George Herbert Walker Bush was born to a life of privilege. His father Prescott Bush was an investment banker and later United States Congressman from Connecticut serving from 1952 until 1963. His mother Dorothy Walker married Prescott in 1921 and they had five children, George Herbert Walker being the second.
Early Life
George H. W. Busch was born in 1924 in Milton, Massachusetts and his family would relocate to Connecticut when he was a baby. As a teenager he became a boarding student at Phillips Andover Academy and graduated in 1942. The day he graduated, his eighteenth birthday, he entered the U.S. Navy.
Military Service
He became a pilot in 1943, the youngest in the Navy. His military service was in the Pacific Theatre where he flew over 50 missions as a torpedo bomber. In late 1944 he was shot down over the Pacific Ocean and rescued by a submarine. For his heroism he was awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross.
While still in the service he married Barbara Pierce in January 1945.
Bush Enters the Business World
After his discharge from the Navy he enrolled at Yale and studied economics graduating via an accelerated baccalaureate program in 1948.
Bush then decided to go into the oil business and relocated his family to Texas, where he became a salesman for Dresser Industries. In 1950 along with a friend he formed an oil development company that merged with Zapata Petroleum where he later became president for an oil drilling equipment subsidiary.
Early Political Career
Relocating the business to Houston, he started to become involved in politics where he became chairman of the county Republican Party. In 1964 he decided to run for the United States Senate against the Democratic incumbent Senator Ralph Yarborough. The year 1964 was the year of Lyndon Johnson’s sweeping victory and Bush went down to defeat.
In 1966 he was elected to the U.S. House of Representatives and was reelected in 1968 before deciding to try for the Senate again in 1970. In that year Bush was again defeated for the Senate seat by Lloyd Bensten.
Politics and a Diplomatic Career
In December 1970 he was appointed by President Nixon as Ambassador to the United Nations, a post he held until he was asked to become chairman of the Republican National Committee in 1973. After the Watergate scandal he was asked to become envoy to the People’s Republic of China by President Gerald Ford who succeeded Nixon. Bush would stay in China for two years before being asked by President Ford to become head of the Central Intelligence Agency where he remained until Gerald Ford’s defeat to Jimmy Carter in 1976.
Rebuffed to continue as head of the CIA, Bush returned to Houston.
Campaign and Election of 1980
Bush began working on his political campaign for president and announced his candidacy in May 1979. Bush was the surprise victor in the Republican Iowa caucus in early 1980 but the party was drawn more to the conservative Ronald Reagan. To create a more balanced ticket George H. W. Bush was given the nod for the second spot on the ticket with Reagan.
The Reagan-Bush team won handily in 1980 winning the popular vote by more than 8,000,000 ballots and a vote of 489 to 49 for Jimmy Carter.
Campaign and Election of 1984
President Reagan was popular in his first term and the Reagan-Bush team was easily reelected in 1984 over Walter Mondale who lost by over 16,000,000 votes and only carried his home state of Minnesota in the Electoral College.
Campaign and Election of 1988
The Reagan years had proved to be good for America and with the exception of the Iran-Contra scandal there was not much to discredit Bush who had the endorsement of Reagan to become his successor. Bush won handily in the Republican primaries over Bob Dole and Pat Robertson.
Bush picked Dan Quayle as his running mate and they went on to defeat Michael Dukakis by almost 8,000,000 ballots and a vote of 426 to 112 in the Electoral College.
Bush’s Presidency
Politics changes quickly when the economy is bad and by 1991 the economic growth of the 1980s had fizzled out. Bush was also saddled by a large Federal debt that had spawned during the Reagan years. For this reason alone, despite other successes during his administration, Bush went down to defeat in a three-man race, which included Ross Perot by more than 5,000,000 ballots and vote of 370 to 168 to then elected Bill Clinton.
Sources:
- Smith, Carter (2005). PRESIDENTS: All you need to know. Irvington, New York: Hylas Publishing. ISBN 1592581234.
- Naftali, Timothy (2007). George H. W. Bush: The American Presidents Series: The 41st President, 1989-1993. New York: Times Books. ISBN 0805069666
Tony De Vita - My basic background was in mathematics. Having received a B.S. summa cum laude, from Wilkes College, Wilkes-Barre, Pa. My first job was ...
