Presidents and First Ladies Trivia

[Anita]

(01-22-2023 09:47 AM)Gene C Wrote:  Thanks David, that is interesting.
Maybe it was because of the time restraints of the class, but I was frequently disappointed with most of my history teachers that never brought up some of the these little interesting details that made the study of history interesting and fun. They rarely gave people of the past personality, they never made the connection with personal struggles and triumphs to our present day life. People of the past were just names in a book somehow attached to some great deed. They didn't seem very real.

Such as https://www.bartleby.com/400/prose/491.html
Kind of makes me want to read and learn more.
(which is what I think a good teacher does)

I agree with you Gene. When I read David's post I also wanted to know more.
I found this.

"Benjamin Franklin called Mme. Helvétius “Notre Dame d'Auteuil” and sometime between 1778 and 1780 proposed to her. Upon being rejected, he wrote a letter to her containing a parable in which he meets the late M. Helvétius and Deborah Franklin, who have married in the afterlife, prompting Franklin to renew his proposition. (“The Elysian Fields, M. Franklin to Madame Helvétius,” printed in Benjamin Franklin: Writings, ed. J. A. Leo Lemay, xixN.Y., 1987, p. 924–925. It is thought to be dated January 1780 by the editors of the Franklin Papers.)"
https://www.masshist.org/publications/ad.../AFC05fd12