Thank you for the Dec. 30 story, “Poison whiskey and the Red Scare.” It is a good decision by the Gazette to cultivate a sense of history as to what was happening in the nation a century ago as the decade of the 1920s arrived.
The article focused on the time between Dec. 30, 1919, and Jan. 3, 1920, and, of particular interest to Gazette readers at that time would have been the second inauguration of Northampton’s Calvin Coolidge as governor of Massachusetts. He had been solidly re-elected the previous November and 1920 would prove to be a pivotal year in his career.
In just a few months after his inauguration he would be thrust into national prominence as the vice presidential candidate of the Republican party and the nation’s spotlight would shine on Northampton. I hope the Gazette will chronicle the story of his rather amazing ascendancy to the presidency in future months.
Richard Szlosek
Northampton
The writer is a volunteer at the Coolidge Presidential Museum, Forbes Library.