Presidents in Waiting
January 20, 2009 through January 3, 2010
Second Floor

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John Adams, perhaps our most cantankerous founding father, viewed vice presidency as the “most insignificant office” ever invented by man. Adams would probably have never guessed that 14 vice presidents would succeed to the presidency. This National Portrait Gallery exhibition will focus on these men, almost one-third of America’s presidents, and how they—upon the death or resignation of an incumbent or by winning election on their own—became president. Co-curators of the exhibition are Sidney Hart, senior historian, and James Barber, historian.





Image
Thomas Jefferson / Charles Willson Peale / 1791/ Independence National Historical Park / Philadelphia, PA

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