Here is an awesome half-hour presentation of the life and landmark accomplishments of Calvin Coolidge by superb scholar Jerry Wallace to the Wichita Pachyderm Club. His irreplaceable volume Calvin Coolidge: Our First Radio President has contributed so much toward shattering the myth that Cal was too inept and silent to make use of the new medium of radio. In fact, Mr. Wallace explains that far from being a failure, Calvin Coolidge bequeaths an historic legacy as not only a masterful communicator but effectual doer and successful President. This is well worth the listen!
Videos
“The Calvin Coolidge Presidential Foundation”
Here is an excellent recap of the first Coolidge Gala Dinner held last November. We look forward to many more to come. The fresh introduction to Calvin Coolidge for many who do not know who he is, what he accomplished and why he is important is thrilling to behold.
What a tremendous way to bring back our thirtieth President from an unjust “exile” by historians and to relearn the principles of limited government, engaged citizenship, and fiscal discipline by which he lived and led. These truths, along with many others, lack none of the necessity or power now than they did in his time. This is NOT out of some simplistic nostalgia about the “good old days” but rather strikes at something far more profound and fundamental: A government held to proper limits by a sovereign citizenry is the only foundation for social progress, economic opportunity and individual liberty.
In this period where so many assume “Big Government” is permanently here to handle every human contingency, we are inescapably bound by the reality of Coolidge’s precepts. As much as we may wish otherwise, we cannot indefinitely spend what we do not have just as we cannot reap what we have not sown, whether as individuals or nations. We have no more outgrown Coolidge’s belief in self-government, exemplified by such virtues as hard work, personal initiative and self-control, than the earth has outgrown a need for the sun.
As Mr. Cal Thomas, quoting his Presidential namesake, brings to our attention, “We can not continue to enjoy the result” of all our success “if we neglect and abandon the cause.”
On Walking the Dogs
Fox News interviews Ex-President Coolidge
Among the many fascinating (and downright entertaining) film reels archived in the Moving Image Research Collections housed by the University of South Carolina there is this three-minute segment featuring Calvin and Grace Coolidge seven months after leaving the White House, October 21, 1929. Their three dogs — Beans the Boston terrier, Beauty the white collie and Tiny Tim the chow — feature prominently in the short movie as does long-time friend and neighbor, Mrs. R. B. Hills. The University’s holdings are well worth viewing!
The Importance of the Obvious 