Warren Harding & "Founding Fathers"

[Fred Shapiro]

On Mon, 18 Sep 2006, Fred Shapiro wrote:

> founding fathers (OED 1941 [1914 dating of first citation in OED is
> erroneous], Yale Book of Quotations 1916)
>
> 1910 _Marion_ (Ohio) _Weekly Star_ 19 Feb. 1 (Newspaperarchive)  (heading)
> An Iconoclast Hits Patriots ... A Boston Writer Whacks the Founding
> Fathers.

At first glance, I thought that this antedating knocked out the usual
ascription of coinage of the term "founding fathers" to Warren G. Harding.
I believe, however, that Harding's status as putative coiner is still
pretty plausible, since the publisher of the _Marion Weekly Star_ was ...
Warren G. Harding!

Fred


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Fred R. Shapiro                             Editor
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   Access and Lecturer in Legal Research     Yale University Press,
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