Herbert Hoover

Herbert Clark Hoover (August 10, 1874 – October 20, 1964) was an American politician and humanitarian who served as the 31st president of the United States from 1929 to 1933. A member of the Republican Party, he held office during the onset of the Great Depression. A wealthy mining engineer before his presidency, Hoover led the wartime Commission for Relief in Belgium, served as the director of the U.S. Food Administration, and served as the U.S. secretary of commerce. Born to a Quaker family in West Branch, Iowa, Hoover grew up in Oregon. He was one of the first graduates of the new Stanford University in 1895. He took a position with a London-based mining company working in Australia and China. He rapidly became a wealthy mining engineer. In 1914, the outbreak of World War I, he organized and headed the Commission for Relief in Belgium, an international relief organization that provided food to occupied Belgium. When the U.S. entered the war in 1917, president Woodrow Wilson appointed Hoover to lead the Food Administration. He became famous as his country's "food czar". After the war, Hoover led the American Relief Administration, which provided food to the starving millions in Central and Eastern Europe, especially Russia. Hoover's wartime service made him a favorite of m... ()