Presidents’ Day: The quiz - a test for you

Presidents’ Day: The quiz
By Valerie Strauss - Washington Post
2/20/12

It’s Presidents’ Day Monday, but whom the holiday is meant to honor depends on whom you ask. Even the placement of the apostrophe is open to question!

To the U.S. government and Virginia, the home state of George Washington, the holiday is recognized as “Washington’s Birthday.” Some states jointly celebrate the birthdays of George Washington, born Feb. 22, and Abraham Lincoln, born Feb. 12, while others honor Washington and Thomas Jefferson but not Lincoln. In some Southern states, all of the presidents are commemorated on Presidents’ Day.

The inconsistent approach to the holiday is echoed in the uneven way schools teach about the presidents. The study of presidents usually is done in the context of American history units — Washington during the Revolutionary War period and the birth of the United States or Lincoln during the Civil War, for example — without a dedicated look at the power and evolution of the executive branch.

The most recent results of students’ performance on civics exams on the National Assessment of Educational Progress, sometimes called the nation’s report card, revealed a continuing lack of knowledge about the nation’s past: On the 2010 test, only 2 percent of fourth-graders, 1 percent of eighth-graders and 4 percent of 12th-graders performed at the advanced level, which represents superior performance.

See how well you can do on our Presidents’ Day quiz. If you don’t do well, it’s time to hit the history books! Here are some Web sites that can help.

1. What is the birth state of the most presidents?

Virginia
Massachusetts
New York
Illinois

2. How many U.S. presidencies have there been?

42
44
45
49

3. Who was the first president to live in the White House?

George Washington
John Adams
Thomas Jefferson
James Madison

4. Which is NOT true about Lincoln's Gettysburg Address?

Lincoln was not the main speaker on Nov. 18, 1863, at the dedication of Soldiers' National Cemetery in Pennsylvania.
He wrote out the address on the back of an envelope on the train to Gettysburg.
Now regarded as one of the greatest speeches ever, at the time it got mixed reviews.
It took about three minutes to deliver.

5. Fill in the missing words in the president's oath of office: "I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will faithfully execute the Office of President of the United States, and will to the best of my Ability, ---, --- and --- the Constitution of the United States."

Preserve, promote and defend
Support, protect and uphold
Preserve, promote and uphold
Preserve, protect and defend

6. True or false: George Washington owned many slaves but decided to free them in his will.

True
False

7. Who was the only president to serve two nonconsecutive terms?

John Quincy Adams
Theodore Roosevelt
Grover Cleveland
Abraham Lincoln

8. Lincoln was virtually unknown in the Republican Party in 1858 when he challenged the powerful U.S. Sen. Stephen Douglas of Illinois. The two debated seven times between July and October of that year. Which is NOT correct?

Lincoln and Douglas ignored key issues of the day, such as immigration and bank regulation, and spoke almost exclusively about slavery.
As a result of the debates, Lincoln beat Douglas but was only in the U.S. Senate for a short time because he beat him again to become president in 1860.
The debates are sometimes depicted as being civil, but both Douglas and Lincoln hurled personal insults at each other.
The format of the debates involved one candidate speaking for an hour and then the other speaking for one and a half hours, with no real interaction.

9. Four presidents were assassinated in office, and four others died from other causes. What killed William Henry Harrison?

Heart attack
Acute gastroenteritis
Cerebral hemorrhage
Pneumonia and pleurisy

10. What was Woodrow Wilson's nickname?

The Boss
The Little Magician
The Rail Splitter
The Professor