George W. Bush First Son Essays - Bush Family, George H. W. Bush

George W. Bush: First Son First Son: George W. Bush and the Bush Family Dynasty by Bill Minutaglio, details the history and upbringing of this years Republican candidate and gives insight as to the impact his family heritage has had on him as a person, and who and what has influenced him as a politician. The biography is mostly nonjudgmental towards George W. Bush, but does paint an image of him and his family that is exactly what he has been trying to deny throughout his whole political life: he was born with a silver spoon in his mouth, and has led a largely unremarkable life that has left him unqualified as a candidate for President of the United States. George W.s grandfather Prescott Bush was the first Bush to attend Yale. George W. saw him as a living legacy of the familys success. While at Yale, he was a golfer, football player, and baseball player, and a member of the glee club. He served in Word War I as well, as an army captain assigned to a field artillery unit in France. By 1921, Prescott had married Dorothy Walker and they settled in Greenwich, Connecticut where they raised five children, among them George W.s father. Prescotts second son, George Herbert Walker Bush, attended the finest prep school in the country, Philips Academy in Andover, Massachusetts. He would graduate and then immediately enlist in the Navy, where he became a fighter pilot and was rewarded with the Distinguished Flying Cross after being shot down by Japanese anti-aircraft fire and being rescued by an American submarine. Once returning home, he followed in his fathers footsteps and enrolled in Yale. While there he majored in economics, was a captain of the baseball team, and was also chapter president of the Delta Kappa Epsilon fraternity. George and Barbara Bush married in January of 1945 and they moved into a small house in New Haven, Connecticut. George Walker Bush was born a little over a year later on July 6, 1946. George W.s father continued his studies at Yale after his son was born, and would graduate two years later in the spring of 1948. The day after graduation, the elder Bush set off for West Texas and a job at the International Derrick and Equipment Company in Odessa, Texas; his wife and son arrived two weeks later. Odessa was a blue-collar town, where pipe-layers and roughnecks lived. Odessas white-collar sister city was Midland, where the oil deals were made, and the company headquarters were established. More importantly, this is where George H.W. aspired to be. But for now the couple moved into a small apartment in Odessa, where instead of dealing with oilmen they had to deal with another couple with whom they shared their bathroom. The family temporarily moved to California in 1949, but returned to the Texas after a year. But they did not move back to Odessa; instead they moved into a small wooden bungalow in Midland. It was while living here that Bush and John Overbey began to consider the possibility of starting their own oil company, and by 1950 the Bush-Overbey Oil Development Company, Inc., was a reality. The company did business buying and selling oil-drilling royalty rights in the Permian Basin. Big George directed the local chamber of commerce, helped draw up the papers for the Midland Commercial Bank and Trust Company, sat in on planning sessions for the YMCA, was on the local cancer board, and also taught George W.s Sunday school class at the First Presbyterian Church, where the Bush family attended weekly. At the church, he eventually became a church deacon and church elder. The entire time he was involved with these activities, he was also gathering people to convert to the Republican Party. He was involved in countless activities, and was home less and less as time wore on. In February of 1953, George W.s brother Jeb was born, and it was at this time that their parents realized that something was not right with their sister Robin. She was soon diagnosed with leukemia, and died in October later that year. George W. Bush recalls this time as his first vivid memory of his childhood. After their daughters death,