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Quirky Founding Fathers and Other Bonkers Bits of American History

Khalid Elhassan May 2, 2020 36 min

Thomas Jefferson - United States — Jefferson was determined to demonstrate the majestic size of American animals. PBS

38. Exterminate All Dogs

Thomas Jefferson was quite proud of his dogs when he got back home to Monticello, his plantation near Charlottesville, VA. He boasted of their herding skills, and before long, friends were writing Jefferson, asking for a pup from the next litter.

However, Jefferson was one of those types who demanded strict and complete obedience, and when one of his dogs proved obstinate, his views on dogs, in general, underwent a radical change. He killed all his dogs, and ordered his foreman to rid the plantation of dogs by killing all the slaves’ dogs as well. Eventually, he advocated for the complete eradication of all dogs everywhere. As he put it in a letter to a fellow dog hater in 1811: “I participate in all your hostility to dogs, and would readily join in any plan for exterminating the whole race“. Thus, he became the only president to wage war on dogs.

Written by

Khalid Elhassan

A lifelong history buff, I developed a particular passion for WW2 history as a child, when I spent hours listening to my grandfather, enraptured, as he recounted his wartime experiences in the British East African Campaign and with the British 8th Army in North Africa.

I graduated with a history BA from George Mason University, then went on to get a JD from the University of Virginia School of Law. After lawyering for a decade, I moved to sunny Rio de Janeiro and a less demanding career, opening a tourism agency in Copacabana.

A big chunk of my free time is spent blogging (you can follow me on Quora https://www.quora.com/profile/Khalid-Elhassan ) or freelance writing, mostly about my favorite subject, history.