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    Web Sites

    The Internet, while useful in researching many topics, is unfortunately limited in scope in regards to presidential history.  While many more sites exist than the ones listed below, these are the most informative and useful sites that TIA's staff has found.

    General

    Yahoo! 20th Century Presidents

    American Experience: The Presidents (PBS)

    POTUS (Internet Public Library)

    Presidents of the United States (White House)

     

    Theodore Roosevelt

    Theodore Roosevelt: Icon of An American Century

    Online photography and portraiture exhibit sponsored by the National Portrait Gallery

     

    Woodrow Wilson

    Woodrow Wilson on the Web

    Interesting and thorough site, if somewhat amateurish in design.  A useful introduction to Wilson.

     

    Franklin D. Roosevelt

    Franklin D. Roosevelt Library and Digital Archives

    Immensely detailed and comprehensive site dealing with FDR, his presidency, and the Depression and Second World War.

     

    Harry S. Truman

    Harry S. Truman Library and Museum

    A standard, complete online presidential library.

     

    Hiroshima and Nagasaki: The Decision to Use the Atomic Bomb

    Although written by a high school student, this essay is unusually well-researched and informative.  An excellent exposition and critique of the scholarly debate.

     

    Dwight Eisenhower

    Dwight Eisenhower Library

    Difficult and frustrating to use, this site is also sadly uninformative.  However, it does have the standard allotment of primary document sources one expects of presidential libraries.

     

    John F. Kennedy

    John F. Kennedy Library

    A thoroughly useful presidential library site.  While not specifically tailored to foreign policy issues, the site's resources (including transcripts and recordings of all 1960 debates) are outstanding.

     

    14 Days in October: The Cuban Missile Crisis

    A fellow ThinkQuest site (from 1997).  Useful as a resource for the Cuban Missile Crisis.

     

    Lyndon B. Johnson

    Lyndon Johnson Library and Museum

    Again, a useful, comprehensive presidential site.

     

    Richard Nixon

    Thanks to an act of Congress, Nixon's papers have been divided between two organizations: one -- the government's -- incomplete and frustratingly "under construction"; the other -- the family's -- eyecatching, user-friendly, and (predictably) somewhat biased.

     

    Nixon Presidential Materials

    Nixon Foundation

     

    Jimmy Carter

    Jimmy Carter Presidential Library

    Unusually difficult to use.

     

    Ronald Reagan

    Ronald Reagan Presidential Library

    Easy to use and fairly well-designed.

     

    Ronald Reagan and the Soviet Union

    Somewhat sycophantic, but otherwise interesting.

     

    Current Issues

    The Heritage Foundation

    Conservative, but typically well-spoken.  Their Policy Review is influential in rightist circles.

     

    The Brookings Institution

    Erudite and respected, Brooking's only drawback is the difficulty of navigating their site.

     

    The Cato Institution

    Libertarian and typically isolationist, Cato is the determined counterpoint to the Washingtonian consenus of benign interventionism.

     

    Washington File (State Department)

    A useful State Department website that contains U.S. Information Agency releases (including transcripts of press conferences and briefings).

     

    Books

    Even though the Internet is a valuable resource, most research information is still offline and available only in print format.  These books are no more than an introduction to the incredibly huge amount of scholarship produced about American foreign policy in this century.

     

    Theodore Roosevelt

    The Warrior and the Priest, John Milton Cooper

    A fascinating study of the rivalry, both political and philosophical, between TR and Wilson.

     

    Theodore Roosevelt: An Autobiography, Theodore Roosevelt

    By modern standards, somewhat difficult to read, but still the best way to understand TR's policies.

     

    Harry Truman

    Truman, David McCullough

     

    The definitive, Pulitzer Prize-winning biography.

     

    Dwight Eisenhower

    Eisenhower: Soldier and President, Stephen Ambrose

    Although this is a good introductory volume, it suffers from a few flaws, including an elementary style and -- to some extent -- a lack of sophistication in an understanding  of Eisenhower's policies.

     

    John Kennedy

    A Thousand Days, Arthur Schlesinger

    Unfortunately out-of-print, this is an unabashedly sympathetic portrait of Kennedy.  But Schlesinger's strength as a writer makes the book worthwhile.

     

    Richard Nixon

    Diplomacy, Henry Kissinger

    The best single-volume study on the subject TIA's staff has seen yet.  An indispensable guide to foreign affairs. (This book was the basic text used in the research for this website.)

     

    RN: The Memoirs of Richard Nixon, Richard Nixon

    Again, a slanted perspective, but a valuable "behind the scenes" look at the art of policymaking.

     

    A Tangled Web: The Making of Foreign Policy in the Nixon Presidency, William Bundy

    An objective look at Nixon's policies.

     

    Jimmy Carter

    Keeping the Faith, Jimmy Carter

    Biased, yet compelling.  Carter's first-hand account of the presidency is sincere and helps readers move beyond their preconceptions of Carter to a more balanced view.

     

    Ronald Reagan

    Dutch, Edmund Morris

    Despite the critics' complaints about this book (due to Morris' use of fictional characters), in all this book portrays Reagan fairly.  While there is little in-depth study of individual policies, White's first-hand descriptions of the policy-making process of the Reagan White House is invaluable to understanding the U.S. government in the 1980s.

     

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