44 Facts About the U.S. Presidents - mental_floss on YouTube (Ep.52)

TL;DR

George Washington was the richest president, with a net worth of $500 million, and there are many interesting and quirky facts about other American presidents.

Transcript

Hi I’m John Green. Welcome to my salon and my fake fireplace. This is Mental Floss on YouTube and did you know that George Washington is considered by experts to be America’s richest president? I mean, in today’s terms, Washington’s net worth was around 500 million dollars. Anyway, that’s the first of 44 facts about American presidents that I’m goi... Read More

Key Insights

• 🤑 George Washington was the richest president in American history, with a net worth of $500 million.
• 🇬🇧 John Adams successfully defended British soldiers involved in the Boston Massacre.
• 🌱 Thomas Jefferson had a plant named after him, the Jeffersonia plant.
• 🏈 James Madison's second cousin was American president Zachary Taylor.
• 📛 The capital of Liberia is named Monrovia after James Monroe.
• 👶 John Quincy Adams and his wife used a naming method similar to Harry Potter characters for their children.
• 🔫 Richard Lawrence attempted to assassinate Andrew Jackson, but both of his pistols misfired.
• 🧔 Martin Van Buren was the first president to be born a U.S. citizen.
• 😷 William Henry Harrison dropped out of medical school and had a short presidential term.
• 👶 John Tyler had the most children of any president, with a total of fifteen kids.
• 👨 James K. Polk was not baptized until his father's deathbed.
• ❣️ Ulysses S. Grant was a heavy smoker and died of throat cancer.
• 🏇 Rutherford B. Hayes had four of his horses shot during the Civil War.
• 🤘 Alexander Graham Bell tried to locate the bullet inside James A. Garfield with a metal detector but failed.
• 🙃 Chester A. Arthur had a reputation for fashion and owned over 80 pairs of pants.
• 👨 Benjamin Harrison's father's body was stolen by grave robbers but later recovered.
• 🤑 Grover Cleveland had a secret surgery to remove a tumor from the roof of his mouth.
• ✋ William McKinley High is the fictional high school featured in Glee, Freaks and Geeks, and The Wonder Years.
• 🏛️ Teddy Roosevelt gave the White House its name, and William Howard Taft built the first Oval Office.
• 🎱 Woodrow Wilson's face on a bill indicates it is a rare $100,000 bill.
• ❓ Warren G. Harding's death has attracted conspiracy theories similar to JFK's assassination.
• 🥰 Dwight D. Eisenhower was good friends with Arnold Palmer due to their shared love of golf.
• 💌 John F. Kennedy's father described him as "careless" yet "ambitious" in a letter to Harvard's admissions dean.
• ❓ The entire First Family during Lyndon B. Johnson's presidency had the initials "LBJ."
• ❓ Richard Nixon used poker winnings to finance his campaign for Congress.
• 💦 Gerald Ford had a memorable summer working as a ranger at Yellowstone National Park.
• 🙈 Jimmy Carter claimed to have seen a UFO in Georgia in 1969.
• 🧑‍🏭 Ronald Reagan did stand-up comedy during a lull in his acting career.
• 🤮 "Bushu-suru" is a Japanese slang word referring to when George H.W. Bush vomited in public.
• 🖐️ Bill Clinton played rugby while at Oxford University.
• 🏃 George W. Bush is the only president to have completed a marathon.

Questions & Answers

Q: Who was the richest president in American history?

George Washington is considered the richest president, with a net worth of $500 million.

Q: What was John Adams known for?

John Adams defended British soldiers involved in the Boston Massacre, successfully acquitting six of them.

Q: What was named after Thomas Jefferson?

The Jeffersonia plant is named after Thomas Jefferson, as a botanist named it in his honor.

Q: Who attempted to assassinate Andrew Jackson?

In 1835, Richard Lawrence attempted to assassinate Andrew Jackson but was chased away with a walking cane after both of his pistols misfired.

Summary & Key Takeaways

• George Washington is considered the richest president in American history, with a net worth of $500 million.

• John Adams defended British soldiers involved in the Boston Massacre, successfully acquitting six of them.

• Thomas Jefferson had a plant named after him called the Jeffersonia plant.