President Charles Curtis (1929-1933; 1937-1941)

Here's a fun thought.

President-elect Herbert Hoover gets blown up by an anarchist in Argentina (which nearly happened) and his Vice President Charles Curtis becomes President.

Curtis serves from 1929 to 1933, but is blocked at the 1933 convention and Coolidge gets drafted. Coolidge doesn't really campaign but manages to lose far less painfully than Hoover did OTL. Ohio, Michigan, New Jersey, Massachusetts, and Kansas all go for Coolidge and Coolidge loses to Roosevelt in 55-45 race.

Zangara proceeds to shoot Roosevelt, America freaks out as two president-elects in a row have been killed by anarchists, and Garner becomes President. Come 1936, Curtis clinches the nomination (Dawes as VP?). Despite what some think, Garner goes along with more than few of the OTL New Deal proposals (albeit in a more small-c conservative manner) and the result is that in 1936 there is more room for the Union Party to succeed. In a Curtis v Garner v (Lemke?) race, Curtis eeks it out.
 
Here's a fun thought.

President-elect Herbert Hoover gets blown up by an anarchist in Argentina (which nearly happened) and his Vice President Charles Curtis becomes President.

Curtis serves from 1929 to 1933, but is blocked at the 1933 convention and Coolidge gets drafted. Coolidge doesn't really campaign but manages to lose far less painfully than Hoover did OTL. Ohio, Michigan, New Jersey, Massachusetts, and Kansas all go for Coolidge and Coolidge loses to Roosevelt in 55-45 race.

Zangara proceeds to shoot Roosevelt, America freaks out as two president-elects in a row have been killed by anarchists, and Garner becomes President. Come 1936, Curtis clinches the nomination (Dawes as VP?). Despite what some think, Garner goes along with more than few of the OTL New Deal proposals (albeit in a more small-c conservative manner) and the result is that in 1936 there is more room for the Union Party to succeed. In a Curtis v Garner v (Lemke?) race, Curtis eeks it out.

In OTL Curtis died on February 8, 1936 at the age of 76. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_Curtis I doubt very much that being POTUS from 1929 to 1933 would extend his life...
 
He had a heart attack, which is butterfliable.

Even under the dubious assumption that Curtis at the age of 76 would be healthy enough to run for president in 1936 in this TL, he would be as unlikely to win the GOP nomination as Hoover in OTL's 1936. Not only would "Curtisvilles" be associated with him (maybe homeless shelters would be called "Curtis wigwams") but if anything his response to the Depression would be even more politically inept than Hoover's. Remember that the notorious phrase "prosperity is just around the corner" was Curtis's, not Hoover's. https://books.google.com/books?id=RvU1p5tjGhgC&pg=PA374
 
Curtis serves from 1929 to 1933, but is blocked at the 1933 convention and Coolidge gets drafted. Coolidge doesn't really campaign but manages to lose far less painfully than Hoover did OTL. Ohio, Michigan, New Jersey, Massachusetts, and Kansas all go for Coolidge and Coolidge loses to Roosevelt in 55-45 race.

Not Pennsylvania? That went Republican even OTL.

Not only would "Curtisvilles" be associated with him

Or maybe "Curtistowns". To my mind that rolls off the tongue a bit better.

One side-effect of all this is a big boost to Hoover's posthumous reputation. People will remember his work in Belgium during WW1, and there will be many tears shed about how much better things would have gone "if only the great man had lived".
 
Coolidge declined to run in 1932 in OTL even though he disliked Hoover (whom he called "the Wonder Boy"). I don't see why he would run in this alt-1932. Nor do I see why Curtis would be more likely to be denied the nomination than Hoover was in OTL. Sure, Curtis would be unpopular, but so was Hoover in OTL, and Hoover was if anything viewed with more suspicion by Republicans. And if Curtis is so unpopular that he is denied the nomination that makes it doubly unlikely the GOP will nominate him in 1936. (Let's leave aside the fact that he would be 76 years old and that even if the specific heart attack that killed him in early 1936 in OTL can be butterflied away, it seems unlikely that four years as one of the most hated presidents in history will be good for his health.) And if he did somehow get the nomination, he would lose to Garner in a landslide--Lemke as in OTL would have little support beyond wheat farmers in ND and MN and Irish-American followers of Father Coughlin in places like Boston. (Indeed, he might do worse than in OTL, since Garner would be less likely than FDR to rely on leftish Brian Trusters of the kind who made Coughlinites so suspicious.) The economy might not be as strong in this alt-1936 as in OTL but certainly it will not suffer from a comparison with Curtis's administration in 1929-33...
 
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