Although the 41st President George Bush had known and been involved in the presidential campaigns of his Republican predecessors since Dwight D. Eisenhower, his own in 1988 was singularly distinct for the echo rather than sounds of a strongly defining campaign song… Read More ›
Politics
A Reagan Country Song & California Classic by ABBA: His 1980 & 1984 Campaign Music
The presidential campaign year of 1980 marked the beginning of what might be termed “theme music” being adopted by presidential candidates, rather than the traditional campaign song. 1976, the year Ronald Reagan lost his challenge to incumbent President Gerald Ford… Read More ›
Fighting Bigotry Shaped Truman’s 1948 Campaign Tunes (& Carmen Miranda Sang One)
In the fall of 1945, six months after inheriting the presidency upon the April death of President Franklin D. Roosevelt, Harry S. Truman was back home in his beloved state of Missouri, visiting the county fair in the small town… Read More ›
Nixon Then, Nixon Now, Connie Francis & His Changing Campaign Songs from 1960 to 1972
No question about it, Richard Nixon cut the widest swath when it came to presidential campaign songs, both in terms of on-message lyrics and musical genres. Then again, he ran for President three times over the course of a dozen… Read More ›
FDR’s Four-Times Happy Campaign Song & A Home Movie Showing Him Paralyzed
It didn’t start out as his – but like so much else, Franklin Roosevelt claimed it for himself because he saw its value of association. Alice Roosevelt Longworth, his wife’s first cousin, loved telling the story of a couple in… Read More ›
Cool but Contemplative: Jolson Jazzes with Coolidge’s 1924 Campaign Song
He came back – with another song. This time, however, when the legendary screen and stage actor, Al Jolson first performed the official campaign song of a Republican presidential campaign, he didn’t have to march the streets of small-town Oho and… Read More ›
The First President To Win With Actors: Al Jolson’s 1920 Campaign Song for Harding
George Clooney, fundraising and providing thematic strategy for President Barack Obama’s re-election campaign or Clint Eastwood speaking at the convention nominating Mitt Romney: neither story causes a blink in either Hollywood or Washington. Yet preceding even the famous efforts of… Read More ›
Sinatra at Jack’s Back: The John F. Kennedy 1960 Campaign Song
A Hoboken, New Jersey native and the son of Italian immigrants, Frank Sinatra was the Elvis, the Bieber, the Jagger, of the teenage generation during World War II. After a few years of bobbysoxer besiege, however, “Old Blue Eyes” slid… Read More ›
A First Lady’s Princess Complex: Royalty, Racism & Edith Wilson’s Pocahontas Blood
This is the second to last article in a series on First Ladies’ ancestral identities. Previous articles on Michelle Obama, Jacqueline Kennedy, Eleanor Roosevelt, Florence Harding, Pat Nixon, Hillary Clinton can be found by searching at right, in the categories… Read More ›
The First President Captured on Film: McKinley’s 1896 Campaign Song & Commercial
William McKinley is often seen as an important transitional President – at least to those interested in studying some of the real stories behind the headline version of history. It’s true he didn’t have the charisma or excitable speaking style of… Read More ›
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