“Whether the Creator planned it that way,” Warren Harding once wrote in the Marion [Ohio] daystar, “or the environment and human society have made it so, men can learn richly through the love and loyalty of a brave and devoted dog.” The legacy of the twenty-ninth President of the United States – whose administrative historians routinely associate that of Andrew Johnson and James Buchanan as considered one of the worst in American history – is debatable. What cannot be doubted, however, is Harding’s deep affection for dogs.
Harding who owned them Marion Daystar before winning the presidency, he also possessed a keen understanding of public relations, and he kept his Airedale terrier, Laddie Boy, in the public eye. For a nation still reeling from the apocalyptic devastation of World War I, regular updates on the life of the President’s dog proved irresistible. Laddie Boy became a famous president’s first pet.
Warren Harding, a sitting Senator from Ohio, won the Republican Party nomination in 1920. It was the first presidential election since the passage of the 19th amendment, which guaranteed women the right to vote. Harding was charming and handsome, and his party’s support for Prohibition and opposition to President Wilson’s League of Nations helped him win with 60 percent of the vote.
Harding and his wife Florence did not have a dog when they moved into the White House on March 4, 1921, the next day. The President ordered his staff to bring the dog to him as soon as he arrived, and Laddie Boy’s appearance disrupted Harding’s first cabinet meeting. For the remainder of Harding’s tenure, Laddie Boy attended these meetings and, like every Cabinet Secretary, he had his own chair.
Airedale Terriers are intelligent as they were bred to hunt independently. In the UK, they were used as military canines during the First World War. They are sometimes referred to as the “king of terriers” because they are the largest of the breed. While her intelligence can make her stubborn and somewhat difficult to train, Harding appears to have had few difficulties. That New York Times reported that within a week of arriving at the Executive Mansion on March 5, 1921, the President’s pup had learned to fetch the newspaper in the morning and take it to its master without incident.
Maybe Laddie Boy just wanted to brag about the media coverage he was getting. Both Times and the Washington Star ran articles about the dog almost daily. The President gave the media unprecedented access to his dog, and he rarely went anywhere without him. Laddie Boy was known for accompanying Harding on golf outings and he joined the First Lady in fundraisers. Such was the dog’s fame that Harding had thousands of miniature likenesses of Laddie Boy made and gave them away to supporters as souvenirs. These tiny laddie boys are coveted collectibles today.
On rare occasions when the President felt his dog’s media exposure was shrinking, he would compose letters “from” Laddie Boy to major newspapers. In February 1922 the New York Times published one such letter: “So many people have expressed a desire to see me and I shake hands with so many callers at the Executive Mansion,” it said, “that I am concerned that there are some people who suspect me of political leanings will. From what I see of politics, I’m sure I have no such aspirations.”
For Laddie Boy’s first birthday, Caswell Kennels sent him a bone-shaped cake. Accompanying this treat was a letter of encouragement “written” by the First Dog’s father, Champion Tintern Tip Top. The letter expressed pride in Laddie Boy, whose antics were regularly documented in the local Toledo press. Relentless press coverage spurred the public’s desire to own Airedale terriers, and the breed’s popularity increased dramatically. Toy companies tried to capitalize on the dog’s popularity, and several contacted the White House to request exclusive rights to an “official” Laddie Boy likeness, but the President refused to endorse certain of his dog’s stuffed animals. Given the ingrained corruption of many officials in his administration, this principled stance feels deeply ironic.
In the summer of 1923, this corruption caught up with Harding. His Home Secretary, Albert Fall, had leased state-owned land to oil companies in return for private loans. The press began following the scandal known as Teapot Dome as it had once followed stories about the Hardings’ dog. In an effort to distance himself from these ongoing problems, President Harding traveled to the western United States and up to Alaska, then a US territory. (He was the first President to visit Alaska, and was photographed there with a team of sled dogs.) While in San Francisco, the President, who had been unwell for some time, died on August 2, 1923. The general public, the Having been told days earlier that Harding had gastrointestinal problems but was feeling better, was deeply shocked by his sudden death. The first lady did not consent to an autopsy, but modern scholars believe he died of cardiac arrest. The nation, not yet fully aware of the corruption of Harding’s government, mourned deeply.
Laddie Boy had not followed his owners on their trip west, and his White House handlers sadly noted that the dog was waiting for their return. The Associated Press reported:
There was one member of the White House household today who couldn’t quite understand the sadness hanging over the Executive Mansion. It was Laddie Boy, President Harding’s Airedale friend and companion. Lately he’s been keeping an expectant eye and a keen ear for the cars pulling up in the White House driveway. Because in his dog sense he seems to be arguing that a car drove [the Hardings] gone, so a car has to bring them back. The White House attachés shook their heads, wondering how to make Laddie Boy understand.
A poet named Edna Bell Seward wrote a poem entitled “Laddie Boy, He’s Gone”. (“Not alone, your dog’s heart will break if he takes another look at him.”) The poem was set to music by George M. Seward and published as sheet music for grieving Americans to gather in their drawing rooms and offer condolences to the grieving dog could .
The nation’s newsboys collected pennies for a unique tribute to Harding in recognition of the late President’s past service. Nineteen thousand were collected and made into a statue of Laddie Boy. (The dog, always a good boy, sat for sculptor Bashka Paeff on fifteen separate occasions.) The finished statue is owned by the Smithsonian but is not currently on display. After her husband’s death, Florence Harding gave Laddie Boy to Secret Service agent Harry L. Barker, whom she considered a son. Barker transferred to Boston when his White House duty ended, and he took the legendary Airedale with him. Laddie Boy lived with the Barkers until 1929, when he reportedly died of old age. The media darling has made it into the newspapers once again. That Times reported that the dog walked by with “his head on Mrs. Barker’s arms.” The family buried him in Newtonville, Massachusetts.
Laddie Boy’s legacy stretches well beyond the decade in which he lived. His role as a media darling set the stage for everyone’s favorite Presidential dogs – from Franklin Roosevelt’s Fala to Barack Obama’s Bo. The media attention attracted by Laddie Boy, and cleverly encouraged by President Harding, helped set the standard for presidential dogs and firmly planted the idea of White House pets in the public imagination. Every other animal that roams the living quarters of the Executive Mansion does so in the shadow of Laddie Boy. He remains President Harding’s lasting contribution to American life.
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Out of All American dogs: A History of the President’s Pets from Each Era © 2022 by Andrew Hager. Reprinted with permission from Dey Street Books, an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers.