Press/Journalists

Prologue Magazine Looks at Lyndon B. Johnson and His Legacy
Press Release · Thursday, July 3, 2008

Press Release
July 3, 2008

Prologue Magazine Looks at Lyndon B. Johnson and His Legacy at Home and Abroad

Washington, DC…The successes and failures of President Lyndon B. Johnson’s powerful and well-known persuasive powers—the “Johnson treatment”—are chronicled in the Summer 2008 issue of Prologue in observance of Johnson’s birth 100 years ago this summer.

Prologue, the quarterly magazine of the National Archives and Records Administration, reviews, in text and photos, LBJ’s turbulent five years in the White House. The article was written by Harry Middleton, the now-retired longtime director of the Lyndon B. Johnson Presidential Library in Austin, Texas.

In the article, “LBJ: Still Casting a Long Shadow,” Middleton recalls how LBJ—using his famous “Johnson treatment”—pushed his “Great Society” through Congress and how he dealt with the enigma that was the Vietnam War.

“His legacy—his revolution, if indeed that is what it should be called—was an avalanche of legislation,” Middleton writes, but adds: “Johnson’s domestic achievements were only part of his legacy, of course. There is also the elephant in the room named Vietnam.”

Prologue also highlights the career of Ellis Zacharias, a Navy intelligence officer in World War II. Zacharias’s revelations about Japan’s intentions in the Pacific, including an attack at Pearl Harbor, were usually on the mark but often ignored by Navy brass, who found him abrasive and slowed his advancement up the ranks.

Battlefilm” provides a rare guide to the World War I footage available in the National Archives’ vast holdings of moving images. While World War II footage is familiar to many Americans through movies and TV documentaries, moving images from World War I are seldom seen.

“For Pity’s Sake” offers a look into the efforts of Civil War nurses to collect a pension from the Federal government. Many of them had fathers, brothers, husbands, or sons who fought and either died or suffered lifetime injuries and had little income.

Exodus to Kansas” documents a Senate investigation in 1880 on why freed slaves were migrating from the South to places like Kansas.

For four decades, Prologue has shared with readers the rich resources and programs of the National Archives, its regional archives, and the Presidential libraries.

Each issue features historical articles—drawn from National Archives' holdings and written by noted historians, archivists, and experts—as well as articles explaining and describing many of the National Archives’ activities and programs as the nation’s recordkeeping agency. The Washington Post said, “Prologue . . . can be regarded quite literally as an invitation for further study. It is also consistently absorbing reading.”

A one-year subscription to Prologue costs $24, and you can order in a number of ways:

  • Call 1-800-234-8861 or 202-357-5482.
  • Go to the subscribe page, print out the order formOpen order form PDF file, and mail it to Prologue, P.O. Box 100684, Atlanta, GA, 30384.
  • Order online.
  • Fax credit card orders to Prologue at 202-357-5918.

Single copies of Prologue are available at the Archives Shop or at the Cashier's Office in the National Archives Building in Washington or at the Publications Sales Office at the National Archives at College Park. Single copies are also available in the shops at some Presidential libraries.

For more information about the National Archives and its programs and exhibits, go to www.archives.gov.

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For press information, contact the National Archives Public Affairs Staff at 202-357-5300.

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