Art, obsession, and identity
The President of the United States is used to talking tough. But how many presidents in US history were able to do so in another language besides English? Not many people realize that there are 21 former White House incumbents who could converse in at least one foreign language. Some, in fact, were multilinguists. And did you know that there was one American president who didn't speak English as his first language. Intrigued?
Click through and discover the presidents who could communicate in foreign tongues.
John Adams, the second president of the United States, learned to read Latin at a young age. At Harvard, he studied the works of ancient writers such as Thucydides, Plato, Cicero, and Tacitus in their original languages.
Between 1778 and 1788, John Adams served his country as a diplomat in France, the Netherlands, and Great Britain. It was while posted in France during the Revolutionary War that Adams became fluent in French. He's depicted here reviewing troops.
Thomas Jefferson, the third president of the United States, spoke and read multiple languages.
President Jefferson, who served from 1801 to 1809, was able to speak French, Latin, and Italian. He also had knowledge of Greek, German, and Spanish.
James Madison was also a gifted linguist. By the time he entered the College of New Jersey, later Princeton University, Madison had mastered Greek, Latin, Italian, and French.
Madison, who served as the fourth president of the United States from 1809 to 1817, could also speak Greek and later learned to speak and read Hebrew.
James Monroe, who served as the fifth president of the United States from 1817 to 1825, was fluent in French.
Monroe mastered the French language while serving as a diplomat in Paris. In fact, his entire family spoke French.
John Quincy Adams, the sixth president of the United States, also spoke French fluently, a language he learned while at school in France. He could also converse in Dutch from his time spent studying in the Netherlands.
As the United States Ambassador to Prussia, Adams was also proficient in German. And he had a basic understanding of Russian and Italian.
Martin Van Buren was the only American president who did not speak English as his first language. Instead, Dutch was his native tongue, having been born in Kinderhook, New York, a primarily Dutch community.
Van Buren, who was the eighth president of the United States, honed his English language skills at school, gaining some knowledge of Latin along the way.
William Henry Harrison, who served as the ninth president of the United States for just 31 days before passing away, studied Latin at college in Virginia.
Harrison, previously a military officer, favored reading about the military history of ancient Rome and Julius Caesar from Latin chronicles. While at college he also grasped the fundamentals of the French language.
John Tyler was the 10th president of the United States, serving from 1841 to 1845.
A scholarly man, Tyler excelled at school, where he mastered both Greek and Latin.
James Polk was the 11th president of the United States, serving from 1845 to 1849. As a youngster, he showed no aptitude for languages, but proved a quick learner later at university.
During his graduation ceremony, Polk delivered his welcoming address in Latin. He'd spent many hours mastering classical languages and received honors in both Greek and Latin on his degree.
James Buchanan also demonstrated a penchant for classical languages, which he studied at the private Old Stone Academy in Mercersburg, Pennsylvania.
Buchanan, the 15th president of the United States, excelled in Greek and Latin, graduating in both at Pennsylvania's Dickinson College.
The 19th president of the United States, Rutherford B. Hayes was another who studied a traditional classical curriculum.
Hayes left school proficient in Greek and Latin. He also had a basic understanding of French.
James A. Garfield excelled as a student and was especially interested in languages and elocution.
In fact, the 20th president of the United States knew and taught both Latin and Greek. He was also the first president to campaign in two languages, delivering speeches in English and German.
Chester A. Arthur served as the 21st president of the United States from 1881 to 1885. He too demonstrated an interest in classical languages, though rather more modestly than some of his predecessors.
President Arthur was comfortable enough with Greek and Latin to be able to converse with others who understood the two languages.
Roosevelt could also read and understand the German language, though he struggled at times to speak it. In addition, the president had a basic command of Dutch.
Another German-speaking US president was Woodrow Wilson.
However, Wilson, who served as the 28th president of the United States from 1913 to 1921, never claimed proficiency in the German language, though he did read it a lot.
Herbert Hoover, who served as the 31st president of the United States from 1929 to 1933, once translated a book from Latin to English with his wife, Lou.
The Hoovers also spoke some Mandarin Chinese, having lived in China from April 1899 until August 1900.
Franklin D. Roosevelt, known to many as FDR, was raised speaking both French and German, his teachers being governesses from Europe.
By all accounts, FDR's French was better than his German, despite spending one summer of his schooling in Germany. As the 32nd president of the United States from 1933 to 1945, Roosevelt gave a bilingual speech (in English and French) during a 1936 visit to Quebec City.
The 39th president of the United States, Jimmy Carter maintained a command of the Spanish language, albeit functional.
Carter studied Spanish at the United States Naval Academy. He has written and given a number of addresses in his second language.
Bill Clinton, the 42nd president of the United States, studied German at Georgetown University and is able to hold a conversation in the language.
In 1994 Clinton, mirroring John F. Kennedy, gave a speech in English at the Brandenburg Gate in Berlin, during which he said one sentence in German, pledging to his audience that "Nichts wird uns aufhalten. Alles ist moeglich. Berlin ist frei," ("Nothing will stop us. Everything is possible. Berlin is free,").
George W. Bush, the 43rd president of the United States, has a conversational proficiency in the Spanish language.
Bush on occasion has delivered several speeches in Spanish, though some have been interspersed with English.
Barack Obama, who served as the 44th president of the United States from 2009 to 2017, can claim to speak some Indonesian.
From the age of six through 10, Barack Obama lived in in Jakarta, Indonesia, and attended local Indonesian-language schools where he picked up the language. However, he admits to not using Indonesian much as an adult.
Sources: (The White House) (POTUS) (The American Presidency Project) (Institute for Cultural Diplomacy)
See also: Words and expressions popularized by US presidents
These are history's multilingual US presidents
White House incumbents able to speak in foreign tongues
LIFESTYLE Languages
The President of the United States is used to talking tough. But how many presidents in US history were able to do so in another language besides English? Not many people realize that there are 21 former White House incumbents who could converse in at least one foreign language. Some, in fact, were multilinguists. And did you know that there was one American president who didn't speak English as his first language. Intrigued?
Click through and discover the presidents who could communicate in foreign tongues.