezing on the wires, and he said, "I don't know whether this train is going to get out there on time. If we don't get there in time to make that connection we aren't going to get to Washington until a day late." It won't do me any good to get there a day late. As we traveled on he said, "I'm giving up hopes of getting there, so when I get to St. Louis I'm going to come on back." He said, "You're actually going to see Mr. Truman aren't you?"

I said, "Yes, I think I probably will." I was going with the RFC at that time, on some things that they had to have done. He said, "Will you take a message to him?"

I said, "Sure. Do you want to write it out?"

He said, "No, I'm going to tell it to you. I was going down to tell him that us railroads are in hard times because we haven't had any pay for two or three years for the Federal freight, monies that were due us, and it just cripples us for cash." And he said, "I would like to have him have his folks down there pay us on account, and then audit it as long as they want

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to, but just pay us on account, so we can get some cash." He said, "We need that." It was the Kansas City Southern Railroad.

When I got to Washington I was in to see him and I said, "I've got a message here for you." I told him about Mr. Deramus, and he knew him because he had been the one that negotiated for the railroad to go through some of their lands out there. At that time he was just low down on the ladder, but now he was head of the Kansas City Southern Railroad. I said, "He told me that he would like you to have your folks pay some money on account on the railroad charges that his company has, and other ones will do the same way." He said, "You mean they haven't been .paid?"

I said, "He said they are a couple, three years behind."

"Oh," he said. He got on the telephone and got hold of John Snyder, and said, "John, I wish you'd look into the matter that the railroad companies have charges owed them, and they haven't been paid for quite a long time. Give them some money on account; they're needing it." He was in the Oval Office when I gave that to him.

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Snyder evidently said, "Sure," and that was the way I left it. Truman took my word for it and he gave Snyder instructions.

I was only gone a few days, and I came back home. I called up my friend, and said, "I delivered the message."

He said, "Well, hell yes, I know you did." He said, "I got a check here the next day or so on account. They said we've got some more coming, and other folks have got it coming. You sure hit the jackpot for us."

I said, "Well, I'm glad I did."

JOHNSON: You were a highly placed lobbyist there. Remember when that happened?

BURRUS: It was sometime in the latter part of '45 that that happened. A little later than that, because I hadn't been attorney for the RFC until a little after that.

JOHNSON: You became an attorney for RFC? When did that happen?

BURRUS: It was sometime about 1946 or '47.

JOHNSON: That meant you had to live in Washington?

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BURRUS: Oh no. I had what they called Agency Counsel which took care of the Kansas City agency, and that comprised all of the eastern counties of Missouri and all of the State of Kansas.

JOHNSON: This episode you just mentioned, was that your first visit to the White House after Mr. Truman became President?

BURRUS: No.

JOHNSON: You probably remember your first visit.

BURRUS: I'll tell you that in a moment, too. But anyhow I got that job done for this fellow. When I went with the RFC, I went back to Truman and told him about the folks that were over at the RFC that I didn't think were doing as good a job as they should.

He said, "I know about that, and they are going to be removed." He said, "We're going to change directors over there; don't worry about it. It's going to happen." So that's how that happened.

When I came back from overseas in 1945, I came back from Italy.

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JOHNSON: You were in Italy, north of Rome, around Rome?

BURRUS: Not from Rome but from Masserta, in May of 1945, after the end of the war over there. The other folks had been taking leave and going places and I kept on staying. I thought I'd get a chance to get back home. I wanted to get back and not have to stay over there.

Well, as things happened, I was able to leave but I had to sign and tell them that I wouldn't ask to be retained or sent someplace else and not back to Italy. I said, "All right, I'll do that."

I did. And I got back to the United States; landed in Boston from overseas, on the 30th day of May. That was Memorial Day, and the flags were all half mast, bands were playing, and the faces were long. I stopped at New York and had to take care of 250 soldiers that I had charge of; had to get rid of them, and get my own orders to go on. I finally got to Washington on the afternoon of the 30th. It was too late to try to do anything then, and I was tired too, so I got >my hotel room. The next morning I got up early, got on the telephone, called over, and got hold of Harry Vaughan on the phone at the White House. I said,

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"Harry, I want to come over and see the Chief." I always called him the "Chief," because he had been a colonel to me, and then he got to be commander in chief.

"Why, come on over."

I said, "Well, I don't know how you get in this place."

"You go to the gate and I'll tell them over there that you're coming and to bring you in."

I was in uniform, and I went over and went to the gate, and the guard said, "Is your name Burrus?"

I said, "Yes."

He said, "There's a captain over here that's looking for you."

He gave a signal. The fellow came up; the captain saluted and said, "General Vaughan says that I am to bring you over to the Oval Room at the White House."

I said, "Fine, thank you."

So he went over to the Oval Room. Truman had been out in the garden where he had occasion to give to Steve Early an award for having been the Press Secretary for Roosevelt, and also for him. Early had announced his

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retirement, and they had quite a ceremony outside. Vaughan said, "Let's don't go out there. They'll come in here pretty soon."

So I stood around in the Oval Room and on the desk there he had a bottle of vermouth, and he had a bottle of gin and a bottle of scotch and a bottle of bourbon, and some mixes and so forth. I kind of smiled and he said, "Yes, they're going to have a little celebration here."

Truman came in those double doors, looked up and said, "Why, I thought you were still over in Italy."

I said, "Mr. President, I learned in the Army that you got time off for good behavior, just like you did being in jail. I guess I was entitled to get off and I'm over here."

He said, "Well, fine, fine, fine." And we got to visiting a little while and I told him I was on my way home. He said, "That's good." Then he said, "What about what you want to do next?"

I said, "Well, I had to tell them over there that I wouldn't ask to be relieved, to be transferred, that I would agree to go back."

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He said, "I guess I can take care of that," and kind of smiled.

He turned to Vaughan and said, "See that Burrus' separation from the service is expedited."

Vaughan said, "Yes sir."

JOHNSON: That's going to the top.

BURRUS: Well, he was the one that asked it, you know. I said that was what I wanted to do. And sure enough. he did.

JOHNSON: By the way, did you get in on the celebration?

BURRUS: They passed the drinks around, and I'll tell you about that too.

When we were at Ft. Riley, in earlier years, I helped get the drinks fixed up for him when he was entertaining folks. We had glasses that had been issued to all of us. We only had a few of them, and we had to go around and collect them when we were going to have 20 or 30 people, in order to use the liquor and the fruit juice.

JOHNSON: In the officers' club?

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BURRUS: No, this was in the barracks.

So I had to help get the glasses together and put them in the sink. Truman also helped get some more in the sink, and I went back to get some more, In the meantime, Truman had started washing out some of these glasses. We had the alcohol in a tin can, like what came out of a drugstore, and he was pouring the alcohol into the glasses. I didn't know that that was what he was putting into the glasses. I thought it was still that solution I put in there to get the crust, the alkalai, off the glass. He said, "What are you doing?"

I said, "I'm washing the glasses."

"Washing?" he said, "That's got alcohol in it, that's got alcohol."

I had taken only two of them. So he told that story on me. "Don't let Burrus pour the drinks, because he'll pour them all down the sink."

JOHNSON: Who was there with you then?

BURRUS: Well, I don't know who all was there.

JOHNSON: There was a bunch there in the Oval Office?

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BURRUS: In the Oval Office.

JOHNSON: Celebrating a little bit after the ceremony.

BURRUS: They included friends that knew Steve Early. I remember him being particularly there.

JOHNSON: Was Clifford there? Clark Clifford?

RURRUS: I never saw Clark there; I didn't know him then.

JOHNSON: Eddie McKim was Administrative Assistant.

BURRUS: He wasn't there.

JOHNSON: So was Vaughan the only one that you knew besides the President, at that time?

BURRUS: I think it was. I think that's the only one that I knew then.

JOHNSON: After this reminiscing there in the Oval office, then you left to come back to home here in Independence.

BURRUS: To Independence, that's right. But while I was in the White House I did a favor for Harry Vaughan.

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He gave it to me and said, "You go over to the Adjutant General's office. He's a major general." Vaughan said it hasn't been announced yet, but he's going to be the new Adjutant General. You go over and you salute him, and tell him that you are glad to salute him as the new Adjutant General. But don't say it in the presence of anybody else, because it's supposed to be secret, up to now not to be generally known."

I said, "All right." So I went in--this general was an affable sort of a fellow—and I said, "I have a letter here, and I want to congratulate you on being the new Adjutant General."

"What?"

I said, "Yes, I want to."

"Why, who told you that?"

I said, "Well, Harry Vaughan told me, and he told me not to tell anybody else."

He said, "Well, that's all right." He said, "Nobody knows that besides President Truman, Harry Vaughan and you and I." He sure enough was announced to be the Adjutant General. And that's how I got started.

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JOHNSON: After that then you came back out here to Independence?

BURRUS: That's right. And then I went back to Washington; I had to get cleared over there, and I got everything all done.

JOHNSON: Truman came back to Independence the first time as President, I think, in June.

BURRUS: Yes, I didn't come back at the time.

JOHNSON: You weren't here when he came back here the first time?

BURRUS: Not the first time, no.

JOHNSON: You had to go back to Washington to finish up the red tape.

BURRUS: Yes, and also Mrs. Burrus had some cousins in Annapolis. They had a summer house too, and we stayed there for a few days. We had our son with us, too, so we stayed there with them for a little while.

JOHNSON: You had been gone for how long?

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BURRUS: Been overseas for 27 months; thirteen months in Africa and fourteen months in Italy.

JOHNSON: That must have been some experience, to come back to the United States after 27 months over there.

BURRUS: It was.

JOHNSON: Your son and wife were probably getting a little impatient to get you back here.

BURRUS: Well, they were glad to know that I was coming. I kept writing, and my wife kept thinking I was going to be getting home pretty soon. She'd tell my mother about it, and mother said, "Let's be still. Let's be still, it will happen all right, it will come." When I called her on the telephone that morning, she kind of broke down. I told her I'd be home pretty quick.

JOHNSON: What was your second visit to the White House? When would that have been?

BURRUS: Later on I stopped there a time or two to visit with him.

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JOHNSON: In the oval office?

BURRUS: Yes.

JOHNSON: Did you ever visit the living quarters of the White House?

BURRUS: He was over at Blair House.

JOHNSON: He didn't move to Blair House until after the election in '48.

BURRUS: That's right, but I was back there for that too. I'll tell you about what happened then. I was going to go back to Washington on another occasion to attend the Reserve Officers national meeting. Meanwhile, I was the president of the Missouri Bar, and I went up to northwestern Missouri, driving around to different places to meet members of the Bar. I had my son along with me. On the radio I heard that Truman's plane was coming in and that he was going to get off at the airport. I said to my son, "We're going to go by there and see Mr. Truman when he comes in." So we drove down to the airport. He hadn't come in yet, but pretty soon the plane came in. He came off, saw me, and said, "Well Rufe."

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I introduced him to my son. "Good to see you, good to see you."

I said, "Yes sir, Mr. President." Again, I've always said, "Mr. President," just as he was President to everybody else. I said, "By the way, I am going to go back to Washington next Sunday by train, and be there for purposes of the Reserve officers meeting in Washington."

"Well, well," he said, "fine, that's good." He said, "I'll be seeing you back there then."

I said, "Well, just a second. When you go back on the plane, if you have room for someone to deadhead, I'd like to ride back."

He said, "Why sure. Put Burrus on the manifest. Put Burrus on the manifest."

Well, they got my name and my telephone number. So I went on home, and expected to fly back on Monday. On Sunday Mrs. Burrus wasn't feeling very well, so she didn't go to church. I took my son and went to church and I came back home and got there a little before 12. When I got home she said, "Mr. Truman's aide called and said he wants you to be at the airport at 1:15." I said,

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"My!" I had to get things together and call my brother to have him take care of some things.

We got over to the airport all right and Truman was there. But he hadn't gotten his crew together. He said, "I haven't found all my crew around here yet. He said, "I guess we'll have to go off and leave some of them because I can't find some of them." He had his brother-in-law Fred Wallace along with him. He said, "We'll be leaving here in a little while." We did get in the plane, and when we got in he said, "We're going to stop at St. Louis and pick John Snyder up." He said, "You know, the Korean trouble seems to be coming to a head and I'm going to go back and see about that. That's why I'm going back today instead of tomorrow." He said, "I'm going to wait until John Snyder is with us, then I'm going to tell you what's happened so you'll get it one time for the two of you."

I said, "That's good." So I sat down. Sure enough, we got down to St. Louis and Snyder got in, and sat down, and Truman told him and me why we had to be ready to go back so unexpectedly. He said that there would be a meeting of the United Nations, and

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that there was going to be a U.N. action on account of Korea. South Korea has been invaded by North Korea.

JOHNSON: So he was already thinking of the U.N. being involved.

BURRUS: It was, it was.

He said that they were going to meet that after noon and they were going to have a resolution passed, and they did. Again it was not what he had determined to be; it was what the, the U.N., had determined to be, a police action against North Korea. He also asked me to come with him and stay overnight with him.

JOHNSON: Stay where?

BURRUS: At the Blair House. Fred Wallace too. The next morning I went downstairs about 6 o'clock. I knew that they were stirring around downstairs, and I went down. He was sitting at his desk and he had a big yellow pad of paper. He said, "Maybe you would read these remarks that I'm going to make to the joint session of the House and Senate."

I looked at it and I read it, and as I remember

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it I don't think there was hardly a word or two that was changed when it became published. He then said, "Today I was going to have you take a swim with me."

I said, "Yes."

He said, "I'm going to give you a rain check on it, because I've got to take care of some folks here. We're going to get that done first." He said, "You come back again later." And I did. I went back a few days later and we went swimming.

This particular time though, he wanted me to stay overnight again, but I said, "No, I've got to go out to the hotel. I'm going to have to meet people and I'd better go down there and be where I can be available." I think it was Thursday of that week that they had the meeting of the Reserve officers. He was present and made the address.

Anyhow, sometime later I had the swim. We were out walking through the area before we went to the swim. He came by the hotel, 6 o'clock in the morning, and I was out ready for him. We went walking around. He had some Secret Service folks with him, and he had me be over to his side where I could talk with him and he could talk with me. These Secret Service men

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discretely stayed back a little. Anyhow, we went along and he finally said, "We're going to get this police action going." He said that was going to be happening.

Well, one of his agents came up and said, "Averell Harriman is on the telephone for you." "Oh," he said, "I don't want it on the street here; I don't want it here. You tell him I'm going to cut my walk short and to transfer the call over to the swimming pool."

So he cut it short a little bit and we went across into the area of the swimming pool. I heard him on his end of the line. He said, "Averell, close station and march order. I've got more important things for you to do here." Well, that's artilleryman's words,"close station, march order." He evidently got a yes from him because he said, "We'll be seeing you."

Later I ran across Harriman and I related to him what I heard. "Why," he said, "that's exactly what he said." He remembered it exactly, just like I did.

JOHNSON: He brought Harriman in to help on that problem with South Korea?

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BURRUS: That's right, that's right.

Also, John Snyder couldn't go to the White House with us immediately, because he had to make contact with some folks that he was going to get together with the next day for a Congressional hearing. He had to have that rescheduled, because of a change in plan. He said, "We're going to have to put that off, we're going to have to change our plan from reduction of taxes to maybe increasing them." That was because of the Korean war. So that was John Snyder's relation to Truman, and what he had to anticipate.

JOHNSON: Truman was in favor of "pay-as-you-go."

BURRUS: Yes.

JOHNSON: But he didn't get as much tax increase as he thought was necessary to do that, so they had to borrow.

BURRUS: That's right.

JOHNSON: But he balanced the budget something like three times out of seven or eight, which is still a record since the 1920s.

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I don't think we've exhausted the subject, but we've probably exhausted you. You had another comment here before we take a break.

BURRUS: Back in 1924 the Republicans drafted Rummell, as I told you, and Bundschu paid his filing fee. He told them he didn't have to run, that they would get somebody to take his place. Well, the Rabbits had learned about that and they went around trying to get him to withdraw, but he wouldn't withdraw. He stayed in. Anyhow that's what happened.

In addition to that, the reason why Truman lost the election was not only the fact that the Rabbits ran out on him, but it was the fact that the Coolidge landslide had taken place that same time. So that was something that frosted the top of the cake.

JOHNSON: Yes, even here in a Democrat bastion, they went for a Republican candidate. That was a rare occurrence, wasn't it?

BURRUS: That's right.

JOHNSON: I guess the incumbent had an advantage there.

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Coolidge was known. Did you ever hear William Jennings Bryan give a speech?

BURRUS: I heard him here in Independence, at a Chatauqua Event. The Chatauqua tent was on a lot south of the Presbyterian Church. Bryan made his speech in that place.

JOHNSON: What year was that? Do you recall?

BURRUS: It was about 1912 or '13.

JOHNSON: Oh, back before the war, when he was in his prime.

BURRUS: That's right. He made a beautiful speech; he was a real orator and he did a good job. There was a big tent there; it must have been 80 or 100 feet long and 30 or 40 feet wide.

JOHNSON: He lived up to your expectations then?

BURRUS: He did, he did.

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