Nothing about President Washington's wooden teeth

 

                Since this is the month of Lincoln and Washington's birthdays, plus Presidents' Day, I delved into two resources for unusual information about our first president.Arkansas Living's "trivia" feature and Eric Couch's Presidential Trivia provided the snippets that follow.

                George Washington was born at Pope's Creek Farm (now Wakefield), Westmoreland County, Virginia, February 22, 1732. He did not have a middle name. In school, his favorite subject was arithmetic.

                George was only eleven when his father, Augustine Washington, died. George was one of nine presidents who didn't attend college.

At age 17, he secured a surveyor's assistant job helping lay out the town site in Alexandria, Virginia. At 19, while on his only foreign trip, George contracted smallpox on the island of Barbados.

At age 27, George, an Episcopalian, married Martha Dandridge Custis, also 27. The name of her plantation home was White House.

                The mule owes its popularity on the farm to George Washington. While researching farming methods, he determined that mules (the offspring of a male donkey and a female horse) were better for farming because they were stronger and had more endurance than a horse. In the 1770s, he began breeding mules at Mount Vernon.

                In 1782, as leader of the Continental Army, George Washington introduced the military decoration, Order of the Purple Heart. During this time, he became close friends with marquis de Lafayette, who eventually gave his general a Maltese jackass to help in the latter's mule business.

Washington served as president from 1789-1797. Our first president is the only one who did not live in the White House, which wasn't completed until after his death. He was 57 years old when he was sworn in as president for the first time. The oath of office was administered by Robert R. Livingston of New York, and ended with President Washington saying, "So help me God!" He appointed Thomas Jefferson secretary of state.

Though never paid for his work, Pierre Charles L'Enfant, a French engineer, was hired by President Washington to lay out the physical plan for a new capitol for the new nation.

 Because of the tardiness of some states in ratifying the Constitution, only eleven states officially comprised the USA at the time he was elected. In April, 1792, the president exercised his veto power for the first time in the nation's history.

                Washington's second inauguration was held March 4, 1793 in Federal Hall, Philadelphia. That inaugural speech was 133 words in length. The next year, he raised 15,000 troops to put down a rebellion by farmers in western Pennsylvania, known as The Whiskey Rebellion. The same year, he and the Congress authorized the creation of the United States Navy as a branch of the U.S. Defense Department.

                His 6,000-word Farewell Address was published in the Philadelphia newspaper, American Daily Advertiser, on September 19, 1796.

                On December 12, 1799, George Washington fell ill with a cold and sore throat. His condition worsened to the point that he had trouble breathing. He died two days later of what is now believed to be acute epiglottitis.

                In 1847, his likeness appeared on the first 10-cent stamp issued by the U.S. Post Office.

                Pat here: Like any researcher, I benefited the most. If you learned even one new fact, Yay!