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.

9/07/2020

Tuesday, September 7, 1920 (ON THE WAY TO MINNEAPOLIS/ST. PAUL)

Senator Harding makes his first campaign trip outside of Ohio. A special train leaves Marion at 7:30 a.m. The Hardings are joined by "George B. Christian, Jr., private secretary to the senator; Dr. and Mrs. C. E. Sawyer; Frank Gibbs, secretary to Harry M. Daugherty, member of the Republican National Executive committee; Judson C. Welliver, director of publicity at Harding headquarters; James Sloan, secret service operative; and a number of newspaper men."

Spencerville, Ohio

As reported by the Spencerville Journal-News, "Perhaps the shortest speech that Senator Warren G. Harding will make during his entire campaign was made at Spencerville Tuesday forenoon... Senator Harding was enroute from Marion to the state fair of Minnesota over a special train on the Erie. The train had stopped for a few minutes at Spencerville for a new supply of water for the tender, and Senator Harding stepped to the rear platform of the back coach, just as the train started. A number of Spencerville men attempted to shake hands with the Senator and his words of caution followed":

Boys be careful. Don't get hurt.

Huntington, Indiana


Harding speaks to a "crowd of more than 200 enthusiastic citizens who received him at the Erie station at 10 o'clock Tuesday morning":

Let me say to you, my fellow countrymen, it is a very great compliment to have you come down to greet us in passing and I very gladly return your greeting. If it were possible in our hurried schedule to stop and meet you all personally that would be an added pleasure. 

I take it that you are interested alike in the welfare of our common country, but I know human nature well enough to know how natural it is to be interested in the things that specifically and more particularly concern us as individuals. And I happen to know Huntington. We are neighbors. We are linked by the Erie Railroad, and I take it that you residents of this great railroad center, with hundreds of men in the railway employment and active in the citizenship of this community, are more interested in the railway question than any other. But I would not talk to you solely as railway workers or as fellow citizens interested in the railway problem because we are interested in the good fortunes of America, and the railways of this land are the nerve lines by which we get our energies, through which we are kept in communication, by whose transportation our industries and our farms are made to prosper, by whose connections we are kept in touch with one another, and America becomes one people...

Tne report in the New York Times suggests that six to seven hundred people meet Harding's train here.

Fort Sheridan, Illinois

The Harding train arrives in Chicago at 3:30 p.m. Because of a change in the schedule, the train does not stop at the Englewood station, where a crowd has gathered to greet him; instead the Hardings stop at the Dearborn station. Former front-runner for the Republican nomination, General Leonard Wood greets the Harding party and takes them to his residence at Fort Sheridan. Per the Times, the "cars sped rapidly along Michigan Boulevard on the road to Fort Sheridan. The streets were crowded with pedestrians and traffic, but only one man in front of the Art Institute showed signs of recognizing the Senator."

The Chicago Tribune reports that "Senator Harding visited Fort Sheridan hospital, shook the hands of several hundred wounded soldiers, passed from bed to bed, and spoke a few words of sympathy and cheer to each."





Mrs. Harding and Mrs. Leonard Wood; General Leonard Wood and Senator Harding

Here's a photograph of Harding greeting the wounded men:

Deerfield, Illinois

Harding's party then drives to Deerfield, "where he found himself at home among villagers, who crowded about him to show him their babies":

It is mighty nice of you to come out and greet us in this informal way. It has been a very great pleasure indeed to grasp you by the hand and know you face to face. You know that is the gospel I am preaching this year for the people of the United States, that is a better understanding of our mutuality of interest in everything done in this country. 

I have been thinking today of the wonderful development of the Northwest. We take things so readily for granted that we never stop to think what made us what we are. This section of the country in its development is not yet a century old, and in this brief time we have been building this wonderful country of ours, we have been working to the perfection of a new civilization and a habitation and a condition which are the pride of all Americans...

Sources:
  • "Harding on Trip Talks From Train." New York Times. 8 September 1920.
  • "Harding Visits Fort Sheridan and Deerfield." Chicago Tribune. 9 September 1920.
  • "Senator Harding and Party Leave This Morning for Chicago and Minneapolis." Marion Star. 7 September 1920.
  • "Senator Harding at Spencerville." Spencerville Journal-News. 9 September 1920.
  • "Senator Warren G. Harding Makes Short Speech as His Train Stops in This City." Huntington Herald. 7 September 1920.
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