Woodrow Wilson Inaugurated

17-year-old Helena Muffly wrote exactly 100 years ago today: 

Thursday, March 6, 1913:  I got pretty cold today. My hands got rather chilly coming home from school. Ma and Ruth went up to Oakes.

woodrow wilson
President Woodrow Wilson

Her middle-aged granddaughter’s comments 100 years later:

It sounds like it was a cold day. Did Grandma forget her gloves? Maybe she thought that the day would be warmer than it actually was.

For today’s post, I searched for a hundred-year-old newspaper article about the weather, but I failed to find any anything. Instead I discovered that a hundred years ago today was the 3rd day of President Woodrow Wilson’s presidency.

A hundred years ago the presidential inauguration was in March.  Inauguration Day used to be four months after election day. In 1913, it was on March 4.  Inauguration day was changed to noon on January 20 by the Twentieth Amendment in 1933.

In November, 1912 Woodrow Wilson, a Democrat, beat the incumbent president, Robert Taft in a three-way race. He also beat former president Theodore Roosevelt. Roosevelt was the founder of the Bull Moose Party. For more on the election see:

The 1912 Presidential Campaign: The Republicans, the Democrats, and the Bull Moose Party

Was Grandma excited about the new president? . . unhappy about the change. . .indifferent?

The Oakes lived on a farm near the Muffly family. They had several children about the same age as the Muffly children. Rachel Oakes was a friend of Grandma and her sister Ruth.