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Herbert Hoover, his wife Lou Henry Hoover, and their family shaped this presidential memorial area to present a fuller picture of Hoover's life. The park's memorial landscape and its elements symbolize American ideals of religion, education, hard work, community, and entrepreneurship as Herbert Hoover saw them and lived them.
As additions to the historic landscape of Herbert's early years, the Gravesite, the Statue of Isis, and the Presidential Library and Museum connect his childhood to his later accomplishments. The Great Depression began with the stock market crash in October , soon after Hoover became president. Committed to individualism and opposed to direct Federal intervention, he hoped at first that local governments and traditional charitable organizations could solve the problems that arose.
In the presidential election of , he met overwhelming defeat at the hands of Democrat Franklin D.
There were two main rooms in the one-story, board-and-batten house. The first was a combined living room, kitchen, and dining room; the second was the bedroom. The partially enclosed back porch served as a summer kitchen or spare bedroom.
Jesse Hoover was a young, up-and-coming blacksmith. The Hoovers lived in the cottage until , when they moved to a larger home a short distance away. Jesse sold his blacksmith shop and bought a larger store where he sold pumps, wagons, barbed wire, and sewing machines. A heart attack cut short his promising career in ; he was She also accepted help from her relatives and from other members of the Quaker community. In , Hulda died of typhoid fever, leaving her three young children orphans.
The three siblings were separated and sent to live with different relatives. In , Herbert left West Branch to live with his uncle, Dr. Henry J. Minthorn, a physician and businessman, in Oregon. His brother and sister joined him there three years later. His uncle oversaw his schooling and later hired him as an office boy.
Herbert learned to type and to keep books and attended business school at night. In , he graduated from Stanford University, with a degree in geology. To support himself through school and the years immediately following, he worked as a surveyor and for a mining engineering firm. Early in , Herbert returned to California and married his university sweetheart, Lou Henry.
The couple sailed the next day for China, where Herbert had taken a job as mining engineer-consultant to the Chinese Government.
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For the next two decades, the Hoovers shared an adventurous life on several continents, as Herbert gained an international reputation for developing mines and managing other industrial projects. His service as secretary of commerce in the Harding and Coolidge administrations and his humanitarian work during and after World War I made him a highly respected figure. He decisively defeated Democrat Alfred E. The economy did not recover, and Hoover suffered an overwhelming defeat in the election. Hoover is usually ranked lower than average among U. After President Calvin Coolidge announced in August that he would not seek a second full term of office in the presidential election , Hoover emerged as the front-runner for the Republican presidential nomination.
While Hoover gained the support of important party constituencies and won several primaries, many party leaders opposed his candidacy. The convention instead selected Senator Charles Curtis of Kansas. Smith , who was described by Smith ally Franklin D. Roosevelt as "the Happy Warrior of the political battlefield. Smith ran on his record of efficiency earned over four terms as governor. Both candidates were pro-business, and each promised to improve conditions for farmers, reform immigration laws, and maintain America's isolationist foreign policy. They differed on the Volstead Act which outlawed the sale of liquor and beer.
Smith was a "wet" who called for its repeal, whereas Hoover gave limited support for Prohibition , calling it an "experiment noble in purpose. In the November election, Republicans won an overwhelming victory ; though, Smith carried every large urban areas in the country, Hoover received 58 percent of the popular vote and a massive to 87 Electoral College majority.
He delivered twenty-five speeches, stressing his plans to reduce American political and military interference in Latin American affairs. In sum, he pledged that the United States would act as a "good neighbor. Hoover was inaugurated as the nation's 31st president on March 4, on the East Portico of the United States Capitol.
Chief Justice and former president William Howard Taft administered the oath of office. This was the first inaugural ceremony recorded by newsreel cameras. Ours is a land rich in resources; stimulating in its glorious beauty; filled with millions of happy homes; blessed with comfort and opportunity.
In no nation are the institutions of progress more advanced. In no nation are the fruits of accomplishment more secure. In no nation is the government more worthy of respect.
No country is more loved by its people. I have an abiding faith in their capacity, integrity and high purpose. I have no fears for the future of our country. It is bright with hope.
These words would stand in stark contrast to the sense of desperation that would pervade the nation during much of his presidency. Hoover's cabinet consisted largely of wealthy, business-oriented conservatives. Davis and Secretary of the Treasury Andrew Mellon.
Hoover disliked Mellon, who maintained intense support among the party's Old Guard, and instead relied on Undersecretary of the Treasury Ogden L. Mitchell to the head the Justice Department. The position instead went to Arthur Hyde , who was inexperienced regarding agricultural issues. Businessman Robert P.
Hoover held a press conference on his first day in office, promising a "new phase of press relations". Hoover declined to use a spokesman, instead asking reporters to directly quote him and giving them handouts with his statements ahead of time. In his first days in office, he held more regular and frequent press conferences than any other president, before or since.
However, he changed his press policies after the stock market crash, screening reporters and greatly reducing his availability. Hoover appointed three justices of the Supreme Court of the United States. A former associate justice, governor, secretary of state, and presidential nominee, Hughes would lead the Hughes Court until A second vacancy arose in due to the death of Edward Terry Sanford. Hoover' first nominee, federal appellate judge John J. Hoover next nominated Owen Roberts , an attorney who had risen to prominence due to his role in investigating the Teapot Dome scandal.
Roberts was confirmed by acclamation. Hughes and Roberts both established centrist reputations on the bench, and they often held the balance between their more conservative and more liberal colleagues during the s. George W. Norris , the Chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee , insisted that Hoover nominate a progressive judge to succeed Holmes. Hoover nominated Benjamin Cardozo , the highly regarded chief judge of the New York Court of Appeals , and Cardozo was approved by the Senate in a unanimous vote.
Cardozo joined with Louis Brandeis and Harlan F. Stone in forming a progressive block of Supreme Court justices known as the "Three Musketeers". Hoover saw the presidency as a vehicle for improving the conditions of all Americans by encouraging public-private cooperation—what he termed "volunteerism". He tended to oppose governmental coercion or intervention, as he thought they infringed on American ideals of individualism and self-reliance.
One of the commissions started by Hoover, the Research Committee on Social Trends, was tasked with surveying the entirety of American society. After taking office, Hoover called Congress into session in an attempt to address the farm crisis that had affected the country throughout much of the s. Since the end of World War I, a glut of agricultural products on the world market had reduced the demand for American exports, resulting in domestic overproduction and a drop in prices.
Reflecting his desire to avoid statist solutions, Hoover successfully opposed other proposals, such as the McNary-Haugen bill, that would have directly subsidized farmers.