Radio Script #1305
Little Talks on Common Things
March 14, 1982
Last week we told some stories about U.S. Presidents ending with the administration of Andrew Johnson” the President who immediately followed Abraham Lincoln. Today we shall continue the account with stories about later Presidents.
Johnson was followed by the Civil War general, Ulysses S. Grant. Although a great general, Grant is considered by historians to be one of our weakest Presidents, largely because of the scandals connected with his administration, especially Jay Gould’s attempt to corner the market in gold.
Even while in the army, Grant was careless about dress, and often wore a private’s blouse with his three stars attached to it. Yet he was respected by his staff and the men in the ranks, and many affectionate stories are told about him.
One day when Grant was courting his future wife and they were riding in a buggy, they came to a rickety bridge over a rushing stream. “Do you think it is safe?” asked Julia. He assured her all was well, but she said, “I’m going to cling to you.” That prompted Grant’s proposal, “What about clinging to me for the rest of your life?”
One day during the Civil War, Grant got into a dispute with Secretary of War Stanton, and Grant said. to him, “I think I outrank you.” “We’ll see to that,” said Stanton, and together they went to see President Lincoln, who outranked them both. After Stanton presented his case and said that Grant was duty bound to obey orders” Lincoln settled the case by saying: “You and I, Mr. Stanton, did not succeed very well in running the war, so we turned the job over to General Grant. Now I think we had better let him do it.”
An American well-wisher, when Grant was a guest in England after his presidency, not aware that protocol demanded sending such messages through the foreign office’, addressed a cable to Grant in care of Queen Victoria. When a messenger brought the cable to Windsor Castle, he said to the butler who opened the door, “I have a cable for General Grant. Is he staying in this house?”
Grant’s successor, Rutherford B. Hayes, had the distinction of being the only President to date to ban all kinds of liquor from the White House, even beer and wine. His wife was called “Lemonade Lucy.” Concerning one of Hayes’ state dinners, an ambassador said: “It was a brilliant affair. Water flowed like champagne.” After leaving the presidency Hayes said: “Any man foolish enough, to want to be President ought to be scalped.”
President Garfield was once at a political meeting in New Hampshire, where he was preceded on the program by Senator Hale of Maine, who spoke for a hour. When Garfield was introduced he said to the audience, “I know you must be getting tired, I ask you to wait just ten minutes.” Then he made a rousing ten-minute speech.
When Garfield was assassinated he was succeeded by Vice-President Chester Arthur, who had never held public office until h,e became Vice-President. He was said to be just the tool of Boss Conkling of New York, who was called the “power behind the throne.” But he proved to have a mind of his own, and was the President who instituted the civil service system over the protest of politicians.
When he had the White House repaired and refurbished, Arthur sold at auction some of the relics considered sacred. Among them was a pair of Lincoln’s pants, a chipped bust of John Quincy Adams, and an empty trunk left there by John Quincy’s mother, the wife of the second President, John Adams. Another article was a sideboard given to “Lemonade Lucy” by the WCTU. It was bought by a Washington saloon keeper on which to display his fanciest liquors.
In 1884 Grover Cleveland narrowly defeated for the presidency James G. Blaine, the only Maine man ever to be nominated by either major party for the highest office in the nation. Cleveland was not strict about his personal conduct. He once said: “My father told me it was wrong to go fishing on Sunday. He said nothing about playing poker. Cleveland was such an inveterate beer drinker that one White House employee said, “We had to remove a lot of wine from the cellar shelves to make room for the President’s beer.”
Cleveland got along well with the House of Representatives, but not with the Senate. One night his wife , awaked him with the announcement, “There’s a burglar in the house.” Cleveland assured her, “Impossible. Perhaps in the Senate, but not in the House.”
The only grandson of a former President ever elected to the same office was Benjamin Harrison, who intervened between Cleveland’s two terms. Harrison was criticized for signing a bill that would raise the national debt to a billion dollars. “Why not?” he said. “This is a billion dollar country.” “We want a new postmaster in our town,” a visitor told Harrison. “What’s wrong with the present man?” asked the President. “He’s a Democrat.” “That’s true,” said Harrison, “but Grover Cleveland was allowed to complete his term. I think your postmaster is entitled to the same treatment.”
When McKinley was President, he and his influential sponsor, Mark Hanna, attended a football game. Neither knew anything about football. The President kept asking Hanna what was going on, and Hanna couldn’t give a reasonable answer. Finally McKinley said: “This reminds me of the boy who told his mother about a game he had just attended.” The boy said, ”They didn’t have a game. They got into a scrap and kept on fighting when they ought to have been playing ball.”
One of our most colorful Presidents was Theodore Roosevelt, who spoke softly but carried a big stick. He got a reputation for toughness when he was a young man and went to the Dakota Badlands for his health. One evening, after a long day chasing stray horses, Teddy entered a Dakota tavern. A tough cowboy drew his pistol and stepped up to the tenderfoot Easterner and said, “Now the drinks are on you.” Roosevelt got up from his stool as if to, comply, then hit the man on the jaw with one hand, and jabbed the other hand into the cowboy’s stomach. The fellow crumbled to the floor, and Roosevelt was no longer a greenhorn, but was accepted as one of the boys. When Roosevelt became Vice President, Mark Hanna said, “What a disaster. Now there’s only one life between that cowboy and the White House.” When the assassination of McKinley made Roosevelt President, Hanna saw only catastrophe ahead for the nation:
Although he was always getting hurt in the game, TR insisted on playing polo at Oyster Bay. His wife, after repeated attempts to make him stop, finally gave up. When, one day, he came in from a game with a bleeding head, she said: “Theodore, I wish you would do your bleeding in the bathroom. You are ruining every rug in the house.”
After the funeral of King Edward VII, the German Kaiser said to Roosevelt: “Call on me at two o’clock, but I can give you only 45 minutes.” Roosevelt answered: “I’ll be there at two o’clock, but I can give you only 20 minutes.”
One of the yarns made up about TR has it that in heaven he one day said to St. Peter, “You have a terrible choir. You ought to reorganize it.” “All right,” said the good saint, “I appoint you to do it.” “O.K.,” said Roosevelt. “I’ll need 100 sopranos, 1000 tenors and 10,000 altos.” “What about the basses?” asked St. Peter. “That’s all taken care of,” said Roosevelt. “I’ll sing base.”
President Taft was known for his obesity and excessive overweight. One day, coming in from a horseback ride, he said to Elihu Root, “l’ve just had a long ride on my horse Charger, and I feel great.” “But,” said Root, “how does the horse feel?” After his defeat by Woodrow Wilson in 1912, Taft said: “I have one consolation. No one was ever before defeated by such a large majority”
Woodrow Wilson liked to tell a story about his clergyman father. One day he drove into town in work clothes that were both dirty and shabby. A woman who knew him said: “Reverend, your horse is a lot better groomed that you are.” “I can explain that,” said the preacher. “I take good care of my horse. My congregation takes care of me.”
As President of Princeton, Wilson was proud of the University’s academic standing. To an alumnus who complained when his son was refused admission to Princeton, Wilson said: “If the Angel Gabriel applied for admission to Princeton and couldn’t pass the entrance examinations, he wouldn’t get in.” A New Jersey politician said of Wilson, “I don’t understand what a fellow as smart as that is doing around a college.”
Like TR, Wilson invited a story about being in heaven. Moses asked him, “Are you the Wilson who presented the fourteen points after the war?” When he got Wilson’s admission, Moses said: “I’m sorry for you. Just see what happened to your 14 points.” “You’re the last person who ought to remind me of that,” replied Wilson. “Just see what happened to your Ten Commandments.”
Now our time is up, but next week I will have some yarns about Presidents from Warren Harding to Ronald Reagan.
Year: 1982