Weatherford, Robert P., Jr. Papers

Mayor of Independence, Missouri, 1950-1958

The papers of Robert P. Weatherford, Jr. consist of Mr. Weatherford’s recollections of his service as Mayor of Independence and his relationship with President Harry S. Truman. Also included is correspondence between Mr. and Mrs. Weatherford and Harry and Bess Truman.

Size: Less than one linear foot (about 50 pages).
Access: Open.
Copyright: No donation of copyright was received with this collection. Documents created by U.S. government employees in the course of their official duties are in the public domain. Copyright interest in other documents presumably belongs to the creators of those documents, or their heirs.
Processed by: Kate Morton (2009) as part of the Truman Library Internship Program.
Supervising Archivists: Randy Sowell and David Clark.

The papers of Robert P. Weatherford, Jr. consist of personal recollections, correspondence, and a speech transcript. Included are Mr. Weatherford’s transcribed recollections of his service as Mayor of Independence, Missouri from 1950 to 1958, his subsequent career in Kansas City and Arizona, and his relationship with President Harry S. Truman. Also in the collection is personal correspondence between Mr. and Mrs. Weatherford and Harry and Bess Truman, information concerning President Truman’s funeral service and memorial stamp, and Weatherford’s speech upon receiving the Harry S. Truman Award for Public Service in 1992. The collection also includes Weatherford’s account of a conversation with Mr. Truman, during which the former President stated that he had personally destroyed documents relating to General Dwight D. Eisenhower’s plans to divorce his wife and marry his wartime chauffeur, Kay Summersby.

These papers were originally opened for research as part of the Miscellaneous Historical Documents Collection [MHDC 795].

Related collections at the Truman library include the Harry S. Truman Post-Presidential Papers.