Harry Truman was by far the least formally educated president of the 20th century, with about nine years of schooling. Special assistant to the director of the Harry S. Truman Presidential Library, Raymond Geselbracht, discusses what Truman's elementary and high school education reveals about the president and his character. This event took place at the National Archives in Kansas City and was hosted by the Harry S. Truman Presidential Library.

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Franklin D. Roosevelt's first two presidential campaigns - in 1932 and 1936 - were waged during the Great Depression amidst great national uncertainty and fear.  The Roosevelt Presidential Library recently convened panels of scholars to consider all four of FDR's elections.  This program focuses on the Depression years.

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Franklin D. Roosevelt’s last two presidential campaigns – in 1940 and 1944 – took place while the world was at war. The 1940 election secured FDR an unprecedented third term, and the 1944 contest was the first wartime White House campaign since the Civil War. But it elected a chief executive who would not live to see the war’s end.  The Roosevelt presidential library recently convened panels of scholars to consider all four of FDR’s elections and this excerpt focuses on the war years.

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The anniversary of Richard Nixon’s 100th birthday was marked in January by a dinner and gala in which his former adviser Pat Buchanan and his former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger spoke about the 37th president. The event was hosted by the Richard Nixon Foundation.

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Former President Herbert Hoover wrote a critique of his successor, Franklin D. Roosevelt, and of American foreign policy that he called his "magnum opus." This exhaustive review covered the years from 1933 through the early 1950s -- and remained unpublished for nearly 50 years. Hoover's biographer, George Nash, edited the manuscript and published it under the title, "Freedom Betrayed: Herbert Hoover's Secret History of the Second World War and Its Aftermath." Nash spoke about Hoover and his manuscript at the National Archives.

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Scholars meeting at the University of Virginia's Miller Center discuss presidents in world affairs, including the differences in leadership styles between Presidents Franklin Roosevelt and Harry Truman -- and President Dwight Eisenhower's ideology, and how it guided his decision-making in the Cold War.

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On American History TV, the two wives of President Woodrow Wilson. Ellen Axson, who died in the White House during the summer of 1914. And Edith Bolling Galt, who married the widowed president in December 1915. After Woodrow Wilson's stroke, it was Edith who carefully guarded access to the president and who ignited a debate that continues to this day over how much power she exerted. The Kansas City Public Library hosted this event.

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This is an examination of Theodore Roosevelt's failed run for the White House in 1912.  He had been the 26th President from 1901-09, but chose not to seek another term.  Initially he supported his successor, William Howard Taft.  But after several policy disagreements, Roosevelt ran against Taft as a third party candidate from the Progressive or Bull Moose Party.  The Theodore Roosevelt Association hosted this event.

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Pulitzer Prize-winning photographer David Hume Kennerly shares some of his images of First Ladies.  Mr. Kennerly was the White House photographer during the Ford Administration from 1974-77.  This event was part of a conference which examined the legacies of America's First Ladies and took place at the Lyndon B. Johnson Presidential Library. 

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This is a look at the current state of the presidential studies.  Presidential scholars, among others, discuss the intersection between popular and scholarly history - including the narrative approach of authors David McCullough, Doris Kearns Goodwin, and of documentary filmmaker Ken Burns.  One question before the panel: How can academics embrace the high public interest in presidential history?  The Miller Center at the University of Virginia hosted this discussion.

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