The Dry Candidate from East Stroudsburg
Tonight at 8, Gov. Josh Shapiro and Treasurer Stacy Garrity meet in Pennsylvania's first governor's debate since 2018, carried locally on WBRE/WYOU. Eighty-four years ago, one of the men on the governor's ballot came from East Stroudsburg, and his party's whole reason for being came down to one word: dry.
The Candidate. Dale Harold Learn was born Dec. 8, 1897, in Paradise Township, according to the Monroe County Historical Association. He graduated in 1916 from East Stroudsburg Normal School (today's East Stroudsburg University) and from Dickinson College in 1922, and served in the Army in both world wars. Back home, he became one of East Stroudsburg's best-known real estate men and the youngest president the Pennsylvania Real Estate Association ever had. He was also a Methodist lay minister, a borough secretary, a school director, a Kiwanian and executive director of the Pocono Mountains Chamber of Commerce.
The Campaigns. In 1942, Learn ran for governor on the Prohibition Party ticket and finished third with 17,385 votes, behind Republican Edward Martin and Democrat F. Clair Ross. In June 1947, the party's national convention in Winona Lake, Ind., unanimously nominated him for vice president alongside Dr. Claude A. Watson. He accepted on Nov. 20, 1947, in front of 175 people at the inn at Buck Hill Falls, declaring that "alcohol is the primary evil overcoming America today." In 1948, the Watson-Learn ticket finished sixth, with 103,900 votes nationwide. Harry Truman won. Learn died in 1976 and is buried in Laurelwood Cemetery in Stroudsburg.
The Twist. Nobody in Monroe County is running on Prohibition anymore, but the arguments haven't gone away. They've just gotten smaller and more practical. Stroudsburg's new Safe Streets Downtown Task Force is working out how to keep Main Street safe at night, and Borough Manager Larry Kopp told WFMZ last month that "the only problems we've ever seen have been a closing on Friday and Saturday nights at about 2 o'clock in the morning." In Harrisburg this week, the House voted to regulate kratom, and lawmakers face an Oct. 13 deadline on skill games. Learn's party wanted alcohol banned outright. Eighty-some years later, we're arguing about closing time.
