From top left, clockwise: Pushinka was a gift from Nikita Khrushchev to John F. Kennedy; Bo is the Portuguese water dog of President Barack Obama; Commander is President Biden’s German Shepherd; and Socks is President Bill Clinton’s pet cat.
Marc Nighswander/AP, Mandel Ngan/AFP/Getty Images (2). William J. Smith/AP
hide caption
toggle caption
Marc Nighswander/AP, Mandel Ngan/AFP/Getty Images (2). William J. Smith/AP
Clockwise, from top left, Pushinka was a gift from Nikita Khrushchev to President John F. Kennedy; Bo is the Portuguese water dog of President Barack Obama; Commander is President Biden’s German Shepherd; and Socks is President Bill Clinton’s cat.
Marc Nighswander/AP, Mandel Ngan/AFP/Getty Images (2). William J. Smith/AP
Since President George Washington’s time, the White House was home to cats and birds. Some have been immortalized in speeches, while others have found themselves at the center of controversy, with one even suspected of
espionage!
Van Buren wanted to keep tiger cubs. Congress refused.
President Martin Van Buren received a pair tiger cubs that were originally given to Andrew Jackson by the Sultan. Van Buren had already been elected president when the cubs arrived in Washington, D.C., and was adamant that the animals be kept. According to the National Park Service, Congress said the cubs belonged to the U.S. Government, not the president. “In the end, the President lost his argument with Congress and gave the tiger cubs to a zoo,” the park service says.
Presidents
Calvin Coolidge and Teddy Roosevelt each
kept a strange collection of animals. Coolidge received a pygmy-sized hippo called Billy, but he sent it to National Zoo.
Roosevelt was an avid outdoorsman and had a wide variety of exotic pets. These included a badger, a hyena and a number of farm animals. The Bidens are familiar with the controversy surrounding Commander. In the first months of the administration, another of the first family’s dogs, Major, was sent to Delaware to live after biting security personnel. In an odd historical parallel, President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s German shepherd, also named Major, met a fate similar to Biden’s dog. Andrew Hager, historian-in-residence at the Presidential Pet Museum, says FDR’s Major had to be rehomed after “
the pants of the British prime minister at the first state dinner Roosevelt gave in 1933.” Major, the German shepherd of President Franklin D. Roosevelt who was also named Major, had to be rehomed after biting the pants of British Prime Minister at the first state dinner Roosevelt gave in 1933. According to Andrew Hager, historian-in-residence at The Presidential Pet Museum. Just don’t call him Major.
Fala the Scottish terrier with President Franklin Delano Roosevelt, 1941.
Hulton Archive/Getty Images
hide caption
toggle caption[tearing]
Hulton Archive/Getty Images
President Franklin Delano Roosevelt with his Scottish terrier Fala in 1941.
Hulton Archive/Getty Images
FDR’s “Fala”, speech transformed fake news into comedyBut FDR’s Scottish terrier Fala has earned a lasting place in history. Hager, retelling the story, says that to retrieve Fala “they had to turn the destroyer around and go back at a cost of several million dollars and at a risk for everyone.” Hager tells the story of how to retrieve Fala, they had to turn around the destroyer and return at a cost several million dollars, and risking everyone’s safety. “
They now include my dog Fala,” said the president to laughter.
Richard Nixon, Republican vice presidential candidate, explained a $18,000 expense account on national television, in September 1952. This appearance was nicknamed “Checkers Speech” due to his reference to his family dog.
AP
hide caption
toggle caption
AP
Richard Nixon, Republican vice presidential candidate, explained a $18,000 expense account on national television, in September 1952. This appearance was nicknamed “Checkers Speech” due to his reference to his family dog.
AP
Nixon’s dog and the speech that may have saved his political career
Richard Nixon may owe his political career to a black-and-white cocker spaniel named Checkers. This story is not about his time as Dwight Eisenhower’s running mate, but rather the 1952 presidential campaign. A potential scandal over an alleged Nixon political war chest was in the works and Eisenhower threatened to remove him from his ticket. In a televised speech, Nixon countered critics, acknowledging that what he had done “was wrong, just not illegal.” Nixon, taking a cue from FDR’s example, invoked the family pet to make a political point. Nixon said that his daughter Tricia, aged 6, had named the dog.
“And, you know, the kids, like all kids, loved the dog, and I just want to say this, right now, that regardless of what they say about it, we are going to keep it,” Nixon said.
The “Checkers speech” is widely regarded as having rescued Nixon from political oblivion.
Some thought Kennedy’s Cold War canine could be a spyDuring the Cold War intrigue of the 1960s, Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev gave President John F. Kennedy a small mixed-breed dog from the litter of Strelka, one of two Russian mutts to have flown into space and returned safely. Some thought Kennedy’s Cold War canine could be a spyDuring the Cold War intrigue of the 1960s, Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev gave President John F. Kennedy a small mixed-breed dog from the litter of Strelka, one two Russian mutts that had flown into space and returned safely.
Pushinka with her pupniks. Pushinka (Russian for “fluffy”) was a present from Nikita Khrushchev, Soviet Premier to John F. Kennedy.
Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum/NARA
hide caption
toggle caption
Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum/NARA
Pushinka with her pupniks. Pushinka (fluffy in Russian) is a gift that Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev gave to John F. Kennedy.
Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum/NARA
“People thought it was a spy,” says Jennifer Pickens, a White House historian and first lady expert who also has written a book on presidential pets.
“After a whole bunch of tests for bombs and germs and other listening devices …
went on to fall in love with President Kennedy’s beloved terrier, Charlie, and had puppies that were coined pupniks,” she says.
Kennedy’s successor, President Lyndon Johnson, infamously caught flak for a photograph that showed him picking up one of his beagles by the ears, apparently to encourage him to bark for guests.
When the photo appeared in
Life
magazine, “the public reaction was swift and vehement. In letters and phone calls to the White House, in newspaper editorials, on TV and radio talk shows, LBJ was denounced for animal cruelty,” according to the American Kennel Club.
But Pickens argues that it was overblown.
“President Johnson was one of the greatest animal lovers of all times, especially dog lovers,” she says. She says that Johnson was one of the greatest animal lovers in history, especially dog lovers. I think it was a media flurry that went crazy for a brief moment. “
Hager attributes this episode to a Texas hunting tradition which “didn’t transfer outside of rural West Texas or outside of the hunting community. “
Lyndon B. Johnson and his beagles Him and Her.
Lyndon B. Johnson Presidential Library and Museum/NARA
hide caption
toggle caption
Lyndon B. Johnson Presidential Library and Museum/NARA
President Lyndon B. Johnson and his beagles Him and Her.
Lyndon B. Johnson Presidential Library and Museum/NARA
Bill Clinton is president, and the first family’s black and white domestic shorthaired cat, Socks, is a feline icon. Socks was briefly caught up in the bitter partisan divisions during the 1990s. The cat was receiving so much fan mail that Indiana Republican Rep. Dan Burton requested data on how much it cost the White House to process the correspondence.
Finally, there was the kerfuffle over President Barack Obama’s Portuguese water dog, Bo. The Obamas promised to get their daughters Sasha, Malia and Obama a dog following the election. They “repeatedly said they wanted it to be a rescued dog such as one from a shelter,” The Associated Press said.
However, “Their search was complicated by daughter Malia’s allergies, which would rule out many of the ‘mutts’ the president has said he would prefer,” according to the AP.
Sen. Edward Kennedy, his wife Victoria and their son, John, suggested a Portuguese Water Dog, a breed that is known for being hypoallergenic. Bo came from a Massachusetts breeder after the dog was returned by its first owner.[Pushinka]Technically a rescue? Bo is a “quasi-rescue dog,” Pacelle said. Bo is “quasi rescue dog,” Pacelle said.
A photo taken in 2012 of President Barack Obama and his family pet Bo, an Portuguese water dog outside the Oval Office at the White House.
Pablo Martinez Monsivais/AP
hide captiontoggle caption
Pablo Martinez Monsivais/AP
A photo of President Barack Obama in 2012 with his family pet Bo, an Portuguese water dog outside the Oval Office of White House.
Pablo Martinez Monsivais/AP
She says: “We are a nation that loves dogs and cats.” The president is humanized to a large degree by owning a pet. “
But, as any pet owner is aware, there are good and bad days. The same is true for the chief executive. Hager said that history has shown how the positive image of a pet can backfire, and “come to bite you”. “