All the data still pointed to a Dewey landslide. Pundits had predicted that the Republicans would easily maintain a House majority but that the Senate was too close to call. Now even the Senate appeared to be leaning back toward the GOP. Columnist Joseph Alsop, on October 15: “This correspondent’s inquiries have led to the view that the Republicans will not lose the Senate after all.” Drew Pearson in the Washington Post claimed on October 14 that “about 75 percent of the newspapers have announced for Dewey . . . Dewey is certain to win, and it’s only natural to want to be on the side of the winner.”
Truman saw the numbers differently. The day before Pearson made this claim, he sat with his aide George Elsey, on the way from Duluth, Minnesota, toward the Twin Cities. Elsey was focused on facts and figures to prepare Truman for the upcoming whistle-stops, but Truman interrupted him and told him to start writing down some notes.
The president rattled off each of the forty-eight states, knowing by heart how many electoral votes came with a win in each. Elsey scribbled in pencil as the train swayed back and forth. In the corner of the page, Elsey jotted: “13 Oct 1948 between Duluth + St. Paul Minn.” When Truman was done listing states and their respective electoral college votes, he said, “George, how many do I have?”
“Three-hundred-forty, Mr. President.”
Truman smiled; that was more than enough to win. Elsey later remembered the moment: “The fact is, I thought Truman would lose.”
At Democratic National Committee headquarters in New York’s Biltmore Hotel, campaigners were desperately manning phones to find donations, and pulling all-nighters attempting to dream up out-of-the-box ideas. The committee had come up with novel strategies to spread the Truman message, but they cost money.
In mid-October, the committee released a comic-book version of a Harry Truman biography—sixteen pages of colorful drawings with captions. The Story of Harry S. Truman had a tagline on the bottom of the cover: “Farm boy, Soldier, Statesman, President!” Demand for the publication stunned committee officials. Over 3.3 million copies were printed. “Workers at the precinct level reported it as the most effective piece of campaign material they had,” noted the committee’s publicist, Jack Redding, who had a hand in writing the book’s copy.
The committee had created a women’s division with a budget of $50,000, to be headed up by India Edwards, later to become vice chair of the Democratic National Committee. The women’s division was tasked with creating the first-ever political radio program aimed specifically at women voters. The show would be called Democratic Record, and it would air three times a week starting October 11, on ABC, nationwide, at 3:45 p.m. on the East Coast, when it was believed the largest audience of women would be at home with their radios on.
Each episode opened and closed with “The Missouri Waltz,” in honor of Truman’s home state, and it featured radio broadcaster Galen Drake interviewing women on important issues, with plenty of music and wisecracking woven in. Truman was campaigning through the Midwest when the first episode ran. The show was an instant hit. Variety, which covered the entertainment industry, reported on its success: “The ‘Democratic Record’ show is the best election pitch ever made on radio.”
At one point, publicist Jack Redding called Eleanor Roosevelt, who was in Paris in negotiations with the Soviets, as a member of the US delegation to the United Nations. Mrs. Roosevelt had thus far remained silent on the election.
“I think, Mrs. Roosevelt, that you are the key to the situation,” Redding told her over the phone. “I think your influence in America could elect President Truman. Without you . . . we may fail.”
The former First Lady replied without hesitation. “I have been reluctant to be part of this campaign because of my United Nations responsibilities. You know that?”
Surely Redding figured that Mrs. Roosevelt was making an excuse; she was reluctant to get behind a losing cause. “Yes, ma’am,” he said.
“But if it’s as close as you say, and if you think I can help, I’ll do it. But how?” The Democratic National Committee drummed up an idea to have Mrs. Roosevelt give a speech over ABC radio on the night of October 31, two days before Election Day. ABC officials, however, demanded a hefty fee: $25,721. The scramble for the money began.
The Republican campaign’s short film, The Dewey Story, was set to debut on movie screens before feature films three days before Election Day. When the DNC staff heard about it, a committee official made a desperate call to the Universal Newsreel company. Universal had plenty of existing film capturing Harry Truman in various important scenes, for its newsreels over the past years, so a deal was struck to make a ten-minute Truman documentary. The Dewey team had shot its own movie with a $35,000 budget; Truman’s film would have to use already-existing footage, and the Universal Newsreel company agreed to produce it for free. It would be released right before the election—if Universal could get it done in time.
Meanwhile, Truman himself moved from town to town, speaking extemporaneously, attempting to make personal connections with as many voters as possible. On October 13, at 7:55 a.m. in Adams, Wisconsin, Truman spoke to a group of children who were given permission to show up late for school so they could see the president on the back platform of his train. “The country is going to be in your hands in the next generation,” he said, “and you ought to inform yourselves on all the things that affect your country, and the world, because the United States has assumed the leadership in the world unequaled in the history of the world, and we have got to assume that responsibility.”
“On November 2,” Truman said two hours later, in Spooner, Wisconsin, “you are going to make the most important decision that has been made in a generation, and that will be made for another generation, as to how this country
