WASHINGTON (AP) – DNA testing is rewriting a chapter in Ohio presidential history, this one from the Roaring ’20s.
AncestryDNA, a division of Ancestry.com, says genetic analysis has confirmed President Warren G. Harding fathered a child out of wedlock with his long-rumored mistress Nan Britton. She set off a scandal when she went public nearly 90 years ago with her tale of forbidden love in the White House.
The findings — based on DNA results from Britton’s grandson and descendants of Harding — are 99.9 percent certain, according to AncestryDNA.
Harding was a U.S. senator from Ohio when the affair began. It ended with Harding’s sudden death during his presidency in 1923.
Britton published her story in a 1927 best-selling autobiography, “The President’s Daughter.” But historians long questioned her claims.