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.

8/10/2020

Tuesday, August 10, 1920 (PRIMARY ELECTION)

Will Hays, chair of the Republican National Committee, is in Marion today to discuss the campaign with Senator Harding. After the conference, Hays states, "It is squarely up to the electorate to indorse [sic] or repudiate the last seven years of Democratic maladministration in Washington which to the vast majority of the citizenry of this country stands for a sinful squandering of extravagance, a cataclysm of perverted purposes and broken promises, and, finally, an absolute betrayal of American rights and American interests."

The electorate in Ohio is voting today in the primary election. Harding's voting location is on Greenwood Street:




Five Republicans are in the running to replace Senator Harding in the U.S. Senate:

  • Walter F. Brown, Toledo lawyer
  • Macy Walcutt, a Fairfield County contractor
  • J. P. Walser, an Akron business man
  • R. M. Wanamaker, Ohio supreme court justice
  • Frank B. Willis, former governor

Willis placed Harding's name before the Republican convention at Chicago in June, and Brown was the floor leader of the Harding forces. Harding does not publicly endorse a candidate.

Sources:

  • "Delegations from Indiana." Marion Star. 10 August 1920.
  • "Harding Men Aim to Shift League as Chief Issue." New York Times. 11 August 1920.
  • "Harding Votes Today for Man to Succeed Him." New York Tribune. 10 August 1920.

Images:

  • "Warren G. and Florence Harding voting photographs." Ohio Memory..

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