Amazon.com's Best of 2001
In Carter Beats the Devil, Glen David Gold subjects the past to the same wondrous transformations as the rabbit in a skilled illusionist's hat. Gold's debut novel opens with real-life magician Charles Carter executing a particularly grisly trick, using President Warren G. Harding as a volunteer. Shortly afterwards, Harding dies mysteriously in his San Francisco hotel room, and Carter is forced to flee the country. Or does he? It's only the first of many misdirections in a magical performance by Gold. In the course of subsequent pages, Carter finds himself pursued by the most hapless of FBI agents; falls in love with a beautiful, outspoken blind woman; and confronts an old nemesis bent on destroying him. Throw in countless stunning (and historically accurate) illusions, some beautifully rendered period detail, and historical figures like young inventor Philo T. Farnsworth and self-made millionaire Francis "Borax" Smith, and you have old-fashioned entertainment executed with a decidedly modern sensibility.
Gold has written for movies and TV, so it's no surprise that he delivers snappy, fast-paced dialogue and action scenes as expertly scripted as anything that's come out of Hollywood in years. Carter Beats the Devil has a mustachioed villain, chase scenes, a lion, miraculous escapes, even pirates, for God's sake. Yet none of this is as broadly drawn as it might sound: Gold's characters are driven by childhood sorrows and disappointments in love, just like the rest of us, and they're limned in clever, quicksilver prose. By turns suspenseful, moving, and magical, this is the historical novel to give to anyone who complains that contemporary fiction has lost the ability to both move and entertain. --Mary Park
Book Description
In Carter Beats the Devil, Glen David Gold subjects the past tothe same wondrous transformations as the rabbit in a skilled illusionist's hat.Gold's debut novel opens with real-life magician Charles Carter executing aparticularly grisly trick, using President Warren G. Harding as a volunteer.Shortly afterwards, Harding dies mysteriously in his San Francisco hotel room,and Carter is forced to flee the country. Or does he? It's only the first ofmany misdirections in a magical performance by Gold. In the course of subsequentpages, Carter finds himself pursued by the most hapless of FBI agents; falls inlove with a beautiful, outspoken blind woman; and confronts an old nemesis benton destroying him. Throw in countless stunning (and historically accurate)illusions, some beautifully rendered period detail, and historical figures likeyoung inventor Philo T. Farnsworth and self-made millionaire Francis "Borax"Smith, and you have old-fashioned entertainment executed with a decidedly modernsensibility. Gold has written for movies and TV, so it's no surprise that he delivers snappy,fast-paced dialogue and action scenes as expertly scripted as anything that'scome out of Hollywood in years. Carter Beats the Devil has a mustachioedvillain, chase scenes, a lion, miraculous escapes, even pirates, for God's sake.Yet none of this is as broadly drawn as it might sound: Gold's characters aredriven by childhood sorrows and disappointments in love, just like the rest ofus, and they're limned in clever, quicksilver prose. By turns suspenseful,moving, and magical, this is the historical novel to give to anyone whocomplains that contemporary fiction has lost the ability to both move andentertain. --Mary Park
Download Description
America in the 1920s was a nation obsessed with magic. Not just the kind performed in theaters and on stages across the country, but the magic of technology, science, and prosperity. Enter Charles Carter—a.k.a. Carter the Great—a young master performer whose skill as an illusionist exceeds even that of the great Houdini.
Fueled by a passion for magic that grew out of desperation and loneliness, Carter has become a legend in his own time. His thrilling act involves outrageous stunts carried out on elaborate sets before the most demanding audiences. But the most outrageous stunt of all stars none other than President Warren Harding and ends up nearly costing Carter the reputation he worked so hard to create.
Filled with historical references that evoke the excesses and enthusiasm of postwar, pre-Depression America, Carter Beats the Devil is the complex and illuminating story of one man's journey through a magical—and sometimes dangerous—world, where illusion is everything, and everything is illusory.
Customer Reviews:
I tried.......2007-08-21
I normally read non-fiction. Politics, science, and environmental policy are my usual fare. I mention this so you know that I am quite comfortable investing in and reading through relatively dry, boring material.
Having said that, I could not bring myself to finish Carter Beats the Devil. I started reading it on a flight between San Francisco and Portland, and tried, really, really tried, to continue it once I got home.
I couldn't.
This book meanders aimlessly through a plot and introduces characters I couldn't bring myself to care about. I made it just beyond where Carter visits his adult brother and to the murder in...in...where was it again?
Who knows? Certainly not me.
I stuck it on the shelf and cracked open Al Gore's The Assault on Reason.
Ah...much better.
I must admit - I'm puzzled by the glowing reviews of Carter Beats the Devil. I'm surprised anyone would rate this book highly.
Magic and Mayhem - What a Treat!.......2007-05-22
This is a great book. Set in the San Francisco area in the 1920s, it tells a tale of murder, mayhem, romance and magic that is, amazingly, mostly factual. It's true that the author does take some liberties with the facts in several places, but it's all in the spirit of fun at the core of this novel. You'll meet magicians, a US president, secret service men, entrepreneurs, inventors, pirates, lions and elephants before this book ends and if you're like me you'll be left wanting more. Author Glen David Gold captures the spirit of the age - the rapid pace of technological innovation, the profligate spending habits of those with money - with a clarity that made me see the similarities to the present era in a way I had never considered before.
Granted, this was a fairly long book by current standards, but it was a page-turner that captured me within the first few pages and carried me effortlessly along all the way to the end. When will Glen David Gold produce another novel? The sooner the better as far as I am concerned. Definitely recommended.
Humor, History, Adventure and Mystery.......2007-05-18
I can't remember the last time I read something this exciting-- just plain fun! This is a great read for anyone who enjoyed The Illusionist or The Prestige, but has the added advantage of humor infused throughout. Gold has expertly crafted the characters, written clever dialogue, and created an entertaining mix of historical fiction, mystery, adventure, and humor. This novel would translate well on the screen.
Clever, fast-paced and entertaining.......2007-03-14
A well done suspenseful intricately told story that surrounds the mysterious death of President Warren Harding.
The backdrop of magic and Vaudeville gives a colorful cast of characters including; an evil magician, a pet lion, a genius inventor, the money managing brother, Houdini and even a pirate.
Charles Carter is a sympathetic protagonist who we enjoy rooting for, sometimes from the edge of our seat. His magic reminds me of David Copperfield's, amazing and fantastic.
The many historical references add another layer of interest. I gasped out loud several times at the unexpected twists and turns in this story.
Making Character Disappear.......2007-02-04
Glen Gold is a good writer who can show a clever
turn of phrase. He knows how to build a plot and
even though this book wanders off from time to time,
he knows how to charm an audience.
I was thoroughly entertained by Carter and I enjoyed
being the victim of his magic trick as the plot
comes together. What disappointed me was that
there was not much development of Carter as a
character. I didn't feel that I knew him any better
at the end of the book than I did when I followed
his childhood at the beginning.
A book that's about magic and illusion really invites
the reader to ask and answer questions about what's
real and what's smoke and mirrors. I finished this book
feeling sorry that this very good writer didn't go
deeper. Still it was a great entertainment and
perfect for a long airplane ride.
--Lynn Hoffman, author of THE NEW SHORT COURSE IN WINE and
the forthcoming novel bang BANG from Kunati Books.ISBN
9781601640005
Book Description
Warren G. Harding may be best known as America's worst president. Scandals plagued him: the Teapot Dome affair, corruption in the Veterans Bureau and the Justice Department, and the posthumous revelation of an extramarital affair. Raised in Marion, Ohio, Harding took hold of the small town's newspaper and turned it into a success. Showing a talent for local politics, he rose quickly to the U.S. Senate. His presidential campaign slogan, 'America's present need is not heroics but healing, not nostrums but normalcy,' gave voice to a public exhausted by the intense politics following World War I. Once elected, he pushed for legislation limiting the number of immigrants; set high tariffs to relieve the farm crisis after the war; persuaded Congress to adopt unified federal budget creation; and reduced income taxes and the national debt, before dying unexpectedly in 1923. In this wise and compelling biography, John W. Dean-no stranger to controversy himself-recovers the truths and explodes the myths surrounding our twenty-ninth president's tarnished legacy.
Customer Reviews:
facts, fiction and supposition.......2007-10-21
There is nothing wrong with giving a broader perspective on Harding, but the documented facts are never going to go away. Anyone who says Harding wasn't responsible for Teapot Dome and all the other corruption scandals that went on during his administration (such as the Veteran's Administration) simply doesn't understand the concept of Chief Executive accountability. While no one has ever said that Harding himself was corrupt, the fact that so much of his inner circle was corrupt says all we need to say about the man. Harding was a simple man who gave a great speech and had an authority about him. He had a cold wife but he was a man of privilege who preoccupied himself with the pleasures always afforded such men: good cigars, women on the side, golf and other activities with his male peers of the day. He left the day to day running of the country to a set of cronies who ultimately proved to be thoroughly rotten. Apologetic Republicans would like to re-write this little stretch of history because it is a cautionary tale of cronyism masquerading as conservatism. The fact that John Dean penned this book makes it all the more interesting, but Harding was no Nixon by any stretch of the imagination. Nixon may have left office in disgrace but I think that he was still one of the most intelligent and innovative presidents of the 20th century, and he was running his own show, not somebody else. Harding was more like George W. Bush, a mouthpiece for a staff full of robber barons.
A Half Hail to Harding.......2007-09-21
John Dean's volume on President Harding succeeds due to the following:
1. It takes Harding's accomplishments seriously without subjugating them to his failures as do other biographies (i.e. He had good cabinet members, but chose poorly as well; He was elected by a huge margin but woman voters found him attractive, etc). Harding for too long, as Dean's work observes, has been the victim of bias and not scholarly study. Harding deserves to be taken seriously as president, and Dean faithfully does this.
2. Although Harding was to some extent a philanderer, the author does not give this undue focus, rather he focuses more on what Harding tried to accomplish, even highlighting his acts of courage.
3. As have other solid biographies, Dean shows how the Harding story was written not by historians, but by anti-Harding writers, and how his private papers, long hidden and not catalogued, allowed anyone to write basically anything. Of interest were the comments by Randolph Downes, who, after juxtaposing the discovered Harding papers to popular opinion about Harding, wrote in his article "The Harding Muckfest" in the Northwest Ohio Quarterly:
"It is high time for a painstakingly honest and scholarly appraisal of the life of Warren G. Harding."
It is of interest that a recent book on the Teapot Dome scandal was titled "Slick and the Duchess", again sensationalizing the Harding years (Was Harding called "Slick" when he lived?, was the "Duchess", Mrs. Harding, even involved in the Teapot Dome scandal?)
Building upon Murray's "The Harding Era", Ferrell's The Strange Death's of President Harding, and Trani and Wilson's "The Presidency of Warren Harding" Dean's book continues a fair historical and academic renovation of the Harding years.
However, that being said, one still gets the picture of an historian rummaging through a pile of Harding papers, holding one up and proclaiming "See, the real Harding years were better than what many think!" True enough, but even when the real Harding has stood up, there just isn't enough in the pile to really take Harding beyond this. While Dean's book restores Harding to where he should be, it cannot save him from his lackluster place in American History.
Posthumous Rehabilitation.......2007-06-20
John W. Dean is a native of Marion Ohio and lived a few blocks from Harding's home. Since his teenage years Dean has read almost every book about Harding. This book attempts to get the right facts about a President who was given a bad reputation after his untimely death at age 58. Warren Gamaliel Harding was a precocious child, the oldest of the children. His father studied medicine and farmed, his mother was a midwife. Warren worked as a farm boy and was sympathetic to the problems of farmers. He started working in the printing business at age 11. At 14 he started college, and bought a newspaper at age 19. Harding made this newspaper a success. The story how Warren met his wife tells about small town life (Chapter 2). [What really happened in those days?]
Harding was elected to the Ohio Senate from a Democratic district. His 1910 defeat as a gubernatorial candidate led to a withdrawal from politics. After the adoption of the 17th Amendment Harding was elected as US Senator (Chapter 3). Harding was a master of rhetoric, high-sounding speech that didn't say much (p.36); a "bloviator". Harding was as skilled in politics as he was in poker (p.43). He prepared for running for President (p.45). Harding became the first US Senator to go directly to the White House (p.52). Read Harding's rhetoric on page 57. Harding positioned himself as a compromise candidate (pp.58-59). It worked (p.66). Woodrow Wilson's desire for a third term shows how he was out of touch with reality (p.68). Harding's campaign set a new precedent in using advertising techniques to sell the President (p.70). Harding won the largest victory in Republican history (p.77).
After the war's end the economy suffered from deflation, tight credit, large inventories, and a drop in foreign trade. Harding picked men with good credentials, and political friends, for his Cabinet. The friends were to create scandals. His choices were considered good (p.93). The "booming economy of the roaring twenties" (p.111)? Agricultural areas were in economic decline. Employee wages were falling (p.114), unemployment rising (p.115). The Wilkerson injunction against railroad workers marked Harding as "antilabor" (p.121). The Washington Naval Conference was to limit battleships (p.133). Other treaties followed. America was back to normalcy. Harding could take care of his enemies, but his friends gave him trouble (p.141).
Harding had health problems before his trip west (p.150. Pneumonia was deadly in those days. But Harding seemed to be getting better until he died of a stroke (p.152). Later that year the Teapot Dome scandal erupted. Oil lands reserved for military use were being leased to private oil companies (pp.156-157). President Harding had approved this. Secretary of the Interior Fall had prospered. President Coolidge started an investigation (p.159). The result was to damage Harding's reputation forever (p.160). Harding's wife burned his papers, so writers were free to create scandalous details. In the 1940s they found Harding's papers were not destroyed, they were turned over to the Ohio Historical Society in 1963. These documents portray a different Harding from the legend (p.168).
Author John W. Dean tries to correct the legend of Harding (pp.161-165) with a sympathetic portrait of the 29the President, the last President from Ohio. Does it seem too good to be true? Why didn't his former Cabinet officers or personal friends ever defend Harding? Nixon was defended by his friends. [I wonder if the facts about Harding's youth would tell us something?]
A quick look at Harding.......2007-04-04
I am reading all the presidential biographies in order.
When I ordered this book, I didn't realize that the author was THE John Dean, from the Nixon Watergate scandal. It was rather surreal at some points reading about presidential scandals by someone involved in a presidential scandal.
I was also suprised at how short this book was, but it felt much longer. I'd say 75% of the time, it read like a textbook (yawn), but I did get a loose sense of what Harding was like. The juicy parts were handled very well, and it was easy to follow the drama. His handling of Harding's last trip when he died was handled rather oddly though. He'd provide too little, then too much information. For instance, I was reading one paragraph about how Harding was resting and preparing for the rest of his trip and reviewing state papers. At the end of the paragraph, I looked up at the clock to see what the time was. When I looked back down, the first sentence of the next paragraph was "Harding died that night."
Also, his explanation of the Teapot Dome scandal was too short, though I guess most of it played out after Harding's death. I will probably investigate that further after this reading project.
I would recommend this book to get a quick overview of Harding if you are reading all the bios like I am. When I have finished this reading project, I will probably want to go back and read a larger book on Harding. Certainly a coloful point in our nation's history...
An obscure man.......2006-12-05
You figure John Dean has, sometime in the last three decades, contemplated the effect of scandal on the public's assessment of an American president? Dean was President Nixon's counsel before becoming his administration's chief accuser. Nixon, of course, is forever linked with Watergate, and whatever was accomplished during his administration - and there was much - is obscured by the glare cast by the biggest political scandal in American history. Without Watergate Nixon wouldn't be bringing up the rear on those historians' lists of American presidents, a bottom-feeder swimming with the likes of Millard Fillmore, James Buchanan, and Warren G. Harding. Harding, if he's remembered at all nowadays, is remembered as the president whose administration gave us the second greatest political scandal in American history - Teapot Dome.
In `Warren G. Harding,' a volume in The American Presidents series, author John Dean claims Harding has been the victim of writers who have "uncritically perpetuated specious and baseless stories." These stories range from the relatively wonkish canard that Harding was a puppet president nominated by a cabal of US senators to the sensational story, first to see print in 1927, claiming Harding was the father of an illegitimate daughter. Harding died young, of natural causes (an `apoplexy stroke,' according to Dean, although later there were rumors he was poisoned by his wife, who was fed up with his extra-marital affairs) only 882 days into his administration. Harding hardly had time to louse things up bad enough to rank him amongst the worst.
And, in some sense, Dean's patient detailing of Harding's life makes his point for him. If you discount the scandals and accusations (all of which waited until after Harding's death to become headline news,) he wasn't the worst president by a long shot. I've read a few books in The American Presidents series and they all follow the classic biography form - Youth (including parents and their forebears); education and early career; political career; party nomination; acts as president and legacy. All these books are under 200 pages longs, and, even with a short-termer like Harding, they all have a lot of ground to cover. Harding was born in 1864, bought the Marion Star in 1884, and was by profession a newspaper editor. He was first elected to the United States Senate in 1914. In 1920 he won the Republican nomination to run for president on the tenth ballot, and went on to win a landslide victory over his Democratic opponent, James Cox. In the meantime we learn "everyone appreciated Harding's political civility and personal graciousness," Harding Cabinet appointees were well above average, and he had the strength of character to hew to his fiscal conservatism and veto a popular bonus bill for veterans of World War I.
There's a movement afoot to rehabilitate Harding's reputation, and Dean surely belongs in that camp. It can be argued that Harding shouldn't be held accountable for the actions of Administration officials. After all, he wasn't the Interior Secretary taking kickbacks for oil leases, nor was he the Veterans' Bureau administrator who was also taking kickbacks, in this case for the construction of hospitals. Nor was he the Attorney General who was eventually tried on charge of conspiring to defraud the US government. But it all happened during his brief tenure, and all have to be a part of the equation when assessing Harding as president. If those scandals are all entered on the debit side of the ledger sheet, there's precious little to put down as assets. Although Dean does yeoman work, it's hard to disagree with H.L. Mencken's assessment of Harding, written shortly after the President's sudden death, a reaction piece questioning the outpouring of transient affection for the departed leader. Mencken called Harding "an obscure man" who "leaves behind him a career so horribly bare of achievement, and also so bare of intelligible effort, that the historian will have to labor, indeed, to make him more than a name." Dean gives us more than a name, but still something less than a mediocre president.
Customer Reviews:
Warren the Bad.......2005-09-02
The worst of our presidents? That's the usual judgment, but it's hard to say because nothing of real consequence occurred during Harding's two years in office that would have tested his mettle: calling the Washington Conference in 1921 to limit naval armaments, perhaps his biggest (positive) accomplishment, doesn't exactly go down in history as memorable. His reputation, though, much of it hidden from the public until long after his death, is horrendous. He would rather play poker than do anything else, and he revelled in his own pomposity. He fathered a child out of wedlock as a Senator and had other affairs as well. His presidency was one of the most corrupt in history: many of his cabinet cronies were involved in one scandal after another, the biggest being the Teapot Dome affair, which was all about selling off the government's oil reserve to the highest bidders behind everyone's back. Not much to admire, and Russell pulls no punches in expressing his disdain for his subject. The book is solidly written, though it is overly long, especially where Russell goes into Harding's death (food poisoning?) in California. One of the better Presidential biographies out there, however. Recommended.
ooh the delicious taste of scandal.......2005-06-25
Over the last several years I have read around 30 presidential biographies, usually using Amazon readers as my guide to find the best available book. This is certainly my favorite biography of a failed presidency. Many presidents are "in over their heads" once they become president. Harding was over his head as a senator , if not before. He was a fairly successful small town newspaper publisher and a gregarious glad-hander. Shadow of Blooming Grove lays out all of the sordid details in a highly readable way, connecting the reader to the times. Covered are the rumors of Harding being a mulatto, his marriage to a difficult woman, Ohio politics (which managed to produce about every other president for 60 years), the smoke filled room convention, the cronyism and party life in Washington D.C. , the almost complete involvement of Harding's cabinet in one shady deal after another, and Harding's affairs and his illegitimate child. Amazingly, Harding remained popular with the people as so little of the scandals made it into the press while he is alive.
Reading reviews of other Harding books on Amazon and finding that John Dean tries to rehabilitate Harding's reputation is laughable. Personally, Harding is a disaster. As a president he was incompetent, and his administration was rife with corruption.
My edition of Shadow of Blooming Grove has a few quotes and half-pages from Harding's love letters to a mistress censored out due to threats of a lawsuit. Even 40 years after his death, his family tried to hang onto to some decency. The censorship just adds to the fun.
I highly recommend Shadow of Blooming Grove, a top ten presidential biography.
warren G.......2003-09-19
This is by far the best book on President Harding. The name "shadow of blooming grove" apparently refers to a rumour that he had black ancestors, if this is true then Jesse Jackson can sit down because we have had a black president.
Harding has been sighted as the worst of American presidents. he was currupt(teapot dome) and he cheated on his wife and he was not interested in foriegn policy and the country suffered internal strife during his administration(the communists were on the loose).
Now this book helps bring Harding to life, to let us understand his roots, the bigotry against him and his presidency. What one will see is that perhaps Mr. Harding was not the worst president. He presidency was beset by the same failures as the CLinton administration and the Grant administration.
A very well researched book.
The Oft-maligned President.......2003-07-12
With few exceptions, Warren G Harding is always referred to as America's "worst president" and this book goes to great depths to find out just exactly why.
It's no secret now that Warren G. Harding was the William Jefferson Clinton of his day when it came to an eye for the opposite sex. The difference between the two in this regard (which in no way compares their presidencies) is that in Harding's day, no one talked about it, and if they did, absolutely no one wrote about it.
Harding was one of the most notorious (and last) of America's "selected" Presidents, where party bosses met in "smokey back rooms" and arrived at reasonable compromises. In fact, the author is sympathetic to the reasoning that Harding never had any aspirations on being President and probably could have cared less if he had lost. (It's hard to say he showed any passion in campaigning for the job)
Harding was faced with many obstacles besides an inability to keep his zipper up. He doesn't seem to have made the wisest choice in his choosing of a mate, in fact, according to the author, she appears to be the one who had true aspirations for the presidency.
Harding was dogged throughout the campaign by rumors that he was of African-American descent, something that his relatives still seem intent on fighting to this day. What does appear to be true is the fact that the family were devout abolitionists and served on the Underground Railroad.
Harding's most prominent flaw seems to be his affability, something that many had assumed at the time to be his dominant strength. His inability to call his friends to task, allowed them to run free with the power of the Federal government.
His death will be controversial for years to come, and the author does little to truly answer the question of murder vs. food poisioning, but his presidency remains notorious. If simply for the fact that is considered "the worst."
Why not the worst?.......2003-06-25
Harding often makes the list of the worst presidents in US history and this book explores the reasons behind this judgement. Never a statesman, deeply flawed and ultimately tragic, shows what happens when a person whose only qualifications for the job was that he was good natured back slapper above controversy is elected to the presidency. He was from an important state which helped as well, but these should never be considered as qualifcations for the highest office in the land.
Harding was scandal prone from his early days. There was a rather nasty rumor that, given the circumstances of the time significant. This was that his family was part African American. In some ways this was the transformation of the old Democratic civil war "bloody shirt" strategy that dated back to Reconstruction. The Republicans were accused even after they had abandoned Civil Rights (in 1876) of somehow attempting to promote African American interests at the expense of white Americans. This issue continued to pop up throughout Harding's career.
Then there are the women. Harding was married to a woman who appears to have been a bit of a shrew. He sought comfort elsewhere and from a variety of sources. His primary mistress was a political liabilty for more than obvious reasons. Carrie Phillips was pro-German and after the end of their affair was a thorn in Harding's flesh. Unfortunately, the letters between the two are surpressed in this book due to the legal efforts of Harding's nephew, George T. Harding. Given Harding's reputation, it is unclear what he was trying to protect by doing so. I suppose, given Harding's questionable fluency in English, the letters might make for a further negative reassessment. After all when one is the second worst president, one has to fight tooth and nail anything that would put one below James Buchanan even a collection of letters which may express certain needs in a less than eloquent manner.
There is also Nan Britton, who was kind of the Monica Lewinsky of her day. Fortunately for Harding, this story of their affair and daughter did not come to public notice until after he died.
Sex scandals were only part of Harding's presidency. The people he selected for high office were the worst kind of cronies, who saw public service as the means to make a raid on the treasury and public property. The worst of these was the Teapot Dome scandal in which national oil reserves were sold to private companies below what would be considered fair market price (in exchange for bribes). This was not Harding's finest hour, but again luckily he was dead when most of these revelations became public. By then stories of bootlegged liquor in the White House, Little Houses on K Street and stock market tips (which proved to be bad ones) had destroyed Harding's reputation forever. This is why Harding is remembered as one of our worst presidents. Long term relationships with near treasonous mistresses and out-of-wedlock children are really just local colour.
Harding's presidency was not quite the disaster it might have been, due to the lack of any great national crisis during his presidency. It is fortunate that this mediocre figure was not in power during a war or economic recession. His role could only have been negative as Russell frequently demonstrates. Theodore Roosevelt privately felt that he had had it too easy during his presidency and that had he lived through more trying times as Lincoln did he might have achieved even greater things. Harding is the inverse, had he been really tested, he might have destroyed the republic in the most amiable of fashions.
Though the subject of Russell's book is not an important figute, it does serve as a cautionary tale of what can go wrong in the selection of presidents. In 1920, the Republicans would have been better served by nominating Leonard Wood (an associate of Theodore Roosevelt). Russell is a fan of Wood's who is far a more compelling figure. If anything this proves that the reputation of Harding is beyond all hope.
Amazon.com
A convincing reassessment of President Warren Harding's sudden death in 1923 is only one of the high points in this exhaustive biography of the president's wife, Florence (1860-1924). The author presents a detailed, three-dimensional portrait of the complicated woman he persuasively claims was the first truly modern First Lady: an equal partner in--indeed, the undisputed manager of- -her husband's career, and a trusted advisor whose opinions were always consulted. She'd had hard knocks, including a child conceived out of wedlock and an alcoholic first husband, but in public Florence always possessed the dignified, commanding presence that won her the nickname "Duchess." The contrast between her staid demeanor and Warren's partying ways, which included frequent and flagrant infidelities, makes for some juicy passages in an otherwise sober account of a transitional figure in the long struggle by American women to gain political power. --Wendy Smith
Book Description
A major new biography of the politically powerful forerunner of Eleanor Roosevelt and Hillary Clinton.
Deeply researched and richly told, Florence Harding reveals the never-before-told story of First Lady Florence Harding's phenomenal rise to power. The daughter of an abusive father in small-town Ohio, mother at a young age to an illegitimate child, Florence Harding saw her escape in Warren Harding, and became the driving force behind his ascent to one of the most scandal-ridden presidencies in United States history.Preeminent First Ladies biographer Carl Sferrazza Anthony not only captures the drama of Florence Harding's personality, but he uses the White House to bring to life Jazz Age America -- a world of speakeasies and Miss America, Babe Ruth, Al Jolson, and the rise of Hollywood. He shows how Florence's friendship with Evalyn McLean, the morphine-addicted owner of the Hope Diamond and The Washington Post was one of the defining bonds in her public life. With newly unsealed medical information, Florence Harding finally unfolds the mystery of whether the First Lady poisoned the President, whose death occurred seventy-five years ago. Florence Harding is a fascinating and informative look at a lost chapter in American history.
Customer Reviews:
An Outstanding Biography.......2005-08-29
Writer Carl Anthony has composed an outstanding biography in his work Florence Harding. Harding Florence Harding been one of the more easily understood or admired First Lady's in this nations history, this book would have been written years ago. However, Mrs. Harding's legacy has been in the past told and retold more as a tabloid story than factual account.
When approaching this book, one needs to understand how Mrs. Harding's legacy was tainted by three men, none of which was her husband Warren G. Harding. First, Gaston Means - a grifter and one time low level FBI agent - did a master job at maligning the deceased Mrs. Harding in his book, The Strange Death of President Harding, a ghost written work that was penned by a tabloid jouranlist who sued Means when he failed to honor his obligations to the writer. In this book, Means paints the picture of Mrs. harding that is pervasive in American Pop Culture: that Mrs. Harding was clueless love lorn hag, who spent her time with mystics plotting the Presidents next moves in star charts. This is an image that the public bought, hook, line and sinker.
The other two men who betrayed Mrs. Harding were her doctor, Charles E. Sawyer and his son Dr. Carl Sawyer. The Sawyers held Mrs. Harding in their sway - she believed that they were great medical doctors, however it was the elder Sawyer's mis diagnosis of President Harding's heart condition as food poisoning. When Charles Sawyer discovered that the widowed First Lady's kidney ailment acted up, he travelled to Washington DC and demanded that Florence return to Marion Ohio for treatment at his private Sanatorium rather than seek treatment at at the better suited facilities in Washington. Mrs, Harding was placed in a cottage at the facility, and then kept at the facility by Sawyer's son Carl after the elder Sawyer died. Following Mrs. Harding's death, Dr. Carl Sawyer assummed total control of the Harding Memorial Association and maintained an iron grip on the Harding legacy until his death in the 1960s. As with all great dictators, Carl Sawyer controlled all aspects of the Harding legacy. As a result, the public never had a fair opportunity to study the Harding's, but rather were fed a steady stream of "approved" information about the couple.
Anthony's work goes the distance in seperating the negative myths from the honest truths in her life, which by any standard was not charmed. However, the author does take liberties in communicating his emotions about Mrs. Harding. He believes that she has been mis-portrayed and his passion about correcting that sometimes overstates her case. However, his book is very well documented by copious endnotes and reliable first person accounts and primary documents.
This book will never be a New York Times best seller - the public would rather believe that Harding Myths inseatd of the facts - but for those who care to learn more about the truths of the 29th President and his most remarkable wife, this is a satisfying and accurate book to read.
A Magnificent Work!.......2003-12-17
How to make a fairly dull and unpleasant like Florence Harding come alive is a difficult enough feat, however the author does a splendid job of doing it! Expertly researched and pleasantly told, Mrs. Harding comes off far better than she has ever been depicted before - and perhaps even better than she deserves.
One of the best biographies ever.......2003-03-30
I found this book hard to put down. I had not realized all the things this obscure first lady was involved with in her life. She looks like somebody's stern grandmother so when I idly looked through this book, I was surprised to find myself drawn in immediately. It is a large book, but I read it very fast as I just could not put it down. This is how a biography should be written, it is well researched and yet still reads almost like a novel.
Living Vicariously.......2002-04-06
Carl Anthony reports in his prologue that the inspiration for this project came from none other than Alice Roosevelt Longworth, one of Florence Harding's collection of mercurial and dysfunctional friends. That fact alone speaks volumes about the tenor and atmosphere of the story. Perhaps aware of America's antipathy toward "The Duchess," Anthony has given this work a title worthy of an Oliver Stone epic. The reader who gets past the burlesque title will discover an intensively fascinating narrative of a driven, unconventional woman intertwined with a malleable young newspaper editor. When, years later, the Duchess would tell her "W'urrn" that she had made him president of the United States, many of their contemporaries would have agreed.
Born in 1860 to an Ohio businessman who wanted a son, Florence was in fact raised as a boy until her fourteenth year, when her domineering father realized that what he had actually created was a feminist with an attitude. He struck back ferociously and physically; Florence eventually retaliated by having herself impregnated by a hayseeder several years her junior. Christmas Day of 1882 found the young mother homeless and abandoned. Anthony takes the time to access the options available to this intelligent, ambitious, but impoverished woman. Determined to not disappear into rural Ohio obscurity giving piano lessons, Florence makes two critical decisions that would change her life forever, for better and worse: she gave her child away, and she set her cap for the man through whom she could make her mark in the public forum. On the surface these seem like cynical strategies, but with feminist sympathies Anthony takes pains to remind the reader that American business and politics were both male bastions in the Gilded Age. There were few routes for a woman of ambition.
Florence married the handsome and randy Warren Harding and immediately took over the operation of his local paper, turning a handsome profit and expanding the couple's business ventures. Anthony lets his facts carry the story: the Harding marriage is clearly one of convenience, arguably Florence's more than her husband's. Unencumbered by children, the Duchess, as she came to be called for obvious reasons, had time to consort with the political beat writers and politicians who came to Marion. She tended bar at their poker games, plied them with liquor for information and party gossip, and strategized a grand design for her husband's career in Ohio Republican politics. Managing Warren Harding was a full time job. He was not by nature ambitious, he was not a particularly good businessman, and he was not physically or mentally well, having suffered nervous breakdowns and indications of cardiovascular disease. His most obvious flaw-and one particularly odious to his wife-was his womanizing, which continued virtually to his death, with little concealment, and occasionally on the sly with her best friends.
For two people as different as Warren and the Duchess, it is surprising that they shared one common fatal flaw: they were both dreadfully poor judges of character. For all her intelligence and savvy, the Duchess became dependent [perhaps co-dependent] upon two outright rogues, Charles "Doc" Sawyer, her personal physician, and a gypsy fortune teller, Madame Marcia, both of whom exercised excessive influence throughout the entire Harding Administration. There is a sense in which Florence becomes more insecure with her greater success: Anthony describes her as weeping on Warren's Inauguration Day because of Madame Marcia's prediction that the new president would not live out his term.
Writing about a president's wife inevitably involves detailing the president and the presidency itself. Anthony does a creditable job in paying appropriate attention to Teapot Dome and Veterans Affairs scandals, for example, but in ways that keep the focus of the narrative on Florence and other political wives--Grace Coolidge, Emma Fall, and the aforementioned Mrs. Longworth, for example. The later unraveling of the Harding Administration has obscured the activism of the First Lady; Anthony reminds us of the Duchess's emotional investment in women's rights, veterans' welfare, animal rights, and international peace.
Anthony takes the position that the fateful 1923 "Alaska Trip" was essentially the First Lady's act of self-promotion. Ostensibly, the President's lavish cross continent tour was undertaken to rally political support at a time when congressional investigation of the executive branch was accelerating. The author's narrative of the trip forms a good portion of the book and deservedly so. Warren Harding was depressed and ill as the presidential train left Washington and journeyed across the continent. After innumerable speeches and rallies, the party sets sail from California to Alaska, traveling overland to sites that have probably not seen a president since. Although Anthony debunks many of the myths about the trip, the facts are strange enough-the presidential vessel collided twice with other vessels, and several members of the party were killed in various accidents.
The great mystery of the trip among conspiracy buffs is what [or who?] killed Warren Harding. In one sense the answer is simple enough-the trip exhausted the president to the point where he either suffered a stroke or heart attack in San Francisco. That we cannot say for certain is due to the Duchess, who permitted only Doc Sawyer to treat her husband. Sawyer's incompetence is excelled only by his arrogance; when Herbert Hoover fetched a renowned cardiologist from Stanford to the president's bedside, Sawyer, who was treating the chief executive with questionable purgatives, would have nothing to do with him.
For a veteran of the journalist profession, the Duchess's management of the news of the President's death was poor, and veteran reporters at once smelled cover-up. Most likely her immediate concern was the reputation of Sawyer, and she refused permission for an official autopsy. But her greater worry was the legacy of her husband; she spent weeks burning his official papers and personal correspondence. Her podium destroyed, Florence Harding outlived her husband by one year; she died while in residence at Sawyer's "sanitarium."
.
A Great Social Biography.......2001-02-26
I bought Anthony's biography of Florence Harding some time ago and it's sat a while in my "need to read stack". Every time a friend came over and saw it they laughed, questioning why I would have any interest Florence Harding. And I was hard pressed to explain why. But having just completed it I find it an amazing story and great compainion volume to Barbara Goldsmith's wonderful "other Powers" about Victoria Woodhull. More than a personal story, Anthony has given us a great social history of the era and early hipocracies of America's good old days. Eveyone would be better educated it they read this volume. And as to the Hardings, well the less said the better... as you will enjoy every single page of this great biography. Enjoy!
Average customer rating:
- Keep a spare copy of this one just in case
- History Laid Bare
- Fascinating Facts That Our History Teacher Never Mentioned
- A fun and frisky romp through the bedrooms of yesteryear.
- History no one knows much about
|
History Laid Bare: Love, Sex, and Perversity from the Ancient Etruscans to Warren G. Harding
Richard Zacks
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A book that illuminates the underbelly of history, telling you about everything that your history teacher never did. From Cleopatra's seduction of Marc Antony to Leonardo DaVinci's dirty jokes, from the virginity tests of Joan of Arc to Toulouse Lautrec's admiration of redheads, Zacks digs up the dirt on the celebrities of yesteryear.
Customer Reviews:
Keep a spare copy of this one just in case.......2004-12-28
This is a book likely to be stolen from your coffee table for its delicious romp through the back rooms of history. It's full of bawdy stories and poetry about history's most notorious figures written (mostly) during their lifetimes. You will laugh out loud at the verse about Julius Caesar's promiscuity and the size of King Charles II's "royal sceptre", the humorous epigrams of the great Roman satirists, the wit of Mark Twain, and the sexual superstitions of the past. It more than fills the void left by PLAYBOY when it ended the Classic Ribaldry section years ago because many of the entries are about real people whose names you've heard in history lessons since you were a child. My only complaint about this book is that it isn't longer with even more stories about Napoleon, Thomas Jefferson, and everyone else who seems larger than life. This book adds to their humanity.
History Laid Bare.......2001-12-13
This book is where you go to learn the things they wouldn't teach in school.
Fascinating Facts That Our History Teacher Never Mentioned.......1998-04-01
In this book Zacks has compiled an extensive collection of facts about how Sex played a major role in history. The more I read, the more amazed I was at how history is cleansed of these realities before we are taught it in school. This book has made me hungry to dig up other books that fill in the blanks in my knowledge of the past.
A fun and frisky romp through the bedrooms of yesteryear........1997-01-11
It seemed to me that history classes took all the life out
out of the past leaving a shell of battle dates and wars.
I never really cared about that. This book puts back what
history teachers (and time) took out: The Smut!
This book is an easy read as it has a lot of humor served in
doses of one to two paragraphs. The subject is not wartime
strategies...well, not on the battlefield. Cleopatra's
seduction of Marc Anthony was better planned than most
military skirmishes, and was far more successful with only
one moonstruck casualty.
I would recommend this book for anyone who loves history,
and even for those that found it tedious in school. It is
essentually a fun and frisky romp through the bedrooms of
yesteryear.
History no one knows much about.......1996-12-06
I found this book to be very humorous and quite amusing. As it said in the prologue, this is the kind of history that adds life and color to the old, cold marble statues that litter antiquity. I've always been very interested in history, but with traditional textbooks, one is often at a loss to explain what many people used to do for fun or even how they propigated themselves. This book holds all the answers to those pressing questions and presents them in a readable format that would hold the attention of even the most burned-out-on-history student
Average customer rating:
- Inspired Lunacy.
- The funniest book I have ever read!!!!
- Hilarious and Historical!
- Funny, funny--and there sure aren't enough of those anymore.
- Surpirsed to find so much hate filled language
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My Search for Warren Harding
Robert Plunket
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Customer Reviews:
Inspired Lunacy........2007-07-08
This is one of the funniest books I've ever read. It is a blend of slapstick, gallows humor, and literary wit, the likes we haven't seen since Nabokov's Pale Fire, which this book nods to often, with its incorporation of recipes (cold squash soup, sour cream coffee cake), a hysterical acknowledgments page (where the character complains about the Foundation that has provided his grant money but "disassociated" itself from his project) and footnotes.
The plot concerns a desperate historian who moves into the poolhouse of Warren Harding's still-alive ex-mistress in Southern California in hopes of nabbing her trove of love letters. He then gets involved with the woman's daughter, an obese woman who falls immediately in love with him, and pure mayhem ensues, including a disastrous excursion on a yacht that involves the coast guard and a giant canvas diaper. No description can do this hilarious scene justice.
Plunket's comic voice, his riffs on the characters he meets ("I knew right away I wasn't going to like the play. No plot, no jokes, and God knows, no stars. Just eight ugly girls whining about rejection. Well, I'll say this for them--they looked like experts on the subject.") are laugh-out-loud funny, and very un-P.C.
Jonathan Yardley listed this book as one of the top five comic novels in America, and he's right.
There is no book like it.
The funniest book I have ever read!!!!.......1999-07-23
I have read this book at least 6 times and each time I have enjoyed it more. Definitely one of those books where you can't help laughing at loud. I first discovered the book shortly after it was published. I was browsing one evening at the great, old (and now, alas, departed) Doubleday Bookstore at 58th & 5th in Manhattan. The title just jumped out and me and I knew I had to read this book even though I knew nothing about it. I had been living in NYC for about 4 years at the time and had only visited LA once for about a month in the late 70's. Plunkett must have lived there at about the same time because everything was so recognizable. I understood how out-of-place a New Yorker can feel in the land of swimming pools and movie stars. My job transferred me to Los Angeles in 1991 and I read the book again. It resonated even more for a recently transplanted New Yorker. Now I've lived in Los Angeles for eight years (only one year shy of my New York experience). I recently pulled my well-worn copy of the book off the bookshelf, dusted it off, and re-read it. The book is as funny as ever but there is something sad about it now when I realize how much not only I have changed over the past fifteen years but also New York and Los Angeles. As a New Yorker at heart I can daily find a hundred reasons New York is better than LA but at the same time LA is my home now I can't ever imagine myself living in NYC again. This time I read the book not as a New Yorker laughing at Los Angeles but as a Los Angelo laughing at a New Yorker laughing at LA. How the times change. Still, this is the best and funniest book ever written about the differences (both good and bad) between New York and Los Angeles. A must read for anyone who loves/hates either city.
Hilarious and Historical!.......1998-07-08
A friend loaned me the book about 8 years ago. I passed it on and eventually lost it. I found a few new copies a few years ago... I ordered it through a bookstore in Maine. They're hard to come by! I have since given it to many other friends who have said it's one of the funniest books they've read. It's one of my all-time favorites. Very sarcastic... and very entertaining. "Harding" has my highest recommendation!
Funny, funny--and there sure aren't enough of those anymore........1998-04-21
No book has ever made me laugh more. I've reread it more times than I can count. The Falls Church reader is right that the main character skewers everyone, but he's such a mess himself that it all comes out even. With all the sooo sooo serious books being published, thank goodness for this one. An all-time favorite.
Surpirsed to find so much hate filled language.......1998-03-16
I had been looking forward to reading this book for several years. I did laugh once, when the police found a pornographic magazine in the narrator's garbage. Then I was shocked that a character was repeatedly referred to as "The Faggot", as if that were his name. There is also an obese main character in the book, Jonica, that although he finds her disgusting, is willing to sleep with her and pretend to love her so he can get close to the secrets of Warren Harding. . . . ooooooh boy. Thirty pages away from the end of the book, and I no longer care about the secrets of Warren Harding. As I begin to read another of Mr. Plunketts unrelated ponderings, I just fall asleep.
Customer Reviews:
Another wish unfulfilled.......2005-08-15
In reading Six Black Presidents: Black Blood : White Masks USA I was struck by the need of the author to acquire the men that are reviewed in the book. These men are people, they are not posessions, however I felt distinctly that I was being asked to give someone away for the purposes of supporting the theories put forth in this work.
While the content is compelling, if true, the lack of primary evidence and fact overshadows this work.
As another reviewer has pointed out, there is a heavy reliance on phrases such as "It is thought..." and "It is believed..." Qualifying key sentences with these pharses detracts from the reliability of the material as fact. There also seems to be a reliance on "Post Hoc Ergo Promptor Hoc" (Therefore, because of this) reasoning, which while persuasive, is faulty.
Structurally, the writing style of the author develops a cadance, seldom stumbling, but often bringing this reader to reread portion of the book to see if the mind was carried past a detail that would add clarity to the argument.
While not a bad example of theory, however, the author fails to sell the reader on the premise that these men have enough identifiers to clearly identify them as being Afro-Centric in the ancestry, or in their thoughts.
Pseudo-history at its absolute worst.......2003-08-24
Set firmly in the afrocentrist tradition of GGM James, JH Clarke, and JA Rogers, this junk is a classic example of pseudo-history. Again and again, we see speculation and rumor ("it has been said" appears again and again in the text) presented later in the book as established fact. Repeatedly, the only citations for the assertions made refer to other afrocentrist authors, particularly Rogers. Very little use of legitimate primary sources is made; evidently using archival material, in the eyes of the author, only plays into the hands of the conspiritorial White Establishment.
The author justifies her deplorable historical standards by babbling something about "ourstory," implying that "history" is only for white folks. "Ourstory," because it somehow empowers black folks, is evidently exempt from any sort of academic standards. Anything goes, apparently.
Not only are the academic standards totally lacking, but the book at times borders on incoherence. Herbal remedies pop up, seemingly out of nowhere, in the middle of narratives unrelated to the remedies. The author frequently rants about the evils that white folks do, in jarring digressions that serve only to detract from the overall narrative.
The real shame is that the subject of people of black heritage "passing for white" is indeed a subject that deserves serious study. In fact, serious scholarship has been devoted to the subject. More Americans than we realize have artfully concealed, sometimes from their own families, their true ethnic heritage. People within the same family will choose to live either as white or black, and it is intriguing how this shapes their descendants perceptions of themselves. This is a very important topic, but the author, with her rampant speculation (she seems to believe that every single white American is hiding a black ancestor somewhere), only serves to undermine the scholarship surrounding this subject.
This is a worthless book in every respect. It isn't even good for a cheap laugh. Please do not regard this as good history in any way, because it is more about the author's personal agenda than responsible history.
I'm So Sorry.......2002-09-01
Sorry, but I have to offer a dissenting opinion. When J.A. Rogers wrote the Five Black Presidents--that was a landmark work. This book is not. Let me explain why. First, Dr. BaKhufu's feelings about whites mars the book. She can't stop letting her anger intrude on the narrative. Second, she makes a lot of mistakes that would be insignificant by themselves but put together make the book look bad. First, Thomas Jeffeson was born in Goochland County, not Coochland. His boyhood home was Tuckahoe, not Tockahoe. Sally Hemmings was not auctioned off; she was set free by Martha Jefferson and allowed to stay in Virginia with her sons as free people by an act of the state legislature. Robert Lincoln was predjudiced, not predjudice...The author really should've gone to a proofreader and fact checker.
Several chapters are simply weird. The author's poems and even a herbal remedy for hoarse throats are scattered throughout the book and she goes off on these wild tangents. One minute you'll be reading about Abe Lincoln, and in the very next she's accusing Eleanor Roosevelt of being a lesbian. The sad thing is that the book doesn't settle down and get serious until the middle. The section on Harding, who probably had black ancestry is very good. The chapter on Eisenhower is pretty good but other than a picture of his mother there is no credible proof offered that he was black.
As a black person and a historian I know that the truth of history is often not what we were taught in school. Lies have been told about black people and our contributions to this country but that doesn't justify making up a mythos of our own. So, to sum up I have to say that this book doesn't cut it as serious history (except for the Harding section) but it does do one thing: It makes the reader curious about J.A. Rogers and his books.
A Great Read!.......2001-12-14
This is a serious, but a "rose" of a book. I can see (after reading it) how it could cause some to turn "scarlet." It is a serious and profound piece of work, of which I haven't read in a very long time, and I've read many great pieces as of late. Dr. BaKhufu has spawn, as far as I'm concerned, a new genre in writing and the understanding of history as it should be. Her understanding of the society at large is deep. I had never thought seriously about whether or not there were presidents in the White House of african ancestry. So I guess it is. She has very professional and indepth references in the back of this marvelous book. Yes, her editors may have flawed in a couple of things (not factually maybe, but editorially),though it in no way takes away from the point she is making and she makes it well! I would really like to read something else by Auset BaKhufu. A friend and I have been looking for a couple of months for anything. We have not come up with anything. I want to see more like this, or anything she has to say about the past in America. Her style of writing makes a person want to read and read. I'm personally glad that she has not followed so many rules. She just wants us to know, really, and to think for ourselves; she claims nothing. And she certainly did not make the statement that another writer "thinks" that she did. BaKhufu explains herself very well. Reading the comments by other enthusiastic readers made me want to put my two cents worth in -- even though it has taken me 4 months. Please do read about the minds of these presidents and how their ancestry may or may not have played a part in their political thinking. I don't want to give anything away, so I will not mention all of the presidents, but the chapter on Lincoln is enthalling. As a psychology major, I would advise anyone who is interested in psychology and the mind to read this book; it is more than just a book. I thank the author for writing it, and I hope to read more books by her soon.
Should be taught in every american history class.......2001-12-13
THE BOOK WAS GIVEN TO ME BY MY 85 YEAR OLD AUNT & IT WAS VERY INSIGHTFUL. SHE TOLD ME THAT IN THE 30'S & 40'S POPLE KNEW THIS INFORMATION BUT KEPT QUIET BECAUSE OF RACIAL TENTIONS IN THE COUNTRY AT THAT TIME. I THINK THAT MORE BOOKS LIKE THIS WILL EVENTUALY BECOME STANDARDS IN CLASSROOMS.
Book Description
In this volume, Eugene P. Trani and David L. Wilson evaluate the presidency of Warren G. Harding by surveying scholarship on the Harding years. Harding--generally considered one of the weakest American presidents--was elected chief executive in 1920, during a time of uncertainty and frustration for many of the American people. The authors assess the critics and defenders of Harding in light of the administration's accomplishments and failures.
Both the strengths and weaknesses of the Harding administration came from the people President Harding selected for high office. Charles G. Dawes accomplished much by implementing sound budgetary practices in the federal government for the first time in history. Herbert Hoover became the dominant figure in the Harding administration, using his influence to advance both domestic and foreign policies. And Charles Evans Hughes proved to be an able, if conservative, secretary of state. Yet the accomplishments of these and other capable men tended to be short-term in nature.
Trani and Wilson describe the widespread corruption and malfeasance in the Harding administration, pointing out the Harding's erratic judgment of character caused many of his problems as president. His personal habits--philandering, playing poker, and drinking liquor during national prohibition--tainted his reputation and appeared to connect him to the activities of his associates. Tragically, Harding sought to avoid controversy, even if it meant ignoring real problems or evading justice, and thus failed to provide moral leadership for the nation.
Harding and his advisers demonstrated little understanding of the social and economic forces at work in the country and abroad. In the early 1920s, the United States continued the transition from a rural society to an urbanized and industrialized society. Rather than adjusting the government to meet the needs of all segments of an industrialized society, Harding instituted "normalcy," an attempt to maintain the values of a rural society rapidly disintegrating under the impact of social and economic change. The few real accomplishments of the Harding administration were buried under scandal. and in the end, Harding must be rated as an ineffective leader at a time when the nation would have been better served by a different, more imaginative approach to government.
This book is part of the American Presidency Series.
Customer Reviews:
A man in over his head.......2004-10-19
In polls of historians, Warren Harding has consistently ranked last when their greatness is examined. Even those who are more favorably disposed towards his presidency never rank him out of the very bottom. While some of that is due to the major scandals of his administration, Harding himself was not a dynamic, imaginative figure. The major changes in the world due to the consequences of World War I meant that the American president needed those skills.
The old order in Europe was destroyed, new small nations were created out of the remnants of the old and the United States emerged as the economically most powerful country in the world. The colossal Russian Empire was dismembered and ruled by a revolutionary regime that openly advocated overthrowing the governments of other nations. Due to their assuming many traditional male roles during the war, women were finally granted the right to vote and other issues concerning female rights were still being debated. Japan emerged as the dominant power in Asia and their ruling class was determined to expand Japanese power as much as possible. Since the only nation standing in their way was the United States, the military forces of both countries began planning for a war between them. The end of the war saw a worldwide economic downturn and millions succumbed to a flu pandemic. Finally, the last years of the Wilson presidency saw American policy drift. Wilson's serious health problems meant that there was a leadership vacuum at the worst possible moment.
Harding stepped into this maze of problems and he simply was not capable of understanding them, much less dealing with them. Fortunately for the country and the world, he chose some very capable cabinet members and left them alone. Unfortunately, he also selected some really bad cabinet members and also left them alone. On the positive side, he chose Charles Hughes as secretary of state, Henry Wallace as secretary of agriculture and Herbert Hoover as secretary of commerce. As Trani so aptly points out, the position of the American secretary of commerce had changed dramatically due to the war. After the war, the only nation that could provide the funds for rebuilding the European economies and the food to feed the people was the United States. Trani spends a great deal of time describing how effective Hoover ways in transitioning the United States into the major global economic power.
The expanded U. S. involvement in world events meant that the secretary of state was more active than ever. While the main point of American domestic political contention was whether the U. S. should join the League of Nations, many other things were taking place. Two of the eight chapters are devoted to foreign policy, very little of which deals with the question of league membership. One chapter is devoted to the ending of the war in Europe and the early indications of the eventual conflict between the United States and Japan. The other deals largely with U. S. relations with Latin America. After decades of military interventions, the United States was beginning the "Good Neighbor" policy of non-intervention.
The negative side of Harding's cabinet appointments was significant. Attorney General Daugherty was indicted, although acquitted at trial and three officials of the Harding administration served time in jail. Harding was sexually active outside his marriage and did not feel bound to adhere to the laws against alcohol. Nearly all of the scandals were revealed after his death, so he personally did not have to face them. Herbert Hoover deserves credit for giving Harding advice that all politicians should heed. He told Harding that when faced with the possibility of scandal, "reveal it, at least you will be praised for your integrity."
This book does very little to raise the stature of Warren Harding as a president. That task is impossible, as it would force the author to commit historical turpitude. It describes Harding as he was. He was without vision, unable to take a stand on any issue and almost certainly the weakest personality ever to occupy the presidency.
THE MAN BEHIND THE MYTH.......2001-04-06
ANY SERIOUS STUDENT OF AMERICAN HISTORY, AND MORE ESPECIALLY THAT OF PARLIAMENTARY GOVERNMENT, IS WELL AWARE OF THE SCANDALS THAT HELPED TO BLACKEN PRESIDENT HARDING'S NAME FOREVER. HOWEVER, IN RECENT YEARS, INTEREST WITHIN THE ADMINISTRATIVE POLICIES HAVE SHOWN ITSELF TO BE QUITE OVERWHELMING TO SAY THE LEAST. WARREN HARDING REMAINS TODAY TO BE A SHADOW WHEN STANDING NEXT TO WOODROW WILSON AND CALVIN COOLIDGE. THE ROARING '20'S BROUGHT WITH IT SIGNIFICANT CHANGES IN THE LIVES OF ALL AMERICANS, AND IN HOW THEY LIVED AND WORKED. THE ECONOMIC BOOM CAN BE DIRECTLY TRACED TO THE POLICIES OF THE HARDING ADMINISTRATION. HARDING PROMISED A RETURN TO "NORMALCY" AND HIS PLANS TO REVITILZ THE UNITED STATES WORKED BETTER THAN ANYONE FIRST THOUGHT. THE TWENTY-NINTH PRESIDENT IS LARGELY UNAPPRECIATED TODAY, BUT DESPITE THE SCANDALS, ONE WOULD HAVE TO CONCLUDE, AFTER REVIEWING ALL OF HIS DECISIONS, THAT THIS MAN CARED DEEPLY FOR THE FUTURE OF THIS GRAND NATION. PRESIDENT HARDING DONE MORE FOR THIS COUNTRY THAN MOST PEOPLE THINK, AND THAT CLAIM CAN WITHSTAND THE TEST OF TIME.
Books:
- Chief of Station, Congo: Fighting the Cold War in a Hot Zone
- Complete Works - 6 Volumes (Notable American Authors Series - Part I)
- Conscience of a Conservative
- Conversations with God : An Uncommon Dialogue (Book 1)
- Courage After Fire: Coping Strategies for Troops Returning from Iraq and Afghanistan and Their Families
- Crimes Against Nature: How George W. Bush and His Corporate Pals Are Plundering the Country and Hijacking Our Democracy
- Crisis
- Cuban Death-Lift
- Day Of The Dragon-King (Magic Tree House 14, paper)
- Divided by Faith: Evangelical Religion and the Problem of Race in America
Books Index
Books Home
Recommended Books
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- World of Warcraft Dungeon Companion
- The Things That Matter: What Seven Classic Novels Have to Say About the Stages of Life
- Reports of the United States Tax Court, Jan 1, 1988-June 30, 1988
- The 7 Habits of Highly Effective Teens: Conversation Cards from TableTalk: Conversation Starters for
- Criminal Injuries Compensation Board Report And Accounts For The Year 2002/2003
The Prestige
The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay
Hiding the Elephant: How Magicians Invented the Impossible and Learned to Disappear
The Chinatown Death Cloud Peril: A Novel
The Glorious Deception: The Double Life of William Robinson, aka Chung Ling Soo, the "Marvelous Chinese Conjurer"
