How George H.W. Bush's relationship to Louisiana was unique among modern presidents - The Advocate
Dec 10, 2018Minutes after arriving at Spanish Plaza, with then-New Orleans City Council member Peggy Wilson serving as the master of ceremonies, Bush surprised the throng by revealing that he had chosen Dan Quayle, a young senator from Indiana, to be his running mate.A day later, delegates at the Republican National Convention nominated Bush as their presidential candidate. The day after that, Bush stood inside the Louisiana Superdome and accepted the nomination with the ill-fated pledge, “Read my lips. No new taxes.” In November, Bush carried 40 states, including Louisiana, and was elected as the 41st president of the United States.No recent president has had a stronger connection to Louisiana than George Herbert Walker Bush, who died Friday at age 94. (The nation’s 12th president, Zachary Taylor, lived near Baton Rouge for 25 years, though he was not born in Louisiana.)Bush grew up in Connecticut as the privileged son of a wealthy banker who was elected twice as a U.S. senator. After serving as a pilot during World War II and later graduating from Yale, Bush moved to Texas to enter the oil business. George H.W. Bush, a patrician New Englander whose presidency soared with the coalition victory over Iraq in Kuwait, but then plummeted in the … He traveled throughout south Louisiana in the 1950s to acquire drilling righ...
