City Folk (Part 8): Historical People Quiz

Answer: He was the last President not to have a Cabinet

All of the Presidents had Cabinets from the very first President, George Washington.
Madison was born in 1751 the oldest child to his parents James and Nelly. His siblings were next in order: Francis, Ambrose, Catlett, Nelly, William, Sarah, then a stillborn, then Elizabeth, then another stillborn, then Reuben, and lastly Frances.
George Clinton and Elbridge Gerry, both of whom served as Vice President under James Madison, died in office.
At 5' 4" (163 centimeters) James Madison was the shortest of all U.S. Presidents.
James Duane Doty, a land speculator, traveled through the isthmus between Lakes Mendota and Monona in 1829 and purchased land in much of the region. In 1836
he then convinced the territorial legislature to make that area the capital city. Doty named the city Madison after James Madison. In 1837, Eben and Rosaline Peck became the first white settlers in Madison.

Answer: Republican

John C. Fremont (1813-1890) explored the western part of the United States, charting it on maps. He was an important person in establishing the American West as a region to settle in, and he was a key figure in the country's acquisition and development of California.

The city of Fremont in California was incorporated in 1956, a century after Fremont's run for President. Indeed, the city was named after John C. Fremont who was elected as one of the first two Senators of the state of California. Prior to that Fremont had served as Military Governor of California.

The city is located in the San Francisco Bay area, and today has a population of a quarter of a million people.

Answer: Nebraska

The capital of Nebraska is Lincoln, named after President Abraham Lincoln who signed that Homestead Act during his presidency in 1862. The Act freed up unclaimed lands in Nebraska and further west to homesteaders. The first claim was filed by Daniel Freeman near what is today Beatrice, Nebraska.

The Capitol Building in Lincoln was built between 1922 and 1932 for $10 million. Above the east entrance are three relief panels representing the cause of freedom. In the panel on the right, Abraham Lincoln is shown with the Emancipation Proclamation in front of the United States Capitol Building. His trademark top hat rests on the railing next to him. Above the arched rotunda windows at the base of the Capitol tower, many great lawmakers are depicted, but on the north side a young Abraham Lincoln is portrayed, without his beard. On the west side of the Capitol, on 14th Street in Lincoln, is Nebraska's Lincoln Memorial, predating the one in Washington, D.C. by ten years.

Answer: Florence Nightingale

Florence Nightingale was born May 12, 1820 in Florence, of Tuscany, Italy. She came from a wealthy family and was educated at home. After deciding that nursing was the career she wanted to pursue, she trained as a nurse at Kaiserswerth and Paris in 1851 and in 1853 became a superintendent of a London hospital for invalid women. For many years, she crusaded for sanitary reform in the military, and for the improvement of nursing and public health in India. She wrote the book, "Notes on Nursing", published in 1859, that was used in many training schools.

Florence, Italy features some of the best nursing schools in Italy such as The University of Florence. Among the best hospitals in Florence, Italy are the Santa Maria Nuova, the Osperdale Pediatrico Meyer, the Centro Diagnostico Leonardo da Vinci, and many others.

Answer: First to have electricity installed in White House

It was actually the President who served between Grover Cleveland's two non-consecutive terms, who had electricity installed. Apparently, though, Benjamin Harrison and his wife feared it and never turned on light switches.

Cleveland was the first to have a child born in the White House; in 1893 his daughter Esther was born and so far the only one up to Joseph Biden's inauguration on January 20, 2021. Grover Cleveland was not only the first President to have his voice recorded, but he was also the first President to be filmed by a motion picture camera. It captured his final hours as President on March 4th, 1897 during William McKinley's inauguration.

Contrary to what some might think, Cleveland, Ohio was NOT named after Grover Cleveland. Firstly, it used to be spelled with an "a" in it as in "Cleaveland." That's because the city was named after General Moses Cleaveland who as a surveyor for the Connecticut Land Company, set foot on the banks of the Cuyahoga River in 1796. After that expedition, and founding the city, General Cleaveland never returned to the city. Hrmph!

Answer: Roanoke Island

Because of his expertise as a soldier and commander and explorer, Queen Elizabeth I awarded Sir Walter Raleigh the task of organizing a British expedition to sail the Atlantic and establish a permanent colony in the "New World." They reached the shores of Roanoke Island, in the Outer Banks of what today we call North Carolina, whose capital city is....you guessed it, Raleigh.

But Sir Walter Raleigh called the landing spot "Virginia", named so to honor the Virgin Queen Elizabeth. Founded in 1792 as the capital city of North Carolina, Raleigh was named after Sir Walter Raleigh.

The city has been nicknamed "The City of Oaks" because of its many....pine trees. No I'm kidding, it's because of the oak trees.

Answer: Battle of San Jacinto

The Siege of Guanajuato, The Battle of Calderon Bridge, The Battles of Puerto de Piñones were all fought between Mexico and Spain in the struggle of Mexico's independence from that country. General Sam Houston won Texas's independence from Mexico at the Battle of San Jacinto located 25 miles east of Allen's Landing, recognized as the official birthplace of the city of Houston, Texas, Roughly 900 Texans faced off against about 1200 of the Mexican Army led by Antonio Lopez de Santa Anna.

The Mexican general's mistake was in splitting up his troops into too many different tasks, spreading them out, so that he only came at Houston with about 600 soldiers.

It was a very lopsided victory for Sam Houston. Houston became President of the Texas Republic in 1837, and the city of Houston was named for him.

It was incorporated in 1837 and made the Lone Star Republic's capital.

Answer: Virginia and Maryland

George Washington himself had chosen the site of the capital in 1791, after sites in Baltimore, New York and Trenton were considered. The Residence Act in July 1790 had declared that the site should be on the Potomac River, and gave George Washington the power to choose exactly where, which he did in 1791. George Washington also appointed a commission to oversee the city's development, and they named the city Washington. Maryland and Virginia had given over the land to form a district called the Territory of Columbia (named after Christopher Columbus) in which the city would reside.

The district would be reduced by a third in 1846, when the land Virginia ceded was returned to it. The Territory of Columbia was renamed District of Columbia in 1871.

Answer: la San Antiaga

The San Antiaga was the name of Amerigo Vespucci's ship. Columbus's ships were la Santa Clara (the Niña), la Pinta and la Santa Gallegas (The Santa Maria). The three ships set sail from Palos in southern Spain on August 3, 1492. They sailed for 35 days, and things started to look very bleak; murmurings of mutiny were spreading until finally at 2 in the morning on October 12th land was spotted.

Columbus, Ohio, in the center of the state, was named after Christopher Columbus. It was established as the state capital in 1816. Prior to the state government moving to Columbus, they were located in the city of Chillicothe, 45 miles south of Columbus.

Answer: Andrew Jackson

Rachel Donelson had married Lewis Robards when she was 18. It was an unhappy marriage and they separated several times until Rachel moved to her mother's house in Tennessee. Andrew Jackson, a young lawyer at the times, was boarding there. The two fell in love, and believing her first husband had divorced her, Rachel married Andrew in Natchez, Tennessee. But her marriage was actually not legally dissolved yet, so he marriage to Jackson was technically invalid, thus necessitating the remarriage.

The assassination attempt on January 30, 1835 was by a mentally disturbed unemployed house painter named Richard Lawrence, who went up to Jackson at a congressional funeral at the Capitol building and Lawrence fired his gun. But it misfired. Jackson was irate and started clubbing him with his cane. Lawrence attempted a second shot but again the gun misfired. Jackson's aides were able to wrestle Lawrence away.

Established in 1821 as the capital of Mississippi, Jackson was named after the former General Andrew Jackson, as an honor to his victory at The Battle of New Orleans in the War of 1812. By 1860, Jackson's population was 3,191 citizens, but that number plummeted sharply with the onset of the Civil War.