In the Navy

At trivia (pub quiz) on Tuesday, we had this question: Name 4 of the 6 U.S. presidents who have served in the Navy or Naval Reserves. We got it wrong, unfortunately, and the answer surprised me.

All six of the men in the list served in WWII, and all six served in the White House successively: Kennedy, Lyndon Johnson, Nixon, Ford, Carter, and George H.W. Bush. (Bush was Reagan's vice president, remember.)

So...was there a secret conspiracy of Naval officers in the 1960s to take over the U.S. government?

Nah. But it's an interesting pattern.

(One of our team explained how Reagan didn't really break the pattern; "He was in McHale's Navy.")