The recent Presidential press conference brouhaha reminds me of another presidential press conference. A prominent journalist shared this story during a lunch of journalists and journalism teachers at the University of North Carolina campus in the 1980s.
I forget the journalist’s name, who worked for a national publication, but have not forgotten his historical description of one of President Calvin Coolidge’s press conferences.
“Silent Cal” Coolidge may have been the first President to hold frequent press conferences with some two dozen reporters who covered the White House back in the 1920s.
But President Coolidge imposed rules:
- All questions must be written, in advance of the President’s attendance.
- If the President was quoted, credit must be attributed to “a source close to the President”—never directly to President Coolidge.
- The President would answer questions of his choice, not every written question.
The ‘boys’, in what would later become the White House Press Corp and include women, decided to joke with President Coolidge. All reporters submitted the same, identical written question.
President Coolidge arrived. Probably orated a “Good Morning, Gentlemen.”
Then opened the first written question, read, and placed it back on the nearby table. Unanswered.
In silence, the President in turn opened all the other questions. Read each without a sound. Placed on the table. All unanswered.
After President Coolidge opened the last question, he invented and delivered a question, then answered his own question.
Probably said “Thank You, Gentlemen” as he left the room.
Photo by Shelagh Murphy from Pexels
Dick, no doubt you’ve heard the tale that a female guest at ta White House dinner said to President Coolidge, “I bet my friend that I could get you to say more than two words.” Then came Coolidge’s reply: “You lose.” Alice Roosevelt Longworth is said to have commented that “Coolidge was weaned on a pickle.” I can believe it.