What 20 Ex-Presidents Did to Stay Busy After Leaving Office

What 20 Ex-Presidents Did to Stay Busy After Leaving Office

Larry Holzwarth - September 1, 2018

What 20 Ex-Presidents Did to Stay Busy After Leaving Office
One of Harry Truman’s first acts as a former president was to buy a new car and head out on a road trip. Truman Library

15. Harry Truman took a road trip and built a library

When Truman left the White House the only pension he received was a small monthly stipend from his World War I service. After selling the rights to his memoirs, Harry bought a car, a spanking new Chrysler New Yorker, and after weeks of meticulous planning over gasoline station maps on the kitchen table and letters to friends with whom they would stay on the way, he set off on a drive to Washington and New York, accompanied by Bess. There were no interstates, no fast food stops, few motels, and fewer road signs guiding motorists on their way. He also had no Secret Service protection and no bodyguards, other than Bess, who would likely have been a formidable one.

The trip was a rousing success for the ex-president, though his speed was carefully monitored by his wife, and he was stopped on the Pennsylvania Turnpike for impeding traffic, though the patrolman let him off with a warning. Upon his return to Independence, Truman began writing his memoirs and building the first Presidential Library to house his personal papers and correspondence as it became unclassified. Truman remained available for consultation by his successor Eisenhower and by John Kennedy, whom Truman distrusted, having had more than one run-in during his political career with JFK’s father. Truman had, according to him to his face, once threatened to throw Joseph Kennedy out of a window.

Advertisement