I have read that the proper rendition of our 33rd president’s name is Harry S Truman, no period after the S because it was not an initial for a name, his middle name was just a letter. I have seen it written by many sources with a period.
Is there a factual answer, or is this left to the judgement of whoever is publishing a work?
The answer is S, as it is not an abbreviation. At least his folks gave him the S, or he would have been Harry NMN Truman.
Follow up: The White House doesn’t use the period:
http://www.whitehouse.gov/history/presidents/ht33.html
but the Truman Library does
It appears he signed it with a period, though: link.
I didn’t know that. Well, if that’s how he used his own name, that settles that.
Here’s my standard query whenever a manuscript I’m copyediting omits the period:
Should we not then call him “Harry Ess-dot Truman”?
Trumans situation is similar to that of my father and his twin brother. The were named Clifford and Clarence with no middle name (NMN in Army lingo). Businesses of the time frequenty addressed letters with just the initial of the first name so letters to “C. Simmons” were frequently misdelivered. So my uncle, having been born first, took the middle initial A and my father took B. They used periods.
On the other hand, I never use a period after the W in my signature, but my name is still Alexander W. [Lastname].
–Cliffy
It depends on whether you’re writing his full name or not. His full name was Harry S Truman. However, it’s often customary to not use the full name. Instead, one uses the full first name, the middle initial, and the last name. The middle initial consists of the first letter of the middle name, followed by a period. In this case, the first letter of the middle name is “S”, so the abbreviated form of his name would be “Harry S. Truman”.
How ironic that the abbreviated version is longer than the unabbreviated version.