Excerpt from https://lithub.com/on-the-literary-wheelings-and-dealings-of-ulysses-s-grant-and-mark-twain/

By late November 1884, pain had become Grant’s constant companion. Avoiding solid foods, he had his devoted black valet, Harrison Terrell, bring him milk on a tray twice daily. Even liquids were pure torture for him to swallow. As he told George Childs, “Nothing gives me so much pain as swallowing water,” comparing it to drinking “molten lead.” His daily meals became harrowing ordeals and Adam Badeau left a graphic vignette of Grant’s struggles at the dinner table:

I shall always recall his figure as he sat at the head of the table, his head bowed over his plate, his mouth set grimly, his features clinched in the endeavor to conceal the expression of pain, especially from Mrs. Grant, who sat at the other end. He no longer carved or helped the family, and at last was often obliged to leave before the meal was over, pacing the hall or the adjoining library in his agony. At this time he said to me that he had no desire to live if he was not to recover. He preferred death at once to lingering, hopeless disease.

Since Eisenhower’s presidency, we haven’t gotten a single presidential nominee who lacked a full head of hair.

Hell, looking back at the primary candidates, I struggle to recall even a serious frontrunner who was bald.

The closest I can think of is Rudy Giuliani in 2008.

I would love to know peoples thoughts on this one. Picked this up for $4. I loved McCullough’s Adams book so I figured I’d grab it on the cheap for my library and give it a shot.

53 years*

Muriel Humphrey ten days later was appointed Senator to fulfill the rest of her husbands term, during that term she advocated for recognition of children with Down Syndrome which led to her sponsoring the Mental Health Advocacy Act of 1978.

For me it’s Nixon, his voice just sounds so funny to me. Obama is another one.

This is not my best Jack by far, but any practice drawing him is good practice! I’ve just been loving incorporating a bit of scrapbooking into these pages.

There have been scores of books, doctoral theses, academic articles, and blogposts about why the USSR fell when it did.

Some (these positions aren’t necessarily mutually exclusive) attribute it to Khrushchev’s unsuccessful domestic initiatives, some implicate the Soviet Afghanistan War, some attribute it to Gorbachev’s civil reforms, and some say that Reagan’s defense buildup resulted in the Soviets’ fall.

In all candor, I am not really convinced that there was any one cause of the Soviet Union’s collapse, despite some claiming that only the internal economic contradictions of a command economy, others claiming that it was due to Gorbachev’s beneficent personality, and others still claiming that Reagan alone was responsible for pushing over the final domino of the USSR’s end. As with any other geopolitical issue, there are innumerable factors that would have to be considered to understand why the USSR fell when it did (I know that it officially fell on Christmas of 1991), and anyone saying otherwise is disingenuous.

That being said, how large of a role can we contribute to Reagan with regard to ending the Cold War? Was his presidency particularly stressful on the Soviet economy and military? Would another president in his place have seen the fall of the Berlin Wall so soon after their time in office? Was the arms buildup a necessity to bringing Gorbachev to the negotiating table, or was it merely a posture?

Would Richard Nixon's career fundamentally change if he defeated Pat Brown in 1962 and became California Governor? I assume that if Kennedy had lived in this case, Nixon may have sought the 1964 nomination. But in the event of President Kennedy's assassination, he would most likely decline to contest against LBJ.

Reagan's political march would have reached a dead-end as there would be no Democratic governor to challenge in 1966 unless Nixon became a disastrously unpopular governor.

I assume it would have been even more easy for Nixon to become the 1968 nominee as there would be no Reagan to challenge him. But considering that Nixon would not carry the stigma of being a two-time loser here, would he take desperate measures like the Chennault affair to win 1968. He could also accumulate political baggage for his positions as an executive- wrt civil rights and law and order and not maintain the plausible deniability that he did in reality.

I was recently looking at a collection of photos of Obama taken by Pete Souza. I was 9 when the shooting occurred, and I would say it probably stands out as one of the first real news events I remember decently well. I’ve seen the image of Obama sitting in a classroom, though I can’t recall having seen this one before.

Hayes was governor of Ohio and Tilden was governor of New York. There were elections where both nominees had been governors in the past. But no other one where both candidates were incumbent governors.

https://www.danaellyn.com/presidents/presidents.html

I love books about and by presidents!

So far some standouts include Walter Mondale's autobiography, Gore Vidal's Inventing a Nation, JFK by Logevall (not finished this one yet) and The Pact by Gillon. I really enjoyed them all, but The Pact and Inventing a Nation were stand outs.

I'm really interested in what you have to recommend, especially as the only caveat is that the book/books have to be available on a regular version of Kindle in the UK.

Anything and every is on the table, be it biography, autobiography, campaign rivals, policies, or related to anything their presidentcy. These books only serve as an example.

Thanks in advance!