CAZENOVIA — This fall, the University of Missouri Press will release the latest book by John Robert Greene, Ph.D., the Paul J. Schupf Professor of History and Humanities at the former Cazenovia College.
The book, titled “Little Helpers: Harry Vaughan, His Cronies, and Corruption in the Truman Administration,” is a biography of General Harry H. Vaughan, President Harry S. Truman’s military aide in the White House.
“In ‘Little Helpers,’ [Greene] encourages us to rethink the scandals of Harry Truman’s presidency by providing the first political biography of the man who precipitated them — Gen. Harry H. Vaughan,” the publisher’s website states. “As the former president’s close friend and military aide, Vaughan brought a number of disreputable figures into the White House, in addition to committing plenty of misconduct on his own. Although aware of Vaughan’s misdeeds, Truman remained unwilling to rid his administration of him and his hangers-on. Vaughan’s scandals have largely gone overlooked by historians — a tendency that ‘Little Helpers’ corrects.”
The book begins with the story of Truman and Vaughan’s first meeting during World War I; it then explores Vaughan’s support for Truman for the Senate and later as president.
According to the publisher, most of the book centers on the various cronies surrounding Vaughan, the significance of his relationship with Truman, and the president’s “inability to rein him in.”
“I was stunned to find out that Harry Truman not only knew about Vaughan’s transgressions but acted as his enabler by keeping him on his staff, even after those transgressions had been made public,” said Greene, who drew from primary and archival sources — many never previously published — and correspondence between Vaughan and Truman.
According to the University of Missouri Press, the author’s dramatic narrative account of the inner workings of the Truman administration helps make the book accessible to both the general reader and the specialist.
“Little Helpers” is set to be published on Nov. 18, 2024.
Greene specializes in American political history, specifically the American presidency.
“My interest comes from my reading as a child,” Greene said. “I read every biography of the presidents available at Betts Branch Library, near my home in the Valley section of Syracuse. Then my interest in political history was piqued by the scandals of the 1970s, particularly in Vietnam and Watergate — it drove my studies in college and beyond.”
Greene is the author or editor of 20 books, including works on Dwight D. Eisenhower, Richard Nixon, Gerald Ford, and George H. W. Bush. He has also published or presented over 150 book chapters, scholarly articles, conference lectures, and reviews, and he is frequently invited by print and broadcast media to provide his perspective on regional and national political matters.
According to Greene, the message he hopes readers gain from his latest book is that presidential mismanagement and scandal are nothing new.
“Neither is having members of a White House staff that are corrupt,” he added.
Greene, who resides in Chittenango, taught at Cazenovia College for over 42 years before retiring in January 2023.
He started at the institution in Sept. 1979 as a part-time instructor while serving as a manager of the campus radio station, WITC-FM.
Greene became a full-time faculty member in 1984 and was tenured in 1987.
He was named Distinguished Faculty Member in 1993, awarded the college’s first endowed chair — the Paul J. Schupf Chair in History and Humanities — in 2000, and received the college’s Distinguished Service Award in 2020.
Greene founded Cazenovia College’s social science and history majors; co-founded the dual major in history and social science with Jody Hicks, D.A., assistant professor of social sciences; and introduced the Washburn Junior Research and Teaching Fellowship Programs and the Wheler Great Lives Speaker Series.
He also founded the college’s Frederic and Jean Williams Archives.
Leading up to his retirement, the professor and writer was chair of the social and behavioral sciences division, director of the history program, co-director of the dual major in history and social science, college archivist, director of the Washburn Junior Research and Teaching Fellowship Programs, co-director of the Wheler Great Lives Speaker Series, and advisor to the Alpha Chi Honor Society.
“Cazenovia College was special,” said Greene. “I stayed there for 42 years because the emphasis was on teaching, not ‘publish or perish.’ As a professor, I was a teacher who moonlighted as a writer/researcher, not a writer/researcher who did just a little teaching.”
In 2002, Greene and his family endowed the Mary Rose Greene Scholarship, awarded annually to an outstanding junior or senior student pursuing a degree in social sciences or history.
For more information on “Little Helpers,” visit upress.missouri.edu/9780826223166/little-helpers/.
