The Reagan Diaries

Douglas Brinkley is an American author, professor of history at Rice University and a fellow at the James Baker Institute for Public Policy. Brinkley is the history commentator for CBS News and a contributing editor to the magazine Vanity Fair. He joined the faculty of Rice University as a... professor of history in 2007. Brinkley was born in Atlanta, Georgia. His parents were high school teachers. Raised in Perrysburg, Ohio he earned his B.A. from Ohio State University , and his M.A. and Ph.D. from Georgetown University in U.S. Diplomatic History. He has taught at Tulane University, Princeton University, the U.S. Naval Academy, has received an honorary doctorate for his contributions to American letters from Trinity College in Hartford, Connecticut. During the early 1990s, Brinkley taught American Arts and Politics out of Hofstra aboard the Majic Bus [sic], a roving transcontinental classroom, from which emerged the book, The Majic Bus: An American Odyssey . In 1993, he left Hofstra to teach at the University of New Orleans, where he taught the class again using two natural-gas fueled buses.
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Ronald Wilson Reagan was the 40th President of the United States, serving from 1981 to 1989. Prior to that, he was the 33rd Governor of California from 1967 to 1975 and a radio, film and television actor. Born in Tampico, Illinois and raised in Dixon, Reagan was educated at Eureka College, earning... a Bachelor of Arts degree in economics and sociology. After his graduation, Reagan moved first to Iowa to work as a radio broadcaster and then in to Los Angeles in 1937 where he began a career as an actor, first in films and later television. Some of his most notable films include Knute Rockne, All American, Kings Row, and Bedtime for Bonzo. Reagan served as president of the Screen Actors Guild, and later as a spokesman for General Electric ; his start in politics occurred during his work for GE. Originally a member of the Democratic Party, his positions began shifting rightward in the late 1950s, and he switched to the Republican Party in 1962.
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