What is Special About the President’s Desk? by Gregory Hilton

President Obama uses the HMS Resolute desk in the Oval Office. It was a present from Queen Victoria to President Rutherford Hayes in 1880. Every president since Hayes, except Lyndon Johnson, Richard Nixon & Gerald Ford, has used the desk. It was on display in the Smithsonian from 1964 to 1977. For 13 years Nixon thought he was using the desk of Woodrow Wilson, but it was actually used by Vice President Henry Wilson. Nixon frequently referred to Woodrow Wilson as our most educated President. Ironically Henry Wilson only spent 12 months in school.
The Resolute desk, it was first used in the Oval Office by John Kennedy, and replicas can now be found in the JFK, Carter, Reagan, Bush and Clinton presidential libraries. Vice President Henry Wilson died on a sofa in the U.S. Capitol on November 22, 1875. The same sofa is still being used in the Vice President’s office in the Capitol.