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Photo Diary: Herbert Hoover Presidential Library and Nat'l Historic Site [1]
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Date: 2022-09-01
Herbert Hoover began his Presidency as one of the most popular political figures in the US, and ended it as one of the most reviled.
For those who don't know, I live in a converted campervan and travel around the country, posting photo diaries of places that I visit. I am currently in Iowa.
Herbert Hoover was born in the little farming town of West Branch, Iowa, in 1874, the son of a Quaker blacksmith. Orphaned as a child, he was raised by an uncle in Oregon and eventually went to Stanford University and graduated as a mining engineer, and traveled to China to work for an American mining company.
By this time, the nations of Europe were locked in a global struggle of economic rivalry and commercial expansion (which often turned military), and China was one of their targets. Beginning with the Opium Wars, the Europeans (shortly afterwards joined by Japan and then the Americans) seized control of most of the Chinese port cities and forced a series of concessions from the Emperors.
By 1900, this European domination had provoked a rebellion within China that had the goal of expelling the foreigners and returning China to Chinese control. The "Boxer Rebellion" quickly swept across China. By May 1900, most of the remaining Westerners in China had retreated into the “foreign quarter” of Beijing, behind stone walls, and thousands of European and westernized Chinese refugees crowded in to escape the Boxer mobs. As troops began arriving from England, France, Russia, America and Japan to crush the Boxers, Herbert Hoover took charge of running the relief efforts to distribute food to the Europeans trapped inside Beijing.
When the First World War broke out in August 1914, the United States declared its neutrality. Though President Woodrow Wilson did not join in the war, he did allow American companies to send food and supplies to both sides. This was once again taken up by Herbert Hoover, who had by now returned to the US. He organized the Commission for Relief in Belgium, a privately-funded charity which organized shipments of food and clothing from the United States to Belgium, which had been occupied by the Germans. It was one of the largest humanitarian programs ever carried out to that time.
Hoover's effort was so successful that when the US finally entered the war in 1917, President Wilson appointed him to head the wartime committee which oversaw US food production. Hoover's task was to maximize the American food supply for both civilians and troops, and also shipments of food to Europe. Once again Hoover demonstrated his talents for organization and humanitarian work.
In 1921, President Warren G Harding selected Hoover to be his Secretary of Commerce, an office that Hoover continued to hold when Calvin Coolidge became President in 1923. During his time as Commerce Secretary, Hoover earned a reputation as a rare progressive voice within the Republican Party, giving his support to the League of Nations and the rights of labor unions, as well as overseeing government regulation of new industries such as radio broadcasting and aviation. He also organized relief efforts for war-torn Europe, including the Soviet Union, responding to criticism by declaring, "Twenty million people are starving. Whatever their politics, they shall be fed."
When Calvin Coolidge decided not to run for re-election in 1928, Hoover, who had never run for any office before but who had become well-known for his humanitarian work, was the natural choice to run as the Republican candidate for the White House, and won by over six million votes. Proudly pointing out that the Roaring Twenties had produced an era of uninterrupted prosperity, Hoover declared, “We are nearer today to the ideal of the abolition of poverty and fear from the lives of men and women than ever before in any land.”
Less than a year later, it all fell apart.
In October 1929, the stock market crashed, and the Great Depression brought the entire economic world to a virtual standstill. Unemployment skyrocketed, bank failures left people without their life savings, and foreclosures put many people on the street. It was the worst economic disaster in the nation's history.
At first, people believed that Hoover, the expert at humanitarian relief, was precisely the right man to deal with it. But despite his progressive reputation, Hoover was still a Republican at heart; he did not want the Federal Government to be involved with economic markets or with relief efforts, and he argued that local charities and the free market should be trusted to eventually set things right. As the Depression dragged on, people lost faith in him, and the homeless camps that began appearing in every town were sarcastically dubbed "Hoovervilles". In 1932, Hoover sent military troops into Washington DC to break up a protest camp consisting of WW1 veterans who were demanding the pay bonuses that they had been promised.
Herbert Hoover became the most hated man in America, and lost the 1932 election to Franklin Roosevelt in a landslide.
After leaving office Hoover hoped that the Republican Party would turn to him again in 1936. He spoke out against FDR's New Deal policies, wrote a book titled The Challenge to Liberty accusing the Democrats of being socialists, and opposed American involvement in the Second World War (right up until December 7, 1941). But although he was appointed by President Harry Truman to head a commission to study ways to streamline the Federal Government, Hoover was mostly ignored by the public, and died virtually forgotten in 1964.
Today, Hoover's Presidential Library is in his home town of West Branch, Iowa, on the site where he was born and grew up. Next door is the Herbert Hoover National Historic Site, which preserves the little cottage in which Hoover lived as a child, his father's blacksmith shop, and several other buildings from the time.
Some photos from a visit.
Hoover library and museum
Inside the museum
Some items from Hoover’s family home
A toy train that belonged to young Bertie
Items collected by Hoover and his wife in China
The Belgian relief effort
Letters and proclamations from the USSR thanking Hoover for his relief efforts
Hoover as Commerce Secretary
White House china from Hoover’s term in office
Hoover re-election campaign posters
Visitors Center at the National Historic Site next door
The cottage in which Hoover was born
His father’s blacksmith shop
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