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Document
#858; (May 4, 1954)
Draft of introduction to document to be placed in cornerstone of Gettysburg house
Series:
EM, AWF, Drafts
The Papers of Dwight David Eisenhower, Volume
XV - The Presidency: The Middle Way
Part
V: Maintaining "a united defense"; April 1954 to August 1954
Chapter
10: Losing the war "they could not win"
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This paper--of which one copy only is to be made--has a special, even though inconsequential, purpose. It is to be placed, along with other items, of interest principally to the family, in the cornerstone of the house Mamie and I are now rebuilding on our farm near Gettysburg, Pennsylvania.1 The idea of providing such a cornerstone was developed in a conversation between Charles Tompkins (the builder) and me as we rode from the farm to the city of Washington on May 2, 1954. There was no agreed upon subject to be described or expounded in this paper. Rather the idea (Charlie's) was that it should be titled, "Random Thoughts of a President on a Day of 1954."
In order that no inhibitions may loom up in my mind to mar the freedom of this recording. I make two assumptions:
(a). That no one--aside from my secretary, Mrs. Ann Whitman--will see this document before it is enclosed in its temporary tomb,2
(b). That the copper box in the cornerstone shall not be disturbed for at least 60-75 years. (This I shall try to assure in appropriate provisions in my will.)3
Bibliographic reference to this document:
Eisenhower, Dwight D. Draft of introduction to document to be placed in cornerstone of Gettysburg house,
4 (May 1954).
In The Papers of Dwight David Eisenhower, ed. L. Galambos and D. van Ee, doc. 858.
World Wide Web facsimile by The Dwight D. Eisenhower Memorial
Commission of the print edition; Baltimore, MD: The Johns
Hopkins University Press, 1996, http://www.eisenhowermemorial.org/presidential-papers/first-term/documents/858.cfm
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