Only one US President, James Buchanan, never got married at all; Presidents John Tyler and Woodrow Wilson both lost their wives during their presidency, and remarried during their respective tenures; before Trump, Ronald Reagan was the first president who had ever divorced his wife; Presidents Franklin Roosevelt, Bill Clinton, Thomas Jefferson, John F Kennedy, Warren Harding, Lyndon B Johnson,
Gerald Ford, George Bush Senior and Dwight Eisenhower etc are known to have love affairs at the White House; Donald Trump is only the second divorced president and the first to have multiple failed marriages; he has been married three times and has five children
Despite the fact that numerous scandals pertaining the private lives of American heads of states have been flashing headlines across the globe to the sheer delight of salacious gossip-lovers throughout these last 228-years since George Washington had assumed charge as the country's first-ever President, research reveals that Presidential marriages have remained remarkably stable throughout history.
The incumbent Donald John Trump is only the second divorced president, after Ronald Reagan, and the first to have multiple failed marriages.
Ronald Reagan was the first president who had ever divorced his wife, but had left that first marriage so early in life, and moved on to such a stable and functional second marriage, that the voters didn't care.
Trump has been married three times and has five children, three from first wife Ivana Zelnickova; one from second wife Marla Maples; and one from current wife Melania Trump.
Trump's wives and children: Donald Trump married the Czechoslovakia-native Ivana in 1977. A former model, the new Mrs. Trump joined her husband in his real estate development business and eventually held executive positions at the Plaza Hotel and Trump's Castle Hotel and Casino. The couple became prominent in New York society and had three children: Donald Junior, Ivanka and Eric.
In the 1990s, rumors began to swirl that Donald Trump was having an affair with model Marla Maples, a Georgia native.
Trump's first wife Ivana separated from her husband in 1990 and eventually won a $20 million divorce settlement. She went on to become an author, fashion designer and has married - and divorced - two more times.
Trump had married Maples in a lavish New York ceremony in December 1993, two months after daughter Tiffany was born. The marriage was short-lived; the couple separated in 1997 and divorced in 1999 with Maples receiving about $1 million. She has not remarried.
Trump had married the Slovenia-born Melania Knauss in January 2005. In 2006, the couple's son, Barron William Trump was born. Melania Trump later launched a jewelry collection and skin care line.
According to the "White House Historical Association," America has only had one divorcee president, but two widower presidents moved on to second wives while in office.
Research shows Presidents John Tyler and Woodrow Wilson both lost their wives during their presidency, and remarried during their respective tenures.
The "White House Historical Association" states on its website that Presidents John Tyler and Woodrow Wilson had remarried while in office.
The "White House Historical Association" writes: "John Tyler, whose wife Letitia had died a year and nine months before, wed Julia Gardiner in New York City on June 26, 1844. Woodrow Wilson, whose wife Ellen had died a year and four months before, married Edith Galt at the bride's Washington, D.C. home on December 18, 1915."
Meanwhile, Michael Nelson, a professor of political science at Rhodes College and coauthor of "The American Presidency: Origins and development, 1776-2007," had viewed: "Some presidents, like Franklin Roosevelt, faced the possibility of divorce after their wife had discovered an affair, but kept the marriage together for the sake of their political career. The Clintons had also displayed the political power of avoiding divorce. Had Hillary Clinton not stood by her husband after the public learned of his affair with Monica Lewinsky, President Clinton would have likely faced removal from office or forced resignation."
We all know that Clinton was also involved with a model and actress Gennifer Flowers.
In 1992, as the Presidential election was getting into full swing, Gennifer Flowers had gone public with her 12 year relationship with candidate Bill Clinton.
The Presidential hopeful (Clinton) had denied everything at first, but Flowers came back with intimate recorded conversations that were hard to refuse.
The "Time" magazine had held: "After the White House intern conducted an infamous affair with President Bill Clinton in 1995 and 1996, Lewinsky's name became a punch line. Though Clinton initially denied their relationship, Lewinsky was called to testify before the Starr commission and contradicted the President, leading to an impeachment trial (and an eventual acquittal) in the Senate."
And one president, James Buchanan, remained a bachelor for his entire life.
About President (James Buchanan), Professor Nelson has written: "James Buchanan was unmarried at the time he was in office, and is widely thought of to have been what we would today call gay."
Apart from Franklin Roosevelt and Bill Clinton, other US Presidents who scandalized their position with extramarital affairs at the White House included Thomas Jefferson, John F. Kennedy, Warren Harding, Lyndon B. Johnson, Gerald Ford, George Bush senior and Dwight Eisenhower etc.
In early American history, President Thomas Jefferson had nourished a spicy relationship with a 30 years younger woman known as Sally Hemings.
(Reference: Annette Gordon-Reed's book "Thomas Jefferson and Sally Hemings: An American controversy")
History shows President Warren Harding had a life-long affair with a woman called Nan Britton and even fathered her daughter, Elizabeth Ann, right before he was elected to the presidency in 1920.
In her book "The President's Daughter," Harding's beloved Nan Britton had described her relationship with Harding throughout his term.
Before Nan Britton, President Harding had got it on with Carrie Fulton Phillips, the wife of a department store owner who was successful at blackmailing the President for their relationship conducted when he was a Senator.
As far as the Polio-hit President Franklin Delano Roosevelt's "romantic adventures" are concerned, he had begun began an affair in 1916 with his wife's secretary, Lucy Mercer, while First Lady Eleanor and the kids were away on a vacation.
American author and White House Press Secretary, Jonathan Daniels, mentions in his book "The time between the wars: Armistice to Pearl Harbor," that it was two years later that First Lady Eleanor had finally discovered a trove of letters addressed to her husband by her former employee.
Daniels writes that Eleanor had offered Franklin a divorce, but the two somehow reconciled for his political career.
The "Time" magazine reveals: "Hired as a secretary by Eleanor Roosevelt, Mercer ended up having an affair with Roosevelt's husband. Eleanor discovered love letters between Franklin D. Roosevelt and Mercer in 1918, when the presidency was just a distant ambition for her husband."
President Lyndon Johnson was especially blatant about his infidelities throughout his political career.
In 1937, he took up a relationship with one Alice Glass, a six foot tall blonde and beautiful Texan woman. She was the daughter of a local bank President.
Although First Lady Claudia knew at times that her husband was busy merry-making at Alice's 800 acre Virginia farm, she kept her emotions bottled and rarely mentioned it.
(Reference: Johnson's leading biographer, Robert Caro's book "Path to power")
General Dwight Eisenhower had fallen for his Irish chauffeur Kay Summersby during World War II.
The woman would accompany Eisenhower into combat zones and to drinks and dinner with other generals and politicians.
Eisenhower was then the Supreme Allied Commander and not yet the American President.
According to US media, the pair's relationship had ended with the war and both Eisenhower and Summersby denied the rumours in the years that followed.
Later, as Summersby was dying from cancer, she finally penned a memoir "Past forgetting: My love affair with Dwight D. Eisenhower," in which she had revealed the intimate details of her war time years.
President Kennedy had an intimate relationship with an alleged Soviet spy called Eva Mensch, according to the "New York Post."
After Kennedy's assassination, the FBI had got hold of video of spy Eva Mensch relationship with President Gerald Ford. She would blackmail Ford that she would furnish information about te affairs to the famous Warren Commission, which was formed by President Johnson to probe the assassination of Kennedy.
While John F. Kennedy had also had a romantic association with a 19-year old White House intern Mimi Alford, he was emotionally involved with the blonde Hollywood sensation Marilyn Monroe.
The "Time" magazine writes: "Such is the wattage of both Monroe and John F. Kennedy that rumors of their affair have kept tongues wagging more than 40 years later. Though there has never been official confirmation of any of Kennedy's dalliances, there are indications he was unwilling to cede his playboy lifestyle to the conventions of marriage. Of his supposed conquests, Monroe tops the list. A sultry version of "Happy Birthday" sung by Monroe to Kennedy at Madison Square Garden in 1962 was supposedly the impetus for their affair. Monroe died later in 1962 of a drug overdose, but tales about her alleged fling with the President grew increasingly tall. FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover tried to prove that the man on a secret FBI sex tape of Monroe was Kennedy, but he lacked definitive proof."
As far as Mimi Alford is concerned, she was not even a week into her White House internship when President John Kennedy had reportedly asked her for drinks in the residential quarters
By the way, there were always whispers that there was something cooking up between the then US Vice President George Bush Senior and one of his staffers, Jennifer Fitzgerald.
In his book "The Power House," a Washington DC lobbyist Susan Trento had disclosed a former US Ambassador Louis Fields had admitted that he arranged for the President and his lady friend to stay in a private cottage while visiting Geneva in 1984.
In a 1991 "Vanity Fair" magazine article, Hillary Clinton had also lobbed an accusation about Bush and Jennifer Fitzgerald.
On April 17, 1990, the "Washington Post" had maintained: "When Bush came to the White House in 1981 as vice president, Fitzgerald came with him. She became his appointments secretary and, despite what sources describe as a "natural surliness," she enjoyed wide influence and a warm friendship with the vice president. She was also unofficial gatekeeper at the time; no one could see Bush without Fitzgerald's approval."
However, Bush Senior had refuted all such rumours.
On August 12, 1992, the "New York Times:" had written: " In an Oval Office interview for the NBC program "Dateline NBC," Mr. Bush was asked by the interviewer, Stone Phillips, "Have you ever had an affair?" Mr. Bush, who had warned Mr. Phillips as he began his question that he might end the interview, tried to brush off the issue. "I'm not going to take any sleaze questions," he said. "I gave you a little warning. You see, you're perpetuating the sleaze by even asking the question, to say nothing of asking it in the Oval Office, and I don't think you ought to do that, and I'm not going to answer the question. Similar reports were raised during Mr. Bush's first campaign for the Presidency four years ago."
