Warren Gamaliel Harding was the first Baptist to serve as President of the United States and the only Baptist president—thus far—to be a Republican. Neither Baptists nor Republicans are particularly proud of that fact these days, as Harding is generally ranked dead last among the nation’s chief executives. His name is nearly synonymous with the Teapot Dome scandal, only one of many episodes of corruption and graft in his administration—this despite the fact that he was elected in a landslide in 1920 and deeply mourned across the nation when he died suddenly of a heart attack on August 2, 1923. The museum built to honor his memory in his hometown of Marion, Ohio, has been called “the most attractive presidential memorial outside of Washington, D.C.”
Harding was reputed to be a womanizer, a facet of his character long denied by some of his defenders for lack of evidence. That defense can no longer be made. His siring of an illegitimate daughter by one of his paramours, Nan Britton, has recently been confirmed by DNA testing. Harding is said to have had trysts with Britton in the Senate Office Building before he became president and then in the White House itself—Hillary and Jackie had nothing on First Lady Florence, the dour and long-suffering wife of Harding whom he called, not so endearingly, “Duchess.”
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