PRINTHoliday reading
Tippecanoe and trivia, too
Courtesy of Scribner
February 14, 2008 | 12:00 a.m. CST
He led his soldiers to victory to establish our nation. He is recognized on the $1 bill as our first president. He also wore a pair of dentures made out of hippopotamus bone. It’s easy to forget that the heroic George Washington, like all U.S. presidents, had his share of quirks. To honor the singularities of our 43 chief executives on President’s Day, Vox explores the lighter sides of the U.S. heads of state.
Secret Lives of the U.S. Presidents
Too many presidential trivia tomes to take in this week? Don’t worry, we’ve got you covered. Here are some of the lesser - known things our presidents accomplished while in office.
- Martin Van Buren attempted to cure his frequent upset stomach by drinking a mixture of soot, charcoal and water.
- Calvin Coolidge kept fit by riding an electric horse installed in the White House.
- At the 1865 inauguration, an ill Andrew Johnson reluctantly agreed to speak before incoming president Abraham Lincoln. He prepared for the big moment with the help of alcohol. The resulting strange, rambling speech continued until outgoing vice president Hannibal Hamlin pulled on Johnson’s sleeve.
- Leaving the White House at 325 pounds, William Taft was so overweight that he often could not remove himself from his bathtub. He solved this problem by installing a tub large enough to contain four regular-sized men.
--Robert McMahon
by Cormac O’Brien
>>Want to learn about the presidents without trudging through a massive biographical tome? (This is a holiday, after all.) This book feels like a modern entertainment magazine with its eye-catching design, short bursts of information and acerbic writing. O’Brien gives each president a short introduction before offering bite-sized paragraphs of silly trivia. Despite some obvious entries (Bill Clinton had an affair?), most of this amusing trivia exposes the quirks of supposedly great men such as John Quincy Adams, who enjoyed skinny-dipping in the Potomac River.
Star-Spangled Men
by Nathan Miller
>>The inside flap claims that Miller uses “pointed humor and a deft hand” in his subjective takedown of 10 presidents. Although Miller does present convincing cases for why Jimmy Carter, William Howard Taft and others were bad presidents, he rarely uses sharp humor. Occasionally a good joke will pop out (“Coolidge’s political career was a shining example of the power of inertia over talent.”), but most of the book is too concerned with the chiefs’ lives before office and why they failed at their job.
Which President Killed a Man?
by James Humes
>>Humes was a speechwriter for five Republican presidents. He introduces each piece of trivia in the form of a question and organizes the history in sections such as “Memorable Sayings” and “Pets and Animals.” The focus is less on outrageous incidents and more on minutiae. Unless Rosalyn Carter wearing an old dress to her husband’s inauguration seems like tantalizing trivia, you’ll find much of this less-than-absorbing. Still, the sheer amount of well-organized information makes it hard to veto.
YO, MILLARD FILLMORE!
by Will Cleveland and Mark Alvarez
>>Whether for the young reader or the young at heart, this book masters the order in which the presidents served by creating humorous mnemonic devices that associate the chief executive’s name with the placement of his term. For example: Atoms (John Adams) swim in a washing machine before a chef’s son (Thomas Jefferson) takes them. It’s not Shakespeare, but when combined with sporadic quizzes, this book makes an excellent educational tool. Despite its target audience, it’s great for anyone in need of a quick refresher course.
