The 45 presidents of the United States have held a variety of professions before arriving at the White House. Many held jobs that provided them with insight into the everyday lives of their American compatriots.
Twenty-five American presidents — including Thomas Jefferson, Abraham Lincoln, Franklin Roosevelt, and Barack Obama — were lawyers. Several presidents had military experience before entering politics. George Washington, Ulysses S. Grant, and Dwight D. Eisenhower achieved the rank of general. Lyndon Johnson was one of many U.S. presidents who served in Congress and among several, including Joe Biden, who served as vice president. Other previous occupations of U.S. presidents include men’s clothing store owner (Harry Truman), peanut farmer (Jimmy Carter), actor in
Photo: President Ford by Mark Reinstein/Shutterstock.com
film (Ronald Reagan), and real estate businessman (Donald Trump).
Versatile Presidents
In addition to their main professions, several U.S. presidents experienced unusual, short-term, or secondary jobs. James Garfield, a lawyer and Civil War officer in the Union Army, was also an ordained minister, serving as a pastor in the Disciples of Christ Church. Abraham Lincoln, a lawyer before entering politics, held the position of postmaster in New Salem, Illinois. Lincoln sometimes delivered the mail carrying it in his hat, according to the U.S. Postal Service.
Before running for president, Grover Cleveland was sheriff in Erie County, New York. And Calvin Coolidge made doll carriages at a toy company in Ludlow, Vermont.
Early Responsibilities
Like many young Americans, U.S. presidents had diverse early jobs that did not always indicate their future paths.
At 17, Washington began working as a land surveyor, according to the nonprofit Mount Vernon Ladies’ Association, which maintains Washington’s estate in Virginia.
In 1926, while in high school, Reagan got a summer job as a lifeguard in Dixon, Illinois. By the end of the summer, he had saved 77 lives, said his biographer Edmund Morris in a 1999 interview with 60 Minutes. Reagan also worked as a radio sports announcer in Iowa in the 1930s.
Photo: President Washington by Everett Collection/Shutterstock.com
During the mid-1970s, a teenage Obama earned his first paycheck serving ice cream at a Baskin-Robbins in Honolulu. In a LinkedIn post published in 2016, Obama recalled that the job “wasn’t exactly glamorous,” but taught him about “responsibility,” “hard work,” and “balancing a job with friends, family, and school.”
Gerald Ford, at 23, was hired as a park ranger at Yellowstone National Park. According to the National Park Service, Ford spent the summer of 1936 in Wyoming “directing traffic, supervising camps, and greeting visitors.”
Ford also helped monitor the park’s considerable bear population. He described his experience as a park ranger as “one of the greatest summers of my life.”
Source: it.usembassy.gov, by Lauren Monsen