Charles L. Mee Jr. - The Ohio Gang: The World of Warren G. Harding

The Ohio Gang

Also by Charles L. Mee, Jr.

BOOKS

White Robe, Black Robe
Erasmus
Daily Life in the Renaissance
Meeting at Potsdam
A Visit to Haldeman and Other States of Mind
Seizure
The End of Order: Versailles 1919

PLAYS

Players Repertoire
Anyone! Anyone!
Constantinople Smith
Wedding Night

M Evans
An imprint of Rowman & Littlefield
4501 Forbes Boulevard, Suite 200
Lanham, Maryland 20706
www.rowman.com

Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data

Mee, Charles L.

The Ohio gang.

Bibliography: p.243

Includes index.

1. Harding, Warren G. (Warren Gamaliel), 1865-1923. 2. Corruption (in politics)United States. 3. United StatesPolitics and government1921-1923. 4. PresidentsUnited StatesBiography. I. Title. II. Title: The world of Warren G. Harding.

Copyright 1981 by Charles L. Mee, Jr.
Illustrations 1981 by M. Evans and Company, Inc.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means without the written permission of the publisher.

Distributed by

N ATIONAL B OOK N ETWORK

D ESIGN BY R ONALD F. S HEY

Manufactured in the United States of America

For Herb Katz

Picture research by M EREDITH M. C OLLINS.

All photographs from B ROWN B ROTHERS except where otherwise credited.

The Twenties

1. Miss America, 1921

2. The boys come marching home, through Madison Square, New York

3. The Babe

4. In grandpas lap, listening to the new radio

5. Miss Mary Pickford

6. Charlie Chaplin and Jackie Coogan in The Kid

7. Corn-on-the-cob and a hot dog at Coney Island

8. Howard Wilcox, winner of the Indy 500, in his Peugeot Special

9. Atlantic City bathing beauties

10. Women vote, for the first time

11. 12, and 13. Prohibition agents Izzy and Moe, the still, and the speakeasy

14 and 15. The Klan

16. Wall Street, bombed by non-traders

17. Sacco and Vanzetti

18. Philadelphia strikers, broken

19 and 20. Hoboes

21. The family on Sunday in their Model T

22. Mt. Vernon Avenue, near the home of Mr. and Mrs. Warren G. Harding, in Marion, Ohio

The Ohio Gang

I.

The Handshake

I N MIDWEEK, THE last week of May 1921, Jess Smith stood talking to another man just off Times Square, in the Astor Hotel lobby next to the entrance to the American Indian dining room with its crossed spears, peace pipe, snowshoes, horned headdress of a Tlingit chief, buffalo head, moose head. He was forty-eight years old, tall and pigeon-toed, with a florid complexion, heavy lips, black mustache, and loose, floppy cheeks, and he carried his head slightly down, accenting his double chin, as he peered out the tops of his round, owlish spectacles with shifty hazel eyes.

He was partial to diamond rings, although his favorite ring was one set with two large rubies and a number of small diamonds. He liked to dress in matching combinations: gray hat, gray tie flecked with lavender, gray gloves, gray tweed suit, gray silk socks, and a gray handkerchief with handwoven gray and lavender threads around the edges. One of his most memorable ensembles was a white linen suit with a purple hatband, purple necktie, purple breast pocket handkerchief, and purple silk socks.

When he talked, he sputtered, spraying any near him with saliva, so that those who had no kind feeling for him resorted to the obvious joke behind his back, Here comes Jess. Get out your umbrella.

Before he entered a room, he would fix his tie, pull his vest down smartly, set his cuffs just so, pat down his hair. He was a timid man; tears came to his eyes easily; and he was terribly frightened of firearms.

He had been born in a small town, Washington Court House, Ohio, about thirty miles south of Columbus. His father, a clerk in a dry goods store, died when he was three years old, and his mother married againboth of her husbands were named Smithto a man who was elected sheriff of Fayette County at a time when sheriffs legally pocketed their fees along with whatever else came their way. As a child, Jess was never short of cash.