WILLIAM CHANCELLOR
(William Estabrook Chancellor)
The professor had done some historical research on Harding's ancestry going back to the seventeenth century and claimed that Harding had Negro blood. One Ohio newspaper carried the information and the Harding forces bought up most of the copies and suppressed the story. There has been no subsequent confirming research.
William Estabrook Chancellor was an American academic and writer. An opponent of the 1920 Republican presidential candidate, Warren G. Harding, Chancellor gained notoriety when he allegedly wrote a study of Harding's ancestry just prior to the election, asserting that Harding had an African-American ancestor. Chancellor denied authorship, and it has never been proved. Two years later, a biography of Harding was published under Chancellor's name, but Chancellor denied authorship of that as well.
