Presidential Pets: Furry Friends In The White House
This month for President’s Day, we wanted to take a look at the pets that have called the White House home. From dogs and cats to raccoons and alligators, here are some of the most interesting stories about presidential pets.
President Gerald R. Ford's Dog Liberty on the South Lawn of the White House (National Archives)
Why do Presidents have pets?
There are many reasons why the president would want to have pets. One of the big ones is relatability. Over 70% of Americans have a pet, and having something in common with people is an easy way for the president to be more grounded and relatable to their citizens. Only three presidents had no pets while in office: James K. Polk, Andrew Johnson, and Donald Trump.
Another big reason many presidents have pets is foreign relations. Several presidents receive pets as gifts while they are in office. Sometimes they’re Japanese teacup puppies or Soviet space dogs, and sometimes they’re Tigers. As they say, never look a gift horse in the mouth… or a donkey in George Washington’s case.
Some presidential pets have jobs. Most presidents lived before the age of automobiles and kept horses they used to get around. Some presidents kept livestock, like William Howard Taft’s prized Heffer Pauline Wayne, who he occasionally sent out as an envoy to the president; or during World War 1, Woodrow Willson kept sheep on the Whitehouse lawn to keep the grass short due to worker shortages and sold their wool to raise money for the Red Cross.
President William Jefferson Clinton with Buddy the Dog (National Archives)
Pets of the Founding Fathers
Pets have always been welcome in the house of the president, George Washington himself set the president. Here are the pets that were favored by America’s Founding Fathers:
George Washington was actually a dog breeder! His dogs of choice were various breeds of hounds, which he used for hunting. While in office Washington had 8 dogs, 7 horses, and a donkey he received as a gift from the King of Spain.
John Adams had three dogs, Juno, Mark, and Satan; as well as two horses named Cleopatra and Ceasar.
Thomas Jefferson had many animals with him in the White House including two Shepard dogs he brought over from France named Bergère and Grizzle, a couple of horses named Caractacus and Young Fearnought, a mockingbird named Dick, and two grizzly bear cubs that were gifted to him by the American explorer Zebulon Pike (they were later donated to a friend’s museum in Pennsylvania).
James Madison only had one pet while president, a parrot named Polly who outlived both him and his wife, Dolley Madison.
George Washington Taking the Salute at Trenton (John Faed)
Which president had the most pets?
That title would belong to none other than Theodore Roosevelt. No other president had such a large number of animals or such a wide variety (though Calvin Coolidge got close).
Roosevelt was a huge lover of animals and is the namesake of the Teddy Bear. Stuffed bears became popular after Rosevelt refused to shoot a black bear that was tied to a tree on a hunting trip. The incident was published as a political cartoon titled “Drawing the Line in Mississippi” in papers across the country. A New York shopkeeper was inspired by the cartoon and started selling stuffed toys called “Teddy’s Bear”. The stuffed bears exploded in popularity and Teddy Roosevelt himself used one as his mascot when running for reelection.
Roosevelt practically had his own zoo while in the White House. His many animals included 6 dogs, 8 horses, 2 ponies, 2 cats, a rabbit, a snake, a lizard, 5 guinea pigs, 3 rats, a flying squirrel, a macaw, 2 parrots, a barn owl, 5 bears, a pet badger, a lion, a hyena, a wildcat, a coyote, a zebra, a pig, and a one-legged rooster.
Drawing the Line in Mississippi (The Washington Post)
Presidential pet ‘tails’
Martin Van Buren fights Congress for his tigers: Early on in his presidency, 8th President Martin Van Buren received two tiger cubs as a gift from the Sultan of Oman, Kabul al Said. Van Buren loved the tigers and started to make plans for the White House to be modified to accommodate the large cats. Congress however intervened, saying that the tigers were a gift for America, not just the president. Van Buren fought Congress on this, going back and forth, but in the end the tigers were taken away and placed in a local zoo.
Coolidge and his raccoons and lions and hippos oh my: When Calvin Coolidge entered the White House he found himself in an unusual situation. The farmer who previously supplied the White House with their Thanksgiving turkey had passed away and each Thanksgiving countless farms and companies sent in turkeys vying to become the new supplier to the president. While mostly turkeys, some farmers sent in other animals to be used for the president’s Thanksgiving feast, including a raccoon. During Coolidge’s second year as president in 1926, he received a raccoon from a supporter in Mississippi for his dinner. The (at the time) common southern dish did not seem at all appetizing to Coolidge’s northern pallet, so a pardon was issued to the raccoon. Coolidge’s wife fell in love with her, naming the raccoon Rebecca and keeping her as an official White House pet.
Over the course of his presidency, Coolidge was gifted a number of strange exotic pets. One such pet was a 6-foot-long pigmy hippopotamus. The hippo was named William Johnson Hippopotamus (Billy for short) and was promptly donated to a local zoo. Other animals gifted to Coolidge include a black bear, a wallaby, 13 Pekin ducks, and a pair of twin lion cubs named Tax Reduction and Budget Bureau.
Kennedy and the space dog: The year was 1960. America was in the middle of a Cold War and a space race with Soviet Russia. The Soviets had just launched and recovered the first living things into space, including two dogs named Belka and Strelka.
At a summit in Vienna early in 1961, Jacqueline Kennedy mentioned adoring the space dogs and Strelka’s recently born puppies while making small talk with Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev. A few months later a Soviet envoy showed up at the White House with a puppy named Pushinka (or fluffy in Russian), one of Strelka’s puppies as a gift for the Kennedys.
Of course, with so much tension between the two countries, precautions had to be taken. So Pushinka was sent to Walter Reed Medical and examined for germs, bombs, and listening devices. Luckily none were found and Pushinka lived out her days with the Kennedys, eventually having puppies of her own with the family dog Charlie.
Hyannisport Weekend (Cecil Stoughton, White House Photographer)
Fun Facts about Other Presidential Pets
The most common pets of the president are dogs, horses, and birds.
Andrew Jackson had a parrot who cussed so much it had to be removed from Jackson’s funeral for using too many expletives during the service.
Two presidents owned opossums while in the White House: Benjamin Harrison, the 23rd president, and Herbert Hoover, the 31st president.
Benjamin Harrison’s son also had two alligators that he kept in the White House conservatory.
Abraham Lincoln was the first president to have a cat in the White House.
Lincoln also had a dog that became so famous their name would forever be associated with K9s… Fido. You can try to find Fido over on our Instagram!
FDR also had a very famous dog named Fala. Fala is the only presidential pet to be honored at a national memorial.
Before becoming president, Ronald Regan starred in a movie called ‘Bedtime for Bonzo’ in which he played a college professor trying to prove that nurture is greater than nature by raising a chimpanzee named Bonzo as his child.
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