A PERSONAL LOOK AT OUR PRESIDENTS

By Edwin Cooney

I thought it might be fun to celebrate Presidents’ Day -- however belatedly -- simply by telling you something about every President which you may not have known before. Here we go:

• George Washington (1789-1797) was exceedingly cool toward his mother Mary Ball Washington, because she often embarrassed him by complaining, sometimes quite publicly, that she was being forsaken by her children — George included. She died at age eighty-one a little more than three months after he became President.

• John Adams (1797-1801) was the first President sworn in by a Chief Justice of the Supreme Court. The Chief Justice was Oliver Ellsworth of Connecticut.

• Even though President Thomas Jefferson (1801-1809) complained that the President’s House was big enough for “two emperors, one Pope and the Grand Lama”, by the time he left it in 1809, he’d added the East and West Wings and furnished them with French furniture.

• James Madison (1809-1817) was our smallest President. He stood five feet four inches and weighed only one hundred pounds. Dolley Madison, his famous wife, was taller than he. Additionally, Madison, even with his towering intelligence and considerable intellect, was deathly afraid of Indians.

• James Monroe (1817-1825) holds the distinction of being the only President to have been physically attacked by a member of his cabinet. The attacker was Treasury Secretary William H. Crawford. Angered by Monroe’s refusal to make appointments he’d recommended, Crawford proceeded to brandish his cane and chase Monroe around the room while calling him “an infernal scoundrel”. The President fended Crawford off with a pair of tongs from the fireplace. Crawford, as he was being escorted from the premises, apologized and Monroe rather grudgingly accepted the apology.

• John Quincy Adams (1825-1829) was caught swimming in the “buff” one morning by a woman newspaper reporter Anne Royall. She sat on his clothes until he’d completed giving her an interview while standing chin deep in the Potomac River.

• Even if Senator John McCain is elected president in 2008, he won’t be the first prisoner of war to become President. Andrew Jackson (1829-1837) and his older brother Robert were prisoners of war in Camden, South Carolina during the Revolutionary War. The boys were held for two weeks in April of 1781 and severely mistreated by their British captors.

• Martin Van Buren (1837-1841), nicknamed the “Little Magician”, was the first President who was not born a British subject. He was born on December 5, 1782, a year and two months after the battle of Yorktown.

• William Henry Harrison (March - April 1841) was the only President elected while holding a purely local public office. He was Clerk of the Court of Common Pleas of Hamilton County, Ohio at the time of his 1840 election.

• John Tyler (1841-1845) was the father of fourteen children. He had four daughters and three sons by his first wife Liza. He had five sons and two daughters by his second wife, his White House bride Julia Gardner.

• In 1812, at the age of seventeen, James K. Polk (1845-1849) was sent to Danville, Kentucky for the removal of gallstones with only liquor to dull the pain. This was before anyone knew about sterilizing medical instruments. It was also before the invention of ether or other anesthetic.

• Zachary Taylor (1849-1850) automatically returned the letter sent him by the 1848 Whig convention informing him of his nomination. This was because, as a Mexican War hero, he’d been receiving so many letters with postage due that he had the local post office send back postage due letters. The Whig Party Chairman promptly paid the two cents postage and Taylor did accept the party nomination eventually becoming our twelfth President.

• In a post-presidential visit to Britain, Millard Fillmore (1850-1853) impressed Queen Victoria as being one of the most handsome men she ever met.

• Franklin Pierce (1853-1857), “handsome Frank” as he was often called, is the only President so far to govern four straight years with the same Cabinet.

• James Buchanan (1857-1861) was the only Pennsylvania born President and he was the last of six Presidents to have been Secretary of State.

• Abraham Lincoln (1861-1865), “the rail splitter” and “the Great Emancipator”, is the only President to have applied for a patent from the U.S. Patent office. His invention was an inflatable device attached to ships at the water line to lift them over shoals. It was never marketed because it was too heavy. Lincoln whittled a wooden model of the device and it is now on display at the Smithsonian Institute.

• Apprenticed to a tailor as a lad, Andrew Johnson (1865-1869) continued to practice his profession even after being elected to public office. When he was Governor of Tennessee, he made a suit for the governor of Kentucky -- a former blacksmith -- who sent Johnson a homemade shovel and a pair of tongs.

• Born Hiram Ulysses Grant, his eventual name, Ulysses S. Grant (1869-1877) evolved during his West Point days. He found the idea of the initials HUG emblazoned on his trunk embarrassing, so he began signing his name Ulysses H. Grant. Meanwhile, he discovered that his local congressman, who had arranged his appointment, had recommended him as Ulysses Simpson Grant, which suited Grant just fine. Henceforth, he signed his name Ulysses S. Grant or U. S. Grant. His friends began calling him “Uncle Sam Grant” or Sam for short.

• Rutherford Birchard Hayes (1877-1881) was the first President to use a telephone while in office. He was also the first sitting President to visit the west coast.

• James Abram Garfield (March-September 1881) was a man of unusual physical strength and intellect. He could write in English with one hand while simultaneously writing in Greek with the other. Some say he was capable of holding any Cabinet position under him.

• Chester Alan Arthur (1881-1885) is probably the least known of all the presidents. A Republican who became president upon the assassination of Garfield, Chet Arthur was a superb administrator, a stylish fashion plate and a polished gentleman. As a young abolitionist lawyer, he represented a black woman, Lizzie Jennings, in 1855 when she sued a Brooklyn streetcar company for refusing to let her ride. He won the case and thus ended discrimination on public transportation in New York City.

• Grover Cleveland (1885-1889 and 1893-1897) was born Stephen Grover Cleveland. Having married twenty-one-yearold Frances Folsom when he was forty-nine, their first child Ruth was born in 1891. Known as “Baby Ruth”, it was she and not the Babe Ruth baseball player for whom the candy bar was named.

• Benjamin Harrison (1889-1893) was the grandson of President William Henry Harrison. Last of the bearded post Civil War Presidents, Harrison was a splendid orator but cold as ice to meet. It was said that one needed a top coat in Washington D.C. even in August, if one was going to shake hands with President Harrison.

• William McKinley (1897-1901) was one of the most likeable men ever to become President. Always attentive to his ailing wife Ida, patient and courteous to visitors and to his political opponents, it was said he had no political enemies, just political opponents. (Ironic that he was assassinated, isn’t it?)

• Theodore Roosevelt (1901-1909) had two goals as President which he never achieved. First, he wanted to institute a more phonetic spelling within the English language. Second, he wanted “In God We Trust” removed from our money.

• William Howard Taft (1909-1913) was the only man to serve as both President and Chief Justice of the United States. He once told of the little boy who observed him as he was walking down the steps of the Supreme Court one day in 1925. The boy ran up to him and said, “Oh! I know who you are! You used to be President Coolidge.”

• Woodrow Wilson (1913-1921) was born Thomas Woodrow Wilson. Possessed of a long bony face, fronted by a rather prominent nose, and bottomed by a long chin followed by somewhat large ears, this is how he described himself: “As for beauty I am not a star. For others are more handsome by far. But my face I don’t mind it, for I am behind it. It’s the people down in front that I jar.” Wilson, however, was very vain about his intellect and his spirituality.

• Warren Gamaliel Harding (1921-1923) looked like a President. His mother had wanted to name him Winfield, but gave in to her husband’s wishes that the lad be named Warren Gamaliel after his great uncle, a Methodist minister in the Wisconsin prison system. However, Warren’s mother usually called him Winnie.

• Calvin Coolidge (1923-1929) used to like to hide on the Secret Service. He’d press one of the buzzers that were installed in the White House to let the Secret Service know where the President was headed, then hide in a closet keeping the door open a crack so he could watch the Secret Service looking for him.
• Herbert Clark Hoover (1929-1933) was the first President born west of the Mississippi River. He was nearly murdered while working in China during the famous 1900 Boxer Rebellion against the rule of “Western imperialist domination.”

• Franklin Delano Roosevelt (1933-1945) married Eleanor Roosevelt on St. Patrick’s Day 1905 in New York City. Eleanor’s uncle Teddy Roosevelt came down to give the bride away. Two receiving lines were set up after the ceremony. After a very short time, Franklin and Eleanor decided to join Uncle Teddy’s receiving line since they didn’t really seem to have one after all.

• Harry S. Truman (1945-1953) was dead serious about civil rights. He desegregated the military, proposed fair housing and voting rights legislation for blacks, and, on January 20, 1949, made band leader Lionel Hampton the first black to perform at a presidential inauguration.

• Dwight David Eisenhower (1953-1961) once told Vice President Nixon that he, Ike, would never quit smoking again. “You mean, Mr. President, that you’ll never start smoking again?” asked Nixon. “No, Dick,” said the President, “I mean exactly what I said. I’ll never stop smoking again.”

• John Fitzgerald Kennedy (1961-1963) called Caroline “Buttons.” She called him “silly daddy”. He called his son “John John”. John called his father “fo fo head”. Jacqueline Kennedy called her husband “bunny”. There’s no record of what JFK called Jackie.

• Lyndon Banes Johnson (1963-1969) nearly did not become President. While serving in the Naval Air Corps during World War II, he was assigned a plane called “The Wabash Cannonball.” While waiting to take off, LBJ left his seat and, by the time he returned, it was taken. He was then assigned to another aircraft called “The Heckling Hare.” LBJ didn’t know why he left his seat aboard the “Wabash Cannonball”, but it’s a good thing he did because it never returned.

• Richard Nixon (1969-1974) was the first President born in California. As a young lawyer he applied to become an FBI agent, but wasn’t accepted. J. Edgar Hoover had two reasons. The first was because the agency’s budget was cut. The second was that Nixon’s file was misplaced. Most would agree that Mr. Hoover just didn’t lose files.

• Gerald Rudolf Ford (1974-1977) was born Leslie Lynch King, but was adopted by his mother’s second husband and given his name. Ford is the only Eagle Scout to have become President so far. He is also the only President to have been drafted by the NFL out of college. He was chosen by the Detroit Lions and the Green Bay Packers.

• Jimmy Carter (1977-1981) like most boys was a baseball fan. His father and uncle were officials of the local team which sometimes played exhibition games with major league teams on their way north from spring training. When Jimmy was about ten, he went down on the field before a game at his father’s suggestion to acquire an autograph from St. Louis Cardinal Manager and Cardinal star infielder Pepper Martin. Frankie Frisch (who was destined for the Baseball Hall of Fame) signed his peanut bag. Pepper Martin, however, spat some tobacco juice, which nearly hit him and told young Jimmy, “Get your ass off the field, boy.”

• Ronald Wilson Reagan (1981 – 1989) was called “Dutch” because his father said he looked like a “fat little Dutchman” as a baby. Somewhat superstitious, President Reagan frequently knocked on wood prior to taking an uncertain trip or venturing on an uncertain project.

• George Herbert Walker Bush (1989 – 1993) was an outstanding athlete in high school as well as at Yale University. He played first base at Yale and batted .280 leading Yale to the College World Series in 1947 and 1948.

• William Jefferson Clinton (1993 – 2001) was the youngest state Attorney General and the youngest Governor of Arkansas. His father, William Blythe III died in an auto accident before he was born. At sixteen, he legally adopted his stepfather’s last name, Clinton. As Governor of Arkansas, he signed his name as Bill Clinton. As President, he signed his first executive order as Bill J. Clinton.

• George Walker Bush (2001 – present) holds quite a distinction as a speaker, believe it or not. According to a recent Yahoo internet survey, President Bush is the sixth most quoted president in U.S. history. He ranks one behind George Washington and one ahead of John F. Kennedy.

Sources: “An Hour Before Daylight” by Jimmy Carter; “Presidential Anecdotes” by Paul F. Boller; “Presidential Fact Book” by Joseph Nathan Kane; “Complete Book of Presidents, 4th ed” by William Degregorio; “The World Almanac of Presidential Facts” by Lu Ann Paletta and Fred L. Worth.


RESPECTFULLY SUBMITTED,

EDWIN COONEY