When I was in high school, I remarked to my grandmother that it was the anniversary of President Franklin Roosevelt’s death.

Grandma Donna responded, “To me, April 12, 1945 will always be the anniversary for Harry Truman becoming president.”

When Grandma was 8 years old, Roosevelt became president. For twelve years, he was the only president she knew.

On April 6, 1945, my mother was born and in those days, mothers and new born babies remained in the hospital for two weeks following a baby’s delivery.

On April 12, Grandma Donna was walking the hospital corridor after her dinner and happened by the nurses’ station where the Catholic Sisters were gathered around the radio, several dabbing at tears. It was then that Grandma learned President Roosevelt had died at his Warm Springs, Georgia retreat.

One of the nuns asked, “Who is this new president? I’ve never heard of him.”

The next morning, my grandfather brought Grandma the newspaper and there was a brief biography of President Harry Truman. Grandma told me, “I knew I was going to like him because we both shared May 8th as our birthdays.”

And sure enough, Grandma loved Harry Truman. In 1972, she and I sat together watching the former president’s funeral at the Truman Presidential Library in Independence, Missouri. I saw his grandsons, all around my age, sitting with Mrs. Bess Truman (who’d soon become one of my favorite First Ladies), and the Trumans’ daughter, Margaret Truman Daniel, and her husband, Clifton Daniel.

Upon seeing one of the Daniel boys with very blonde hair, Grandma exclaimed, “President and Mrs. Truman have a tow-head grandson, too!”

I do commemorate the passing of FDR, but April 12 is the day Harry Truman of Missouri became President of the United States.