Government: Presidents
Work on the White House began in 1792 on a site specifically chosen by George Washington. Its designer, an Irishman named James Hoban, won a design competition which awarded the architect a gold medal worth $500 for his efforts. The mansion's first occupants were John Adams and his family, who moved into the still incomplete residence in 1800. John Adams was father to John Quincy Adams and the grandfather to Henry Adams who lived across the Square from the White House in the last nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.
Thomas Jefferson began a series of improvements to the Executive Mansion in 1807 while President with the help of architect Benjamin Henry Latrobe. The building has endured a number of changes since then, including a near destructive burning by the British in 1814.
The White House is a Georgian masterpiece, loosely based on Dublin's Leinster House and James Gibb's Book of Architecture. Landscaping is based on the Olmstad brother 1936 design for the Franklin Delano Roosevelt administration. While the mansion is referred to as the White House because of its white paint, it was President Theodore Roosevelt who first used the name in an official capacity. Prior to that, the building was simply known as the Executive Mansion.
The Presidents
Historic Places Commemorating
The Chief Executives of the United States
- Abraham Lincoln Birthplace National Historic Site
- Adams National Historic Site
- Andrew Johnson National Historic Site
- Eisenhower National Historic Site
- Eleanor Roosevelt National Historic Site
- Ford's Theatre National Historic Site
- First Ladies National Historic Site
- Franklin D. Roosevelt Memorial
- General Grant National Memorial
- George Washington Birthplace National Monument
- Harry S. Truman National Historic Site
- Herbert Hoover National Historic Site
- Home of Franklin D. Roosevelt National Historic Site
- James A. Garfield National Historic Site
- Jimmy Carter National Historic Site
- John Fitzgerald Kennedy National Historic Site
- Lincoln Boyhood National Memorial
- Lincoln Home National Historic Site
- Lincoln Memorial
- Lyndon B. Johnson National Historical Park
- Lyndon Baines Johnson Memorial Grove on the Potomac
- Martin Van Buren National Historic Site
- Mount Rushmore National Memorial
- Roosevelt Campobello International Park*
- Sagamore Hill National Historic Site
- Shenandoah National Park: Camp Hoover
- Theodore Roosevelt Birthplace National Historic Site
- Theodore Roosevelt Inaugural National Historic Site
- Theodore Roosevelt Island
- Theodore Roosevelt National Park: Elkhorn Ranch
- Thomas Jefferson Memorial
- Ulysses S. Grant National Historic Site
- Washington Monument
- White House
- William Howard Taft National Historic Site
More Presidential Web Pages and Sites
- American Presidents: Discover Our Shared Heritage Travel Itinerary
- Teaching with Historic Places: US Presidents
- American Presidents: Life Portraits
- American Visionary: Harry S Truman
- George Washington Papers
- Journey Through Hallowed Ground,
- Mr. Lincolns White House
- Presential Libraries
- Ten Presidential Speeches That Transformed The United States of America
- The Presidents of the United States of America
- The First Ladies of the United States of America
Online Books--Theodore Roosevelt