Electronic Highways
The presidency
As the United States swears in Barack Obama as its 44th president, many Americans will feel a swell of pride. For others, it may evoke a less inspiring emotion. However, all Americans can rejoice in the peaceful transition of power and the knowledge that the office is bigger than the person who holds it. This also is a time that evokes the historian in all of us. Whether looking for hard facts or interesting factoids, there is no shortage of information on the Internet.
Visit the Smithsonian site The American Presidency: A Glorious Burden for a comprehensive overview of the Office of the President of the United States. It includes extensive information about the foundations of the presidency, the campaign trail and life and death in the White House. Also included is biographical information for all of the presidents. Of course, no walk through presidential history would be complete without a visit to the White House Web site. The President’s Hall has biographical and policy information for each president. Go to the pages for John Adams and Thomas Jefferson to learn some of the interesting details of their lives and deaths. For example, the two former presidents wrote long and thoughtful letters to each other for years. Also, both men died on July 4, 1826, 50 years to the day after the signing of the Declaration of Independence.
Nestled among the vital statistics about the presidents is the most interesting information of all: the trivia. Did you know that James Madison and Abraham Lincoln were the shortest and tallest presidents, respectively? Jimmy Carter was the first president born in a hospital, Richard Nixon was the first president to campaign in all 50 states, and Franklin Delano Roosevelt was the first president to appear on television. All these facts, plus many more tidbits, are available from the Internet Public Library. Visit the Presidential Trivia page from the National Parks Service to find out which president was the first to be an American citizen and the first to own a car, and which president was once a fashion model.
One of the most enduring symbols of the presidency is the seal of the president of the United States. The seal features an eagle holding an olive branch in one talon and arrows in the other surrounded by stars, and a banner that reads “E pluribus unum.” Wikipedia has extensive details on the history, use and symbolism of the seal, such as the olive branch symbolizes peace and arrows represent military might. It is worth noting that the original version of the seal had no stars and the eagle’s head faced the arrows. President Harry Truman ordered a redesign to include the stars to represent the states and reorient the eagle to face the olive branch to symbolize that the United States prefers a state of peace.
Certainly a figure as important as the U.S. president should have his own band. The Marine Corps Band is the oldest professional musical organization in the country and the only one whose primary function is to play music for the president of the United States. Most famously, the band plays “Hail to the Chief” to announce the arrival of the president. Listen to the band play “Hail to Chief.”
For even more information, the UB Libraries have resources on the presidents and the office in abundance. Visit ARTstore to look at images of the presidents, JSTOR to find articles in scholarly journals, or The New York Times Historical Index to get a sense of the presidency through the news.
—Linda Hasman, Health Sciences Library
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