Although no Speaker in real life has become President, in the excellent episode of the West Wing, “25”, the Speaker temporarily acts as President because President Bartlett’s daughter has been kidnapped by terrorists.
Bartlett voluntarily steps aside under the authority in the 25th Amendment because he does not think he would necessarily act in the nation’s best interests when his daughter’s life is on the line.
The Vice-President has previously resigned, so it falls to the Speaker, a Republican played by John Goodman in an excellent turn, to exercise the presidential powers until Bartlett’s daughter is rescued.
In the 1964 political thriller The Man by Irving Wallace, the President pro tem of the Senate becomes President of the United States after the accidental deaths of both the President and the Speaker due to the collapse of a ceiling in an ancient German building during a diplomatic summit. (The Vice President had previously died of cancer and had not been replaced, as the 25th Amendment was not yet in effect). The new President, Douglass Dilman of Maryland, is black, and is immediately opposed by many conservatives and racists, leading to an impeachment crisis. James Earl Jones played Dilman in a movie adaptation of the book.
The best-known film to feature the first female POTUS was Kisses for My President, with Polly Bergen as President Leslie McCloud and Fred MacMurray as her First Gentleman. After hilarity ensues, with the two teens getting into scrapes, President McCloud does the only thing an honorable 1964 wife could, especially after getting pregnant again - she resigns to devote herself to her family.
Craig T. Nelson played Coach Hayden Fox of the Minnesota State University Screaming Eagles, with one last season with the NFL-expansion Orlando Breakers, on Coach, supported by Shelley Fabares and Jerry Van Dyke.
Charles Fox was the hard-drinking, wild living leader of the radical Whigs in Britain at the end of the 18th century. It was widely assumed that his good friend, the Prince of Wales, would appoint him Prime Minister when he acceded, but it turned out that “Prinny”'s liberalism was more for opposition to his conservative father, George III, than real. He favoured conservative ministries throughout his time as Prince Regent and then as King.
A Framingham, Massachusetts Quaker meeting made a send up video of the recent novelty hit by Norway’s Ylvis, “What Does George Fox Say?”, describing the origins and tenets of their faith.
Prince William of Denmark was elected King of the Hellenes on 30 March 1863 by the Greek National Assembly under the regnal name of George I. He was aged 17. He is said to have found out about his election to the Greek throne when he saw an article in the newspaper wrapping the sandwiches he took with him to the Danish Naval Academy.
The Hair song Good Morning Starshine hit the pop charts for William Oliver Swofford (known as Oliver, or as Bill Swofford). Swofford died from cancer at the young age of 54 on 12 February 2000, the same day that three other notable people died: Tom Landry, Charles Schulz, and Screamin’ Jay Hawkins.