Richard Nixon

American lawyer who entered politics in 1946, became a U.S. Senator in 1950, was elected V.P. under Dwight D. Eisenhower in 1952, and was elected President of the U.S. on 5 November 1968. After the eruption of the Watergate scandal, he resigned his office on 9 August 1974. He is the author of "Six Crises," published in 1962.

His parents Frances Anthony Nixon and Hannah Milhous were married on 25 June 1908. His dad, a strict disciplinarian, was an oil field worker, street car motorman, service station and store owner. The second of five sons, Nixon was named Richard after Richard the Lion-Hearted With his older brother and three younger brothers, he grew up in a prim Quaker household. Nixon did well in school and worked in his father's grocery store. His simple beginnings and innate shyness made him a socially ill-at-ease introvert.

After graduating second in his class from Whittier College on 9 June 1934 he enrolled at Duke Law School where he graduated third in his class. He returned to Whittier to set up a law practice. While auditioning for a part in a play at the Whittier Community Theater, he met Thelma Catherine (Pat) Ryan who eventually consented to marry him in June 1940. They were married on 21 June 1940 in Riverside, CA.

Two years later Nixon began a four-year stint in the Navy during WW II. After the war, he returned to California where he sought and won a seat in Congress, 1946. Once in Washington he quickly gained a reputation for his zealous pursuit of communists working in the federal government. While on the House Un-American Activities Committee he was involved in two of the most famous cases; Whittaker Chambers, a confessed Communist Party courier and the former State Dept. official Alger Hiss, who was accused by Chambers of passing secrets to Soviet agents. Popular back in California, he won the 1950 campaign for the U.S. Senate which brought him into national recognition.