Richard Nixon was a young Navy officer when he first saw Dwight D. Eisenhower through a storm of tickertape as Manhattan celebrated the end of the war in Europe. Seven years later, Nixon was Eisenhower's running mate on the Republican presidential ticket—the beginning of a political and personal relationship that lasted for nearly twenty years. Despite a gulf that separated them by age and temperament, their association evolved into a collaboration that helped to shape the nation's political ideology, foreign policy, and domestic goals, from civil rights to the civilian space program. Ike and Dick relates much that occurred out of public view, such as the sensitive discussions among senior staffers concerned about Nixon's proper role when Eisenhower suffered illnesses that might have incapacitated him.
