Sep 15, 2011 - Sale 2253

Sale 2253 - Lot 274

Price Realized: $ 1,680
?Final Price Realized includes Buyer’s Premium added to Hammer Price
Estimate: $ 1,000 - $ 1,500
DEWEY DEFEATS TRUMAN (PRESIDENTS--1948 CAMPAIGN.) Chicago Daily Tribune. 26 pages, each 23 1/2 x 16 3/4 inches, on 7 sheets; several small areas of loss and archival tape repairs on front page, not affecting headline, minor edge wear; subscriber's address printed in upper right margin of front page. Two-star edition. Chicago, 3 November 1948
Set Alert for Similar Items

Additional Details

The most famous newspaper error edition of all time, declaring Harry Truman the loser of the 1948 election. The professional linotype operators at the Tribune were on strike at the time, forcing the publishers to go to press a few hours sooner than usual to accommodate their crude typesetting techniques. The publishers put their faith in the early polling from their Washington correspondent Arthur Sears Henning, whose accompanying article noted that "Dewey won the presidency by an overwhelming majority of electoral votes." When Truman's upset victory was announced, the Tribune sent trucks out to retrieve as many copies as possible of these error editions, but a few remained in private hands.
The strike not only prompted a premature headline, it resulted in stunningly amateurish typography. Much of the text was done on a regular typewriter, and five lines of text in the lead story were printed upside down. with--the classic press photograph of a smiling Truman holding this edition.