He was staying across the street at Blair House while the White House was undergoing major renovations. One Secret Service officer was killed in the attack.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...n_of_Harry_S._Truman

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leslie_Coffelt

The best detail is in Stephen Hunter's "American Gunfight: The Plot to Kill President Truman--and the Shoot-out That Stopped It."

https://www.amazon.com/gp/prod...hsch_vapi_tpbk_p2_i4

And that idiot Jimmy Carter commuted one of the shooters’ sentences, iirc. Worthless pieces of shit both of them.

quote:

Originally posted by PowerSurge:
And that idiot Jimmy Carter commuted one of the shooters’ sentences, iirc. Worthless pieces of shit both of them.

You are correct. (Truman himself actually originally commuted the death sentence to a life sentence, then Carter let him out).

https://www.trumanlibrary.gov/...ase-united-states-vs

 
Stephen Hunter's non-fiction work American Gunfight is about this gunfight. The entire book spans the time it took for the fight/shootout itself.

Excellent book and a hell of a story. They came close to getting Truman.

Interesting, a VERY under reported part of US History. Did not know about Carter issuing a pardon to Callazo and his associates.

Rather disgraceful that a mural at the Puerto Rican Cultural Center of Chicago memorializes Callazo and Torresolla.

Anybody recall the reactions to this pardon at the time?

quote:

Originally posted by corsair:
Interesting, a VERY under reported part of US History. Did not know about Carter issuing a pardon to Callazo and his associates.

Rather disgraceful that a mural at the Puerto Rican Cultural Center of Chicago memorializes Callazo and Torresolla.

Anybody recall the reactions to this pardon at the time?

I believe this assassination attempt was loosely tied, or at least motivated, by the same Puerto Rican Nationalist movement that led to the U.S. Capitol Building shooting with several injuries.

According to Wikipedia those pardoned in the Capitol shooting received a heroes'welcome by many once they returned to Puerto Rico.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wik...ol_shooting_incident

Not sure if was the same movement, but they also murdered two sailors back in 1979:

On December 3, 1979, at 6:40 AM, terrorists attacked unarmed sailors en route to a day watch at NSGA Sabana Seca. Volunteered to drive the Navy bus was CTO1 John Ball, the Communications Supervisor; seated directly behind him was RM3 Emil White. As the yellow bus rolled out of the U.S. Navy compound in Toa Baja, a San Juan suburb, the passengers – 13 men and five women – dozed or talked quietly as they traveled the familiar route from the Sabana Seca Communications Station to a radio transmitter site four miles away. Nobody paid any attention to a green pickup truck that was following close behind. About a mile from Sabana Seca, the truck suddenly accelerated. It passed the bus, slowed, and forced the bigger vehicle to a halt beside a trash dump.

Simultaneously, a white van that had been parked down the road came roaring toward the scene and the blast of automatic weapons fire shattered the dawn silence. The attack from the white van lasted for 30 seconds “a lifetime,” said one survivor. Of the 17 sailors on the bus, CTO1 John R. Ball, 29, of Madison, WI and RM3 Emil E. White, 20, of Charlotte Amalie, Virgin Islands were both killed by the gunfire. When it was over two U.S. sailors lay dead and ten other sailors, including all of the women were injured. Credit for the savage attack, the worst outbreak of political violence in Puerto Rico in two decades, was claimed by three terrorist groups that favor Puerto Rico’s independence from the U.S.: the Volunteers for the Puerto Rican Revolution, the Boricua Popular Army, and the Armed Forces of Popular Resistance.

https://stationhypo.com/2018/01/31/test-2/

What would be the ramifications of granting Puerto Rico their sovereignty? Seems like we’d have more to gain than lose.

Seventy years ago today.

Both handguns used by the PR Nationals are on display at the Truman Museum, Independence MO.

German P38 and a Luger, both probably WWII surplus.

With the guns behind glass is a complete newspaper article describing the invent during which a Secret Service man was killed.

quote:

What would be the ramifications of granting Puerto Rico their sovereignty? Seems like we’d have more to gain than lose.

^^^^^^^^^^^^
PR has many close ties to the United States. I would guess that it has some sort of strategic importance but do not know for sure. We did the Panama Canal go and it certainly has strategic importance.

quote:

We did the Panama Canal go and it certainly has strategic importance.

Jimmy Carter, again.

Soviets call Carter the "Peanut Politician".

Now, back on topic...

quote:

Originally posted by ZSMICHAEL:

...I would guess that it has some sort of strategic importance but do not know for sure...

Minor thread drift:

Some, but not as much as in the past. Ramey AFB closed around 1971, a Coast Guard Air Station has a small area of the base. NS Roosevelt Roads closed about 15 years ago, the locals whined about bombing on Vieques Island so the range closed. The Navy then concluded they no longer needed Roosevelt Roads. I can't think of any military left there other than the PR Guard.

Fox Nation had this story featured in one of their shows. The security officer who was killed, I believe, fired the fatal shot on one of the attackers...head shot with a .38 revolver if I remember correctly. The security officer bled out before he could be saved.

quote:

Originally posted by gearhounds:
What would be the ramifications of granting Puerto Rico their sovereignty? Seems like we’d have more to gain than lose.

They've never asked for independence from the United States in a serious (read: mainstream) way. From a economic standppint, yeah...it'll probably always be a "net drain" because it's an island territory with limited production capacity, limited agriculture, and retail/service sectors that require everything to be shipped in.

I suspect you'd have some pretty violent opposition from the portion of the territory's population who'd tell you that, yeah, they're Puerto Rican AND proud Americans..

David McCullough discussed this in his excellent biography of Truman.