Grover Bergdoll: America’s Most Wanted “Slacker”

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Grover Bergdoll: America’s Most Wanted “Slacker”

2012-03-21 01:00

In an era when millions “keep up” with the Kardashians, it’s easy to see tabloid culture as a modern phenomenon, an ill effect of our 24-hour news cycle and social media that puts every tweet and Facebook update at our fingertips. But one need only look to the Lindbergh baby, Bonnie and Clyde, and countless others to see the nation’s fascination with celebrity and scandal is nothing new. I was recently reminded of this truism while digitizing some materials from the Bergdoll family papers [MSS021], a collection that perfectly captures how the salacious story of one individual can take hold in the popular imagination and dominate the national psyche.

When I first started corresponding with a Bergdoll descendant about digitizing her family’s papers, the name “Bergdoll” wasn’t familiar to me. But as I soon realized, had I lived in Philadelphia at the turn of the twentieth century, the Bergdolls were inescapable. In the heady days before World War I, the sons and daughter of the prominent Philadelphia German family who operated Bergdoll and Sons Brewing Company dominated headlines in and around Philadelphia. From racing cars around Fairmount Park to building a roller coaster at their Brewerytown estate, the five children of Louis Bergdoll, Jr. and Emma Barth Bergdoll were constant fodder for the press and provided a rapt public with snapshots of the alluring lives of Philadelphia’s privileged class.Grover Cleveland Bergdoll

Of all the Bergdoll family’s adventures and exploits, none attracted public fascination quite like those of the youngest son, Grover Cleveland Bergdoll. Known as “the playboy of the Eastern Seaboard,” Grover was both an aviation and racing enthusiast whose numerous traffic violations raised a public outcry against issuing him a driver’s license in 1912. But it wasn’t until World War I that Grover’s exploits attracted national attention and infamy when, after registering for military service, Grover and his brother Erwin failed to show up for physical examinations when they were drafted in 1917. Grover fled across the United States and, for the next two years, taunted authorities with postcards sent from each new hideout.

One of the national headlines about Grover's exploits in GermanyThe case of the errant Grover Clevand Bergdoll captured the public imagination and inspired rumors about his German sympathies and offers to serve as an aviator for the Fatherland. The so-called “Philadelphia slacker” was finally apprehended in 1920 and sentenced to five years at Governors Island, but escaped imprisonment a short time later and fled to Germany. For the next two decades, Grover’s exploits continued to provoke national ire and captivate the public consciousness to the extent that even President Warren Harding commented on the case and personally ordered the seizure of the Bergdoll family's assets. Throughout the 1920s and 30s, details of Grover's life in Germany dominated the headlines, as did the ongoing efforts of kidnapping vigilantes determined to return him to the U.S.  In 1939, on the eve of World War II, Grover finally came home to face trial and was eventually imprisoned at Leavenworth federal penitentiary until 1944.

Grover Cleveland Bergdoll returns to the U.S.As interesting as Grover’s tale is in its own right, the public fascination and anger with his draft evasion adds another intriguing layer to the story.  Whether due to his wealth, ancestry, showman’s flair (or some combination of all three), Grover Cleveland Bergdoll struck a chord in such way that made him a national celebrity.  Looking through the Bergdoll family papers, this phenomenon is most evident in the family scrapbooks and clippings that make up the bulk of the collection and dutifully chronicle a sense of public rapture and outrage with many modern-day parallels.  Now available for view in our digital library, these scrapbooks and the mania to which they attest evoke Alger Hiss, O.J. Simpson, and countless others who became notorious by virtue of a love of gossip and scandal that endures, even if the medium has changed. 

Comments

Submitted by Louis E. Bergdoll (not verified) on

I found this quite by accident searching for some other private affair concerning the family name.
I have to say that Hillary Kativa worte a story about my family that doesn't leave me cringing. Not from embarrasment but in slaughtering the facts. After all, as her article's subject, sensationalism sells print.
The inspired rumors of offering to serve as an aviator for the Fatherland as far as I know are just rumors. I do believe he offered his service as an aviator to the U.S. cause and was turned down by being conscripted into infantry. This being what I have heard from family. I guess Grover, having his flair for the dramatic, didn't see himself in the infantry. If there is anything in the family papers that would point to Grover offering his services to Germany I would like to be made aware of it.

Submitted by Edward Stewart (not verified) on

I have been researching the Bergdoll family history for quite some time now in preparation of doing a book and agree with Louise E. Bergdoll that there is no evidence whatever that Grover offered his services to Germany as a pilot or anything else. That story got started sometime during his absence most likely by the press or government agents. It went something like he went to the German embassy in Washington DC and made the offer but it is most unlikely that he would have gone to Washington DC at the time nor does any of the timeline.

Submitted by Sara B., HSP (not verified) on

Thank you for your thoughtful comment, Edward. We wish you the best of luck with your research; please don't hesitate to contact us if we can facilitate it in any way.

Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on

Dear Mr. Stewart,

I have recently read your book entitled, "Slacker: The Bergdoll Chronology".  As I am now in the process of attempting to rescue Harmony Hill Farm (Grover's immediate residence after Prison) from being permenantly lost to ruin, I would like to discuss some of the passages of your book for clarity and personal research.  Please contact me at ethenry89@gmail.com if you are willing to discuss the details of your knowledge on the subject.

Sincerely,

Emmett

Submitted by Dirk Langeveld (not verified) on

I recently completed my own book on Grover Cleveland Bergdoll, entitled The Artful Dodger: The 20-Year Pursuit of World War I Draft Dodger Grover Cleveland Bergdoll. The HSP archives and staff were a huge help, so thank you for your assistance! I'm planning to check out Edward Stewart's book, and hope he'll give mine a look as well.

There is a brief news clipping suggesting that Bergdoll offered his services and plane to the German consulate in Philadelphia before the U.S. entered the war on the Allied side, but opted not to when he found that he'd have to somehow get the aircraft to Europe and enlist overseas due to American neutrality policies. Another archive had a friend recalling a similar incident, where he looked into joining Pershing's military expedition into Mexico but bowed out after learning that they weren't accepting airplanes.

Bergdoll's offer wasn't to be an aviator, but an aviation instructor. He also made it via a mailed press statement after he had been accused of draft evasion. However, there was certainly some bad blood between Bergdoll and a draft board member, however, and several contemporaries (including members of other draft boards) suggested that there was an effort to conscript him for the infantry instead of capitalizing on his aviation experience by assigning him to that field.

Submitted by D. J. Keating (not verified) on

What more to the stories can you add about the residence on West Chester Pike? As a previous long term resident of the area I was always interested in this home, located on property frequently called Bergdoll's Hill.

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