59 Fun Facts About Richard Nixon

Richard Nixon became the 37th president in January 1969, succeeding which man?

Lyndon B. Johnson had announced in March 1968 that he would not seek re-election, so Nixon beat Johnson's vice president, Hubert Humphrey, eight years after losing the White House to Kennedy.

Nixon is the only US president to have done what?

Resigned from office, not impeached: the House Judiciary Committee had approved three articles of impeachment in late July 1974, but Nixon quit on August 9 before the full House could vote on them.

Nixon was born into a poor family belonging to which religious group?

Quakers through his mother, Hannah, whose faith his Methodist-born father adopted. As a birthright Quaker Nixon could have claimed exemption from wartime service, yet he volunteered for the Navy.

Nixon was born in a Southern California house his father built on what kind of farm?

A lemon ranch, and a failing one: it went under in 1922 and the family moved to nearby Whittier, where his father opened a grocery store and gas station that put the whole family to work.

Richard Nixon, like three of his four brothers, was named after which British king?

Richard the Lionheart gave the future president his name, and Harold, Arthur and Edward were royal namesakes too; the odd one out was Donald, whose first name, Francis, came from their father.

Snubbed by Whittier College's Franklins club, Nixon helped found a rival called what?

The Orthogonian Society was his answer to the Franklins, whose well-to-do members dominated campus life; Nixon, a grocer's son who worked in the family store, had not been asked to join.

Which university's scholarship did Nixon pass up in 1930 because his family needed him at home?

Harvard was out of reach: his older brother had tuberculosis and Depression money was short, so Nixon stayed in his hometown, helping run the family store while he studied at the local college.

From which university's law school did Nixon graduate in 1937?

Duke ranked him third in its law class of 1937, yet the prestigious East Coast firms he applied to all turned him down, and he went home to a small-town California practice.

Which federal agency did Nixon apply to join straight out of law school in 1937, without success?

The FBI never took him on. Decades later a tape of President Nixon telling aides to have the CIA block an FBI investigation became the key evidence against him in Watergate.

As a young California lawyer, Nixon was president of a company that went bankrupt trying to sell what?

Frozen orange juice sank Citra-Frost: it froze whole juice rather than concentrate, and Nixon spent evenings after his law work cutting and squeezing oranges himself before it went bankrupt.

How did Nixon meet his future wife Pat Ryan in 1938?

Acting together in a community play was how it began: for Nixon it was love at first sight, but Pat turned him down several times before she agreed to a date.

What were the names of Nixon's two daughters?

Tricia and Julie grew up in public view. Julie married David Eisenhower, grandson of the president her father had served under, and spoke up for Nixon in public throughout Watergate.

Nixon helped finance his first congressional campaign with winnings from what?

Poker paid because Nixon played it patiently: a fellow Navy officer told him to fold unless he held the best hand, he did exactly that, and he sent thousands of dollars home.

Which Democratic incumbent did Nixon defeat to win his House seat in 1946?

Jerry Voorhis, a five-term incumbent, challenged Nixon in a debate to prove a communist-linked group backed him; Nixon stepped forward with a bulletin listing Voorhis among its picks.

Nixon first gained national attention through his role on which congressional body?

The House Un-American Activities Committee heard Alger Hiss deny being a communist, and many observers believed him; first-term congressman Nixon insisted the hearings go on, and the case made his name.

What were the microfilms Whittaker Chambers hid in a field during the Hiss case called?

The Pumpkin Papers were named for their hiding place, a pumpkin Chambers had hollowed out on his Maryland farm; Nixon paraded the film before the press, and Hiss was indicted within two weeks.

Nixon's 1950 Senate campaign against Helen Gahagan Douglas earned him what lasting nickname?

Tricky Dick was the label Douglas made stick after Nixon called her 'pink right down to her underwear'; he won the seat by a wide margin but never shook the name.

Nixon's 1952 televised defence of his political fund became known by what name?

The Checkers speech ended with Nixon asking viewers to wire the Republican National Committee on whether he should quit the ticket; telegrams poured in, and Eisenhower kept him.

What kind of animal was the gift Nixon vowed on television in 1952 that his family would keep?

A cocker spaniel, shipped in a crate from Texas; Nixon put the dog in the speech on purpose, copying Franklin Roosevelt's famous defence of his own dog Fala to needle his opponents.

In his 1952 fund speech, Nixon said his wife owned no mink but wore what?

A respectable Republican cloth coat was a dig as well as a boast: a mink coat given to an official's wife was then at the centre of a Truman administration bribery scandal.

Why did Nixon have no formal power to act after Eisenhower's 1955 heart attack?

The 25th Amendment had not yet been proposed, so Nixon simply chaired Cabinet meetings until Eisenhower recovered, and his low-key restraint won wide praise.

In which two South American capitals did hostile crowds attack Vice President Nixon during his 1958 goodwill tour?

Lima and Caracas were the flashpoints: rioters in Venezuela attacked his motorcade, yet his coolness under fire made headlines and only left him more popular back home.

Nixon's impromptu 1959 argument with Khrushchev took place in front of what?

A model American kitchen at a Moscow trade fair set the scene; Nixon boasted that America led in colour television, the very technology taping their argument for broadcast in both countries.

Who was Nixon's running mate in the 1960 presidential election?

Henry Cabot Lodge Jr. had already lost to Kennedy once, when the young congressman took his Massachusetts Senate seat in 1952; in 1960 the same opponent beat him a second time.

Republicans cried ballot-stuffing in Texas and which other state after Nixon's 1960 loss?

Illinois, home of Mayor Daley's Chicago machine, was where the charges centred; Nixon refused to demand a recount and said publicly he would not contest the result.

What was the title of the bestselling book Nixon wrote after leaving the vice presidency?

Six Crises ends in defeat: five chapters cover scrapes he came through, from a spy case to a Moscow showdown, and the sixth is the 1960 election he lost to Kennedy.

After losing the 1962 California governor's race, Nixon told reporters they wouldn't have him to do what?

Kick around was his parting shot at what he called his last press conference; ABC aired a special billed as his political obituary, and six years later he was elected president.

Where was Nixon on the morning of November 22, 1963?

Dallas had him in town on business for Pepsi-Cola; he flew home that morning, hours before President Kennedy was shot in a motorcade there.

Which Maryland governor did Nixon pick as his running mate in 1968?

Spiro Agnew resigned in 1973 in a scandal unrelated to Watergate: investigated for taking kickbacks in Maryland, he pleaded no contest to a single charge of tax evasion.

In a televised 1969 address on the Vietnam War, Nixon asked which group of Americans for their support?

The silent majority was his new catchphrase for Americans who stayed out of the anti-war marches; he insisted on writing the speech himself, barely involving his speechwriters.

Which chief justice, an old political rival, swore Nixon in as president in 1969?

Earl Warren had been California's favourite-son candidate in 1952 while Nixon lobbied behind the scenes for Eisenhower; in 1969 the two family Bibles lay open at Isaiah 2:4.

In his first inaugural address, Nixon said the greatest honour history can bestow is which title?

Peacemaker was a bold title to reach for: he took office having promised to end a war that had more than half a million American troops in Vietnam.

What sport provided the 1971 breakthrough that led to Nixon's visit to China?

Table tennis players from both countries mingled at a 1971 tournament in Japan, China invited the US team to visit, and within months Kissinger was flying in secretly to arrange a summit.

Arriving in China in 1972, Nixon pointedly shook the hand of which leader, as Dulles had refused to in 1954?

Kissinger had briefed him for more than 40 hours before the trip.

What was the code name of the secret 1969 B-52 bombing campaign in Cambodia?

Operation Menu opened in March 1969 with a raid code-named Breakfast, and the strikes on officially neutral Cambodia were kept secret from Congress and the American public.

What did Nixon's team call the policy of handing the ground war to Saigon's army as American troops came home?

Vietnamization was his answer to a war he said his predecessor had Americanized; Defense Secretary Melvin Laird shaped the plan, and the last US troops left in March 1973.

Where did Nixon hold an impromptu early-morning meeting with anti-war protesters in May 1970?

The Lincoln Memorial drew a sleepless Nixon near dawn, days after the Kent State shootings; he chatted with student protesters about college football, among other things.

Which two arms-control agreements came from Nixon's 1972 Moscow summit?

SALT I and the ABM Treaty were paired for a reason: a missile shield could let one side strike first and shoot down the reply, so capping defences came with capping missiles.

A Soviet threat to send troops into which 1973 war put US nuclear forces on worldwide alert?

The Yom Kippur War brought the superpowers closer to a nuclear confrontation than at any point since the Cuban missile crisis; a UN ceasefire resolution defused it within a day.

Nixon in June 1974 became the first sitting US president to visit which country?

Israel had been resupplied eight months earlier by an American arms airlift he approved, which led Arab oil producers to embargo shipments to the United States.

In August 1971, Nixon ended the dollar's convertibility into what?

Gold stopped backing the dollar after a weekend with his advisers at Camp David; the same Sunday-evening broadcast froze wages and prices for 90 days and put a 10 per cent surcharge on imports.

Which federal body did Nixon propose in 1970, the year of the first Earth Day?

The Environmental Protection Agency was his answer to rising public concern: it pulled pollution programmes scattered across the federal government into one body, which opened that December.

Nixon's 1969 Philadelphia Plan made contractors on federal building projects set goals for doing what?

Hiring minority workers, by set goals and dates, was demanded of firms in Philadelphia's highly segregated building trades; a Republican White House had revived a plan drafted under Johnson.

Whom did Nixon reach in 'the most historic telephone call ever made from the White House'?

Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin took the call on the Moon; Nixon then judged NASA's plans for a Moon base and a crewed trip to Mars too costly, and budget cuts cancelled later Apollo landings.

Whom did Nixon defeat in the 1972 landslide, losing only Massachusetts and D.C.?

George McGovern said he was '1,000 percent' behind running mate Thomas Eagleton when Eagleton's past treatment for mental illness came out, then dropped him from the ticket.

Who raised the alarm on the Watergate burglars in June 1972 after finding a door latch taped open?

A security guard rang the police, who arrived in time to catch five men with wiretap gear inside the Democratic National Committee's offices.

Which aide told Congress in July 1973 that Nixon secretly taped Oval Office talks?

Alexander Butterfield changed the scandal in an afternoon: John Dean's word against the president's could now be checked against recordings, and the fight for the tapes began.

What was the name given to Nixon's October 1973 firing of special prosecutor Archibald Cox?

The Saturday Night Massacre took three tries: the attorney general and then his deputy refused to fire Cox and left office that evening, and Solicitor General Robert Bork finally did it.

Who took the blame for part of the 18-and-a-half-minute gap in a key Watergate tape?

Rose Mary Woods, his secretary, said she hit record by mistake while answering the phone with her foot still on the pedal; photographs of her acting out the long reach became an enduring image of the scandal.

At Walt Disney World in November 1973, Nixon insisted to a room of newspaper editors that he was 'not a' what?

Crook was the word he chose on television, before Associated Press managing editors, as he insisted he had never profited from public service and had earned every cent.

What was the recording released August 5, 1974 showing Nixon approved thwarting the Watergate probe called?

The Smoking Gun Tape caught him, six days after the break-in, agreeing to use the CIA to block the investigation; within days of its release, Republican leaders told him he could not survive a Senate trial.

Who granted Nixon a 'full, free, and absolute pardon' on September 8, 1974?

Gerald Ford acted a month into his own presidency; the pardon angered much of the public, and many historians think it helped cost him the 1976 election.

Which British broadcaster paid Nixon $600,000 for the interviews aired in 1977?

David Frost asked whether a president could do something illegal for the nation's good, and Nixon replied that when the president does it, it is not illegal.

What money trouble pushed Nixon to write his memoirs?

Legal bills from Watergate lawsuits, on top of back taxes, were eating into his savings; the memoir, titled RN, came out in 1978 and became a best seller.

Where is Nixon buried?

On the grounds of his library in Yorba Linda, he lies beside his wife Pat, only a few steps from the house where he was born.

Which famous aviator did Nixon, then a young Navy officer, decline to dine with because he was hosting a card game?

Charles Lindbergh was in the Pacific as a civilian adviser who flew combat missions anyway; Nixon chose his own game over the dinner and was still telling the story in a 1983 interview.

What was Lieutenant Nixon's job in the South Pacific during World War II?

Running air transport operations is what he got when he volunteered for sea duty: he left a desk at a naval air base in Iowa for the Solomon Islands, where his unit drew up flight plans and loaded cargo planes.

Before joining the Navy in 1942, Nixon spent a few months at which federal agency, the one running wartime rationing?

The Office of Price Administration and its red tape soured him on government bureaucracy within months; nearly three decades later, as president, he froze wages and prices himself.

What illness nearly killed Nixon in October 1974, weeks after he left the White House?

Phlebitis had put a clot in his leg, so surgeons clamped a vein to keep it from his lungs; hours later internal bleeding sent him into shock, and he spent a long spell in hospital.