“If you knew of a great scandal in our administration, would you for the good of the country and the party expose it publicly or would you bury it?”
This is the story of a brilliant man’s presidency and the greatest presidential scandal to precede Watergate. This is the story of Warren G. Harding and the Teapot Dome Scandal.
Growing up in Ohio, Warren–or little “Winnie,” as his mom calls him–shows his brilliance from day one. The smart, charismatic, and handsome boy grows up to become a newspaperman and falls in love with politics while reporting. He soon becomes a rising star, holding Ohio then national offices. Taking the reins of government after World War I, the Republican hopes to return the post-war, economically downtrodden, and fearful nation to “normalcy.”
But can he return the nation to “normalcy” while his friends in the “Ohio Gang” are making shady deals? And what does Warren know of these deals? Is he naive? Or is the several-times adulterous president, who copes with the stress of office through drink and gambling, in on it? That’s the question we’ll ask ourselves as we follow his less-than-a-full-term presidency.
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122: Halloween Special II: H.P. Lovecraft – “The Outsider” & “Dagon”
121: Henry Ford: The Model T & Mass Production
120: From Atlanta to the NAACP, or Booker T. Washington v. W.E.B. Du Bois
119: Women’s Suffrage & the Passage of the 19th Amendment
118: “The Island of Hope and Tears:” Ellis Island
117: Epilogue on Progressive Era Part I (Teddy Roosevelt)
116: Teddy Roosevelt’s Foreign Policy: From Big Stick Diplomacy to the Panama Canal
115: History–Doomed to Repeat It? A Conversation with Lindsay Graham
114: A Square Deal (pt. 3): “Leave it as it is” (Teddy Roosevelt & Conservationism)
113: A Square Deal (pt. 2): Consumer Protection–The FDA, & Ida Tarbell muckrakes Standard Oil
112: A Square Deal (pt. 1): Corp. Regulation—a coal strike, a trust, & Teddy’s Frenemy J.P. Morgan
111: The Assassination of Will McKinley & The Strenuous Life of Theodore Roosevelt
110: Epilogue to the Age of Imperialism
109: The Election of 1900 & the Rise of Anti-Imperialism
108: G.O. 100, “The Water Cure,” & The Law of War in the Early-20th Century with Professor Ryan Vogel
107: The Philippine-American War
106: The US Annexation of the Hawaiian Kingdom
105: “A Splendid Little War:” The Spanish-American War and Theodore Roosevelt’s Rough Riders
104: The Road to the Spanish-American War
103: A Gilded Age Christmas: Joseph Pulitzer’s Christmas Tree Fund
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