PRESIDENT'S 76 YEAR OLD DAD WEDS 52 YEAR OLD NURSE
Monroe, Michigan (JFK+50) On August 11, 1921, seventy-six year old Dr. George T. Harding*, father of the President of the United States, married his nurse, fifty-two year old Miss Alice Severns.
The couple arrived here in Monroe and immediately got their marriage license. It took less than an hour for the ceremony to be conducted at the home of Rev. Frank T. Knowles, minister of the local Presbyterian Church.
President Warren G. Harding was as surprised as anyone else when he received word of his father's marriage. He immediately cut short the meeting he was holding.
Dr. Harding's comment on the marriage was...
"I was lonesome, simply unbearably lonesome."
*Dr. George Tryon Harding (1843-1928) was born in Blooming Grove, Ohio & received his M.D. in 1873. GRH became the 1st presidential father to outlive his son, Warren G. Harding, & the 2nd to live through his son's presidency.
SOURCE
"President's Father, 76, Weds Aid, 52," The New York Tribune, August 12, 1921, Chronicling America, Library of Congress, www.loc.gov/
