14 min read
Reading time
2,777
Words
Published
18
Books
2
Awards
George Washington was appointed commander of the Continental Army in 1775 and led the Patriots to victory in the American Revolutionary War. He presided over the Constitutional Convention of 1787 and became the first U.S. president in 1789, serving two terms until 1797. Despite losing more battles than he won, Washington is known as the Father of His Country and remains the highest-ranking soldier in U.S. military history.
Names, aliases, and relatives of George Washington — birth name, kin, and personal ties.
George Washington by the numbers — life, work, and family.
George Washington — early life, career, personal life, and legacy.
George Washington was born on February 22, 1732, in Westmoreland County, Virginia. He was the son of Augustine Washington and Mary Ball Washington, growing up on a family plantation with nine siblings. Washington left school at age 15 because his family could not afford college, and he later developed skills in surveying.
In 1775, the Continental Congress appointed Washington as commander-in-chief of the Continental Army. During the Revolutionary War, he lost more battles than he won but secured a decisive victory at Yorktown in 1781. After the war, Washington presided over the Constitutional Convention in 1787, which drafted the U.S. Constitution. He was unanimously elected the first president in 1789 and served two terms until 1797.
George Washington married Martha Dandridge Custis in 1759. They had no children together, though Washington helped raise Martha’s children from a previous marriage. He was an avid dog lover, keeping more than 30 hunting hounds, and he famously loved ice cream, spending about $200 on it in one summer. Washington suffered from numerous illnesses including diphtheria, tuberculosis, smallpox, and malaria.
Washington is remembered as the Father of His Country for his central role in America’s founding. He set many precedents as the first president, including the two-term limit. His Farewell Address in 1796 warned against political parties. In 1847, he became the first U.S. president to appear on a postage stamp. Washington remains the highest-ranking U.S. military officer, with a six-star rank that cannot be surpassed.
Every award, honor, and recognition received by George Washington — Grammys, hall-of-fame inductions, civic honors, lifetime achievements.
George Washington's bibliography — every authored, edited, and co-written book, ranked by edition count.
Could not load more books.
A wall of memorable lines from George Washington — lyrics, interviews, and off-the-cuff remarks captured over a lifetime.
Associate with Men of Good Quality If You Esteem Your Own Reputation; for It Is Better to Be Alone Than in Bad Company.
The Foolish and Wicked Practice of Profane Cursing and Swearing Is a Vice so Mean and Low That Every Person of Sense and Character Detests and Despises It.
Labor to Keep Alive in Your Breast That Little Spark of Celestial Fire, Called Conscience.
It Is Better to Offer No Excuse Than a Bad One.
Observe Good Faith and Justice Toward All Nations. Cultivate Peace and Harmony with All.
My Mother Was the Most Beautiful Woman I Ever Saw. All I Am I Owe to My Mother. I Attribute All My Success in Life to the Moral, Intellectual and Physical Education I Received from Her.
To Be Prepared for War Is One of the Most Effective Means of Preserving Peace.
If the Freedom of Speech Is Taken Away Then Dumb and Silent We May Be Led, Like Sheep to the Slaughter.
Truth Will Ultimately Prevail Where There Is Pains to Bring It to Light.
The Basis of Our Political System Is the Right of the People to Make and to Alter Their Constitutions of Government.
I Hope I Shall Possess Firmness and Virtue Enough to Maintain What I Consider the Most Enviable of All Titles, the Character of an Honest Man.
Let Us Raise a Standard to Which the Wise and Honest Can Repair; the Rest Is in the Hands of God.
The Alternate Domination of One Faction Over Another, Sharpened by the Spirit of Revenge Natural to Party Dissension, Which in Different Ages and Countries Has Perpetrated the Most Horrid Enormities, Is Itself a Frightful Despotism. but This Leads at Length to a More Formal and Permanent Despotism.
My First Wish Is to See This Plague of Mankind, War, Banished from the Earth.
Impressed with a Conviction That the Due Administration of Justice Is the Firmest Pillar of Good Government, I Have Considered the First Arrangement of the Judicial Department as Essential to the Happiness of Our Country and to the Stability of Its’ Political System Hence the Selection of the Fittest Characters to Expound the Laws, and Dispense Justice, Has Been an Invariable Object of My Anxious Concern.
We Should Not Look Back Unless It Is to Derive Useful Lessons from Past Errors, and for the Purpose of Profiting by Dearly Bought Experience.
True Friendship Is a Plant of Slow Growth, and Must Undergo and Withstand the Shocks of Adversity, Before It Is Entitled to the Appellation.
If We Desire to Avoid Insult, We Must Be Able to Repel It; If We Desire to Secure Peace, One of the Most Powerful Instruments of Our Rising Prosperity, It Must Be Known, That We Are at All Times Ready for War.
The Constitution Is the Guide Which I Never Will Abandon.
Be Courteous to All, but Intimate with Few, and Let Those Few Be Well Tried Before You Give Them Your Confidence.
Discipline Is the Soul of an Army. It Makes Small Numbers Formidable; Procures Success to the Weak, and Esteem to All.
Liberty, When It Begins to Take Root, Is a Plant of Rapid Growth.
Mankind, When Left to Themselves, Are Unfit for Their Own Government.
There Can Be No Greater Error Than to Expect, or Calculate, Upon Real Favors from Nation to Nation. It Is an Illusion Which Experience Must Cure, Which a Just Pride Ought to Discard.
It Will Be Found an Unjust and Unwise Jealousy to Deprive a Man of His Natural Liberty Upon the Supposition He May Abuse It.
Friendship Is a Plant of Slow Growth and Must Undergo and Withstand the Shocks of Adversity Before It Is Entitled to the Appellation.
Religion Is as Necessary to Reason as Reason Is to Religion. the One Cannot Exist Without the Other. a Reasoning Being Would Lose His Reason, in Attempting to Account for the Great Phenomena of Nature, Had He Not a Supreme Being to Refer To; and Well Has It Been Said, That If There Had Been No God, Mankind Would Have Been Obliged to Imagine One.
There Is Nothing Which Can Better Deserve Your Patronage, Than the Promotion of Science and Literature. Knowledge Is in Every Country the Surest Basis of Public Happiness.
Worry Is the Interest Paid by Those Who Borrow Trouble.
I Beg You Be Persuaded That No One Would Be More Zealous Than Myself to Establish Effectual Barriers Against the Horrors of Spiritual Tyranny, and Every Species of Religious Persecution.
I Have No Other View Than to Promote the Public Good, and Am Unambitious of Honors Not Founded in the Approbation of My Country.
The Time Is near at Hand Which Must Determine Whether Americans Are to Be Free Men or Slaves.
The Constitution Vests the Power of Declaring War in Congress; Therefore No Offensive Expedition of Importance Can Be Undertaken Until After They Shall Have Deliberated Upon the Subject and Authorized Such a Measure.
Arbitrary Power Is Most Easily Established on the Ruins of Liberty Abused to Licentiousness.
Let Your Heart Feel for the Afflictions and Distress of Everyone, and Let Your Hand Give in Proportion to Your Purse.
Overgrown Military Establishments Are Under Any Form of Government Inauspicious to Liberty, and Are to Be Regarded as Particularly Hostile to Republican Liberty.
Nothing Can Be More Hurtful to the Service, Than the Neglect of Discipline; for That Discipline, More Than Numbers, Gives One Army the Superiority Over Another.
Laws Made by Common Consent Must Not Be Trampled on by Individuals.
Few Men Have Virtue to Withstand the Highest Bidder.
It Is Impossible to Account for the Creation of the Universe Without the Agency of a Supreme Being.
It Is Impossible to Reason Without Arriving at a Supreme Being.
Some Day, Following the Example of the United States of America, There Will Be a United States of Europe.
Lenience Will Operate with Greater Force, in Some Instances Than Rigor. It Is Therefore My First Wish to Have All of My Conduct Distinguished by It.
Being No Bigot Myself to Any Mode of Worship, I Am Disposed to Indulge the Professors of Christianity in the Church, That Road to Heaven Which to Them Shall Seem the Most Direct Plainest Easiest and Least Liable to Exception.
I Walk on Untrodden Ground. There Is Scarcely Any Part of My Conduct Which May Not Hereafter Be Drawn into Precedent.
Guard Against the Impostures of Pretended Patriotism.
Happiness and Moral Duty Are Inseparably Connected.
Bad Seed Is a Robbery of the Worst Kind: for Your Pocket Book Not Only Suffers by It, but Your Preparations Are Lost and a Season Passes Away Unimproved.
My Observation Is That Whenever One Person Is Found Adequate to the Discharge of a Duty . . . It Is Worse Executed by Two Persons, and Scarcely Done at All If Three or More Are Employed Therein.
Little-known facts about George Washington — origins, oddities, and behind-the-scenes details from a public life.
Ice cream was a favorite treat; Washington once spent about $200 on it during one summer, a substantial amount at the time.
Washington lost more battles than he won during his military career.
Despite many close calls, Washington was never seriously wounded in battle.
At 6 feet 2 inches, Washington is the third tallest U.S. president, after Abraham Lincoln and Lyndon B. Johnson.
Washington had absolutely no political experience when he was asked to become the first president.
Washington lost all but one of his teeth in his 20s and wore ivory dentures afterward.
He was the first person to sign the U.S. Constitution.
Washington was one of the few U.S. presidents who did not have any children.
He remains the highest-ranking soldier in U.S. military history, holding a six-star rank that is legally forbidden for others to surpass.
Washington was the only president not affiliated with a political party; he warned against the dangers of parties in his Farewell Address.
He was the only U.S. president not to live in the White House, as it was not completed until after his second term.
Washington was the first president elected under the U.S. Constitution, serving from April 30, 1789, to March 4, 1797.
He was the wealthiest U.S. president, largely due to owning about 300 slaves, with a net worth equivalent to about $525 million in 2013 dollars.
An avid dog lover, Washington kept more than 30 hunting hounds.
He was the only U.S. president to serve in a war while also serving as president.
Throughout his life, Washington suffered from diphtheria, tuberculosis, smallpox, dysentery, malaria, quinsy, carbuncle, pneumonia, and epiglottitis, among other illnesses.
Washington was made an honorary citizen of France in 1792.
He penned between 18,000 and 20,000 letters in his lifetime.
Washington left school at age 15 because his family could not afford college.
Some of his favorite dishes were cream of peanut soup, mashed sweet potatoes with coconut, and string beans with mushrooms.
Washington traveled widely, and many cities across America have placards commemorating where he stayed.
When the idea of a monarchy was suggested, Washington refused to be appointed king.
He was known as a keen social expert, skilled at figuring out details about people with little information and endearing himself to them.
When the first official U.S. postage stamps were issued on July 1, 1847, Washington became the first president to appear on the 10-cent denomination.
Washington is generally considered to have been more effective as a spy and intelligence operative than as a general.
When at home, Washington slept at Mount Vernon, Virginia.
Quick answers to the questions readers ask most about George Washington.
Celebrities similar to George Washington — same craft, ranked by reach.
🇺🇸 United States
🇺🇸 United States
🇫🇷 France
🇷🇺 Russia
🇺🇸 United States
🇺🇸 United States
🇩🇪 Germany
🇦🇷 Argentina
🇬🇧 United Kingdom
🇷🇺 Russia
🇺🇸 United States
🇩🇪 Germany
