Carter was just awful. He couldn't... get a sentence out in... a speech without... weird pauses. I don't know if he just never got used to teleprompters or just thought in odd spurts.
Ford's raspy, high-pitched voice always sounded like he wouldn't make it to the end of a long speech before he wouldn't be able to talk at all.
Nixon actually was a decent public speaker.
L. B. Johnson sounded like a hick preacher from the sticks. He often wanted to sound fatherly, but it was just annoying.
Kennedy was mesmerizing to listen to.
Eisenhower was a decent speaker, too. He liked keeping reporters in the dark, so they gave him a lot of grief he didn't deserve, about being scattered when he was being evasive.
Truman was a decent singer, so his tenor voice was pleasant, but he was not well educated and it showed.
F. D. Roosevelt was before my time, but the media idolized him so much, we heard his speeches all the time. His high-falutin' Knickerbocker accent often clashed with his desire to be appealing personally to working people. But, unlike LBJ, and like Eisenhower, he could use a fatherly tone that everyone appreciated.
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branchandroot
Old Presidents
Date: 2018-01-31 11:22 pm (UTC)Ford's raspy, high-pitched voice always sounded like he wouldn't make it to the end of a long speech before he wouldn't be able to talk at all.
Nixon actually was a decent public speaker.
L. B. Johnson sounded like a hick preacher from the sticks. He often wanted to sound fatherly, but it was just annoying.
Kennedy was mesmerizing to listen to.
Eisenhower was a decent speaker, too. He liked keeping reporters in the dark, so they gave him a lot of grief he didn't deserve, about being scattered when he was being evasive.
Truman was a decent singer, so his tenor voice was pleasant, but he was not well educated and it showed.
F. D. Roosevelt was before my time, but the media idolized him so much, we heard his speeches all the time. His high-falutin' Knickerbocker accent often clashed with his desire to be appealing personally to working people. But, unlike LBJ, and like Eisenhower, he could use a fatherly tone that everyone appreciated.