George Washington

In an effort to promote an end to slavery, Washington released all 124 slaves he had owned in his will after he died.

John Adams

Adams was the first president to reside in the White House.

Thomas Jefferson

Jefferson was the original founder of the University of Virginia.

James Madison

Madison was so concerned with his legacy that he edited and omitted private documents from his important years as president and during the revolution. He even forged Jefferson’s handwriting!

James Monroe

Monroe was the third president to die on Independence Day.

John Quincy Adams

Adams described his presidency as one of the unhappiest times in his life.

Andrew Jackson

Jackson suffered from illness stemming from a musket ball that was never removed from his lungs.

Martin Van Buren

Buren was the first US president not born a British subject, or of British ancestry.

William Henry Harrison

Harrison was the last US president born before the American Revolution.

John Tyler

Tyler fathered the most children (eight) of any US president.

James Knox Polk

Polk became the first president to win despite losing his state residence of Tennessee. He also lost his birth-state, North Carolina.

Zachary Taylor

Taylor was the last president to be elected from neither the Democrat or Republican parties (he was a Whig).

Millard Fillmore

Fillmore was only sworn in after Taylor died of gastroenteritis five days after Independence Day.

Franklin Pierce

Pierce lost his eleven-year-old son in a train accident just weeks after his election to the presidency.

James Buchanan

Buchanan was the first president to remain a bachelor for life.

Abraham Lincoln

Lincoln practiced law without a formal degree.

Andrew Johnson

Johnson was the first president to be impeached, for removing an official (the secretary of war) in favor of his own replacement. He was acquitted in his trial.

Ulysses Simpson Grant

Mark Twain offered 75% royalties for Grant’s memoirs when Grant fell ill and needed to provide for his family in the later years of his life.

Rutherford Birchard Hayes

Hayes was the first person to earn a third term as Governor of Ohio.

James Abram Garfield

Though Garfield was assassinated, he otherwise made his daily plans and intentions known in newspapers, and had no bodyguards with him at any time.

Chester Alan Arthur

Arthur ordered nearly all his personal and official papers burned days before he died.

Grover Cleveland

Cleveland married the youngest first lady ever to be in the White House at 21.

Benjamin Harrison

Harrison was the only president who preceded and succeeded the same person.

William McKinley

McKinley was the last president to have served in the Civil War.

Theodore Roosevelt

Roosevelt was the first president to win a Nobel Peace Prize.

William Howard Taft

Taft was the first president to pitch a baseball on opening day.

Woodrow Wilson

Wilson put the first Jewish justice on the Supreme Court, Louis Brandeis.

Warren Gamaliel Harding

He was the first president to own a radio and speak over the airwaves.

Calvin Coolidge

He had several nicknames: Cool Cal, Cautious Cal, Silent Cal, speaking to his personality.

Herbert Clark Hoover

Hoover was the first president born west of the Mississippi.

Franklin Delano Roosevelt

He dropped out of law school after prematurely passing the bar exam.

Harry S. Truman

Truman’s middle name didn’t stand for anything.

Dwight David Eisenhower

Eisenhower was the first president to ride in a helicopter.

John Fitzgerald Kennedy

JFK faked his medical certificate to get into the Navy.

Lyndon Baines Johnson

Johnson was a teacher for four years before taking up politics.

Richard Milhous Nixon

Nixon was a Quaker.

Gerald Rudolph Ford

Ford was the target of two female-led assassination attempts.

Jimmy Carter

Carter created the Department of Energy and put solar panels on the White House.

Ronald Wilson Reagan

Reagan was the first elected president to have been divorced.

George Herbert Walker Bush

Bush was shot down while on active duty in the Pacific in 1944.

Bill Clinton

Clinton is the winner of two Grammy awards.

George Walker Bush

Bush held the highest and lowest public approval ratings in history during his terms.

Barack Hussein Obama II

Obama lived in Indonesia for four years as a kid.

Donald Trump

Trump is the oldest president to take office.

 

 

 

That’s a lot of knowledge. Thanks for joining us for fun facts about US presidents!