On 24 October 1855, James Schoolcraft Sherman was born in upstate New York. He represented New York in the House of Representatives from 1887 to 1891, lost the election of 1890, and then won again in 1892...Taft's ticket. On 30 October 1912, he died while in office (and while taking part in a losing re-election campaign: Taft came in third in the election, behind Woodrow Wilson and Theodore Roosevelt)

A double-shot of history: a birth and a wedding. On 15 October 1872, Edith Bolling was born. In 1896, she married Norman Galt, a jeweler in Washington, DC. He died in 1908. In 1915, she was introduced...in 1977. In December 2006, Gerald Ford died, the longest lived President ever. Following Lady Bird Johnson's death last year, Betty Ford is now the senior living former occupant of the White House

The New York Times reports the death of Francis Bowes Sayre, Jr.—who had been the dean of the National Cathedral in Washington, DC, for 27 years—on 3 October 2008. The 93-year-old presided over the... Wilson's second wife, Edith Bolling Galt Wilson, died 28 December 1961 (during his tenure), and was buried with Wilson at the Cathedral. His grandmother, Ellen Wilson, died five months before his birth

It's Nobel Prize season (the committee is working its way through announcing the winners of the science prizes), so what better time to consider the Nobel Prize and the Presidents of the United States...shared the prize in 1978 with Menachim Begin and Anwar Sadat (for mediating the Camp David Peace Accords). Carter's medal is on display at the Jimmy Carter Library and Museum in Atlanta, Georgia

What do great historical figures like Patrick Henry, Gandhi, Thomas Jefferson, Woodrow Wilson, J. Edgar Hoover, Franklin Delano Roosevelt, and Thomas Edison have in common?  Apparently, they were all assholes!  http://www.cracked.com/article_14870_7-great-men-in-history-why-you-should-hate-them.html

CNN has this piece from Mental Floss on "5 feisty presidential daughters" which is amusing and well-worth the few minutes it takes to read. The piece has brief stories of Zachary Taylor's daughter...Elizabeth Harrison Walker, Woodrow Wilson's daughter Margaret Woodrow Wilson, Warren Harding's daughter Elizabeth Ann Christian Blaesing, and Harry Truman's daughter Margaret Truman Daniel. Enjoy

Virginia is the state that has birthed the most Presidents, eight, from George Washington in 1732 to Woodrow Wilson in 1856. But the number two state on that list, Ohio, bred seven men who would go on...successive Presidents matched Virginia's record, although Virginia's served more years (Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, and James Monroe held the Presidency as sons of Virginia from 1801 to 1825)

Five colleges can lay claim to more than one President as a graduate, but when one considers how many colleges there are in the US, such a concentration of future Presidents is remarkable. The most popular... he'll be the first President to have graduated from Columbia (BA, 1983), and Harvard's eighth (Law, 1991). If John McCain wins, he'll be the second President from Annapolis (Jimmy Carter is the first)

Former Chief Justice (and, oh yeah, former President) William Howard Taft was born on 15 September 1857 in Cincinnati, Ohio. After serving as Governor-General of the Philippines (1901-03), President Theodore... He resigned from the Court in early 1930, a month before his death on 8 March 1930. Taft was the first of only two Presidents to be buried in Arlington National Cemetery (the other is John Kennedy)

I found a great quote from Woodrow Wilson at the Mountain of Light website. If you will think about what you ought to do for other people, your character will take care of itself. Character is a by-product...more compassionate if it is to claim it among his virtues.  It's only through doing for others that a concern for others can develop. Alhamdulillah!  May Allah know how grateful I am for guidance.