Presidential Trivia for Election Time, part II

The second in a series of blog articles on presidential trivia (part 1, part 2, part 3, part 4). Next week: Harding through Bush 43.

Abraham Lincoln (right) is considered by many Americans to be the greatest president; it is estimated that the Emancipation Proclamation freed 3, 500,000 slaves.

Andrew Johnson was a tailor by trade.

Ulysses S. Grant’s name given at birth was Hiram Ulysses Grant; he began calling himself Ulysses Simpson Grant after a mix-up in his application and recommendation to West Point.

Rutherford Hayes was a gutsy soldier who had four horses shot from beneath him during the Civil War.

Another of the Civil War generals who went on to become president, James Garfield was a professor of Latin and Greek before serving as either politician or soldier.

Chester Arthur hired Louis Tiffany to redecorate the White House.

Grover Cleveland’s wedding to Frances Folsom (couple shown on left) on June 2, 1886, is the only wedding of a president to occur inside the White House.  Francis F. Cleveland was a beautiful woman and the marriage did much to improve Cleveland’s image; earlier, during his first run for the presidency, he had admitted to fathering a child out of wedlock.

Benjamin Harrison was the first president to put a Christmas tree in the White House and the last president to wear a beard.

The third president to be assassinated was also the second president to die in Buffalo, New York: William McKinley.  Millard Fillmore died in Buffalo after he left office.

Valentine’s Day 1884 was perhaps the most tragic day in Theodore Roosevelt’s life; both his mother and his wife died on that day.

William Howard Taft (right) is the only president other than John Kennedy to be buried at Arlington Cemetery.

Dr. Thomas Woodrow Wilson received his Ph. D. from Johns Hopkins University and taught at Bryn Mawr, Wesleyan University and Princeton.  He coached football while he was at Wesleyan.

Sources:
Secret Lives of the U.S. Presidents by Cormac O’Brien
Isaac Asimov’s Book of Facts by Isaac Asimov
American Presidents by David C. Whitney
Portraits of the Presidents by Frederick Voss
www.whitehouse.gov/president/holiday/whtree

Abraham Lincoln/Mathew Brady, 1864/Albumen silver print/National Portrait Gallery, Smithsonian Institution

Grover Cleveland and Frances Folsom Cleveland/Donaldson Brothers, c. 1886-1890/Chromolithograph on paper/National Portrait Gallery, Smithsonian Institution; gift of John O'Brien

William Howard Taft/William Valentine Schevill, c. 1910/Oil on artist board/National Portrait Gallery, Smithsonian Institution; gift of William E. Schevill