Here's Where It Gets Interesting - Deaths in the White House

Episode Date: December 7, 2022

On this episode of Here’s Where It Gets Interesting, let’s take a brief look at the history of some past presidential deaths–how they happened and what happened after. How has the U.S. government responded to the death of our nation’s leaders? Some of the traditions may surprise you. Do you know which president’s death revolutionized the funeral and embalming industry? Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Buy from dysoncanada.ca. With ANC on, performance may vary based on environmental conditions and usage. Accessories sold separately. Hello, friends. Welcome. I am so glad you're here with me for another episode of Here's Where It Gets Interesting. interesting. Last time we talked a bit about the death of former President William Henry Harrison, who caught pneumonia shortly after he gave his two-hour inauguration speech in the cold while refusing to wear a coat. And then he passed away a month later, which gave him the distinction of becoming the first president to die while in office. But he was certainly not the only one to meet an early end. So let's take a brief look at the history of some past presidential deaths, how they happened, and what happened afterward. How has the U.S. government responded to the death of our nation's leaders?

I'm Sharon McMahon, and here's where it gets interesting. I'm Sharon McMahon, and here's where it gets interesting. In addition to William Henry Harrison, three other U.S. presidents died from an illness or complications from a disease while in office. Zachary Taylor, Warren G. Harding, and Franklin Delano Roosevelt. Taylor had a gastrointestinal illness that resulted in a quick passing. Harding suffered from a heart attack and Roosevelt from a cerebral hemorrhage while he sat for a portrait painting in Warm Springs, Georgia. But four more presidents died another way, by assassination. James Garfield was the 20th president of the United States, and while his time in office lasted a bit longer than William Henry Harrison's, it wasn't by much.

Four months into his presidency, he was shot. He succumbed to the damage and died two months later, making his presidency the second shortest at only 200 days in office. later, making his presidency the second shortest at only 200 days in office. In 1881, Garfield entered office seeking to unite a fractured Republican Party, a bickering governing body, and a country still picking up the pieces after the Civil War. However, a man named Charles Guiteau wasn't happy with Garfield's new political appointments. The biggest chip on Guiteau's shoulder was that he specifically was not given an appointment. The failed lawyer and mediocre writer thought he should be named as the ambassador to Paris. He had considered himself instrumental in getting the Republican leader, Garfield, elected.

He had not. And believed he was owed the Paris Post. Garfield didn't agree, which enraged Charles Guiteau, who declared that the president was not only an enemy to him, but an enemy to all. Guiteau grew more bitter and more reckless. He considered himself a, quote, mess Messiah for the nation and made the decision to get rid of Garfield so that Vice President Chester Arthur could take over as the true leader. On the morning of July 2nd, 1881, Guiteau tracked Garfield to a train station in the nation's capital. Guiteau used a carefully selected.44 caliber British bulldog gun, and this will tell

you how deeply disturbed he was. He chose it because he thought it would appear impressive in a museum. He shot the president twice. The first shot grazed Garfield's arm and the second shot lodged itself in his pancreas. In his pocket, Guiteau carried a letter addressed to the White House that read, the president's tragic death was a sad necessity, but it will unite the Republican Party and save the Republic. As he was arrested, he repeatedly yelled, Arthur is president now! A host of doctors furiously tried to locate the bullet in President Garfield's body in the effort to save his life. And if you're squeamish, you might want to turn on this part. The well-meaning physicians only worsened the damage by using their unsterilized fingers and instruments to probe the wound,

searching for the bullet. They couldn't find it, but they definitely introduced a whole slew of germs that would later blossom into a full-blown infection. Unable to find the bullet, they called in an inventor by the name of Alexander Graham Bell. Maybe you've heard of him, who had just invented a metal detector. But their last-ditch efforts didn't work, mostly because, get this, Garfield was being scammed with the metal detector while he was laying on a metal bed. Ironically, medical historians believe that if the bullet had been left alone, Garfield would have survived, similar to how Andrew Jackson lived most of his life with a bullet inside his chest. But the prevailing medical belief at the time was that the bullet

needed to be removed for survival, even though in the end, it was the poking and prodding that brought on the infection that eventually killed James Garfield. Technically, what killed James Garfield was medical malpractice. That's what we would call it today. But at the time, they were doing the best they could. He died on September 19th, 1881, about two months after the shooting. Imagine living with that bullet wound for two months. As was Charles Guiteau's plan, Chester Arthur served as the new president. From jail, Guiteau wrote the new commander-in-chief a creepy personal letter that stated, my inspiration is a godsend to you and I presume that you will appreciate it. Never think of Garfield's removal as a murder. It was an act of God resulting from political

necessity for which he was responsible. Guiteau was found guilty of murder and hanged on June 30, guilty of murder and hanged on June 30, 1882, two days before the first anniversary of when he shot Garfield on that busy train platform. James Garfield was given three very simple funerals, one in Elberon, New Jersey, where he had died, another in Washington, D.C., when his body lay in state at the Capitol for three days for the public to pay their respects, and the third in Cleveland, Ohio, where he was permanently laid to rest. Steadfastly by Garfield's side through the train station shooting to his death was his Secretary of the War, Robert Todd Lincoln, the son of assassinated 16th President Abraham Lincoln. And in a twist of life's cruel ironies, Robert Todd Lincoln ended up in close contact with three, three presidential assassinations during the course of his life. What are the odds? How did Robert Todd Lincoln have to feel about this fact? It is fascinating.

At the turn of the 20th century, popular President William McKinley won a second term and set off on a tour of the United States to celebrate with his wife Ida by his side. But portions of the presidential tour were postponed due to Ida's health complications, and a trip to the 1901 Buffalo Pan American Exposition, a World's Fair that highlighted the latest cultures, achievements, and inventions, was delayed until the fall. William and Ida McKinley made a grand arrival by traveling over the Pan Am Expo's triumphal causeway and entering the fairgrounds in an open carriage accompanied by troops, military bands, and mounted honor guard. Once the grandiose parade was over. The military dispersed and President McKinley entered the expo with the protection of only a few aides. Earlier that summer, a reclusive anarchist by the name of Leon Kolgosh moved to Buffalo and began spending his spare time walking the Pan Am fairgrounds. Leon had grown up in the Midwest and after a series of multiple layoffs

from steel mills in the late 19th century, he joined the anarchist movement of Emma Goldman. Emma Goldman was a Russian-born writer and lecturer who spoke about anarchist philosophy, women's rights, and other social issues. She often attracted huge crowds when she spoke, and Leon attended her lectures frequently, attracted by her philosophies about the rights of laborers. Burying himself further in anarchist ideas, Leon began to view President McKinley as the ultimate enemy of the working people of America. When he heard that the president would be making a stop in Buffalo, he viewed it as his destiny, his way to secure his place in the history books, to assassinate William McKinley. Leon had found his place in the front of the president's receiving

line in the music building at the expo, and seven minutes into the event, he came face to face with the president, shooting him twice in the abdomen. When he was in police custody, Leon confessed, saying, I killed President McKinley because I'd done my duty. I didn't believe one man should have so much service and another man should have none. He was the enemy of the good people, much service and another man should have none. He was the enemy of the good people, the working people. McKinley was taken to the medical facility at the expo where doctors worked on his injuries by, you guessed it, trying to locate the bullet. His vice president, Teddy Roosevelt, members of his cabinet, and even Robert Todd Lincoln rushed to his side in Buffalo. They all initially believed that he would heal from the wounds and return to Washington. However, McKinley had an epic case of

gangrene brewing from his bullet wounds. In another case of so close, Thomas Edison was in Buffalo at the expo displaying his new x-ray machine. He offered to let the doctors use it on McKinley to check the bullet sites, but the doctors declined because they were afraid of the possible side effects. Had they used it, perhaps they would have been able to quickly locate the bullet and would have been able to contain the infection. Maybe McKinley would have been able to contain the infection. Maybe McKinley would have been saved. As McKinley's condition began to worsen, Teddy Roosevelt was located in upstate New York and immediately began to head back to Buffalo. McKinley passed away before he could

make it to his side and Theodore Roosevelt re-entered Buffalo as the 26th President of the United States. Fun fact, Teddy Roosevelt was also later shot, but he did not die. He was shot while giving a speech and continued speaking while blood soaked his shirt. speaking while blood soaked his shirt. McKinley's body was taken by train to Washington, D.C. on September 16th and placed in the East Room, where an honor guard stood by it through the night. The room had been filled with flowers, fruit trees, and palm trees, and McKinley's wife Ida sat among them as she spent hours praying at his coffin. The next day, his coffin was taken to the Capitol Building for a state funeral. It was accompanied there by a large military procession through the streets of Washington

while mourners gathered at the sides of the streets. McKinley's assassination changed the way the Secret Service was employed. Remember, he traveled around the Buffalo Pan Am Expo with only a few aides at his side. The Secret Service existed, but it was primarily a branch of the Treasury, and its employees were primarily tasked with the preventing of counterfeiting, not protecting government officials. McKinley did travel with some of these Secret Service members, but after his death, the Secret Service's responsibilities were updated to include protection of the president.

The agency would eventually transform again after the November 1963 death of our 35th president, John F. Kennedy. I'm Jenna Fisher. And I'm Angela Kinsey. We are best friends. And together, we have the podcast Office Ladies, where we rewatched every single episode of The Office with insane behind-the-scenes stories, hilarious guests, and lots of laughs. Guess who's sitting next to me?

Steve! Ah! It is my girl in the studio! Every Wednesday, we'll be sharing even more exclusive stories from the office and our friendship with brand new guests, and we'll be digging into our mailbag to answer your questions and comments.

So join us for brand new Office Lady 6.0 episodes every Wednesday. Plus, on Mondays, we are taking a second drink. You can revisit all the Office Ladies rewatch episodes every Monday with new bonus tidbits before every episode. Well, we can't wait to see you there. Follow and listen to Office Ladies on the free Odyssey app and wherever you get your podcasts. You may be familiar with the short Zapruder film of President Kennedy's motorcade traveling through Dealey Plaza in Dallas, Texas.

While the footage is silent, viewers can infer when the shots hit Kennedy. The first one causes the president to slump over, and First Lady Jackie Kennedy turns to him trying to figure out what is wrong. When the second shot hits the president, Jackie panics and crawls over the back of the car to reach for help from someone behind them. Just under an hour later, President John F. Kennedy was officially pronounced dead. A very important thing happened after Kennedy's death. Vice President Lyndon B. Johnson began to make the official transition from vice president to president. As the country learned about JFK's assassination, rumors spread that Johnson, who was in the same motorcade, was also wounded.

If he had been hurt, the people wanted to know who was in charge of the country. Up until this point, the Constitution never spelled out how a vice president would succeed to the presidency if there was a resignation, incapacitation, or death. This oversight became apparent in 1841 when William Henry Harrison died. Vice President John Tyler, in a bold move, immediately took action and had the District of Columbia Circuit Court Chief Judge administer the presidential oath, making clear that he was the legitimate president of the United States. And we're going to discuss this further in an upcoming episode, but this Tyler precedent became the de facto system for filling a vacant presidency. To assure everyone that he was alive and well after Kennedy's assassination,

Johnson made sure the moment when he took the oath of office about two hours after Kennedy's death was well documented, so the nation knew a constitutional change of office had taken place. Johnson also spent the next few years working with Congress to officially establish the 25th Amendment. This new constitutional provision clearly laid out how a president could ascend to the presidency, whether as acting in a temporary capacity or permanently. It also gave the president power to name a new vice president should need arise. Johnson's constitutional fine-tuning began in that moment we've all seen. The infamous photo of Johnson on Air Force One, standing next to Jackie still in her blood-stained pink Chanel suit, taking the oath of office to officially become the 36th President of the United States.

Jackie, for her part, took charge of the details related to her husband's death and funeral. She was still in deep mourning for her infant son, Patrick, who had died 39 hours after his birth earlier that summer. But she stepped up to make the difficult decisions about what would happen to her husband's body. Jackie wanted John's body transported back to Washington immediately. She was determined that the entire presidential party, including the deceased body of the president, all returned to Washington, D.C. together. Jackie ordered one of the Secret Service members to find her husband the very best casket in Dallas. What was delivered was a 400 pound bronze casket, which while beautiful and befitting a president, was not at all practical for transport. Jackie approved it anyway. The casket ended up being too large to be loaded

onto the plane easily and Secret Service agents had to remove portions of the handles to get it in. When the party returned to Washington, D.C., Jackie instructed those in charge of the funeral to model it after the 1865 state funeral of Abraham Lincoln. So JFK's remains were taken to the East Room of the White House and displayed there exactly as Lincoln's had been. But there was a delicate problem. Jackie had considered keeping her husband's casket open. While professionals had done their best to prepare the body and hide the extensive head trauma from Lee Harvey Oswald's second bullet, there remained the fact that it still didn't look like the man who had, until recently, been the leader of the

free world. Jackie and her brother-in-law, Robert Kennedy, decided that the casket should remain closed. Jackie cut a lock of her husband's hair, and the casket was closed for a final time. On November 24th, Kennedy's body was taken to the Capitol Rotunda, and more than 250,000 people filed past his flag-draped coffin. The next day, the day of the funeral, a horse-drawn carriage carried the casket down Pennsylvania Avenue from the White House. Jackie and other official mourners joined the procession there, and the military escort, band, and a symbolic riderless horse with boots reversed in the stirrups, walked a solemn eight blocks to

St. Matthew's Cathedral, where the funeral service was held. After the service, the carriage brought the president's remains to their final resting place, an Arlington cemetery. The same carriage used in President Kennedy's funeral procession also once carried the remains of President FDR in 1945 and the Unknown Soldier in 1921. Newly sworn-in President Lyndon Johnson declared Monday, November 25, 1963, a National Day of Mourning, which allowed 41.5 million households in the United States to watch the funeral on television. An additional 800,000 people gathered in Washington, D.C. to view the funeral procession in person, as well as dignitaries from 92 countries and two former presidents, Dwight Eisenhower and Harry Truman. and two former presidents, Dwight Eisenhower and Harry Truman.

After JFK's assassination, the Secret Service again overhauled the agency's policies. Presidents no longer ride in open vehicles, and teams of agents arrive at presidential site visits several days in advance to prepare the area and install safety measures. The Secret Service also began staffing up after JFK's death. There were just 28 agents on the ground in Dallas in 1963, and today there are around 1,300 agents in rotation on the president's detail. We haven't had another successful presidential assassination since 1963, although people have tried. They have tried. But almost 100 years earlier, when President Abraham Lincoln was killed, routine presidential security protocols didn't exist.

While Jackie Kennedy sprang into action at the moment of her husband's death, Mary Lincoln had the exact opposite reaction when she learned her husband Abraham Lincoln had been shot. Mary was, at the time, a very sad woman. The stress of the Civil War and the death of her 11-year-old son Willie in 1862 put her in a constant state of depression. It's possible that leading up to his death, she'd also been afraid his life was in danger because President Abraham Lincoln had a strange dream, a premonition of his own death. Lincoln told Mary and a few close friends about this. And here's what he said. About 10 days ago, I retired very late. I had been waiting up for important dispatches from the front. I could not have been long in bed when I fell into a slumber for I was weary. I soon began to dream.

dream. There seemed to be a death-like stillness about me. Then I heard subdued sobs, as if a number of people were weeping. I thought I left my bed and wandered downstairs. There the silence was broken by the same pitiful sobbing, but the mourners were invisible. I went from room to room. No living person was in sight, but the same mournful sounds of distress met me as I passed along. I saw light in all the rooms. Every object was familiar to me, but where were all the people who were grieving as if their hearts would break? I was puzzled and alarmed. What could be the meaning of all this? Determined to find the cause of a state of things so mysterious and so shocking, I kept on until I arrived at the east room, which I entered. There I was met with a sickening surprise. Before me was a catafalque on which rested a corpse

wrapped in funeral vestments. Around it were stationed soldiers who were acting as guards, and there was a throng of people gazing mournfully upon the corpse whose face was covered, others weeping pitifully. Who is dead in the White House? I demanded of one of the soldiers. The president was his answer. He was killed by an assassin. Then came a loud burst of grief from the crowd, which woke me from my dream. I slept no more that night, and although it was only a dream, I have been strangely annoyed by it ever since. Lincoln's dream became his reality when on April 14, 1865, John Wilkes Booth shot the president in the head while he was enjoying the play My American Cousin at Ford's Theater. in the head while he was enjoying the play My American Cousin at Ford's Theater. Lincoln lived a few more hours before officially passing away on April 15th. As the president lay dying in the Peterson house, Mary's anguish became too disturbing for the male circle of

advisors gathered, and she was ordered to leave, denying her the chance to be with her husband in his final moments. When she returned to the White House, Mary collapsed in a small spare bedroom. Her dressmaker, Elizabeth Keckley, described her as having the wails of a broken heart, the unearthly shrieks, the terrible convulsions. The few people who entered her room were alarmed by her condition, with one person describing her as more dead than alive, broken by the horrors of that dreadful night, as well as worn down by body sickness. Mary did not surface for a viewing of the president's coffin on April 18th, nor for funeral services the following day. She did, however, give a feeble confirmation that Lincoln's body should be embalmed.

Embalming a dead body was actually a new technology at the time. Wanting to grow their industry, embalmers went to where death was happening. And in the 1860s, that place was the American Civil War. Embalmers set up stations close to military camps and would approach soldiers going into battle and offer their services should they be killed. Strangely enough, this tactic worked because soldiers saw it as a way to bring closure to their family if they perished. Civil War corpses were rarely given any sort of burial. They were mostly left to decompose wherever they had fallen or rolled into mass graves. When the president's son Willie died, Lincoln asked for him to be embalmed so they could have more time with him.

Before embalming, when a death occurred, a family would have around two days or so with the body of their loved ones. Their bodies would be washed, dressed in special clothing, and laid out for a short viewing and funeral. Candles would be lit and placed all around the body to hide the growing stench of decomposition. After the funeral, the body would be placed in a simple wooden box and lowered into the earth. But the people liked the idea of having more time with the bodies of their loved ones, though wary because they couldn't envision the science behind it or understood what it would look like once it was filled with embalming preservatives. After Lincoln died, his body was embalmed just as his son's was.

He was dressed up with makeup and placed in an open casket. 600 invited guests attended the funeral of President Lincoln at the White House, and when the service ended, they exited and joined the thousands of other mourners outside. The coffin was placed on a black draped funeral carriage drawn by six white horses. Church bells tolled throughout the city as it rolled down the driveway through the iron gates and away to the Capitol Rotunda where Lincoln's body lay in state before it was sent on a 400-city train tour for its final interment in Springfield, Illinois. Tour stops included Pennsylvania, New York, Ohio, and Indiana. This was the first massive public mourning that our country had ever experienced, and people waited for hours in

long lines to see the president's preserved body. If you followed the recent death of Queen Elizabeth, you may have heard reports on the queue, lines that stretched for miles and miles with mourners who waited to pay their respects. This was very similar to the lines people made to view Lincoln's body. Accompanying his body were a host of caretakers, including an embalmer and the body of Lincoln's son Willie, who would be reburied next to his father in the family plot in Springfield. Lincoln's appearance early on the trip was apparently so lifelike that mourners often reached out to touch his face, but it soon began to show signs of wear. The embalmer on the trip kept working on him, and by the time he reached northern New York,

the Buffalo Morning Express newspaper reported his face to only be slightly discolored after some preparation by the embalmer and the undertaker. And they said he still had a lifelike expression, that same kind, benignant look that characterized the people's president when alive. Lincoln's funeral tour was the first time most Americans had seen an embalmed body, and it quickly became a national sensation. The appeal of body preservation grew, and over the next few decades, it revolutionized the American funeral industry. With embalming as its cornerstone, families ceded control of their loved ones' bodies to funeral homes. Even in death, Lincoln was changing the nation.

Morbid as it may be, we could talk about this topic all day. So if you want to hear more, let me know. Maybe we can do a presidential deaths part two in the future. I'll see you next time. Thank you so much for listening to Here's Where It Gets Interesting. If you enjoyed this episode, would you consider sharing it on social media or leaving us a rating or review on your favorite podcast platform? All those things help podcasters out so much. The show is written and researched by executive producer Heather Jackson, Valerie Hoback, and Sharon McMahon. Our audio engineer is Jenny Snyder, and it's hosted by me, Sharon McMahon. We'll see you again soon.