Statue of President Harry Truman to be unveiled in U.S. Capitol rotunda this month

Former President Harry Truman will soon stand in the United States Capitol rotunda.

A statue of the former senator from Missouri and 33rd president will be unveiled in a ceremony on September 29, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi announced Thursday.

Truman will serve as one of Missouri’s two statues in the U.S. Capitol, replacing one of former U.S. Sen. Thomas Hart Benton, who was an ancestor for the famous Kansas City painter of the same name whose work hangs a few blocks from the U.S. Capitol in the Smithsonian American Art Museum.

The Benton statue was originally sent to the Capitol by Missouri in 1899 and is located in statuary hall in the Capitol. Truman’s statue will be placed in the rotunda among former President Ronald Reagan (one of California’s statues) and former President Dwight Eisenhower (one of Kansas’ statues).

Truman, a Democrat, grew up in Independence and started his political career in Jackson County, eventually winning election to the U.S. Senate in 1934. He took office as president after former President Franklin Roosevelt died in 1945. Truman oversaw the end of World War II and made the decision to drop the atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in Japan. He also enacted the Marshall Plan, which helped rebuild Europe after the war.

The artist Tom Corbin, from Kansas City, created the bronze statue. He told KCUR in 2021 that he wanted to make the statue look approachable, because he felt that most of the statues in the U.S. Capitol are too stiff. He was selected to design the statue in 2019.

Rep. Emanuel Cleaver, a Democrat who represents Kansas City, helped bring the idea of having a statue of Truman in Capitol to the Truman Library Institute, according to a video the group posted in 2021.

Missouri’s other statue is of 19th Century Congressman and Democratic Vice Presidential nominee Francis Preston Blair Jr. It’s in the Hall of Columns in the U.S. Capitol.