The U.S. President Who Kept an Alligator in the White House Bathtub
When you think of pets in the White House, dogs like Bo or Commander probably come to mind. But for decades, a strange rumor has lingered about John Quincy Adams and an alligator said to have lived in his bathtub. The tale shows up in trivia books and party conversations, the kind of story that sticks because it sounds just possible enough. There’s only one problem: Adams never mentioned an alligator, and historians say the evidence just isn’t there.
Birth of a Presidential Legend
Image via Getty Images/nattanan726
Here’s how the story goes: John Quincy Adams, president from 1825 to 1829, supposedly received an alligator from the Marquis de Lafayette and kept it in a White House bathtub. He was said to enjoy showing it off to startled visitors near the East Room. It’s a vivid picture—foreign diplomats dodging a restless reptile—but there’s no record of it ever happening. Adams kept detailed diaries and letters, yet none mention a gator of any kind.
The earliest mention of the alligator doesn’t come until 1888, more than 60 years after the alleged incident. Harriet Taylor Upton, a suffragist and author, casually wrote that Lafayette’s curiosities included “some live alligators” placed in the East Room. That’s it. From there, the tale began spreading, eventually making its way into history trivia collections and, much later, onto Snapple caps.
A Story That Stuck
It’s easy to see why the alligator tale has stuck around. Presidents with dogs and cats are ordinary. A president with an alligator feels like something straight out of a cartoon. By the time sites like the Presidential Pet Museum included it on their pages, the myth had already taken on a life of its own.
Even though experts from the White House Historical Association and the Massachusetts Historical Society point out that it’s almost certainly fiction, people love to repeat it. Part of that is because it doesn’t hurt anyone. Unlike the nasty mudslinging of Adams’s 1828 election against Andrew Jackson, the alligator story is harmless and funny. And honestly, compared to Adams’s real quirks, like swimming without clothes in the Potomac River every morning, the idea of him keeping a gator doesn’t feel that far-fetched.
The thing is, it’s not completely impossible. Alligators were exotic gifts at the time, and baby ones aren’t hard to keep for a short while. A small alligator could have survived in a tub for a few months without much notice. What makes historians doubt it is the silence from Adams himself. He was a meticulous diarist who used to jot down everything from daily swims to opinions on annoying reporters, yet he never once mentioned an alligator.
The Lasting Bite of a Good Tale
Image via Wikimedia Commons/jklamo
John Quincy Adams was already a complicated figure. He lost both the popular and electoral vote in 1824 but still became president thanks to the House of Representatives. He kept up strict exercise routines, installed a billiards table in the White House that stirred controversy, and later spent nearly two decades in the House of Representatives fighting against slavery. By the time he collapsed on the House floor in 1848, Adams had lived a life full of real drama.
The alligator story may never be proven, but that hasn’t stopped it from snapping its way into American folklore. Maybe Adams never had a reptile lurking in the White House bathtub, but for a president remembered as serious and awkward, a tale about scaring guests with a gator gives him a little bite of mischief he otherwise lacked.