The Journal of San Diego History
SAN DIEGO HISTORICAL SOCIETY QUARTERLY
Winter 2000, Volume 46, Number 1
Gregg Hennessey, Editor
Book Notes
Confessions of a Kinetic Congressman.
By Bob Wilson with Larry Bischof and William Brian Lowry. San Diego: San Diego State University Foundation, 1996. Photographs. Index. ix + 262 pages.
This is a collection of very brief chapters on the life and career of Bob Wilson, who represented San Diego in the United States Congress from his election in 1952 to his retirement in 1980. In those years on capitol hill, he became a major spokesman for the American defense establishment and played a large role in the development and maintance of the Cold War military presence in San Diego. He was also a key figure in Republican politics, chairing the Congressional Campaign Committee for twelve years. This book’s truncated segments give only a superficial sense of Bob Wilson and his family, give little depth to our understanding of his work in Congress, or even what he meant to his community. The book represents a missed opportunity to provide a serious record of the life and contributions of a man who made a difference in San Diego in the Cold War years.
