With a book about Virginian-born presidents already written, Heather Cole spoke at the Woodrow Wilson Presidential Library on Wednesday about her second book on presidents born in Ohio.
“There were more U.S. presidents born in Virginia than in any other state,” Cole, who lives in Staunton, said.
Cole was a tour guide at WWPL a few years ago when the idea for a nonfiction book came to her: United States presidents born in Virginia.
“This history stuff is kind of addictive, once you get into it,” Cole said.
Arcadia published Virginia’s Presidents: A History & Guide in 2023, and, in April, The History Press published Ohio’s Presidents: A History & Guide. Seven presidents were born in Ohio who would serve the U.S. from 1969 until 1923. Both books are part history and part travel guide.
In Born in the Buckeye State: Stories of the Ohio Presidents, Cole shared with an audience in downtown Staunton at WWPL what she found most interesting about the seven men.
“They aren’t as well known as sort of the Founding Fathers from Virginia,” she said. Most served only one term as U.S. president, but they served in what Cole called her favorite period which was an “important and pivotal period in American history.”
Between 1869 and 1923, the country began Reconstruction and to rebuild the union after the Civil War, the population more than doubled, and Blacks and women earned the right to vote.
“There’s still rampant racism, sexism and nativism in the country, but the stage was set for some of the larger reforms that would take place in the 20th Century.”
All seven were Republicans, but what came to be known as Abraham Lincoln’s Republican party, not the Republican party Americans know today. The first five served in the Union Army during American Civil War. All seven were married.
“It’s that last piece — the men behind the presidencies that I found particularly interesting when I was researching this book,” Cole said.
Ulysses S. Grant attended West Point years before the Civil War would make him famous. After West Point, he attempted farming but was more suited to life in the military and he refused to have slaves because he disliked the practice. He would be Lincoln’s second choice to command Union troops from 1861 to 1865. Grant’s memoir was one of the most sold books in the 19th Century.
Rutherford B. Hayes served in the U.S. House and then three terms as governor of Ohio before running in the disputed 1876 presidential election, which served to further disenfranchise Black Americans.
James A. Garfield was the last U.S. president born in a log cabin and before becoming the 20th president he would begin the “Front Porch Campaign,” a tradition by which politicians running for president would campaign on their front porches. Garfield was assassinated in September 1881. He was 49 years old.
Benajamin Harrison came from a long line of politicians. His grandfather, William Henry Harrison, was the 9th president and his great-grandfather, Benjamin Harrison V, signed the Declaration of Independence. Harrison was the first president to enjoy electricity while he lived in the White House.
The last president to have served in the Civil War was William McKinley. He joined the war at age 18 and served with Hayes. He served in the U.S. Congress and was governor of Ohio. While the 25th president, Hawaii joined the U.S. McKinley was assassinated in 1901 by a young man who was an anarchist.
William Howard Taft, the first president to own an automobile, is the only man to serve as U.S. president and Chief Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court. After his presidency, he ran against Theodore Roosevelt and Woodrow Wilson in the 1912 election which made Wilson the 28th president. Taft was the first president and first member of the Supreme Court buried at Arlington National Cemetery.
Warren G. Harding was the first president to own a radio while living in the White House. He was a newspaper man before becoming a politician and continued to own a newspaper while in office. His father fought for the Union Army and Harding ran for president on the notion of “A Return to Normalcy.” He was the last president to have a “Front Porch Campaign” and his wife was the first First Lady to vote. Scandals involving Harding did not surface until after his death.
“He was good with the media,” Cole said. “And, with his death in 1923, the line of Ohio presidents came to an end.”
Each of the Ohio presidents has a museum and library similar to WWPL, and Cole visited each museum in researching her book. According to Robin von Seldeneck, WWPL president and CEO, Grant’s museum is in the process of moving to Mississippi State University. Von Seldeneck added that Wilson had a connection to Ohio. His father was born in Ohio, and his mother immigrated to Ohio where she would later meet Wilson’s father.
According to Cole, each museum shares the complex stories of each Ohio-born president, which are stories that humanize the presidents just as WWPL humanizes Wilson.
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Rebecca Barnabi
