16. Eisenhower played golf and remained politically active
The presidency, the strain of command during World War II, including dealing with the egos of fractious allies, and a multiple packs per day lifelong smoking habit had severely weakened Eisenhower’s health by the time he left the White House. Ike and Mamie purchased a farm outside Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, where the Eisenhower Presidential Library was eventually established. He relaxed playing golf, a game which he famously enjoyed as president (he built the putting green on the White House lawn), and at a second home near Palm Desert, in California. But his retirement was only partial, he remained active in Republican Party politics.
Eisenhower was enormously popular as president, and his reputation in retirement was enhanced, despite the many failures which could be traced to his administration and its active intervention in foreign affairs. In 1964 he filmed a television commercial alongside Barry Goldwater, the Republican nominee for president, at his Gettysburg farm. Goldwater was beaten in a historic landslide by Lyndon Johnson. Eisenhower was less enthusiastic in his support of Richard Nixon in 1968, though he did make appearances on his behalf and released a statement in support of the new president on the day of his inauguration in January 1969. Eisenhower died just a few weeks later, of heart failure, in Washington DC.