"Dewey Defeats Truman" was an incorrect banner headline on the front page of the Chicago Daily Tribune on November 3, 1948, the day after incumbent United States president Harry S. Truman won an upset victory over his opponent, Governor Thomas E. Dewey of New York, in the 1948 presidential election. It was famously held up by Truman at a stop at St. Louis Union Station following his successful election, smiling triumphantly at the error.
President Truman holding an early edition of the November 4, 1948 Chicago Daily Tribune showing the erroneous presidential election headline
The Chicago Tribune is an American daily newspaper based in Chicago, Illinois, owned by Tribune Publishing. Founded in 1847, and formerly self-styled as the "World's Greatest Newspaper", it remains the most-read daily newspaper in the Chicago metropolitan area and the Great Lakes region. In 2022, it had the seventh-highest circulation of any newspaper in the United States.
An 1870 advertisement for Chicago Tribune subscriptions
The lead editorial in the Chicago Tribune following the Great Chicago Fire
Truman was widely expected to lose the 1948 election, and the Chicago Tribune ran the incorrect headline, "Dewey Defeats Truman".
Tribune Tower, the newspaper's headquarters, opened in Chicago in 1925.
