These Two Female Assassins Independently Tried to Kill Gerald Ford | Smart News | Smithsonian SmartNews Keeping you current These Two Female Assassins Independently Tried to Kill Gerald Ford The only two women to attempt to kill a president did so within 17 days of one another Secret Service agents grab Gerald Ford seconds after Sara Jane Moore attempts to shoot him in September 1975. (Gary Fong/San Francisco Chronicle/San Francisco Chronicle/Corbis) smithsonian.com June 3, 2015 1975 was a year of political disillusionment as the United States pulled out of Vietnam, the Khmer Rouge regime took over Cambodia, and American officials were convicted of crimes in the Watergate scandal. It was also the year in which two women independently tried to assassinate President Gerald Ford in the same month, writes Atlas Obscura’s Sarah Laskow . The story of how a Manson Family devotee and a 45-year-old housewife both tried to kill the president is strange indeed, writes Laskow. She notes that though the attempts were not connected in any way, both culprits “had been involved in the strange subcultures of Southern California”: a cult and the left-wing political scene.

Lynnette “Squeaky” Fromme was the first to make her attempt. On September 5, 1975, the 26-year-old attempted to draw attention to Charles Manson, who had been found guilty of a series of grisly, cult-fueled murders along with four of his followers in 1971, by pulling a pistol on Ford at a park. Though she pointed the gun at Ford, writes Laskow, she didn’t fire. 17 days later, Sara Jane Moore did. “Externally, she looked like an average member of American society,” Laskow notes, but she was known in left-wing political circles as a mom with severe mood swings, anger and the type of temper that could “turn on a dime.” On September 22, 1975, Moore stood in a crowd outside of the St. Francis Hotel in San Francisco and fired a .38 caliber revolver at Ford from 40 feet away.

It’s not that gun-toting women were unusual in the 1970s — the New York Times’ Sabrina Tavernise and Robet Gebeloff report that 50 percent of households owned guns in 1973 — but the independent attempts of the only two women known to ever attempt to kill a president within just days is strange indeed. But what became of Ford’s would-be killers? Both were released from jail after Ford’s death at age 93. Moore was freed on parole in 2008 at age 77 after serving more than 30 years. A year later, Fromme was released as well . Like this article? President Ford survives second assassination attempt - Sep 22, 1975 - HISTORY.com President Ford survives second assassination attempt Share this: President Ford survives second assassination attempt Author President Ford survives second assassination attempt URL Publisher A+E Networks On this day in 1975, Sarah Jane Moore aims a gun at President Gerald Ford as he leaves the Saint Francis Hotel in San Francisco, California.

The attempt on the president’s life came only 17 days after another woman had tried to assassinate Ford while he was on his way to give a speech to the California legislature in Sacramento. Moore’s attempt was thwarted by a bystander, Oliver Sipple, who instinctively grabbed Moore’s arm when she raised the gun. She was able to fire off one shot, but it failed to find its target. Secret Service agents quickly hustled Ford into a waiting vehicle and sped him to safety. On September 5, 1975, in Sacramento, California, a woman named Lynette “Squeaky” Fromme had also attempted to shoot Ford. Fromme, a drug-addled Charles Manson cult follower, and Moore, a mentally unstable former FBI informant and accountant who fell into fringe revolutionary politics, both targeted Ford as a symbol of their hatred for the political establishment. Moore served time in the same prison in West Virginia as Fromme. Fromme escaped the prison in 1979, but was caught and transferred to a higher-security facility. Moore escaped in 1989, but turned herself in two days later and, like Fromme, was transferred to a more secure penitentiary.

Both women remain incarcerated today. Sipple received a written letter of thanks form Ford. Later, some critics claimed that the White House initially hesitated to publicly thank Sipple, a former Marine and Vietnam veteran, because he was gay. Related Videos US Presidential Assassinations and Assassination Attempts By Martin Kelly Updated July 25, 2016. In the history of the US presidency, four presidents have actually died from assassination. Another six were the subject of assassination attempts. Following is a description of each assassination and attempt that has occurred since the founding of the nation. Assassinations Abraham Lincoln - Lincoln was shot in the head while watching a play on April 14, 1865. His assassin, John Wilkes Booth escaped and was later shot and killed. Conspirators who helped plan Lincoln's assassination were found guilty and hung. Lincoln died on April 15, 1865. James Garfield - Charles J. Guiteau, a mentally disturbed government office seeker, shot Garfield on July 2 , 1881. The president did not die until September 19th of blood poisoning.

This was related more to the manner in which the physicians attended to the president than to the wounds themselves. Guiteau was convicted of murder and hanged on June 30, 1882. William McKinley - McKinley was shot two times by anarchist Leon Czolgosz while the president was visiting the Pan-American Exhibit in Buffalo, New York on September 6, 1901. continue reading below our video 10 Best Universities in the United States He died on September 14, 1901. Czolgosz stated that he shot McKinley because he was an enemy of working people. He was convicted of the murder and electrocuted on October 29, 1901. John F. Kennedy - On November 22, 1963, John F. Kennedy was mortally wounded while riding in a motorcade in Dallas, Texas. His apparent assassin, Lee Harvey Oswald , was killed by Jack Ruby before standing trial. The Warren Commission was called to investigate Kennedy's death and found that Oswald had acted alone to kill Kennedy.

Many argued, however, that there was more than one gunman, a theory upheld by a 1979 House Committee investigation . The FBI and a 1982 study disagreed. Speculation continues to this day. Assassination Attempts Andrew Jackson - On January 30, 1835, Andrew Jackson was attending a funeral for Congressman Warren Davis. Richard Lawrence attempted to shoot him with two different derringers, each of which misfired. Jackson was incensed and attacked Lawrence with his walking stick. Lawrence was tried for the attempted assassination but was found not guilty by reason of insanity. He spent the rest of his life in an insane asylum. Theodore Roosevelt - An assassination attempt was actually not made on Roosevelt's life while he was in the office of president. Instead, it occurred after he had left office and decided to run for another term against William Howard Taft . While campaigning on October 14, 1912, he was shot in the chest by John Schrank, a mentally disturbed New York saloon keeper. Luckily, Roosevelt had a speech and his spectacle case in his pocket that slowed down the .38 caliber bullet. The bullet was never removed but allowed to heal over.

Roosevelt continued with his speech before seeing a doctor. Franklin Roosevelt - After giving a speech in Miami on February 15, 1933, Giuseppe Zangara shot six shots into the crowd. None hit Roosevelt though the Mayor of Chicago, Anton Cermak, was shot in the stomach. Zangara blamed wealthy capitalists for his plights and those of other working people. He was convicted of attempted murder and then after Cermak's death due to the shooting he was retried for murder. He was executed by electric chair in March, 1933. Harry Truman - On November 1, 1950, two Puerto Rican nationals attempted to kill President Truman to bring attention to the case for Puerto Rican independence. The President and his family were staying at the Blair House across from the White House and the two attempted assassins, Oscar Collazo and Griselio Torresola, tried to shoot their way into the house. Torresola killed one and wounded another policeman while Collazo wounded one policeman. Torresola died in the gunfight. Collazo was arrested and sentenced to death which Truman commuted to life in prison. President Jimmy Carter freed Collazo from prison in 1979.

Gerald Ford - Ford escaped two assassination attempts, both by women. First on September 5, 1975, Lynette Fromme, a follower of Charles Manson , pointed a gun at him but did not fire. She was convicted of attempting to assassinate the president and sentenced to life in prison. The second attempt on Ford's life occurred on September 22, 1975 when Sara Jane Moore fired one shot that was deflected by a bystander. Moore was trying to prove herself to some radical friends with the assassination of the president. She was convicted of attempted assassination and sentenced to life in prison. Ronald Reagan - On March 30, 1981, Reagan was shot in the lung by John Hin c kley , Jr. Hinckley hoped that by assassinating the president, he would earn enough notoriety to impress Jodie Foster. He also shot Press Secretary James Brady along with an officer and a security agent. He was arrested but found not guilty by reason of insanity. He was sentenced to life in a mental institution.

One fascinating sidenote to presidential assassinations and deaths in office is Tecumseh's Curse whereby presidents starting with William Henry Harrison who were elected in a year ending with a zero were assassinated or died while in office. The curse ended with Ronald Reagan . Read this article to learn more about the history of the curse. A 45-Year-Old Mom and a Manson Girl Both Tried to Kill Gerald Ford | Atlas Obscura A 45-Year-Old Mom and a Manson Girl Both Tried to Kill Gerald Ford Please separate multiple addresses with commas. We won't share addresses with third parties. Subscribe me to the Get our latest, delivered straight to your inbox by subscribing to our newsletter . Subscribe to our newsletter and get our latest, sent right to your inbox. Subscribe Thanks for subscribing!

Related Stories The Many Faces of La Flaca In the 19th Century, No One Wanted to Believe a Woman Could Have Helped Kill Lincoln Israeli Assassin Sylvia Rafael Never Meant to Be Famous After Fromme’s Sept 5, 1975, attempted assassination (Photo: Public Domain/WikiCommons ) In September of 1975, Lynette “Squeaky” Fromme was on the front page of the New York Times: earlier that month, she had brandished a .45 caliber automatic pistol at President Gerald Ford, and now she had been judged competent to stand trial for the attempted assassination. Normally, this might have been above-the-fold news. But on that same day, the Times was profiling Sara Jane Moore—the other woman who had attempted to assassinate Gerald Ford that month. It’s a historical fact that many forget: Two women attempted to assassinate Gerald Ford, in the same month. Both attempts had occurred in California, Fromme’s in Sacramento , Moore’s in San Francisco . Fromme had not fired a shot; Moore had, and it went wide.

The two attempts were not connected to each other, but both women had been involved in the strange subcultures of 1970s California. Fromme, 26 at the time, was a member of the Manson Family , and although she had not been implicated in the group’s murders, she was one of Charlie Manson’s oldest and most devoted supporters. Moore was older, 45, and she had immersed herself in the world of San Francisco’s leftist political groups, in part out of a personal fascination and in part because the FBI had recruited her as an informant. It’s hard to outmatch a Manson Family member in a contest of unsettling personalities. And Fromme holds the distinction of being the first woman charged with the attempted assassination of a U.S. president. But between Ford’s two would-be assassins, it’s Moore who, ultimately, is the more mysterious and troubling figure. Fromme was a small, red-headed woman who, by 1975, had etched an “X” on her forehead in support of Manson and taken to wearing a red hood and cape. But, in a way, her story’s familiar enough.

As reporter Jess Bravin recounts in Squeaky , his autobiography of Fromme, she grew up unhappy, in an abusive household. By high school she was inconsistently attending class, trying drugs and spending her time with older men. She was what we’d now call a cutter, and she tried to slit her wrists. When she left home and ended up on Venice Beach, she met a charismatic older man—Manson—who, for many years, made her life interesting and better than it ever had been. She remained loyal to him even after he started leading the people who gathered around him down a dark path; her defense, in her trial for the assassination attempt, was that she was not interested in hurting Ford but in attracting attention to Manson’s cause. Moore seems like a more sympathetic character. Externally, she looked like an average member of American society. When she stood in the crowd while waiting to shoot the president, she was wearing “baggy tan pants and a neatly pressed blue raincoat,” the scholar Philip H. Melanson wrote in his history of the Secret Service —she dressed like a mom . And she was: She had four kids, which was normal enough in 1975.

But only one of them still lived with her—the other three had been officially adopted by their grandmother, which would have been more unusual. She had also been married and divorced five times. Even if she dressed the part, she was not the picture of normalcy. Born in West Virginia, Moore (a name she assumed after her fifth divorce) was always, as the reporter Geri Spieler writes in Taking Aim at the President , seen as someone who was a “little odd.” Her first two husbands were in the military; the second two worked in the film industry, one as a bookkeeper, the other as a sound engineer. Her fifth husband was a doctor: Moore lived with him in a staid San Francisco suburb and volunteered for the senate campaign of a Republican candidate. After the divorce, Moore volunteered to work at People in Need, a feed-the-hungry organization that Randolph Hearst created to try to appease his daughter’s kidnapper. From the beginning, here too, she acted strangely. When she showed up, she told the people in charge that God had sent her; soon, she had forced her way into a role as PIN’s press person.

The operations of PIN were dominated by leftist groups, but Moore maintained her mom uniform of blue slacks, a camel blazer, and a string of pearls, Spieler writes. She gained the trust of Hearst himself. But within PIN, she was known for swerving erratically between hyper-professionalism and irrational anger. She later became the organization’s bookkeeper. However much she was enjoying her new life as a left-leaning activist, it seems that she pushed deeper into San Francisco’s political scene in part because the FBI asked her to. Her PIN activities caught the attention of agents, who recruited her as an informer: they asked her to start attending the meetings of various leftist groups, taking notes on who came, and befriending fractious elements. (She wasn’t paid for this work, but the bureau did pick up her expenses .) Moore, Spieler says, had a “chameleon ability to charm everyone she met,” and soon she was both informing on the radical groups to the FBI and confiding to the radicals she knew about the FBI’s interest in them.

At one lefty hangout, she was even known as “the FBI Lady.” One interpretation of Moore’s assassination attempt is that she had made a choice between the two sides—she had decided to throw her lot in with the leftists and wanted to demonstrate her allegiance. In the days before she shot at Ford, Moore called up the San Francisco Police Department and told the officers there she was considering a “test” of the president’s security system. They took away her gun; she bought another one, and with that gun in her car, sped through downtown in the hopes, she later said, of being apprehended. While she stood waiting to fire her shot, she was thinking about whether she’d be on time to pick up her son. In contrast, Fromme, at least by her own account, had a clear motive for wanting to shoot Gerald Ford. “I just wanted to get some attention for a new trial for Charlie and the girls,” she’d tell reporters later. The chamber of the gun she used was empty—although there were more cartridges in the pistol’s clip and the Secret Service agent who stopped her said she was fumbling to load it. Both Fromme and Moore were both judged psychologically sound enough to stand trial; Fromme defended herself.

(Mostly, she tried to make political statements about environmental issues, which didn’t go over well with the judge.) Dr. Gustave Weiland, a psychiatrist who evaluated Moore, said that people like her “cannot be described as psychotic.” They were strange, yes, “seldom at ease with themselves,” and they had hard time making strong relationships. But on some level, Moore knew what she was doing. What’s so unsettling about Moore is that it’s hard to reconcile the person she presents to the world with the person who decided to kill President Ford. “You look like someone’s grandmother,” Matt Lauer told her, in a 2009 interview , and he’s right. He asked Moore why she agreed to the interview, and she explained that “one gets tired of being thought of as a kook, a monster, an alien. I’m a human being.” Just watching the interview, it’s hard not to sympathize with her. But she’s good at creating that impression. Before Spieler wrote her book, she spent years talking with and visiting Moore, informally. It was Moore’s idea that she write the book.

But as soon as the process started, and Spieler made clear that Moore wouldn’t have control over who she talked to or what would go into the story, Moore cut her off: “I am no longer home to you,” she said, and never talked to Spieler again. Once you know that Moore can turn on a dime, it’s hard to watch her and not feel uneasy. Fromme seems like the sort of person who might think it was a good idea to brandish a gun at a president. With Moore, you’re just left to wonder. Ronald Reagan - Biography - IMDb Ronald Reagan Biography Showing all 174 items Jump to: Overview (5) | Mini Bio (1) | Spouse (2) | Trivia (96) | Personal Quotes (66) | Salary (4) Overview (5) 6' 1" (1.85 m) Mini Bio (1) Ronald Reagan is, arguably, the most successful actor in history, having catapulted from a career as a Warner Bros.

contract player and television star, into serving as president of the Screen Actors Guild, the governorship of California (1967-1975), and lastly, two terms as President of the United States (1981-1989). Ronald Wilson Reagan was born in Tampico, Illinois, to Nelle Clyde (Wilson) and John Edward "Jack" Reagan, who was a salesman and storyteller. His father was of Irish descent, and his mother was of half Scottish and half English ancestry. A successful actor beginning in the 1930s, the young Reagan was a staunch admirer of President Franklin D. Roosevelt (even after he evolved into a Republican), and was a Democrat in the 1940s, a self-described 'hemophilliac' liberal. He was elected president of the Screen Actors Guild in 1947 and served five years during the most tumultuous times to ever hit Hollywood.

A committed anti-communist, Reagan not only fought more-militantly activist movie industry unions that he and others felt had been infiltrated by communists, but had to deal with the investigation into Hollywood's politics launched by the House Un-Amercan Activities Committee in 1947, an inquisition that lasted through the 1950s. The House Un-American Activities Committee investigations of Hollywood (which led to the jailing of the "Hollywood Ten" in the late '40s) sowed the seeds of the McCarthyism that racked Hollywood and America in the 1950s. In 1950, U.S. Representative Helen Gahagan Douglas (D-CA), the wife of "Dutch" Reagan's friend Melvyn Douglas , ran as a Democrat for the U.S. Senate and was opposed by the Republican nominee, the Red-bating Congresman from Whittier, Richard Nixon . While Nixon did not go so far as to accuse Gahagan Douglas of being a communist herself, he did charge her with being soft on communism due to her opposition to the House Un-Amercan Activities Committee.

Nixon tarred her as a "fellow traveler" of communists, a "pinko" who was "pink right down to her underwear." Gahagan Douglas was defeated by the man she was the first to call "Tricky Dicky" because of his unethical behavior and dirty campaign tactics. Reagan was on the Douglases' side during that campaign. The Douglases, like Reagan and such other prominent actors as Humphrey Bogart and Edward G. Robinson , were liberal Democrats, supporters of the late Franklin D. Roosevelt and his New Deal, a legacy that increasingly was under attack by the right after World War II. They were NOT fellow-travelers; Melyvn Douglas had actually been an active anti-communist and was someone the communists despised. Melvyn Douglas, Robinson and Henry Fonda - a registered Republican! - wound up "gray-listed." (They weren't explicitly black-listed, they just weren't offered any work.) Reagan, who it was later revealed had been an F.B.I. informant while a union leader (turning in suspected communists), was never hurt that way, as he made S.A.G. an accomplice of the black-listing.

Reagan's career sagged after the late 1940s, and he started appearing in B-movies after he left Warners to go free-lance. However, he had a eminence grise par excellence in Lew Wasserman , his agent and the head of the Music Corp. of America. Wasserman, later called "The Pope of Hollywood," was the genius who figured out that an actor could make a killing via a tax windfall by turning himself into a corporation. The corporation, which would employ the actor, would own part of a motion picture the actor appeared in, and all monies would accrue to the corporation, which was taxed at a much lower rate than was personal income. Wasserman pioneered this tax avoidance scheme with his client James Stewart , beginning with the Anthony Mann western Winchester '73 (1950) (1950). It made Stewart enormously rich as he became a top box office draw in the 1950s after the success of "Winchester 73" and several more Mann-directed westerns, all of which he had an ownership stake in.

Ironically, Reagan became a poor-man's James Stewart in the early 1950s, appearing in westerns, but they were mostly B-pictures. He did not have the acting chops of the great Stewart, but he did have his agent. Wasserman at M.C.A. was one of the pioneers of television syndication, and this was to benefit Reagan enormously. M.C.A. was the only talent agency that was also allowed to be a producer through an exemption to union rules granted by S.A.G. when Reagan was the union president, and it used the exemption to acquire Universal International Pictures. Talent agents were not permitted to be producers as there was an inherent conflict of interest between the two professions, one of which was committed to acquiring talent at the lowest possible cost and the other whose focus was to get the best possible price for their client. When a talent agent was also a producer, like M.C.A. was, it had a habit of steering its clients to its own productions, where they were employed but at a lower price than their potential free market value. It was a system that made M.C.A. and Lew Wasserman, enormously wealthy.

The ownership of Universal and its entry into the production of television shows that were syndicated to network made M.C.A. the most successful organization in Hollywood of its time, a real cash cow as television overtook the movies as the #1 business of the entertainment industry. Wasserman repaid Ronald Reagan's largess by structuring a deal by which he hosted and owned part of General Electric Theater (1953), a western omnibus showcase that ran from 1954 to 1961. It made Reagan very comfortable financially, though it did not make him rich. That came later. In 1960, with the election of the Democratic President John F. Kennedy , the black and gray lists went into eclipse. J.F.K. appointed Helen Gahagan Douglas Treasurer of the United States. About this time, as the civil rights movement became stronger and found more support among Democrats and the Kennedy administration, Reagan - fresh from a second stint as S.A.G. president in 1959 - was in the process of undergoing a personal and political metamorphosis into a right-wing Republican, a process that culminated with his endorsing Barry Goldwater for the Republican presidential nomination in 1964.

(He narrated a Goldwater campaign film played at the G.O.P. Convention in San Francisco.) Reagan's evolution into a right-wing Republican sundered his friendship with the Douglases. (After Reagan was elected President of the United States in 1980, Melvyn Douglas said of his former friend that Reagan turned to the right after he had begun to believe the pro-business speeches he delivered for General Electric when he was the host of the "G.E. Theater.") In 1959, while Reagan was back as a second go-round as S.A.G. president, M.C.A.'s exemption from S.A.G. regulations that forbade a talent agency from being a producer was renewed. However, in 1962, the U.S. Justice Department under Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy successfully forced M.C.A. - known as "The Octopus" in Hollywood for its monopolistic tendencies - to divest itself of its talent agency. When Reagan was tipped by the California Republican Party to be its standard-bearer in the 1965 gubernatorial election against Democratic Governor Pat Brown, Lew Wasserman went back in action.

Politics makes strange bedfellows, and though Wasserman was a liberal Democrat, having an old friend like Reagan who had shown his loyalty as S.A.G. president in the state house was good for business. Wasserman and his partner, M.C.A. Chairman Jules Styne (a Republican), helped ensure that Reagan would be financially secure for the rest of his life so that he could enter politics. (At the time, he was the host of "Death Valley Days" on TV.) According to the Wall Street Journal, Universal sold Reagan a nice piece of land of many acres north of Santa Barbara that had been used for location shooting. The Reagans sold most of the ranch, then converted the rest of it, about 200 acres, into a magnificent estate overlooking the valley and the Pacific Ocean. The Rancho del Cielo became President Reagan's much needed counterpoint to the buzz of Washington, D.C. There, in a setting both rugged and serene, the Reagans could spend time alone or receive political leaders such as the Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev , Margaret Thatcher, and others.

Reagan was known to the world for his one-liners, the most famous of them was addressed to Mikhail Gorbachev in 1987. "Mister Gorbachev, tear down this wall" said Reagan standing in front of the Berlin Wall. That call made an impact on the course of human history. Ronald Reagan played many roles in his life's seven acts: radio announcer, movie star, union boss, television actor-cum-host, governor, right-wing critic of big government and President of the United States. Spouses William Holden and Brenda Marshall served as Best Man and Matron of Honor at his wedding to Nancy Reagan in 1952. 40th president of the United States (20 January 1981 - 20 January 1989). Governor of California. Term of service: 2 January 1967 - 6 January 1975. President of the Screen Actors Guild from 1947 to 1952 and 1959-1960. Graduate of Eureka College (1932). Son of John Edward Reagan and Nelle Clyde Wilson Reagan.

Was a sports announcer in Des Moines, Iowa, before becoming an actor in 1937. Member of Tau Kappa Epsilon fraternity. Was presented with George Gipp's letterman's sweater by the University of Notre Dame football team on January 18, 1989, two days before leaving the White House, and his two-term Vice President, 'George Herbert Walker Bush', became President. Younger brother of Neil Reagan (1908-1996). When he was a young man, he had a part-time job as a lifeguard. He once had to retrieve an old man's dentures at the bottom of the pool and did so without hesitating. On Thursday, October 11th, 2001, he became the oldest ex-president in U. S. history, surpassing the previous record-holder, of John Adams . His own record was surpassed on Sunday, November 12, 2006, by Gerald Ford . While President of the USA, his Secret Service codename was "Rawhide".

(May 16th 2002) Awarded the United States Congressional Gold Medal for ending the "Cold War" against Russia, along with his wife Nancy Reagan , for fighting substance abuse among American youths. When Reagan's long-time friend and first Hollywood agent, studio mogul Lew Wasserman , died on 3 June 2002, AP reported that their friendship was the subject of a controversial book called "Dark Victory: Ronald Reagan, MCA and the Mob" (1988). The book reviewed the federal investgation into the Reagan- Wasserman relationship and charges that alleged payoffs were made in the 1950s by Wasserman's mammoth MCA agency to Reagan and some of his fellow officers of the Screen Actors Guild. Ultimately, Reagan was cleared in the inquiry. Because of his Alzheimer's disease, he was unaware that his daughter Maureen Reagan had died. Wife Nancy Reagan chose not to tell him. Was the first guest of honor on the Dean Martin Celebrity Roasts, in 1973. Although he was 30 when the United States entered World War II, he volunteered for military service. He was turned down for combat duty due to his poor eyesight.

For two weeks in 1954, Reagan opened as a stand-up comic at the Ramona Room of the Hotel Last Frontier in Las Vegas, Nevada. Inducted into the Hall of Great Western Performers of the National Cowboy and Western Heritage Museum in 1989. On Tuesday, March 14, 1972, during his second term as governor of California, he expunged the criminal record of country-western singer Merle Haggard , granting him a full pardon. Influenced by the Martin Scorsese film Taxi Driver (1976), John Hinckley --the son of a prominent Republican family from Colorado--tried to assassinate Reagan in 1981 in order to impress actress Jodie Foster . Foster had won her first Oscar nomination for the film, in which Robert De Niro 's character, "Travis Bickle", tried to assassinate a liberal Democratic presidential candidate to impress Betsy ( Cybill Shepherd ), the woman he is obsessed with. Hinckley was acquitted by a jury on reasons of insanity and (as of 2010) remains incarcerated in a psychiatric facility.

He was the first president to beat the "zero factor." Before him, every president elected in a year ending in zero (beginning with 1840) had died in office. Originally was a very liberal member of the Democratic Party, but eventually converted to the Republican Party in 1962, when he was fifty-one. He gave a highly acclaimed speech in support of Barry Goldwater during the 1964 Presidential election. At the time of his death he was the longest-living President of the United States, at age 93 years and 120 days. This record was broken by former President Gerald Ford on Monday, November 12, 2006. Their age difference, in days alone, was only 45 days. Reagan's lifetime lasted 34,088 days, and Ford's lasted 34,133 days. Amidst the panic at the hospital after Reagan's assassination attempt, a Secret Service agent was asked information for Reagan's admission forms. The intern asked for Reagan's last name. The agent, who was quite surprised at the question, responded "Reagan". The intern then asked for Reagan's first name.

The agent, again surprised, responded "Ronald". The intern didn't look up, instead he unassumingly asked for Reagan's address. The agent paused for a few moments in great surprise before saying "1600 Pennsylvania Avenue". That got the intern's attention. Became the first president to have a state funeral in Washington, D.C. since Lyndon Johnson in 1973. Had a photographic memory. In 1978, after having served as governor of California but before running for President, Reagan came out against The Briggs Initiative, a ballot initiative introduced by a right-wing Republican state senator named John Briggs, which would have made it illegal for homosexuals to be employed as teachers in the California school system. Reagan strongly and vocally opposed the measure, saying that it infringed upon basic human rights and bordered on being unconstitutional. He is largely credited for turning public opinion against the measure and it was defeated in the election. He never actually broadcast Cubs games, he re-created them from telegraph reports while working for Des Moines radio station WHO in the 1930s.

He demonstrated the technique of making it sound like he was actually at the games to Cubs broadcaster Harry Caray when he made a guest appearance during part of a Cubs telecast in the 1980s. He was offered, a role, in animation, of a guest appearance and an off screen voice, on The Simpsons (1989), but refused their offer. In the film, American Beauty (1999), the Fitts family ( Chris Cooper , Allison Janney and Wes Bentley ) can be seen watching one of Reagan's wartime films, This Is the Army (1943). He played Chicago Cubs hurler Grover Cleveland Alexander in the film, The Winning Team (1952). He also served temporarily, as a broadcaster for WGN Radio, which broadcasts Cubs baseball games. A month after his death, items from his burial and week-long public viewing were selling fast on the online auction site eBay. The company has sold 780 pieces of Reagan funeral memorabilia since June 11, 2004, for a total of $66,000.

The items range from programs (sold for up to $1,525 each) from the interment at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library in Simi Valley, CA, to gratitude cards given to mourners who visited his casket. Pictured on a 60¢ memorial postage stamp issued by the Republic of the Marshall Islands 4 July, 2004, the first memorial to be issued in his honor. The first President since Dwight D. Eisenhower to serve two full terms in office. The former President was buried at his presidential library in Simi Valley, California. Only United States President to have appeared in a shirt advertisement. Pictured on a USA 37¢ commemorative postage stamp issued 9 February 2005. When the first-class letter rate was raised to 39¢ in January 2006, the US Postal Service received an unprecedented number of requests to reissue the stamp at the higher value. The 39¢ postage stamp was issued on 14 June 2006, using the same design as the earlier stamp. He was the first former American president to die in the 21st century.

Rumored studio publicity claimed that he was scheduled to play Rick Blaine in Casablanca (1942); however, this was never the case. His first bid for the Presidency was actually in 1968, when he finished 3rd in the balloting at the GOP national convention behind Richard Nixon and Nelson Rockefeller . As the Constitution, in practical terms, forbids the president and vice president from being from the same state (a rule that binds the electoral college), Reagan was not considered for the vice presidency when Spiro Agnew resigned in 1973. Besides, though Reagan supported his fellow Californian Nixon for president, the two were never close. In 1976, he challenged incumbent Gerald Ford (the man whom Nixon appointed Vice President to replace Agnew) for the Republican nomination, won several primaries, but narrowly lost the nomination at the convention. Though Ford confided in people he was considering a run for the presidency in 1980 to forestall Reagan's ascendancy, he never did and Reagan won the nomination and the presidency.

Received more electoral votes than any other president in history, winning by 525 (out of 538) in his 1984 re-election campaign when he racked up 49 of 50 states in beating Jimmy Carter 's vice president Walter Mondale . Was considered to be the most conservative United States President since Herbert Hoover . Member of the Eureka College cheerleading squad. His last public appearance was at Richard Nixon 's funeral in April 1994. Member of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences (AMPAS). knighted by Queen Elizabeth II , received an honorary British knighthood, Knight Grand Cross of the Order of the Bath. This entitled him to the use of the post-nominal letters GCB, but did not entitle him to be known as "Sir Ronald Reagan". [June 1989] During the 1980 Presidential campaign, incumbent President Jimmy Carter publicly criticized Reagan for launching his campaign with a speech on states' rights in Philadelphia, Mississippi, the site of the 1964 murder of three civil rights workers immortalized in the film Mississippi Burning (1988).

Carter, a former governor of the Deep South state of Georgia who had run as a racial moderate in 1970, noted that the phrase "states' rights" was a code word for segregation, as Southerners opposed to federally mandated integration of the races under the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965 claimed that such mandates "violated" state laws and local customs and were unconstitutional abrogations of the rights of their states to police themselves. Reagan, who had used his opposition to state equal housing laws to defeat Gov. Edmund G. Brown in the 1965 California governor's race, disavowed any racist intent and the issue was ignored by most voters and pundits. After his presidency he and Nancy Reagan moved to 666 St. Cloud Road in Bel Air, California which Ronald lived in until his death. Nancy had the address changed from 666 to 668 due to the fact 666 is known as the devil's number. The house is down the street from 805 St. Cloud Road, the house used in the TV show The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air (1990).

While as an actor he is thought of mostly as a Western/Action-Adventure star, his two best-remembered lines were from straight dramatic roles and delivered while he was flat on his back in bed, his character either dying or horribly crippled: "Win just one more for the Gipper!" in Knute Rockne All American (1940) and "Where's the rest of me?" in Kings Row (1942). His famous nickname "The Great Communicator", was not earned but was requested. Reagan asked for it during his farewell address in 1989. His state funeral service took place on the 25th anniversary of the death of his close friend and ally John Wayne . Spent World War II making Army training films for Hal Roach Studios. Reagan and his wife Nancy were close friends of Rock Hudson , whose death in 1985 spurred the President to provide funds for AIDS research. His closest friend in Hollywood was Robert Taylor . Reagan was the first "true blue" conservative to win the Republican nomination and be elected President since Calvin Coolidge in 1924. Underwent hip replacement surgery in January 2001.

Although Reagan did not formally become a Republican until 1962, he never endorsed a Democrat after Helen Gahagan 1950 and voted for Dwight D. Eisenhower in 1952. He also actively campaigned for Richard Nixon in the 1960 presidential election. Continued to play golf with several friends including Bob Hope and Kevin Costner until 1996. The oldest man to serve as US President, he took office only 17 days before his 70th birthday and left office 17 days before his 78th. He was, in fact, older than four of the previous five presidents: John F. Kennedy , Richard Nixon , Gerald Ford , and Jimmy Carter . Emceed the first PATSY Awards show (1951) where Francis the Talking Mule was the very first winner. PATSY is an acronym for: Picture Animal Top Star of the Year. As Captain in the U.S. Army, Reagan signed Major Clark Gable 's discharge papers in June 1944. He was of Irish descent on his father's side, and of Scottish and English descent on his mother's side.

His paternal grandfather, John Michael Reagan, was born in Peckham, co. Kent, England, to Irish parents, and his paternal grandmother, Jennie Cusick, was born in Dixon, Illinois, also to Irish parents. His maternal grandfather, Thomas Wilson, also an Illinois native, was of Scottish descent (partly by way of Canada), and his maternal grandmother, Mary Ann Elsey, was English, from Epsom, co. Surrey. His paternal great-grandfather, Michael Regan, emigrated to the US from Ballyporeen, Ireland, in the 1860s. Ballyporeen, a tiny rural farming town in County Tipperary, is located in the south-central part of the country and its inhabitants are frequently referred to as "Midlanders". The Regans were one of three primary families, or "clans", that populated St. Mary's Parish in the village of Ballyporeen. The Ronald Reagan Visitors Centre was built down the street from St. Mary's Church following his visit to his ancestral home in the mid-1980s. The spelling of the family name Regan was changed to Reagan after they arrived in the US.

Biography in: "The Scribner Encyclopedia of American Lives". Volume 7, 2003-2005, pages 446-452. Farmington Hills, MI: Thomson Gale, 2007. Honored world champion surfer David Nuuhiwa with a gold medal for Merit. Although Reagan advertised cigarettes during his time in Hollywood, he is believed never to have taken up the habit in real life. Some early photographs show him holding a pipe, but it never seems to have been lit. In later life he was very anti-smoking, especially since his best friend Robert Taylor died of lung cancer at the age of 57, and his older brother Neil Reagan lost a vocal chord in cancer surgery. Only US President to head a labor union (as president of the Screen Actors Guild 1947-1952/1959-1960). To date (2013), first (and only) divorced US President (from Jane Wyman in 1948). Both of his children with Nancy Reagan , Ron Reagan and Patti Davis , became liberal Democrats. The first US President since John F.

Kennedy to die before his predecessor. Erroneously attributed the "Ten Cannots" to Abraham Lincoln during the 1992 Republican National Convention ("You cannot strengthen the weak by weakening the strong, etc.") Lincoln has been widely and inaccurately credited with the list, but it was actually written by Rev. William J.H. Boetcker in 1916, over 60 years after Lincoln's assassination. Maryland Lieutenant Governor (and future RNC chairman) Michael Steele made the same mistake during his speech to the 2004 Republican Convention. Pictured on a nondenominated 'forever' USA commemorative postage stamp issued 10 February 2011, four days after the 100th anniversary of his birth. The original issue price was 44¢. Reagan and Jane Wyman had a daughter Christine who was born June 26, 1947, and lived 9 hours. As a child, Reagan's daughter Patti Davis hated political talk so much that whenever politics came up at the dinner table she would deliberately fall out of her seat. This always changed the topic. Inducted into the Radio Hall of Fame in 2011.

He hosted Warren Beatty at the White House for a screening of the latter's film Reds (1981). Despite their vast political differences, Reagan and Beatty were old friends as Hollywood actors. Was a Boy Scout. Richard Nixon may have been the only US President to have actually met Elvis Presley , but Reagan's daughter Maureen Reagan appeared with Presley in Kissin' Cousins (1964). While married to actress Jane Wyman , the couple resided at 9137 Cordell Drive in Los Angeles (CA). The estate, built in 1942, fetched $8.5 million when sold in September 2012. Favorite film was High Noon (1952). He is mentioned in the lyrics of the Sting song "Russians" from his first solo album "The Dream of the Blue Turtles". Released in 1985 while Reagan was President, the song is about the escalating tensions of the Cold War and was a criticism of the way politicians on both sides were refusing to back down. It includes the line "Mr. Reagan says we will protect you, I don't subscribe to this point of view".

The song became a top 20 hit in the UK and the USA, as well as a chart hit in many other countries. Inducted into the Eureka College Athletics Hall of Fame in 1982. Doug McClelland's 1983 book, "Hollywood on Ronald Reagan" contains comments from Reagan's show business colleagues. Virginia Christine, famous as Mrs. Olson, TV's spokeswoman for Folger's Coffee, worked with the future President as recently as "The Killers." She tersely commented on her co-star, "I just can't place him.". Favorite drink was fine wine from west coast vineyards. Announced the Strategic Defense Initiative as "Star Wars" after Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope (1977). The Stephen King novel Doctor Sleep has one of the characters describe Reagan as "still having an actor's hair after becoming President, and an actor's charming but untrustworthy smile". His surname comes from an Irish surname, an Anglicized form of Ó Ríagáin meaning "descendant of Riagán", meaning "impulsive".

His name is a Scottish form of the Old Norse name Ragnvaldr, meaning "advisory ruler" or "ruling council". According to Soviet spy Jack Barsky, the Russians were afraid of three things: AIDS, Jewish people and Ronald Reagan; with Reagan taking the top spot. His support for the UK during the Falklands War violated the Monroe Doctrine. Personal Quotes (66) [at the Berlin Wall, 1987] Mr. Gorbachev [Soviet premier Mikhail Gorbachev ], tear down this wall! The best view of government is seen on a rear view mirror as one is driving away from it. [in the 1980 campaign] Recession is when your neighbor loses his job. Depression is when you lose yours. Recovery is when Jimmy Carter loses his. [1964] I love three things in life: drama, politics and sports and I'm not sure they always come in that order. [1980] I remember some of my own views when I was quite young. For heaven's sake, I was even a Democrat! [to his wife after the assassination attempt] Honey, I forgot to duck.

[to his doctors prior to going into surgery after being shot] I hope all of you are Republicans. [semi-consciously, to the nurse who hauled him on the gurney] Does Nancy [wife Nancy Reagan ] know about us? [1980] I know what it's like to pull the Republican lever for the first time, because I used to be a Democrat myself, and I can tell you it only hurts for a minute and then it feels just great. [1985] I've been criticized for going over the heads of the Congress. So, what's the fuss? A lot of things go over their heads. America is too great to dream small dreams. [from the Alzheimer's letter] I now begin the journey that will lead me to the sunset of my life. I know that for America, there will always be a bright dawn ahead. Politics is not a bad profession. If you succeed there are many rewards; if you disgrace yourself you can always write a book. You can tell a lot about a fellow's character by his way of eating jellybeans. Government is not the solution to our problems. Government IS the problem!

[in a 1984 presidential debate, referring to Walter Mondale (born 1928), who was age 56, 17 years younger than Reagan] I will not make age an issue of this campaign. I am not going to exploit, for political purposes, my opponent's youth and inexperience. All the waste in a year from a nuclear power plant can be stored under a desk. Fascism was really the basis for the New Deal. [on Vietnam] I have a feeling that we are doing better in the war than the people have been told. [Carmel, CA, June 1990] You may think this a little mystical, and I've said it many times before, but I believe there was a Divine Plan to place this great continent here between the two oceans to be found by peoples from every corner of the earth. I believe we were preordained to carry the torch of freedom for the world. I have left orders to be awakened at any time in case of national emergency - even if I'm in a Cabinet meeting.

[During a microphone check on August 11 1984, unaware that he was being broadcast] My fellow Americans, I'm pleased to tell you today that I've signed legislation that will outlaw Russia forever. We begin bombing in five minutes. Trees cause more pollution than automobiles. They say hard work never hurt anybody, but I figure why take the chance. Well, I learned a lot . . . I went down to Latin America to find out from them and [learn] their views. You'd be surprised. They're all individual countries. We are trying to get unemployment to go up and I think we're going to succeed. When I go in for a physical, they no longer ask how old I am. They just carbon-date me. [from a 1950s interview] Nobody ever "went Hollywood". They were already that way when they got here. Hollywood just brought it out in them. Approximately 80% of our air pollution stems from hydrocarbons released by vegetation, so let's not go overboard in setting and enforcing tough emission standards. Abortion is advocated only by persons who have themselves been born. Tonight is a very special night, although at my age, every night is a special night.

[His opinion of the Klingon warriors he saw during a visit to the set of Star Trek: The Next Generation (1987)] I like them. They remind me of Congress. [During his re-election campaign in 1984] America's future rests in a thousand dreams inside our hearts; it rests in the message of hope in songs of a man so many young Americans admire: New Jersey's own Bruce Springsteen . And helping you make your dreams come true is what this job of mine is all about. [confirming his 1984 re-election victory to the crowd chanting "Four more years"] I think that's just been arranged. A few months ago I told the American people I did not trade arms for hostages. My heart and my best intentions still tell me that's true, but the facts and the evidence tell me it is not. I can't do a damn thing until I'm elected! If I could paraphrase a well-known statement by Will Rogers that he never met a man he didn't like, I'm afraid we have some people around here who never met a tax they didn't like.

[at the 1980 presidential debate, when Jimmy Carter accused him of opposing Medicare] There you go again. [from his Presidential Farewell Address] I've spoken of the shining city all my political life, but I don't know if I ever quite communicated what I saw when I said it. But in my mind it was a tall, proud city built on rocks stronger than oceans, windswept, God-blessed, and teeming with people of all kinds living in harmony and peace; a city with free ports that hummed with commerce and creativity. And if there had to be city walls, the walls had doors and the doors were open to anyone with the will and the heart to get here. That's how I saw it, and see it still. [in 1992, regarding Bill Clinton , in a paraphrase of Lloyd Bentsen from the 1988 presidential election] This fellow they've nominated claims he's the new Thomas Jefferson . Well, let me tell you something: I knew Thomas Jefferson. He was a friend of mine. And governor, you're no Thomas Jefferson. Of the four wars in my lifetime, none came about because the U.S. was too strong.

If we ever forget that we're one nation under God, then we will be a nation gone under. The taxpayer: that's someone who works for the federal government but doesn't have to take the civil service examination. No arsenal or no weapon in the arsenals of the world is so formidable as the will and moral courage of free men and women. [Notre Dame University. 17 May, 1981] The years ahead will be great ones for our country, for the cause of freedom and the spread of civilization. The West will not contain Communism, it will transcend Communism. We will not bother to denounce it, we'll dismiss it as a sad, bizarre chapter in human history whose last pages are even now being written. [in a 1981 videotaped Oscar tribute] Film is forever. I've been trapped in some films forever myself. [comparing politics to prostitution, known as the world's oldest profession] Politics is supposed to be the second-oldest profession. I have come to understand that it bears a very close resemblance to the first. It isn't that liberals are ignorant. It's just that they know so much that isn't so.

The crew of the space shuttle Challenger honored us by the manner in which they lived their lives. We will never forget them, nor the last time we saw them, this morning, as they prepared for their journey and waved good-bye and "slipped the surly bonds of earth" to "touch the face of God." Freedom and Security go together. [speech at the Republican National Convention, Aug. 17, 1992.] Whatever else history may say about me when I'm gone, I hope it will record that I appealed to your best hopes, not your worst fears; to your confidence rather than your doubts. My dream is that you will travel the road ahead with liberty's lamp guiding your steps and opportunity's arm steadying your way. I know in my heart that man is good, and that what's right will always - eventually - triumph. And that there's purpose and worth to each and every life. Status quo, you know is Latin for "the mess we're in". [To Warren Beatty ] I don't know how anybody can serve in public office without being an actor. All great change in America starts at the dinner table.

Government's view of the economy could be summed up in a few short phrases: if it moves, tax it; if it keeps moving, regulate it. And if it stops moving, subsidize it. Republicans believe every day is the fourth of July, but the Democrats believe every day is April the 15th. We have some hippies in California. For those of you who don't know what a hippie is, he's a fellow who has hair like Tarzan, who walks like Jane and who smells like Cheetah. We can't help everyone but everyone can help someone. Economists are people who wonder if what works in reality can also work in theory. Government is a like a baby: an alimentary canal with a big appetite at one end and no sense of responsibility at the other. [on the death of Rita Hayworth from Alzheimer's disease, a disease which Reagan would be afflicted with just a few years after Hayworth's death] Rita Hayworth was one of our country's most beloved stars. Glamorous and talented, she gave us many wonderful moments on the stage and screen and delighted audiences from the time she was a young girl.

[to the viewers at the 1980 presidential debate] Are you better off now than you were four years ago? Is it easier for you to go and buy things in the stores than it was four years ago? Is there more or less unemployment in the country than there was four years ago? Is America as respected throughout the world as it was? Do you feel that our security is as safe, that we're as strong as we were four years ago? And if you answer all of those questions "yes", why then, I think your choice is very obvious as to whom you will vote for. If you don't agree, if you don't think that this course that we've been on for the last four years is what you would like to see us follow for the next four, then I could suggest another choice that you have.

[In 1985 after having his nose surgery he arrived at the White House briefing with a patch on his nose he opened the news conference saying (with a smile)] Not wanting you to lose any sleep at night, let me explain the patch on my nose [In 1985, after having additional cancer cells removed from his nose] Yesterday afternoon, when we came back from Chicago, I went over there in the White House to the doctor's office and he did the additional work, and biopsy revealed there were some cancer cells and now I have a verdict of, my nose is clean. The most terrifying words in the English Language are: I'm from the Government and I'm here to help. Salary (4) The 6 Most Utterly Insane Attempts to Kill a US President The 6 Most Utterly Insane Attempts to Kill a US President NFL Reviewing Touchdown Celebration Penalty Rules Anyone can change the course of history. You can start a movement, run for office, or if you're too insane for that kind of thing, buy a cheap gun and try to kill the President. Now killing the President requires a lot of planning, but when you're crazy, planning involves casting imaginary spells and talking to ghosts.

All of which makes it even stranger that some of the craziest assassination plots ever hatched by some of the craziest people came so close to succeeding. For instance... John F. Kennedy The Man: At the dear old age of seventy-three, Richard Pavlick maintained his youthful vigor by constantly ranting about politicians, wealth and Catholics. So naturally when these things converged in the form of John F. Kennedy's presidency, Pavlick felt that something drastic had to be done and that he was just the senile nutbar for the job. Apparently Pavlich learned everything he knew about committing crimes from The Riddler. After giving away his property and most of his possessions, he decided it would be a good idea to mail postcards around town, with cryptic clues about his intentions. Pavlick began stalking Kennedy and on December 11th this elderly one man League of Evil launched his plan. The Attempt: Fun Fact: Guns can be problematic. They require training to use well and even then they can still jam or miss. But do you know what never misses? A 1950 Buick filled with dynamite .

Maybe Pavlick felt that the revolution he'd spark would be so awesome that he didn't need to live and witness it. Maybe he just had a gross misunderstanding of how dynamite works. Whatever the reason, one Sunday as Kennedy left for mass, there was an old man in an exploding car, prepared to kill him in the flashiest way possible. What Went Wrong: On the first attempt, Pavlick saw Kennedy had his wife and two children with him, and got cold feet (note that if you're that concerned about bystanders, a car bomb is probably not your best weapon). This bought time for the good guys to work through the diabolical clues he mailed out. And by that we mean the postmaster glanced at the dates and postmarks and told the Secret Service where he was. By the time he was working on his second attempt on Kennedy's life, the cops were closing in. When they pulled him over, the cops found seven sticks of dynamite wired in the vehicle. Pavlick originally had much more, but when he became nervous about getting caught he removed most of it, apparently under the impression that it's ok to have just a few explosives in your trunk at any given time. "What?

There's, like, four sticks in there. Come on." He was held in a mental institution for a few years, then upon release decided to stalk and terrorize the postmaster that had tipped off the Secret Service on the Kennedy thing. Before he could come up with a more efficient way to kill than the old exploding Buick trick, he died in 1975, and was no doubt buried in a dynamite laden coffin. 5 Gerald Ford The Woman: Growing up, Lynette "Terrible Nickname" Fromme lived a little girl's dream. A local dance troupe she participated in toured the country and parts of Europe. Then this promising young lady grew up, moved to LA, got hooked on drugs and met the charismatic and clearly trustworthy Charles Manson. She was quickly lured in by his philosophies and joined the Family. Fromme was happy to be accepted, even if it was by a bunch of sociopaths. Then Manson was found guilty of orchestrating the Tate-LaBianca murders and Squeaky was back on her own.

She latched onto environmentalist cause, which would seem like a step in the right direction unless you know that "environmentalist" translates to "killing a United States President" in the language of Crazy Hippy on Acid. The Attempt: Fromme met Gerald "The Game" Ford in Capitol Park on the morning of September 5, 1975. She disguised herself with a red robe, apparently under the impression that bystanders wouldn't notice a flamboyant warlock walking around. While Ford was taking questions from the crowd, he noticed a hand go up near the front row. Much to his surprise there was .45 Colt pistol in that hand. "I got a fucking question!" What Went Wrong: As soon as the weapon was drawn, a Secret Service agent was on her like Nixon on Cambodia. In a moment that must have occurred in slow motion, the agent tackled Fromme and jammed his finger behind the trigger of the gun before wrestling it out of her hand. Fromme was arrested on scene and quickly found guilty of batshittery in the third degree.

If you're thinking that this was actually a good assassination attempt, prevented only by the Secret Service and their Matrix-like skills, you should know Ford would have been fine either way. It turns out the morning of her attempt, Fromme was still unsure if she actually wanted to kill Ford or just spook him and make him pee a little. She decided she would settle it later and ejected the bullet from the gun. She must have forgotten by the time she met Ford, because the gun she tried to fire at him still had no bullet in the chamber. Though Fromme failed, she blazed a path for female Presidential assassins and people wanting to kill Gerald Ford in general. Sara Jane Moore tried killing Ford only seventeen days after Fromme. Then again she also didn't manage to get off a shot, so maybe there's still a bit of a glass ceiling there for female assasins, despite what the film Wanted would have us believe. ↓ Continue Reading Below Ronald Reagan The Man: You know that friend who's just really, really into some actress? That weird guy who spends hours in Blockbuster, gently caressing a copy of Speed 2: Cruise Control just to feel closer to Sandra Bullock?

Well here's a tip: don't let that guy buy a gun. That brings us to John Hinckley, Jr., a failed songwriter who must have had a lot of down time because, according to trusted historian Dr. Wik E. Pedia , Hinkley saw the movie Taxi Driver at least fifteen times. The family friendly story of vigilante justice apparently captivated him because of Jodi Foster's role as a 12 year-old prostitute. When Hinckley learned that Foster was enrolled at Yale in 1980 he moved to Connecticut and enrolled in a writing class there. After numerous attempts to charm her by talking about how he fell in love with her portrayal of a child prostitute, he decided he would have to try something else. "Yikes. You look so much less 12-years-old in person." Proving that he totally understands women, Hinkley decided that the best way to impress Foster was by murdering the leader of the free world. It was between that and flowers. The Attempt: Hinckley first sought to assassinate Jimmy Carter, but got arrested on a firearms charge before he had the chance.

Obviously a man of persistence, he waited until March of 1981 and decided to try Ronald Reagan. "Same difference." Reagan, having just given a speech at the Washington Hilton Hotel in D.C., was returning to his limo when he was greeted by a crowd of public admirers and news cameras (that captured the event in its entirety ). At the time he had a whopping 73% approval rating, so it probably came as a shock to him when some dude drew a pistol and fired six rounds in his direction. What Went Wrong: In the three seconds it took Hinckley to fire six shots he hit four people, Reagan included. It wasn't a direct hit, however; the bullet ricocheted off the open limo door and grazed the President's side. At the end of the ordeal Hinckley had a kill-to-hit ratio of 1 to 5, but only if you count breaking a window as a kill. No, Hinckley hadn't practiced with the weapon before the event. What's more embarrassing, however, is that the rounds he used were "Devastators," which were supposed to explode on impact. Of the six bullets not one of them detonated, despite each one striking something.

So Hinckley was probably eligible for some kind of refund. Everyone injured by the attack survived and Hinckley was committed to a mental institution. Jodie Foster became a lesbian , though far be it from us to suggest that she did so mainly in an attempt to avoid the gender that thought six explosive bullets would be a good way to win her heart. ↓ Continue Reading Below

Question: Who was the only President to have two women attempt to assassinate him - and in the same month?
Answer: Gerald Ford