From Log Cabins and Empty Lots, Presidential Origins Manifest America’s Destiny

The federal government is commemorating Washington’s Birthday, but what’s now called Presidents Day is a chance to trace the roots of all America’s commanders-in-chief. Humble or hallowed, their birthplaces testify to the rise of the republic from sea to shining sea. Bridges Creek, Virginia, has a national monument where President Washington entered the world. A fire destroyed the birth house in 1792. Yet its foundation endures like the one Washington laid for the federal government along with the cornerstone of the White House. Six of Washington’s nine immediate successors were Virginians. Of Presidents Jefferson, Madison, Monroe, William Henry Harrison, Tyler, and Taylor, just Harrison and Tyler’s birthplaces exist. Only the Harrison mansion is open to the public.To mirror democratic ideals, Harrison told voters he’d been born in a log cabin. Father-and-son, Presidents John and John Quincy Adams, were born at Braintree, Massachusetts, in saltbox houses just 75 feet apart, while President Jackson had a genuine hardscrabble story.The author of “Where the Presidents Were Born,” Louis Picone, said in our History Author Show interview that Jackson’s birthplace was so obscure that North and South Carolina feud over the honor. Old Hickory’s successor, President Van Buren, was born in his father’s saloon at Kinderhook, New York.Presidents Coolidge and Reagan were born in family stores at, respectively, Plymouth, Vermont, and Tampico, Illinois. President Polk’s birthplace at Pineville, North Carolina, is marked by a stone pyramid as is President Buchanan’s at Cove Gap, Pennsylvania.President Fillmore of Summerhill, New York, was illiterate until his wife taught him to read. A plaque marks where he proved what parents tell their children: Anyone can grow up to be president. A man-made lake at Hillsborough, New Hampshire, submerged President Franklin Pierce’s birthplace in 1926.President Lincoln was the first president born outside the original 13 states. A cabin at Hodgenville, Kentucky, presents as his birthplace, but that claim is questionable. Nevertheless, a sweeping national park commemorates where the Great Emancipator drew his first breath. President Andrew Johnson was born at Raleigh, North Carolina, in what Mr. Picone describes as “a loft in a detached kitchen.” The “very small little structure” was relocated to preserve it as the embodiment of the 15th president’s struggles.President Grant of Point Pleasant, Ohio, signaled the rise of the Midwest. Six of his nine immediate successors hailed from the Buckeye State: Presidents Hayes, Garfield, Benjamin Harrison — William’s grandson — McKinley, Taft, and Harding. Only Grant and Taft’s birthplaces remain. McKinley’s is a replica. The land where Hayes’s cradle first rocked is occupied by a British Petroleum station — “BP,” Mr. Picone quipped, “for birthplace.” Where President Arthur’s birthplace stood is commemorated at Fairfield, Vermont, despite Democratic foes who alleged he was born in Canada and therefore ineligible for office.President Cleveland and New York’s two Roosevelts — along with the last Virginian to occupy the White House, President Wilson — skipped the nation back to the East Coast. Yet soon came President Hoover from Iowa and President Truman from Missouri. New England reemerged with President Kennedy of Massachusetts and, later, President George W. Bush of Connecticut.Texas reared Presidents Eisenhower and Lyndon Johnson. After LBJ, the presidency at last realized Manifest Destiny by touching the West Coast with President Nixon. Of humble stock, he spoke with pride of being “born in a house my father built” at Yorba Linda.Nixon’s successor, President Ford, was born at Omaha, Nebraska, and President Clinton at Hope, Arkansas. There were again stops back east with President Carter at Plains, Georgia, and President George H. W. Bush at Milton, Massachusetts — less than five miles from those Adams saltboxes. Yet despite the streaks of Virginia and Ohio, the Constitution succeeded in ensuring that presidents could emerge from anywhere in the union. With President Obama’s birth at Hawaii, the Oval Office reached its 50th state deep into the Pacific. President Trump of New York and President Biden of Pennsylvania were born in hospitals as is now the norm. Yet the places where their predecessors started climbing into history testify to the republic’s ideal — a nation where leaders need not be born in castles, and children crawling on dirt floors can one day walk into the White House.

From Log Cabins and Empty Lots, Presidential Origins Manifest America’s Destiny

More from the New York Sun

Attempt To Entangle Trump in Jeffrey Epstein Debacle Confirms Democrats’ Moral and Tactical Bankruptcy

Trump Announces $5 Billion Gaza Pledge as ‘Board of Peace’ Prepares To Meet at Washington

CBO Predicts $1 Trillion Higher Debt by 2036 Despite Trump’s Big Beautiful Bill

More from the New York Sun

Attempt To Entangle Trump in Jeffrey Epstein Debacle Confirms Democrats’ Moral and Tactical Bankruptcy

Trump Announces $5 Billion Gaza Pledge as ‘Board of Peace’ Prepares To Meet at Washington

CBO Predicts $1 Trillion Higher Debt by 2036 Despite Trump’s Big Beautiful Bill

MAGA Insiders Want Longtime Trump Confidant Steve Bannon Excommunicated Following Latest Epstein Files Release

The New Subaru Outback Looks Different, but Hasn’t Changed a Bit

Last Crack at Diplomacy? U.S. Prepares for War and Peace With Iran

‘Kramer/Fauci’ Plays Back a Political Battle From a More Civil Time

Homan Looks To Ease Tensions Amid Deportation Campaign, Declines To Defend Decisions of Other Administration Officials