50 Fun Facts About John Tyler

John Tyler became president in 1841 when which man died just one month into his term?

William Henry Harrison died 31 days after his inauguration, the first president to die in office. Nobody was sure a vice president could fully take over until Tyler insisted that he had.

Which mocking nickname did John Tyler earn for becoming president without being elected to the office?

His Accidency stuck as an insult, yet Tyler's firm stand set the rule that every later vice president followed when a president died.

In his final days in office, John Tyler signed a bill offering statehood to which republic?

Texas accepted the offer and joined the Union that December as the 28th state. Texans later named the city of Tyler in his honor.

A Virginia chemical engineer who died in 2025 was what relation to John Tyler, born in 1790?

The grandson was born in 1928 to Tyler's son Lyon, then 75, who was himself born when the former president was 63. The three generations spanned 235 years.

John Tyler, who had two wives, holds which family record among all American presidents?

Most children by a wide margin: Tyler is usually credited with 15, the last seven with his second wife. The youngest, Pearl, was born when he was 70.

In June 1844, John Tyler became the first sitting American president to do what?

To get married in office, Tyler slipped away to New York City and wed Julia Gardiner, who was 30 years his junior. The secret ceremony became a sensation once newspapers found out.

Which banner draped the coffin of former president John Tyler at his funeral in 1862?

The Confederate flag covered him because he had just been elected to the South's new congress. Washington took no official notice of his death, a snub given to no other former president.

Which political party expelled John Tyler in 1841 while he was its own sitting president?

The Whigs threw him out two days after nearly all of his cabinet quit in protest. Tyler finished his term as a president without a party.

Which warship's giant gun burst on an 1844 Potomac cruise, killing two of John Tyler's cabinet?

USS Princeton carried a huge gun named the Peacemaker, which blew apart and killed six people. Tyler was below deck at the time and escaped unhurt.

Feeling cast out by his party, John Tyler gave his plantation which name from English legend?

Sherwood Forest was his joke about being an outlaw, like Robin Hood, in the eyes of his former allies. He retired there after leaving the White House.

First Lady Julia Tyler is credited with having which tune played to announce the president's arrival?

Hail to the Chief suited her taste for royal ceremony. She also kept her own court of ladies-in-waiting, copied from the European courts she had visited before her time in the White House.

Shortly before John Tyler left office in 1845, Congress did what to a president for the first time?

Congress overrode his veto of a minor bill about revenue cutters on his last full day as president. No president before him had ever lost that fight.

Where did John Tyler take the presidential oath in April 1841, with a federal judge presiding?

His hotel room in Washington had to do, since he had rushed to the capital overnight. Tyler believed his earlier oath already covered him but swore a second one to end all doubt.

What did John Tyler do with mail addressed to him as 'Acting President' or 'Vice President'?

Returned it unopened, every time: Tyler would accept nothing that questioned his title. Former president John Quincy Adams was among those who thought he should be only a caretaker.

John Tyler's father roomed at college with which future president, whom Tyler eulogized in 1826?

Thomas Jefferson stayed a friend of the Tyler family for life. When he died, the younger Tyler was running Virginia's government and delivered the state's funeral address for him.

Which profession did John Tyler enter at 19 and return to between his political offices?

Lawyer at 19 was too young under Virginia's rules, but the judge who admitted him never asked his age. Tyler trained under his father and then a former attorney general.

John Tyler raised the Charles City Rifles, a militia company, to defend Richmond in which conflict?

The War of 1812 never reached his company: no British attack came, and Captain Tyler sent his men home after two months. His service still earned him a land grant in what became Iowa.

Which drink became a symbol of the 1840 log cabin campaign that made John Tyler vice president?

Hard cider entered the race as an insult: a rival paper sneered that the old general would gladly retire to a log cabin with a barrel of it. His side turned the jab into a mascot.

The 1840 song title ending 'and Tyler Too' opens with which nickname of John Tyler's running mate?

Tippecanoe was the battle the head of the ticket had won as a general. A jeweler in Zanesville, Ohio, wrote the song, which caught on after he sang it at a rally in New York.

John Tyler came out of retirement in February 1861 to head which last-ditch gathering?

The Peace Conference drew 131 politicians to Washington hoping to hold the country together. After it failed, Tyler gave up on compromise and backed Virginia's secession.

Which secretary of state alone stayed on when the rest of John Tyler's cabinet resigned in 1841?

Daniel Webster stayed to finish a border treaty with Britain and to show that he took no orders from his party's leader in the Senate. He finally left the cabinet in 1843.

Which senator and party leader orchestrated the mass resignation of John Tyler's cabinet in 1841?

Henry Clay hoped the walkout would force Tyler to resign and put an ally of his own in the White House. Tyler quickly named a new cabinet instead.

After dropping his own 1844 run, John Tyler endorsed which Democrat, who went on to win?

James K. Polk also favored annexation, so Tyler dropped out that August and backed him. Tyler wrote that the new administration would be a continuance of his own.

John Tyler resigned from the Senate in 1836 rather than vote to erase the censure of which president?

Andrew Jackson had been censured with Tyler's own vote, and Virginia's legislature ordered him to help wipe the record clean. Giving up his seat instead won Tyler praise for integrity.

Which sitting president lost the 1840 election to the ticket with John Tyler on it?

Martin Van Buren took the blame for the slump that followed the Panic of 1837 and carried only seven of the 26 states. The winning side never even published a platform.

John Tyler twice rejected his own party's bills to create what, driving most of his cabinet to quit?

A national bank struck Tyler as unconstitutional, a stand he first took at 21 in Virginia's legislature. His second rejection set off angry rallies against him around the country.

An 1842 treaty under John Tyler fixed which state's northern border, the cause of the Aroostook War?

Maine and neighboring New Brunswick had clashed over 12,000 square miles of disputed territory. The treaty split it, leaving the United States with about 7,000.

John Tyler sent Caleb Cushing in 1844 to negotiate the first American treaty with which country?

China agreed to the Treaty of Wanghia, and trade between the two countries grew greatly in the years that followed. Tyler wanted American merchants to compete with Britain's.

The 1842 Tyler Doctrine warned European powers against colonizing which Pacific island kingdom?

Hawaii mattered because American traders in Honolulu and American missionaries already held great influence there. Tyler's warning began the long path to annexation by the United States.

Which state joined the Union on John Tyler's last full day as president, March 3, 1845?

Florida entered as the 27th state, three years after Tyler declared an end to the long and bloody war against the Seminoles there.

House members angry at John Tyler began the first proceedings of what kind against a president in 1842?

Impeachment never got far: the House voted the measure down 127 to 83. A committee led by a former president still condemned Tyler's conduct in a formal report.

Which amendment, ratified in 1967, wrote John Tyler's succession precedent into the Constitution?

The Twenty-fifth Amendment put in writing what Tyler had claimed 126 years earlier. By then seven more vice presidents had followed his example after a president's death.

John Tyler graduated at 17 from which Virginia college, which he later helped save from closing?

William & Mary was losing students fast until Tyler, then a state legislator, pushed through reforms instead of moving it to Richmond. He later served as its chancellor.

John Tyler is the only White House occupant who earlier held which post in the Senate?

President pro tempore was a parting gift: his allies voted him the honor in 1835 with only hours left in the session, as a symbolic gesture of approval.

What was the first name of John Tyler's first wife, the first woman to die while serving as first lady?

Letitia Tyler had been disabled by a stroke and came downstairs at the White House only once, for a family wedding. She died in September 1842, aged 51.

Who served as White House hostess for John Tyler while his first wife was too ill to entertain?

His daughter-in-law Priscilla, a former stage actress and the wife of his son Robert, ran White House entertaining from 1841 until she left Washington in 1844.

John Tyler lies in Richmond's Hollywood Cemetery near which fellow Virginia-born president?

James Monroe was reburied there in 1858 after 27 years in a New York City cemetery, four years before Tyler joined him in what is now called Presidents Circle.

After the Senate rejected his annexation treaty, John Tyler won passage in Congress by what means?

A joint resolution needed only a simple majority in each house, not the two-thirds of the Senate that a treaty requires. Even so, it squeaked through the Senate 27 to 25.

Which former vice president did President Tyler name secretary of state after the 1844 gun explosion?

John C. Calhoun was the fourth secretary of state in a year. To Northerners he stood for nullification, so his appointment undercut Tyler's effort to keep annexation separate from slavery.

Which English novelist was welcomed upstairs at John Tyler's White House to meet the ailing first lady?

Charles Dickens was also honored, with the American writer Washington Irving, at a White House party in March 1842 that drew about 3,000 people.

John Tyler was born in 1790 at which Charles City County plantation built by his father?

Greenway was built around 1776 by his father, a judge who later ran the state. Tyler chose his retirement home partly because it lay close to this birthplace.

As a joke, neighbors gave the retired John Tyler which minor local office, which he took seriously?

Overseer of roads let him summon his neighbors' enslaved laborers for road work again and again, and he kept at it even after the neighbors asked him to stop.

Which animal of John Tyler's, named The General, lies in a pet cemetery on his Virginia plantation?

A horse called The General is the best-known resident of the plot, where the Tyler family went on burying its pets for generations.

John Tyler added a long, narrow ballroom to his plantation house to suit which popular dance?

The Virginia reel is a line dance, so Tyler built a long, slim connecting wing for it. The house ended up 301 feet from end to end.

During the Dorr Rebellion of 1842, John Tyler declined to send federal troops into which state?

Rhode Island was still run under a royal charter from 1663 and had not opened the vote to all white men. Tyler urged its leaders to widen the vote, and the rebels fled before any federal force was needed.

Which Army explorer led two western expeditions under President Tyler, guided by mountain man Kit Carson?

John C. Frémont planted a flag on a Wyoming peak in 1842 and mapped Mount St. Helens and Mount Hood on his second trip. Tyler rewarded him with a double brevet promotion.

After John Tyler signed the annexation bill in 1845, First Lady Julia Tyler wore what around her neck?

The pen he used became her trophy because she had lobbied members of Congress hard for the measure, hosting parties to win over votes.

Julia Gardiner, later John Tyler's wife, earned which nickname by posing in an 1840 store advertisement?

Rose of Long Island shocked polite society so much that her family took her off to Europe, possibly to escape the publicity. There she was presented at the French court.

Which breed of dog did John Tyler order from overseas as a gift for First Lady Julia Tyler?

An Italian Greyhound came from Naples and went about with her, part of a grand style in which she also received guests seated on a raised armchair.

John Tyler was at home in which Virginia town when a messenger brought news of the president's death?

Williamsburg was where he had gone after the inauguration, expecting few duties in his new job. He set out at once and reached Washington by dawn the next day.