When I think of our founding fathers a number of things comes to mind, but one thing does not – their sexiness. Parade Magazine asks its readers who is the sexiest founding father? They are then given the choices of Alexander Hamilton, Thomas Jefferson, Ben Franklin, John Adams and George Washington.
About Alexander Hamilton, our first Secretary of the Treasury, they wrote:
Devastatingly handsome and, according to one historian,“brimming with libido,” Alexander Hamilton was the nation’s first public figure to be embroiled in a sex scandal. The good news: He confessed to the misdeed. The bad news: Instead of offering a simple apology, he described his indiscretions in what was termed “almost picaresque detail,” making colleagues squirm.
Their description of Thomas Jefferson, principal author of the Declaration of Independence and our third President, was:
Renaissance man Thomas Jefferson was a violinist, an inventor of words (belittle, to name one), a gourmet, and a wine connoisseur—during his eight years in the White House, he ran up a wine bill of over $10,000 (nearly $200,000 today!).
Benjamin Franklin, an author, publisher, political theorist, musician and inventor, they described as:
Centuries before the word cougar became part of the vernacular, Ben Franklin offered a pal eight reasons why he should take an older mistress. Among them: “Because there is no hazard of Children, which irregularly produc’d may be attended with much Inconvenience.”
John Adams, our second President, was described as…
He was short and stocky (his nickname around D.C. was “His Rotundity”). But in letters to wife Abigail, John Adams was Mr. Smooth: “I am, with an Ardour that Words have not Power to express, yours.”
They then referred to our first President, George Washington, as a “bruiser.”
George Washington had two horses shot from beneath him in battle, but the bruiser had a soft side, too: He named one of his hunting dogs “Sweet Lips.”
Then they left off James Madison, our fourth President and “father of our Constitution.” Readers can also submit their suggestions. One suggestion in the comments was Preisdent George H.W. Bush, perhaps we really should require a civics test. This is a sad commentary on our culture when we’re now sexualizing our founding fathers.
