Most people only remember Grover Cleveland as the "non-consecutive" guy. You know, the answer to that specific trivia question about which president has two different numbers (22 and 24). Honestly, that's the most boring thing about him.
If you actually dig into his life, the guy was a walking paradox. He was a fiscal conservative who hated big government but personally oversaw the hanging of criminals. He was a bachelor who married a woman twenty-seven years his junior in the Blue Room. He even had a secret surgery on a boat to hide a cancer diagnosis from a panicked nation.
These fun facts about Grover Cleveland aren't just dry history. They're bizarre, somewhat dark, and occasionally hilarious.
The President Was Once A Professional Executioner
Before he was the leader of the free world, Cleveland was the Sheriff of Erie County, New York. Most sheriffs back then would pay a deputy $10 to handle the actual "hanging" part of the job. It was grisly work. Nobody wanted to do it.
Cleveland wasn't "most sheriffs."
✨ Don't miss: Ten dollar bills worth money: Why your pocket change might be a small fortune
He felt that if he was the one who had to oversee the law, he should be the one to carry out the ultimate penalty. He didn't want to pass the emotional burden to his subordinates. So, he personally pulled the lever for two different executions.
The first was Patrick Morrissey in 1872. Morrissey had killed his mother with a bread knife. Cleveland did the deed, but it reportedly made him sick for days afterward. He still didn't quit, though. He later hanged John Gaffney, a man who shot someone during a card game. Opponents later tried to use this against him, calling him the "Buffalo Hangman." It didn't work. If anything, it just cemented his reputation for being "Ugly Honest."
The Secret Surgery On The High Seas
In 1893, right at the start of his second term, Cleveland noticed a rough spot on the roof of his mouth. It was a tumor. Doctors confirmed it was malignant.
The timing was a disaster. The country was in the middle of a massive economic depression called the Panic of 1893. Cleveland knew that if the public found out the President was dying of cancer, the stock market would basically disintegrate.
So, he lied.
He told the press he was going on a four-day fishing trip. Instead, he boarded a friend's yacht, the Oneida, and a team of surgeons operated on him while the boat was moving. They removed a large portion of his upper jaw and five teeth. They did the whole thing through his mouth to avoid leaving a scar on his face.
The craziest part? It worked.
A dentist made him a custom rubber prosthesis to fill the gap in his jaw so his speech wouldn't sound different. He went back to work, and the public didn't find out the truth for nearly twenty-four years.
A White House Wedding And A Massive Age Gap
Cleveland entered the White House as a bachelor. His sister, Rose, had to act as the First Lady because there was no wife in the picture. That changed pretty quickly.
At age 49, Cleveland married Frances Folsom. She was 21.
If that sounds a little "kinda weird" to you, the backstory makes it weirder. Frances was the daughter of Cleveland’s law partner, Oscar Folsom. When Oscar died, Cleveland became the executor of his estate and basically looked after Frances as she grew up. He bought her her first baby carriage.
Despite the "creepy" factor by modern standards, the public was obsessed with her. She was the 19th-century version of a superstar. People copied her hairstyle. They used her face to sell products without her permission. She remains the only First Lady to get married inside the White House itself.
The Baby Ruth Mystery
You’ve probably heard that the Baby Ruth candy bar was named after the legendary slugger Babe Ruth. That makes sense, right? He was the biggest star in the world when the bar was released in 1921.
But the Curtiss Candy Company claimed something different.
They said it was named after Ruth Cleveland, Grover’s eldest daughter. The problem? Ruth Cleveland had died of diphtheria in 1904, seventeen years before the candy bar came out.
Most historians think the company was just trying to dodge paying royalties to Babe Ruth. By claiming it was named after a dead president's daughter, they won a huge court case and didn't have to give the baseball player a dime.
He Was The King Of The Veto
Grover Cleveland did not like spending the government's money. At all.
He holds the record for the most vetoes of any president besides FDR (who served four terms). Cleveland used his veto power 414 times during his first term alone. For context, the first 21 presidents combined only used the veto 204 times.
He famously vetoed a bill that would have given $10,000 to Texas farmers suffering from a drought. His reasoning? He believed that while the people should support the government, the government should not support the people. He thought "paternal care" from the state would ruin the American character.
He also spent an absurd amount of time personally reading through thousands of private pension claims from Civil War veterans. If he found one that looked even slightly fraudulent—like a soldier claiming a pension for an injury that actually happened years after the war—he’d write a snarky veto message and shut it down.
A Few More Quick Hits
- Telephone: He was the first president to have a phone installed in the White House (1886), but he rarely used it. He actually preferred to answer the White House front door himself sometimes.
- Size: He was a big guy. He weighed about 250 to 280 pounds, which earned him nicknames like "Uncle Jumbo."
- Draft Dodger: During the Civil War, he didn't want to fight, so he did what was legally allowed at the time: he paid a Polish immigrant $150 to serve in his place.
- The Kid: He had a child out of wedlock with a woman named Maria Halpin. During his campaign, his enemies chanted, "Ma, Ma, where's my Pa?" After he won, his supporters added the line: "Gone to the White House, ha, ha, ha!"
Actionable Takeaways For History Buffs
If you want to see the Cleveland legacy in person, there are a few specific things you can do:
- Visit the Birthplace: The Grover Cleveland Birthplace Historic Site is in Caldwell, New Jersey. It's the only house he ever lived in that is open to the public as a museum.
- Check the Blue Room: If you ever take a White House tour, remember that the Blue Room is where the only presidential wedding in that building happened.
- Read the Yacht Story: For a deeper look at the medical cover-up, read The President Is a Sick Man by Matthew Algeo. It details the surgery on the Oneida with incredible accuracy.
Cleveland wasn't the most "exciting" president in terms of wars or massive social shifts, but as a human being, he was fascinatingly stubborn and weirdly consistent. Whether he was hanging a man or hiding a tumor, he did things his way.