Herbert Hoover

Herbert Hoover

Historical Figure
Nationality:	United States
Year of Birth:	1874
Year of Death:	1964
Cause of Death:	Natural causes - internal haemorrhaging
Religion:	Quaker
Occupation:	Engineer, Businessman, Author of Non-Fiction, Politician
Spouse:	Lou Henry Hoover (d. 1944)
Children:	Herbert Jr., Allan
Political Party:	Republican Party
Political Office(s):	United States Secretary of Commerce (1921-1928), President of the United States (1929-1933)
Fictional Appearances:

Herbert Clark Hoover (August 10, 1874 – October 20, 1964), was an American mining engineer, author, Secretary of Commerce in the 1920s (under Presidents Warren G. Harding and Calvin Coolidge), and the 31st President of the United States (1929–1933). While a popular political figure throughout the 1920s, his responses to the Great Depression as President badly damaged his credibility, and he lost his bid for re-election in 1932 to Franklin D. Roosevelt in a landslide.

A lifelong Quaker, Hoover became a successful mining engineer, and built an international reputation as a humanitarian by leading international relief efforts in Belgium during World War I prior the country's entry into the war. When the U.S. entered the war in 1917 he became "food czar" as head of the U.S. Food Administration with charge of much of the nation's food supply and a massive advertising campaign to help consumers adjust and save. He worked well with President Woodrow Wilson and the cabinet, and gained a national following. After the war, he oversaw food relief in Central Europe and Eastern Europe. Hoover was a popular among progressives as a potential candidate in the 1920 presidential election, but his candidacy quickly petered out. Republican Warren G. Harding won the election and appointed Hoover as Secretary of Commerce. Hoover was an unusually active and visible cabinet member; when Calvin Coolidge ascended to the presidency after Harding's unexpected death in 1923, he kept Hoover as Secretary of Commerce. Hoover was so outgoing and energetic in his position that during the Great Mississippi Flood of 1927, six governors asked Hoover to coordinate a response, even though the Commerce Department normally had no role in such disaster relief.

Hoover seemed poised to capitalize on these successes. He won the Republican presidential nomination in 1928, and defeated Democrat Al Smith in a landslide. However, the Wall Street Crash of October 1929 soon proved to be the unraveling of his presidency as the Great Depression followed the crash. Hoover pursued a variety of policies in an attempt to lift the economy, but opposed direct federal relief efforts until late in his tenure. He asked business and labor leaders to avoid wage cuts and work stoppages, and raised taxes in the hope of balancing the budget. In 1930, he reluctantly approved the Smoot–Hawley Tariff, which sent foreign trade spiraling down. The economy kept falling, and the unemployment rate rose to 25%. In 1932, Hoover signed a major public works bill and established the Reconstruction Finance Corporation, which was designed to provide government loans to banks, railroads and big businesses in danger of failing. The downward economic spiral, along with violent dispersal of the Bonus Army, set the stage for Hoover's overwhelming defeat by Franklin Roosevelt in 1932.

Hoover maintained an antagonistic relationship with Roosevelt for the latter's presidency, when Hoover was the only living former president. He opposed the New Deal and its programs, made a halfhearted attempt to obtain the Republican nomination for President in 1940, and further opposed America's entry into World War II. He was able to develop relationships with Harry Truman and Dwight Eisenhower during their respective presidencies, and had rehabilitated his image somewhat by the time of his death in 1964.

Herbert Hoover in Joe Steele[]

*Joe Steele* _{POD: 1878; Relevant POD: July, 1932}
Novel or Story?:	Both
Type of Appearance:	Direct
Political Office(s):	President of the United States

Herbert Hoover was the 31st President of the United States. Despite his failure to end the downward spiral into the Great Depression during his term, he was renominated by the Republicans at the Republican National Convention at the Chicago Stadium in Chicago, Illinois. He was defeated in the 1932 election in a landslide by Democratic candidate Joe Steele.^[1]

The fundamental difference between Hoover and Steele could be seen in Steele's inauguration on March 4, 1933. President Hoover and his wife, Lou, wore refined (if dated) clothing that suggested their "importance" to the audience. Steele and his wife, Betty, each dressed tastefully, but in clothing the average person might have been able to afford.^[2]

Hoover sought the Republican nomination in the 1936 election, but it instead went to Alf Landon.^[3]

Herbert Hoover in Southern Victory[]

Southern Victory _{POD: September 10, 1862}
Appearance(s):	The Center Cannot Hold; The Victorious Opposition
Type of Appearance:	Direct
Military Branch:	United States Army (Great War)
Political Party:	Democratic Party
Political Office(s):	President of the United States (1933-1937)

Herbert Hoover was the 31st President of the United States. He served a single term from 1933 to 1937, the first Democratic President in 12 years. His was an accidental presidency: he was Calvin Coolidge's running mate in the 1932 presidential election, but Coolidge died of a heart attack before his inauguration, leaving Hoover to assume the office.

Born in Iowa,^[4] Hoover was raised in California.^[5] Growing up in the so-called "Remembrance era" of U.S. history, Hoover served two years as a conscript before the turn of the century. Hoover had demonstrated an aptitude for science from a young age. During the Great War, Hoover served as a major in the US Army corps of engineers.^[6]

Hoover gained national prominence helping to address the Great Mississippi Flood of 1927,^[7] and received the Democratic nomination as vice presidential candidate in 1932.^[8] Despite the prosperity of the country under Socialist President Upton Sinclair after the Great War, the fortunes of the country had fallen dramatically under Sinclair's successor, Hosea Blackford. The bull-market that had characterized most of the 1920s had finally crashed in 1929.^[9] Blackford was unable to deal satisfactorily with the resulting depression. In 1932, the United States found itself in the Pacific War against Japan.^[10] While the war was largely a stalemate on the ocean, Japan ran a successful air-raid on the city of Los Angeles on the very day Blackford was in town for a rally in 1932.^[11]

Thus, when Hoover was nominated to run with Coolidge, the Democrats were in the strongest position they had been in for over a decade. Coolidge defeated Blackford handily. However, on January 5, 1933, Coolidge died of a heart attack while still president-elect,^[12] leaving Hoover to be sworn in as President on February 1.

Despite some of the initial optimism expressed by the voters, Hoover quickly proved a disappointment. His complete contempt for "paternalism" in the federal government rendered him just as ill-equipped to handle the economic depression as Blackford had been. He made this opinion known when Colonel Abner Dowling, military governor of Utah, proposed a make-work plan for the state.^[13] Hoover flatly refused, despite the fact that the jobless rate in Utah was further exacerbating that state's already-precarious situation.^[14] This stance led the voters to return the Socialists to Congress in 1934.

Hoover's handling of foreign affairs also frustrated many of his supporters in the military. While he continued the policy of rearmament begun by Blackford, the Pacific War ended inconclusively in 1934.^[15] After Jake Featherston and the Freedom Party came to power in the Confederate States, Hoover proved indecisive in his dealings with the United States' long-time enemy. When President Featherston pressed for permission to arm more troops to suppress black uprisings,^[16] Hoover (after a period of vacillation) acquiesced, justifying his decision by citing his concerns about "radical" elements among the black Confederate community, and naively concluding that Featherston would not use the increased military against the U.S.^[17]

While Hoover did stand strong against Featherston on the rebellious states of Kentucky and Houston,^[18] which the U.S. had taken from the C.S. following the Great War, it was too little, too late. Growing dissatisfaction with Hoover led him and his running mate William Borah to lose the 1936 Presidential Election to Socialist candidate Al Smith and his running mate Charles W. La Follette.^[19]

Hoover served as a pallbearer, alongside fellow former President Upton Sinclair and incumbent Vice President Charles W. La Follette, at Hosea Blackford's funeral in February 1937.^[20]