He didn’t write it, but his is probably the most famous version. It was written by Ramblin’ Jack Elliot.
Am I the only one who read this and immediately imagined Newman (from Seinfeld) cackling with glee?
He’s got a cartoon cat named after him.
Hey guys, did you know President Garfield nicknamed his penis “McKinley,” and President McKinley nicknamed his wife’s tush “Garfield?”
Mind: blown.
They are in obvious denali.
This is the same sort of rage that got him killed! Can’t we tone it down, and perhaps save another President’s life??:eek:
McKinley’s voice;
The home of former 1st Lady Ida Saxton is the 1st Ladies Museum in Canton.
Ever been there?
I would expect historical importance in school history class was a main reason, as Lincoln was President during the CIVIL WAR, and the 1st murdered, and Kennedy was President during the Cuban Missle crisis and Bay of Pigs, and the last murdered.
Never mind assassination- does ANYBODY think much about Benjamin Harrison or Rutherford B. Hayes?
When’s the last time you thought about Grover Cleveland or Chester Alan Arthur?
From Lincoln’s death until Teddy Roosevelt’s inauguration, we had a series of unremarkable presidents who did unremarkable things. If James Garfield had lived and served two full terms, I seriously doubt whether he’d be any better remembered than he is now.
Another thing about Kennedy, he was popular around the world, before his murder.
Just because it needs to be mentioned here, Sarah Vowell’s Assassination Vacation is wonderful and funny - and Garfield’s killer was a complete and total loon.
Kennedy I get because people are living who remember him being assassinated. It’s one of those things that you remember where you were and what you were doing when you heard like the Challenger & Columbia disasters or 9/11. In a hundred years (like Garfield and McKinley) not so much.
The story behind Lincoln’s assassination, the first President ever assassinated. He won the war but wasn’t given a chance to win the peace. How polarizing he is still today being #1 or 2 on best Presidents with George Washington yet had the win at all cost mentality that doesn’t fit our notion of how Presidents are supposed to act [yet doing it to save our country].
This. I’m sure plenty of people remembered where they were when they heard McKinley or Garfield were assassinated. When most of the people who remember Kennedy are gone, he’ll join them on the list of presidents you learn about in History class, then promptly forget about again. His deeds simply weren’t great enough to stand the test of time, like Lincoln’s were.
Compare talking to to two people about 9/11, one 30 years old and on 13 years old. It is clear that the 13 year old’s generation will not remember it the way 30 year olds will.
This is one of my favorite books. If you can, listen to it on audio–read by the author with assists by a bunch of her famous friends.
The section on Garfield and his assassin is really great, including, improbably, a brief history of Utopian communities in Upstate New York.
She makes some pretty compelling parallels between McKinley’s arguments for the Spanish-American War and G. W. Bush’s arguments for Iraq.