15 Crazy Facts About America’s Presidents! (w/ Gallery)
With the Presidential Election upon us, I wanted to learn some fun facts about the Presidents that came before. Thus, I consulted randomfacts.com and found out all of these marvelous things! Then I matched them with slightly appropriate modern day memes and pics!
HAPPY LEARNING, ‘MERICA!
1 . Jimmy Carter is the first known president to go on record as seeing a UFO.
2. “Teddy Bears” were so named when Theodore “Teddy” Roosevelt (1858-1919) refused to shoot a small bear cub one day. The incident was reported in the news, which inspired a toy manufacture to come out with the cute stuffed animals.
3. James Abram Garfield (1831-1881) is the first president to ever talk on the phone. When he spoke to Alexander Graham Bell, who was at the other end 13 miles away, he said: “Please speak a little more slowly.
4. Ulysses S. Grant (born Hiram Ulysses Grant, 1822-1885) smoked at least 20 cigars a day and, after a brilliant war victory, a nation of well wishers sent him more than 10,000 cigars. He later died of throat cancer.
5. John F. “Jack” Kennedy most likely had the most active extramarital sex life of any president. He allegedly slept with Marilyn Monroe, Jayne Mansfield, Audrey Hepburn, Angie Dickinson, stripper Blaze Starr, Marlene Dietrich, and many other women including White House staffers, secretaries, stewardess, campaign workers, strippers, and acquaintances of trusted male friends. The FBI taped sounds of him and Inga Arvad making love.
6. When Martin Van Buren wrote his autobiography after serving as president from 1837-1841, he didn’t mention his wife of 12 years. Not even once.
7. James Madison (1751-1836) was the shortest president of the United States, standing at only 5’4”. He never weighed more than 100 pounds.
8. As a young man, Rutherford Birchard Hayes (1822-1893) fought lyssophobia, or the fear of going insane.
9. Abraham Lincoln was the first president to ever be photographed at his inauguration. In the photo, he is standing near John Wilkes Booth, his future assassin
10. Thomas Jefferson was convinced that if he soaked his feet in a bucket of cold water every day, he’d never get a cold.
11. No president has ever been an only child.
12. Rutherford Hayes banished alcohol from the White House and held gospel sing-alongs every night in the White House.
13. After President Bush Sr. vomited on the Japanese Prime Minister, a new word entered the Japanese language. Bushusuru means “to do the Bush thing,” or to publicly vomit.
14. Twenty-ninth president Warren Gamaliel Harding (1865-1923) repeatedly made love to a young girl, Nan Britton, in a White House closet. On one occasion, Secret Service agents had to stop his wife from beating down the closet door.
15. Andrew Johnson is the only tailor ever to be president. As president, he would typically stop by a tailor shop to say hello. He would wear only the suits that he made himself.
