Here’s another blog I was working on for Monday that I didn’t get finished in time to post. (Sorry Ike)…
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“What counts is not necessarily the size of the dog in the fight; it’s the size of the fight in the dog.” — Dwight Eisenhower
Dwight David Eisenhower was on October 14 in Denison, Texas, USA in 1890. Monday was the 113 anniversary of his birth.
He was the third of seven sons born to Ida and David Eisenhower. Times were tough and David, who went to college for engineering, cleaned railway cars to support his growing family.The Eisenhowers moved to Abilene, Kansas when Dwight was a year and half. Dwight enjoyed his childhood in Abilene and considered it his home town. He played both football and baseball for Abilene High School before he graduated in 1909.
He worked at his family’s Bell Springs Creamery and as a fireman. In 1911 He earned an …
appointment at the United States Military Academy in West Point, New York, where attendance was free of charge. Once again he was a star on the football field, until a series of knee injuries forced him to stop playing. In 1915, Eisenhower proudly graduated from West Point at the top of his class, and was commissioned as a second lieutenant. [Biography.com]
While he was stationed in Texas he met Mamie Doud. The two married six months later. During World War One Eisenhower was in charge of Camp Colt in Gettysburg, Pennsylvania.
By 1920, he was promoted to major, after having volunteered for the Tanks Corps, in the War Department’s first transcontinental motor convoy, the previous year. [Ibid]
In 1926 he graduated first in his class from Command and General Staff School in Ft. Leavenworth, Kansas. He worked as the chief military aid to General Douglas MacArthur before becoming chief of staff for the Third Army. By 1942 he was a Major General.
In his early Army career, he excelled in staff assignments, serving under Generals John J. Pershing, Douglas MacArthur, and Walter Krueger. After Pearl Harbor, General George C. Marshall called him to Washington for a war plans assignment. He commanded the Allied Forces landing in North Africa in November 1942; on D-Day, 1944, he was Supreme Commander of the troops invading France. [WhiteHouse.gov]
General Eisenhower speaks with members of the 101st Airborne Division on the evening of 5 June 1944 (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
After V-E day Ike was made military governor of the U.S. Occupied Zone. In 1947 He became president of Columbia University. In 1951 he left that post to become Supreme Allied Commander of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO).
In 1952 Eisenhower ran for President of the United States on the Republican ticket. He won the election with 442 electoral votes over Adlai Stevenson’s meager 89 and became the 34th POTUS.
Dwight D. Eisenhower photo portrait. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
Highlights of his presidency include:
- Reduced Cold War tension with the USSR
- Orchestrated an armistice that halted the Korean War
- Started America’s manned Space Exploration
- Eisenhower Doctrine — a 1957 policy that extended the Truman Doctrine to the countries of the Middle East. Eisenhower promised military or economic aid to any nation in the area that needed help in resisting communist aggression.
- Worked toward ending segregation. Desegregated the Armed Forces.
Difficulties:
- First advisors sent into Vietnam.
- U-2 Spy plane shot down over the Soviet Union
Eisenhower died at Walter Reed Hospital in Washington, DC on March 28, 1969, he was 78 years old.
Funeral services for Dwight David Eisenhower (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
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