Not true at all. Harry Truman came up in the long and honored tradition of "stump speaking" in American politics. In that tradition, a candidate stood upon a stump or the back of a buckboard wagon and spoke without notes. Radio and television pretty much killed that off.
When Truman was forced to work from a printed speech, he was deadly boring. But when he improvised, he could be devastating.
In his 1948 "Give 'em Hell" tour, his first speech, given from the open end of a railroad business car, started off as a boring speech from a paper source. A few minutes into it, Truman realized he was dying on stage. He muttered, "Hell, I can't deliver this speech," tore it in two, and began to work the crowd in the old traditional stump speaking style. He electrified the crowd and spent the rest of the tour winging it at each stop.
I've seen films of Truman stump speaking on that tour, and he was magnificent.
“Not true at all. Harry Truman came up in the long and honored tradition of “stump speaking” in American politics. In that tradition, a candidate stood upon a stump or the back of a buckboard wagon and spoke without notes. Radio and television pretty much killed that off.
When Truman was forced to work from a printed speech, he was deadly boring. But when he improvised, he could be devastating.”
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This makes President Bush even more Truman-esque, as everyone who has seen him give a ‘stump’ speech or conduct a townhall meeting can attest! . . . During the 2004 election run up, I saw the President speak (in person) at least 20 times — he electrified EVERY audience from the smaller gatherings of 100 contributers to the mass rallies of 55,000!