Bio James K. Polk
Often referred to as the first "dark horse" president, James K. Polk was the last of the Jacksonians to sit...
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Portrait of President James K. Polk at about age 50 by George P.A. Healy, 1846. To Polk, the long sittings were irksome, fatiguing, and “time unprofitably spent.”
Often referred to as the first "dark horse" president, James K. Polk was the last of the Jacksonians to sit...
Born in 1803, Sarah Childress grew up on a plantation near Murfreesboro, Tennessee. Elder daughter of a Captain, she gained something...
Did you know that after her husband's death, First Lady Dolley Madison was so poor that she had to accept...
Beginning with Thomas Jefferson in 1801 and for much of the nineteenth century, the White House hosted an annual reception on...
Savior of American portraiture, server of ice cream, dual term first lady and mentor of White House hostesses: all of...
Designed to be lit in the way common to the world at the beginning of the nineteenth century, the President’s...
As he left the White House in 1869, President Andrew Johnson supposedly exclaimed that he could “already smell the sweet mountain ai...
The presidency of James Knox Polk is underscored, among other things, by the War with Mexico. Amidst a military confrontation...
Today’s State Floor of the White House has rooms designated by color (Green, Blue, and Red), purpose (State Dining Ro...
Elias Polk was born into slavery in 1806 on a farm owned by Samuel Polk, father of the future president of...
Of her family’s role in the White House in the immediate aftermath of the Civil War, Martha Johnson Patterson, da...
While not as famous as the presidents they served, several African American slaves who lived inside the White House went...