HISTORY BUZZ: HISTORY NEWS RECAP
HISTORY BUZZ: HISTORY NEWS RECAP
Presidents’ Day: How well do you know our chief executives?
Source: LAT, Chicago Tribune, 2-20-12
At the funeral of President Richard Nixon in 1994, from left: Then-President Bill and First Lady Hillary Clinton; former presidents and first ladies George H.W. and Barbara Bush, Ronald and Nancy Reagan, Jimmy and Rosalynn Carter, and Gerald and Betty Ford. (Mark Boster / Los Angeles Times)
Happy Presidents’ Day. This holiday, which dates to 1971, originally was meant to celebrate the birthdays of George Washington (Feb. 22) and Abraham Lincoln (Feb. 12) but it’s also meant to honor all presidents. In the spirit, we offer you this quiz. How well do you know our chief executives? You’ll learn lots from visiting the 13 presidential libraries. Forty-four presidents have been installed in office, but there are only 43 people who have been president. Why? Take the quiz below and find out:
1. Barack Obama was the first sitting senator to win election to the presidency since what man?
2. Who was the first president to be impeached?
3. To what party did John Quincy Adams, the sixth president, belong? Extra credit: Who was his father and when was he president?
4. Name another father-son presidential pair.
5. Who were the vice presidents of that father-son presidential pair in Question 4?
6. Who was the first president to die in office?
7. Who was the last president born under British rule?8. Whose grandson became president of the United States four dozen years after he was president?
9. What president was born in Iowa but orphaned at age 9 and sent to live in Oregon?
10. What president and his wife were Stanford graduates?
11. Which president graduated in 1809 from Dickinson College in Pennsylvania?
12. What president refused renomination in 1880 and thus served only one term?
13. Who was elected president after Rutherford Hayes?
14. How long did James Garfield remain in office?
15. Who served as James Garfield’s secretary of War?
16. Who succeeded James Garfield and how many terms did he serve?
17. What president suffered what was then called Bright’s disease?
18. Who is the only president to serve two terms that weren’t consecutive?
19. Who was the last Civil War general to serve as president?
20. William McKinley was shot and killed in September 1901. He was succeeded by a man his campaign manager called “that damned cowboy.” Who was that?
21. What president frequently declared, “Politics makes me sick”?
22. What president died in 1923 in San Francisco?
23. What president died 10 months after his wife died of lung cancer? (He was out of office when he died.)
24. This president graduated from West Point in the class that was called “the class the stars fell on” because it produced 59 generals. Who was that and what year?
25. Which former president was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2002?Answers:
1. John Kennedy
2. Andrew Johnson
3. National Republican. John Q. was the oldest son of the second president, John Adams, 1797-1801.
4. George H.W. Bush and George W. Bush
6. William Henry Harrison, who died just a month after taking office.
7. William Henry Harrison.
8. William Henry Harrison.
9. Herbert Hoover.
10. Herbert Hoover and his wife, Lou.
11. James Buchanan
12. Rutherford Hayes
13. James Garfield
14. Four months. He was shot July 2 and died Sept. 19, 1881.
15. Robert Todd Lincoln, son of Abraham Lincoln.
16. Chester Arthur. One term.
17. Chester Arthur. He lost the nomination for a second term, even though he knew he had Bright’s, a kidney disease. He died a year after leaving office.
18. Grover Cleveland
22. Warren G. Harding
23. Richard Nixon
24. Dwight D. Eisenhower. 1915.
25. Jimmy Carter