Tuesday, August 21, 2012 11:09:00 AM | by v-lizmac
Presidential fun facts & trivia
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George Washington - 1st president (1789-1797)
George Washington, the first president of the United States, was a former military commander, Virginia planter and politician at the time of the American Revolution. Delegates to the Second Continental Congress named him Commander in Chief of the Continental Army in 1775. His famous false teeth were made from hippopotamus and elephant ivory, not wood as popularly believed.
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John Adams - 2nd president (1797-1801)
John Adams, the second US president, first served the country as a diplomat in France, Holland and Great Britain. After serving as George Washington's vice president, Adams was the first president to live in the White House, although the building was unfinished at the time. Adams (along with Washington and Jefferson) collected and played marbles.
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Thomas Jefferson - 3rd president (1801-1809)
Thomas Jefferson, the third US president, wrote the Declaration of Independence when he was only 33. He spoke five languages, was an inventor and was active in the areas of science, religion, architecture and philosophy. Though an advocate of freedom, he was also a slave owner. He and his longtime friend John Adams died within hours of each other on July 4, 1826.
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The last of the Founding Fathers to serve in the office, James Monroe was the fifth US president. He is perhaps best known for the Monroe Doctrine, which told European powers not to meddle in the affairs of countries in the Americas and threatened war if they did. He was the third US president to die on the Fourth of July.
John Quincy Adams, the sixth US president, was the first son of a president (John Adams) to hold the office. Like his father, he served as a diplomat before becoming president. When none of the three candidates for president received a majority of Electoral College votes, the election was decided by the House of Representatives and Adams won. A surprising fact: Adams took a nude swim in the Potomac River each morning.
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Andrew Jackson - 7th president (1829-1837)
Andrew Jackson, the seventh US president, was born in the Carolina backwoods but became a wealthy lawyer and politician who built a mansion near Nashville, Tenn. He later earned national fame after defeating the British in the Battle of New Orleans during the War of 1812. He was nicknamed 'Old Hickory' as a tribute to his toughness and once killed a man in a duel. He is one of six presidents to survive an assassination attempt.
Martin Van Buren, the eighth president of the US, previously served as secretary of state and vice president. He helped to establish the Democratic Party. His policies were blamed for making an economic crash, the Panic of 1837, worse and he was voted out of office after only one term. He was the first president who was born a US citizen and the only president whose native language wasn't English. He first spoke Dutch.
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William Henry Harrison - 9th president (1841)
Although born to Virginia aristocracy, William Henry Harrison, the ninth US president, spent much of his life in the military in the Northwest Territory. He famously defeated the Indian chief Tecumseh at the Battle of Tippecanoe. He has the distinction of serving the shortest time in office: less than a month. He developed pneumonia and became the first president to die in office.
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John Tyler - 10th president (1841-1845)
John Tyler, the 10th US president, was the first vice president to become president due to the death of his predecessor. A states' rights advocate, Tyler feuded with the Whig Party, which had nominated him as Van Buren's vice president, over a bill to establish a national bank. He was the first president threatened with impeachment by the House of Representatives; the resolution failed. He ended his career as a member of the Confederate House of Representatives.
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James K. Polk - 11th president (1845-1849)
James Knox Polk, the 11th US president, was the first 'dark horse' (little-known) candidate for the office. His policies of supporting the annexation of Texas and the occupation of Oregon proved popular with voters. He fought a war with Mexico and bought California and New Mexico from that country for $15 million. He vowed to serve only one term and did. Polk's post-presidential retirement was the shortest: He died 103 days after leaving office.
Zachary Taylor, the 12th US president, spent 40 years in the Army and was known as 'Old Rough and Ready.' A Southerner who owned slaves, he nonetheless did not support the expansion of slavery and was willing to risk war with the South to prevent secession. Taylor died after just 16 months in office, the third-shortest presidential tenure.
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Millard Fillmore - 13th president (1850-1853)
Millard Fillmore, Zachary Taylor's vice president, became the 13th president after Taylor's death. Fillmore favored the Compromise of 1850, five Senate bills that defused the confrontation between North and South over slavery in territory gained during the Mexican-American War. A popular story that he installed the first bathtub in the White House was actually a hoax.
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Franklin Pierce - 14th president (1853-1857)
Franklin Pierce, another 'dark horse' candidate, was nominated at the Democratic Convention after 49 ballots. His support of the Kansas-Nebraska Act reignited the confrontation over slavery and turned Kansas into a bloody battleground. Democrats refused to nominate him again in 1856. He is the only president to come from New Hampshire.
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James Buchanan - 15th president (1857-1861)
James Buchanan, the 15th US president, was thought to be a compromise between the two sides in the slavery question. Unfortunately his actions, such as urging Kansas be admitted as a slave state, only made the situation worse. He said Southern states didn't have the right to secede but that the federal government couldn't stop them. He was the only president to never marry. His niece, Harriet Lane, served as first lady.
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Abraham Lincoln - 16th president (1861-1865)
Taking office at a time of the gravest constitutional crisis in its history, Abraham Lincoln, the 16th US president, led the country through the Civil War. On Jan. 1, 1863, he issued the Emancipation Proclamation, declaring slaves in the Confederacy were free. His Gettysburg Address is one of the most famous speeches in US history. He is one of four presidents to be assassinated in office.
The great Union general of the Civil War, Ulysses S. Grant, was the 18th US president. Although a hero on the battlefield, Grant struggled as president. His administration was beset by scandals. After losing his money in a financial firm bankruptcy, Grant wrote his memoirs to pay his debts. He died just days after finishing them. His publisher was Mark Twain.
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Rutherford B. Hayes - 19th president (1877-1881)
The election of Rutherford B. Hayes, the 19th US president, was one of the most controversial in US history. Hayes trailed his opponent in the popular vote, and the election hinged on electoral votes in three contested races (Louisiana, South Carolina and Florida). A congressional commission eventually awarded all three states to Hayes. He won by one electoral vote.
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James A. Garfield - 20th president (1881)
James A. Garfield, the 20th US president, had the second shortest time in office of any president: just 200 days. He was shot on July 2, 1881, by an angry attorney who had wanted a consular post. He lingered for weeks before dying. He dealt with corruption and brought a degree of prestige back to the presidency.
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Chester A. Arthur - 21st president (1881-1885)
Chester A. Arthur, the 21st US president, entered office after Garfield's assassination. He was generally distrusted because his career had begun in the graft of the New York City Republican machine. After becoming president, he became a staunch advocate for civil service reform. He kept secret the fact that he was suffering from a fatal kidney disease and died two years after leaving office.
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Grover Cleveland - 22nd and 24th president (1885-1889 and (1893-1897)
Grover Cleveland is unique among US presidents: He is the only one to serve two nonconsecutive terms. He was the 22nd and 24th presidents. He was also the only president to be married in the White House. He is known for fighting for political reform and for being a fiscal conservative.
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Benjamin Harrison - 23rd president (1889-1893)
Benjamin Harrison, the 23rd US president, is one of four to lose the popular vote but win the Electoral College. (He defeated Cleveland.) His grandfather was the ninth president, William Henry Harrison. He struggled with tariff issues while in office and signed bills for domestic improvements and expansion of the Navy. He was the first president to attend a baseball game.
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William McKinley - 25th president (1897-1901)
William McKinley, a Civil War veteran and Ohio lawyer, was the 25th US president. He presided over a period of economic prosperity. When Spain refused to grant independence to Cuba, McKinley launched the Spanish-American War of 1898. After winning the war, the US gained the colonies of Puerto Rico, Guam and the Philippines. He was shot by a deranged anarchist and died eight days later.
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Theodore Roosevelt - 26th president (1901-1909)
Theodore Roosevelt, the 26th US president, was the youngest person ever to assume office. He was 42 when he took over from the assassinated McKinley. He worked to break up economic monopolies, ensured that the Panama Canal would be built, conserved millions of acres of forest land and won the Nobel Peace Prize. He ran for president again in 1912 and was shot in the chest while campaigning but survived.
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William Howard Taft - 27th president (1909-1913)
William Howard Taft, the 27th US president, was a distinguished jurist but didn't like politics much. He continued Roosevelt's policy of busting of monopolies and also promoted constitutional amendments to set up an income tax and directly elect senators. He was the largest person to hold the office (300 pounds) and the only president to later serve as Supreme Court chief justice.
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Woodrow Wilson - 28th president (1913-1921)
President Woodrow Wilson, the 28th US president, passed major progressive reforms, including lower tariffs and the Federal Reserve Act. He campaigned for re-election on the slogan 'He kept us out of war' but soon realized the US needed to enter the war against Germany, which it did on April 2, 1917. He suffered a stroke in 1918 and his wife largely ran the presidency until he left office. His face appears on the $100,000 bill.
The administration of Warren G. Harding, the 29th US president, was one of the most corrupt ever. It included the infamous Teapot Dome bribery scandal. Harding was a newspaper publisher whom one admirer promoted for the nomination because 'he looked like a president.' Harding died of a heart attack in office in 1923. Rumors at the time claimed he had either killed himself or was poisoned by his wife.
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Calvin Coolidge - 30th president (1923-1929)
Calvin Coolidge, the 30th US president, was mainly known for saying little and doing less. A woman sitting next to him at dinner told him she had a bet that she could get three words of conversation out of him. His response: 'You lose.' His main accomplishment was to restore confidence in the presidency after the Harding scandals.
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Herbert Hoover - 31st president (1929-1933)
Herbert Hoover, the 31st US president, was a trained engineer who believed that government and the economy could be improved with better efficiency. Unfortunately, just months after he was sworn in, the stock market crashed. Hoover was blamed for failing to stem the Great Depression. He is one of only two presidents (the other is William Howard Taft) who won with no previous experience in elected office.
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Franklin D. Roosevelt - 32nd president (1933-1945)
Franklin D. Roosevelt, the 32nd president, was elected in the depths of the Great Depression on his promise to end the downturn and provide a New Deal for Americans. His programs are credited with spurring the recovery. He later formed a close alliance with England’s Winston Churchill to fight and win World War II. He is the only president to serve more than two terms.
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Harry S. Truman - 33rd president (1945-1953)
Harry S. Truman, the 33rd US president, had been vice president for just a few weeks when Roosevelt's death made him president. He oversaw the end of WWII, authorized the dropping of atomic bombs on Japan and the start of the Korean War. He survived an assassination attempt in 1950 and was the last US president not to have been to college.
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Dwight D. Eisenhower - 34th president (1953-1961)
Dwight D. Eisenhower, the 34th US president, turned his success as the victorious commanding general of Allied forces in World War II into victory at the ballot box. He ended the Korean War, ensured desegregation in schools in Little Rock, Ark., and presided over an era of relative peace and prosperity. He was the first president to appear on color television.
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John F. Kennedy - 35th president (1961-1963)
John F. Kennedy, the 35th US president, was the youngest elected to the office and the youngest to die in office when he was assassinated on Nov. 22, 1963. Kennedy authorized the failed Bay of Pigs invasion of Cuba and later successfully pressed the Soviet Union to remove nuclear missiles from the island during the Cuban Missile Crisis. He is the only president to win a Pulitzer Prize.
Lyndon B. Johnson, left, the 36th president of the United States, is seen with his vice president, Hubert Humphrey. Johnson passed landmark civil rights legislation, created Medicare and launched the war on poverty. He was also widely blamed for embroiling the US in the unpopular Vietnam War. He is the only president during Queen Elizabeth II's reign not to have met her.
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Richard M. Nixon - 37th president (1969-1974)
Richard Nixon, the 37th US president, is the only person to have resigned the office. He quit in 1974 rather than face almost certain impeachment for his role in the Watergate scandal. He ended the Vietnam War and opened diplomatic relations with China.
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Gerald Ford - 38th president (1974-1977)
Gerald Ford, the 38th US president, was the only person to hold the office without first being elected vice president. He was appointed vice president after Spiro Agnew resigned, then became president upon Nixon's resignation. He was a star player on the University of Michigan football team. He survived two assassination attempts in three weeks in California.
Ronald Reagan, the 40th US president, was known as the 'Great Communicator' and the 'Teflon president.' His Reagan Revolution cut taxes and government spending. He had several important summit meetings with the Soviet Union's Mikhail Gorbachev. He survived an assassination attempt after only 69 days in office and is one of only four presidents to reach age 90. (The others were John Adams, Herbert Hoover and Gerald Ford.)
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George H. W. Bush - 41st president (1989-1993)
George H.W. Bush, the 41st US president, sent American troops to Panama to overthrow corrupt leader Gen. Manuel Noriega. After Iraq's Saddam Hussein invaded Kuwait in 1990, he organized an international coalition that successfully removed Iraqi troops from the country. He marked his 85th birthday with a parachute jump.
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Bill Clinton - 42nd president (1993-2001)
Bill Clinton, the 42nd US president, oversaw a period of peace and economic prosperity that was unequaled in US history. He achieved a budget surplus, saw unemployment rates at record lows and authorized a bombing campaign to end 'ethnic cleansing' in Serbia. He was the first Democrat since Franklin Roosevelt to win a second term. He was impeached over a scandal surrounding his indiscretions with a White House intern but was found not guilty in the Senate. He and former President George H.W. Bush have become friends.
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George W. Bush - 43rd president (2001-2009)
George W. Bush, the 43rd US president, is the second son of a president to hold the office and the fourth to win on electoral votes after losing the popular vote. The Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on the Pentagon and the World Trade Center made Bush into a wartime president. He oversaw the invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq and the creation of the Department of Homeland Security. He also delivered promised tax cuts.
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Barack Obama - 44th president (2009-present)
Barack Obama, the 44th US president, was the first African-American to be elected to the office. He entered office just months after the massive economic collapse in September 2008. He signed economic stimulus legislation as well as Wall Street reforms. He repealed the military's Don't Ask, Don't Tell policy, increased US troops in Afghanistan, ended US involvement in Iraq and ordered the operation that killed Osama bin Laden.