The Truman Presidential Library and Museum - Independence, Missouri
While driving west back to Colorado, I was reminded of several experiences with the Truman Presidential Library's resources - as one of three presidential libraries in the Plains states region, it's a great opportunity to help students use primary sources connected to their area - not thousands of miles away from them.
Jay LeBlanc
8/1/20252 min read
Driving home from the JET (Journal of Economics Teaching) Conference in St. Louis - saw several great sessions on the final day, but will wait a couple of days to post on those to allow resources from the conference to be posted online (so I can link some of them to teachers). In the meantime, my drive to Kansas City this afternoon took me by Independence in the eastern suburbs of KC, and reminded me of several trips over the years to visit the Truman Presidential Library and Museum there. The museum just reopened after a big renovation project during the first couple of years of the COVID-19 pandemic - haven't visited it since then, but it largely focused on his unconventional story to becoming a politician and later president on the death of FDR. Unless you happen to be within driving distance of Kansas City, though, I think the bigger value for teachers is the wealth of primary source materials available from his administration - the Truman Library staff has really worked hard to make resources available online to patrons, not just for in-person researchers. Here are a few you might want to keep in mind . . .
General information:
Basic link to the Presidential Library and Museum - https://www.trumanlibrary.gov/
A 3-D virtual tour of the museum (if you can't get there) - https://theclio.com/entry/32094
Education Center for the library - https://www.trumanlibrary.gov/education
The Harry S. Truman National Historic Site (focuses on his life in Independence) - https://www.nps.gov/hstr/index.htm
More specific resources you might want to make use of:
Collection of transcripts of oral interviews with 100s of key people - Americans and foreign dignitaries - involved in the time period of the Truman presidency (1945-1953). While we often focus on documents when getting students connected to primary source materials, this is a great way to let students connect to a single person - many ordinary citizens - and relate to why they got involved with government. https://catalog.archives.gov/id/200668
Student Research Files online collections. These are collections by subject area of online-accessible resources - for example, excerpts from Truman's diary about his thoughts leading to the development of the atomic bomb. A LOT of material in each one, but if you want to get into a specific topic (like I did with primary and secondary sources on the decision to drop the bomb in 1945) there can be a great mix of material here. https://www.trumanlibrary.gov/library/online-collections
Teacher Lesson Plan collection - If you prefer to work with something already developed, the library has a pretty good collection of lesson plans, BUT it is pretty eclectic in the topics covered. This list is alphabetical by lesson title - https://www.trumanlibrary.gov/education/lesson-plans/all
One final resource NOT from the Truman Library (but they do link to it) - if you have not used any of the National Archives' "Advise the President" series resources, you should check them out. A good starting point is with this first one on the Truman administration - "What Should the United States do About the Emerging Threat Posed by the Soviet Union?" - it gives you a lot of simulation material to work with:
https://www.archives.gov/presidential-libraries/education/advise-the-president/truman-soviet-union