The Great 'Dewey Defeats Truman' Oopsie

On November 3, 1948, the Chicago Tribune learned the hard way that you should never count your chickens—or your presidents—before they hatch! Following the U.S. presidential election, the newspaper was so confident that New York Governor Thomas Dewey had defeated incumbent Harry S. Truman that they rushed their early edition to the presses with the now-legendary, massive front-page headline: 'DEWEY DEFEATS TRUMAN.' [4]

There was just one tiny, hilarious problem: the voters had actually chosen Truman. By the time the paper hit the streets, the election results had shifted, leaving the Tribune with thousands of copies of a very embarrassing collector's item. The image of a grinning President Truman holding up the incorrect newspaper remains one of the most iconic and humorous blunders in the history of American journalism!