Harry Guyer Leslie (April 6, 1878 – December 10, 1937) was an American politician and Indiana Republican Party member, speaker of the state house and the 33rd governor of the state. His term as governor was marked by the start of the Great Depression.
Harry G. Leslie was born in West Lafayette, Indiana, on April 6, 1878 to Daniel and Mary Burkhart Leslie. His father was a local politician and served a chief of police for the town. While still a boy, his family moved into the country outside of the town. He attended public schools and worked delivering groceries as a teenager. In 1898 he was elected town clerk, a year after he graduated.[4]
He soon enrolled in the recently constructed Purdue University where he was a member of the Sigma Pi fraternity and Acacia fraternity. While at Purdue, Leslie was captain of both the school's football and baseball teams and became one of the school's "immortal" players. As one of the school's star players, his team was on course to win the state championship in 1903. On October 31 he and his teammates took a train from Lafayette to Indianapolis to a match against Indiana University. As the train neared the 18th Street crossing in Indianapolis, it collided with another train, and Leslie's coach was shattered. One member of the team miraculously landed on his feet and was unharmed after being thrown out a window. The other eighteen boys, including Leslie, were pronounced dead at the scene and taken to the morgue.[5]
A few hours later at the morgue, as the morticians prepared to embalm his body, they discovered he still had a pulse and immediately rushed him to the hospital. Barely alive, he needed several operations and edged on death for several weeks. His recovery was slow, but he eventually regained his health, although he walked with the aid of a cane for the remainder of his life. He returned to school at the end of 1904 and after another year he graduated. His survival of the "Purdue Wreck" received significant attention across the state and he became a famous folk hero.[6]
In 1904, Leslie founded the Purdue College Republicans. For a number of years in the 1990s and early 2000s, the Purdue chapter held a "Leslie Day" celebration and fundraiser in his honor.[7]
Leslie graduated from the Indiana Law School in 1907. He opened a law office in Lafayette the year he graduated and took a position at a local high school coaching football. There he met Martha Morgan, whom he married on August 16, 1910, and by whom he had three sons, Jack, Richard, and Robert. Leslie became involved in local politics and was elected as a Republican Tippecanoe County treasurer in 1912. He purchased a farm in 1914, but disliking the labor, he sold the farm and bought stock in a local bank at which he served as president until 1924.[6]