27. TAFT

  1. NAME –  William Howard Taft                                                     Library of Congress
  2. NICKNAME(S) –  Big Bill  /  Jumbo Bill  /  Old Heavy Cargo  /  Big Lub
  3. BIRTH / DEATH –  Sept. 15, 1857  Cincinnati  /  Washington (heart disease)
  4. FATHER –  lawyer, Secretary of War and Attorney General for Grant
  5. MOTHER –  housewife
  6. COLLEGE –  Yale  /  University of Cincinnati
  7. WIFE –  Helen Herron
  8. KIDS –  3  (2 boys)
  9. PETS –  cow (Pauline Wayne);  dog (Caruso) – given by Enrico Caruso to daughter because he didn’t like the cow as a pet
  10. RELIGION –  Unitarian
  11. ANCESTRY –   English
  12. AGE –   51

FIRSTS: 

–  first to throw out the “first ball” of the baseball season

–  first to have a car in the White House

–  first to visit Mexico

–  first to use the Oval Office

–  first to be buried in Arlington National Cemetery

–  first presidential funeral covered on the radio

–  first to serve on the Supreme Court (after Presidency)

MA AND PA:  His father graduated from Yale with honors.  He opened a prosperous law practice in Ohio.  Later, he got into politics and served as Grant’s Attorney General and Secretary of War.  Later, he was minister to Austria-Hungary and Russia.  He was a dominating, but loving father and lived to see five of his sons become lawyers.  His first wife died after giving him two kids.  The widower Alphonso met the beautiful Louise Torrey when she was 27.  She had grown up a feminist due to her mother’s influence.  She was a free spirit who believed women should choose their own destiny.  They had a one month engagement and then were married.  She had five children and was a loving mother.  Her husband died in 1891, but she lived to one year before her son became President.  Parents 

BACKGROUND:

–  after college, became a lawyer

–  held a variety of political jobs – Ohio Superior Court, Solicitor General under Harrison, judge on the U.S. Court of Appeals

–  Governor of the Philippines

–  Secretary of War for Roosevelt

FIRST LADY:   He met Helen (“Nellie”) at a bobsled party.  She was looking for a husband who might become President. Nellie loved to travel.  His son Charles had been around the world twice by age 8.  She had the 3,000 cherry trees planted in Washington, D.C..  She was the first First Lady to publish an autobiography.  She died in 1948 at age 87.  She was the first Presidential wife to be buried at Arlington National Cemetery, next to her husband.  Kelly 329  

Library of Congress

RETIREMENT:

–  he became a law professor at Yale and then in 1921 was appointed Chief Justice of the Supreme Court

TRIVIA: 

–  when he was President, New Mexico and Arizona became the 47th and 48th states

–   he got stuck in the White House bath tub when he arrived;  a new, much bigger, bath tub was installed

–  he sometimes fell asleep during conferences, cabinet meetings, and White House dinners;  he once fell asleep at a funeral and during a parade for him

–  he kept a milk cow on the White House lawn called Pauline Wayne

–  he was the only former President to swear in a President (Coolidge) as Chief Justice

–  his wife died at age 87 in 1948

ANECDOTES:

LARGE PARTY –   When Taft was a young law reporter, but already a big man, he was studying a case one evening and realized he needed to get back to his office in another city.  The only way to do that was to board an express train that did not normally stop in the town.  He sent a telegram to the railroad headquarters.  Sure enough, the train stopped at the station.  The conductor got off and looked around, seeing only Taft.  He said “A telegram said to stop here for a large party.”  Taft:  “You’re looking at him.”  Fuller 123

USING THE OCEAN –  Taft liked to go on vacation to the beach.  One day he was in the water when a group of people arrived on the beach.  One said “Let’s go in the water.”  Another:  “We can’t.  The President is using the ocean.”  Fuller 125