November 22, 1963: President John F. Kennedy Is Assassinated

November 22, 1963: President John F. Kennedy is assassinated in Dallas. Vice President Lyndon B. Johnson becomes President.

With the 1964 Presidential election coming up, and the 1960 election having been close, Kennedy wanted to be sure of as many States as he could. And, with a split in the Democratic Party in the State of Texas, a State then with 25 Electoral Votes, he knew that was a State he had to hang onto.

He visited San Antonio and Houston the day before, settled for the night in Fort Worth, and made the short flight to Dallas the next morning. He rode in an open car, a 1961 Lincoln Continental limousine, with the protective "bubble top" removed, so the crowds along the motorcade route could see him.

He was in the back seat, with his wife, Jacqueline Kennedy, who was wearing a pink suit, complete with a pillbox hat. In the middle seat were the Governor of Texas, John Connally, and his wife, Nellie. In the front seat were 2 Secret Service Agents: William Greer, the driver, and Clint Hill.

In the car behind them sat Vice President Johnson, his wife Claudia "Lady Bird" Johnson, and Senator Ralph Yarborough. (Yarborough's wife, Opal, was not there.) Yarborough, a liberal, and Connally, more conservative on some issues, were seen as the reason behind the intra-State Party split. The other Senate seat for Texas, which Johnson had held until the 1960 election, had been won in a special election by a Republican, John Tower. He was not present.

There was concern that there might be trouble in Dallas: A month earlier, Adlai Stevenson, America's Ambassador to the United Nations, was hit with picket signs on a visit to the city. JFK told Jackie it was "real nut country."

But the reception for the Kennedys seemed to be wonderful. There was at least one Confederate flag along the route, but it was mostly American flags and signs of support, including a few for Jackie.

At 12:30 PM, Central Standard Time -- 1:30 Eastern -- as the limo went down Elm Street into Dealey Plaza, about to head under a highway and railroad underpass near Union Station, on its way to the Trade Mart where JFK was to attend a luncheon and deliver a speech, Nellie Connally turned to JFK, and said, "You can't say Dallas hasn't been kind to you today." And he said, "No, I suppose you can't."

(For the number of shots, I'm sticking to the official story, even though, like millions of Americans, I am not entirely convinced of it.)

At that moment, the kindness stopped. A shot rang out. It missed the car completely, and struck a curb, breaking off a piece of concrete that cut a bystander, James Tague, on his face. Tague was a 27-year-old car salesman, originally from Indiana, and later claimed that it was the second shot that wounded him. He published a book, claiming that Johnson was involved in the conspiracy to assassinate JFK, so he could become President himself. He has not been the only person to suggest this, but it seems incredibly unlikely.

A second shot was fired. It hit Kennedy in the back, drilled through his body, and exited through his throat. Some witnesses said they heard him yell, "My God, I'm hit!" But the nature of his wounds calls his continued ability to speak into question. Connally, having turned around after hearing the first shot, was hit in the back by the same bullet. He yelled out, "My God, they're going to kill us all!"

This shot has been called "the magic bullet" by people who don't believe the lone-gunman theory that was later accepted by the Warren Commission. They have used "The Zapruder Film," a silent home movie recorded by Abraham Zapruder, a local clothing manufacturer, to back up their claim. But the wounds caused by that bullet can be accounted for by the varying positions, both horizontal and vertical, of the car's seats.

A third shot was fired. It struck Kennedy in the head, sending it back and to the left. This is the key for people who don't believe the lone-gunman theory: If the shot had come from behind, it would have caused Kennedy to fall forward. Therefore, it had to come from the front and to the right, probably fired from behind a white fence atop what became known as the "grassy knoll" at Dealey Plaza.

Dealey Plaza. The "grassy knoll" is roughly

in the center of the picture, with the white fence behind it.

(The Plaza was named for George Bannerman Dealey, the publisher of The Dallas Morning News from 1926 to his death in 1946.)

Greer sped off to the nearest hospital, which was Parkland Hospital, 4 miles to the northwest. There was nothing the doctors, led by Robert N. McClelland, could do. Father Oscar Huber, a priest at the hospital, gave him the last rites. It was the 4th time he had received them.

John Fitzgerald Kennedy, the 35th President of the United States, was pronounced dead at 1:00 PM -- 2:00 Eastern. NBC was the first network to announce his death to the public, with Frank McGee saying so at 2:35. Walter Cronkite of CBS followed, 3 minutes later.

After being told of JFK's death, Johnson ordered that he be taken back to Air Force One, which was sitting on the tarmac at Love Field, Dallas' main airport at the time. Sarah T. Hughes, whom JFK had appointed a federal Judge on LBJ's recommendation, administered the Oath of Office at 2:39 (3:39 Eastern). She remains the only woman ever to swear a President into office.

Johnson insisted on having the swearing-in photographed, and that Jackie be by his side, to show the peaceful transfer of power. Cecil W. Stoughton, then the official White House photographer, would win the Pulitzer Prize for Photography for his picture. There is no film of it, although there is a very scratchy audio recording.

Most versions of this photo are in black & white.

This one is probably colorized.

At 1:50 (2:50), Lee Harvey Oswald was arrested at the Texas Theatre. He had been identified as the shooter from the nearby Texas School Book Depository, and had also killed a Dallas police officer, Patrolman J.D. Tippit.

Someone once wrote up a series of "Lincoln-Kennedy Coincidences," some of them erroneous or misleading. (Kennedy did have a secretary named Evelyn Lincoln, who did warn him not to go to Dallas, but Lincoln did not have a secretary named Kennedy, and no one warned him against going to Ford's Theatre.) To me, the most interesting one is that John Wilkes Booth shot Abraham Lincoln in a theater, and was caught in a storehouse (for tobacco on a farm); while Oswald shot Kennedy from the window of a storehouse, and was arrested in a theater. And no one seems to bring up the fact that the car that Kennedy was riding in was a Lincoln.

The murder sent the world into mourning. Everything else, including sports, became secondary to laying the fallen President to rest, and bringing his killer to justice.

Within 48 hours of the assassination, Oswald, 24 years old -- born on October 18, 1939, the same day as Pro Football Hall-of-Famer Mike Ditka -- would be also be murdered. Those who believe he acted alone, and those who believe he couldn't have, each have evidence to back up their theory, but neither has enough information to make it conclusive. There was no trial. We may never know for sure whether he did it alone, or at all.

What we do know is that the assassination of John F. Kennedy still haunts this country. His generation, who grew up in the Great Depression and fought in World War II, never got over it. Their children, who were inspired to public service by JFK, were emotionally scarred for life as well.

The fact that all of Johnson's subsequent achievements as President have been clouded by his failure in the Vietnam War makes it all worse: There is the belief that Kennedy would have handled Vietnam better, and we would have been spared the worst of that war, and spared the Presidency of Richard Nixon, and Watergate, and so many other things.

But we'll never know. The events of November 22, 1963 insured that.

With the Vice Presidency vacant, the next man in the line of succession was the Speaker of the House of Representatives, John McCormack, like Kennedy a Bostonian. He was 73 years old, and looked older. Next was the President Pro Tempore of the Senate, Carl Hayden of Arizona. And he was 86. Next was the Secretary of State, Dean Rusk.

John W. McCormack

This potential succession situation led to the proposal, and by 1967 the ratification, of what became the 25th Amendment to the Constitution, allowing for the replacement of the Vice President for the remainder of the Presidential term, and also for a Presidential inability to serve short of death.

Jack Ruby, who shot Oswald, died in prison in 1967. Abraham Zapruder died in 1970. President Lyndon Johnson died in 1973. Father Oscar Huber died in 1975. Agent William Greer, the driver, died in 1985. So did Judge Sarah Hughes. Governor John Connally died in 1993. First Lady Jacqueline Kennedy died in 1994. Senator Ralph Yarborough died in 1996. Nellie Connally died in 2006. Claudia "Lady Bird" Johnson, the new First Lady, died in 2007. Photographer Cecil Stoughton died in 2008. James Tague, the 3rd wounded man, died in 2014. Dr. Robert McClelland died in 2019. Clint Hill, the Secret Service Agent who kept Jackie in the car, was the last living person in the car. As of November 22, 2022, he is still alive. (UPDATE: He died in 2025.)

The Lincoln Continental limousine is now in the Henry Ford Museum in Dearborn, Michigan, outside Detroit. So is the chair in which Abraham Lincoln was sitting in, in Ford's Theatre in Washington, when he was assassinated.

Within 5 years, his brother, Robert F. Kennedy, would also be assassinated. These murders were mentioned as part of the actions claimed by the Devil, played by Mick Jagger, in The Rolling Stones' 1968 song "Sympathy for the Devil."

The last brother, Senator Edward M. "Ted" Kennedy, lived until 2009. All three brothers are now buried at Arlington National Cemetery, across the Potomac River from Washington, D.C. 

*

November 22, 1963 was a Friday. This was also the day that A Christmas Gift for You from Philles Records, a.k.a. The Phil Spector Christmas Album, was released. I have a separate entry for that. Also that day, With the Beatles was released in Britain, later repackaged in the U.S. was Meet the Beatles.

In addition, the pilot episode of the TV series The Man from U.N.C.L.E. was being filmed, on the 31st birthday of its star, Robert Vaughn, when the cast and crew received word of the assassination, at which point they stopped, resuming on Tuesday the 26th, after the funeral. The show premiered on NBC on September 22, 1964.

British authors Aldous Huxley and C.S. Lewis also died on November 22, 1963. Hardly anyone in America noticed.

One more weird thing: Hugh Millen was born that day. Millen played 10 seasons in the NFL, mostly as a backup quarterback. In 1987, he played for the Los Angeles Rams, who represent the city where Kennedy was nominated for President, and where Bobby was assassinated in 1968.

In 1991 and 1992, Millen played for the New England Patriots, who represent the Kennedys' hometown, Boston. In 1993, he played for the Dallas Cowboys, who represent the city where Kennedy died. And the last team to cut him, in 1996, was the New Orleans Saints, who represent the city that was home to one of the major theories about a conspiracy as to Kennedy's assassination.

Also born that day: English soccer defender and manager Tony Mowbray; Brian Robbins, who played Eric Mardian on the ABC sitcom Head of the Class before becoming a major executive at Paramount Pictures; and Kennedy Polamalu, a Samoan whose parents named him for the President, and who went on to become a coach in both college and pro football -- including pulling off the rare feat of having been the offensive coordinator at both Los Angeles arch-rivals, USC (where he was a running back) and UCLA. He is the uncle of Pittsburgh Steelers Hall of Fame safety Troy Polamalu.

The memorials to Kennedy came quickly after his death. Many schools that had previously been named after towns, or other people, were renamed for him, including Central High School in Paterson, New Jersey. Also named for him in New Jersey were high schools in the Iselin section of Woodbridge and in Willingboro. (The latter has since been closed.)

John F. Kennedy High Schools also opened in the Marble Hill section of The Bronx, making him the most recent President to be honored with a high school named for him in New York City; Cheektowaga, New York, a suburb of Buffalo; Glenmont, Maryland, a suburb of Washington, D.C.; Cedar Rapids, Iowa; Los Angeles, Fremont and La Palma, California; Burien, Washington.

Statues of him stand outside the Massachusetts State House in Boston, the Puerto Rico Capitol in San Juan. Memorials to him were dedicated in Montreal, Tegucigalpa (the capital of Honduras), London, Barcelona, Jerusalem, Melbourne, and West Berlin: The square in front of their City Hall, where he told a crowd of 500,000, "Ich bin ein Berliner," was named John-F-Kennedy-Platz.

In 1960, while his campaign motorcade came down Broad Street in Newark, New Jersey, my father, then 17 years old and having just started college, shook hands with Kennedy. Roughly across Broad Street from that spot, at the southern tip of Military Park, stands a column topped by a bust of Kennedy. Another bust was dedicated at Grand Army Plaza in Brooklyn. Both were dedicated in 1965.

The aircraft carrier USS John F. Kennedy (CVN-67), a.k.a. the Big John, was in service from 1968 to 2007, in service longer than its namesake lived. A replacement carrier (CVN-79) was launched in 2019, but has not yet entered official service. (UPDATE: It is currently scheduled to do so in March 2027.)

Since 1964, his portrait has appeared on the U.S. half-dollar (50-cent) coin. Idlewild Airport in New York, Philadelphia Municipal Stadium, and the Delaware and Maryland sections of Interstate 95, which he had dedicated just a few days before his death, were renamed for him.

Interstate 190, connecting O'Hare International Airport to Chicago, is named the John F. Kennedy Expressway. A bridge of Interstate 65 over the Ohio River, connecting Louisville, Kentucky with Indiana, was named the John F. Kennedy Memorial Bridge. U.S. Route 75 in Omaha, Nebraska was named the Kennedy Freeway. And the Space Center at Cape Canaveral, Florida, was named for him. From 1964 to 1973, the cape itself was named Cape Kennedy. A bridge connecting Miami and Miami Beach was named the John F. Kennedy Causeway.

On October 22, 1979, his Presidential Library opened on the Boston campus of the University of Massachusetts, at Columbia Point. In 1982, the stop on Boston's subway Red Line, serving the campus and the Library, was renamed "JFK/UMass."

W. Willard Wirtz was the last surviving member of Kennedy's Cabinet, serving him and Johnson as Secretary of Labor from 1962 to 1969. He lived until 2010.

JFK remains the most recent President to represent Massachusetts, although Governor Michael Dukakis and Senator John Kerry have since been nominated for the office, and each has lost the general election.

*

On that Friday, for the 1st time in their 17-year history, the NBA's New York Knicks postponed a game. They were supposed to play the Detroit Pistons at the old Madison Square Garden. Indeed, there would be no games in the NBA that night, nor in the NHL. All were postponed. And, of course, it was after the baseball season, so there were no MLB games to postpone. The Los Angeles Dodgers had completed their 4-game World Series sweep over the Yankees on October 6 at Dodger Stadium.

The Knicks-Pistons game was pushed back to the following night, and the Knicks won, 108-99. Their next postponement would be on November 9, 1965, the day of the great blackout.

The 1963 Army-Navy Game had been scheduled for Saturday, November 23. It was postponed for 2 weeks, until December 7. With eventual Heisman Trophy winner, and eventual Dallas Cowboys quarterback, Roger Staubach leading them, Navy won, 21-15 at Municipal Stadium in Philadelphia. The following year, the huge 105,000-seat horseshoe in South Philadelphia was renamed John F. Kennedy Stadium.

Most college games were postponed. But 1 game, scheduled for that night, went ahead as planned. As you might guess, it was in the South: North Carolina State beat Wake Forest, 42-0 at Riddick Stadium in Raleigh, North Carolina. Attendance: 15,200, out of a capacity of 23,000. The Nebraska-Oklahoma rivalry, set for the 23rd, went on as scheduled at Memorial Stadium in Lincoln. Nebraska won 29-20.

JFK's alma mater, Harvard, was supposed to play arch-rival Yale at the Yale Bowl in New Haven, Connecticut on November 23. It was postponed until the following week, and Yale won, 20-6.

You might expect the rivalry game between Texas and Texas A&M, the 2 biggest college football teams in the State where the assassination took place, to be postponed. In fact, neither team was scheduled for November 23. Each team's next game was against the other, and was already set for the 28th, Thanksgiving Day. Texas, then ranked Number 1 in the country, held off a great upset effort by the Aggies, scoring 12 points in the 4th quarter to win 15-13. The Longhorns went on to beat Number 2 Navy in the Cotton Bowl -- in Dallas, on January 1, 1964 -- and won the National Championship.

The Iron Bowl was also scheduled for November 30, not the 23rd. At Legion Field in Birmingham, Number 9 Auburn beat Number 6 Alabama, 10-8.

In my home State of New Jersey, Rutgers was supposed to play Columbia University of New York City on the 23rd, at Rutgers Stadium in Piscataway. It was postponed to the 28th, and Columbia won, 35-28. Only 5,000 people came out to the 23,000-seat stadium. Not surprising: Not only was it a holiday, with pretty much anybody who wanted to see a football game that day watching their hometown high school team, but the country was still very depressed, and neither team was any good: Rutgers came in at 3-5, Columbia at 3-4-1.

The other big college team in New Jersey, Princeton, was supposed to host Dartmouth at Palmer Stadium, in a game that would decide the Ivy League title. That one was postponed to the 30th, and, before a crowd of 35,000, Dartmouth won, 22-21.

Notre Dame, with no official connection to the nation's 1st Catholic President, but unofficially accepted as the nation's leading Catholic university, was supposed to visit the University of Iowa on the 23rd. That game was canceled outright, and never played.

East Brunswick High School, my alma mater, was supposed to play football on the Saturday, against neighboring Sayreville. The game was postponed, and, for the 1st time in the then-new school's 3-year football history, a game was played on Thanksgiving. E.B. won, 13-12.

When the announcement that JFK was dead reached us at 2:35 PM Eastern Time on November 22, it was a Friday afternoon, and decisions had to be made to play or postpone the following Sunday's professional football games. The AFL chose to postpone their games until the week after the close of the regular season, while the NFL chose to play as scheduled. Since November 24 turned out to be another significant day, I have an entry for that day, including those games.

August 9, 1974: President Richard Nixon Resigns

August 9, 1974: Richard Nixon resigns as President of the United States, due to the crimes he committed that fell under the umbrella term "Watergate."

We may never know for sure if Nixon authorized the break-in of the offices of the Democratic National Committee at the Watergate hotel and office complex on the Potomac River in Washington, D.C. on June 17, 1972. What we do know, thanks to the audiotaping system he had in the Oval Office at the White House, is that, on June 23, 6 days after the break-in, he told his White House Chief of Staff, H.R. "Bob" Haldeman, to tell the FBI to back off on their investigation of the break-in.

That was obstruction of justice. On July 27, 1974, the Committee on the Judiciary of the U.S. House of Representatives approved an Article of Impeachment against Nixon, on the charge of obstruction of justice. On July 29, they approved another, on the charge of abuse of power. On July 30, they approved a third, for contempt of congress.

On August 5, in United States v. Nixon, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled unanimously that Nixon had to turn over all the tapes. This 8-0 vote included 3 of the 4 Justices that Nixon himself had appointed: Chief Justice Warren Burger, Harry Blackmun and Lewis Powell. Nixon had also appointed William Rehnquist, who recused himself, because he had worked in the U.S. Department of Justice for the 1st 3 years of the Nixon Administration.

And the tape of the June 23, 1972 order from Nixon to Haldeman was made public. It became known as "the Smoking Gun Tape." On August 7, Republican Congressional leaders visited Nixon at the White House, and told him they didn't have the votes to save from from being impeached by the House, or convicted in a trial by the Senate. He would be removed from office, unless he did it by himself, by resigning.

On August 8, at 9:01 PM Eastern Time, he addressed the nation in prime time, and spoke for 16 minutes, telling the nation what it was more than ready to hear:

I have never been a quitter. To leave office before my term is completed is abhorrent to every instinct in my body. But as President, I must put the interest of America first.

America needs a full-time President and a full-time Congress, particularly at this time with problems we face, at home and abroad.

To continue to fight through the months ahead for my personal vindication would almost totally absorb the time and attention of both the President and the Congress in a period when our entire focus should be on the great issues of peace abroad and prosperity without inflation at home.

Therefore, I shall resign the Presidency effective at noon tomorrow. Vice President Ford will be sworn in as President at that hour in this office.

The next day, at 9:00 AM Eastern, Nixon gave a tearful Farewell Address to his staff in the East Room of the White House. After it, the President and First Lady Pat Nixon were escorted to a waiting helicopter, Marine One, by Vice President Ford and his wife Betty. Mrs. Nixon got in. Mr. Nixon got to the top step, gave a wave to his staff, and did one more "V for Victory" salute before boarding.

At 11:35 AM, a letter arrived at the office of U.S. Secretary of State Henry Kissinger, reading, in its entirety: "Dear Mr. Secretary: I hereby resign the office of President of the United States. Sincerely, Richard Nixon." As soon as Nixon received it, officially, Nixon was no longer in office, and Vice President Gerald Ford was now the President, regardless of whether there was an actual swearing-in.

At 12:05 PM, in the East Room, Gerald Rudolph Ford Jr. was sworn in as the 38th President of the United States by Chief Justice Warren Burger. He told the nation, "My fellow Americans, our long national nightmare is over. Our Constitution works. Our great republic is a government of laws, and not of men. Here, the people rule."

Nixon had been nominated at 5 different Republican Conventions: In 1952 and 1956 for Vice President; and in 1960, 1968 and 1972 for President. After 1972, he could never attend another. It would take until 2004, and Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger of California, for a speaker at a Republican Convention, to even mention him again, so toxic was his name considered to be, even in his own Party.

By 2004, of course, the Republicans had lurched so far to the right that, not only was it possible for Nixon's name to be both spoken aloud and cheered at a Republican Convention, but for people in the Republican Party to come to a consensus that Nixon did nothing wrong, except get caught.

UPDATE: It took me until 2024 to think of this, but the 1970s were Schrödinger's Decade. There was too much Republican competence, and too much crimefighting; and, at the same time, not enough of either of those things.

Nixon's Presidential Library was built adjacent to his birthplace in Yorba Linda, California, 30 miles southeast of downtown Los Angeles. Yorba Linda also has a Richard M. Nixon Parkway and a Richard M. Nixon Elementary School.

The Nixon Library opened on July 19, 1990, and its opening was attended by the 5 men then living who had been President: Nixon, Ford, Jimmy Carter, Ronald Reagan, and the incumbent, George H.W. Bush. Nixon died on April 22, 1994. Four days later, he was laid to rest at the Library, and his funeral was attended by the 5 men then living who had been President: Ford, Jimmy Carter, Ronald Reagan, George H.W. Bush, and the incumbent, Bill Clinton; and also their wives. Both of Nixon's Vice Presidents, Ford and Spiro Agnew, attended. It was Agnew's last public appearance.

Comedians David Frye and Rich Little became famous for their impersonations of Nixon, among other political figures. Frye leaned on the phrase, "Let me just say this," while Little preferred, "Let me make this perfectly clear." Dan Aykroyd played Nixon as a bitter former President on Saturday Night Live, although he refused to shave the mustache he had at the time.

There appear to be only 2 statues of Nixon in the entire world. One is in the "Presidential City" display in Rapid City, South Dakota. The other is in Wakefield, on the Australian island of Tasmania, ordered by a local fan of his.

Rapid City

Nixon frequently features in time-travel and alternate-history pieces. These include Robert Wisdom as an alternate-history 5th-term Nixon in 1985 in the superhero film Watchmen in 2009, Stuart Milligan on Doctor Who in 2011, John H. Tobin in Transformers: Dark of the Moon the same year, Mark Camacho in X-Men: Days of Future Past in 2014, and Paul Ganus on DC's Legends of Tomorrow in 2019. Two films have been made about Nixon's 1970 meeting with Elvis Presley: He was played by Bob Gunton in Elvis Meets Nixon in 1997, and Kevin Spacey in Elvis & Nixon in 2016.

Among the other actors to play Nixon have been Rip Torn in Blind Ambition (based on the memoir of John Dean) in 1979, Philip Baker Hall in Secret Honor in 1984, Lane Smith in The Final Days in 1989, Anthony Hopkins in Oliver Stone's film Nixon in 1995,  Dan Hedaya in the comedy Dick in 1999, Frank Langella reprising his Tony Award-winning Broadway role in Frost/Nixon in 2008, and John Cusack in The Butler in 2013.

Ford is the only President whose Presidential Library and Presidential Museum are in 2 different locations: The former opened on April 27, 1981 at his Alma Mater, the University of Michigan; while the latter is in his hometown, Grand Rapids, Michigan, opening on September 18, 1981. He has a statue in the Capitol Rotunda in Washington, and a House of Representatives Office Building is named for him, due to his service as House Minority Leader.

Ford Statue, U.S. Capitol Building

Ford was born in Nebraska, but represented Michigan. He remains the only President with a significant connection to either of those States.

Despite looking and sounding nothing like Ford, Chevy Chase played him on Saturday Night Live. He was also played by Dick Crockett in The Pink Panther Strikes Again in 1976, Josef Sommer in The Betty Ford Story in 1987, Larry Lindsay in Hot Shots! Part Deux in 1993, Drew Snyder in Dark Skies in 1997, Jeffrey Ventimilia in That '70s Show in 1998, Corbin Bernsen in The Commission in 2003, and Bill Camp in Vice (about Ford's former Chief of Staff, Dick Cheney) in 2018.

The State where he was born, Nebraska, and the State where he grew up, Michigan, both have a Gerald R. Ford Freeway, and Interstate 70 in Eagle County in Colorado is the Gerald Ford Memorial Highway. In 2017, the USS Gerald R. Ford, a nuclear-powered aircraft carrier, CVN-78, was launched, and is the largest warship ever built.

So far, despite also having served in the Navy during World War II, Nixon doesn't have a ship named for him. Maybe he'll get a pirate ship.

As of August 9, 2022, Kissinger is the last surviving member of Nixon's Cabinet. (UPDATE: He lived until November 29, 2023, age 100.)

*

August 9, 1974 was a Friday. These Major League Baseball games were played on this historic day:

* The New York Yankees lost to the California Angels, 7-1 at Anaheim Stadium in the Los Angeles suburb of Anaheim, California. The ballpark is now named Angel Stadium of Anaheim. George "Doc" Medich was knocked out of the box in the 3rd inning, and Frank Tanana shut the Yankees down, other than Elliott Maddox and Lou Piniella, who each had 2 hits.

* The New York Mets beat the Cincinnati Reds, 4-1 at Shea Stadium. Bob Apodaca outpitched Fred Norman. Don Hahn hit a home run for the Mets. For the Reds, Pete Rose went 0-for-3 with a walk, and Johnny Bench went 1-for-4, his hit a homer for the Reds' only run.

* The Atlanta Braves beat the Philadelphia Phillies, 3-2 at Veterans Stadium. Darrell Evans drove in the winning run with a sacrifice fly in the top of the 11th inning. Hank Aaron did not start the game, but appeared as a pinch-hitter and drew a walk. Mike Schmidt went 2-for-5 with an RBI.

* The Pittsburgh Pirates beat the San Diego Padres, 7-3 at Three Rivers Stadium in Pittsburgh. Willie Stargell went 2-for-5. Rennie Stennett hit a home run. Dave Winfield went 2-for-4 for the Padres.

* The Chicago White Sox beat the Cleveland Indians 5-3 at Cleveland Municipal Stadium. Dick Allen, Pat Kelly and Jorge Orta homered for the South Siders, and Stan Bahnsen outpitched Gaylord Perry.

* The San Francisco Giants beat the Chicago Cubs, 3-0 at Wrigley Field in Chicago. Jim Barr pitched a 6-hit shutout, and was backed by home runs from Gary Mathews Sr. and Dave Kingman.

* The Minnesota Twins beat the Baltimore Orioles, 6-2 at Metropolitan Stadium in the Minneapolis suburb of Bloomington, Minnesota. Harmon Killebrew went 1-for-4 with an RBI, and Rod Carew went 2-for-4. Brooks Robinson went 0-for-3, but did draw a walk.

* The St. Louis Cardinals beat the Los Angeles Dodgers, 5-3 at Busch Memorial Stadium in St. Louis.

* The Kansas City Royals beat the Milwaukee Brewers, 13-3 at Royals Stadium in Kansas City. It was renamed Kauffman Stadium in 1993.

* The Montreal Expos beat the Houston Astros, 4-3 at the Astrodome in Houston.

* The Texas Rangers beat the Detroit Tigers, 4-3 at Arlington Stadium in the Dallas suburb of Arlington, Texas. Mike Hargrove singled home the winning run in the bottom of the 14th inning.

* And the Boston Red Sox beat Oakland Athletics, 6-2 at the Oakland Coliseum. Carl Yastrzemski went 0-for-4, but Rico Petrocelli hit a home run. Joe Rudi hit a home run, and Reggie Jackson went 2-for-4. But Bill Lee outpitched Ken Holtzman.

And basketball star Derek Fisher was born.

August 3, 1923: The Struggle to Inaugurate Calvin Coolidge

Artist's depiction of the Inauguration. There was no photographer present.

August 3, 1923: A new President of the United States must be sworn in. It becomes the most difficult Inauguration in the office's history. Not because of any external threat, real or imagined. And not because of any resistance to the peaceful transfer of power. But because of simple logistics, and the technology of the time.

Note: I originally had this entry as part of the one for the previous day, the death of Warren Harding. Then I checked to see if I had entries set in all 50 States, and found that I didn't have one for Vermont. So I chose this one, since it's probably the biggest thing ever to happen to Vermont.

At 10:30 PM, Eastern Time, the night before, President Warren G. Harding had died in San Francisco. Now, the Secret Service had to find the Vice President, Calvin Coolidge, former Governor of Massachusetts. Like Harding, he was escaping the Summer heat of Washington, D.C., staying at his family's homestead in Plymouth, Vermont, where he had been born on July 4, 1872. (This makes him, to this day, the only person born on the nation's birthday to become President.)

This was 1923, and less than half of all American homes had telephones. And the Coolidge Homestead did not have a telephone. But it shouldn't have been that hard to send a telegram. Well, they couldn't reach the Coolidge Homestead by telegram, either.

So, Secret Service Agents had to drive up from Boston, and knock on the front door of the Coolidge Homestead in the middle of the night. The unwitting new President's father, John Coolidge, a former Vermont State Senator, a notary public, and a justice of the peace, answered the door. The Agents discovered that this rural home -- 150 miles northwest of Boston, 100 miles northeast of Albany, and 100 miles southeast of Vermont's largest city, Burlington -- didn't even have electricity. The ceremony had to be conducted by candlelight.

At 2:47 AM Eastern Time -- meaning that, less than 100 years ago, there was a time when the nation didn't have a working President for over 4 hours -- Calvin Coolidge was administered the Oath of Office by his father. 

When John was asked by a reporter a few days later how he knew he could swear his son in, he said, "I didn't know that I couldn't." The legal basis for him being the person to swear the President in is a bit vague: He wasn't actually a judge, and every other person who has ever sworn a President in has been, at the very least, a judge.

Most have been the Chief Justice of the United States. This includes Salmon Chase, swearing in Andrew Johnson after the assassination of Abraham Lincoln in 1865; Harlan Stone, swearing in Harry Truman after the death of Franklin Roosevelt in 1945; and Warren Burger, swearing in Gerald Ford after the resignation of Richard Nixon in 1974. The others:

* April 30, 1789, George Washington, Federal Hall, New York: Robert Livingston, Chancellor of New York. In other words, the State's Chief Justice. There wasn't yet a Chief Justice of the country, because there wasn't yet a Supreme Court, because the Justices of that Court hadn't yet been appointed by the President, because there wasn't yet a President.

* April 6, 1841, John Tyler, Indian Queen Hotel, Washington: William Cranch, Chief Judge of the U.S. Circuit Court of the District of Columbia.

* July 10, 1850, Millard Fillmore, House of Representatives Chamber, U.S. Capitol, Washington: Cranch again.

* September 20, 1881, Chester Arthur, his apartment, New York: John R. Brady, a Justice of the Supreme Court of the State of New York.

* September 14, 1901, Theodore Roosevelt, Ansley Wilcox House, Buffalo, New York: John R. Hazel, Judge of the U.S. District Court for the Western District of New York.

* November 22, 1963, Lyndon Johnson, aboard Air Force One, Love Field, Dallas: Sarah T. Hughes, Judge of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Texas. She remains the only woman to administer the Oath of Office to an incoming President.

Thus sworn in by his father, President Calvin Coolidge went back to bed, helping to feed the legend that he slept too much while he was President. The next morning, Coolidge was driven to Rutland, Vermont, where he took a train to Boston, and then another to Washington, where, just to be on the safe side, he was sworn in again, by a federal Judge, Adolph A. Hoehling Jr.

Calvin Coolidge ran for a term of his own in 1924, and, untainted by the Teapot Dome scandal that had engulfed Harding, won easily. On March 4, 1925, at the Capitol, he got a proper Inauguration, sworn in by the Chief Justice, himself a former President, William Howard Taft.

John Coolidge died in 1926. Calvin Coolidge did not run for a 2nd full term in 1928, and left office on March 4, 1929, with the Inauguration of Herbert Hoover. He died on January 5, 1933. His Presidency had so little drama, and Coolidge himself had so little personality, that, when the writer Dorothy Parker was informed that he had died, she said, "How can you tell?"

The Forbes Library in Northampton, in the Berkshire Mountains of western Massachusetts, where he lived while he was Mayor, has been converted into the Calvin Coolidge Presidential Library. However, Coolidge Corner, outside Boston in Brookline, Massachusetts, is not named for him. Instead, it's named for the now-defunct Coolidge & Brother general store. Only one high school in America has been named for Coolidge, in the Takoma Park section of the Northwest quadrant of Washington, D.C.

Statue, Plymouth, Vermont

He was played by Ian Wolfe in The Court-Martial of Billy Mitchell in 1955, Ed Flanders in Backstairs at the White House in 1979, and Bruce McGill in Cristiada in 2012. (UPDATE: In 2023, he was played by Mark Landon Smith in Killers of the Flower Moon.)

Hoover ended up being the last surviving member of Coolidge's Cabinet, and also of Harding's, living until 1964.

Coolidge remains the last President born in Vermont. But none has ever represented the State in politics. Levi P. Morton, Vice President under Benjamin Harrison, was born in Vermont, but represented New York. The highest-ranking Vermont born politician is Patrick J. Leahy, who served as President Pro Tempore of the Senate from 2012 to 2015, and again from 2021 to 2023.

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August 3, 1923 was a Friday. It was the off-season for the NFL and the NHL, and the NBA hadn't been founded yet. And, out of respect to Harding, all games scheduled for August 3 were postponed. So there were no games on this historic day. The games would be again on August 10, the day of Harding's Washington funeral.

Actress Jean Hagen and fashion designer Anne Klein were born on this day.

March 4, 1933: The New Deal Begins

March 4, 1933: A new President is inaugurated, and it begins a new era in American history.

A few of our transfers of power have been fraught with worry:

* March 4, 1797: The 1st transfer of power, from George Washington to John Adams. It turned out not to be anything to worry about, but that was far from certain at the time, since no one, not even the brilliant and highly talented Adams, had Washington's gravitas.

* March 4, 1801: The 1st transfer of power from one party to another, from Adams, a member of the Federalist Party, to Thomas Jefferson, founder and leader of the Democratic-Republican Party, whose members called themselves "Republicans," but would eventually evolve into the Democratic Party. 

Once closely linked in the fight for independence, now estranged and bitter enemies, Adams had appointed what became known as "midnight judges" at the end of his Administration, with the intent of holding Jefferson back from perceived extreme measures. But Jefferson's 2 terms in office turned out to be comparatively peaceful. The friendship would later be restored.

* March 4, 1861: With the threat of civil war becoming very real, James Buchanan handed the Presidency over to Abraham Lincoln. Threats against Lincoln's life had already been made, and he practically had to sneak into Washington. He tried a conciliatory Inaugural Address. It didn't work.

* March 5, 1877: The disputed election that put Rutherford B. Hayes in as the next President, despite Samuel J. Tilden having received the most popular votes and, it appeared at first, the necessary Electoral votes, infuriated people to the point where another civil war seemed possible: The cry from the Democrats was "Tilden or blood!" And it wasn't officially settled until March 2. To complicate matters further, the usual Inauguration Day, March 4, fell on a Sunday: The official ceremony at the Capitol was set for the following day.

To simplify things, the outgoing President Ulysses S. Grant, suggested that Hayes take the Oath of Office in the White House on March 3, taking effect at noon on March 4, so that he would already be the President on March 5, so that the Inaugural ceremonies would essentially be going through the motions for public display. There was no violence.

* January 20, 1981: The 20th Amendment to the Constitution, ratified in 1933, had moved Inauguration Day up, largely because of the events of 1932-33. President Jimmy Carter, a Democrat, and President-elect Ronald Reagan, a Republican who had overwhelmingly defeated him in a bitter election, were not friendly with each other. But that wasn't the problem.

The problem was that Carter was finally close to getting 52 hostages released by Iran, but the Iranian government decided to keep them in custody until after noon, U.S. Eastern Time, to deny Carter a full victory. Their plane ended up clearing Iranian airspace at 12:35 PM Eastern. While Carter went to meet them at the U.S. Air Force base in Weisbaden, West Germany, it was Reagan who welcomed them to the White House, making it look like he was taking credit for it. He did nothing to make their release happen.

* January 20, 1993: Despite a bitter campaign, President George H.W. Bush, Republican, and President-elect Bill Clinton, Democratic, had made peace with each other in the transition. But there was a situation involving Iraq on the last day of Bush's term. Bush suggested that his national security team remain in charge for a few hours more, and Clinton agreed. Bush signed an Executive Order extending their terms by 4 hours. The situation was settled, and Clinton's team began their terms.

* January 20, 2001: Bush's son, George W. Bush, had emerged victorious over Clinton's Vice President, Al Gore, under dubious circumstances. There were protestors at the Capitol for the Inauguration, but there was no violence.

* January 20, 2017: Again under dubious circumstances, a Republican who did not win the popular vote took the office. This time, it was Donald Trump, the most underqualified incoming President ever, and the most psychologically unfit. Violence was feared. There was none.

* January 20, 2021: Joe Biden had beaten Trump, but after the attack on the Capitol while the Electoral Votes were being certified on January 6, people were afraid that another attack would be launched. This time, there was enough of a deterrent force on hand that the would-be second-time insurrectors did the smart thing, and stayed away.

If anything, the events of March 4, 1933 were fraught with even more worry than 2021 -- or even 1861.

*

For it was the depth of the Great Depression. Within 8 months of taking office as President on March 4, 1929, Herbert Hoover saw the stock market crash on his watch. He wasn't responsible for it. And it would be unfair to say he did nothing about it. A fairer statement would be that he didn't do enough things, and that he didn't take the things he did do, which did help a little, far enough.

So, in the 1932 election, he lost in a massive landslide to the Governor of New York, a Democrat, Franklin Delano Roosevelt. The interregnum between the election on November 8 and the Inauguration on March 4 was interminable, as a bitter Hoover, like Trump with Biden 88 years later, shared nothing with FDR and his team. Essentially, Hoover sabotaged his own best chance at leaving office on a high note.

As a result, things got worse. Banks were failing all over the country. People were terrified. The American economy was on the brink of complete collapse, more so than it had been during the "panics" of 1791, 1819, 1837, 1857, 1869, 1873, 1893 and 1907, even more so than during the Crash of 1929. And, as it turned out, more than during the Crash of 1987, the economic free-fall of 2008, and the drop during Spring 2020's coronavirus crisis.

Inauguration Day fell on a Saturday, and this may have been for the best, as the banks would have been closed anyway.

Roosevelt was sworn in by the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, Charles Evans Hughes, and made the most important Inaugural Address in the history of the office. It wasn't just the conditions that were the problem, it was the fear of the problem that he wanted to address, the fear that was making things worse. On that subject, it is fair to say that Hoover did nothing. Roosevelt addressed this right off the bat:

President Hoover, Mr. Chief Justice, my friends: I am certain that my fellow Americans expect that, on my induction into the Presidency, I will address them with a candor and a decision which the present situation of our Nation impels.

This is preeminently the time to speak the truth, the whole truth, frankly and boldly. Nor need we shrink from honestly facing conditions in our country today. This great Nation will endure as it has endured, will revive and will prosper.

So, first of all, let me assert my firm belief that the only thing we have to fear is fear itself: Nameless, unreasoning, unjustified terror which paralyzes needed efforts to convert retreat into advance. 

Despite a light rain falling on Washington for most of the day, the Inaugural crowd may have been the biggest in history to that point, and a great cheer went up.

Roosevelt promised "action, and action now!" He acted on it. Over the weekend, he set in motion the policies that embodied what he called, during the campaign, "a new deal for the American people." His New Deal measures included keeping the banks closed for a week, so they could straighten out their own situations. When they reopened on March 12, they were secure, and the nation's recovery began.

It would be long and slow, but FDR's New Deal measures helped millions of people get by. Had he only served 2 terms, and someone else had led the nation through World War II, FDR would still be remembered as one of the nation's greatest and most important Presidents. His leadership during World War II would put him up there with Washington and Lincoln as 1 of the 3 greatest.

Franklin Delano Roosevelt was inaugurated as President of the United States just 33 days after Adolf Hitler was appointed Chancellor of Germany, and the Nazi regime began. No one knew it at the time, but FDR and Hitler were on a collision course. A little more than 12 years later, both would be dead -- but one of them would be victorious. And for most of those 12 years, it wasn't clear which one that would be.

There have been, essentially, 4 eras of American history:

* The Colonial era, beginning with the arrival of Christopher Columbus in 1492 (note that I'm not saying that he "discovered America"), and lasting until the Declaration of Independence in 1776.

* The Revolutionary era, from the Declaration until the end of the Civil War in 1865.

* The next era, whatever name you want to give it, lasting from the end of the Civil War until the start of the New Deal in 1933.

* And the era that began with the New Deal. If you want to say that, sometime since 1933, that 4th era ended and a 5th era has begun, I don't know what your line of demarcation would be. Neither the resignation of Richard Nixon in 1974, nor the Inauguration of Reagan in 1981, nor that of Clinton in 1993, nor the 9/11 attacks of 2001, nor the arrival of Trump in 2017, nor the leaving of Trump in 2021 carries the same amount of historical weight, nor is likely to.

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March 4, 1933 was a Saturday. Roosevelt's appointee as Secretary of Labor, Frances Perkins, took office that same day, making her the 1st female member of any President's Cabinet. I have a separate entry for that distinction.

Baseball teams were starting Spring Training, the NFL was out of season, and the NBA hadn't been founded yet. There was only the NHL to provide games and scores. Even then, there were slim pickings:

* Only one American-based team was scheduled to play: The New York Americans lost to the Montreal Canadiens, 2-0 at the Montreal Forum.

* And, in a game broadcast on the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation's most popular radio show, which would become, and remains, the CBC's most popular television show, Hockey Night In Canada, the Toronto Maple Leafs beat the Montreal Maroons, 4-2 at Maple Leaf Gardens in Toronto.

* The Detroit Red Wings and the Ottawa Senators had last played on March 2, against each other at the Ottawa Auditorium, with the Wings winning 3-2. They would play each other again on March 5, at the Olympia Stadium in Detroit, with the Wings winning 2-0.

* The Chicago Black Hawks had also last played on March 2, beating the Americans 3-2 at Chicago Stadium. They would next play on March 5, also at the Stadium, losing to the Maple Leafs 2-1.

* The Boston Bruins had last played on February 28, against the Senators at the Boston Garden. It ended in a 0-0 tie.

* The New York Rangers hadn't played since February 26, a 4-1 win over the Hawks in Chicago. Their next game would also be the Bruins' next game, on March 5, at what was then called the new, but would eventually be called the old, Madison Square Garden, and the Bruins won 2-1.

Also, Arsenal beat Liverpool, 1-0 at Highbury in North London.

March 4, 1921: The "Return to Normalcy"

March 4, 1921: Having spent the last year and a half of his Presidency physically and politically paralyzed, Woodrow Wilson leaves the White House -- his dreams, his spirit, and for all intents and purposes his body broken. He is 62 years old, but seems considerably older.

He moved America forward in many ways, but very much backward in one of the most important ways: Race. All of his accomplishments, including making America a true world power for the first time through saving the Allies' bacon in World War I, must forever include the attachment, "Yes, but... "

Warren Gamaliel Harding is inaugurated as the 29th President of the United States. He and Wilson are the 1st incoming and outgoing Presidents to ride to the Inauguration in a car, rather than in a horse-drawn carriage.

The 55-year-old former Senator from Ohio had told America what it wanted to hear, campaigning on a turn away from the activist and internationalist ways of Wilson. With radio still in the process of being made public, no television, and no sound films, he made a phonograph record of his big speech, which was short on specifics, but had plenty of platitudes, and availed of alliteration:

America's present need is not heroics, but healing.

Not nostrums, but normalcy.

Not revolution, but restoration.

Not agitation, but adjustment.

Not surgery, but serenity.

Not the dramatic, but the dispassionate.

Not experiment, but equipoise.

Not submergence in internationality, but sustainment in triumphant nationality.

In other words, the occasional need to go back to a simpler time, before liberal Presidents made big demands of us. You know: "Morning in America." And "Make America great again."

The word "normalcy" had been in use before the 1920 campaign. It should have been "normality," but the Harding campaign used the theme of "Return to Normalcy," and America wanted that, and he won in a landslide.

Harding was sworn in by Chief Justice Edward D. White, on the East Portico of the Capitol. Outgoing Governor Calvin Coolidge of Massachusetts was sworn in as Vice President.

During the previous year's campaign, journalist H.L. Mencken wrote, "As democracy is perfected, the office of President represents, more and more closely, the inner soul of the people. On some great and glorious day the plain folks of the land will reach their heart's desire at last and the White House will be adorned by a downright moron."

Of Harding's Inaugural Address, Mencken wrote, "It is rumble and bumble. It is flap and doodle. It is balder and dash. But I grow lyrical." Harding began:

My Countrymen: When one surveys the world about him after the great storm, noting the marks of destruction, and yet rejoicing in the ruggedness of the things which withstood it, if he is an American, he breathes the clarified atmosphere with a strange mingling of regret and new hope.

We have seen a world passion spend its fury, but we contemplate our Republic unshaken, and hold our civilization secure. Liberty -- liberty within the law -- and civilization are inseparable, and though both were threatened, we find them now secure. And there comes to Americans the profound assurance that our representative government is the highest expression and surest guaranty of both.

And he rambled on -- to use the term often associated with Harding, "bloviated" -- in that vein for about half an hour.

Harding may have wanted a "return to normalcy," and the nation may have gotten that in terms of international relations. At home, though, the decade became known as the Roaring Twenties.

The general public knows that Harding is a friend of Thomas Edison. What it does not know is that he is not exactly the brightest bulb in the chandelier. Also not generally known: He is terribly corrupt, with a Cabinet nearly as thieving as Ulysses S. Grant's; a compulsive womanizer, on a scale surpassing any President before him and competitive with some who came after him; and a man every bit as sick as Wilson. Within 2½ years of his Inauguration, he dies of a heart attack, just as the Teapot Dome scandal was beginning to be reported. His wife, Florence, known as "The Duchess," was a piece of work, too.

Richard Norton Smith is a conservative who has served as director of the Presidential Libraries of Abraham Lincoln, Herbert Hoover, Dwight D. Eisenhower, Gerald Ford and Ronald Reagan. He was honored by the Presidential Library of John F. Kennedy. He has written biographies of Hoover, Ford, George Washington, and unsuccessful Presidential candidates Thomas E. Dewey and Nelson Rockefeller. And, as a former aide to unsuccessful Presidential candidate Bob Dole, he ran the Dole Institute of Politics at the University of Kansas.

He knows as much about the Presidency as any person alive as of March 4, 2022. He knows plenty about his fellow Republican Harding. He has said that Harding had "the creepiest Administration in American history," and included Florence as part of the reason. (This, of course, was before Donald Trump took office.)

Still fairly popular for a few years, by the time the 1920s ended with a crash, his reputation crashed as well. The Hardings were buried together in their shared hometown of Marion, Ohio, first in a temporary vault, and then in a monumental tomb. By the time it opened in 1929, all the scandals had come out, and the oversized memorial became an embarrassment. He is still regarded as one of the worst Presidents, his accomplishments all but forgotten (and not a big deal anyway).

As sick as he was, Wilson managed to outlive Harding by 6 months, and attended his funeral, although he remained inside his car, to protect him from the August heat in Washington. He had become the only former President ever to stay in Washington to live. His house at 2340 S Street NW, on Embassy Row, is the only Presidential house in DC open as a museum.

Wilson is also the only President laid to rest in Washington, at the National Cathedral. William Howard Taft and John F. Kennedy are in Arlington National Cemetery, and George Washington on the grounds of his home in Mount Vernon, both right across the Potomac River.

*

March 4, 1921 was a Friday. Baseball was in Spring Training. Football was out of season. Professional basketball barely existed. And no games were scheduled for the NHL. So there were no scores on this historic day.

March 4, 1873: Ulysses S. Grant's Frozen Inauguration

March 4, 1873: President Ulysses S. Grant is inaugurated for a 2nd term. It was the coldest Inauguration Day in history to that point: 16 degrees Fahrenheit, with a wind-chill factor of -15.

Regardless of temperature, things were different at the time: First the parade; then, the Inaugural Address and swearing-in of the Vice President-elect by the outgoing Vice President, in this case, former Senator Henry Wilson, sworn in by Schuyler Colfax; then the President-elect (or the re-elected President) would deliver an Inaugural Address; and, finally, the President would be sworn in by the Chief Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court, in this case, Salmon P. Chase.

Grant requested the Bible be open to Isaiah, Chapter 11, a chapter about "Christ's Peaceable Kingdom,", which was symbolic to Grant's view of post-Civil War America. The passage also referred to "the stem of Jesse," which was also the name of Grant's father. (Grant was the 1st President who had both of his parents live to see him achieve the office.)

His Inaugural Address began with a defense of his policy in the South, gave a statement of support for black freedmen, and celebrated the success of Reconstruction. He also praised technological advances, and spoke against his political enemies.

The Inaugural Ball was disastrous. It was held in a temporary structure built on Judiciary Square, which was not heated. Guests danced in their coats. Desserts congealed. The champagne froze. Musicians struggled to play. Canaries, which were to be part of the entertainment, died in their cages. The room was designed for 6,000 guests, but only half that number attended. The President and the Cabinet didn't get in until 11:30 P.M., and stayed for a short time before moving on to a private, heated room for supper. By Midnight, the event was over.

It was a bad omen: Grant had a very difficult 2nd term. Not as difficult as Vice President Wilson, though: He was in poor health for a big chunk of it, and died with over a year to go.

Despite Inauguration Day having been moved from March 4 to January 20 by the 20th Amendment to the Constitution in 1933, there has been only 1 colder one since: Ronald Reagan's 2nd Inauguration, in 1985. The ceremony was moved inside the Capitol Rotunda, and the Parade was canceled. Grant's 1873 swearing-in was held outdoors. The only other indoor ceremony, due to slushy grounds, came in 1909, when William Howard Taft was inaugurated in the Capitol's Senate chamber.

UPDATE: In 2025, Donald Trump was inaugurated in the Rotunda, officially due to the cold. But it wasn't as cold as it was in 1873. Or 1985. Or 1909. Or 1961. Or 1973. Or 1993. Or 2009. Trump was a coward, either with cold, or a with seeing the crowd coming to see it being too small.

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March 4, 1873 was a Tuesday. The only professional team sport in America at this point was baseball, and the season hadn't started yet. So there were no scores on this historic day.

January 21, 2017: Women Return Fire On Trump

Demonstrators dressed as "suffragettes,"

advocating votes for women, 100 years earlier,

prior to the ratification of the 19th Amendment

An evil man as President would be bad enough. A stupid man who doesn't have a freakin' clue as to how the job works would be bad enough. A weak man who lets others push him into bad policy would be bad enough.

January 20, 2017: An evil man, a stupid man, and a weak man walked into the White House. And Donald Trump was all three. And that's no joke. But now, we all needed to walk into a bar.

Actually, what we needed was to march. But I'm getting ahead of myself.

January 21, 2017: The Women's March is held, in locations all over the world, in protest of Trump and the way he personally, and his policies in general, treat women. The largest march is in Washington, attracting about 200,000 people -- about 1/3rd as many people as attended Trump's Inauguration the day before. In total, the marches were estimated at attracting 4 million.

According to organizers, the goal was to "send a bold message to our new administration on their first day in office, and to the world that women's rights are human rights" -- reflecting a speech given by Hillary Clinton in China in 1995.

You can read the sign held by the cosplaying protester above. Here's another, from a woman who supported various women's rights before they were enshrined into law, and had come back hard:

During the 2016 election, feminists had warned that Trump would appoint Justices to the Supreme Court that would rule to overturn Roe v. Wade and the right to an abortion. But enough people believed Trump's lies about his abilities, and about Mrs. Clinton's alleged flaws, that he won the Electoral Vote, if not the popular vote. Sure enough: Trump appointed Neal Gorsuch, Brett Kavanaugh and Amy Comey Barrett to the Supreme Court.

In 2017, the #MeToo movement gained momentum, as women began to use social media to spread stories about how men had used whatever power they had to abuse women, from "the bedroom" to the boardroom. Time magazine chose "The Silence Breakers" as their collective Persons of the Year.

The cover showed singer Taylor Swift, actress Ashley Judd, software engineer Susan Fowler, lobbyist Adama Iwu, an immigrant strawberry picker who used the pseudonym Isabel Pascual, and a 6th woman, a hospital worker who wished to remain anonymous, and so only her right arm was shown. 

Among the other women featured in the cover article were actresses Alyssa Milano, Tarana Burke, Selma Blair, Rose McGowan; journalists Megyn Kelly (who had supported Trump on Fox News, before criticizing him and facing his vulgar wrath in a campaign speech) and Jane Merrick; Oregon State Senator Sara Gelser; and 7 plaintiffs in a lawsuit against the Plaza Hotel in New York, formerly owned by Trump. They also featured one man who came forward with a story of sexual abuse: Football player-turned-actor Terry Crews.

In the 2020 Presidential election,, women voted for Joe Biden over Donald Trump, 57 percent to 42; unmarried women were for Biden, 62-36; black women were for Biden, 90-9; and Latina women were for Biden, 69-30. White women were still 55-44 for Trump, many of them simply voting the same way as their husbands. (White men were for Trump, 61-38.)

Women made the difference in defeating Trump. It was called "Roevember."

UPDATE: In 2022, Trump's Court appointees joined with John Roberts, Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito in a 6-3 vote that struck Roe down. And in 2024, Trump got back in, largely because a majority of white women chose being white over being women. It was also in part because a larger number of Hispanic men chose Trump over Vice President Kamala Harris, choosing being men over being Hispanic. In each case, they thought it would protect them against Trump's abuses over the next 4 years. They found out how wrong they were.

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January 21, 2017 was a Saturday. Baseball was out of season. Football was between rounds of the Playoffs. There were 11 games in the NBA:

* The New York Knicks lost to the Phoenix Suns, 107-105 at Madison Square Garden.

* The Brooklyn Nets lost to the Charlotte Hornets, 112-105 at the Spectrum Center in Charlotte.

* The Portland Trail Blazers beat the Boston Celtics, 127-123 in overtime at the TD Garden in Boston. Isaiah Thomas (not to be confused with Isiah Thomas) scored 41 in defeat.

* The Atlanta Hawks beat the Philadelphia 76ers, 110-93 at the Philips Arena (now the State Farm Arena) in Atlanta.

* The Miami Heat beat the Milwaukee Bucks, 109-97 at the American Airlines Arena (now the Kaseya Center) in Miami.

* The Houston Rockets beat the Memphis Grizzlies, 119-95 at the FedEx Forum in Memphis.

* The San Antonio Spurs beat the Cleveland Cavaliers, 118-105 in overtime at the Quicken Loans Arena (now the Rocket Mortgage Arena) in Cleveland. Kawhi Leonard scored 41 points for the Spurs.

* The Detroit Pistons beat the Washington Wizards, 113-112 at the The Palace in the Detroit suburb of Auburn Hills, Michigan.

* The Chicago Bulls beat the Sacramento Kings, 102-99 at the United Center in Chicago. DeMarcus Cousins scored 42 in defeat.

* The Denver Nuggets beat the Los Angeles Clippers, 123-98 at the Pepsi Center (now the Ball Arena) in Denver.

* And the Utah Jazz beat the Indiana Pacers, 109-100 at the Vivint Arena (as the Delta Center was then known) in Salt Lake City, Utah.

There were 11 games in the NHL:

* The New York Islanders beat the Los Angeles Kings, 4-2 at the Barclays Center.

* The New Jersey Devils beat the Philadelphia Flyers, 4-1 at the Wells Fargo Center (now the Xfinity Mobile Arena) in Philadelphia.

* The Buffalo Sabres beat the Montreal Canadiens, 3-2 at the Bell Centre in Montreal. Zach Bogosian scored the winning goal, with 3:12 left in overtime.

* The Ottawa Senators beat their arch-rivals, the Toronto Maple Leafs, 3-2 in a shootout at the Air Canada Centre (now the Scotiabank Arena) in Toronto.

* The Columbus Blue Jackets beat the Carolina Hurricanes, 3-2 at the Nationwide Arena in Columbus.

* The Washington Capitals beat the Dallas Stars, 4-3 at the American Airlines Center in Dallas. Jay Beagle scored the winning goal, 19 seconds into overtime.

* The Minnesota Wild beat the Anaheim Ducks, 5-3 at the Xcel Energy Center in St. Paul, Minnesota.

* The Winnipeg Jets beat the St. Louis Blues, 5-3 at the MTS Centre (now the Canada Life Centre) in Winnipeg.

* The Arizona Coyotes beat the Tampa Bay Lightning, 5-3 at the Gila River Arena (now the Desert Diamond Arena) in the Phoenix suburb of Glendale, Arizona.

* The Edmonton Oilers won their "Battle of Alberta" rivalry with the Calgary Flames, 7-3 at the Saddledome in Calgary.

* And the San Jose Sharks beat the Colorado Avalanche, 3-2 at the SAP Center in San Jose. David Schlemko scored the winning goal, with 3:42 left in overtime.