Were we to overhear a conversation about a particular year: shocking political scandals over oil reserves, two attempted government coups overseas, the mysterious death of a national leader, and a devastating natural disaster that claimed many thousands of lives, we might think the talk would be about our day.  These were the headlines of a century ago, during the year 1923.

January 1, 1923 came on a Monday, and the year was a most eventful one.  In the United States, Warren G. Harding, a former Ohio newspaper executive and senator, was living in the White House.  Handsome and popular, Harding had taken the oath of office in March of 1921, and was embarking on his third year of the Presidency.  The nation enjoyed a robust economy, as the new President had created a national budget and insisted on balancing that budget.  Yet, all was not well in Washington.  Due to the President’s naïve choice of cabinet, he began to see problems with his Secretary of the Interior, Albert Fall, among others.  Fall had convinced the President to allow him to oversee lands in Wyoming that were designated for government oversight.  These lands were rich in oil reserves, in a region known as the Teapot Dome.  Albert Fall surreptitiously sold portions of the land to private businessmen, pocketing a significant amount himself.  When the news leaked, Congress had no choice but to investigate, and by 1923 hearings began.

Harding’s wife, Florence, had recently recovered from nephritis, a serious and usually fatal illness.  The couple decided to tour the United States, hoping to receive a boost of popularity in the shadow of the Congressional investigation.  That summer they traveled by train throughout the nation, and even visited the territory of Alaska – the first U.S. President and First Lady to do so.  On the way home, the Hardings and their entourage stopped in San Francisco.  The 57-year-old President suddenly felt ill and was ordered to rest.  On August 2 he died of unknown causes. The doctor who was present suggested an autopsy to determine the cause, but Florence Harding refused.  Speculation exploded on the President’s demise, opining about his death from a possible heart attack, cerebral hemorrhage or stroke, to possible poisoning; to this day, no one knows the cause of Harding’s sudden death.

In Vermont, Vice-President Calvin Coolidge was awakened in the middle of the night with the news of Harding’s passing.  He took the oath of office in the early hours, administered by his father who was a local judge, in his home.

Across the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans, other nations were in turmoil.  In Spain, a successful coup placed Miguel Primo de Rivera in power, who ruled as a dictator.  In Germany, a disgruntled World War I veteran turned politician named Adolf Hitler attempted to overthrow the government in a coup known as the Beer Hall Putsch.  It failed, and Hitler was arrested and sentenced to prison for insurrection.  That same year Russia, which had successfully invaded smaller neighboring countries during the recent war, incorporated them into the mother land.  They called themselves the Union of Soviet Socialists Republics, or USSR, with Vladimir Lenin as their leader.  This group of communist nations lasted almost seventy years.

In 1923, a massive earthquake struck the island of Honshu, on land that included the national capital of Tokyo.  The earthquake lasted for several minutes.  It caused fires and tsunamis, and over 100,000 people were killed.  It remains, a century later, as one of Japan’s deadliest natural disasters.

On the island of Sicily, Mount Etna, already well known for its frequent eruptions, erupted again, the fifth time since the turn of the century.

In Gettysburg, professional baseball icon Eddie Plank had retired from the game, after having been traded a few years earlier from his team, the Philadelphia Athletics.  The A’s should not have let him go, as they fared badly after Plank’s departure.  They did especially poorly in 1923 – losing twenty games in a row during the season.  Eddie also sold his gas station on the corner of York and Stratton Streets, and spent time helping his brother, Ira, who was the coach of the baseball team at Gettysburg College.

In 1923, a strike ensued among newspaper printers in New York City.  The states of Nevada and Montana were the first in the nation to pass legislation to fund old age pensions.  Songwriter George Gershwin composed the popular Rhapsody in Blue.  In Missouri, Harry Truman, who had recently decided upon a career in politics, was elected a judge in Jackson County.  His wife, Bess, learned she was expecting their first, and only, child – a daughter, Margaret, who was born the following year.  In Germany, Dr. Sigmund Freud published The Ego and the Id, the first book on psychoanalysis. 

In Turkey, Ankara replaced Istanbul as the national capital.  In Great Britain, Enrique Tiriboschi, an Argentine citizen, was the first person to successfully swim across the English Channel.

That same year, astronomer Edwin Hubble, who had recently designed his telescope for viewing of deep space, discovered a distant star in the Andromeda Nebula.  Magician Harry Houdini gained national notoriety for escaping from a straightjacket while dangling from a skyscraper in New York City.  Babe Ruth also made headlines for the city for helping his team, the New York Yankees, to beat the New York Giants, winning the World Series.

In 1923, Dwight D. Eisehower was in Panama, as an aide to General Fox Conner in guarding the building of the Panama Canal.  Ike’s wife, Mamie, and their infant son, John, also lived in the tropical country for much of the year.  Mamie, however, did not like the intense heat and unrelenting mosquitoes – and the constant absence of her husband.  She took John back to Denver to stay with her family after just a year in Central America.  Ike later recalled, “I’ve always regarded General Conner and that period as considerable influences in my life.” ¹

Some who were born during the year 1923 included Richard Nixon’s Secretary of State Henry Kissinger, astronaut Alan Shepherd, singer Hank Williams, actor Charlton Heston, George Patton IV – the son of the famed World War II general, and renowned World War II veteran and Civil War historian Ed Bearss.

In addition to President Harding, those who departed the world in 1923 included the notorious bandit Pancho Villa, who was assassinated at age 55, actress Sarah Bernhardt, Gustave Eiffel – the aged engineer of Paris’s most famous landmark, and Lord Carnarvon, the English earl who participated in the discovery of the tomb of King Tutankhamun in late 1922.  He received an insect bite in Egypt, which soon became infected, and the earl succumbed from sepsis early the following year.

After her husband’s death, Florence Harding returned to Ohio.  She burned all of his documents and personal correspondence that she felt might implicate him in any scandals.  Sadly, she was destroying history – and breaking the law – as they were Presidential documents.

The year 1923 was indeed eventful, and eerily similar to modern times.  Perhaps the cycles of history are just that – cycles, doomed to repetition from time to time.

Sources:  Anthony, Carl Sferrazza.  First Ladies: The Saga of the Presidents’ Wives and Their Power: 1789-1961.  New York: William Morrow & Co., 1990.  Eisenhower, Dwight D.  At Ease: Stories I Tell to Friends.  Washington, D.C.: Eastern National, 1967.  Grun, Bernard.  The Timetables of History.  New York: Simon & Schuster, 1991 (3 rd Edition).  Whitney, David C. and Robin Vaughan Whitney.  The American Presidents.  New York: Reader’s Digest Association, 1993 (8 th Edition).  Additional births and deaths found on Wikipedia.com.

End Notes: 

1.  Eisenhower, p. 194.