George Washington accumulated vast acreage—more than 50,000 acres by his death—by shrewd speculation in frontier land he surveyed. Marrying one of the richest widows in Virginia, he developed a taste for fine things. At their Mount Vernon estate, he diversified their income, switching the primary cash crop from tobacco to wheat and starting a profitable whiskey distillery.

When Washington became the colony’s unrivaled choice to lead revolutionary forces against the British, he declined a salary, asking only to be reimbursed for his expenses. Over the the war’s eight years, the meticulous record keeper shelled out $160,074 (about $5 million in today’s dollars)—including paying a network of 500 spies and feeding his staff officers. Congress would only quibble about $8 of his income expense accounting, but paid him in heavily depreciated Continental currency.

War wreaked havoc with Washington’s finances in other ways. In 1781, British raiders hauled away much of Mount Vernon’s livestock and 17 enslaved workers. With Washington away fighting—and neglecting his farm businesses—for so long, he lost 50 percent of his net worth. And a postwar depression made it impossible for Washington to collect rents for his frontier land holdings.

In 1787, when he was elected to the Constitutional Convention to help formulate “a more perfect union,” the land-rich, cash-poor war hero had to borrow money from a neighbor to spend four months in the expensive capital of Philadelphia. And when he was unanimously elected America’s first President, he wrote to a relative that he needed the salary: Without a pension, he could no longer afford his retirement at Mount Vernon.

Born March 15, 1767, the 7th president was 69 years and 354 days when he completed his second term in March 1837. Though “Old Hickory” had a reputation for being a rugged ex-soldier and outdoorsman, by the time he reached the White House, he already had spent years coping with a variety of ailments.

According to biographer H.W. Brands, samples of his hair reveal that he had lead poisoning from old bullet wounds. Jackson also struggled with chronic diarrhea from diseases he’d contracted while fighting the Indians in the 1810s. His habits of smoking and chewing tobacco didn’t help his health either, and according to biographer Sean Wilentz, Jackson became so sick at times during his two terms that it appeared he might not survive.

Jackson did make it to the end of his term but when returned to the Hermitage, his plantation in Tennessee, the white-haired ex-president was physically spent and suffered from blinding headaches, insomnia, severe pains in his side and a chronic cough.

Despite the exceedingly cold weather on William Henry Harrison’s inauguration day in 1841, the war hero and incoming president refused to wear a coat or hat, and insisted on riding back to the White House on horseback instead of a covered carriage. “Old Tippecanoe” also delivered the longest address in inaugural history; his speech was 8,445 words long, and took more than two hours to read. Ironically, Harrison’s presidency would turn out to be the briefest in the nation’s history. Shortly after his inauguration, Harrison caught a cold, which turned into pneumonia. He died on April 4, 1841, just 31 days after taking office.

Abraham Lincoln on Stephen Douglas’ policy on slavery: It 'is as thin as the homeopathic soup that was made by boiling the shadow of a pigeon that had been starved to death.'

Lincoln, who used that tortured metaphor during his famous 1858 debates against Stephen A. Douglas for Senate, is known for his eloquence, less so for his ability to craft brutal one-liners.

Lincoln didn’t win that race, but the publicity he gained during the campaign helped him secure the presidency just a couple years later.

The day of Ulysses S. Grant’s second inauguration in March 1873 was one of the coldest March days in the history of Washington, D.C. The recorded temperature was 16˚F at noon, with gusty winds making it feel more like -15° to -30°F. Flags along Pennsylvania Avenue froze or were ripped loose, while ambulances stood by during the inaugural parade to take frostbitten military cadets to the hospital.

Grant’s inaugural ball that evening took place in a temporary structure erected for the grand occasion, but it wasn’t equipped for the cold weather, and the guests kept their heavy overcoats on as they dined and danced. Cold food and frozen champagne weren’t the worst of it however: Some 100 canaries, hanging from the ceiling in cages, were supposed to serenade the guests, but many of the birds froze to death before they could perform.

Dwight D. Eisenhower on Richard Nixon contributions as his vice president: 'If you give me a week, I might think of one. I don’t remember.'

Before Richard Nixon was our infamous 37th president, he was Dwight D. Eisenhower’s veep. Judging by the remark Eisenhower made at a 1960 presidential news conference, they didn’t get along so well.

Time correspondent Charles H. Mohr was asking Dwight about what Nixon actually did in his administration, and was getting some pushback. Dwight said Nixon “was not a part of decision-making,” and Mohr countered that he must be doing something.

“We understand that the power of decision is entirely yours, Mr. President,” he said. “I just wondered if you could give us an example of a major idea of his that you had adopted in that role, as the decider and final—”

That was when Dwight cut him off, saying he’d need those seven days to think of one.

The image most people had of John F. Kennedy was one of youth and vitality. And, that was on purpose. JFK in fact lived in near-constant pain, but his poor health was kept a closely guarded secret for fear of damaging his political career. He had allergies, stomach troubles and suffered from chronic back pain, which was aggravated by his World War II service and required numerous surgeries. The back injury allegedly happened in 1937 while he was a student at Harvard, and it initially disqualified him from military service (his father later used his connections to get JFK into the Naval Reserve).

He’d been ill before the injury, too. As a child he suffered from gastrointestinal issues, which were later diagnosed as Addison’s disease, an endocrine disorder. In a strange twist of fate, one of the symptoms of Addison’s—as well as a symptom of the steroids used to treat it—is hyperpigmentation, which may be responsible for JFK’s perpetual “tan,” something viewers of his televised debate with Richard Nixon definitely noted.

At one of the packed balls celebrating Richard Nixon’s second inauguration in 1973, held at the Smithsonian’s Museum of History & Technology (now the American History Museum), a rooster escaped from a farm exhibit and joined some of the guests in their $1,000 box. After one guest claimed it “assaulted” her, the Smithsonian’s Secretary S. Dillon Ripley succeeded in capturing the rooster. By smoothing his feathers, he calmed the bird down enough so he could return it to the colonial barn exhibit in the museum’s Growth of the United States hall.

After taking his oath in a $175 suit purchased a week earlier in his home state of Georgia, Jimmy Carter surprised spectators when he and his family emerged from the presidential limousine to walk at the head of his inaugural parade in January 1977. The only other president to do so had been Thomas Jefferson, on his first inauguration day in 1803.

Much like Jefferson, Carter wanted to be seen as the “people’s president,” and his decision to walk in the open air down Pennsylvania Avenue made a memorable statement. (By contrast, Richard Nixon’s limo had been escorted by an armed guard including 3,000 District police, 5,000 regular troops and 1,000 National Guardsmen at his first inauguration in 1969.) Carter’s nine-year-old daughter, Amy, even skipped part of the way back to the White House. Presidents after Carter would follow his example and walk for at least part of the procession to the White House.

At Barack Obama’s first inauguration in 2009, he and Chief Justice John Roberts got their signals crossed while Roberts was administering the oath of office in front of a record-breaking crowd of nearly 2 million people. After Obama inadvertently interrupted Roberts, the chief justice, who was not using notes, flubbed the wording of the oath, saying “That I will execute the office of president to the United States faithfully,” rather than the exact wording (“That I will faithfully execute the office of president of the United States”) prescribed by the U.S. Constitution. As Obama then repeated Roberts’ incorrect wording, constitutional scholars questioned whether he had been properly sworn in. Obama and Roberts ended up doing the whole thing over again at the White House the following day—this time without a hitch.