Although our first President, George Washington, never lived in the White House - it was not completed until the administration of our second president, John Adams. President John Adams is credited with owning the first Presidential Pets: two mixed breed dogs, named Juno and Satan. John Adams' tenure in the White House was short-lived (he lost reelection later that year), but many dogs and cats have served as First Pets ever since. John Adams' son, President John Quincy Adams, received an alligator as a gift from France's Marquis de Lafayette.

Cape May, New Jersey, the nation's oldest seashore resort, has been catering to vacationers since pre-Revolutionary days, although there were probably a lot fewer T-shirt shops at the time. There's evidence that even earlier tourists in the form of local Kechemeche Indians came there in summer "to hunt and fish." Later, the shady tree-lined streets and colorful homes of Cape May became the playground of presidents. Ulysses S. Grant, Franklin Pierce, James Buchanan, Chester Arthur and Benjamin Harrison all sought refuge there from the humidity of D.C. summers. Those are not bad references!