The Richard Nixon Foundation is a not-for-profit organization based at the
Richard Nixon Presidential Library and Museum
The Richard Nixon Presidential Library and Museum is the presidential library and burial site of Richard Milhous Nixon, the 37th president of the United States (1969–1974), and his wife Pat Nixon.
Located in Yorba Linda, California, on land ...
in
Yorba Linda, California
Yorba Linda is a suburban city in northeastern Orange County, California, United States, approximately southeast of Downtown Los Angeles. It is part of the Los Angeles metropolitan area, and had a population of 68,336 at the 2020 census.
Y ...
. It was founded in August 1983
by
Richard Nixon
Richard Milhous Nixon (January 9, 1913April 22, 1994) was the 37th president of the United States, serving from 1969 to 1974. A member of the Republican Party, he previously served as a representative and senator from California and was t ...
, 37th
president of the United States
The president of the United States (POTUS) is the head of state and head of government of the United States of America. The president directs the Federal government of the United States#Executive branch, executive branch of the Federal gove ...
, and served as the governing body of the Nixon Library for nearly twenty years.
Today it operates the Nixon Library in conjunction with the
National Archives and Records Administration
The National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) is an " independent federal agency of the United States government within the executive branch", charged with the preservation and documentation of government and historical records. It i ...
,
[Richard Nixon library offers candid new take on Watergate](_blank)
Syracuse.com, Associated Press, 31 March 2011, accessed November 2011 which is an entity of the federal government of the United States, in addition to undertaking charitable and education-based activities.
The Nixon Foundation founded, controlled and operated the Nixon Library from the library's dedication on July 19, 1990 until July 11, 2007, at which the Foundation invited the National Archives to take control.
The two entities signed a joint operating agreement which allowed the library to become officially known as the Richard Nixon Presidential Library, welcoming it into the national system of presidential libraries. This move allowed President Nixon's White House documents to be moved to his library in Yorba Linda.
The Nixon Foundation is governed by a Board of Directors, led by former Nixon White House domestic adviser James H. Cavanaugh. The board includes President Nixon's daughters
Tricia Nixon Cox
Patricia Nixon Cox ( Nixon; born February 21, 1946) is the elder daughter of the 37th United States president Richard Nixon and First Lady Pat Nixon, and sister to Julie Nixon Eisenhower.
She is married to Edward F. Cox and is the mother of Chr ...
and
Julie Nixon Eisenhower
Julie Nixon Eisenhower ( Nixon; born July 5, 1948) is an American author who is the younger daughter of former U.S. president Richard Nixon and his wife Pat Nixon. Her husband David is the grandson of former U.S. president Dwight D. Eisenhower ...
, former Ambassador
George Argyros former California Governor
Pete Wilson
Peter Barton Wilson (born August 23, 1933) is an American attorney and politician who served as the 36th governor of California from 1991 to 1999. A member of the Republican Party, he also served as a United States senator from California betw ...
, nationally-known radio host
Hugh Hewitt and longest-serving Vietnam War POW
Everett Alvarez Jr.
Everett Alvarez Jr. (born December 23, 1937) is a former United States Navy officer who endured one of the longest periods as a prisoner of war (POW) in Military history of the United States, U.S. military history. Alvarez was the first U.S. pilot ...
The Foundation's President and CEO is Jim Byron.

The Foundation has hosted United States presidents,
first ladies and several
vice presidents
A vice president, also director in British English, is an officer in government or business who is below the president (chief executive officer) in rank. It can also refer to executive vice presidents, signifying that the vice president is on ...
.
Also hosted have been public affairs commentators such as
Bill O'Reilly, academics such as
Doris Kearns Goodwin
Doris Helen Kearns Goodwin (born January 4, 1943) is an American biographer, historian, former sports journalist, and political commentator. She has written biographies of several U.S. presidents, including ''Lyndon Johnson and the American Drea ...
,
and Supreme Court Justice
Stephen Breyer
Stephen Gerald Breyer ( ; born August 15, 1938) is a retired American lawyer and jurist who served as an associate justice of the U.S. Supreme Court from 1994 until his retirement in 2022. He was nominated by President Bill Clinton, and re ...
.
The library includes "Meet the Presidents," in which presidential impersonators speak to several hundred school-aged children. To commemorate the 10th anniversary of the
September 11, 2001 attacks
The September 11 attacks, commonly known as 9/11, were four coordinated suicide terrorist attacks carried out by al-Qaeda against the United States on Tuesday, September 11, 2001. That morning, nineteen terrorists hijacked four commerc ...
, the Nixon Foundation brought 16 tons of warped steel from the
World Trade Center and a damaged, first-responder FDNY firetruck to the Nixon Library for viewing.
Before the National Archives took over its management, the Nixon Library had been accused by several media outlets of glossing over Nixon's 1974 resignation with "whitewashed" exhibits.
In 2007, the National Archives removed the 17 year old Watergate exhibit and, after three years, the new exhibit was scheduled to open in July 2010. The Nixon Foundation objected to the proposed exhibit, because the Nixon Foundation was not consulted in the way that other presidential foundations had been consulted with similar situations. The Foundation filed a 158-page memorandum to the Assistant Archivist for Presidential Libraries expressing their dissatisfaction and NARA stated a committee would review the objection but gave no timeline for when that process would be concluded. The exhibit opened on March 31, 2011.
"Nixon Library Opens a Door Some Would Prefer Left Closed"
by Adam Nagourney, "The New York Times
''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...
", March 31, 2011 (April 1, 2011 p.A19 NY ed.). Retrieved 2011-04-01.
Footnotes
External links
The Richard Nixon Foundation
The Richard Nixon Foundation Youtube Channel
{{Authority control
Richard Nixon