Presidential Trivia Answers (March 15 & 16)

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(1) QUESTION: One Vice President went on vacation, little suspecting that he’d be sworn in as President before his vacation was over. Which President?

ANSWER: Calvin Coolidge. In 1923, he was sworn in during the wee morning hours at his family’s Vermont farmhouse. Vice President Coolidge was on vacation there when he learned of Harding’s death. He took the oath of office from his father, a local notary. Later, he was elected on his own merit during the presidential election of 1924.

A quick note for those of you who answered Theodore Roosevelt: He was traveling when William McKinley was shot, but he was giving an address at the annual meeting of the Vermont Fish and Game League. He immediately traveled to Buffalo to be with the President. It at first seemed like McKinley would recover, so Roosevelt left to go climb a mountain (naturally).  McKinley died while Roosevelt was still on this trip. That is a vacation, I guess, but I wasn’t thinking of Roosevelt: He knew McKinley was injured, and he wasn’t sworn in during the vacation. Instead, he returned to Buffalo and was sworn in there.

(2) QUESTION: Which President was the first to be born west of the Mississippi River? Which was the first to be born west of the Rockies?

ANSWER: Herbert Hoover (West Branch, Iowa) was the first President to be born west of the Mississippi. Richard Nixon (Yorba Linda, California) was the first to be born west of the Rockies.

(3) QUESTION: Has any President served in all three branches of the federal government (legislative, executive and judiciary)? If so, which President?

ANSWER: No, although (obviously) several Presidents have served in both the executive and the legislative branches. The only President to serve in the judicial branch was William Taft. He was a judge on the U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit prior to his time serving in the Teddy Roosevelt administration. Taft later succeeded Roosevelt and became our 27th President. Later, he returned to the judicial branch when he was nominated by Warren Harding to serve as Chief Justice of the United States. Taft served on the Supreme Court for nearly 9 years before retiring.