 This is Dennis McMahon and welcome to Positively Vermont. And today we are going to explore the Calvin Coolidge Presidential Foundation and all the aspects of President Calvin Coolidge. And also we're gonna keep cool with Coolidge and learn about a very fascinating series of educational and centennial events that are coming up in the very near future. And my special guest is Matthew Denhart, the president of the Calvin Coolidge Presidential Foundation. Welcome, Matthew. Hi, Dennis, good morning, great to be with you, thank you. Tell us on Matthew a little bit about yourself first. Sure, well, I'm Matt Denhart. I grew up in the Midwest in Ohio but have been here at the Coolidge Foundation in Plymouth Notch for nearly a decade now versus executive director now as president. And really have been fascinated with Coolidge for quite some time, very interesting figure, understudied figure and someone from whom I think we all can learn a lot. And as you've previewed for us, which I'm sure we'll talk more about, a big anniversary for Coolidge this year. So plenty of things for folks to get involved with and I'm excited to talk more about it. So thanks so much for having me here. All right, tell us a little bit about Plymouth Notch for a month and its relationship to Calvin Coolidge. Absolutely, Plymouth Notch is in Windsor County. It's between Woodstock and Rutland or also between Woodstock and Ludlow, kind of right in that triangle, right in the middle of it. Basically the basic Killington Mountain in a way off of route 100 and 100A. Of course, in Coolidge's day, those roads might have been somewhat different. They wouldn't have been as well paved and access here to Plymouth was much more difficult. Though even today, it's quite remote. Even by Vermont standards, I would say it's considered somewhat remote. But it's the village where President Coolidge was born. He was born July 4th, 1872, the only president born on Independence Day. And where he grew up, he attended a one room school house here in Plymouth for his primary education. He then went on down to Ludlow, to Black River Academy for high school and on to Amherst College in Massachusetts, eventually made his career in Massachusetts politics before becoming vice president and president, but he returned often to Plymouth. And in fact, he happened to be here visiting his father 100 years ago this summer in early August, when word came that President Harding had died and sudden and rather unexpected fashion, meaning Coolidge was now suddenly president of the United States. And we can talk more about the sort of the dramatic scene and all of that, if you like Dennis, but that happened here. And so this site is not only important because Coolidge was born here, but also because he became president, took the oath of office right here in Plymouth. He's buried here of course as well. Today, it's a 200 plus acre historic site at the Coolidge Foundation, where a private nonprofit, we partner with the state of Vermont and specifically the Division for Historic Preservation to maintain it. It's often considered one of the best preserved presidential birthplaces in America. The entire village is as it would have appeared in 1923 when Coolidge became president. About 25,000 tourists come through each year and we invite anyone, everyone to come and see Plymouth for yourself, especially this summer. That's great. There's an iconic painting I think among your collection that shows the oath of office being administered to Calvin Coolidge. Can you give us a little background on how that happened? How did he find out? Was it a telegram or a telephone call? That might be something to focus on before we start with some of the other things. Tell us about it. That's right. Absolutely. For our viewers, remember 100 years ago, radio was a brand new technology, meaning that we couldn't have had a Zoom to tell the president the news or anything like that. You couldn't even really call them. In fact, in this case, you couldn't call them on the telephone. There was no telephone installed at the Coolidge family homestead here in Plymouth. And so word came by telegram over the wire to Bridgewater, which was the nearest telephone station. And the dispatcher took the message down. It was just before midnight when word came in. And so the word, the message was literally driven from Bridgewater, Vermont, about six miles down the road here to Plymouth. And just before midnight, gentlemen came and knocked on the door of the homestead, Vice President Coolidge, I should say, and his wife, Grace, were asleep for the night. In fact, I think the whole house was asleep, but Coolidge's father was awakened. And by the banging, he went and answered the door and took the message. He went up the stairs and told his son that he now was president because sadly, President Harding had died. This was about midnight. And so there was a small group that had gathered. Some others in the area had heard the news through other sources and reached Vermont generally and various news reporters gathered. President Coolidge put out a message with his condolences to Mrs. Harding and to the country for the loss of President Harding. And then most of the press actually left. All but one reporter left. That was a young reporter for the Springfield paper. His name was Joe Fountain. He stayed. Everyone else thought that that was the news for the night, but Coolidge, I think in his no-nonsense fashion, he knew that the country was without a president and so they consulted the Constitution to be sure they had the text of the oath correct called the Attorney General. And at 2.47 a.m. on the morning of August 3, 1923, Colonel John Coolidge, the father, administered the oath of office to the son, Calvin Coolidge, making him America's 30th president. People often ask, you know, well, how did the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court usually administer the oath at a ceremony in Washington? How was this legit? And they asked Colonel John Coolidge that too. They said, you know, how did you know that you had the power to do that? And he said, well, nobody told me I didn't. So very kind of Vermont, no-nonsense. He took matters into his own hand. He administered the oath. He was a notary public, which was the authority by which he had the power to do that. It's the only case of presidential power, you know, transferring from, you know, by an oath administered by one's father must be the humblest, you know, inaugural ceremony in America's history. So we'll re-enact that this summer. Actually at 2.47 a.m., the morning of August 3rd, we invite people to come see that. We'll get into more of the activities going on. There'll be several days of activities to celebrate this, but really unique in America's history and a big part of Vermont history too. That's great. Well, tell us about his past as a presidency. He was elected with Harding in 1920. Is that correct? That's correct. So Coolidge, as I said, he made his career in Massachusetts politics. He held more elected offices than any other president. So he's very well-prepared, as prepared as perhaps anyone could be to assume such an obligation as being president. But he served in his mayor of Northampton, Massachusetts. He climbed the ladder. He was state senator. He was president of the state senate in Massachusetts, lieutenant governor and governor. As governor of Massachusetts, he sort of developed a national name in 1919 when there was an unfortunate police strike in Boston with much violence that ensued in rioting and his handling of that crisis really made him a national name. He then was put on the vice president and on the ticket running with Warren Harding in 1920 on the return to normalcy campaign in the post-war era. And then of course, as we just described, Harding died unfortunately in 1923 making Coolidge president in his own right. So he served out the balance of Harding's term but was sent up for election himself in 1924 and was very popular. He's largely forgotten today, but in his era, he was very popular. In fact, he had a sort of a major victory in the election of 1924. It was a three-way race. The progressives were part of the Republican party at that time and there was a break-off of the progressive party from the Republicans. Coolidge himself being a Republican and fighting Bob LaFollette of Wisconsin broke off from the Republican party, ran as a progressive. And so even with him sort of dividing the Republican vote, Coolidge still managed an absolute majority in that election defeating John Davis, the Democrat and Bob LaFollette and swept into a term of his own, pardon me and served through 1928, finishing in early 1929. Very popular. He sort of famously chose not to run again in 1928. He almost certainly would have won. His commerce secretary, Herbert Hoover, did run in won easily and largely campaigning on a continuation of Coolidge policy. But Coolidge thought that it was important, as he said for the president to know that he is not a great man. And he thought that after a certain amount of time, president becomes ineffective and it's good to have kind of fresh blood, new ideas leading. He really, he saw the president as a presider and administering what the constitution says that that branch in that office ought to do. And so he thought it was healthy in a democracy in a republic such as ours for that to change. So he, I think in a very principled way, decided to step aside in 1928 and not run again. He retired back to Northampton, Massachusetts. He moved back into half of a two family duplex house that he had rented most of his adult life. Can imagine he leaves the White House and goes to a duplex in Northampton. Eventually the crowds became overwhelming for that small little street. And so he did move into a somewhat more private house a bit after that. But he was a modest man, a humble man and retired, he died in 1933 and he's buried back here in Plymouth. His grave is no larger than the graves beside him. In fact, there's sort of scan evidence that there's a presidential cemetery in any way. There's a very small sign along the road says president's grave with an arrow that way. And as I described his own marker is very humble. That's interesting. Tell us if you can a little bit about his personality. Was he a humorous person or a humble person or a go-getter? Tell him how he functioned in government and maybe in his personal life. Yeah, he's a very humble man and a very shy man or especially shy as a young person. In fact, he'd described his father, Colonel John Coolidge was a real kind of local and eventually even a state leader here in Vermont serving in Montpelier. But so he'd often be entertaining people in the family sitting room and Calvin describes that he felt he barely could even go in and say hello and introduce himself. He was so shy as a youngster that never really went away. He overcame it. And I think a lot of introverts maybe find inspiration from Coolidge or they might. He was known to silent Cal as president and in sort of small chit chat or gossip. I think that's very fair. In terms of sort of his prepared remarks, I'd say it's really a misnomer of the silent Cal moniker. He gave more press conferences on average than any other president before since. He averaged two per week. His speeches are just brilliant. When you read Coolidge, you don't get the sense that you're reading some politician who had a speech writer and they cobbled together some lines to get up there and say something or that he's trying to push very specific policy things. Instead, really what you sense is almost more like a sermon when you read a Coolidge speech and they're long. He's the last president to have written all or at least most of his own speeches. He once likened them to his, he wasn't a painter but he said sort of his masterpieces are his speeches. And so he took a lot of care to them. In fact, there are a couple of volumes of his speeches. One is called Have Faith in Massachusetts, which we just recently republished here at the Coolidge Foundation. And on our website for anyone who's interested, we're republishing all of Coolidge's speeches and digitizing them at CoolidgeFoundation.org. Folks can find that. But really, you know, he was guided, I think by a serious humility and a sense of service. He, I don't think he thought he'd likely ever be president. This probably wasn't really his ambition. He was a lawyer by training. He got into, I think he was always interested certainly in public affairs. He grew up going to the town meeting with his father and found public affairs and, you know, being involved in the community important. But really in his autobiography, he says he thought of making him a better lawyer to get involved in sort of local affairs in Northampton, Massachusetts and in a very kind of steady way. He always talked about doing the job that you're in well and then not worrying too much about what comes next in terms of your career. And it's good advice for young people. If you do the job you're in well, probably something worthwhile else may come along and you can decide if you should do that or not. For him that led on, you know, sort of climbing the stairs all the way to the presidency. But very, you know, a very humble man who, you know, really sought to serve others. He worked in bipartisan fashion, always very civil, very committed to the budget. I'd say if you look at his policy priorities, I think that old Yankee frugality stuck with him. Absolutely. He balanced the federal budget. He reduced the national net coming out of World War II by about a third and lowered taxes rather dramatically after they crept all the way up to about 77% the top rate after World War I. So he was very interested in economics as well. Well, it must have been an interesting period in American history or our involvement in World War I and the post-war period and the roaring 20, so to speak and all that. How did he function during that era? Or did he help really make that era in terms of government and people? Yeah, I think he did help make the era. You know, it was a very interesting time as you say. We're coming out of World War I, really the return to normalcy campaign slogan of Harding and Coolidge, which then Coolidge continued after Harding's death. And a lot of ways was normalcy meant sort of a normal operating society after being mobilized for war in such a dramatic way, a way that, of course, we had been in wars, but not one that had encompassed sort of the entire operations of the society, you could argue, up to that point for America. The government had taken our large sectors of the economy to operate the war, people's entire lives and the ways they thought about anything were uprooted and different. So demobilizing, coming back to civilian lifestyle was important to kind of get back to normalcy. Coolidge, I think, he viewed it as an imperative, being vice president and president to assist in that. And he thought that the American system of government as outlined in the constitution was really one of self-government led by the citizens. So during times of war, perhaps the government, by necessity takes over quite a bit of control, but now it's time to give it back to ordinary citizens, the private sector. And so he thought it was very important to keep the government within a budget, a budget that ought to shrink. Of course, it had grown dramatically in the war and the taxes likewise should shrink so that people had more money to take care of themselves, take care of their communities. And he also was a strong believer in federalism, this idea that states and local towns ought to look after their citizens before the federal government, federal government, certainly has important roles to play, but they're perhaps different from the states and the towns. You mentioned the roaring twenties and they did roar there. I think often misunderstood in a lot of ways. Coolidge is sort of a puritan throwback on us in an era when sort of cultural norms were changing. And he sort of clung somewhat to the past, but he embraced a lot of change, especially technological change. This was the era of radio. This was some of the early flight when flight became, it was sort of daredevils at the beginning of the decade. And by the end, it was seen as a promising new industry. Coolidge celebrated Charles Lindberg. He hosted big congratulatory welcome for him in Washington upon his return from his flight. And really, I think he saw the promise of technology and economic growth, but he really believed that it's the American people that would drive that. And so he thought it was important for the government to leave as much money in the private sector to fuel that as possible. That's great. Well, it's interesting that this is the only presidential birthplace that isn't publicly funded. Could you tell us how this got started? Yeah, well, at least he's the last president not to have a federally funded presidential library. Yeah, in the 1950s, there was a presidential library's Act Pass, and it established the modern presidential library model that most presidents have followed, which provides federal funding to operate the library, at least the library aspect of the presidential center. Of course, the Obama library is being built in Chicago. There's the Bush Library in Dallas, the Clinton Library in Little Rock. But by the 1950s, Coolidge had already died. And his successor, Herbert Hoover, was still alive. And so this Act established funding for a Hoover presidential library, which is in Iowa, I believe, West Branch, Iowa, meaning Coolidge is the last not to have a federally funded library. He probably would have thought that was a good thing. He wrote in his autobiography that he didn't think that ex-presidency should have a pension. He said it might encourage a leisure class. And I think it's funny. Coolidge thought even ex-presidents should have to do something worthwhile if they need to earn a living. They shouldn't just live off the taxpayer dying. Very Coolidge-like. But anyway, so the Coolidge Foundation, our organization was founded in 1960 by John Coolidge, who was his son. Coolidge had two sons, Calvin Jr. and John. Calvin Jr. tragically died when he was 16 of a blister. He developed while playing tennis on the White House tennis court, while Coolidge was president of a big blow to the Coolidge family, of course. But anyway, back to the point. John Coolidge established the Coolidge Foundation in 1960. We're a private, or a public charity, a nonprofit supported by private donors. And have an educational mission. We operate here in Plymouth Notch. We have another base of operation in Washington, D.C. as well. And we focus largely on youth education. We run a speech and debate program, which brings students from around the country to Vermont each summer to compete in the Coolidge Cup, which gives them debate topics. They debate, we think, civil dialogue and research and the skills developed through debate are important. We also do declination. The students give and deliver Coolidge speeches in compelling fashion, and visitors can come see this and help judge the competitions, which are wonderful. We also run a major scholarship program called the Coolidge Scholarship, which gives four-year college scholarships to a number of students, about 4,000 apply from all over the country every year and study Calvin Coolidge in the process, write essays about him and his presidency and a few win. We've had two Vermonters actually who have won this, which is rather remarkable. We've been doing it since 2016, I guess. And we've had 32 winners all time. And two of them are Vermonters, which is really pretty incredible. One from Craftsbury Common and one from Middlebury. So anyway, those students are at colleges around the country run programming for them as well, as well as a broader group of them, the top hundred each year called the Coolidge Senators. And all of the Coolidge Senators, about a hundred of them will be coming and joining us this summer, right here in Plymouth for the big Coolidge Centennial celebrations. Before I get to that, could you describe the facility in Plymouth notch a little? And particularly since you said you had press conference, you seem to have been a very media-savvy president. Are there recordings or films of him that people can see? Give us a little idea about what it's like where you're speaking to us from. Yeah, absolutely. Well, here in Plymouth is a wonderful place. I mean, just the physical scenery is just absolutely beautiful and breathtaking itself. But it's also just this gem of a historic site. It was, and again, it's a joint partnership between the Coolidge Foundation and the Vermont Division for Historic Preservation, which really does a tremendous job. Most of the sites owned and managed by the state of Vermont. There are about a dozen buildings all set up like they were in the 1920s, and visitors can come and tour through them, included or the Coolidge birthplace where he was born. It's attached to the general store. His father managed the general store up front, and in the back was the family home. Coolidge was born right there at home as was his younger sister. When he was four, I guess, the family moved across the street and his father bought a somewhat larger home, but still relatively modest. We call the Coolidge homestead. That has a barn attached to it as well, and visitors can go and tour through that. That's where he took that oath of office in 1923. It was in the sitting room of the homestead, so folks can see that. Coolidge's father as well in 1890 established the Plymouth Cheese Factory with a couple of other local dairy farmers, and that still operates today. It's had hiatus during the Depression and at other times, but operates today with a private company that makes the original recipe, fabulous cheese that they now ship all over the country, really a thriving business, and folks can come and see cheese making in action. They're the historic barns. There's the also, one of my favorites is the summer White House up above the general store and it was the town dance hall. When Coolidge was president, it served as the summer White House in the summer of 1924, and have air conditioning back in those days, and so it was common for the president to de-camp up to summer cooler and cooler climate. And so in 1924, Coolidge set up shop. It's a couple of hardwood tables and hard wooden benches, and that's where he carried out the office of the president right there and in this very modest town dance hall. It's hard to even fathom today, but crowds came, thousands would come to see him each day right here. There's also, I should mention, a permanent exhibit where you can see, as you mentioned, some video footage and audio of Coolidge and of Grace and some wonderful educational exhibits. This year, there's a special exhibit on that inauguration of 100 years ago. You can see the Bible, the family Bible that lay on the table as he took the oath. You can see the kerosene lamp, which was the light by which this ceremony was lit at 2.47 in the morning. And then there also, it compares Coolidge's inauguration to some other world leaders from that era. So you can see how some others celebrated there. They're ushering into power, and Coolidge is very humble, especially for what arguably was the most powerful country in the world then and now, a very humble presidency. So yeah, we invite any and all to come. It's like literally stepping back in time. Another really neat thing is that a grant, I believe in maybe the 1990s, allowed all the power lines to be buried here in Plymouth. So you don't even see power lines when you come and it's really kind of the 1920s experience. Really. Tell us, carry us through all of the Centennial events. So we're reporting this on June 27 and give us some dates and times and what's gonna be happening during the Centennial which is coming up soon. Yeah, absolutely. Everything will kick off on August 2nd. Of course, that's the day 100 years ago that President Harding sadly died. And word came to Coolidge as we described at the beginning of the episode that he now was president. So we'll begin on the second. And I should mention all these details are on our Centennial website, Coolidge2023.org, Coolidge-C-O-O-L-I-D-G-E-2023.org. But everything kicks off the night of August 2nd with a sort of a gala celebration, 100th anniversary gala. Tickets are needed for that but you can find those online. We hope you'll join us. Governor Jim Douglas, former Vermont governor who's vice chair of our board here at the Coolidge Foundation will be emceeing and we invite Alda to come and join us. We'll then be staying up all night or at least most of it. We'll have Coolidge readings that we'll be doing. We'll be reading his autobiography and some of his speeches and sort of marathon group community fashion up in the Union Christian Church which is right across the street from where the Coolidge family homestead is and where Coolidge himself worshiped. That building, the Coolidge Foundation owns and we'll be reading Coolidge's speeches and folks can come in and they can sign up in advance or they can even just show up and we'll give you a part to read. We'll have Coolidge trivia going on in other parts of the historic site. Some of the students I described will be here competing almost in like a jeopardy like way to test their Coolidge knowledge and we'll make it up till 2.47 in the morning. And right at that time, members of the Coolidge family and some others will recreate the 1923 homestead inauguration right there in the sitting room. So please, if you feel so inclined, join us even at 2.47 in the morning. Celebration continues the next day, August 3rd at 11 a.m. we'll have a naturalization ceremony which is a ceremony during which immigrants here to Vermont take the oath, different kind of oath the oath of allegiance to the United States and become full-fledged citizens of our country. Judge Crawford will be presiding and we look forward to welcoming those new citizens. It's open to the public, we hope you'll come and join us. We've done this many years here at the Coolidge site and I think it's one of the more moving experiences even for those of us who've been citizens a long time many of us even from birth to be reminded of the meaning of that. In the afternoon at two o'clock we'll have a big sort of official ceremony to mark the Coolidge centennial remarks from Coolidge family members and others. So please public officials and others. So please join us for that. That'll be in the village at the homestead and then we'll re-enact the homestead inaugural again at 2.47 p.m. So for those that I think the early morning version sounds nice but they'd rather join us at a more reasonable time. Please do come out for that as well. Then on Saturday, August 5th, celebration continues. We'll have a memorial service for President Harding which is something that was held here in Plymouth by the citizens here in town 100 years ago. So we'll recreate that as best we can with hymns and readings and remember President Harding. And then we'll do one more re-enactment of that homestead inaugural at 2.47 p.m. on Saturday, August 5th for those that might have trouble joining us mid-week. So we hope folks will come on out and enjoy being in Plymouth, enjoy the summer in Vermont and take part in these special activities. Any of that time, the historic site itself is open all week, 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. And I'm certain you'll have a great time when and if you come and learn a lot and be glad that you took part in this celebration. Well, that's great. And having Jim Douglas as MC is really fantastic. He's a great speaker and a very funny guy sometimes and God bless him, that's great to have Jim there and all the other people. So that really sounds very exciting. And so I wanna thank you for appearing here on Positively Vermont. My guest today has been Matthew Denhart, the president of the Calvin Coolidge Presidential Foundation and we've been discussing all the events going on with the Calvin Coolidge Centennial and also things that will continue in this wonderful historic spot right here in Vermont. Thank you so much Matthew for appearing on Positively Vermont. This is Dennis McMahon and thank you for watching.