2. The alligator in the East Room of the White House
This one, too, has several versions. In one, the alligator is a gift from the Marquis de Lafayette to John Quincy Adams. Another has an alligator given to Lafayette as a gift which was temporarily kept at the White House. But the general agreement among those relating the tale is that an alligator was kept as a pet in the East Room. None of the records of Lafayette’s 1824-25 American tour report the gift of an alligator. Nor do any records contemporaneous with the Quincy Adams administration, from either his friends or enemies, tell of the presence of an alligator in the White House, let alone the president’s amusement when it startled visitors. Yet the story is pervasive on social media, websites, in print, and in videos.
The story first appeared in 1888, when it was reported that Lafayette had stored curiosities he was given on his more than year-long tour of the United States in the East Room as he completed his tour. But neither Lafayette nor his aide who cataloged the many gifts reported the receipt of alligators (Lafayette’s journal does record seeing them on his tour). John Quincy Adams’s extensive diaries and journals do not mention an alligator either as a gift from or for Lafayette. Like his father, John Quincy Adams had a raft of political enemies, and they would have found a way to use the story politically had it been known then. Though it continues to spread, the story of John Quincy Adams keeping a pet alligator is most likely false.