If Americans know anything at all about Calvin Coolidge, U.S. president No. 30, they know he had a pet raccoon. The Coolidge White House (1923-1929) has not been enshrined in high school curricula. It ...

Rebecca the raccoon arrived at the White House in November 1926 by way of a Mississippi admirer, with assurances of a “toothsome flavor” befitting the president’s Thanksgiving feast. But rather than ...

This first centennial of the Calvin Coolidge presidency is as good a time as any to revisit an old-fashioned American idea: that families living in the White House kept pets because they liked pets.

Coolidge was president of the United States from 1923 to 1929. He was known for his quiet demeanor, which earned him the ...