Online Exhibitions | Apr, 25 2025 10:11AM - 10:11AM
“The telephone was an extension of Johnson’s personality—a powerful appendage that
preserved for posterity his indomitable will.” Harry Middleton, LBJ Speechwriter and the former
Director of the LBJ Presidential Library who opened LBJ’s telephone recordings to the public.
Shortly after he became President, Lyndon Johnson had a Dictaphone belt recorder installed in
the Oval Office. He recorded more than 643 hours of telephone conversations—to have both a
record of his administration and a chronicle for posterity. The recordings offer an unparalleled
look into a modern Presidency. In the captured words and tones of voice, the recordings also
reveal the more personal side of Lyndon Johnson.
