TLS signed “Harry,” one page, 8 x 10.5, Senate letterhead, November 22, 1943. Truman writes to Judge Brown Harris in Kansas City. In part: “I think you are mistaken when you way I laughed at you when you talked to me about [James H.] Kindleberger [sic]. I was of the same opinion about him but at that time we needed planes, and we needed some one who knew something about them in order to get them built. Kindleberger, along with Douglas Aircraft, Boeing, Consolidated, Volte, and even Henry Ford had to be expanded beyond the point of our wildest dreams. That expansion of course necessitated the spending of management to a point where such things as the Curtiss-Wright engine situation and the North American situation in Dallas developed. Kindleberger’s wild statement about negroes and Missouri farmer boys and such like made no impression on me. What we were after were planes, but when Kindleberger began to cheat the Government by not making his people work we had to go after him…. Naturally we have to stick pins where they will do the most good and then see if the administrative end of the Government will do its duty….” James H. “Dutch” Kindelberger (1895–1962) was the president of North American Aviation from 1934 until 1948, at which time he was promoted to Chairman and CEO. Under Kindelberger’s direction, North American produced the prototype for the legendary P-51 Mustang, the linchpin of the Allied air effort, in four months. After the war, Kindelberger oversaw the development of rocket technology that was incorporated into America’s earliest intercontinental missiles. The comments by Kindelberger that Truman alludes to were evidently characteristic of the outspoken, colorful aircraft engineer. Staple holes and a few wrinkles, otherwise fine condition. Auction LOA John Reznikoff/PSA/DNA and R&R COA.
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