On
the afternoon of election day, November 2, 1948, President Truman slipped
away from his home in Independence in a Secret Service car and went to
the Elms Hotel. He checked into Room 300. He had a ham and cheese sandwich
in his room and went to bed at 9 o'clock. He told the Secret Service to
wake him up if anything important happened. Almost everyone expected Thomas
Dewey to be elected President that night. But at about 4 a.m., the Secret
Service got Truman up and told him that, according to reports on the radio,
he was winning. "We've got 'em beat," Truman said. (David McCullough,
Truman, drawing from an interview with Secret Service agent Jim
Rowley.)
The Elms
Hotel is located at 401 Regent Street in Excelsior Springs, Missouri.
On
the afternoon of election day, November 2, 1948, President Truman slipped
away from his home in Independence in a Secret Service car and went to
the Elms Hotel. He checked into Room 300. He had a ham and cheese sandwich
in his room and went to bed at 9 o'clock. He told the Secret Service to
wake him up if anything important happened. Almost everyone expected Thomas
Dewey to be elected President that night. But at about 4 a.m., the Secret
Service got Truman up and told him that, according to reports on the radio,
he was winning. "We've got 'em beat," Truman said. (David McCullough,
Truman, drawing from an interview with Secret Service agent Jim
Rowley.)
