Inaugural Facts

As the nation gets ready to swear-in its 44th president, here are some facts about the first 43 chief executives:

• Abraham Lincoln was the first president to include African Americans in his inaugural parade.
  
• It wasn't until Woodrow Wilson's second inaugural parade in 1917 that women were allowed to participate.


• Thomas Jefferson was the first president to walk to his inauguration; Warren G. Harding was the first to ride in an automobile to his.


• The very first inaugural address, by George Washington in 1793 was the shortest of any of the presidents'--135 words. They got longer from there. William Henry Harrison's was the longest--8445 words. Harrison's presidency was ironically the shortest, lasting little over one month.


• James A. Garfield was the first president in 1881 to have his mother attend his big day; William Howard Taft's wife was the first First Lady to take part in the inaugural festivities in 1909.


• John Kennedy and Bill Clinton were the only presidents to have poets participate in the inauguration: Robert Frost for Kennedy and Maya Angelou and Miller Williams for Clinton.


• Calvin Coolidge is the only president to be sworn in (1925) by an ex-president (William H. Taft, appointed Chief Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court in 1921). Lyndon Johnson is the only president to ever have been sworn in by a woman (U.S. District Justice Sarah T. Hughes.

• The first inauguration to be photographed was James Buchanan's in 1857. The first to be broadcast on radio was--ironically--"Silent Cal" Coolidge's in 1925. The first to be televised was Harry Truman's in 1949 and the first to be streamed live on the Internet was Bill Clinton's second in 1997.

Just thought you might like to know.