I've Been an Alright Pretty Good Guy...

I've been a pretty good guy, at least most of the time. Sometimes I have been a pretty bad guy. Hopefully no one else remembers that but since I do have a conscience and believe in forgiveness and atonement I think about those times and try to do better. That might be why we kind of have a fascination with our 36th President, a Texan Lyndon Baines Johnson. Cathy has read all the Robert Caro Books that are finished on LBJ's life we have visited his ranch in Johnson City twice now, his Presidential Library In Austin and recall the history he made that happened in our lifetimes. LBJ did some great things with domestic policy for the poor, health care, civil rights, urban and rural development, education and the arts. He did not do so well in in foreign policy and was eventually undone by the criticism of his escalation of the Viet Nam war. Since he was president he probably did other bad things we do not know the extent of but like all of us the judgment of his life has fluctuated through the years. 

A personal connection I have to LBJ is through one of my mom's stories. In 1947 my mom went to work at Southland Paper Mill in Lufkin, Tx, the first mill to make newsprint from southern pine. E.L Kurth, a businessman who organized the mill and had served during FDR's New Deal in the National Recovery Administration to promote the timber industry and conservation was backing LBJ in his 1948 run for U.S. Senate. Kurth loaded all the mill secretaries up (they still beef up the crowds today with paid crisis actors some say) and took them to Jacksonville, Tx where LBJ was making a campaign stop in this helicopter which I found a picture of in the visitors center museum in Johnson City. It was the first time my mom ever saw a helicopter ( she would first fly on an airplane about 55 years later) and she got to shake LBJ's hand. I figure my mom voted for LBJ that year given what I know about her voting record in my lifetime. There was some controversy in the election but he won and like we say a pretty good guy can be pretty bad sometimes.            

As part of our tour in Johnson City we went through LBJ's boyhood home. LBJ stood right here on these steps and made his announcement that he intended to seek a senate seat in 1948. As we see from recent events there is symbolism in the steps someone stands on to make their statement. Back in the day Johnson City was a pretty rural place with no national significance. LBJ wanted his friends and family to be the first to know his intentions and hear it in person. I'm sure there was some press there to spread the news but no TV or video.      

I have been inside LBJ's ranch house, the Texas White House on a pervious trip but on this visit with our oldest grandkids in tow it was closed for renovations and structural work. We were able to drive the area seeing the cows grazing the working ranch, many, many deer and walk around the grounds and see his plane Air Force 1/2.  

Johnson City was pretty isolated back in the day. No internet but LBJ made sure he had three television sets to get all three networks. He adopted that idea from Elvis. 

Robert Caro is getting pretty old. His editor, also old passed recently. I hope he gets to finish his final book on LBJ's presidential years. It probably won't change what you think about LBJ, pretty good guy who was pretty bad sometimes but it might be something to read while we examine our own conscience. 

Most things presidents say are recorded according to certain laws. Do yourself a favor and look up LBJ's phone calls.