Franklin Pierce – The Intelligent Collector Magazine

We’ve seen incredibly successful hucksters and three-ring circuses before

A 1913 poster promoting the Barnum & Bailey elephant baseball team sold for $9,600 at a February 2019 Heritage auction.

By Jim O’Neal

One of the world’s greatest hucksters died in 1891. He was born in Bethel, Conn., and died 80 years later on April 7 in Bridgeport, where he had been mayor in 1875-76. Earlier, he had served four terms in the Connecticut House of Representatives, without distinction. The three-ring circus of modern life with all its hustle and bustle had to start somewhere, so why not simply start with the man responsible for the actual three-ring circus?

Phineas Taylor Barnum had been a loyal Democrat until the 1854 Kansas-Nebraska Act, which supported slavery, was drafted by Democrats and signed by President Franklin Pierce. It effectively nullified the 1859 Missouri Compromise, escalated tensions over the slavery issue and led to a series of violent civil confrontations known as “Bloody Kansas,” a political stain on American democracy.

Barnum promptly switched political parties, becoming a member of the new anti-slavery Republican Party, which was expanding rapidly with defecting abolitionists. John C. Frémont – “The Pathfinder” – was the first presidential candidate of the Republican Party, losing to Democrat James Buchanan in 1856. Abraham Lincoln prevailed in 1860 and 1864, and Republicans would dominate national politics for the rest of the 19th century.

Yes, we’re talking about that Barnum, who would become world famous as founder of “P.T. Barnum’s Grand Traveling Museum, Menagerie, Caravan & Hippodrome.” Most Americans know the name, but whether they know that “P.T.” stands for Phineas Taylor or that he did not enter the circus business until he was 60 years old is doubtful. If not, then it is surely because of the extraordinary, eponymous circus formed when he and James Bailey teamed up in 1881.

Barnum was an energetic 70-year-old impresario. “The Greatest Show on Earth” may have been a slight exaggeration, but it’s not clear who would have rivaled them for the top spot. Clearly it was a distinctive assertion in a life filled with remarkable contradictions. Perhaps it is more precise to think of him as “the Greatest Showman on Earth” or other lofty positions as one desires. (He would undoubtedly find an angle to exploit to the fullest).

He actually had a modest beginning in his show-biz career, starting at age 25. He purchased a blind, nearly paralyzed black slave woman (Joice Heth) who purportedly was 161 years old and a nurse to a young George Washington. She sang hymns, told jokes and answered audience questions about “Little George.” Barnum cleverly worked around existing laws and exhibited her 10 to 12 hours a day to recoup his $1,000 investment.

As Barnum bribed newspaper editors for extra press coverage (always mentioning his name), he also co-produced a sensationalized biographical pamphlet to further hype the hoax. When Heth died in 1836, Barnum sold tickets to another “event” – a public autopsy to judge her actual age. More than 1,300 people eagerly attended the spectacle, which critics slammed as “morally specious.” At 50 cents a ticket, it provided a surprisingly nice profit. Barnum attempted to appease the abolitionists by claiming (falsely) that all proceeds from this flagrant exploitation would be used to buy her great-grandchildren’s freedom.

It is here that that experts who study such arcane issues will argue that it’s important to define the pejorative term “humbug,” using Barnum’s own precepts. To him, a humbug was a fake that delights audiences without scamming them. It is sleight of hand, not bait-and-switch. He called himself the “Prince of Humbugs.” Perhaps it is a distinction without a difference. However, Barnum, still searching for a code of ethics, fled this humbug. Even in his 1854 biography, he wrote that he wanted people to remember him for something other than Joice Heth. It would haunt him until his death.

By 1841, he was touring the country with magicians and jugglers. He bought John Scudder’s struggling American Museum in lower Manhattan, promptly renaming it with the Barnum brand. While displaying a cabinet of curiosities, he introduced pseudo-scientific exhibitions, live freaks and the normal hokums. Still struggling with his ethical bankruptcy, he gambled on backing a national tour for Jenny Lind, the most celebrated soprano in the world, offering her $1,500 for every performance. He calculated it would be worth losing $50,000 just to enhance his reputation.

Her virtuosic arias drew crowds in the thousands, as Barnum wishfully hoped his association with “the Swedish Nightingale” would lessen his reputational baggage. But driven by an outsize eagerness to enrich himself, he peddled spectacles like the “Feejee Mermaid,” the torso and head of a monkey and the back half of a fish, bound together by the clever art of taxidermy. He continued to worship at the altar of celebrity and the power of the press. He created attractions like General Tom Thumb, who at 5, learned to drink wine; at 7, he was smoking a cigar.

He parlayed an audience with President Lincoln into a European tour involving Queen Victoria, gambling that her subjects would be interested as well. The trip paid off big and was extended to include visits with the Tsar of Russia and other nobles. It is not surprising that in his quest for money and fame, his name itself conjured up qualities of audacity, greed and humbug. But how to account or judge the value of excitement, entertainment and gentle controversy? Even as Charles Darwin was jolting the scientific and religious communities with evolution via his Origin of Species, P.T. Barnum introduced William Henry Johnson, a microcephalic black man who spoke a mysterious language … “solving” the quest to find the Missing Link of mankind.

Sadly, on May 21, 2017, Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus gave the last performance of its 146-year history after the elephants had vanished under pressure from animal rights activists. The audience rose for a standing ovation while singing Auld Lang Syne. Then it was over.

Except that it wasn’t!

P.T. Barnum, famous for grabbing headlines, reached up from the grave as Hugh Jackman lionized him in the movie The Greatest Showman. Recent one-word-titled books like Fraud, Hoax and Bunk have found analogies to today while a generation of Madonnas, Warhols and Kardashians have mastered the media to enhance the power of celebrity. We now have the modern equivalent of a three-ring circus continuously playing on Twitter or any cable news channel 24/7. The Romans knew this when they built the coliseum and so did Walt Disney when Disneyland popped up in 1955.

I do miss the cotton candy.

Intelligent Collector blogger JIM O’NEAL is an avid collector and history buff. He is president and CEO of Frito-Lay International [retired] and earlier served as chair and CEO of PepsiCo Restaurants International [KFC Pizza Hut and Taco Bell].

Maybe it’s time for a First Gentleman

A three-piece coin silver coffee set, circa 1855, that belonged to Jefferson and Varina Davis sold for $28,680 at a June 2013 Heritage auction.

By Jim O’Neal

When a discussion of First Ladies occurs, the names of Dolley Madison, Eleanor Roosevelt and Jackie Kennedy Onassis are invariably among the first to be named. However, thanks to David McCullough’s splendid book (and TV mini-series) on John Adams, Abigail Adams (wife of one president and mother of a second) has gained long-overdue respect. Her wisdom, wit and persistent advocacy for equal rights for women was both fresh and modern.

The Adams marriage is well-documented due to an abundance of personal correspondence. She is also particularly associated with a March 1776 letter to John and the Continental Congress requesting that they “remember the ladies, and be more generous to them than your ancestors!”

As the first First Lady to reside in the White House, she was in a perfect position to lobby for women’s rights, especially when it came to private property and opportunities for a better education. After all, mothers played a central role in educating the family’s children. The more education she had, the better educated the entire family. It was this type of impeccable logic that made her so persuasive.

Had John won a second term, women’s progress would have been a big beneficiary with four more years of Abigail’s influence on policy-makers.

Abigail Adams is also given full credit for the total reconciliation of two long-time political enemies: Thomas Jefferson and her grouchy husband. They finally resumed their correspondence, which lasted right up until their same-day deaths on July 4, 1826 – the 50th anniversary of the founding of the nation.

That same year (1826), Varina Howell was born in rural Louisiana. Her grandfather, Richard Howell, served with distinction in the American Revolution (1775-1783) and would become governor of New Jersey in the 1790s. Her father fought in the War of 1812 and then settled in Natchez, Miss. Varina would later jokingly call herself a “half-breed” since she was born in a family with deep roots in both the North and South.

Jefferson Davis (1808-1899) was another prominent example of people who had deep ties to both the North and South, both in government and the military. In September 1824, he entered the U.S. Military Academy (West Point). He was in the middle of his class and was an infantryman 2nd Lieutenant in 1828. He married Sarah Taylor, daughter of President Zachary Taylor. However, they both contracted a fever and she died three months later. Deeply depressed, he lived in seclusion on his plantation until elected to Congress.

When the Mexican War started, he joined his ex-father-in-law’s army at Camargo, Mexico. Davis and his Mississippi riflemen did heroic duty. Davis was wounded at the Battle of Buena Vista and returned to the United States to find himself a hero. He was appointed to fill an unexpired U.S. Senate term. He was re-elected in 1850, gained prominence and made an unsuccessful bid to be governor. Newly elected President Franklin Pierce added him to his Cabinet as Secretary of War. Pierce had a problem with alcohol and relied on Davis to substitute when needed.

Inexorably, he was drawn into the vortex over the slavery issue. He spoke often of his love for the Union and even as the moral issues grew, he still felt the Union was safe, despite being fully aware of the growing political storm clouds. Devoted to the nation by lineage, history and patriotism, he was torn by the compact theory of the Union. These tenets held that the states were in fact sovereign, but they had yielded it by joining the Union and had to secede to reclaim it. He argued for stronger states’ rights within the Union, while urging moderation and restraint to save the Republic.

In December 1860, he was appointed to the Senate Committee of Thirteen, charged with finding a solution to the growing crisis. Davis ultimately judged the situation as hopeless and (reluctantly) advised secession and the formation of a Southern Confederacy.

Weary, dejected and ill, Jefferson Davis made a farewell address to the Senate on Jan. 21, 1861, emphasizing the South’s determination to leave the Union. Disunion was finally a stark reality. He and his family left Washington, D.C., and returned to Mississippi. It was there that he learned of his election as president of the Provisional Government of the Confederate States of America.

The Confederate guns began firing at Fort Sumter on April 12, 1861.

War began.

In one of the Civil War’s richest ironies, the second Mrs. Jefferson Davis – his wife of 16 years – was openly critical of secession, calling it foolish and predicting the Confederacy would never survive. As the first First Lady, she characterized her time as the worst four years of her life. She told her mother the South did not have the resources to win and when it was over, “She would run with the rest!”

She did run to Manhattan and supported herself writing columns for Joseph Pulitzer’s New York World. That baby born in 1826 had fallen in love with Jefferson Davis and became Varina Howell Davis. The only First Lady of the Confederacy died in 1906 and her tombstone reads simply “AT PEACE.”

Considering the wisdom of Abigail Adams and Varina Davis, maybe it’s time for a First Gentleman.

How did cotton farmers give the Union a run for its money?

A three-piece coin silver coffee set, circa 1855, that belonged to Jefferson Davis and his wife sold for $28,680 at a June 2013 Heritage auction.

By Jim O’Neal

Newly elected President Franklin Pierce quickly selected his Cabinet and strategically picked a Southern Senator, Jefferson Davis of Mississippi, to be his Secretary of War in 1853. Davis would become president as well, as the first and only president of the Confederate States of America (1861-65).

Jeff Davis, like so many others in the South, did not support the secessionist movement, since he was convinced the North would not allow this to occur peacefully. However, he was also convinced that each state was sovereign and had an unquestioned right to secede. When war finally came, loyalty to state was an easy choice to make, irrespective of personal views on slavery.

President Davis had an extensive military career and his four years as Secretary of War made him fully aware of the North’s vastly superior military and industrial power. Further, there were 21 million people in the North (mostly white), a 2-to-1 advantage over the South, which had several million slaves. Nevertheless, on April 29, 1861, Davis requested an Army of 100,000 volunteers, knowing full well it would be difficult to equip and arm them on a sustainable basis.

Another man familiar with this significant issue was Colonel Josiah Gorgas, head of the Confederate Ordnance Bureau. Gorgas had three stark sources of supply for the Confederate armed forces: inventory (on hand), home production, and foreign imports. By using arms seized from federal arsenals, Gorgas had (barely) enough weapons to outfit the initial 100,000 forces called out by President Davis. Then he turned his full attention to the future.

Unlike others in the South, Gorgas was savvy enough to know that the war would not be over quickly and realized his meager on-hand stocks of munitions would soon disappear. Given enough time, he planned to establish munitions plants that would make the new nation self-sustainable, but until then, “certain articles of prime necessity” would have to be imported from Europe. In April 1861, he dispatched Captain Caleb Huse to Great Britain to set up a purchasing arrangement to obtain foreign supplies. Only two things went wrong. First, no local munitions were ever produced and no supply lines from Europe were set up because the funding strategy failed due to “King Cotton.”

King Cotton was a political and economic theory based on the coercive power of Southern cotton. The British textile industry imported 80 percent of the South’s cotton. Deny them this supply and the severe impact on the British economy would force them to intervene in the war to help the South. The second tenet was that Northern textile mills were reliant on Southern cotton and starving them would disrupt the Northern economy as well.

Then the South curiously imposed an embargo on cotton shipments in the summer of 1861 and, although designed to bring the British into the war, really only deprived the European group of the funds to buy imported supplies.

The obvious question is how did this small group of cotton farmers … with limited supplies and munitions and a failed strategy to obtain more … fight a war against an armed group backed by an industrial powerhouse, and manage to last four years while inflicting great losses and sustaining even greater losses of lives and property?

My simplistic answer:

President Lincoln and his generals (especially George McClellan) were not focused on the total destruction of the enemy (hopeful of coaxing them back into the Union).
They were interested in winning battles rather than controlling territory.
They avoided destroying infrastructure (until William Tecumseh Sherman demonstrated its benefits).
The South was fighting for its future. I see similarities to both Vietnam and Afghanistan … people who would never surrender and, as the Taliban explained, “You have the watches. We have the time.”

Thank the Lord for generals Grant and Sherman.

JIM O’NEAL is an avid collector and history buff. He is president and CEO of Frito-Lay International [retired] and earlier served as chair and CEO of PepsiCo Restaurants International [KFC Pizza Hut and Taco Bell].

As Nation Moved to Civil War, the North had the Financial Edge

Richard Montgomery was an Irish soldier who served in the British Army before joining the Continental Army.

By Jim O’Neal

Richard Montgomery (1738-75) was a little-known hero-soldier born in Dublin, Ireland, who became a captain in the British Army in 1756. Later, he became a major general in the Continental Army after the Continental Congress elected George Washington as Commander in Chief of the Continental Army in June 1775. This position was created specifically to coordinate the military efforts of the 13 Colonies in the revolt against Great Britain.

Montgomery was killed in a failed attack on Quebec City led by General Benedict Arnold (before he defected). Montgomery was mourned in both Britain and America as his remains were interned at St. Paul’s Chapel in New York City.

A remarkably diverse group of schools, battleships and cities named in his honor remain yet today. Montgomery, Ala., is the capital and second-largest city in the state; it’s where Rosa Parks refused to give up her bus seat to a white passenger on Dec. 1, 1955, sparking the famous Montgomery bus boycott. Martin Luther King Jr. used Montgomery to great advantage in organizing the civil rights movement.

Montgomery was also the first capital of the Provisional Congress of the Confederate States when the first meeting was convened in February 1861. The first seven states that seceded from the United States had hastily selected representatives to visit the new Confederate capital. They arrived to find the hotels dirty, dusty roads, and noisy lobbyists overflowing in the statehouse. Montgomery was not prepared to host any large group, especially a large political convention.

Especially notable was that most of the South’s most talented men had already either joined the Army, the Cabinet or were headed for diplomatic assignments. By default, the least-talented legislators were given the responsibility of writing a Constitution, installing the new president (Jefferson Davis), and then authorizing a military force of up to 400,000 men. This conscription was for three years or the duration of the war. Like the North, virtually everyone was confident it would be a short, decisive battle.

Jefferson Davis was a well-known name, having distinguished himself in the Mexican War and serving as Secretary of War for President Franklin Pierce. Like many others, he downplayed the role of slavery in the war, seeing the battle as a long-overdue effort to overturn the exploitive economic system that was central to the North. In his view, the evidence was obvious. The North and South were like two different countries: one a growing industrial power and the other stuck in an agricultural system that had not evolved from 1800 when 80 percent of its labor force was on farms and plantations. The South now had only 18 percent of the industrial capacity and trending down.

That mediocre group of lawmakers at the first Confederate meeting was also tasked with the challenge of determining how to finance a war against a formidable enemy with vastly superior advantages in nearly every important aspect. Even new migrants were attracted to the North’s ever-expanding opportunities, as slave states fell further behind in manufacturing, canals, railroads and even conventional roads, all while the banking system became weaker.

Cotton production was a genuine bright spot for the South (at least for plantation owners), but ironically, it generated even more money for the North with its vast network of credit, warehousing, manufacturing and shipping companies. The North manufactured a dominant share of boots, shoes, cloth, pig iron and almost all the firearms … an ominous fact for people determined to fight a war. The South was forced to import foodstuffs in several regions. Southern politicians had spoken often of the need to build railroads and manufacturing, but these were rhetorical, empty words. Cotton had become the powerful narcotic that lulled them into complacency. Senator James Hammond of South Carolina summed it up neatly in his “Cotton is King” speech on March 4, 1858: “Who can doubt, that has looked at recent events, that cotton is supreme?”

Southerners sincerely believed that cotton would rescue them from the war and “after a few punches in the nose,” the North would gladly surrender.

One of those men was Christopher G. Memminger, who was selected as Confederate States Secretary of the Treasury and responsible for rounding up gold and silver to finance the needs of the Confederate States of America (CSA). A lawyer and member of the South Carolina legislature, he was also an expert on banking law. His first priority was for the Treasury to get cash and he started in New Orleans, the financial center of the South, by raiding the mint and customs house.

He assumed there would be at least enough gold to coin money and commissioned a design for a gold coin with the goddess of liberty seated, bearing a shield and a staff flanked by bales of cotton, sugar cane and tobacco. Before any denominations were finalized, it was discovered there was not enough gold available and the mint was closed in June.

This was followed by another nasty surprise: All the banks in the South possessed only $26 million in gold, silver and coins from Spain and France. No problem. Memminger estimated that cotton exports of $200 million would be enough to secure hundreds of millions in loans. Oops. President Lincoln had anticipated this and blockaded all the ports after Fort Sumter in April 1861. No cotton, no credit, no guns.

In God we trust. All others pay cash.

One small consolation was that his counterpart in the North, Salmon P. Chase, was also having trouble raising cash and had to resort to the dreaded income tax. However, both sides managed to keep killing each other for four long years, leaving a legacy of hate.

Intelligent Collector blogger JIM O’NEAL is an avid collector and history buff. He is president and CEO of Frito-Lay International [retired] and earlier served as chair and CEO of PepsiCo Restaurants International [KFC Pizza Hut and Taco Bell].

Fillmore Among Presidents Who Juggled Balance Between Free and Slave States

This folk art campaign banner for Millard Fillmore’s failed 1856 bid for the presidency sold for $11,950 at a June 2013 Heritage auction.

By Jim O’Neal

On his final day in office, President James Polk wrote in his diary: “Closed my official term of President of the United States at 6am this morning.”

Later, after one last stroll through the silent White House, he penned a short addendum: “I feel exceedingly relieved that I am now free from all public cares. I am sure that I will be a happier man in my retirement than I have been for 4 years ….” He died 103 days later, the shortest retirement in presidential history and the first president survived by his mother. His wife Sarah (always clad only in black) lived for 42 more lonely years.

The Washington, D.C., that greeted his successor, General Zachary Taylor (“Old Rough and Ready”), still looked “unfinished” – even after 50 years of planning and development. The Mall was merely a grassy field where cows and sheep peacefully grazed. The many plans developed in the 1840s were disparate projects. Importantly, the marshy expanse south of the White House was suspected of emitting unhealthy vapors that were especially notable in the hot summers. Cholera was the most feared disease and it was prevalent until November each year when the first frost appeared.

Naturally, the affluent left the Capitol for the entire summer. Since the Polks had insisted on remaining, there was a widespread belief that his death so soon after departing was directly linked to spending the presidential summers in the White House. The theory grew even stronger when Commissioner of Public Buildings Charles Douglas proposed to regrade the sloping fields into handsome terraces under the guise of “ornamental improvement.” Insiders knew the real motive was actually drainage and sanitation to eliminate the foul air that hung ominously around the White House. (It’s not clear if Donald Trump’s campaign promise to “drain the swamp” was another effort or a political metaphor.)

President Taylor was inaugurated with a predictable storm of jubilation since his name was a household word. After a 40-year career in the military (1808-1848), he had the distinction of serving in four difference wars: War of 1812, Black Hawk War (1832), Second Seminole War (1835-1842), and the Mexican-American War (1846-1848). By 1847, Taylormania broke out and his picture was everywhere … on ice carts, tall boards, fish stands, butcher stalls, cigar boxes and so on. After four years under the dour Polk, the public was ready to once again idolize a war hero with impeccable integrity and a promise to staff his Cabinet with the most experienced men in the country.

Alas, a short two years later, on July 9, 1850, President Taylor became the second president to die in office (William Henry Harrison lasted 31 days). On July 4, after too long in the hot sun listening to ponderous orations and too much ice water to cool off, he returned to the White House. It was there that he gorged on copious quantities of cherries, slathered with cream and sugar. After dinner, he developed severe stomach cramps and then the doctors took over and finished him off with calomel opium, quinine and, lastly, raising blisters and drawing blood. He survived this for several days and the official cause of death was cholera morbus, a gastrointestinal illness common in Washington where poor sanitation made it risky to eat raw fruit and fresh dairy products in the summer.

Vice President Millard Fillmore took the oath of office and spent the rest of the summer trying to catch up. Taylor had spent little time with his VP and then the entire Cabinet submitted their resignations over the next few days, which Fillmore cheerfully accepted. He immediately appointed a new Cabinet featuring the great Daniel Webster as Secretary of State. On Sept. 9, 1850, he signed a bill admitting California as the 31st state and as “a free state.” This was the first link in a chain that became the Compromise of 1850.

The Constitutional Congress did not permit the words “slave” or “slavery” since James Madison thought it was wrong to admit in the Constitution the idea that men could be considered property. In order to get enough states to approve it, it also prohibited Congress from passing any laws blocking it for 20 years (1808), by which it was assumed slavery would have long been abandoned for economic reasons. However, cotton production flourished after the invention of the cotton gin and on Jan. 1, 1808, President Thomas Jefferson signed into law that “Congress will have the power to exterminate slavery from our borders.”

This explains why controlling Congress was key to controlling slavery, so all the emphasis turned to maintaining a delicate balance whenever a new state was to be admitted … as either “free” or “slave.” Fillmore thus became the first of three presidents – including Franklin Pierce and James Buchanan – who worked hard to maintain harmony. However, with the election of Abraham Lincoln in 1860, it was clear what would happen … and all the Southern states started moving to the exit signs.

A true Civil War was now the only option to permanently resolving the slavery dilemma and it came with an enormous loss of life, property and a culture that we still struggle with yet today. That dammed cotton gin!

Fillmore Often Makes the ‘Forgettable Presidents’ Club

Millard Fillmore appears on the lower right corner of this Union Bank of Missouri $100 Color Proof. It realized $61,687.50 at an October 2015 Heritage auction.

By Jim O’Neal

Millard Fillmore, the 13th president, was the last not affiliated with either the Democrat or Republican parties. Born in a log cabin, he developed slowly since he did not read well and was apprenticed when he was 14 years old. After several years, he bought out his indenture for $30, but never saw a map of the United States until he was 19.

However, he learned to love books and spent a lot of time just reading.

Later, his entry into politics was through the New York State Assembly as an anti-Mormon candidate. Eventually, he made it into the U.S. House by following Whig Party policies. He even made a run at being the Whig Party VP candidate in 1844, but finished a weak third. Then, to top it off, he was defeated for governor of New York that same year.

It looked like his career had peaked.

However, his luck changed in 1848 when the Whigs picked General Zachary Taylor to run for president. Taylor was a slaveholder from Louisiana, had never run for office, and had never even voted.

Taylor and Fillmore had also never met, but the Whigs hoped Fillmore would help balance the ticket … a strategy that worked!

Vice President Fillmore was largely ignored when the administration finally took office. That is until President Taylor died unexpectedly and Fillmore was thrust into the Oval Office.

Alas, he gradually lost support of the Whig Party and was unable to generate a lot of support for reelection. One major cause was signing and then enforcing the proslavery Fugitive Slave Law, which alienated Northern Whigs.

During the 1852 convention, Fillmore made a valiant effort, but on the 53rd ballot, Winfield Scott finally prevailed as the Whig Party candidate. He would go on to lose the general election to Democrat Franklin Pierce.

In 1856, the American Party (“Know Nothings”) convinced Fillmore to make another run for the presidency; he won a single state. Curiously, many historians argue that Fillmore was never an actual American Party member, never attended a single meeting, and was even out of the country when all this happened.

All of this is true, but they overlook the fact that he did mail a letter affirming his acceptance of the nomination. So, I say he was an official candidate despite the unusual circumstances and the rather obvious lack of any real interest.

Fillmore often makes the “Forgettable Presidents” club … but we remember him because he was the first president to turn down an Honorary Degree … a Doctor of Civil Law from Oxford. His reason was a little hokey (he could not read or understand it since it was in Latin), but that only makes him more qualified for our club.

Tidbits: Bluebonnets, Sherlock Holmes, Bums and Booze

Julian Onderdonk’s *Texas Landscape with Bluebonnets* sold for $437,000 at a November 2015 Heritage auction.

By Jim O’Neal

The bluebonnets in Texas are beginning to fade, but two names always come to mind when talking about the flowers: Claudia Alta Taylor (better known as “Lady Bird” Johnson ) and “Cactus Jack” Garner, who lobbied to make the prickly pear cactus the state flower (and lost).

Garner became the 32nd vice president of the United States in 1932 and concurrently was elected back to the House. So for one day, on March 4, 1933, he was both Psident of the Senate and Speaker of the House.

Earlier on Feb. 15, 1933, as VP-elect, he came close to being president when FDR just missed being assassinated in Miami.

Garner served two full terms as VP and died 15 days before his 99th birthday – making him the longest-living VP.

♦

“A Study in Scarlet” by Arthur Conan Doyle was the first story featuring Sherlock Holmes. It was published in 1887 in the magazine Beeton’s Christmas Annual – with only 11 copies known to exist today.

♦

The last heavyweight championship bout scheduled for 20 rounds was held in Detroit in 1941. Joe Louis TKO’d Abe Simon in 13 rounds. Simon was a member of Louis’ “Bum of the Month Club” – 13 opponents Louis defeated between 1939 and 1941.

After leaving boxing, Simon went to Hollywood, where he won roles in On the Waterfront, Never Love a Stranger and Requiem for a Heavyweight.

♦

Our 35th vice president, Kentucky lawyer Alben W. Barkley, was elected with Harry S. Truman in 1948 and is still the only one with the middle name of William (he was actually born Willie Alben Barkley).

One of his career highlights was his keynote address at the 1932 Democratic Convention, where he supported Franklin D. Roosevelt and denounced Prohibition (Kentucky bourbon?). It worked … FDR won and prohibition was repealed in 1933.

Although the oldest VP elected at age 71 (Joe Biden was 65 in 2008), Barkley is the only one to marry while in office … a woman half his age. Later, he denounced the 80th Congress as “Do Nothing,” but Truman often gets credit for the phrase.

Jefferson Davis was a Genuine War Hero When He Arrived in the Senate

Jefferson Davis’ arrival in Washington, D.C., as a U.S. Senator from Mississippi was like a coronation.

By Jim O’Neal

Thirteen-year-old Jefferson Davis was tired of school. He returned home from Wilkinson Academy, a few miles from the family cotton plantation, put his books on a table, and told his father he would not return. Samuel Davis shrugged and told his youngest son that he would now have to work with his hands rather than his brain. At dawn the next day, he gave young Jeff a large, thin cloth bag, took him to the cotton field and put him in a long line with the family slaves picking cotton.

Three days later, he was back at Wilkinson, happily reading and taking notes with his bandaged hands.

By 16, Jefferson had mastered Latin and Greek, was well read in history and literature, and eager to study law at the University of Virginia. Instead, he spent four years at West Point, graduated in the bottom third of his class and then entered the Army. He was 20 years old and fighting in both the Black Hawk War and the Mexican-American War.

Jefferson Davis’ arrival in Washington, D.C., as a U.S. Senator from Mississippi was like a coronation. A true war hero at age 36, he was recognized by everyone and warmly greeted by all he met. After all, Jeff Davis was the first genuine war hero in the Senate in its entire 58 years!

His rise to prominence occurred as one generation of leaders died or retired – Henry Clay, John C. Calhoun, John Quincy Adams, Daniel Webster – and a younger one was set to take over, led by Stephen Douglas (39), Andrew Johnson (39), Alexander Stephens (35), Salmon P. Chase (39) and William Seward (35).

Jeff Davis began to give important speeches in the Senate and everyone sensed he had a future in politics.

The Senate proved comfortable and prestigious, providing an intimate venue to discuss and debate the great issues of the time. Yet despite all the exciting opportunities facing the young nation, the hard fact was that slavery was a pernicious issue lurking in the shadows. It was like a cancer that seemed to grow more lethal after every “compromise” designed to resolve it.

An example was the fateful Compromise of 1850, intended to resolve the four-year controversy over the status of the new territories that accrued to the U.S. after the war with Mexico. California was admitted as a free state, and Texas had slaves, but had to surrender its claim to New Mexico. Utah and New Mexico were granted popular sovereignty (self-determination) and there was a more stringent Fugitive Slave Law (destined to be revoked by the Dred Scott reversal).

Jeff Davis felt so strongly that slavery was a 200-year tradition (to be decided by individual states) and detested the 1850 Compromise so much that he resigned his Senate seat to run for governor of Mississippi, confident this would enhance his national visibility, send a strong message to the North and bolster any wavering Southerners. The strategy failed when he lost the election, leaving him with no political office.

Davis bounced back into the Senate by one vote and new President Franklin Pierce (1852) selected him to be Secretary of War, a powerful position to resist the continuous threat from the North to impose their will on the South by any means necessary. The 1854 Kansas-Nebraska Act just roiled the opposing forces and thoughts of secession were like dry kindling waiting for the proverbial spark. First was President James Buchanan (1856), a Democrat who seemed helpless or resigned to the inevitability of war.

As abolition forces gained momentum and the South grew even more resolute that they would not concede a principle that states’ rights trumped Federal aggression, it was only a question of how or what set of events would tip the nation into a civil war. The answer was in plain sight.

In the critical election year of 1860, though still hopeful of a peaceful settlement on slavery, Davis told an audience that if Republicans won the White House, the Union would have to be dissolved. “I love and venerate the Union of these states,” he said, “but I love liberty and Mississippi more.” When asked if Mississippi should secede if another state did, he roared, “I answer yes!” And if the U.S. Army tried to suppress it? Davis answered even more vehemently. “I will meet force with force!”

Republican Abraham Lincoln was elected president in 1860.

The slavery issue was simply not resolvable by anything but force. Few foresaw how much force would be needed and the enormous carnage and loss of life involved. War always seems to be much more than anticipated. The 20th century would really amp it up and the 21st century has gotten off to a rocky start, as well.

Intelligent Collector blogger JIM O’NEAL is an avid collector and history buff. He is president and CEO of Frito-Lay International [retired] and earlier served as chairman and CEO of PepsiCo Restaurants International [KFC Pizza Hut and Taco Bell].

Presidential Sons a Complex, Dark Addendum to First Family History

A pair of baseballs signed by Presidents George H.W. Bush and George W. Bush, from the collection of baseball legend Stan Musial, sold for $2,629 at a November 2013 Heritage auction.

By Jim O’Neal

After favored son John Quincy Adams became president of the United States, there was an unspoken feeling that – like the sons of kings and monarchs – he might be destined for greatness. However, it would be a surprising 176 years before another president’s son, George W. Bush, would be sworn in as president.

The stories of presidential sons between these two bookends make up a complex and slightly dark addendum to the First Families of the United States. Some historians have a theory that the closer the male child is to his father, the more likely he is to die or self-destruct. Whether it is fact or coincidence is open for debate.

George Washington had no biological children, but was stepfather to a notorious young man, John Parke Curtis, who ruined his estate and died prematurely at age 26.
Thomas Jefferson’s only son died shortly after birth (unnamed).
James Madison’s stepson was an alcoholic, gambler and womanizer. After Madison died, he cheated his own mother (Dolley), and Congress had to intervene to help the former First Lady.
James Monroe’s only son died in infancy.
Andrew Jackson Jr. was an adopted son who mismanaged the Hermitage. He died of tetanus after shooting himself in a hunting accident.
Martin Van Buren Jr. died from tuberculosis in a Parisian apartment with his father sitting helpless by his bedside.
James Polk’s nephew and ward – Marshall Polk – was expelled from both Georgetown and West Point, ending his life in prison.
Calvin Coolidge Jr. died of blood poisoning from an infected blister after playing tennis.

A number managed to live longer lives, yet seemed to be cursed with a plethora of issues:

John Tyler Jr. was an alcoholic.
Ulysses S. Grant Jr. got caught up in an investment fraud scheme.
Chester A. Arthur Jr. was a playboy with an unaccountably suspicious source of “easy money” and investigative reporters hounded him and only stopped when his father’s term of office ended.

Franklin Roosevelt Jr. was the first of two sons named after their father and died suddenly after birth. The second namesake, married five times, was banned from the prestigious New York Social Register. Then, the powerful Tammany Hall machine became irked and ended his political career, as well.

Remarkably, when this terrible scourge progressed, fate would sometimes (greedily) step in and run the table. This happened to Franklin Pierce, who lost all three eldest sons in a row. It also happened to Andrew Johnson when first-born Charles Johnson died in a horse accident, Richard Johnson likely committed suicide at age 35, and younger brother Andrew Johnson Jr. died at a youthful 26.

Intuition says this phenomenon is more than random chance or a curse. Perhaps it is the pressure of being the first born, or something that drives the children of powerful figures to escape through substance abuse or risky behavior. Even President George W. Bush admitted to fighting alcoholism for years.

Mine is not to psychoanalyze, but simply to point out a series of eerie similar situations for your interest and speculation.

Ineffective Leadership is the Last Thing Needed in the White House

franklin-pierce-daguerreotype — This Franklin Pierce daguerreotype, housed in a leatherette case, sold for $15,525 at a November 2003 auction.

By Jim O’Neal

Millard Fillmore was the last Whig president and also the last to represent the kind of American nationalism that had appeared during the War of 1812. His successor, Franklin Pierce (1853-57), was a northern Democrat who supported the extension of slavery and a nominee selected by his party in order to win both northern and southern votes. He had praised the Compromise of 1850 and promised to prevent slavery from becoming a national issue.

He was swept into office with the greatest electoral landslide since James Monroe.

A politician’s politician, the curly-headed Pierce never lost an election. At his inaugural ceremony, he stood away from the lectern and spoke extemporaneously; it was more of a sermon than an inaugural address. He challenged the nation with the promise of a bright, prosperous future and his listeners cheered as though they had been delivered at last.

He was also a master of knowing how to get along with all people – evidenced by the fact he is the only president in history who served a complete term without making a single change in his Cabinet. But he totally misjudged the temper of the time, since he regarded the abolitionists as a lunatic fringe that should be ignored. And when he signed the Kansas-Nebraska Act and the repeal of the 1820 Missouri Compromise, he unwittingly let loose a storm that made slavery a greater national issue than ever before.

Unable to accomplish much due to a deeply divided Congress, President Pierce still desperately wanted to be nominated for a second term. But just before the Democratic Convention began in Cincinnati on June 2, 1856, reports of bloodshed in Kansas alarmed the country. Armed battles raged between anti- and pro-slavery factions, firing up public anger.

The telegraph wires clicked constantly, with Pierce anxiously reading each dispatch. In the oval room, he read newspapers until his eyes grew too tired and then had his wife read them to him. He followed every detail of the convention, considerably more confident than he should have been. At the convention, Pierce’s supporters abandoned him in favor of Stephen A. Douglas, but the strategy failed and James Buchanan took the prize home to Pennsylvania.

Buchanan was the last of the weak, compromising northern Democratic presidents, more sympathetic to slave owners than to northern abolitionists. When he tried to push through Kansas as a slave state, he infuriated the North and shattered the Southern Democratic Party. As Southern states seceded from the Union, one by one, in the last months of his administration, Buchanan stood by helplessly, unable to take resolute action.

This string of three weak, ineffective men – Fillmore, Pierce and Buchanan – clearly demonstrate the unequivocal effects of poor leadership, as the catastrophic violence of a civil war nearly destroyed our young nation.

Intelligent Collector blogger JIM O’NEAL is an avid collector and history buff. He is President and CEO of Frito-Lay International [retired] and earlier served as Chairman and CEO of PepsiCo Restaurants International [KFC Pizza Hut and Taco Bell].