Who Am I?

Two of my favorite subjects are American history and trivia. When Margie and I first got married one of our favorite ways to spend time with friends was to play the then popular game Trivial Pursuit. That’s when I discovered that I am the master of useless information, the repository of all things that will never earn me any money. But it’s still fun and when I can combine my love of trivia with my love of American history, so much the better. This is the first of what I hope will be a series of posts about American history trivia. We’ll start with the presidents. A subject that most of us know a fair amount about but maybe not as much as we think.

Before I go into the questions, we’ll start with the mystery man above. That’s James Buchanan, the 15th president of the United States. Now The Grumpy Doc must admit that he did recognized this fellow. If you did, bonus points for you. However, no prize for beating The Grumpy Doc beyond a sense of satisfaction that comes from besting the master. Did I mention that not only am I grumpy, but I’m also cheap?

The first question should be an easy one.

  1. Who was the first president to have a full beard while in office?
  2. Who was the last president to have a full beard while in office?
  3. What president had the first telephone installed in the White House?
  4. What two presidents had only a letter for a middle name?
  5. What president established the first National Park?
  6. Who was the first president to serve in the Navy?
  7. Who was the first president to write a best seller?
  8. Who was the only president to remain a bachelor throughout his life?
  9. Who was the first divorced president? (Should be another easy one.)
  10. What president had the most children?
  11. Who was the first president to ascend to the presidency from the vice presidency upon the death of the president?
  12. Who was the first president to have impeachment charges filed against him?
  13. Who was the only president to commit treason against the United States?
  14. And now, a question of great national significance. What president installed the first bathtub in the White House?
  15. Who was the first president born in a hospital?
  16. What presidents attended military academies?
  17. Who was the last president not to have a college degree?
  18. A final question with significance to current events. Who was the only president to have completely paid off the national debt during a period of his administration. I don’t mean balance the budget; I mean zero national debt.

ANSWERS

  1. Abraham Lincoln was the first president to have a full beard while in office.
  2. Benjamin Harrison was the last president to have a full beard throughout his term of office. However, there is a slight trick to this question. Harry Truman, during a vacation in 1948, briefly sported a goatee. However, it was gone by the time he returned to Washington.
  3. Rutherford B. Hayes had the first telephone installed in the White House. Not only did he have it installed, he was so fascinated by it he frequently answered it himself.
  4. Both Ulysses S. Grant and Harry S. Truman had S for a middle name. However, the story behind the S is significantly different. Grant was born Hiram Ulysses Grant. The congressman who signed his recommendation for West Point mistakenly listed his name as Ulysses S. Grant. Grant never disputed it and retained the S throughout his life. Biographers have reported that this was because he did not like the initials that spelled HUG. The rumor spread that the S stood for Simpson, his mother’s maiden name, but it never really stood for anything. Harry Truman’s middle name at birth was S. Both his maternal and paternal grandfathers had names that began with S and a significant family conflict arose about who he would be named after. The compromise was the initial.
  5. Although it is widely believed that Teddy Roosevelt established the first National Park, it was Ulysses S. Grant who signed the legislation creating Yellowstone. The National Park Service was created by legislation signed by Woodrow Wilson.
  6. The first US president to serve in the Navy was John F. Kennedy. Interestingly, the next four presidents also served in the Navy, three of them in World War Two.
  7. Teddy Roosevelt was a best-selling author before he became president. He wrote histories, biographies, essays, and memoirs. His books were widely distributed and very popular. And this was in the era before presidents “wrote” their memoirs as a way of supplementing their post presidential income.
  8. This was our mystery man, James Buchanan who never married.
  9. The first man elected president who had previously been divorced was Ronald Reagan.
  10. John Tyler had 15 children with two wives.
  11. Once again, John Tyler. He was elected as vice president with William Henry Harrison. He became president when Harrison died shortly after assuming office. At the time, no one was sure if the vice president would become president or simply assume the duties. Tyler solved the problem by quickly having himself administered the oath of office. Tyler was never popular with his party and was referred to as “His Accidency”. He was not nominated for an independent term of office and left after his first term.
  12. This is one The Grumpy Doc missed. I thought it would be Andrew Johnson. But, once again it was John Tyler. The charges were not successful, although surprisingly they were brought by his own party, and he completed the term.
  13. You may have noticed a trend here; this was our old friend John Tyler. He was elected to the Confederate House of Representatives but died before actually taking office.
  14. The first permanently installed bathtub was during the administration of Millard Fillmore. This may be the most significant thing that happened during the administration of this otherwise undistinguished president.
  15. Jimmy Carter, born in 1924, was the first president born in a hospital.
  16. Both President Grant and President Eisenhower graduated from the U. S. Military Academy at West Point and President Carter graduated from the U. S. Naval Academy at Annapolis.
  17. President Truman was the last president without a college degree. He attended business school and law school but did not graduate from either. At that time, it was possible to attend law school without an undergraduate degree.
  18. Andrew Jackson achieved his campaign promise of completely paying off the national debt on January 8th, 1835. However, this proved not to be a good thing. The practices he implemented to pay off the debt led directly to the panic of 1837, one of the worst recessions in U.S. history and a significant increase in national debt.

There is a lot more presidential trivia, but this is enough for our first go around. Please send me comments about your success in answering these questions. My score was right around 70%. Hopefully some of you can do better. But of course, if you do, The Grumpy Doc will never admit to having been beaten.