Warren G. Harding was the 29th president of the United States, serving from 1921 to 1923. He is commonly referred to as the worst president the country ever had, and you will soon find out why. Among the crazy and unacceptable things that he did, he once gambled away the White House china while playing poker.
While he was good looking and charming, he was not that smart or talented. He admitted himself that he is a “man of limited talents from a small town; I don’t seem to grasp that I am president”.
He was a big fan of poker games, way before becoming a president. He continued to play while at the White House, organizing two games each week with friends and members of the cabinet (including the attorney general, the secretary of war and the interior secretary). He encouraged them all to play as equals, regardless of their position.
The group was known as “the Poker Cabinet”, and they were drinking a lot during the poker games, despite the Prohibition. Rumor says that he once gambled the china set of the White House, an old collection that dated since Benjamin Harrison was president.
Some historians are claiming that when he lost the china set he didn’t even played poker, but a game called “cold hand”. This was the simplest possible way of gambling: each player draws a random card, and the one with the highest card wins.
Warren G. Harding wasn’t the only president to like poker, and even Barrack Obama admitted to love the game. Although he isn’t showing this as obvious as Harding did.
Experts are saying that the game of poker teaches presidential behaviors, such as calculating future moves, comparing the risks against the rewards, reading your opponents and even bluffing them.
Besides gambling and drinking, president Harding is also known for having an affair with the wife of his friend James Phillips. Afraid of people finding out about it, they even paid the man and his wife a monthly fee to keep it quiet.
During his term, many government officials took bribes and skimmed money from the sales of war items. The secretary of the interior even sold national oil reserves and kept the money for himself.
Unfortunately for him but luckily for the country, Warren G. Harding had a heart attack and passed away in 1923. This is before his behavior became known to the general public. Even so, he was still a popular president.
So now you know the story of how the US president gambled away the White House china while playing poker. Is it a true story or just a myth? Who knows?
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