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the latter two were leading Republican activators in New York State and Kenneth Simpson was Chairman of the Republican State Committee. They met Willkie for the first time that night at my house, and later, as you may remember, helped to turn the tide for him by coming out for him and casting the votes of the New York delegation for him in the 1940 convention.

Now, I knew at this time that I thought he would make a wonderful candidate, but everybody thought it was absolutely ludicrous. When I mentioned this to Albert Lasker, whom I had just met, he said that it was the silliest thing he had ever heard and said that I might be intelligent in some areas but I certainly knew nothing about politics, because the idea of a big public utilities man would be any good as an opponent to Roosevelt was absolutely absurd. I recognized that he knew a lot more about politics than I did, but I persisted with this idea notwithstanding.

Earlier in the summer, in early August of 1939, I was still interested in Willkie and what the chances might be. I didn't know anything about the issues involved between the two parties, really, although I recognized that the Republicans were more conservative than the Democrats. And I didn't know any Democratic politicians at the time at all, but I thought that in any country that was a democratic country it was surely better to have two strong candidates than just one strong candidates, for the issues would become clearer and the country would be better governed. So, persisting with this general theory and the idea that Willkie was an effective personality, a saleable personality and a likeable personality, I invited him and Rita Van Doren, who