John Tyler's grandsons are alive and well, 156 years after his death
Some people might argue that the greatest accomplishment of John Tyler, the 10th president of the United States, is the fact that 156 years after his death, he still has living grandsons.
Tyler was born in 1790, and after his first wife and mother to eight of his children died during his presidency, Tyler married his second wife, the much younger Julia, with whom he had seven more kids. Their son Lyon was born when Tyler was 63, and after Lyon's first wife died in 1921, he married a woman 35 years younger than him, named Sue. They had three children, and two are still alive today — Lyon Jr., born in 1924, and Harrison Tyler, born in 1928, when his father was 75.
Harrison Tyler maintains his grandfather's Sherwood Forest Plantation in Virginia, where the president and his second wife enjoyed entertaining guests, and he believes it's haunted — there's an image of a young girl clearly visible on a wall, and it's still there despite being painted over. He has absolutely no interest in politics, he told CBS News, and doesn't boast about being the grandson of a president. When his son, William Tyler, was asked if people are surprised when they find out his dad's close connection to John Tyler, he joked, "I find it hard to believe." Catherine Garcia
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Catherine Garcia has worked as a senior writer at The Week since 2014. Her writing and reporting have appeared in Entertainment Weekly, The New York Times, Wirecutter, NBC News and "The Book of Jezebel," among others. She's a graduate of the University of Redlands and the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism.
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