Stanford University, 1941 By Matthew Schaefer While in a research dalliance regarding Allan Hoover’s graduation from Stanford, I learned that his father, Herbert Hoover, was tapped twice to deliver the commencement address at Stanford. This brought me up short. Even though I recognize that commencement addresses are largely forgettable exercises in oratory, I was abashed … Continue reading Rites of Spring: Public Addresses to Graduates
Part of series of photos on presidential candidates and their families. Secretary of Commerce Herbert Hoover and Lou Hoover with King Tut on the porch of their Washington, DC home. 5/21/1928 By Thomas F. Schwartz Napoleon’s invasion of Egypt in 1798 served both a military function in disrupting British access to India as well as … Continue reading The Neo-Egyptian Revivals
By Thomas F. Schwartz W. J. Loring and Herbert Hoover, mining in Australia, Hoover on the left. ca. 1903 November As part of an ongoing exploration of Herbert and Lou Hoover’s connection with the Rosetta Stone exhibit, this blog post examines Herbert Hoover’s brief efforts to revive a turquoise mine in the Sinai Peninsula. The … Continue reading An Explosive Story: Hoover and the Sinai Peninsula Turquoise Mine
By Thomas F. Schwartz Beginning on Saturday, April 13, 2019 and running through October 27, 2019 will be a unique temporary exhibit at the Herbert Hoover Presidential Library and Museum entitled Written In Stone: The Rosetta Stone Exhibit. The exhibit will feature an exact replica made from a cast of the original Rosetta Stone at … Continue reading Herbert and Lou Hoover’s Connection to the Rosetta Stone
By Thomas F. Schwartz, PhD Herbert Hoover during his years at Stanford. A story often cited claims that when Hoover was a student at Stanford, he invited the famed Polish pianist, Ignacy Jan Paderewski, to perform at Stanford for a promised fee of $2,000. Much to Hoover’s chagrin, the ticket sales fell short of the … Continue reading Hoover and Paderewski
Herbert Hoover mining in possibly Australia or South Africa, ca. 1900. America celebrates National Engineering Week each February in the week containing February 22nd, George Washington’s birthday. Washington, who used engineering skills while surveying land on the frontier, is an apt President on which to hang this celebration of engineering. Other Presidents who’d merit consideration … Continue reading Presidents and Engineers
Herbert Hoover, 1931. A while back, I wrote on Hoover’s smoking as President. Given the times, this was not a surprise. No further surprise to learn that Hoover smoked all of his adult life. Thus there are six folders in box 286 of his Post-Presidential Subject Files related to smoking. These document various aspects of … Continue reading I Might as well Finish my Smoke…
Barack Obama was the most recent President to smoke cigarettes. He did his best to keep his habit out of the public eye knowing that it was frowned upon. Before the habit was socially stigmatized, many Presidents smoked. Herbert Hoover was one of them. A recent reference question concerning Hoover’s choice in pipe tobacco led … Continue reading Smoke Gets in Your Eyes
by Spencer Howard Continuing Coningsby Dawson's tour of post-World War I Vienna, his writings sought to convey the absolute desperation of the people – primarily children – who were dependent on the American Relief Administration. In this dispatch, he describes his visit to one of the child-feeding stations: Today I visited one of the strategic points … Continue reading Christmas in Vienna, 1920 – Part 3: Caring for the children
This third installment in the saga of Hoover’s ties with American Presidents gets tricky. Hoover’s connections to Teddy Roosevelt and William Taft were small, self-contained universes which allowed for easy translation into a blog post. This is not the case with Hoover and Woodrow Wilson. Their contacts were frequent, their engagement deep, their conjoined … Continue reading Herbert Hoover and American Presidents of the 20th century, Part 3
