Dead Presidents

I’ve mentioned how my days have recently been dominated by digging through the 12-volume, 70-year-long diaries of John Quincy Adams, but I also wanted to compare them with the diaries of James K. Polk and Rutherford B. Hayes, who are the only other pre-20th Century Presidents to keep diaries during their Administrations.

JQA’s diary is hard-to-read at many points and there is a lot of it that is just not all that interesting.  Polk’s is fascinating because he obviously thought that he was far smarter and worked way harder than everyone else.

But the diary of Rutherford B. Hayes is just straight-up awesome, to use a scholarly phrase.  It’s fun to read, and he has great observations about his the other figures of his time.  What’s best, however, is that the Ohio Historical Society and Rutherford B. Hayes Presidential Center have organized them online with searchable indexes.  Check them out.