Truman loved taking recommendations from the locals, whether it was for a place to stay or a place to eat, Truman always seemed willing to give it a try. Another interesting fact brought to light by Algeo is that in 1925 architect named Arthur Heinman, opened the first roadside motor hotel or motel along highway 101 in San Luis Obispo, California. .
The Truman's didn't just make this a point "A"" to point "B" " kind of trip, one of the first stops was to visit Frank McKinney, a classic "rags-to-riches story," " former national party chairman and friend. These stops only helped solidify what most already knew, an ex-president could not travel incognito. It seemed everywhere the Truman's stopped the reporters were there to ask questions and Harry could rarely if ever say no. Truman was very good at sidestepping questions that were directly related to the current president or the current issue going on in Korea.
Harry Truman is definitely a man of times passed, rarely refusing an autograph or picture, taking advice of locals, and at one stop in Frostburg at a place called the Princess, they were having lunch when the owner George Pappas asked Mr. Truman if he would take the time to visit his 92 yr old, lifelong Democrat mother who was very ill. Truman graciously obliged and of his visit he said, "We had a nice chat, " Truman continued. "That little detour to Eckhart, Maryland, may not sound like much, but it was the high point of our whole motor trip" (pg105)." At the Gulf station in Frederick, Maryland, Harry even took time to have Coke with a staunch Democrat and devout Republican.
Throughout the book you come to find that Truman had some people that he was not very fond of. Mr. Truman was not a fan of President Eisenhower for reducing the military budget, McCarthy for lying about the congressman involved in Communism and Kennedy for being in your face kind of rich. Of Kennedy, Truman once said, "Kennedy embodied the kind of elitist sense of entitlement that Truman despised" (pg 125).
