RUDIMENTS, pt. 139
Making Cars
There was a biography of Harry
Truman, about 1973, entitled
'Plain Speaking,' by Merle Miller.
It was essentially a compendium
of interview material, from the
Carlyle Hotel, in New York City,
and in Independence, Missouri too
(Truman's town). Originally, much
of it had been put together for a TV
show based on Truman's life and
career. It was rejected and never
aired, for whatever reason. Truman
died in 1972. Merle Miller, an
outspoken gay man - which was
still quite problematic in those years,
(gayness as a movement and a
lifestyle, although just as prevalent
as ever, was kept quite closeted and
secret. It was always scandalized
if exposed). Once Truman was dead,
people started asking him - Miller -
about the interviews he'd amassed,
and the text and transcripts he had.
So, he proceeded to then complete it,
as a book. The whole thing about
Harry Truman was the outspoken,
blunt, in-your-face way he had
about things. 'Sonofabitch' this,
and 'goddamn asshole' that. 'General
MacArthur was a God-damned fool,'
- stuff like that. In fact, in 1948, he
had successfully run for re-election
as 'Give 'em Hell Harry,' calling
out Congress and various individuals
from the rear of his train car across
the country ('The Whistle-Stop Tour'
as his campaigning by train was called.
One small town and city across the
country after another. The country
just wasn't ready for this guy, or
at least for hearing the truth about
him. America has always had a
way of 'pretending' it was better,
higher, than it was, and all this
playing at propriety and 'the
gentle side' was part of it. Frankly,
all crap. The book was a big hit,
and, posthumously, Truman got
the whole 're-examination' treatment.
I enjoyed all that - to watch it develop
and to witness some of the execution
of stupid old thought as it went down
the drain. To begin with, everywhere
Miller went people had to deal with the
fact that the was gay, as gay as flaming
lettuce, as gay as Peach Melba. It was
a difficult moment - at that time there
were 'queers' out on the street, yelling
and fighting, the Stonewall riot and the
incipient movement it engendered -
all of that was just getting started.
There was a big reckoning coming,
and the starting pitchers were just
then warming up. In a few years,
it all hit. I always smiled at the
conjunction of 'Harry S Truman'
and Truman Capote, as they almost
accidentally (and unknowingly)
smashed heads in the night. (Capote
was a major 'gay' writer, at that
time, riding his own delirious,
questing, routing of media stardom
and touching base with each gay
attribute perfectly). In the same
way, I always smiled at the conjunction
too of Merle Miller, and, at that
time, the very non-gay Arthur Miller,
playwright of the day through those
years. He'd married, for a while, in
the 1950's, to Marilyn Monroe,
who - along with Jayne Mansfield
- at that moment carried the buxom
1950's world of glamour and all that
breast-oriented consciousness into
each person's living room. I found it
all curious how things worked out :
Jayne Mansfield, by 1960, was dead,
decapitated in a 'car-crash.' And a
few years later, Marilyn Monroe was
dead, supposedly an 'overdose' in
bed. Just like 'Elvis' again. some
years later. Yeah, right. I always felt
that something was up - whatever
operational or psychological powers
are in play, they thrust forth these
people, to present an idea or introduce
a concept into the mass psyche, and
them just as slyly, later, 'remove' them,
after their job as been completed. It
was like 'Society' was setting up all
these opposites just to have them
clash and rip apart. (No, no one has
to agree with that, but I know it's
true enough).
-
Harry Truman was the sort of guy
we don't make anymore. As a country,
I mean - the way we manufacture
career politicians and creeps now is
all different. They never say anything
authentic, and they can't. Their flappers
would be hung out to dry, and they'd be
afraid to speak their minds anyway, what
little of a mind they have. There's not an
original thought anywhere in those halls
of 'Power.' To get there, you've first got
to be dead. Funny thing was, sometimes
men have things thrust upon them; much
like Truman. Back-room, last minute
convention deal as the secretly-ailing
Roosevelt's 4th term VP. And Roosevelt
dies soon enough, and accidental Harry's
all of a sudden President. In the crazy
midst of war and bringing it to a finish.
Who gets to drop, by accident of fate,
those two A-Bombs over Hiroshima
and Nagasaki? Harry Truman himself,
by Presidential order to the crew of the
Enola Gay. How do you live that down?
It took Harry Truman a long time to die.
Two months or so, deathbed stuff; each
morning on the car radio, driving to work,
I'd hear the updates, get the progress report
on Harry's death. I used to think the reason
it took so long was because, before he died,
the spirit and visage of each person who
died by those two bombs first had to pass
by him, and have a short chat about what
had transpired.
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