OMAHA (DTN) -- For my birthday earlier this year, my wife bought me a book titled "Man of the People: A Life of Harry S. Truman" written by Alonzo L. Hamby. I would certainly recommend the book if you haven't read it.

I didn't really have any connection with Truman, other than studying history and knowing his place in it during the end of World War II and in the post-war years. He is probably best known for deciding to use the first atomic bomb to end the war.

A few years ago, we went to Kansas City for a short family vacation, and while there we visited Truman's presidential library in Independence, Missouri.

I'm not sure my family found it as interesting as I did, but we did spend a few hours there. I'm sure visiting Worlds of Fun and Oceans of Fun was higher on my kids' list than Truman's Presidential Library.

Truman's family farmed on the outskirts of Kansas City, Missouri. He tried his hand at farming, but he always wanted more. He thought of himself as a businessman and more times than not he failed at whatever business he got into.

He entered the local political scene in Kansas City and got elected to the U.S. Senate in 1934. President Franklin D. Roosevelt made him his vice president when he ran for an unprecedented fourth term in 1944 and Truman became president after Roosevelt died in April of 1945.

In the book, agriculture was discussed quite a bit. The government farm programs began in the 1930s as part of the New Deal legislation, to handle the negative effects of the Great Depression and farm programs continue today.

Some farm policy issues in the years after Truman became president were discussed in the book. It was interesting to see farm groups at the time have such an effect on federal policy compared to today. But there were many more farmers in the mid-1940s compared to 80 years later.

The most interesting part for me was when the book briefly talked about rationing during the end of the war. Nearly everything was rationed for the war effort -- from food items to steel to gasoline.

Because of rationing, the "black market" for various things existed, including one for farm equipment. The book said local authorities tried to enforce the rationing rules but often they looked the other way.

I have written about this in the past; my late grandpa, John B. "Jack" Quinn, farmed outside of Omaha during this time. He needed a different tractor but couldn't buy one because of the rationing for the war effort.

His brother, Ed, owned and operated a sand pit business in the next town to the west near the Platte River. In the 1930s, the pair bought a couple different John Deere D tractors together, including the 1935 D we still have. My great-uncle used it at the sand pit most of the year, and my grandpa would use it in the spring to plow.

Since he was operating this business, Ed had more access to machinery than my grandpa did and so he purchased an industrial yellow International Farmall M tractor later toward the end of the war. My grandpa then bought the tractor from his brother, went to the railyards in downtown Omaha and drove it to their farm. And then shortly after he painted it the familiar red color.

It would turn out to be the last new tractor he would ever buy.

He needed some implements for the recently purchased tractor, so he turned to local farm machinery "black market." Somehow, he found a guy in a neighboring town who had access to International farm equipment. The story goes he bought a loader, mounted picker and a two-row planter this way.

I guess I never really knew the "black market" was truly illegal until I read that book. In my mind I figured since farmers were bending the law to help feed everyone it was okay. But again, according to the book, it was illegal.

I wish I had been able to ask my grandpa his thoughts about this situation and why he did what he did, according to family history. I was only six years old when he passed away.

If I had to take an educated guess to his answer, I'm sure it would have been something to the effect he needed better machinery to operate his eastern Nebraska dairy farm and feed his growing family. At the time, my grandparents had three children, but four more children were born in the late 1940s and into the early 1950s, including my dad in December of 1947.

It is interesting to consider these stories in the light of 80 years of hindsight. I wasn't in his shoes. I wonder what I would have done.

Russ Quinn can be reached at Russ.Quinn@dtn.com

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