The Accidental President: Harry S. Truman and the Four Months That Changed the World

by A.J. Baime

When Margaret left for Independence, Washington’s most popular political gossip columnist—Drew Pearson, in his “Washington Merry-Go-Round” column—put an uncomfortable spin on her departure. “It came as something of a shock to Washington dowagers and socially-minded young naval officers when attractive, dynamic Margaret Truman suddenly was whisked out of Washington at the very height of the gay June season,” Pearson wrote. “A very wise presidential papa wasn’t happy about the featured newspaper articles of his daughter shagging at this party, cocktailing at that, and bitting merrily through Washington society with the war still bitterly contested in the Pacific.” Truman felt personally wounded. Pearson’s column was the most widely read syndicated newspaper column in the country, and it suggested whimsy and heartlessness on the part of Margaret Truman. He wrote Margie from the White House to apologize, on the day the story was published. “You evidently are just finding out what a terrible situation the president’s daughter is facing,” he wrote. “That was the main reason for my not wanting to be Vice-President. I knew what it would mean to you and your mother—to your Aunts and Uncles and Grandmothers and cousins.”

His daughter insulted by press