1

George Washington

Image: Alonzo Chappel, CC0, via Wikimedia Commons

Founding Father and first president of the United States, George Washington, enjoyed many recreational activities during his free time. He was a true outdoorsman—he loved hunting and fishing and was a devoted gardener and farmer .

It’s common knowledge that after deciding not to run for a third term, he retired to his Virginia farm and dedicated the rest of his life to farming. But one fact you may not know is that, in his youth, Washington was a frequent dancer —and rumor has it, he was even extremely good at it! He considered dancing an important social interaction, describing it as "so agreeable and innocent an amusement."

2

Franklin D. Roosevelt

Image: National Archives and Records Administration, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

Franklin D. Roosevelt, the only president to be elected to four consecutive terms, led the country through the critical years of the Great Depression and World War II. To maintain a clear mind while navigating such tumultuous times, Roosevelt embraced a number of pastimes. He collected books , stamps , and ship models , for example.

In addition, he was an avid swimmer . After losing the ability to walk due to polio, Roosevelt began swimming three times a week to strengthen his muscles. Following his election, the New York Daily News donated a swimming pool to the White House so he could continue his practice.

3

James A. Garfield

Image: Unknown; part of Brady-Handy Photograph Collection., Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

Before becoming the 20th president, James A. Garfield enjoyed fishing , hunting , and playing billiards . But he was also exceptionally intelligent and studious.

Though many people may know Garfield for serving just four months in office, he was also the first ambidextrous president of the United States . Not only could he write with both hands, but when asked a question, he could simultaneously write the answer in ancient Greek with one hand and Latin with the other. Pretty impressive, don’t you think?

4

Calvin Coolidge

Image: National Photo Company Collection, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

The 30th president of the United States liked riding horses so much that he had an electronic horse installed in the White House. The device had two speeds—trot and canter—and he rode it every day.

That said, Calvin Coolidge was a taciturn man of few words, who enjoyed taking afternoon naps, earning him the nickname "Silent Cal." He also had a very particular sense of humor . He reportedly enjoyed pressing the alarm buttons in the Oval Office or hiding in the garden shrubbery to startle his Secret Service agents.

5

Jimmy Carter

Image: Tuntematon, Valkoisen talon valokuvaajat (01/20/1977 - 01/20/1981), Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

Throughout his life, Jimmy Carter was a curious man who never stopped doing things. He studied nuclear physics in college, could read two thousand words a minute, wrote numerous books, and even won a Nobel Peace Prize in 2002.

But what did this brilliant man like to do in his spare time? Carter had a variety of hobbies, including painting , poetry , tennis , cycling , fly fishing , and skiing . However, the one activity in which he perhaps excelled most was woodworking . After retiring, the 39th president of the United States set up a garage workshop on his Georgia ranch, where he built furniture that was later auctioned to benefit the Carter Center.

6

John Quincy Adams

Image: Pieter Van Huffel, 1769 - 1844, CC0, via Wikimedia Commons

John Quincy Adams was notoriously meticulous and kept a diary detailing his daily routine. Thanks to this, we now know that the sixth president of the United States liked to relieve the stress of the presidency with an early morning swim .

After waking up around 4 or 5 a.m., Adams would walk two miles to the Potomac River and leave his clothes on the shore before taking a swim. According to lore, one morning, a reporter named Anne Royall snatched his clothes and demanded that the president give her an interview. Adams had no choice but to answer her questions while standing deep in the river, completely naked.

7

Harry S. Truman

Image: Abbie Rowe, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

Harry S. Truman governed the United States from 1945 to 1953, right after World War II—a difficult and stressful time, to be sure. To blow off some steam, the 33rd president liked to immerse himself in one of his two long-time passions: reading and music .

Truman had eye problems, which prevented him from participating in sports. As a result, he became an avid reader from an early age—in fact, he once boasted of having read every book in the library by the age of 14. He was also a very skilled piano player , having started lessons at the age of seven.

8

Lyndon B. Johnson

Image: Yoichi Okamoto, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

Living up to the legacy of one of the most popular presidents in American history can't be easy. But it appears that the 36th president of the United States knew just how to maintain a good balance between responsibility and leisure. During his five-year administration, Lyndon B. Johnson spent 490 days —about a quarter of his presidency— at the LBJ Ranch in Stonewall , Texas, combining work and vacation so seamlessly that the place became known as "The Texas White House."

At this ranch, Johnson had an extensive collection of vehicles . Among them was the Amphicar, an amphibious passenger car built in the 1960s, which he used to play pranks on his visitors.

9

Richard Nixon

Image: White House Photographer, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

Not many people know this, but Richard Nixon was an artistic man. He enjoyed theater—he even met his future wife during a community theater audition—and he could play five musical instruments : piano, saxophone, violin, clarinet, and accordion.

But he was also into sports. In addition to being a huge football fan, he and First Lady Pat Nixon enjoyed bowling . In fact, the Nixons were responsible for moving the White House bowling alley back to the Executive Mansion after it had been relocated to a nearby building years earlier.

10

George W. Bush

Image: Series: Photographs Related to the George W. Bush Administration, 1/20/2001 - 1/20/2009Collection: Records of the White House Photo Office (George W. Bush Administration), 1/20/2001 - 1/20/2009, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

During his free time, George W. Bush enjoyed golfing, biking, attending baseball games, and reading American history. He was also a very competitive runner .

However, when the 43rd president of the United States left office, he was only 62 years old—plenty of time to acquire a new pastime. In the years following his time in the White House, Bush surprised many by turning to painting . "I’m a painter," he told Jay Leno on The Tonight Show .

11

Dwight D. Eisenhower

Image: ddd

To relieve the stress of leadership, Dwight D. Eisenhower maintained a number of hobbies that he cultivated throughout his life. One of his main passions was golf , which he played during and after his presidency. He even kept a small putting green in the White House garden and had a four-hole practice course installed at Camp David.

But that’s not all. Ike enjoyed fishing, hunting, shooting, watching Western movies, and playing bridge. He was also an avid painter who often captured natural landscapes and gave them as gifts to friends. After leaving the White House, Ike settled on a farm near Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, where he raised Black Angus show cows that won blue ribbons at state and county fairs.

12

John F. Kennedy

Image: Robert LeRoy Knudsen, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

John F. Kennedy was an exercise enthusiast and something of a jock. He played many sports : golf, tennis, swimming, baseball, and football. Despite being an athletic man, he enjoyed smoking between four and five cigars a day—his favorite brands were Upmanns and Monticellos!

But perhaps the hobby that most helped him relax from the tensions of the presidency was boating. Like many members of his family, John F. Kennedy loved to sail and was often photographed at sea with his wife and young children.

1

Rachel Jackson: A "Bigamy" scandal (1820s)

In 1791, a young Andrew Jackson married Rachel Donelson. Both believed her first husband, Captain Lewis Robards, had successfully finalized their divorce. Apparently, Robards didn’t file the petition, making her marriage to Jackson technically bigamous. Once the divorce went through in 1794, they officially remarried.

During the 1828 presidential campaign, Jackson’s political opponents used this legal mistake against him. They branded Rachel a loose woman and a bigamist in pamphlets scattered across the country. The intense public shaming broke her spirit and deteriorated her health. She suffered a fatal heart attack just days before Jackson’s inauguration, leaving the newly elected president heartbroken and extremely bitter toward his political rivals for the rest of his life.

2

Grover Cleveland’s illegitimate child (1884)

Decades later, another personal bombshell rocked another presidential race. Republican opponents revealed that Democratic nominee Grover Cleveland, a bachelor praised for his integrity, had fathered a child out of wedlock with a widow called Maria Halpin ten years before.

Republicans paraded through the streets chanting, "Ma, Ma, where’s my Pa?" Instead of denying the affair or trying to bury it, Cleveland instructed his campaign managers to do something radical: "Tell the truth." He admitted to supporting the child financially. His honesty caught his opponents off guard and won over voters who were tired of such dirty political tactics.

3

The Crédit Mobilier scandal (1872)

This particular scandal stands as one of the most shameless corporate schemes of the Gilded Age. Stockholders of the Union Pacific Railroad formed a fraudulent construction company called Crédit Mobilier of America . Then, they hired themselves to build the transcontinental railroad at inflated prices, pocketing tens of millions of dollars in federal subsidies.

To prevent Congress from investigating their profit margins, Congressman Oakes Ames distributed discounted shares of the company’s stock to influential politicians, including Vice President Schuyler Colfax. When the press exposed the story in 1872, the revelation that lawmakers were bribing themselves tarnished the legacy of the Ulysses S. Grant administration.

4

The Whiskey Ring scandal (1875)

A few years later, another financial disaster hit the Grant administration. The Whiskey Ring was a widespread conspiracy involving distillers, distributors, and internal federal tax officials who stole millions of dollars in liquor taxes.

Using a complex web of bribes and falsified records, the ring defrauded the U.S. Treasury. The scandal reached the inner circle of power when President Grant’s own private secretary, Orville Babcock, was indicted as a ringleader. Grant provided a deposition in his secretary’s defense. While this saved Babcock from prison, it permanently damaged the president’s reputation.

5

The Teapot Dome scandal (1920s)

Until Watergate occurred, Teapot Dome was synonymous with political corruption. During the administration of Warren G. Harding, Secretary of the Interior Albert Fall took control of valuable federal oil reserves located at Teapot Dome, Wyoming, and Elk Hills, California.

Instead of opening these fields up for competitive bidding among energy companies, Fall secretly leased the drilling rights to private oil tycoons in exchange for more than $400,000 in bribes.

6

The Chappaquiddick incident (1969)

By the mid-20th century, the nature of political scandals shifted. Secrets began to involve personal crisis and tragic losses.

In July 1969, Senator Edward "Ted" Kennedy drove his car off a narrow wooden bridge on Chappaquiddick Island, Massachusetts. The vehicle overturned into a tidal pond, trapping and drowning his passenger, 28-year-old campaign worker Mary Jo Kopechne. Kennedy managed to escape but failed to report the fatal accident to the police for ten hours. Although he eventually pleaded guilty to leaving the scene of an accident, his delayed reaction ended his lifelong presidential ambitions.

7

The Pentagon Papers (1971)

In 1971, military analyst Daniel Ellsberg felt the moral obligation to leak a top-secret 7,000-page Department of Defense study detailing U.S. political and military involvement in Vietnam from 1945 to 1967.

Published by The New York Times , the papers exposed a disturbing truth: successive administrations had systematically lied to both Congress and the American public. The documents proved that the government had expanded the war and increased troop counts while knowing that the conflict was unwinnable. The Supreme Court eventually rejected the government’s attempts to block the leaks, making a victory for freedom of the press.

8

The Watergate scandal (1972–1974)

This is, probably, the ultimate American political scandal. In June 1972, five men were arrested breaking into the Democratic National Committee headquarters at the Watergate complex in Washington, D.C.

The break in itself was minor compared to the illegal cover-up orchestrated by President Richard Nixon and his collaborators. From paying hush money to instructing the CIA to block the FBI’s investigation, Nixon’s complicity was exposed via his own secret White House taping system. Facing impeachment and conviction by the Senate, Nixon became the first and only U.S. president to resign from office.

9

The "Keating Five" (Late 1980s)

During the Savings and Loan crisis of the late 1980s, five U.S. Senators—John McCain, Alan Cranston, Dennis DeConcini, John Glenn, and Donald Riegle—came under intense scrutiny.

The group was accused of intervening with federal banking regulators on behalf of Charles Keating, the chairman of Lincoln Savings and Loan, who had contributed to their political campaigns. Lincoln eventually collapsed, costing American taxpayers over $3 billion. Although the Senate Ethics Committee ultimately cleared the senators of corruption, they were publicly condemned.

10

The Bill Clinton–Monica Lewinsky affair (1998)

The 20th century ended with a scandal that blended personal infidelity with a constitutional crisis. In 1998, news broke that President Bill Clinton had an intimate relationship with a 21-year-old White House intern called Monica Lewinsky.

The affair turned into a legal battle when Clinton denied the relationship under oath during an unrelated sexual harassment lawsuit. The investigation led to Clinton’s impeachment by the House of Representatives on charges of perjury and obstruction of justice. The Senate ultimately acquitted him, yet he couldn’t bypass the media circus.

1

He was of French descent

While we think of Paul Revere as an early American icon, his roots lay across the Atlantic. His father, Apollos Rivoire, was a French Huguenot (a member of the French Reformed Church) who fled religious persecution and immigrated to Boston as a teenager.

To fit in his new home, Apollos Americanized the family name to "Revere". Paul was born in late 1734 or early 1735, the son of Apollos and a Boston local called Deborah Hichborn. Apollos was so interested in blending in that he never taught his children to speak and read French. In fact, a young Paul Revere even fought against the French as part of the colonial forces during the French and Indian War.

2

He was an accomplished artisan

Before he was a revolutionary, Revere was a master craftsman. He learned the art of silversmithing from his father and quickly gained a reputation as an accomplished artisan. He designed seals, coats of arms, plate engravings, and silver teapots.

Revere also used his engraving skills to create sharp political cartoons that mocked the British. His most famous artistic work was a sensationalized engraving of the 1770 Boston Massacre. It wasn’t entirely historically accurate, but it spread through the colonies, stirring up the anti-British sentiment that laid the groundwork for the Revolution.

3

He worked as an amateur dentist

When silversmithing work ran slow, Revere picked up a side hustle: dentistry. He started cleaning teeth and crafting dental prosthetics out of animal teeth and walrus ivory for the people of Boston.

This amateur dental career actually led to a major moment in American history. In 1775, Revere’s close friend, Dr. Joseph Warren, was killed at the Battle of Bunker Hill and buried in an unmarked mass grave by British soldiers. A year later, when the bodies were exhumed, the remains were unrecognizable. Yet, Revere was able to identify Warren’s body by recognizing the specific ivory tooth and custom wire bridge he had personally crafted for his friend. It’s widely considered one of the earliest documented cases of forensic dentistry in the United States.

4

He played a key role in early intelligence efforts

Long before the CIA existed, Paul Revere was working as a pioneer of organized American espionage. As a member of the Sons of Liberty, Revere wanted to track British movements closely. In 1774, he helped form a spy group known as "the mechanics" or the "Liberty Boys".

These men were Bostonian blacksmiths, artisans, and laborers who used their ordinary routines to watch British troops, listening for rumors of upcoming military actions. The spies would gather at the city’s historic Green Dragon Tavern to trade secrets and map out British movements.

5

Longfellow's inaccurate poem

If your knowledge of Revere comes from Henry Wadsworth Longfellow’s famous 1861 poem, "Paul Revere's Ride," you’ve been given a romanticized version of history. Longfellow wrote the poem nearly a century later, on the brink of the American Civil War, to stir up national pride.

In reality, Revere wasn’t a lone rider. The night of April 18, 1775, Revere set out with two other main horsemen: William Dawes and Dr. Samuel Prescott. As they triggered local alarms, dozens of other riders joined the effort. By midnight, more than 40 people were racing across the country, spreading the word. Furthermore, Revere never actually made it to his final destination of Concord. He was captured and briefly detained by a British patrol.

6

He didn’t even own a horse for his midnight ride

It’s hard to imagine the midnight ride without Revere’s faithful steed, but the truth is, Revere didn’t even own a horse when the fateful night arrived. Because he had to be quietly rowed across the Charles River, bringing a horse from Boston was out of the question.

Once he reached Charlestown, he had to find a ride. He ended up borrowing a horse from a sympathetic local merchant called John Larkin. Legend has it that this borrowed mare was named "Brown Beauty". Sadly, after Revere was captured later that night, the soldiers confiscated the horse, and she was never seen again.

7

He didn’t actually say THAT

"The British are coming!" is one of the most famous quotes in American history, but Revere never said it. The countryside was crawling with British soldiers, so his mission had to be very quiet. Yelling at the top of his lungs would have landed him in military prison before he even left town. Instead, he went door to door delivering the warning quietly to specific patriots.

Also, the phrase wouldn’t have made sense to the colonists. At the moment in 1775, the colonists still considered themselves British citizens. Instead, historical accounts indicate that Revere used the phrase, "The Regulars are coming out!" "Regulars" was the standard colonial term for the standing British army troops.

8

His military record wasn't outstanding

Although Revere was a phenomenal community organizer and courier, his transition into traditional military leadership didn’t go smoothly. During the war, he served as a major and later a lieutenant colonel in the Massachusetts State Artillery. His military career hit a disastrous low point in the summer of 1779 during the Penobscot Expedition in modern-day Maine.

The mission was a total failure for the Americans. In the aftermath, Revere was accused of cowardice, laziness, and disobedience. He faced a court-martial and spent several years fighting to clear his name. He was ultimately acquitted of all charges in 1782, but the incident permanently tarnished his dreams of military glory.

9

Fatherhood came early… and often

If you think managing a household today is stressful, consider Paul Revere’s domestic life: he fathered an astonishing 16 children.

He had his first eight children with his first wife, Sarah Orne. Following her death in 1773, he remarried a woman called Rachel Walker, with whom he had another eight children. They crammed this huge family into a small townhouse at 19 North Square in downtown Boston. Amazingly for the 18th century, 11 of his 16 children survived to adulthood.

10

Revere Copper Products, Inc. is still in operation

After the Revolution ended, Revere left politics and went back to industry with some success. He opened a hardware store, a foundry, and the first rolling copper mill in the United States.

In fact, his business supplied the copper used to protect the hull of the USS Constitution. He also cast nearly 1,000 church bells, many of which still ring across New England today. Amazingly, the company he founded, Revere Copper Products, Inc., is still in business. Paul Revere passed away in 1818 at the age of 83, leaving behind a legacy more industrious than a single night’s ride.