Hail to the Chiefs! Trivia Quiz

Thomas Jefferson (1743-1826) was the third U.S. president, following George Washington and John Adams. He served for two terms, between 1801 and 1809, before retiring at the age of 66. He then continued to be politically active and died at the age of 83 on July 4th, 1826: 50 years to the day since the Declaration of Independence was formally adopted.

As an additional co-incidence, the second president, John Adams, died on the very same day, a few hours after Jefferson.

The seventh U.S. president was Andrew Jackson (1767-1845). Before becoming president, he had a successful military career, which helped to build him support when he decided to run for president. After an unsuccessful campaign in 1824, he was elected president in the 1828 election and re-elected for a second term in 1832.

He left office in 1837, and died eight years later, in 1845, at the age of 78.

The Democrat James Knox Polk (1795-1849) was the 11th U.S. president, preceded by John Tyler and succeeded by Zachery Taylor. In the run-up to the 1844 presidential election. Polk actively sought the Democratic nomination for vice-president but ended up as his party's presidential candidate when none of the main contenders were able to gain the necessary support.

In the election itself he narrowly defeated the Whig candidate, Henry Clay, and found himself president. In the event, his term of office was relatively successful, but he decided not to run for a second term and retired in 1849. Shortly afterwards he contracted cholera and died.

Millard Fillmore (1800-1874) was the 13th president of the United States and held office between 1850 and 1853. At the 1848 presidential election he ran alongside Zachery Taylor as members of the Whig Party and became Taylor's vice-president in 1849. In 1850 Taylor unexpectedly died, probably of gastroenteritis, and Fillmore succeeded him as president. During his presidency he made a number of enemies within his own party and was not nominated to run again for the Whigs at the 1852 election.

As a result, he left office in 1853 having served less than a full term.

Andrew Johnson (1808-1875) became the 17th president of the United States when his predecessor, Abraham Lincoln, was assassinated in 1865. In fact, the Lincoln conspirators originally intended to kill Johnson as well on the same day, but the conspirator assigned to kill him, George Atzerodt, got cold feet and got drunk in a hotel bar instead. Johnson served out his term but was not selected to stand in his own right at the 1868 election, and thus left office in 1869.

The 21st president of the United States was Chester Arthur (1829-1886). He was the second vice-president to be forced to assume the role when his predecessor was assassinated, after Andrew Johnson (Lincoln's successor). In Arthur's case, the assassinated president was James Garfield, who was shot by Charles Guiteau in 1881, only a few months into his term of office. Arthur therefore served from 1881 until 1885.

He suffered from ill health throughout his presidency and retired at the end of his first term.

He died the following year of a cerebral haemorrhage aged 57.

Serving as the 28th president of the U.S., Thomas Woodrow Wilson (1856-1924) was in office for two full terms, from 1913 to 1921. He was thus president throughout the First World War. When that conflict broke out, the U.S. remained neutral, but in 1917 (following his re-election) Wilson's government declared war on Germany and her allies, citing the sinking of American merchant ships by German submarines.

After the war, Wilson was a key player in setting up the League of Nations, which led to his being awarded the Nobel peace Prize in 1919.

He died in 1924 aged 67.

Warren G. Harding (1865-1923) was the 29th president of the United States. He took office in 1921 after winning the 1920 presidential election. He appeared to be in good health, but died unexpectedly of a heart attack on August 2nd, 1923, aged 57, and was succeeded by his vice-president, Calvin Coolidge.

He was relatively popular during his time in office, but after his death various scandals came to light which served to damage his reputation. These included the so-called "Teapot Dome Scandal" (involving illegal development of oil reserves) and a secret affair with his mistress, Nan Britton, which produced an illegitimate child.

The 33rd U.S. president was Harry S. Truman (1884-1972), who served from 1945 until 1953. He was elected vice-president in the 1944 election and formally took up the role in January 1945, serving under Franklin D. Roosevelt. However, Roosevelt died only three months into his fourth term as president, and Truman took over. He therefore saw the U.S. through to the end of the Second World War, personally authorising the use of the two atomic bombs dropped on Japan in August 1945.

He stood as president in his own right at the 1948 election, defeating his Republican opponent Thomas Dewey in a very close-run vote. He chose not to stand again for a second full term in 1952, choosing to retire undefeated, and lived for another 20 years, dying in 1972 at the age of 88.

Gerald Ford was the 38th president of the United States. He held the unusual distinction of serving as both vice-president and president despite having been elected to neither position. While serving as House Minority Leader in the House of Representatives, he was appointed vice-president in 1973 when Spiro Agnew resigned after a financial scandal.

Then in August 1974 Richard Nixon resigned over the Watergate scandal, and Ford found himself president. He served for two years but lost to Jimmy Carter at the 1976 presidential election.

He continued to be active in politics and lived on until December 2006, when he died aged 93.