July fourth in 1850 had been unusually hot. President
Zachary Taylor attended festivities at the newly dedicated grounds where the
Washington Monument would be built. Witnesses said he ate an awful lot of sweet
cherries, washed down with iced milk. When he returned to the White House, he
drank several glasses of water. For the next four days, the president suffered
from what many people believe was cholera, although it may have been food poisoning
or typhoid fever. On July 9th, Taylor became the second president to die in office.
Zachary Taylor is a bit of a puzzle to contemporary scholars. He owned several
slaves; some inherited and some purchased. He even brought slaves with him to
the White House. (They slept on the top floor, which at the time could only be
reached by climbing a ladder.) But he strongly opposed the spread of slavery to
the new U.S. territories, and worked very hard to keep the union intact.
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