During 1952, while he's still out speaking as he has been for years, Hoover is not actively campaigning - but his views now comprise what is considered to represent the mainstream conservative wing of the Republican party, consisting of people like Robert A. Taft. Unfortunately for both, Eisenhower wins overwhelmingly and is a much more moderate President, even if Hoover makes one last widely seen appearance (at 85!) at the Republican convention in 1960, where he bemoans America's "moral slump" as "an infection from Communist Russia" as well as "beatniks and eggheads" who were destroying national pride.
I was 12 in 1960. I hadn't yet begun to follow politics closely--that would come in 1964--but I did pay some attention. And I don't remember EVER seeing Hoover on TV, or reading about anything he said. I probably didn't realize he was still alive.
Young people look to the future...
