The President’s
DAUGHTER by Nan Britton
Published by Elizabeth Ann Guild Inc.
New York, U.S.A., 1927
COPYRIGHT, 1927, by ELIZABETH ANN GUILD, Inc.
All rights reserved
Including Translations,
Reproductions, Reprinting
in Newspapers or
Periodicals. Quotation
from this book restricted
to three hundred words
except by special permission
of the publishers
Printed in the
United States
of America
Publisher’s Note
The engraving of the illustrations and the printing of this entire book
were done by the Polygraphic Company of America, Inc., New York, who
employed the Contrasto process of printing.
“There is no such thing as concealment”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson in
the Essay on Compensation
“Only by frankness concerning the truth that hurts can
we secure a sustained respect for the truth that helps”
—Glenn Frank, President,
University of Wisconsin
HER EYES
By Nan Britton
Sometimes her eyes are blue as deep sea-blue,
And calm as waters stilled at evenfall.
I see not quite my child in these blue eyes,
But him whose soul shines wondrously through her.
Serene and unafraid he was, and knew
How to dispel the fears in other hearts,
Meeting an anxious gaze all tranquilly:
These are her father’s eyes.
Sometimes her eyes are blue—the azure blue
Of an October sky on mountain-tops.
I do not see my child in these blue eyes;
They are the eyes of him whose spirit glowed
With happiness of soul alone which lies
Far deeper than the depths of bluest eyes—
Whose smile a thing of joy it was to see:
These eyes, this smile, are his.
Sometimes her eyes are of a tired gray-blue,
Filled with the sadness of an age-old world.
And then again my child’s not in these eyes;
These are the eyes of one whom grief assailed,
Whom disappointment crushed with its great weight.
Around his head a halo memory casts,
Reflecting that refiner’s fire which purged
Him clean, and made him what he was.
Sometimes in child-amaze and wonder-blue
Her baby eyes are lifted up to mine.
These only are the eyes she brought with her.
And so I fold her close within my arms
And talk of dolls, and stars, and mother-love,
For well I know that pitifully soon
She will be grown, and then her eyes will hold
Only the deeper lights—his own eyes knew!
Reprinted by permission from
THE NEW YORK TIMES
DEDICATION
this Book is dedicated
with understanding
and love
to all unwedded
mothers, and to
their innocent
children whose
fathers are usually
not known to the
world....
Nan Britton
THE AUTHOR’S MOTIVE
If love is the only right warrant for bringing children into the world then many children born in wedlock are illegitimate and many born out of wedlock are legitimate.
In the author’s opinion wedlock as a word quite defines itself. Often a man and woman are locked at their wedding in a forced fellowship which soon proves to be loveless and during which the passions of the two express themselves in witless and unwanted progeny. And yet we wonder what is wrong with the world!
The story of my life-long love for Warren Gamaliel Harding and his love for me and our love for our child is told in these pages, together with the family, community, and political circumstances under which this relationship continued for the six and one-half years preceding the sudden passing of the President on August 2, 1923.
The author has had but one motive in writing for publication the story of her love-life with Mr. Harding. This motive is grounded in what seems to her to be the need for legal and social recognition and protection of all children in these United States born out of wedlock.
To the author, this cause warrants the unusual and conscious frankness with which she has written this book, and the apparent disregard for the so-called conventions, because she feels that the issue is greater than all the personal sacrifices involved.
Indeed, even like frankness on the part of thousands of mothers who could divulge similar life-tragedies might well be added to that of the author’s if such sacrifice would insure the aggressive agitation of a question involving one of the gravest wrongs existent today, with a view toward a legislative remedy.
Because of the political stature of the man-character involved, this fact-story would no doubt get to the public sooner or later, as news, or as court testimony in trials such as have recently involved men who are or have been national figures. In such case the story so sacred to the author would doubtless be garbled by news writers, or told only partially to serve some legal, personal or party interest. The author feels therefore that through her experiences she has been led to see the need for telling it herself, truly and completely, and in making it the basis for an appeal in behalf of the unfathered children of unwedded mothers, in the sincere hope that this book may result in happier conditions for childhood and motherhood throughout these United States of America.
Much consideration has been given by the author to all probable reactions resulting from the publication of this book. The fact that this narrative is bound up with the life of a man who has held the highest office in this land may mean that temporarily he may be misjudged. But the author, who has shrined him in reverent memory, feels in her heart that these revelations cannot but inspire added love for him after his trials and humanities are perceived and acknowledged.
Moreover, the author is obliged to introduce to a none-too-kindly world the daughter of her love-union with Mr. Harding and thus subject her to curious gaze and speculation. The author regrets this as any mother would, but feels that in no way can she effectively show her understanding love for all children except by baring her own experience, in the hope that the notability of the case itself may influence regard for the welfare of children and help to right an old and current wrong.
Nor, indeed, does the author herself hope to escape criticism unless her real motive is definitely apprehended and conceded. It has required no little heart-break on her part to relive the story of her love-life, but it had to be relived in memory that the story might be portrayed truthfully. Only by keeping before her the human cause which impelled the writing, and a constant hope that through her own suffering she might be instrumental in preventing the heartaches of thousands of potential mothers, has this been possible.
Knowing the real President Harding as she does, the author feels that if he could be brought back today to witness the futile struggle the mother of his only child has suffered, he himself would proclaim his own fatherhood, and seek to open eyes blinded by convention to a situation which is depriving thousands of innocent children of their natural birthright in denying them legal recognition before the world. In the author’s opinion, there should be no so-called “illegitimates” in these United States.
It is to be remembered that all children must be precious in the sight of our Father, otherwise he would not be a heavenly father, and that Jesus of Nazareth did not say, “Suffer little children born in wedlock to come unto me for of such is the kingdom of heaven.” Jesus loved and honored all little children and didn’t bother at all about who their parents were or about the manner of their birth. He himself was born in a manger which was most unconventional.
As a result of the author’s own personal experiences written in this book, and because of the thousands of prospective mothers who face unknowingly like tragic situations, she feels that an organized effort should be made to secure State and Federal legislation providing the following benefits for unwedded mothers and unfathered children:
First: That on the birth of a child the name of the father be correctly registered in the public records, and that failure to do so shall constitute a criminal offense.
Second: That every child born in the United States of America be regarded as legitimate whether born within or without wedlock.
The enactment of these statutes would not, in the author’s opinion, detract from the dignity of the marriage-union which automatically legalizes children born therein, but would insure protection for those innocent children born of a love-union in which one or both parents are unmarried.
Readers of this book who agree with the author that this entire situation constitutes a Cause, and who feel with her that members should be gathered into the Elizabeth Ann League to collectively urge the proposed legislation suggested above to provide social equality among children, are invited to write her a personal letter in care of the publishers {see [title page]}.
The Author
FOREWORD
The author desires to express gratitude to the many public-spirited men and women who have shared her earnest in the cause sponsored by this book; also to those friends whose knowledge and review of the facts herein recorded have contributed to their chronological correctness.
The author early sought legal counsel regarding the use of the letters from which she has quoted in this book, and others unmentioned by her. She was advised that the copyright of these letters remains with those who wrote them and she has therefore been obliged by law to paraphrase them or quote only partially. The originals of all these letters from President Harding, Mrs. Ralph T. Lewis (Abigail Harding), Mr. Heber Herbert Votaw, Mrs. Heber Herbert Votaw (Carolyn Harding), Tim Slade (as he is called in this book), Hon. James M. Cox, Democratic nominee for President in 1920, Mr. C. E. Witt of the Picture Publicity Bureau of the Republican National Committee during the Harding Campaign, and others, are in the possession of her publishers and may be read by any persons whose request appears justified.
The
President’s
Daughter
1
I was born in Claridon, Ohio, a very small village about ten miles east of Marion, Ohio, on November 9th, 1896. My father, a physician, was at that time practising under the supervision of his cousin, an older physician who had an established practice of long standing. My mother, who had received some of her high school training in Marion, where she had come from New Philadelphia, Ohio, to live with her maternal grandmother, was teaching a country school in Claridon when father met her. I was still a baby and my older sister Elizabeth about three when we moved to Marion, where we settled permanently.
Inasmuch as this book has much to do with President Harding and myself, I may sketch briefly the friendly relations which existed early between our families:
While my father was working up a practice in Claridon, Mr. Harding, then in his twenties, was struggling with Marion’s now well-known newspaper, The Marion Daily Star. Father, being himself somewhat of a writer, often wrote humorously to Mr. Harding of his experiences among the country-folk, and these letters were edited by Mr. Harding and published in his paper; I remember Mr. Harding’s telling me how delighted he always was to receive them.
My father always spoke of Mr. Harding with warmest affection, and, later on, was one of Mr. Harding’s strongest advocates despite the fact that my father was a Democrat. It is very likely that they developed mutual regard and affection for each other back in those days of ambitious editor and country doctor. Certainly no finer tributes could be paid any man than those which I have myself heard from Mr. Harding concerning my father.
Mr. Harding’s father was a physician also, and this fact may have strengthened the bond of friendship which early grew to warm regard. As far back as I can remember Dr. Harding had his office in the old Star Building, right across the hall from his editor-son. I believe it is only recently that he has discontinued active practice. I know he has passed his eighty-second birthday.
My mother’s attitude in the matter of my relationship to Mr. Harding has not been conducive to discussion with her about her own early acquaintance with the Harding family, but this I know: she must have been attending high school at the same time that some of the Hardings were, because she is only a few years Abigail Harding’s senior.
There were, as Miss Abigail Harding has often told me, three “sets” of Harding children: first came Warren, the eldest, then Charity, these two forming the first set; then came “Deac” (Dr. George Tryon Harding III, only brother of Warren) and presumably Mary, the sister who was almost blind and who died about 1910, I think, soon after Warren Harding’s mother passed on; then came Abigail, known to everyone as “Daisy” Harding, and lastly Carolyn, the “baby” of the family. It seems to me there was a child who died very early, though I am not sure about this.
My mother had a sister Della who also lived a good part of the time with mother’s and her maternal grandmother, Mrs. Mary Richards, in Marion, and, I believe, went to school there also. Della Williams married a missionary to Burma, India, Howard E. Dudley. Some time after, Carolyn Harding also married a missionary to Burma, Heber Herbert Votaw. Up to that time “Carrie” and “Dell” had been friends, if not intimate at least upon the friendliest kind of terms.
However, their husbands were missionaries of decidedly different denominations. Carrie Harding married a Seventh Day Adventist and my Aunt Dell married a Baptist. So from then on their paths diverged. Diverged indeed so widely that my first recollection of hearing the Hardings discussed at any great length is identified with a heated argument between Aunt Dell and my older sister Elizabeth. I remember that Aunt Dell was almost ferocious in her condemnation of the Seventh Day Adventists and their religion which, to her certain knowledge, she said, was a detrimental influence upon the natives wherever it was promulgated.
At that time Mrs. Carrie Harding Votaw’s cause was warmly espoused by my older sister who, then in high school and in the English class of Miss Abigail Harding, had met and had developed a girlish “crush” upon her sister, the missionary. I cannot forget that argument, which resulted in more or less of a family quarrel (for even my parents’ loyalty was divided) and was responsible for my aunt’s sudden departure. She took occasion to denounce the Seventh Day Adventist religion before a group of her own denomination at a camp meeting and almost immediately flounced out of the city with her very picturesque family.
This must have been about 1908 or 1909. The following year, 1910, I entered high school and my English teacher was Miss Abigail Victoria Harding. Curiously enough, I thought that I could see in this sister of the missionary mannerisms which were decidedly peculiar to my Aunt Dell, whom I had quite adored in spite of the family incident recited above. Up to this time I had remained neutral.
Abigail Victoria (“Daisy”) Harding
(now Mrs. Ralph T. Lewis)
the President’s sister
However, seeing Miss Harding day after day, and agreeing heartily with the general dictum that she was a very beautiful woman, I came to idolize her. And thereafter my respect for her sister’s religion was a matter of course. English became my favorite study—a study for which I would neglect if needs be all other assignments. As a matter of fact, Miss Harding inspired me with such pride in my ability to excel that during that year I was made exempt from all final examinations, having kept my grade standing 90 or above.
2
Nineteen-ten was an epochal year in my life. Ohio was electing a Governor, and the Republican candidate of that famous gubernatorial election was no other than the brother of my adored English teacher! I have often tried to remember how this knowledge was first conveyed to me; whether I had actually known that there was a Warren Gamaliel Harding from hearing conversations about him at home, whether I had been first introduced to his existence through talks with Miss Harding on one of the many “walks home” we used to have; whether I had heard of him through one whom I will call Mrs. Sinclair, whose husband, a judge and a prominent Democrat in Ohio, played cards with Mr. Harding very often; or whether I beheld his picture, ubiquitously displayed in almost every store window on Main and Center Streets, as I walked to and from high school. My early recollections are not so much concerned with actually seeing him as with the unforgettable sensations I experienced after I had once seen him and knew that he was for me my “ideal American.”
If I had ever childishly allied myself with my father’s political party, the Democrats, I withdrew instantly in favor of the party advocated by my mother’s family, and from then on I was a full-fledged Republican.
It must have kept me pretty busy to maintain a high average in school and at the same time become the self-appointed spokesman into which I developed during those stirring pre-election days. Warren Harding and Warren Harding’s future formed my life’s background, and whether or not anyone else credited me with the capacity for such a cumulative emotion as love, I knew that I was in love with Warren Harding.
Certain people, including Abigail and Carolyn Harding, speaking truthfully, could tell you of the spectacle I made of myself those months, and indeed in years that followed, for I talked about their brother incessantly; no, I did not talk, I raved. I was fourteen years old, or going on fourteen, an age when one would think a wife of a man Warren Harding’s age (he must have been about forty-five then and Mrs. Harding six or seven years his senior) would be entirely free from any feeling of jealousy regarding a mere child. But I remember well when Mrs. Sinclair telephoned my mother, and with friendly solicitude advised her to curb my girlish enthusiasm, or at least try to quiet me vocally, for my own sake! She said that at the most recent meeting of the Twigs (the most fashionable older ladies’ club in Marion), to which Mrs. Harding also belonged but who was absent on that occasion, “Nan Britton” had been almost the sole topic of conversation, and furthermore the ladies thought it quite scandalous that I should be so freely declaring my adoration for a married man. Of course mother did also, but apparently I didn’t!
My mother used to try to inspire me with antipathy for Mr. Harding and the thing she cited more than anything else was his fondness for tobacco. She would come home from downtown and say, “I saw Mr. Harding standing such-and-such a place, chewing tobacco!” But neither this information nor the withering disdain of mother’s grimace affected me in the least. I think he must have given up this habit later on; I know I never saw him in later years use tobacco in any form except cigars and cigarettes.
In order for my adoration to appear more “in form” I conceived the idea of affecting a crush on Mrs. Harding. She was not my “type” of heroine at all, but I used to pretend I was a great admirer of her anyway. I remember how I used to telephone the Harding residence when I thought Mr. Harding might be there and might answer the phone. I would shut myself up in our “back bedroom” which was away from the rest of the house and where the telephone hung on the wall, and then softly give central the number. I was always afraid mother might hear me. Often the maid answered the telephone. When this occurred I would ask for Mrs. Harding. Sometimes she herself would answer. Once, I remember, mother came in while I was calling and demanded to know to whom I was talking. When I said “Mrs. Harding,” she took the receiver and talked with her herself. It may have been that very time when Mrs. Harding informed mother that she could tell Nan that so far as “Warren” was concerned, “distance lends enchantment.” But there were those rare times when he himself answered the telephone, when he would say upon my telling him it was “Nan Britton,” “Well, how-do-you-do, Miss Britton; and how are you?” in that silvery voice I so loved, and I would immediately become so confused and tremble so I thought he must sense it all from the other end of the wire.
I knew the number of the Harding car by heart and could spot it blocks away. One time I had occasion to go to the Union Station to meet someone and when I reached there I saw the Harding Stevens-Duryea parked outside. The Harding dog then was a bull, rather a fearsome looking animal, and he was always in the car whenever it was out. I was so full of love for Mr. Harding that it extended to any possession of his, and when I observed that dignified creature sitting alert in the front seat alone, I walked over to the car to pet him. But he was “on his job” and snapped at me so fiercely that I backed off with all possible speed. Thereafter I confined my manifestations of affection to the Hardings themselves.
3
About this time we were asked in school by Miss Harding to write an essay on Sir Walter Scott’s Ivanhoe, the particular chapter we had to cover being “The Combat with the Templar.” I think we were given something like a week to complete the writing. I worked upon little else during that time—dreaming over it and sitting up with it into the “wee sma’ hours of the morning.” I prefaced my composition with “Pride goeth before destruction and a haughty spirit before a fall,” a quotation I had heard my mother repeat. The fatal day arrived, and I handed in my composition with fear and trembling—albeit with sufficient confidence in its worth to make me wish I had kept a copy of it to read over to myself. I was not conscious that I was being discussed by the pupils in Miss Harding’s other classes until someone informed me that she had read my essay to all of her classes. And then she even read it before my own class! But what was most gloriously compensating for my labor was her statement to me in private that she had taken my essay over to “brother Warren’s” and had read it aloud to him and to Mrs. Harding as a sample of what her better pupils could do. Then my happiness knew no bounds.
Upon the sloping walls of my modest little bedroom hung three or four pictures of Mr. Harding, cut from the election posters and all the same except that I had varied the style of the frames in which they were set, which frames I had purchased with careful reference to size and suitability from Marion’s one and only five-and-ten-cent store! One of these pictures hung directly in front of my bed so that when I awoke in the morning I looked into the handsome face of him whom I loved, and saw his likeness the last thing before turning off my light.
One day father came home and said he had ridden some distance on the street car with Mr. Harding. I was immediately all aflutter and demanded to know just what had been said. Father said he had outlined for Mr. Harding my advancing campaign in his behalf—in short, they had discussed “this foolish talk” of mine. But evidently Mr. Harding’s verdict as to what should be done with me was not strictly condemnatory for his words were, “Bring her into my office sometime! Perhaps if she sees me——”
Early likeness of Mr. Harding—cut from a campaign poster by the author in 1910 and hung on the wall of her room when she was fourteen years old
If I saw him! Unknown to a living soul, I had been for many weeks shadowing the Republican candidate for Governor. His desk, in the newspaper office, which looked down upon East Center Street, was very near the window, and one of my hero’s favorite positions seemed to be to sit in his easy swivel chair with his feet on the windowsill. Across from the Star Building was Vail’s, the photographer’s, studio. Many were the times I stood in Vail’s doorway, sometimes an hour at a stretch, watching those feet from across the street, knowing that when the owner removed them from my sight he would likely use them to carry him home. Then I would follow him to his home on Mt. Vernon Avenue, about a block behind, in a state of high rapture, until he turned into the grounds of the big green house and disappeared. This was an indulgence I did not dare boast about—partly because I was becoming growingly sensitive to the ridicule such confessions usually brought down upon me at home (and my love was too sacred to be made the subject of ridicule), and partly because my tardiness in reaching home from school could not be explained thus to an oftentimes impatient mother who could have found many chores for me had I come directly home.
4
There was in Marion a very attractive and extravagant woman whose name, let us say, was Mrs. Henry Arnold. Gossip had it that Mrs. Arnold and Warren Harding were very friendly, and gossip-mongers wondered how Mrs. Harding could be so blind to such a mutual infatuation.
These things reached my ears from the girls at school whose parents kept in close touch with anything smacking of scandal, and very likely discussed these things around the family table. I know I never heard them from my father or mother.
But this knowledge of what was currently thought concerning Marion’s leading citizen and one of Marion’s most beautiful women did not move me to condemnation of either Mr. Harding or Mrs. Arnold. Rather did I sympathize with her in her regard for him, for I could conceive of nothing save a very high-minded friendship existing between him and anybody. And wasn’t it quite possible that she too thrilled to her very finger-tips under his smile? The only thing I regretted was that I was not her age, and that I had not travelled in Europe, and that I was not “in society” or in any kind of position to attract his notice.
Mrs. Arnold had a lovely daughter, Angela, I will call her, about my own age, with golden curls, who had every indulgence loving parents could bestow, and my jealousy was directed solely toward her.
Very often the Harding car would whiz by our house, which was then on East Center Street, on Sunday afternoon, and I knew the occupants were headed for Bucyrus, a town some miles north-east of Marion which distance constituted a “nice drive” from Marion. Once, I remember, there were in the car Mr. and Mrs. Harding, Mr. and Mrs. Arnold, and their daughter Angela, as well as Frank the chauffeur, and of course the bulldog. I was sitting on our front porch. Mrs. Harding waved and blew me kisses and Mr. Harding doffed his hat and bowed. How I envied Angela! I would retire on such nights a most unhappy little girl. But I knew they would be coming back later on in the evening and so I would stay awake. My bed was alongside the window and the window screen opened on hinges like a door. I would swing wide open the screen and hang out of the window. I could see about fifty or sixty feet of street from that window and that part of the street was lighted by the corner street light. But even though it had not been lighted I would have recognized the smooth buzzing of those wheels as the great car sped swiftly past the house on its return from Bucyrus. Many a time I have waited until I knew he was safely back in our town.
Angela Arnold, knowing of my adoration for Mr. Harding, one time stopped my sister Elizabeth on the street and told her to “tell Nan” that her hero had been up to call upon them and had sat the bottom out of one of her mother’s favorite chairs! The truth of it was that it was probably a frail chair and Mr. Harding’s weight had broken it.
5
When my youngest brother, John, was born there was much discussion about what he should be called. I immediately attempted to solve the problem by announcing, “Why, he’s going to be named ‘Warren,’ of course!” Father, in cahoots with “his girl,” said we could call him “Warren Le Grand” the latter name for father’s only brother, Le Grand Britton. But Mrs. Sinclair, the judge’s wife, my mother’s friend, seemed to have quite a bit to say in our household and now stepped into the picture. “He’s going to be plain John Britton, isn’t he, Mrs. Britton?” I think she had in mind John the Baptist, much less deserving of a namesake in my opinion than my beloved Mr. Harding. It took a long time for me to recover from this defeat.
In Marion the livery stables rented by the hour one-seated phaetons, drawn by dependable, equine “plugs,” as my father called the drooping animals that jogged about the town pulling the occupants of these pleasure-providing equipages.
Before my doctor-father acquired the small red motor runabout which served to carry him about on his professional calls, he was a good customer at these livery stables, and we children often accompanied him. Often he gave the reins into my small hands and I experienced the thrill of a real charioteer as I called “Giddap!” to the horse and whisked imaginary flies off his back with the reins, even as I had seen my father do.
I have marvelled at what must have been an effort at resigned suspension of parental watchfulness which was responsible for the few memorable afternoons my sister Elizabeth and I enjoyed, unchaperoned, and with fine airs, the use of one of these coveted livery conveyances. One such “drive” in particular stands out in my memory because it is coupled with the memory of the only real “call” I ever made upon the Warren Hardings at their Mt. Vernon Avenue home. This occurred the Sunday following the birth of my baby brother.
I always looked up to Elizabeth with great sisterly reverence for her poise and superior judgment. When she privately voiced to me her resentment that mother and father had not consulted us before adding a baby to the family just when she and I were enjoying associations in high school which demanded dignity in our family circle, I followed suit willingly enough and maintained with her an injured air toward mother and father. I was vaguely confident that divine Providence, in the form of the proverbial stork, could have been appealed to to bestow its infantile goods elsewhere had my sister Elizabeth been allowed to take the situation in hand early enough. Here we were now, Elizabeth seventeen and I fourteen, compelled to admit that we had a tiny, squawking, red-faced youngster in our home. How shamefacedly we responded to congratulations! I might say that within a week or so after the baby’s arrival, both Elizabeth and I were won over to the tiny bundle and became his willing slaves, and, as time went on, yielded him to mother only when he demanded to be fed, spoiling him with attentions which mother deplored with shaking head and futile admonitions. Just so, in our more extreme youth, we were told, had we spoiled Janet, our baby sister.
In our chagrin at having been precipitately thrust into a position of such embarrassment, Elizabeth and I charged an afternoon’s entertainment to father’s livery account, endeavoring to assuage our injured pride by driving about the town. I retain a very vivid picture of my sister, sitting erect, holding the reins, her arms begloved with white kid above the elbows. She wore a black hat which turned up on the left, dropping on the right to accommodate the great red rose which hung heavy with “style” on that side. She wore what seemed to me a stunning blue and white dress. High-heeled slippers encased the small shapely feet which were always my despair. How insignificant and positively ugly I felt, sitting beside her in my gingham dress, occasionally patting my taffy-colored hair which was pulled tightly away from my face and tied with the stiffest ribbons procurable those days.
Mt. Vernon Avenue afforded quite a lengthy drive before one reached the end of the paved road. When we drove past the Harding residence I observed with rapid heart beats my hero sitting on the front porch. Mrs. Harding was with him. Would I dare to suggest to Elizabeth? ... no, I’d better not divulge my thoughts to her ... she didn’t care anything about Mr. Harding and probably wouldn’t want to waste the time to call upon them. We were passing the house. Mr. and Mrs. Harding smiled and waved to us. My heart pounded madly and I felt the heat in my cheeks. A block later I relaxed and breathed deeply. Elizabeth turned to me suddenly. “Say, why don’t we go back and call on the Hardings?” Oh, the blessed intuition of elder sisters! I trembled, but replied enthusiastically, “Oh, yes, let’s!” She turned the horse’s head in the direction of the Harding home.
In front of the house stood the Stevens-Duryea, the big car which sped about town sometimes carrying my hero. It was parked right in front of the hitching-post, and when Mr. Harding observed our intention of stopping he came lightly down the steps and called to us, saying he would tie our horse; he greeted us with smiles and said we should go on up on the porch. With what seemed to me superhuman strength he pushed his car out of the way and hitched our livery nag.
There was a long hanging swing at the end of the porch. Mr. Harding reseated himself there after Elizabeth and I had taken chairs.
The new-baby topic so painful to us was mercifully avoided. I doubt whether Mr. and Mrs. Harding had even read the announcement of our little brother’s birth in their own Marion Daily Star, but if they had they showed excellent restraint!
Being so engrossed in trying to realize that I was sitting next to the man I so adored naturally left me quite speechless, but my sister Elizabeth did not suffer from this affliction. In fact, she and Mrs. Harding carried on a most animated conversation, the thing I remember most vividly about it being that Mr. Harding’s oft-interposed opinions invariably met with vigorous protests from his wife who seemed to me to be very sure that her information about so-and-so was the last word in authority upon the subject and whose remark to her husband, I remember distinctly, usually was either, “Now, Warren, you don’t know anything about it!” or, “Well, Warren, I know better!” The topics did not concern me but I did question any piece of information which could inspire such disputatious quality in the tone of Mrs. Harding’s voice.
When we left, Mr. and Mrs. Harding accompanied us on the short walk to our carriage. Elizabeth, with vast grown-upness, turned to Mr. Harding. “You know, Mr. Harding, Nan talks of nothing but you! She has little campaign poster pictures of you all over the walls of her room!” Secretly elated that he should actually be told of my adoration in my presence, though outwardly greatly perturbed, I furtively watched the effect it would have upon him. I confess I momentarily forgot all about Mrs. Harding in my eager gaze at her husband’s face. I was used to seeing this information amuse the hearer, when dispensed by my parents, and I wondered just a little apprehensively whether Mr. Harding would treat it lightly. But he smiled understandingly, kindly, comfortingly. I ventured to look at Mrs. Harding then. She did not smile.
“Well, Miss Britton,” my hero said, looking down at me, “I move that you have a real photograph of me for your wall!” This met with no seconding from his wife however, and somehow I wished in the silence which followed his remark that Elizabeth had not brought up the subject of my admiration for him. Now Mrs. Harding would know it was not she whom I admired, as I had tried to pretend, but her husband only. I stole another glance at him. Oh, dear, what was the use of trying to pretend anyway! I just loved him and that was all there was about it. He was like a giant Adonis as he stood there petting the horse before unhitching him for us. I felt so diminutive, so pitifully young! How I adored him!
Memories and revisualizations happily filled my days following this visit ... but, though I waited long and patiently, the weeks passed by and I failed to receive the expected photograph. Oh, it was cruel to be young!
6
Our neighbors, the Sinclairs, lived in a large brick house on the outskirts of town, which was surrounded by a spacious lawn dotted with rose bushes of all varieties. Tall trees lined the drives and walks and shaded the grounds throughout.
Mrs. Sinclair often sent her hired man to our house with a basket of lovely green vegetables, fresh from her own garden. Oftener, she would telephone mother to send one of the children with a pail and she would have Emma the cook send back some of the creamy milk of which they had had an over-supply that evening. It often fell to me to “fetch the milk.”
In spite of Mrs. Sinclair’s solicitude concerning the gossip about my frank declarations of love for her husband’s friend, she often suggested to me, with a twinkle in her eye, “Why don’t you stay a little while, Nan? Your hero is coming home with the judge to play cards!” But instead of wanting to linger, I would pick up my heels and fly out the door.
One evening about sunset I swung my pail of milk back and forth as I sauntered leisurely toward home. My eyes were fixed on the grass along the sidewalk where sometimes wild flowers raised their dainty faces and seemed to ask to be gathered. I had just stooped to pick a particularly pretty wild poppy when I looked up—to see Warren Harding approaching! It was too late to retreat, so I walked bravely toward him, one hand literally seeming full of buckets, the other clutching the stem of my pretty wild flower. I wished fervently, in my visible nervousness and hidden delight, that the ground would open and swallow me, bucket, flower and all. My knowledge of father’s talk with Mr. Harding, coupled with the more intimate knowledge of the adoration I had been so publicly boasting, intensified my confusion a thousandfold, and my face burned pitifully.
I did not seem to be advancing, though he seemed to be steadily drawing nearer, and I knew that he recognized me for he began to smile and take off his hat. Then, with a bow that could not have been more gallant had I been a titled lady, and the same smile which has won even the hearts of his enemies, he bade me, “Good evening!” To this day I have not the slightest idea whether I found my voice to answer, but I remember I momentarily recovered sufficiently to look up at him, while all the way home I exulted, “Isn’t he wonderful! Isn’t he wonderful!”
(Years later, in May of 1917, when Warren Harding made his first trip to New York in my behalf, he himself asked me if I remembered the incident and confided that the desire to possess me had been born in his heart upon that occasion—the occasion which had so long been enshrined in my own heart as a wonderful memory.)
7
Election Eve in 1910 was a memorable occasion for me. I shall never forget the mass meeting in the old Opera House on State Street. Shortly afterward, this theatre burned to the ground, but I cherish still the memory of the hall in which the last meeting I attended was a town rally for my beloved editor, Ohio’s Republican candidate for Governor!
I do not remember that I told anybody where I was going that night. I only know I went along, in all haste, after the dinner dishes had been cleared away, out the back door and down to the Opera House. The theatre was comparatively small, accommodating perhaps seven or eight hundred people, but fully twice as many it seemed to me had crowded in, jamming the narrow aisles and standing wherever there was an available spot for a human being to balance himself. I pushed my way up through the stuffy crowds to the balcony and managed to find a seat onto which I climbed. I took a deep breath. From my post I could see every corner of the stage. The whole theatre was decorated, and even the boxes were beflagged. Two or three dozen people stood or sat in a semi-circle at the back of the stage—the more favored few.
The multitude—it seemed a multitude to me—cheered and whistled and suddenly the applause grew to a deafening roar as the audience rose as in a body to greet the hero of the hour. I bent eagerly forward, my heart in my throat, as he advanced to the edge of the platform and bowed. How dear he was! After comparative quiet was regained, he began his address, in his deep silvery voice, the voice I loved years afterward to listen to across the dinner-table or in more intimate surroundings....
Out on the street great flags floated in the cool breeze and telephone posts and store windows were draped effectively in the American colors. The throngs of people stood about expectantly. I wondered if my father had attended the meeting and whether I had been missed at home ... then down the street in an open carriage with seats facing each other rode the Republican candidate, his wife and a couple of intimate friends. The entire carriage was a mass of red, white and blue; even the horses seemed to sense the importance and enthusiasm of the occasion, and lifted high their beflagged heads as they stepped mincingly along through the cheering lines of people.
Still smiling and bowing and occasionally raising a hand to wave to the people, the editor stood throughout the entire procession, head bared, acknowledging this tribute of the home folks who loved him....
Loved him? Yes. But who of men can essay an explanation of that instinct of the American voter who can hypocritically hail a candidate one day and the following day betray him at the polls?
As I look back upon that election, a state-wide land-slide for the Democrats, putting Judson Harmon in the Governor’s chair, I do not feel as I felt then, saddened beyond words, for events have been witness to the fact that nothing can prevent those who are predestined from “coming into their own.”
(These two episodes, the one of the meeting with Mr. Harding when I carried the pail of milk, and the political mass meeting, I have quoted in substance from an autobiography which I wrote in 1921 at Columbia as one of our class assignments. I took this manuscript down to the White House at that time and Mr. Harding read it, expressing in a letter to me his interest and praising me for having received an “A” on it at Columbia, however cautioning me as usual very lovingly against treading compositionally upon what he thought seemed to be “dangerous ground.” The whimsical expression in his face when we used to discuss his earlier political activities often led me to feel that he had felt far from the hero I had pictured him, and perhaps more like the disillusioned candidate his friends reported him to be after that election, driven by ambitious admirers into a field he would fain have avoided.)
8
In June of 1913, when I was a Junior in high school, my father passed on. We had very little money, but my mother managed to keep us together for a year and a half or so. She went back to teaching and was given a position in the Marion Public Schools. My baby brother John was about eighteen months old. My older sister Elizabeth was the pianist in a local theatre, a moving picture house. However, we girls continued to chum with the “best people” up to the time we left Marion, which was in 1915.
My mother had often thought she would like to do Chautauqua work, and it was in this connection that after father’s passing she took occasion to consult Mr. Harding. He had had some experience in this line for I remember my mother took me one Sunday afternoon to hear him, and afterward allowed me to go up and shake hands with him and tell him how much I enjoyed his speech, for which hesitating utterance I received one of his loveliest smiles and a courtly “Thank you kindly, thank you kindly!”
It was upon the occasion of my mother’s visit to Mr. Harding’s office that Mr. Harding, inquiring how “Nan” was, and being assured of my continued admiration of him and any cause he sponsored, said ruminatively, “Mrs. Britton, maybe I can do something sometime for Nan.” I walked for days in the clouds after mother had repeated this to me.
Before we broke up our housekeeping and left Marion, the people had elected Warren G. Harding United States Senator from Ohio. Even in the face of my own difficulties—being thrown upon the world with absolutely no equipment except a high school education and possibly some innate common sense—I felt an ecstatic elation over this victory for my beloved hero, and when Miss Abigail Harding “dared” me to go out to his house and congratulate him, it took less urging than courage to do so. Mrs. Harding came to the door in a pink linen dress. I braved her all right and asked if I might be permitted to speak to her husband. It was late afternoon and he was playing cards with his regular “bunch.” He came out, and I shall never forget his smile—I do not think now it would be too much to say it was a smile of genuine appreciation, for so he assured me in later years—and I thrilled unspeakably under the touch of his hand. Mrs. Harding stood pat; it even seemed to me she curtailed any lengthy remarks Mr. Harding might have been tempted to make just to please me by drawing his attention to the gentlemen in the other room who were waiting for him. But she could have nothing to do with the pressure of a hand-shake which was Mr. Harding’s seal of sincere cordiality to me.
9
Sometime during the summer of 1915 I went to Cleveland, Ohio, where, through the influence of friends, I was given a position in the George H. Bowman Company, a china store on Euclid Avenue. I lived at the Y. W. C. A. where I obtained board and room for the nominal sum of $3.50 a week.
My mother was then teaching school in Martel, Ohio, a small village east of Marion, and it seems to me she had one of the younger children with her, though I don’t remember which one. I think my baby brother John was being taken care of by my Aunt Anna in Canton, Ohio. I went from Cleveland a couple of times to Martel, I know, to see my mother.
My position in Cleveland paid me $6 a week, and I was so delighted when my salary was raised a dollar and a half that I sent for my brother Howard whom we called “Doc,” then about sixteen years of age, to come to Cleveland where, through my own influence and good standing at Bowman’s I was able to secure a position for him also. He lived at the Y. M. C. A. down the street from me. I very early assumed responsibilities toward my family.
However, my sister Elizabeth, working her way through music school in Chicago, persuaded me that we two could live more comfortably and happily together there, and after having been in Cleveland about eight months I went to Chicago to join her.
I remember how my brother Doc helped me to gather together the $11 or so carfare to Chicago, and when I boarded the train it was with just thirty cents “over” in my pocket-book. I became very hungry near noontime and the slender lunch I had brought did not satisfy my healthy appetite, so I went into the diner in search of something “cheap.” Apple pie was 15 cents without cheese; with cheese, 25 cents. I dispensed with the cheese because I thought I must tip the waiter 10 cents, and I must have a nickel to phone Elizabeth in Chicago in case she failed to meet me.
I presented my letter of recommendation from the George H. Bowman Company, which read, “We are glad to recommend Miss Nan Britton, who has been in our employ for about a year, as a girl of ability and good character,” and was given a position in Carson, Pirie, Scott and Company, in the china department, soon after my arrival in Chicago. Elizabeth did wonders with her needle to “fix me up” and make me a little more presentable than I had been able to do on my $6 a week. Moreover, in my new job I received $9 a week wages!
The Brittons were never “good managers.” While my father lived we children had everything we needed and more; but father was far too generous for his income, and never denied where it was possible to give. With so little idea of the value of a dollar, mother, Elizabeth and I were all having a pretty hard time.
I had carried on correspondence while in Cleveland with Miss Abigail Harding, “Daisy,” as she was more commonly called at home, but the dissatisfaction I was experiencing because of my seeming inability to get on more quickly had inclined me to less letter-writing. In other words, I knew my ability and I was ashamed of my small-waged position.
Finally, without saying anything to Elizabeth, I wrote to my father’s favorite college classmate, whom I will call Grover Carter, at that time Vice-President of a coal company in New York, asking his advice concerning the possibilities of my working my way through school. I received an immediate reply in which he assured me of his genuine interest and told me he had written to another Kenyon College classmate of my father, in the offices of the Union Stock Yards in Chicago. In due time I received from him a cordial note in which he invited me to dine with him and his family.
In short, I was given a choice of attending a business school in Chicago at the expense of my father’s two college friends or of coming on to New York City to attend school. It was up to me. The latter plan appealed to me, and I remember I felt the very trip East would in itself be an education to me whose travelling experiences had been necessarily limited.
The remainder of the summer of 1916 was then devoted to preparations for my trip East, my Chicago benefactors taking me to Marshall Fields’ where I was outfitted properly from head to toe. I thought my fairy existence had actually begun.
During the summer of 1916, while I was still working at Carson, Pirie, Scott and Company, the Republican National Convention was being held in the Coliseum, not far from my place of business. United States Senator Warren G. Harding, former Lieutenant-Governor of Ohio, was nominating Charles E. Hughes for the Presidency of the United States. Morning after morning I bought the papers, watching the progress of the proceedings with avid interest, most particularly, of course, any mention of my beloved Warren Harding.
In the spring of 1917 when Mr. Harding came over to New York to help me find a position (or rather to place me in one) I told him of how I had followed the convention items in the Chicago papers. He expressed his regret that I had not at that time gotten in touch with him for it would have been a pleasure, he said, to see that I had a “front seat” during the convention at the Coliseum.
10
In the fall of 1916 my Chicago benefactors put me on the train for New York and at the Pennsylvania Station in the Big City I was met by Mr. Carter. I was put immediately in school; the school selected was the Ballard Secretarial School for Girls which is an endowed school housed in the Y. W. C. A. Building, which building, Central Branch, was at that time down on 16th Street between Broadway and Fifth Avenue.
I entered six weeks late but through the out-of-school-hours’ tutoring of my dear teacher and friend, to whom I will give the name of Miss Helen Anderson, I was enabled to catch up with the class very quickly. I studied hard. The Carter family was an intellectual one and Mr. Carter early began to dictate to me in the evenings, which was a great help. I received A’s in everything when the spring came and I was graduated.
In early spring, in April I believe, there was a request made to the Y. W. C. A. Employment Bureau for a stenographer for one whom I shall call Mrs. Emma Laird Phelps, publicity manager for Ignacy Paderewski, the famous pianist, and I went to be interviewed. I had several hours in the afternoons which I knew I could devote to this work and in that way make some extra expense money. Mrs. Phelps hired me after giving me some trial dictation, and I was launched upon my first stenographic position! During this employment I had occasion to do some special work with Mme. Paderewski and in this connection I met her famous husband.
Inasmuch as I had, when in high school, not been allowed much freedom where boys were concerned, I knew comparatively little about them. I had had my ideal American in my heart for years and all others paled into insignificance beside him. True, I had endeavored to weave romance several times into friendships with boys I had known in Marion, after I became almost seventeen years of age and was a junior in high school, when mother permitted a few “dates”—few and far between. But somehow these fellows, as well as those I met after I left Marion—in Cleveland and in Chicago—all seemed to have things “wrong with them.”
However, I was beginning to receive attentions from men whom I would meet even casually, and the fact that I was able to hold a secretarial position, and had been the only one in my class at Ballard to attempt such a thing before graduation, strengthened my faith in myself and tended to dignify me in my own estimation.
11
When spring came, and graduation day was drawing near, I decided I might now safely appeal to Warren Harding to help me to a position in the business world. I felt sure I could do myself credit and he would not have to be ashamed to recommend me for a position. I could, of course, have depended upon many other sources for situations, and in fact Mrs. Phelps kindly intimated that the Paderewskis might wish to take me to California with them, Mme. Paderewski having evinced a certain fondness for me. But I had other plans. Mr. Harding’s words to my mother back in Marion in 1914, “Maybe I can do something sometime for Nan,” recurred to me again and again. So one afternoon I stayed at school and wrote, after many revisions, and after destroying dozens of sheets of perfectly good Y. W. C. A. paper, and without saying a word to a soul, the following letter, a carbon copy of which I retained:
New York City
May 7, 1917
Hon. Warren G. Harding
United States Senate
Washington, D. C.
My Dear Mr. Harding:
I wonder if you will remember me; my father was Dr. Britton, of Marion, Ohio.
I have been away from Marion for about two years, and, up until last November, have been working. But it was work which promised no future.
Through the kindness of one of my father’s Kenyon classmates, Mr. Grover Carter, of this city, I have been enabled to take up a secretarial course, which course I shall finish in less than three weeks.
I have been reading of the imperative demand for stenographers and typists throughout the country, and the apparent scarcity, and it has occurred to me that you are in a position to help me along this line if there is an opening.
The author, when she wrote the letter on Page [25]
My experience is limited; I have done some work for Mr. Carter this winter; I have also been doing publicity work in the afternoons while going to school; the latter has been in connection with Madame Paderewski’s Polish Refugee work. Now that I am about to look for an all-day position I do so want to get into something which will afford me prospects of advancement.
Any suggestions or help you might give me would be greatly appreciated, I assure you, and it would please me so to hear from you.
Sincerely,
NAN BRITTON
Three days later, toward evening, when I came home from school, I spied a large envelope on the hall table. It was addressed to me in a man’s handwriting and bore the United States Senate return. I tore it open. At first my eyes swept the pages unseeingly, noting only the signature, “W. G. Harding.”
Mrs. Carter was in the living-room on that floor and I joined her there. She was an extremely conventional woman and I knew she would not understand or sympathize if I were to confess my intense admiration for a married man. So, with a supreme effort at nonchalance, I told her that I had some days before written to Senator Harding inquiring about a position, and that this was his reply. With forced calm I read aloud to her his letter to me.
The opening sentence was an assurance that he did indeed remember me. He added, “... you may be sure of that, and I remember you most agreeably, too.” Compared with the warmth of these first sentences the following cordially expressed desire to be of assistance in furthering my ambition to become a secretary held only secondary interest for me.
He said frankly that if he had a position open in his own office he would “gladly tender it to me.” The next best thing he said, would be to help me to a government position provided I were secretarially equipped for it. To this end he inquired specifically what I had been trained to do. He suggested that I accompany my next letter with a note of recommendation, parenthetically emphasizing that this note was not for his own satisfaction but for that of the department chief. After this was in his hands he would “go personally to the war or navy department and urge my appointment.” He thought that “the fact that my esteemed father had belonged to the party now in power” would help.
He mentioned the maximum departmental salary of $100 per month, but warned me that I would probably have to be satisfied with an initial salary of $60. Such positions as were available might last only during the period of the war, he said, and added, “which we all hope will not be long—however, it may be very long.”
The latter paragraphs thrilled me. He wrote that there was “every probability” of his being in New York the following week! If he could reach me by phone or “becomingly look me up,” he would do so, and “take pleasure in doing it.”
The whole tone of the letter was one of utmost cordiality. I could scarcely refrain from uttering exclamations of delight. I took my things and went upstairs to my room where I could reread the letter alone.
My bedroom on the third floor of the Carter home was a joy to me. The house itself stood almost in the shadow of Queensboro Bridge, which spans the North River at 59th Street. My windows faced the southeast and afforded a gorgeous view of the river. On a clear evening the lights of the Williamsburg, Manhattan and Brooklyn bridges looked like arches of stars hung low and twinkling against the sky.
Outside my windows trees were freshly green. Sparrows perched there and chirped joyously. For weeks children had been playing out-of-doors, mingling their cries with a hundred other street noises. And, from the background of these sounds, arose momently the varied shrilling of the river-boat whistles....
It all fascinated me. It was so different from any atmosphere I had ever known. At first these very things had made me homesick, but I was growing now to love New York! I liked to watch the barges glide smoothly and with scarce perceptible progress up or down the river.... I could even see from my bed in the morning the sparkling water surface dancing in the sun!...
Now I closed my door and seated myself on the sill of an open window.... All I had dared to hope for from Mr. Harding was a possible letter of introduction from him to someone, either in Washington or New York, to whom I might apply direct for a position.... But he himself seemed genuinely interested in helping me!... And was coming over to New York, and would see me!... Warren Gamaliel Harding!
As the evening deepened, and even as I crept in between cool white sheets that night, the impression grew upon me that under the cordial phraseology of his letter there was more than the mere desire to be of assistance to me. It was almost a sweet ingratiation.... “You see I do remember you ...” was his concluding sentence....
Well indeed had I perceived this hidden warmth! When, upon his visit, I quoted to him those lines which had moved me to feel an underlying sweetness beyond the evident friendliness, he smiled and nodded and confessed to an overwhelming desire to see me after these years. To see me, he said, had been the sole motive for his trip to New York at that particular time!
And so an inexpressible happiness reigned in my heart, even though my impressions had not yet been grounded in fact by his assurances. Therefore I did not allow secret delight to vent itself in written words, but on May 11th wrote the following formal letter:
My Dear Mr. Harding:
It was good to know that you remembered me; and I appreciated your kind interest and prompt response.
As to my qualifications: I will say frankly that I have had little practical experience. As I said in my recent letter, my work this winter has been, in a degree, handicapped by the fact that it has been carried on while I have been going to school; therefore, I could not give it my entire attention. But certainly the little I have done has been wonderfully helpful, and has given me, at least, a start.
I am hoping that you will be in New York next week and that I can talk with you; I am inclined to believe that an hour’s talk would be much more satisfactory. There is so much I want to tell you; and I am sure that I could give you a better idea of my ability—or rather the extent of my ability, for it is limited—and you could judge for yourself as to the sort of position I could competently fill.
I am almost certain that I will be able to secure a good recommendation—both from Mr. Carter and Mrs. Phelps; if I do not get to talk with you I shall send them to you. This work has been in the stenographic line; this is really the work I want to follow.
If you call Stuyvesant 1900, the telephone number here at school, you would find me here from nine in the morning until one in the afternoon. In case you are able to see me for an hour it would please me immensely to make an appointment—provided it does not interfere with your plans.
Sincerely,
NAN BRITTON
12
I did not comply with Mr. Harding’s request for a letter of recommendation, not immediately securing it and not wishing to hold up my reply to him. I really felt I might likely be able to secure it and send it to him in advance of his answer to my letter of the 11th.
But May the 15th brought, to my surprise, a reply to my second letter sent the 11th. This letter too was written in longhand and was somewhat longer than the first one. In the corner of the stationery this time were the words, “Senate Chamber.”
If the first letter contained what I chose to regard as statements of rather more than conventional import, the second letter only served to confirm my belief.
He wrote that he had every confidence I would succeed—“... an ambitious young woman of your character and talents must succeed.” He spoke of having to break down the civil service bars to secure a place for me, adding, “I must ask it as a very personal favor, with the advantage of your good father having been a loyal supporter of the party in power.” However, he immediately assured me that he did not hesitate “to apply the purely personal appeal” and was glad to do it for me. He merely wished to be satisfied on one point—could I take dictation?
“You write a fine letter, your intelligence is of the high Britton standard.... I will have no doubt you will make good from the very start.”
It pleased me immensely to read, “I like your spirit and determination. It is like I have always imagined you to be.” Like he had always imagined me to be. Then he had thought about me! Even speculated as to what I was like! “... I shall rejoice to note your success,” he wrote.
“I knew you had gone out to contest with the world and win your way, but I had no detailed knowledge....” Why, there was the implication that he had wondered, had perhaps even wanted detailed knowledge and of course hadn’t dared to betray his interest! Wonderful that he had thought about me!
He expected to be in New York within the next ten days and, he said, might definitely advise me in advance of his coming, and again he assured me, “It will be a pleasure to look you up.”
I liked the last line of his letter. “... always know of ... my very genuine personal interest in your good fortune.”
A skylark amid the clouds could not have been happier than I during the intervening days between my receipt of this letter and the arrival of its author. I would often speak sharply to myself when occasionally I touched earth long enough to realize the source of my joy and light-heartedness, “Don’t make a perfect fool of yourself, now, Nan. He hasn’t said anything which actually means much ... and naturally he would take a fatherly interest in any girl who might seek help from him....” But my spirits would not be downed! I talked to the birds. I arose earlier than usual to stand and gaze out of my window and dream. I examined my face carefully in the mirror. I planned exactly what I should wear. My Chicago benefactor had recently sent me $50 with which I had purchased a new gray tailored suit, and I would wear a dark blue sailor hat, the crown covered with grey veiling.
13
Before I had an opportunity to get another letter to him, Mr. Harding came over to New York. He telephoned me at school and made an appointment for me to meet him at the Manhattan Hotel, at Madison Avenue and 42nd Street. What a sweet shock to hear his voice!...
He was standing on the steps of the hotel when I reached there.
It must be remembered that I was but sixteen years of age when I had last seen Mr. Harding (the time I called at his house to congratulate him upon his election to the Senate) and, although I looked very young when I met him at the Manhattan Hotel, still I had had the advantage of the intervening two years, and the added advantage of having lived with the Carters from whom I had learned a great deal, and I am sure Mr. Harding’s agreeable surprise was genuine. Certainly he could not have been more cordial.
He invited me to come back to the reception room near 43rd Street. It was about 10:30 in the morning. We sat down upon a settee and it was not difficult for me to talk to him for he invited confidence. We became immediately reminiscent of my childhood and my adoration of him, and he seemed immensely pleased that I still retained such feelings. I could not help being perfectly frank.
Some kind of convention in New York at that time had made hotel accommodations very scarce, and Mr. Harding confessed that he was obliged to take the one room available in the Manhattan Hotel—the bridal chamber! He asked me to come up there with him so that we might continue our conversation without interruptions or annoyances.
The bridal chamber of the Manhattan Hotel was, to me, a very lovely room, and, in view of the fact that we had scarcely closed the door behind us when we shared our first kiss, it seemed sweetly appropriate. The bed, which we did not disturb, stood upon a dais, and the furnishings were in keeping with the general refinement of atmosphere. I shall never, never forget how Mr. Harding kept saying, after each kiss, “God!... God, Nan!” in high diminuendo, nor how he pleaded in tense voice, “Oh, dearie, tell me it isn’t hateful to you to have me kiss you!” And as I kissed him back I thought that he surpassed even my gladdest dreams of him.
Between kisses we found time to discuss my immediate need for a position and I found Mr. Harding less inclined to recommend me in Washington. In fact, he frankly confessed to me, he preferred to have me in New York where he could come over to see me and where he would feel more at liberty to be with me. There were no intimacies in that bridal chamber beyond our very ardent kisses, and, Mr. Harding, having been acquainted with my plans for going to Chicago after graduation to visit my sister, tucked $30 in my brand new silk stocking and was “sorry he had no more that time to give me.” Inasmuch as I received my carfare and small spending money from Mrs. Carter in amounts of $1.00, $.75, $1.25 or whatever change she happened to have on hand, to have $30 all at one time to “spend as I chose” seemed to me almost too good to be true! I had always been very grateful to the Carters for the way in which they took me into their home as one of them, but of course I would not have been my natural self had I not thought wistfully over Mr. Harding’s statement to me, “Why didn’t you ask me to send you to school, Nan?” and his emphatic “You bet!” after I had inquired with wide eyes, “Oh, would you have done that?”
The first letter I received from Senator Harding I had shown to Mrs. Emma Laird Phelps with whom I was working in the Paderewski connection, and she read it with what I thought seemed avidity.
“A typical letter, my dear,” she said, shrugging her shoulders.
“Typical of what?” I inquired.
“Why, that man has an object—can’t you see that?” she said easily.
“What kind of object do you mean?” I queried wonderingly.
Her explanation must have been very vague for I can’t remember it at all, but I suppose the affectional things that actually did transpire upon our first visit together were things which she would have said proved such ‘object’ on Mr. Harding’s part. But they were all too spontaneous, too sincere to have been premeditated.
Mrs. Phelps afterward asked me one time to give her a letter that she might use to gain a conference with Mr. Harding and I am sure, while I never gave her such a letter, that she changed her mind completely about Mr. Harding’s possible purposes toward me so graciously did she voice her admiration of him to me many times.
Upon this first visit, Mr. Harding and I had luncheon at the Manhattan Hotel, in the dining-room on the 43rd Street side. Then we took a taxi uptown to see Mrs. Phelps—to her apartment on 116th Street.
The entrance hall to Mrs. Phelps’ apartment was dimly lighted, and when we emerged into the living-room which is on 116th Street Mr. Harding turned to Mrs. Phelps. Except for their acknowledgments of introductions nothing had been said by any of us, and now Mr. Harding remarked pleasantly, “Well, Mrs. Phelps, we people with big noses always seem to get along, don’t we?” I had not been long enough in New York and was still too unsuspecting to realize the significance of that remark, though I am confident Mr. Harding meant it all good-naturedly, and I am not at all sure even now that Mrs. Phelps is a Jewess. Within the past year and a half I have been in Mrs. Phelps’ apartment and she asked me if I remembered when President Harding, then Senator, had sat in “that chair,” indicating an easy rocker.
From Mrs. Phelps Mr. Harding obtained the information that I was rather more than a good stenographer.
On the way back downtown in the taxi to the Y. W. C. A. where Mr. Harding next talked with Miss Anderson about my school work, he put his arm around me.
“Nan,” he queried kindly, “just how fast do you think you could take dictation?”
“Oh, I don’t know, not so very fast,” I answered frankly.
“Well, look here, I’ll dictate a letter to you and you tell me whether you ‘get’ all of it.” The “letter” as it was dictated verbatim I do not recall, but the trend of it is easy rememberable:
“My darling Nan: I love you more than the world, and I want you to belong to me. Could you belong to me, dearie? I want you ... and I need you so....”
I remember the letter did not run into length because I silenced him with the kisses he pleaded for. He would tremble so just to sit close to me, and I adored every evidence of his enthusiasm.
“Do people address you as ‘Judge’ or ‘Senator’?” asked Miss Anderson after I had presented Mr. Harding to her.
“No, I have never been a judge,” he answered, “I guess I’m just plain Mr. Harding.” He smiled. Miss Anderson suggested that we sit in one of the little waiting-rooms.
It will be remembered that this visit was in late May of 1917 and our whole United States was full of “the war.” It was entirely logical that the general trend of conversation should bear upon the various aspects of the war. But how it drifted into a discussion of babies I do not recall. Mr. Harding vouchsafed the information he had recently acquired in Washington, that the Germans were actually attempting to create children by injecting male serum, taken at the proper temperature, into the female without the usual medium of sexual contact. He denounced this method of propagation as “German madness” and affirmed that in his belief children should come only through mutual love-desire. I shall never forget the expressions of his face and Helen Anderson’s. Surely she must have thought he was talking strangely to speak of these things so frankly and upon such short acquaintance. But I, though I confess it did not occur to me then, understand these processes of his mind to have been the direct result of contemplations concerning me, and it is not unlikely that even as early as that very first visit Warren Harding was entertaining the possibility of becoming the father of a real love-child. Certainly his face was a study.
Miss Anderson assured him of my readiness for a position and we went from the Y. W. C. A. to Judge Elbert H. Gary’s office at 71 Broadway, Empire Building. I remember we stood quite a few minutes waiting for a Broadway street car, and it must have taken us about forty-five minutes to go from 14th Street to Rector Street. I remember how Mr. Harding suddenly seemed to come to himself somewhere in lower Broadway and exclaim, as we were getting off the car, “Why, Nan, why didn’t we take a taxi!” and his surprise was so genuine that I knew he had not realized where he had been during that ride downtown.
14
Mr. Harding had told me that he thought the very place for me was in the United States Steel Corporation. I had never even heard of Judge Gary, strange to say, and he explained that he was the Chairman of the Board of Directors of the largest industrial corporation in the world.
Mr. Harding handed his card to the secretary in Judge Gary’s outer office. The judge came out immediately. After introducing me to Judge Gary, Mr. Harding inquired casually of him whether his senatorial services in a certain matter had been satisfactory. The judge replied that they had indeed and thanked Mr. Harding. We were then taken into the office of the Comptroller, Mr. Filbert, and Judge Gary made this statement to Mr. Filbert: “Mr. Filbert, I want to help Senator Harding to help this young lady.” Then Judge Gary retired.
Our interview with Mr. Filbert was rather a lengthy one and I thought there were infused in it the elements of a battle of wits between the two men. Mr. Filbert seemed to resent Mr. Harding’s assurance that “Miss Britton can write all of your letters for you!” But, as usual, when we left it was Mr. Filbert who had been won over and I was asked to await a letter from him telling in which branch of service in the Steel Corporation I would be placed.
Going down in the elevator, Mr. Harding whispered to me, “Now, do you believe that I love you?”
We took a taxi back to the Manhattan Hotel. We stopped at the 43rd Street entrance. The taxi had not drawn close enough to the curb and there was a space of perhaps ten inches between the running-board and the sidewalk. Mr. Harding caught his foot and tripped, falling in a very awkward position. His face became red and he arose the most embarrassed man imaginable. I remember how it immediately reminded me of a story mother used to tell about my doctor-father, accompanied also by a young lady, when he was making calls in his shiny “buggy”, being suddenly seized with cramps which bore him to the ground when he alighted in front of the patient’s house; he had been obliged to remain in a squatting position for several moments. Mr. Harding’s blush of confusion after his fall remained a good many minutes and was explained by him, “You see, dearie, I’m so crazy about you that I don’t know where I’m stepping!”
The bridal chamber at the Manhattan seemed almost to be our home when we returned to it for the second time, and the manner in which we threw off our wraps and settled ourselves together comfortably in the big arm-chair the most natural thing in the world. And the fact that Mr. Harding told me dozens of times the thing I had always longed to hear from him, “I love you, dearie,” seemed no less the perfectly natural and normal thing. “We were made for each other, Nan,” he said.
Especially did it all seem so right when Mr. Harding repeated to me many times, “I’d like to make you my bride, Nan darling.”
Mr. Harding came over once more before I left for Chicago on my vacation trip, for which my Chicago friends had sent me my railroad ticket. It was upon this occasion that he took me to his room in the Manhattan and talked over with me my prospective position in the United States Steel Corporation. He expressed his desire to have me dignified in the eyes of the officials there who would hear of me through Mr. Filbert, and about fifteen or twenty minutes before it was time for him to catch his train, he sat down at the desk and wrote out in longhand a letter which he said would be suitable for me to send to Mr. Filbert when that gentleman should send me a note to report for further interview at the Steel Corporation. Mr. Harding seemed very sure that I would be the recipient of such a letter and I watched over his shoulder while he wrote a hasty draft of “my reply.” It was the first time I had seen him slam his Oxford glasses upon his classic nose and I marvelled aloud at this feat.
I have always been quite averse to deception such as claiming authorship for something written by another, and I could not sincerely enthuse over the letter Mr. Harding had tried to couch in terms such as I might employ. However, I accepted it with thanks and he needed only to glance at his watch to see that he had barely time to catch his train. He kissed me and rushed away.
In due time I received the letter from Mr. Filbert, in which he asked me to see Miss Blanche Sawyer, in the legal department, who would tell me about my position in the Corporation. But the letter received from Mr. Filbert seemed not to call for the kind of reply Mr. Harding had pencilled and so I wrote one of my own. I sent Mr. Harding a carbon copy, however, which he approved in his next letter to me.
15
In early June I left for Chicago to visit my sister Elizabeth before taking up my work with the Steel Corporation in New York, in a stenographic position at $16 per week.
Up to that time I had made no one my confidante—in truth, I was finding it difficult to realize that my hero, Warren G. Harding, loved me, Nan Britton. Naturally I told no one. But my sister, Elizabeth, knowing me as she did, sought a reason for the unusual glow of my cheeks and the happiness written so visibly in my eyes, and when I received my first forty-page love-letter from Mr. Harding, I told Elizabeth the truth. She was unmarried then and living at the Colonial Hotel where I visited her, but she was in love herself with the man she finally married, and, having known so well my childhood adoration for Mr. Harding, sympathized with me though she did not encourage me to continue my friendship with him.
My finances were rather low at that time, I disliked to ask my Chicago benefactors for more money, so I wrote to Mr. Harding about it, as he had instructed me to do. The first money he sent me was in the form of a money order—it seems to me on the American Express Company—for $42, which amount, he told me by letter, was odd enough to make it appear that it was in payment of some possible work I had done for him. Elizabeth went with me when I had it cashed.
A week or so after that I received a letter from Mr. Harding saying he had been asked to speak in Indianapolis, and inviting me to come there to meet him. So I packed my suitcase and the following day Mr. Harding met me at the station in Indianapolis. I was, curiously enough, quite free from nervousness as I walked through the iron gate where he stood waiting, and wondered why he seemed so nervous. His hand shook terribly as he took mine after we were in the taxi. Even his voice shook. For me it was a great moment. I was so happy to be with him.
We went immediately to the Claypool Hotel where he registered me as his niece, Miss Harding. During my stay there (we left late that afternoon), I had several phone calls from newspaper men and Republicans who were endeavoring to get hold of Senator Harding. A great deal of the time he was in my room with me and instructed me to tell them to try him at the Republican Club. It was such fun to have him cut them all for me!
There were no climactic intimacies in Indianapolis. When I came to unpack my things I found a note pinned to my nightie on which Elizabeth had written these words, “I trust you, Nan dear.” Elizabeth knew I loved Mr. Harding very dearly.
Mr. Harding had to leave me after luncheon—which, I believe, we had together, though I do not remember for sure—and I wandered about until the hour set for me to meet him with my bag at the interurban station. I bought a postcard of the Claypool Hotel to keep as a souvenir. I remember the clerk at the desk had occasion to say something to me and it sounded so good to be addressed as “Miss Harding.”
Late that afternoon we took the interurban car to Connersville, Indiana. Mr. Harding was scheduled to speak that evening at Rushville, Indiana, which is near Connersville. That trip on the interurban train was wonderful to me. I wore a black satin dress which my sister Elizabeth had “made over” from one of her own for me. I explained to Mr. Harding that I had a “better one” in my suitcase. “This one suits me, Nan!” he said gaily.
He spent quite some time explaining to me the layout of the City of Washington. He seemed to take much pride in Washington, and I thought to myself that he just looked as though he belonged there rather than in the small city of Marion, Ohio, our home town; he looked eminently the part of a United States Senator. Yet, as I write this, I remember I used to find myself cherishing the nice things he said about our home town.
“What would your sister, Daisy Harding, say if she could see us together?” I exclaimed to him.
He laughed whimsically, evidently thinking rather of his wife.
“What would Florence Harding say, I want to know!” he answered.
At Mr. Harding’s suggestion I registered in Connersville at the McFarlan Hotel, where he also stopped, as “Miss E. N. Christian,” or “Elizabeth N. Christian.” Christian was Mr. Harding’s secretary’s name—George B. Christian—and Mr. Harding said he thought it would be “a good joke” to use his secretary’s name. My father and mother must have known the Christians in Marion, and when in high school I knew the older gentleman, George Christian’s father, “Colonel” as he was called, because he used to take us girls to the drug store and buy us sodas.
Mr. Harding intended to take me to Rushville that evening, but when he knocked on my door I was in the bathroom down the hall, and as his car was waiting for him he could not wait for me. So I was left to roam around the little village and wait for his return. There, too, I bought a postcard picture of the McFarlan Hotel “for remembrance.”
He returned about ten-thirty or eleven. I was sitting in the lobby of the hotel, one of the typical lobbies of a small town hotel, with the chairs lined up before the front window. As he came in he ignored me altogether and I smiled to myself. We had planned to take the midnight train into Chicago, and he had told me that afternoon on the interurban that we would get a berth together if I agreed. But it had really been left undecided.
A taxi was announced about eleven-forty-five and I picked up my bag and went out. Mr. Harding was at my side in a moment. The several politicians who escorted Mr. Harding to the cab did not know of course that we were known to each other, and ostensibly we were not. He spoke up, “I am catching the midnight train into Chicago. Is that your train, young lady?” I replied that it was and he said, “Well, I guess we can both ride down in the same taxi.” Inasmuch as I doubt whether Connersville boasted more than one, it was a wise suggestion! I was afraid the taxi man would surely hear Mr. Harding’s whispered remarks to me on the way down, especially when he said over and over again, “Dearie, ’r y’ going t’ sleep with me? Look at me, Nan: goin’ to sleep with me, dearie?” How I loved to hear him say “dearie”!
We secured a section to Chicago. The remembrance of that trip from Connersville to Chicago is very beautiful although it, too, was free from complete embraces. We were both dressed the next morning before we reached the Englewood Station, about nine minutes from the downtown station, and I remarked to Mr. Harding that he looked a bit tired.
“God, sweetheart! what do you expect? I’m a man, you know.”
In Chicago, we went to a downtown hotel. Here Mr. Harding registered us as man and wife, although I stood apart and do not know the name he used. However, if I were to see that register as well as all of the others wherein we were registered, I am sure I could identify his writing, for he did not disguise it well no matter how hard he tried.
I noticed he was conversing with the clerk and when he joined me he said, in a low voice, on the way to the elevator, “The clerk said if I could prove that you were my wife he would give us the room for nothing!” I asked him laughingly what he had replied to that and he said, “I told him I was not in the habit of proving my wife’s identity and that I had no objection at all to paying for accommodations!” Nevertheless, we were very circumspect while there that morning and our love-making was, as it had been up until then, restricted. We had breakfast served in our room. I remember that it was the first time that season I had had strawberries.
Mr. Harding took the noon train back—I think going direct to Washington.
16
During the remainder of my visit with my sister Elizabeth at the Colonial Hotel in Chicago, I analysed my feelings as best I could. What a maze of emotions! I knew I loved Warren Harding more than anything in all the world. However, up to this time I had kept my virginity, despite his very moving appeals to become his completely. Mr. Harding had explained to me that were we to be found on the train coming from Connersville to Chicago, sleeping together in one section, we would invite as severe censure as though we had shared love’s sweetest intimacy; and the trip itself would be sufficient to incriminate us.
But in my own eyes, I was safe so long as my virginity was sustained. It seems to me unbelievable now when I think back on my ignorance about certain things. I had early reached this conclusion: people got married and undressed and slept together; therefore, one must be undressed in order for any harm to come to them. I remember that this belief was so strong in my mind that when, during our ride together from Connersville to Chicago, I experienced sweet thrills from just having Mr. Harding’s hands upon the outside of my nightdress, I became panic-stricken. I inquired tearfully whether he really thought I would have a child right away. Of course this absurdity amused him greatly, but the fact that I was so ignorant seemed to add to his cherishment of me for some reason. And I loved him so dearly.
I had never had, as most girls do have I suppose, a single talk with or from my mother on sex. As a matter of fact, I did not know how babies came into the world, and I frankly told Mr. Harding so. I remember once during one of our “kissing tours”, as he jocularly called them, I asked him what under the sun people were given navels for! I shall never forget how it amused, and then saddened him, nor his face as he told me that that was where I had been attached to my mother. It was all so wonderful and beautiful when he told me. It was he who told me of course what my body functions would be if I were to yield myself to him. He said, “You ask me whatever you want to know; I’ll tell you.”
In my father’s medical library were many books on women and women’s diseases. My sister Elizabeth and I had girl friends who were enormously interested in coming up to my father’s office and poring over these books in his absence, studying with inconceivable interest the lurid pictures portraying various intimate parts of woman’s anatomy, all of course highly colored, but it was to me no less than repulsive to even glance at those medical pictures. I never spent one solitary second looking at them. When I came to the age when all girls experience that normal function which makes of them potential mothers, I was most painfully embarrassed and told my sister Elizabeth, who in turn communicated it to my mother, and even she dwelt very briefly upon it, merely cautioning me not to get my feet unnecessarily wet when I was ill each month.
I told Mr. Harding that I was aware that there was a lovely mystery connected with life itself, but I had early decided that it was a mystery for one’s husband to reveal, and I had been perfectly content not to pry into it. I accepted my puberty as a necessity, even as a sacred necessity to a cause which should later reveal itself. Mr. Harding confessed to me that he had never possessed a woman who had hitherto been possessed of no man, and perhaps that fact concerning me made me the more desirable to him, in addition to his love for me. He told me about his early amours, and he confessed that it had been many years since his home situation had been satisfying.
Mr. Harding told me that he knew of no man except his brother “Deac” who married, having had no previous experience with women. “Brother Deac” was a male virgin, he said, before he married.
The fact that at home we girls were held down, even to not being allowed to attend parties where boys were until we were quite seventeen—at least that applied to me—indicates the measures that my mother and father had taken to guard us. “And no young man is going to visit my girls after ten o’clock at night,” my father used to say. If we expressed sentiments concerning boys—and my sister Elizabeth was early a “man hater” so this refers to me mainly—we were told that they were joshing us, “making fun of us.” So the outlets for my inclinations in this direction were confined to raving about Mr. Harding, and about moving picture actors to whom there was not quite so much parental objection inasmuch as they were only on the screen and in the flesh safely distanced from me.
Of course there was the perfectly logical plea from Mr. Harding that if I loved him so deeply I would consent to belong to him, not merely to be with him, trying him by continued denial. I think I made up to Warren Harding everything I ever denied him—and I was afterward so glad I had not plunged headlong into a relationship which was of such vastness and which I can now look back upon with absolutely no regrets. In the history of lovers, there was, I am sure, none to compare with Warren Gamaliel Harding. And to him I was, or so he has often said, “the sweetheart incomparable.”
17
Through my sister I had met, while in Chicago, a young man, whom I shall call Dean Renwick, who was a pianist of considerable talent, and a rather nice-looking boy. He seemed to like me and “after a fashion” asked me to marry him—perhaps he wanted merely to “be engaged” to me. I have often thought since that the poor boy was just lonesome, for I don’t see how I could have appealed to him particularly; our interests were not the same. In any event, I rather seized the idea of annexing a beau—one who was free to marry me if I wanted and he wanted. You see, I tried hard to convince myself that it was wrong to love Mr. Harding as I loved him, that it would mean ultimate surrender, and perhaps sorrow for us and for our families.
My sister Elizabeth was amazed at the letters I would receive from Mr. Harding when I shared their contents with her. I remember among the first of them that came to me while I was in Chicago that month, was one which particularly took me off my feet. It contained in sweet phrasing a picture of his desire for me, summed up in the final parenthetical exclamation, “God! what an anticipation!” He used to tell me that just to visualize me as he loved to see me brought pangs that seemed virginal in their intensity and surpassed any longing he had ever experienced in his life.
I returned to New York the latter part of June, not having committed myself to Dean Renwick beyond verbal gratitude for his regard and an attempt at a show of affection for him which fell flat in my heart.
The first of July, 1917, I went to work in the United States Steel Corporation. I was interviewed by Miss Blanche Sawyer in the legal department. She informed me that although I had had a splendid introduction I would of course have to prove my worth. She took me in and introduced me to Mr. C. L. Close, Manager of the Bureau of Safety, Sanitation and Welfare, in whose office I was employed for the two years that followed. Mr. Close came from Shelby, Ohio, and his wife, formerly Edna Kennedy, had been a Marion girl. Mr. Close knew George Christian pretty well, having known Mr. Christian’s wife who also came from Shelby, Ohio. This was, in a way, a sort of social grounding for me, as George Christian’s boss, Senator Harding, had been instrumental in placing me with his secretary’s friend in the United States Steel Corporation.
I left the Carter home in Sutton Place, preferring for obvious reasons to live by myself, or rather with a strange family where my movements would not be restricted. The first room I rented was with Mr. and Mrs. Daniels who lived at 607 West 136th Street. I had heard of Mrs. Daniels through Helen Anderson who in turn had met her at the Y. M. C. A. where she had filed her notice of “rooms to rent.” I lived there from July to November, 1917.
Of course I was proud of my friendship with Mr. Harding, and, inasmuch as up to this time it had been free from deepest intimacies, I felt freer to discuss him, although as a matter of fact I had always talked about him so much at home and elsewhere that it was much a matter of course.
The Daniels were wise enough to appreciate that their roomer was rather more than “in” with a United States Senator. Moreover, mention was made from time to time in the papers of senate activities in which Mr. Harding took a prominent part, and on August 12, 1917, The New York Times carried in its magazine section a front-page article entitled, “Need of Dictator Urged by Harding.” I wondered at the time whether the publication of this article had been arranged for in a series of telephone calls made to the Times, the Sun and newspaper friends of Mr. Harding upon the occasion of one of his visits here when I was with him. The Daniels immediately said that I ought to try to persuade the senator to dine at their home. It would, obviously, have been a feather in their joint social headgear! As a matter of fact, he did not do so, though I had his assurance that he would if it would please me.
18
It was mid-July when Mr. Harding came over from Washington. We went to a moderate-priced hotel on Seventh Avenue. He told me that that hotel had once been a very nice place, and he knew George and Dan Frank (dry-goods merchants from Marion) used to stop there when in New York.
We were not questioned when he registered, and we were made very comfortable in a room on the sixth floor, if I remember rightly, looking down upon Broadway. Although I was deliriously happy to lie in close embrace with my darling, I just could not even yet permit the intimacies which would mean severance forever from a moral code which, while never identified to me by my parents as the one virtue to hold intact, was intuitively guarded by me as such. Mr. Harding has many times said to me that if people were to know that we had been together intimately without indulging in closest embrace they would not credit the story. In fact, he said to me with something like chagrin that the men would say, “there certainly must have been something wrong with Harding!” But somehow it is characteristic of me to be sure of myself, and when once committed to a cause there is seldom a turning-back. And, as much as I loved Mr. Harding, the traditional frailty men are wont to attribute to women as the weaker sex did not dominate me. This sureness on my part accounted later on for the total lack of “recriminations,” a word Mr. Harding very frequently employed. “Remember, dearie, no recriminations!” he used to say.
On July 30th, 1917, Mr. Harding came again to New York. He decided we could safely go to a hotel where friends of his in Washington had intimated to him that they had stopped under similar unconventional circumstances with no unpleasant consequences.
This was on Broadway in the thirties. I remember so well I wore a pink linen dress which was rather short and enhanced the little-girl look which was often my despair. I waited in the waiting-room while Mr. Harding registered. I have been in that hotel once since that time and I have noted that they have changed the first floor entirely. I think Mr. Harding said he registered under the name of “Hardwick” or maybe “Warwick.” There were no words going up in the elevator.
The day was exceedingly warm and we were glad to see that the room which had been assigned to us had two large windows. The boy threw them open for us and left. The room faced Broadway, but we were high enough not to be bothered by street noises. We were quite alone.
I became Mr. Harding’s bride—as he called me—on that day.