How do you get the President out of the bathtub? With a crowbar!
The other day I mentioned Millard Fillmore and the bathtub hoax. There's a bathtub story about another president that, though initially denied, apparently is not a hoax.
William Howard Taft is famous for being the largest president. It's said that the Presidency stressed him into eating himself to around 350 pounds. Taft got so big that he became stuck in the bathtub. To prevent a repetition of this embarrassment, Taft had a much larger tub built for him to prevent such mishaps. I was curious what kind of tub Big Willy had. The tub was big enough for four men. Here are a couple of pics of it:
Wikipedia claims that Taft got stuck in the tub "several times", adding:
"Taft was severely overweight to the point that he became stuck in the bathtub in the White House several times, prompting the installation of a new bathtub capable of holding all of the men who installed it – a truth the White House denied until it was torn out years later. At 6 feet, and weighing over 350 pounds (159 kg), Taft is the heaviest person to be President. (Jefferson, Lincoln, Johnson and Clinton were taller.) There is some evidence that his mother started calling him "my pudgy-wudgy boy" before his fifth birthday. This may have led to his disdain for the word "pudgy." In fact, it was said that an aide blacked out "pudgy" from his morning newspaper."
Thankfully, after leaving the Presidency Taft dropped about 80 pounds mostly by walking (since there was no Jenny Craig at that time of course.) The weight wasn't the only thing he dropped. According to Wikipedia, his systolic blood pressure dropped 40-50 mmHg (from 210 mmHg).
William Howard Taft is famous for being the largest president. It's said that the Presidency stressed him into eating himself to around 350 pounds. Taft got so big that he became stuck in the bathtub. To prevent a repetition of this embarrassment, Taft had a much larger tub built for him to prevent such mishaps. I was curious what kind of tub Big Willy had. The tub was big enough for four men. Here are a couple of pics of it:
Wikipedia claims that Taft got stuck in the tub "several times", adding:
"Taft was severely overweight to the point that he became stuck in the bathtub in the White House several times, prompting the installation of a new bathtub capable of holding all of the men who installed it – a truth the White House denied until it was torn out years later. At 6 feet, and weighing over 350 pounds (159 kg), Taft is the heaviest person to be President. (Jefferson, Lincoln, Johnson and Clinton were taller.) There is some evidence that his mother started calling him "my pudgy-wudgy boy" before his fifth birthday. This may have led to his disdain for the word "pudgy." In fact, it was said that an aide blacked out "pudgy" from his morning newspaper."
Thankfully, after leaving the Presidency Taft dropped about 80 pounds mostly by walking (since there was no Jenny Craig at that time of course.) The weight wasn't the only thing he dropped. According to Wikipedia, his systolic blood pressure dropped 40-50 mmHg (from 210 mmHg).