Bob Dole
Bob Dole was the Republican leader in the United States Senate for eleven years and his party's presidential nominee in 1996, and carried the wounds of the Second World War for the rest of his life. Born in Russell, Kansas in 1923 to a family that moved into their own basement during the Depression to rent out the house, he was a college athlete before enlisting. In April 1945, days before the war in Europe ended, he was hit by German machine-gun fire in the Apennines while trying to pull a radioman to cover. His right shoulder and vertebrae were shattered, he was paralysed for months and given little chance of walking, and spent thirty-nine months in hospital. He recovered partial mobility after experimental surgery, and never regained the use of his right arm — which is why he habitually held a pen in that hand, to stop people trying to shake it. He entered Congress in 1961 and the Senate in 1969, becoming known for a mordant wit that helped and hurt him. He was Gerald Ford's running mate in 1976 and was widely judged to have been too aggressive in the debate. He became Senate Republican leader in 1985. His legislative record is bipartisan and substantial: he worked with George McGovern to expand food stamps and create the international school lunch programme, and he was a principal author of the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990, the most significant civil rights law for disabled people in the country's history. He also brokered the 1983 Social Security rescue. He lost the 1996 election to Bill Clinton, having resigned his Senate seat to campaign. He died in 2021.
- Lived: 1923 CE – 2021 CE
- Nationality: American
- Roles: senator
