Barry Morris Goldwater was a businessman and five-term United States Senator from Arizona and the Republican Party's nominee for president in the 1964 election. An articulate and charismatic figure during the first half of the 1960s, he was known as "Mr. Conservative". Goldwater is the politician most often credited for sparking the resurgence of the American conservative political movement in the 1960s. He also had a substantial impact on the libertarian movement. Goldwater rejected the legacy of the New Deal and fought through the conservative coalition against the New Deal coalition. He mobilized a large conservative constituency to win the hard-fought Republican primaries. Goldwater's conservative campaign platform ultimately failed to gain the support of the electorate and he lost the 1964 presidential election to incumbent Democrat Lyndon B. Johnson by one of the largest landslides in history, bringing down many Republican candidates as well. The Johnson campaign and other critics painted him as a reactionary, while supporters praised his crusades against the Soviet Union, labor unions, and the welfare state. [More at Wikipedia]

January 2nd, 1909 in Phoenix  /  Died:   May 29th, 1998