RAPID CITY, S.D. (KOTA) –<\/p>\n
Leading up to America\u2019s 250th birthday, we are highlighting things you may not know about our presidents.<\/p>\n
Today, we feature the 14th President of the United States.<\/p>\n
Franklin Pierce was born on November 23, 1804, in Hillsborough, New Hampshire. His father, Benjamin Pierce, was a two-time governor of the Granite State and a hero of the Revolutionary War. He graduated from Bowdoin College in 1824, studied law, and was admitted to the bar in 1827.<\/p>\n
Pierce served two terms in the U.S. Congress and one term in the U.S. Senate in the 1830s.<\/p>\n
After leaving Washington, he stayed out of the public eye for a decade before becoming a Democratic dark-horse candidate for president in 1852. He was elected, and at 47, was the youngest man at the time to win the White House.<\/p>\n
Two months before his inauguration, his family was involved in a train wreck in Massachusetts. Pierce and his wife were not hurt, but his 11-year-old son Bennie, was killed. All three of the couple\u2019s sons died young.<\/p>\n
His greatest challenge as president was his stance on the Kansas-Nebraska Act. Pierce supported the bill that repealed the ban on slavery in those states. He was a northerner but was sympathetic to slavery. That eventually led to him not getting the Democratic nomination in the 1856 election, thus ending his political career.<\/p>\n
Franklin Pierce, a one-term president, died in 1869. He was 64 years old.<\/p>\n
President Pierce is credited with bringing the first Christmas tree to the White House and a permanent bathtub to the second floor of the White House.<\/p>\n
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