Richard Nixon biography

Synopsis

Early Life and Congressional Career

Born on January 9, 1913, in Yorba Linda, California, Richard Milhous Nixon was the second of five children born to Frank Nixon and Hannah Milhouse Nixon. His father was a service station owner and grocer, who also owned a small lemon farm in Yorba Linda. His mother was a Quaker exerted a strong influence on her son. Richard Nixon's early life was hard, as he characterized by saying, "We were poor, but the glory of it was we didn't know it." The family experienced tragedy early in Richard's life when his younger brother died in 1925 after a short illness and later when he was 20, his older brother, whom he greatly admired, died of tuberculosis in 1933.

Richard Nixon attended Fullerton High School but later transferred to Whittier High School. There he ran for student body president, but lost to a more popular student. The loss would be his last for 31 years. Nixon graduated high school second in his class and was offered a scholarship to Harvard. But his family couldn't afford the travel and living expenses so he attended local Whittier College, a Quaker institution, where he earned a reputation as a formidable debater and standout in college drama productions as well as successful athlete. Upon graduation from Whittier in 1934, Nixon received a full scholarship to Duke University Law School in Durham, N.C. Returning to Whittier to practice law at the firm of Kroop & Bewley, he met Thelma Catherine ("Pat") Ryan, a teacher and amateur actress, after the two were cast in the same play at a local community theatre. The couple married in 1940 and had two daughters, Tricia and Julie.

A career as a small town lawyer was not enough for a man with his ambition, so in August 1942, Richard Nixon and his wife moved to Washington, D.C., where he took a job in Franklin Roosevelt's Office of Price Administration in Washington, D.C. He soon became dissolution with the New Deal's big-government programs and bureaucratic red tape. Though eligible for an exemption from military service as a Quaker and in his job with OPA, Nixon joined the navy, serving as an aviation ground officer in the Pacific. Though he saw no actual combat, he returned to the United States with two service stars and several commendations, eventually rising to the rank of lieutenant commander. He resigned his commission in January, 1946.

Following his return to civilian life, Nixon was approached by a group of Whittier Republicans who encouraged him to run for Congress. He was up against five-term liberal Democratic Congressman Jerry Voorhis. Nixon's campaign exploited notions about Voorhis's alleged communist sympathies.