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.

8/31/2020

Tuesday, August 31, 1920 (GOVERNORS' DAY)

Senator Harding hosts "Governors' Day" today and welcomes a number of politicians who start to arrive early this morning.

Today's speech is nicely summarized by a report in the New York Times: "A continuation of the reclamation policies begun by Theodore Roosevelt, under a larger and more liberal plan that insures equality of privilege and opportunity, was the plea made by Senator Harding in addressing ten Governors and three Republican candidates for Governor who spent today with him here." Reclamation is described elsewhere as "the menace of too much city population and not enough farm population."

The governors are:

  • R. Livingston Beeckman, Rhode Island
  • Thomas E. Campbell, Arizona
  • Robert D. Carr, Wyoming
  • James P. Goodrich, Indiana
  • Frank O. Lowden, Illinois
  • Samuel R. McKelvie, Nebraska
  • Peter Norbeck, South Dakota
  • E. L. Phillip, Wisconsin
  • William C. Sproul, Pennsylvania
  • William D. Stephens, California

The candidates are:

  • Arthur M. Hyde, Missouri
  • E. F. Morgan, West Virginia
  • J. A. O. Preus, Minnesota
Others in attendance include ex-governor William Spry, Utah; Clarence J. Brown, candidate for Ohio lieutenant governor; Simms Ely of Denver; George Stephan of Denver; and William Lloyd of St. Louis.

Here are two photographs of Harding and Representative Joseph Cannon, former Speaker of the House, who is in attendance today.



Here's another of Harding with E. F. Morgan of West Virginia:


In this group shot, Harding is ninth from the left.


Here's the same photograph, cropped, in a contemporary newspaper:

Governor Lowden offers these words: "We admire you, Senator Harding, more than I can say for the dignity and self-restraint with which you discuss public questions. We approve most heartily of the devotion you have to Constitutional Government, and we not only admire your public utterances, Senator Harding, but we applaud the fact that you do not resort to charges against the opposition. It is entirely beyond my power to express the regard we feel for you because you do not hold false promises to the people.."

Harding's introduction:

Your Excellencies: — It is a mighty pleasing thing to greet you as the official representatives of several of our great commonwealths, and especially gratifying to me to be able to take up with you, for brief discussion, one of the most interesting and timely problems of the day. I refer to that of reclamation and development in the great and wonderful West. What a wonderful land is ours! No one has ever come to a full realization of the physical incomparableness of these United States. Nature has been very generous with her bounty and has given us, in the great and measureless West, a variegated and picturesque empire, as beautiful as Switzerland, multiplied many times over in extent, and with a diversification of industry and enterprise which Switzerland could not develop because her mountains are well nigh barren of the riches which characterize the Rockies and the Coast ranges.

After the speech and lunch, the group heads to Garfield Park to attend the annual picnic of the local Grand Army post (although it is the first one in three years). Again the New York Times: "Senator Harding planned this visit because he knew it would please his father, Dr. George T. Harding, a civil war veteran. The candidate and the ten Governors gave up most of the afternoon to the Grand Army men, and the veterans made the most of it. Every one made a speech." Periodically during the speeches, a governor would leave to catch a train.


In Columbus, Cox and Roosevelt visit the Ohio State Fair.

Sources:
  • "Attending Fair." Mansfield News-Journal. 31 August 1920.
  • "Cooper Post Picnic Is Well Attended Today." Marion Daily Star. 31 August 1920.
  • "Governors' Day Over at Marion." Mansfield News-Journal. 31 August 1920.
  • "Menace Seen by Nominee." Marion Star. 31 August 1920.
  • "Notable Visitors Are All Pleased Yesterday." Marion Star. 1 September 1920.
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