Surprising Facts About Every U.S. President
Since the establishment of the office in 1789, 45 people have served in 47 presidencies. Each president has brought their own brand of political discourse to the role, and historians tend to remember these leaders primarily for their major historical achievements and policy decisions.
But behind the presidents’ political legacies lie plenty of lesser-known details we don’t hear about as often, whether it’s a past life as an executioner, a penchant for skinny-dipping, or a fierce dislike of broccoli. Here is a surprising fact about every U.S. president.
George Washington
George Washington’s second inaugural address, delivered on March 4, 1793, was the shortest ever at less than two minutes long and only 135 words. (The average length of an inaugural address is 2,350 words.)
John Adams
John Adams was the first U.S. president to inhabit the White House. He moved into the unfinished and largely unfurnished residence in November 1800, with only six rooms completed.
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Thomas Jefferson
Thomas Jefferson helped popularize ice cream, French fries, and macaroni and cheese in America. He brought recipes from Europe that his staff prepared for guests at the White House.
James Madison
James Madison was the shortest president. He measured 5 feet, 4 inches (163 centimeters) tall and is estimated to have weighed about 100 pounds.
James Monroe
Monrovia, the capital of Liberia, was named after James Monroe, making it the only capital city outside the U.S. named for an American president.
John Quincy Adams
John Quincy Adams had a daily routine that involved early morning nude swims in the Potomac River. He maintained his habit of swimming in the Potomac into his late 70s.
Andrew Jackson
Andrew Jackson was involved in at least a dozen duels during his lifetime (some put the number as high as 100), most of which were resolved without bloodshed. But Jackson did kill one opponent and was shot twice himself.
Martin Van Buren
Martin Van Buren was the first U.S. president who spoke English as a second language. He grew up in a Dutch community in upstate New York, and his first language was Dutch.
William Henry Harrison
After only one month in the White House, William Henry Harrison became the first president to die in office, serving the shortest tenure in U.S. presidential history.
John Tyler
John Tyler fathered 15 children with two wives, more than any other president. His first child was born in 1815, when Tyler was 25, and his last in 1860, when the former president was 70.
James K. Polk
Some of James K. Polk’s contemporaries considered him to be a rather boring man. This likely wasn’t helped by his wife, Sarah, who banned hard liquor and dancing at the White House.
Zachary Taylor
In 1848, the Whig National Convention nominated Zachary Taylor as president of the United States. Letters were sent to Taylor requesting his acceptance, but he didn’t respond — he had instructed the local post office not to deliver his mail to avoid postage fees, and didn’t get official word of his nomination for weeks.
Millard Fillmore
Millard Fillmore came from a large, poor family and received little formal education until he was 18. When he became president, he and his wife, Abigail, established the first permanent library in the White House.
Franklin Pierce
Franklin Pierce was the first U.S. president to recite his inaugural speech entirely from memory — all 3,336 words of it.
James Buchanan
James Buchanan never married and remains America’s only bachelor president.
Abraham Lincoln
Abraham Lincoln is the only president to hold a patent. His invention was designed to buoy and lift boats over shoals and obstructions in rivers.
Andrew Johnson
Andrew Johnson was supposed to be assassinated on the same night as Abraham Lincoln, as he was serving as Lincoln’s vice president at the time. But his would-be assassin, George Atzerodt, lost his nerve and got drunk instead.
Ulysses S. Grant
Ulysses S. Grant’s real name was Hiram Ulysses Grant. He wound up with the moniker we know today due to a mistake by his benefactor on his application form to West Point, which he was never able to correct.
Rutherford B. Hayes
As part of his “Great Western Tour” in 1880, Rutherford B. Hayes became the first president to visit the West Coast while in office.
James A. Garfield
When President James A. Garfield was shot by an assassin on July 2, 1881, he was attended to by Charles B. Purvis — the first Black physician to treat a sitting president.
Chester A. Arthur
Chester A. Arthur appreciated the finer things in life. His administration spent $30,000 (around $2 million today) lavishly refurbishing the White House, and his love of clothing — he reputedly owned 80 pairs of trousers — earned him the nickname “the Gentleman Boss.”
Grover Cleveland
Grover Cleveland was the only president to officially serve as an executioner. As the sheriff of Erie County, New York, he performed the role of hangman on a handful of executions.
Benjamin Harrison
Benjamin Harrison was the first president to have electric lighting installed in the White House, but he and his wife Caroline were afraid to touch the light switches for fear of electrocution.
William McKinley
William McKinley’s favorite pet was a double yellow-headed Mexican parrot that he named Washington Post and taught to whistle “Yankee Doodle Dandy.”
Theodore Roosevelt
Teddy Roosevelt was disappointed with his official presidential portrait by artist Théobald Chartran, which his family jokingly said made him look like a “mewing cat.” Just before the end of his presidency, Roosevelt had the painting removed from the White House and burned.
William Howard Taft
In 1910, William Howard Taft became the first U.S. president to throw the ceremonial first pitch of a baseball season.
Woodrow Wilson
Woodrow Wilson is the only U.S. president to be buried in Washington, D.C. He is interred at the Washington National Cathedral.
Warren G. Harding
Warren G. Harding was involved in a number of extramarital affairs. He wrote more than 100 lustful letters to his mistress Carrie Fulton Phillips.
Calvin Coolidge
Considering it to be good for his health, Calvin Coolidge had his head rubbed with petroleum jelly every morning while he ate his breakfast in bed.
Herbert Hoover
While living in China, Herbert Hoover and his wife were caught up in the Boxer Rebellion, an uprising against foreigners that occurred in 1900. While they were trapped during the Siege of Tientsin, Hoover took a leading role in the defense, building barricades around residential areas.
Franklin D. Roosevelt
FDR suffered from a mild case of triskaidekaphobia, a fear of the number 13. He didn’t like Friday the 13th, wouldn’t travel on the 13th day of any month, and avoided hosting 13 guests at a dinner party.
Harry S. Truman
The “S” in Harry S. Truman’s name doesn't stand for anything — it’s simply the letter “S” and not an initial for a middle name. According to Truman, the letter was chosen as a compromise between the names of his grandfathers, Anderson Shipp Truman and Solomon Young.
Dwight D. Eisenhower
In 1954, Dwight D. Eisenhower had a putting green installed outside the Oval Office — but squirrels kept digging holes in it. Growing increasingly irate, he had his groundskeepers live-trap the squirrels, which were then released in nearby Rock Creek Park.
John F. Kennedy
When JFK and his crew were stranded on an island during World War II, they carved a rough rescue message onto a coconut shell. Kennedy later had the coconut turned into a paperweight, which sat on his desk throughout his presidency.
Lyndon B. Johnson
Lyndon B. Johnson owned an amphibious car, which he used to prank people. Exclaiming to all on board that the brakes had failed, he’d head straight into a lake — at which point the terrified passengers would learn that the car could actually float.
Richard Nixon
Richard Nixon was a talented musician. He played five musical instruments — saxophone, violin, clarinet, accordion, and piano — and even composed a piano concerto.
Gerald Ford
While still in his late 20s, Gerald Ford worked as a fashion model. He even made it onto the cover of Cosmopolitan magazine.
Jimmy Carter
During a fishing trip in 1979, President Jimmy Carter was “attacked” by a swamp rabbit. He was in a small boat when the agitated rabbit swam toward him, possibly trying to escape a predator. The press had a field day with the story, dubbing it the “killer rabbit” or “banzai bunny” incident.
Ronald Reagan
Over the course of seven summers, the young Ronald Reagan was a lifeguard at Lowell Park on the Rock River. During that time, he saved 77 lives — a number he kept track of by cutting a notch in a log each time he pulled someone from the water.
George H.W. Bush
George H.W. Bush had a passionate dislike for broccoli. While reports that he banned it from the White House and Air Force One may have been exaggerated, Bush is on record as having said, “I'm president of the United States and I'm not going to eat any more broccoli.”
Bill Clinton
In 1963, when he was just 16 years old, Bill Clinton shook hands with President John F. Kennedy — and the moment was captured on video.
George W. Bush
During his senior year of high school in the 1960s, George W. Bush was the head cheerleader at Phillips Academy in Massachusetts.
Credit: UPI/ Alamy Stock Photo
Barack Obama
As a child, Barack Obama spent four years living in Indonesia. His family pets included a large turtle and an ape named Tata — and his stepfather secretly bred crocodiles in the house.
Donald Trump
Donald Trump’s Secret Service code name is Mogul, while Melania Trump is Muse. Both code names were selected during Trump’s first term as president.
Credit: Bill Waterson/ Alamy Stock Photo
Joe Biden
While he was a student at the University of Delaware, Joe Biden was put on academic probation for a prank in which he sprayed the dorm director with a fire extinguisher.
