11 fun facts about US presidents
On the day this post publishes, we in the United States are celebrating Presidents Day. Originally established to celebrate George Washington’s birthday, the holiday is widely accepted as a shared celebration of George Washington’s and Abraham Lincoln’s birthdays. Many consider it to be a more general celebration of all U.S. presidents, past and present.
Whether or not you celebrate this holiday at all…and wherever you live in this big, beautiful world…I hope you will find these fun facts about 11 U.S presidents to be of interest. I know I did.
US presidents trivia
George Washington (1789-1797) was a dog breeder and gave his dogs names like Sweet Lips and Drunkard.
James Madison (1809-1817) was the smallest in stature at 5’4” and weighing approximately 100 pounds.
Andrew Jackson (1829-1837) once killed a man in a duel.
Martin Van Buren (1837-1841) was the first US president to be born an American. The rest started life as British subjects.
Zachary Taylor (1849-1850) never voted in an election until he was on the ballot himself.
Abraham Lincoln (1861-1865) was the tallest president at 6’4” and may have had Marfan Syndrome.
Benjamin Harrison (1889-1893) was the first president to hire a female White House staffer.
Warren G. Harding (1921-1923) wrote a series of lurid love letters to his mistress, the wife of one of his best friends (before he took office).
Gerald Ford (1974-1977) was a star football player at the University of Michigan and turned down offers from both the Detroit Lions and Green Bay Packers.
Barack Obama (2009-2017) was the first African American president. Prior to becoming president, he won two Grammy Awards for “Best Spoken Word Album.”
Joe Biden (2021-present) overcame a debilitating childhood stutter after enduring bullying over the condition in grade school.
Source
For facts on all 46 U.S. presidents, visit https://www.history.com/news/us-presidents-facts.
Your turn
- Do you have a fun fact that you would like to share with us?
- If you live in the United States, how do you celebrate Presidents Day?
- What else is on your mind? Anything at all; I just love to hear from you.
I have to admit I don’t usually think about our presidents on Presidents’ Day, I just think of it as a day off. However, these facts were interesting, so thank you!
I suspect you are not alone in that, Cindy. It’s all about the 3-day weekend! I heard a couple of these trivia points on television, found them interesting, and decided to blog about it.
Christie, I read these to my husband and his only comment was when I got to Barack Obama. Me: he won an academy award for “best-spoken word album”. Malcolm: What was it? 🙂
I’m not sure which word was the best. 😉 He actually won two Grammys though for his narration of Dreams from My Father and The Audacity of Hope. He has now been nominated for a third with A Promised Land.
It’s strange to see you guys having a Presidents Day – we don’t have a Prime Ministers Day in Australia…..it’d be an excuse for another public holiday (but I think we get the Queen’s Birthday instead).
The holiday was originally created to celebrate the birthday of our first president, George Washington. The truth is for most people it is the opportunity to enjoy a three-day weekend.
And Joe Biden has just added another one to that list – as a President who visited a country at war, and walked around a city with its President as the air raid sirens were going off.
We don’t have a Prime Ministers day here in the UK. Mind you, after the recent debacle of ever-changing PMs without a general election, it’s probably just as well.
That pretty impressive, isn’t it Debs? Whatever your politics, you gotta give him props for that (though I know not everyone will). To be honest, most Americans don’t focus as much on the presidents as on the chance for a three-day weekend.
I was impressed, as were most of the comments I read on Twitter. But then, as with all social media, the algorithms means I will generally only see those who share my views.
I get why they’d focus on a 3-day weekend 🙂 We’re a bit like that with Easter – it’s all about the 4-day weekend and not the religious holiday, or even the chocolate!
It is interesting how we’ve been put in social media silos, Debs. On the one hand, it does make surfing a bit more agreeable; on the other hand, it can lead to a warped sense of the world, if we aren’t careful.
The only Presidential trivia I know has to do with Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address. That speech has its own monument and it is the only monument to a speech in the world. [Or at least I hope this factoid is still true. Learned it a few years ago.]
According to the Gettysburg Address website, that factoid is true, Ally, and that is something I didn’t know until today. Thank you for that tidbit of information. Speaking of truth, I posted a quote attributed to Lincoln on Instagram yesterday, and the Instagram fact checkers shut it down for being false news. I’m going to have to dig a little deeper into that one…and possibly be more careful with my quoting.