Regardless of the circumstances the source asserts, Senator David Rice Atchinson was not the 12th U.S. president, though I'm sure his descendants would like it to be that way. Nobody becomes the President of the United States until the oath of office is given/taken and David Rice Atchinson did not take the oath of office. The White House list of Presidents of the United States: http://www.whitehouse.gov/WH/glimpse/presidents/html/presidents.html George Washington (1789-1797) - John Adams (1797-1801) - Thomas Jefferson (1801-1809) - James Madison (1809-1817) - James Monroe (1817-1825) - John Quincy Adams (1825-1829) - Andrew Jackson (1829-1837) - Martin Van Buren (1837-1841) - William Henry Harrison (1841) - John Tyler (1841-1845) - James Polk (1845-1849) - Zachary Taylor (1849-1850) - Millard Fillmore (1850-1853) - Franklin Pierce (1853-1857) - James Buchanan (1857-1861) - Abraham Lincoln (1861-1865) - Andrew Johnson (1865-1869) - Ulysses S. Grant (1869-1877) - Rutherford B. Hayes (1877-1881) - James A. Garfield (1881) - Chester A. Arthur (1881-1885) - Grover Cleveland (1885-1889) - Benjamin Harrison (1889-1893) - Grover Cleveland (1893-1897) - William McKinley (1897-1901) - Theodore Roosevelt (1901-1909) - William H. Taft (1909-1913) - Woodrow Wilson (1913-1921) - Warren Harding (1921-1923) - Calvin Coolidge (1923-1929) - Herbert Hoover (1929-1933) - Franklin D. Roosevelt (1933-1945) - Harry S Truman (1945-1953) - Dwight D. Eisenhower (1953-1961) - John F. Kennedy (1961-1963) - Lyndon B. Johnson (1963-1969) - Richard M. Nixon (1969-1974) - Gerald R. Ford (1974-1977) - Jimmy Carter (1977-1981) - Ronald W. Reagan (1981-1989) - George Bush (1989-1993) - William J. Clinton (1993-Present) ================== At 02:49 PM 12/7/99 , you wrote: >______________________________X-Message: #2 >Date: Tue, 07 Dec 1999 09:53:32 -0800 >From: Donna <djzinn@pa.net> >To: PAFRANKL-L@rootsweb.com >Message-ID: <384D499B.6697@pa.net> >Subject: [PAFRANKL] A Little Bit of History Trivia >Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii >Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit > >Hi List: > >Just thought this was quite interesting. You know they say you should >learn something new each and every day... well I just did and now I'm >passing this little bit of history on to you. How many of you out there >knew this??? > >Donna HELLER ZINN of Cumberland Co., PA. > >ps. This was taken off of MailBits.com: Trivia Subscription > > ************************************************** > >The 12th president of the United States was David Rice >Atchinson, a Missouri senator who served for one day in 1849. >The new president usually took office on March 4. But that >year it fell on a Sunday, and although President James Polk >left on schedule, Zachary Taylor did not take the oath until >the next day. Rice was president pro tempore of the Senate, >and under the provisions of the Constitution, he served until >Taylor was sworn in. Atchinson neither started a war nor >raised any taxes: he just left quietly after 24 hours. > >(Source: FACTS ABOUT THE PRESIDENTS)