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The Dwight D. Eisenhower Presidential Library and Museum

2023; University of Illinois Press; Volume: 50; Issue: 2 Linguagem: Inglês

10.5406/21558450.50.2.10

2155-8450

Scott A.G.M. Crawford,

Museums and Cultural Heritage

Dwight D. Eisenhower served as president from January 1953 to January 1961. During this period, much of consequence took place in the sphere of American sports. There was the integration of many African Americans into professional baseball, and Althea Gibson, an African American, won the 1957 Wimbledon and US National titles. October 3, 1951, marked the first coast-to-coast television broadcast of a baseball game. While huge crowds attended football games (98,202 for a Rose Bowl match-up between Ohio State and Oregon), professional football experienced an upsurge in popular appeal. Individuals such as Mickey Mantle, Hank Aaron, Jim Brown, and Rocky Marciano emerged as national heroes.At Abilene High School, Eisenhower played football and baseball. At West Point, he played football. A second-year injury ended his playing career; however, his enthusiasm for the game saw him in the role of an assistant coach for the junior varsity football team.Archivist Herb Pankratz completed A Guide to Historical Holdings in the Dwight D. Eisenhower Library—Sports and Recreation. Although golf is recognized as Eisenhower's premier athletic interest—Pankratz mentions the fact that the president played eight hundred rounds of golf—his affection for the outdoors never paled. "Fishing, hunting, and shooting remained favorite sports of Dwight Eisenhower throughout his adult life. He joined his brothers on a family fishing and camping trip to Wisconsin in July and August 1946. During his presidency he fished in Florida, Rhode Island, Maine, South Dakota, Georgia, Maryland, and Colorado. Hunting quail near Thomasville, Georgia and skeet shooting at the presidential retreat, Camp David, were additional activities which President Eisenhower enjoyed."1The Frederick E. Fox Records (1944–1972) provide a rich and eclectic collection of materials to do with sports and recreation. Box 32 has a focus on sports as a valuable part of educational exchange programs. Box 11 has references to the Junior Olympics and the International Recreation Association. Boxes 12 and 13 contain sources spotlighting youth fitness, the YMCA, Boy Scouts, and the Soap Box Derby.In terms of international sport, there is a revealing and rewarding trove of materials to do with the 1956 Soviet invasion of Hungary. The reformist government of Imre Nagy was toppled, and more than two thousand protestors were killed. A significant number of Hungarian athletes opted to boycott the 1956 Olympics. Others simply fled the country. Many relocated to the United States and continued their athletic careers. The impact of the Cold War on global sport is examined. See the C. D. Jackson Papers (1930–1970) and boxes 60, 62, 69, 90, 91, 93, 104, and 110.The archives are very much a Pandora's box with all manner of avenues to explore. Physical education, for example, is surveyed and scrutinized, see "White House Conference on Children and Youth, Records, 1930–1970." Box 140 is to do with the American Camping Association, while boxes 140, 153, and 183 refer to the work of the American Association for Health, Physical Education and Recreation.In the late 1950s, Congress sought to exempt professional sports teams—hockey, football, basketball, and baseball—from anti-trust laws. The archives have those hearings—June to August, 1957; July 9–31, 1958; May 19–20, 1960; and June 1–15, 1960.In historical terms, understandably, Eisenhower is remembered as the pivotal figure in the 1944 Normandy landings and for his celebrated Presidential Farewell Address in which he warned of "the military-industrial complex" (January 17, 1961). However, Eisenhower's very human legacy is nicely characterized by his affection for Western novels, Camel cigarettes, and golf. The museum library contains one of his golf putters named "Calamity Jane" (box 303). In box 42, there are details of a James C. Hagerty press conference from March 22 and 25, 1960. The first describes squirrels damaging the White House putting green and the second recording the fact that the squirrels were safely trapped and removed to a public park. Pankratz, in his Eisenhower profile, concludes with these words: "In 1968, less than fourteen months before his death, he realized the life-long dream of every golfer. He scored a hole-in-one."2Sports historians looking for narratives with an Eisenhower connection would do well to stay with the topic of golf. Eisenhower's embrace of golf gave a presidential seal and sign of approval that transformed an elite, affluent, club-based, exclusive activity into an everyman's popular pastime. The listing of relevant museum sources runs into literally hundreds of items. Some examples: box 32 ("General Ike Hole" at Cherry Hills Country Club"); box 63 (letter communication with legendary golfer Robert Tyre Jones); box 98 (paintings by Eisenhower at the Augusta National Golf Club); boxes 899–902 (fifteen folders—1952–1960—on golf); Anne Whitman Diary Series—box 2 (an invitation from Bing Crosby to play in a tournament). During Eisenhower's stay in the White House, his personal pastor was Billy Graham. Graham observed, "A golf course is an island of peace in a world often full of confusion and turmoil."3 Such a comment captures a possible explanation for Eisenhower's embrace of the game.