A Note on My Harding Research

The information I posted during 2020 mostly covered Warren Harding's front-porch campaign from his home on Mt. Vernon Avenue in Marion, Ohio. The campaign officially started on July 31, 1920, and ended on September 25. The plan was to post daily on events that occurred exactly 100 years ago that day, but I shared other information as well. You'll have to read bottom-to-top if you want to follow the campaign from Day 1.

I used the open web for some of my research but also information accessible by using my library card or my subscription to www.newspapers.com. The most useful resource was the Marion Star, which was owned by the Hardings at the time of the campaign. I also browsed online copies of other newspapers like the New York Times, the Washington Star, and the Dayton Daily News, which, in 1920, was owned by Harding's Democratic opponent, Governor James M. Cox. I also posted information from other newspapers that covered Harding's trips away from Marion during the campaign.

Another great resource I used was Dale E. Cottrill's The Conciliator, a 1969 biography of the president that expanded an earlier bibliography of Harding's speeches. An online version is available at the Internet Archive, but I used a hard copy borrowed from the State Library of Ohio.

Readers should not construe anything posted here as a political statement on my part. I just like Harding as a historical topic.

7/16/2020

Friday, July 16, 1920

"If Harding sticks to his front porch campaign it oughtn't to be hard to find where he stands." - Dayton Daily News
Harding spends another day working on his acceptance speech. "Working almost without interruption, the candidate put in one of the most arduous days in the two weeks since he returned to Marion," reports the New York Times. "He turned aside from the speech only once or twice to dispose of urgent correspondence, and he abbreviated his lunch period and hurried through the brief daily conferences with his location managers."


Today's callers include a group of English clergy who are mentioned by "The Girl Next Door" in her campaign diary published in newspapers across the country:
They wore little round derbys, high chokers very stiff and proper, and looked very foreign. We learned from the policeman on guard that they...had come all the way from London to see Mr. Harding and, I suppose, to make suggestions about our English policies.
Mrs. Harding -- "now an active participant in the entertainment features of the front porch campaign" -- receives them first on the front porch, then Harding comes over from his office at campaign headquarters for a brief visit.

The Harding campaign announces that it has invited all Republicans whose names were placed in nomination for president to attend the notification ceremonies next week. (I won't list them here; the only name I recognize is Herbert Hoover.)

In Columbus, Governor Cox meets with Alice Paul and other members of the National Woman's Party to discuss the suffrage issue. He leaves for Washington to meet on Sunday with President Wilson.

Sources:
  • "Acceptance Speech Nearly Done." New York Times. 17 July 1920.
  • "Cox Pledges Aid to Swing Tennessee." New York Times. 17 July 1920.
  • Freeland, Eleanor Margaret. "Harding Household Doings Told by the Girl Next Door." Baltimore Sun. 25 July 1920.
  • "Harding Watchful of Cox-Wilson Talk." New York Times. 17 July 1920.
  • "Harding's Rivals Invited." New York Times. 17 July 1920.
  • "Senator Wires St. Louis American Legion Post." Marion Star. 17 July 1920.
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