Senator George Aiken served as the governor of Vermont before he was elected to the United States Senate in 1940. Although he served as a U.S. senator for 34 years, he preferred to be called “governor.” An experienced farmer and author of several horticultural volumes, Aiken served as chairman of the Senate Agriculture and Forestry Committee. He was known for his unfailing support of rural interests. In his later Senate years, from 1972 until his retirement in 1975, Aiken kept an excellent modern-era Senate diary, spending each Saturday dictating his thoughts about his experiences in the Senate. In an oral history interview, former Secretary of the Senate Francis Valeo recalled Aiken’s wit and wisdom, and his famous proposal to “declare victory and get out” of Vietnam.

The U.S. Senate Commission on Art announces a new painting of U.S. Senator Thomas A. Daschle (D-SD).

In 1959, Senator Mike Mansfield, then majority whip, invited Frank Valeo to become his assistant. When Senator Mansfield later served as majority leader, he appointed Valeo as Democratic party secretary. In 1966, the Senate elected Valeo as secretary of the Senate, a post he held until 1977. This oral history recounts the long working relationship between Valeo and Mansfield. It provides a panorama of American foreign policy in the Far East, from World War II to the Philippine turmoil of 1986. It also offers an institutional history of the Senate by the secretary who presided over much of its modernization.