The 43 Presidents
of the
United States of America

Harry S. Truman

33rd President
1945 - 1953

Harry S. Truman was the thirty-third President of the United States. 

Important events during President Truman's administrations were:

• The Germans surrendered unconditionally to the Allied Forces on May 7, 1945.

• The United Nations charter was signed on June 26, 1945 at San Francisco, California.

• The United States tested the first atomic bomb in Alamogordo, New México on July 16, 1945.

• The United States Air Force dropped an atomic bomb on Hiroshima, Japan on August 6, 1945.  This was the first time atomic energy was used in a war.

• Japan surrendered to the United States on August 14, 1945 and the terms of the surrender were agreed to on the U.S.S. Missouri on September 2, 1945.

• The Atomic Energy Commission was established on August 1, 1946.

• The Organization of American States was formed at Bogotá, Columbia, by 21 countries on April 30, 1948.

• The President's salary was raised to $100,000 on January 19, 1949.

• Cortisone was discovered on April 20, 1949.

• President Truman signed the NATO pact on July 25, 1949.

• The Berlin Blockade ended on September 30, 1949.

• Minimum wage was increased to 75 cents per hour on October 26, 1949.

• President Truman announced on January 31, 1950 that the United States would start producing the hydrogen bomb.

• Two Puerto Rican nationalists tried to assassinate President Truman on November 1, 1950.

• The Twenty-second Amendment was ratified on February 26, 1951.

• The first transcontinental television broadcast took place on September 4, 1951.

• The Japanese peace treaty was signed in San Francisco, California on September 8, 1951.

• War between the United States and German was formally ended on October 19, 1951.

• An atomic artillery shell was fired in the Nevada desert on May 25, 1952.

• A peace agreement was signed in Bonn, Germany, by the United States, England, France and West Germany on May 26, 1952.

• The first hydrogen bomb was tested by the United States on November 1, 1952 in the Marshall Islands.

Harry Truman was:

• the first President born in Missouri.

• the ninth President whose mother was alive when he was inaugurated.

• the fourth Democratic President since the Civil War.

• the first President to travel underwater in a submarine.

• the first President to have a speech from the White House telecast.

• the first President to receive a woman ambassador from another country at the White House.