Presidential Pumpkins, replete with identical plastic top hats and seemingly superfluous jackets
Thanks to Futurama fan Ryan Thompson for alerting me to the appearance of Franklin Pierce in Season 6, Episode 20 of the series Futurama. The episode is "All the Presidents' Heads." Handsome Frank makes a cameo appearance in a museum where the heads of U.S. Presidents are on display. The Futurama writers missed a golden opportunity to riff on Pierce's head being pickled in alcohol.
For reasons not entirely clear to me, the artist Bijijoo has produced a series of prints featuring U.S. Presidents holding hams. Now you know what to get for Christmas for the person who has everything.
What youngster wouldn't want to download his own Franklin Pierce coloring page in pdf format at the Free Kids Coloring web site?
Franklin Pierce Presidential Dollar Rolls went on sale at the US Mint on May 20, 2010. In the debut period, sales of 23,960 of the Philadelphia Mint rolls and 24,160 of the Denver Mint rolls were recorded. These amounts are 2,048 and 1,261 behind the debut figures for the previously released rolls featuring Millard Fillmore, suggesting that collector's attention may have faded.
Photo attribution: 
Colonel Bonham's horse was shot near me, and I received an escopette ball through the rim of my hat, but without other damage than leaving my head, for a short time, without protection from the sun. The balls spattered like hailstones around us, at the moment the column advanced; and it seems truly wonderful that so few took effect. A large portion of them passed over our heads, and struck between the rear of Colonel Bonham's command and the main body of the brigade, two or three hundred yards behind, with the train; thus verifying what has so often been said by our gallant fellows, within the last forty days, that the nearer you get to these people in fight, the safer.So we see that Pierce came perilously close to being shot in the head, but took it in stride without fainting or otherwise chickening out.
Drawing of Franklin Pierce from the book Original Acrostics on all the States and Presidents of the United States, and Various Other Subjects, Religious, Political, and Personal1. Though not dedicated exclusively to the tonsorial splendor of Franklin Pierce, his famous hair appears in the illustrated New York Times opinion piece, "Heads of State".That's it. Go forth and enjoy the holiday!
2. The editors of the web site Nerve.com rank Franklin Pierce #5 in their list of "The Top 43 Sexiest US Presidents", stating "There's not much to say about this obscure president, except that he's gorgeous. He's like Johnny Depp, but without as much to show for himself." (Thanks to colleague and sometime reader Ed Yang for alerting me to this reference to Handsome Frank).
3. The New Hampshire Historical Society is releasing audio and text versions of a collection of essays titled "Revealing Relationships: The Family and Friends of Franklin Pierce" which appeared in Historical New Hampshire, Volume 59, No. 1, Spring 2005. These are available for free download in pdf or mp3 format at the NHHS web site.
4. And of course, there is the obligatory survey of presidential historians, wherein Pierce is cited as one of the least productive presidents.
Special order period: April 29, 2010 – June 3, 2010. Public release date: May 20, 2010Can't you feel the anticipation building? I can--or maybe its the shredded wheat I had for breakfast.
Prof. Patrick Rael, Scott Ogden '10 to Discuss Franklin Pierce on WCSH Saturday, Oct 17
Story posted October 09, 2009
Franklin Pierce, fourteenth President of the United States (1853-1857) and a member of the Class of 1824, is to be the focus of a segment on the WCSH program Bill Green's Maine Saturday, October 17, 2009.Host Bill Green interviewed Associate Professor of History Patrick Rael and Scott Ogden '10, who is working on an honors project about Pierce's life.
The crew also photographed some of the Pierce-related materials held in the George J. Mitchell Department of Special Collections & Archives.
Bill Green's Maine airs Saturday at 7 p.m. on WCSH (Channel 6).
Fellow Franklin Pierce aficionado David Holzel has shared with the editorial staff of this blog (me, myself, and I) the breaking news that Handsome Frank is prominently featured in a song slated for release in November of 2009. That's right, Handsome Frank fans--singer-songwriter Christine Lavin has penned a paean to the current White House occupants titled "Attractive Stupid People." Lest stunned supporters of the 44th President start running their Priuses (or is that Prii?) into bridge abutments when they hear this news, let me hasten to add that the song mentions the Obamas only briefly as pretty people with brains, as opposed to the likes of the 14th President, who skated into office on good looks and charm. The song, not surprisingly, was composed after the writer heard Sarah Palin speak.
Nathaniel Hawthorne died while traveling with this N.H.-born U.S. president, his close friend.There could be little doubt of the correct question, even if you didn't know that this particular U.S. president struck up what was to become a lifelong friendship with Nathaniel Hawthorne when both were students at Bowdoin College. After all, there has been only one New Hampshire-born president--Franklin Pierce.
The trucks, tractors, and other machines collected by Dick Kemp over the decades have been dispersed. His collection, which occupied the land along the Contoocook River once used for the Great Pierce Barbecue of 1852, was auctioned off on Saturday, July 25, 2009. The vehicle fetching the highest price was the 1947 Mack single axle dump truck above, which went for $29,000. When questioned by a reporter from the Concord Monitor, Kelly D'Errico, whose mother was Kemp's life partner, said of Kemp, "He's probably looking around and saying, what a bunch of idiots, paying this much."
