Think This Is the Craziest Election Yet? Think again: Check Out 8 More Choatic Novembers

In the wake of the first presidential debate, it’s clearer now than ever that America is faced with a truly unique election in 2016. It may seem impossible to imagine anything stranger than witnessing a celebrity reality show host-turned-politician debating our first seriously considered female candidate on a national stage, but the U.S. has witnessed its fair share of election drama in the past.

October 3, the Elmhurst History Museum will co-host a lecture titled “Mudslinging, Muckraking, and Apple Pie: Presidential Campaigns” at the Elmhurst Public Library. History presenter Terry Lynch will talk through some of the craziest presidential races through the years, including the election of 1800, Jackson v. Adams in 1828, Lincoln v. Douglas in 1860 and the election of 1912, when Teddy Roosevelt just decided to start his own political party.

“It seems that now more than ever, presidential campaigns are getting down and dirty,” a release from the history museum reads. “(But) believe it or not, presidential campaigns have actually become more civil over the years.”

To prepare for the upcoming event, we rooted around for some elections in America’s past that could rival even what’s going on this fall. We drew from Live Science and CNN to bring you a list of the top 8 strangest campaign seasons.

1. The first one in our history. In 1788, America was a new nation and political parties had yet to form. For the first and only time in U.S. history, a presidential candidate — George Washington — ran unopposed and received 100 percent of the Electoral College vote.

2. 1800’s tie. Thomas Jefferson, John Adams and Aaron Burr all ran for president in the election of 1800, but a Jefferson-Burr tie resulted in a first for American politics. Secretary of the treasury Alexander Hamilton launched a campaign to elect Jefferson, who, in his opinion, was the lesser of two evils. When Jefferson was elected as president and Burr took the vice presidential seat, Burr and Hamilton’s bitter rivalry continued until Burr shot and killed Hamilton in a duel three years later. At the time of the election of 1800, runner-up for president immediately became the VP — this election changed all of that, its drama triggering the passage of the 12th Amendment which stipulated that president and vice presidential candidates be determined separately from one another.

3. A messy election. The election of 1828 was messy in almost every sense of the word, but definitely established mudslinging as a big part of the American campaign. During campaigning, Andrew Jackson’s wife was accused of being an adulteress, since she’d married Jackson prior to finalizing her divorce with her previous husband. John Qunicy Adams was accused of pimping out an American girl to a Russian Czar. And when Jackson won the election, he blamed his wife’s death (she died after his election but before his inauguration), on Adams’ dirty accusations.

4. Splitting the country in half. The election of 1860, between Abraham Lincoln and John Breckinridge, divided America’s dominant Democratic party in half. The drama that followed this election resulted in the birth of the Confederate States of America and popularized a new political party.

5. An anticlimactic November. When Ulysses S. Grant ran against Horace Greeley in 1872, he’d pretty much won the election — even before the electoral votes were cast. However, Greeley died before the final election votes were even counted, making it an easy run for Grant.

6. The firsts we've almost forgotten. Also in 1872, suffragette Victoria Woodhull of the People’s Party became the first woman to run for president of the United States, decades before the 19th amendment to the Constitution allowed women to even vote in the country and long before Hillary was born. Frederick Douglass, a writer and abolitionist, was the first black man to be a vice presidential nominee.

7. Appearances start to matter. There were no televised debates before 1960, and John F. Kennedy and Richard Nixon were the first to take the stage. Americans watched as Nixon, who had recently been hospitalized and looked pale and thin in his gray suit, debated Kennedy, who stepped on to the stage tan and in bright blue. Some people argued that appearances alone won Kennedy both the debate and the election — and no other presidential candidates agreed to televised debates for another 16 years.

8. Problems with casting ballots. The 2000 election between Al Gore and George Bush resulted in a mishap in vote counting since New Mexico, Oregon and Florida all seemed too close to call by the end of election night. Chaos ensued while supreme courts struggled with the idea of calling for a recount of votes — which Gore’s campaign was insisting upon — or keeping their original numbers. Eventually, in December, a recount was ruled unconstitutional and Bush took the presidency.

Check out Elmhurst’s event for more information on past presidential campaigns and how those stories translate into our modern politics and current election.

Event details
When: Monday, Oct. 3
Time: 7 p.m. to 8:15 p.m.
Where: Elmhurst Public Library, Large Meeting Room, 125 S. Prospect St.
Cost: Free

Above image via Shutterstock.