Animal Planet - White House Pets

While many past Leaders of the Free World have opted for more traditional house pets over the years, others took a more rock star-like approach in their choice of animal companionship. One of Woodrow Wilson's mammalian companions, for example, was a tobacco-eating pet ram. Party animal Ulysses S. Grant loved his horses. John Adams cared for an alligator, and that loveable William Howard Taft brought a cow to the White House. And Theodore Roosevelt...well Teddy unleashed in the famous hallowed halls all manner of dog, macaw, snake, lion, raccoon, hyena, badger, and a kitty-cat named Tom Quartz. And that's just the tip of the iceberg in this comprehensive history of the hundreds of pets that have graced the White House.