Presidential Trivia

Sources: Infoplease, Maps of World.

Age
The oldest elected president was Reagan (age 69); the youngest was Kennedy (age 43). Theodore Roosevelt, however, was the youngest man to become president—he was 42 when he succeeded McKinley, who had been assassinated. THE OLDEST LIVING former president was Gerald Ford, who was born on July 14, 1913, and died on Dec.27, 2006, at age 93. The second oldest was Ronald Reagan, who also lived to be 93 years.

Ancestry
The ancestry of all 43 presidents is limited to the following seven heritages, or some combination thereof: Dutch, English, Irish, Scottish, Welsh, Swiss, or German.

Arlington National Cemetery
Kennedy and Taft are the only presidents buried in Arlington National Cemetery.

Assassinations
Presidents Lincoln, Garfield, McKinley, and Kennedy were assassinated in office.

Assassination attempts were made on the lives of Jackson, T. Roosevelt, F. Roosevelt, Truman, Ford, and Reagan.

British Subjects
Eight Presidents were born British subjects: Washington, J. Adams, Jefferson, Madison, Monroe, J. Q. Adams, Jackson, and W. Harrison.

Children
Six presidents had no children. Tyler—father of fifteen—had the most.

Coins
Lincoln, Jefferson, F. Roosevelt, Washington, Kennedy, and Eisenhower are portrayed on U.S. coins.

Colleges
Nine Presidents never attended college: Washington, Jackson, Van Buren, Taylor, Fillmore, Lincoln, A. Johnson, Cleveland, and Truman.

Harvard counts six presidents as its alumni - J. Adams, J. Q. Adams, T. Roosevelt, F. Roosevelt, Kennedy, and G. W. Bush (business school). Yale is a close second, with five presidents as alumni: Taft, Ford (law school), G.H.W. Bush, Clinton (law school), and G. W. Bush.

Currency
Washington, Jefferson, Lincoln, Jackson, Grant, McKinley, Cleveland, Madison, and Wilson are portrayed on U.S. paper currency.

Death in Office
Eight Presidents died in office: W. Harrison (after having served only one month), Taylor, Lincoln, Garfield, McKinley, Harding, F. Roosevelt, and Kennedy.

First Lady
The term "First Lady" was first used in 1877 in reference to Lucy Ware Webb Hayes. Most First Ladies, including Jackie Kennedy, are said to have hated the label.

Height
The tallest president was Lincoln at 6'4"; at 5'4", Madison was the shortest.

July 4th
Presidents Adams, Jefferson, and Monroe all died on the 4th of July; Coolidge was born on that day.

Marriage and Divorce
James Buchanan was the only president never to marry.

Five presidents remarried after the death of their first wives—two of whom, Tyler and Wilson, remarried while in the White House.

Reagan was the only divorced president.

Nobel Peace Prize
Theodore Roosevelt was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1906; Woodrow Wilson in 1919. Jimmy Carter was awarded in 2002, after the tenure of his presidency.

Non-Elected
For two years the nation was run by a president and a vice president who were not elected by the people. After Vice President Spiro T. Agnew resigned in 1973, President Nixon appointed Gerald Ford as vice president. Nixon resigned the following year, which left Ford as president, and Ford's appointed vice president, Nelson Rockefeller, as second in line.

Number of Presidents
George W. Bush is the 43rd president, but there actually have only been 42 presidents: Cleveland was elected for two nonconsecutive terms and is counted twice, as our 22nd and 24th president.

Popular Vote
Four Presidents won the popular vote but lost the presidency: Andrew Jackson won the popular vote but lost the election to John Quincy Adams (1824); Samuel J. Tilden won the popular vote but lost the election to Rutherford B. Hayes (1876); Grover Cleveland won the popular vote but lost the election to Benjamin Harrison (1888); Al Gore won the popular vote but lost the election to George W. Bush (2000).

Relatives
George W. Bush (the 43rd president) is the son of George Bush (the 41st president)

John Quincy Adams (the 6th president) was the son of John Adams (the 2nd president).

Benjamin Harrison (the 23rd president) was the grandson of William Henry Harrison (the 9th president).

James Madison (the 4th president) and Zachary Taylor (the 12th president) were second cousins.

Franklin Delano Roosevelt (the 32nd president) was a fifth cousin of Theodore Roosevelt (the 26th president). He was also distantly related to a total of 11 U.S. presidents, 5 by blood and 6 by marriage: Theodore Roosevelt, John Adams, John Quincy Adams, Ulysses Grant, William Henry Harrison, Benjamin Harrison, James Madison, William Taft, Zachary Taylor, Martin Van Buren, and George Washington.

Religion
The most common religious affiliation among presidents has been Episcopalian, followed by Presbyterian.

Tenure, Longest
Franklin Delano Roosevelt was elected to an unprecedented four terms of office?

Vice-Presidents
Fourteen Presidents served as vice presidents: J. Adams, Jefferson, Van Buren, Tyler, Fillmore, A. Johnson, Arthur, T. Roosevelt, Coolidge, Truman, Nixon, L. Johnson, Ford, and George H.W. Bush.

Vice Presidents were originally the presidential candidates receiving the second-largest number of electoral votes. The Twelfth Amendment, passed in 1804, changed the system so that the electoral college voted separately for president and vice president. The presidential candidate, however, gradually gained power over the nominating convention to choose his own running mate.

Washington Outsiders
18 presidents who would be considered "Washington outsiders" (i.e., who never served in Congress) are: Washington, J. Adams, Jefferson, Taylor, Grant, Arthur, Cleveland, T. Roosevelt, Taft, Wilson, Coolidge, Hoover, F. Roosevelt, Eisenhower, Carter, Reagan, Clinton, and G. W. Bush.

White House
John Adams was the first President to live in the White House.