To say that Andrew Jackson’s legacy is complicated would be putting it mildly — he had a particularly horrifying record when it came to enslaved people and Native Americans. But his eight years in the Oval Office did include at least one less painful story: “Old Hickory” kept a nearly 1,400-pound wheel of cheese on display at the White House for more than a year. The enormous block of cheddar was a gift from Colonel Thomas S. Meacham, who made it on his dairy farm in Sandy Creek, New York, in 1835 and presented it shortly thereafter. At 4 feet in diameter and 2 feet thick, the cheese was an imposing presence — and much too heavy to lug around, hence Jackson’s decision to leave it in the foyer. Not wanting to bring it with him upon leaving office, he gave it pride of place at his last public reception, an 1837 celebration of George Washington’s birthday, and succeeded in having his many guests (a reported 10,000) eat the whole thing.
The story may be familiar to fans of The West Wing — the show mentioned it in the episode “The Crackpots and These Women.” And while Jackson and the wheel of cheese were gone when Martin Van Buren assumed the presidency in 1837, the aroma apparently was not. According to Senator John Davis’ wife Eliza, Van Buren “had a hard task to get rid of the smell of cheese, and in the room where it was cut, he had to air the carpet for many days; to take away the curtains and to paint and white-wash before he could get the victory over it.”
Meia Release/InterestingFacts.com
