Mr. President, If You Please... Quiz

Answer: Bill Clinton

Clinton's stepfather, Roger Clinton, joined the family in 1950, when the future president was just four years old. Yet Clinton refused to legally change his name from Blythe until he was fourteen. Known as "Billy" for much of his youth, Clinton ran successfully for president on the Democratic ticket as "Bill" in 1992 (defeating George HW Bush), and he won re-election in 1996 over Bob Dole.

Answer: Harding

Warren Gamaliel Harding (Warren G. Harding) was the 29th president of the United States, and he served from 1921 until he suffered a fatal heart attack while still in office in 1923. Harding's presidency is best remembered for political scandals such as the Teapot Dome, where Secretary of the Interior Albert Fall accepted a bribe to lease oil lands in Wyoming to Harry Sinclair. Harding's wife, jealous of his love affairs that possibly fathered an illegitimate child while he was in office, is suspected by conspiracy theorists of poisoning him.

Answer: Leslie Lynch King, Jr.

Born Leslie Lynch King, Jr., in Omaha, Nebraska in 1913, Ford was the 38th president of the United States, serving from 1974-1976. His mother divorced his father less than six months after he was born, and King lived with his mother. She remarried in 1916 to Gerald Rudolff Ford Sr., and their son's name was changed from Leslie Lynch King to Gerald Rudolph Ford.

As a young man, Ford became an Eagle Scout and played on the football team at the University of Michigan; his ascendence to the presidency only occurred through a sequence of coincidences that allowed him to gain leadership without being elected on a major party ticket.

After Spiro Agnew resigned the vice presidency in December 1973, Ford took the spot, and he became president upon Richard Nixon's resignation in August 1974.

Answer: Millard Fillmore

Born in 1800 to Nathaniel Fillmore and Phoebe Millard, Millard Fillmore notably is the only president to have the same run of three letters (ILL) in his first name and his last name. He was selected as Vice President on Zachary Taylor's Whig ticket for the 1848 election, mainly because he would help carry the major state of New York; when Taylor died in office, Fillmore became the 13th president of the United States. Probably the most important event during Fillmore's presidency was the Compromise of 1850, which staved off civil war for another decade.

Answer: Ulysses S. Grant

Ulysses S. Grant was born as Hiram Ulysses Grant, and his presidency mediocrity is often overshadowed by his successful military career. At West Point, an error by Congressman Thomas Hamer turn Hiram Ulysses Grant into Ulysses S. Grant, and the name stuck, because of its patriotism (US Grant, or Uncle Sam Grant). Appointed by President Lincoln as the Union commander during the American Civil War, Grant's victories as the Battles of Shiloh and Vicksburg earned him public respect, even though his alcoholism and sloppiness were notorious. At the battle of Donelson, Grant earned the nickname "Unconditional Surrender" for his initials and for the only terms he would accept from the Confederates.

As a president, Grant was much less successful. Scandals such as Credit Mobilier and Whiskey Ring permeated his Cabinet, and his immense popularity after the war declined steadily. Although he won two elections in 1868 and 1872, he declined to run in 1876.

Answer: Richard Nixon

Nixon was born in California in 1913 to Francis Nixon and Hannah Milhous Nixon, a strict Quaker mother. From a relatively poor family with a strict upbringing, Nixon earned a scholarship to Duke University's law school, which would signal his future in politics.

After losing to John F. Kennedy in the extremely close 1960 presidential election, Nixon dropped out of the public sight; his ability to revive from obscurity to win the 1968 presidential election over Hubert Humphrey was remarkable. It probably wasn't Nixon's middle name that was most embarrassing for him as president, though; despite his strong foreign policy record, Nixon will be remembered for his role in the Watergate affair, which caused him to be the first-ever president to resign the office.

Answer: Grover Cleveland

Stephen Grover Cleveland was born in 1837 to Presbyterian minister Richard Falley Cleveland and mother Ann Cleveland. Cleveland worked as a sheriff in New York City (where he hanged a man, probably the first president to do so), as well as serving as the mayor of Buffalo and the governor of New York, before running for president in 1884.

After defeating James G. Blaine in a spirited election, Cleveland lost to Benjamin Harrison in the election of 1888, but he regained the office over Harrison as the first president to serve non-consecutive terms in the Election of 1892.

By the way, the city of Cleveland in Ohio was not named for Grover, nor was Grover named for the city.

Answer: Rutherfraud B. Hayes

Rutherford B. Hayes won the Election of 1876, also known as the "Stolen Election", as an underdog. When election returns from southern states invariably announced Samuel Tilden, his Democratic opponent, as the winner, Republican newspapers and leaders instead threw out the results and reported that Hayes had won. Several chaotic months followed, as the people were unable to know who had won, and election officials were bribed or blackmailed to support one side or the other. Eventually, an election commission was formed with the intention of choosing the president, and a partisan vote-line made an 8-7 vote for Hayes.

The Democrats responded by ripping Rutherford into "Rutherfraud". After serving until 1880, Hayes never ran for a second term.

Answer: Woodrow Wilson

Born in 1856, Thomas Woodrow Wilson was named after his maternal grandfather, the Rev. Dr. Thomas Woodrow. Wilson was an academic, becoming president of Princeton University in 1902 and serving until 1910; it was only two years later that he was elected president in an election featuring three candidates: Progressive Bull Moose Theodore Roosevelt, incumbent William Howard Taft, and Wilson.

After his election in 1912, Wilson won a second term under the campaign promise "He kept us out of war", but he engaged the United States in World War I after the sinking of the Lusitania by German U-Boats and the Zimmerman telegram threatened national security.

After the war, he established what would become the precursor to the UN, the League of Nations, although the United States never joined the international organization.

Answer: Hussein

Barack Hussein Obama, Jr., was born in Hawaii in 1961, the first president not to be born in the contiguous 48 states. From age six to ten, he lived in Indonesia; after moving back to Hawaii, he was able to attend college in Los Angeles before entering Harvard Law School. Elected senator from Illinois in 2004, Obama's immediate run for the presidency seemed out-of-place, but his defeat of Hillary Clinton in the Democratic primaries and John McCain in the general election earned him the 2008 presidential election.