Mr. Civil Rights
Thurgood Marshall convinced the Supreme Court that school segregation was unconstitutional in Brown v. Board of Education.
As legal counsel for the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), Marshall represented civil rights plaintiffs all over the south and argued more than 30 such cases before the Supreme Court. He won all but five and earned the nickname, Mr. Civil Rights.
In 1961, President John F. Kennedy named him to the U.S. Court of the Appeals for the Second District. In 1965, President Lyndon Johnson appointed Marshall U.S. Solicitor General, the third highest post in the Department of Justice.
Two years later, on June 13, 1967, LBJ nominated Marshall to be Associate Justice of the Supreme Court where he served for 24 years.
Thurgood Marshall’s nomination by LBJ made him the first African American Supreme Court Justice, but it also followed a long and distinguished career as a civil rights lawyer who successfully fought inequality and discrimination.
Pictured here are Marshall and LBJ outside of the White House. 7/9/65
-from the LBJ Library
Source: archives.gov
December 1961. JFK visits Bermuda, and as on his visit to Texas, he refuses to put on a hat.
Photo by UK National Archives via Flickr.
Source: Flickr / nationalarchives
First Moms
Lady Bird Johnson and with her daughters and sons-in-law at the LBJ Ranch. Charles Robb, Lynda Johnson, Lady Bird Johnson, Luci Johnson Nugent (holding the dog Yuki), Patrick Nugent, 9/30/67.
-from the LBJ Library
LBJ was impressed with the intellectual Kennedy advisors, even if he was something of an outsider among them. Later, LBJ told of how he had spoken admiringly of them to his mentor Speaker Sam Rayburn, who said:
“Well, Lyndon, you may be right and they may be every bit as intelligent as you say, but I’d feel a whole lot better about them if just one of them had run for sheriff once.”
—Halberstam, David. The Best and the Brightest, New York: Random House, 1972, p. 41.
Top: Richard Goodwin, JFK and Dean Rusk. 2nd row, L-R: Larry O’Brien, McGeorge Bundy, and Ted Sorensen. Bottom: Robert McNamara and Pierre Salinger.
Source: lbjlibrary
A Thank You from Neil Armstrong
As he exited the Apollo Lunar Module on July 20th of 1969, ready to set foot on the Moon, Neil Armstrong’s immediate safety was in the hands of an incredible feat of engineering that is often overlooked: his A7L Spacesuit and backpack. Built at Lyndon B. Johnson Space Center by ILC Dover and Hamilton Standard, respectively, this early Extravehicular Mobility Unit (EMU) was required to provide, amongst other things, the following: a safe internal pressure; breathable oxygen; a regulated temperature; shielding from radiation; protection from micrometeorites, and a communications system. In addition, the suit’s eleven layers needed to provide ample levels of comfort and mobility so as to make it usable.
Below, a letter from Armstrong to the ‘EMU gang’, written in 1994 to mark the 25th anniversary of the Moon landing, in which he thanks them sincerely for their highly important work on what he calls his ‘spacecraft’.NEIL A. ARMSTRONG
P.O. BOX 436
LEBANON, OH 45036
July 14, 1994
The EMU gang at
Johnson Space Center
Houston, TX 77058
To the EMU gang:
I remember noting a quarter century or so ago that an emu was a 6 foot Australian flightless bird. I thought that got most of it right.
It turned out to be one of the most widely photographed spacecraft in history. That was no doubt due to the fact that it was so photogenic. Equally responsible for its success was its characteristic of hiding from view its ugly occupant.
Its true beauty, however, was that it worked. It was tough, reliable and almost cuddly.
To all of you who made it all that it was, I send a quarter century’s worth of thanks and congratulations.
Sincerely,
(Signed)
Neil A. Armstrong
(via theatlantic)
Source: lettersofnote.com
April 12, 1945. FDR dies.
LBJ is devastated. Roosevelt would remain a role model for the rest of Johnson’s life.
LBJ Library photo by Cecil Stoughton, 02/10/1965. 43-8-WH65. Public domain.
Source: lbjlibrary.org
President Kennedy throws the first pitch of the 1961 baseball season at Griffith Stadium, Washington, D.C. 4/10/1961
Griffith Stadium hosted every POTUS from William Howard Taft to JFK before it was demolished in 1965. Taft was a baseball fan and initiated the tradition of the Presidential first pitch at Griffith Stadium. As the home of The Washington Senators, the stadium featured a presidential box behind first base.
Also seen in this photo are Vice President Lyndon B. Johnson; Senator Hubert Humphrey of Minnesota; Special Assistant to the President Dave Powers; majority owner of the Washington Senators franchise General Elwood R. “Pete” Quesada; Senate Minority Leader Everett Dirksen of Illinois; Secretary of Health, Education, and Welfare Abraham Ribicoff; Associate Press Secretary Andrew Hatcher; Secret Service Agents Gerald “Jerry” Behn and John J. “Muggsy” O’Leary.
Source: jfklibrary.org
Washington D.C. children participate in the 1967 Easter Egg Roll hosted by President and Lady Bird Johnson. 03/27/1967
From the LBJ Library, Image #C4852-5a
Follow-up memo written a few days after LBJ was trapped in an elevator at the Pentagon. 4/3/28
This exists. A retractable toothpick - about the size of a golf pencil - given to Lyndon B. Johnson by his Senate office staff. An attached note read,
“To Sen. Johnson - but please don’t use on Senate Floor! From Your Office Staff”
Add this to your list of gift ideas for the boss.
-from the LBJ Library
