The Curse of Tippecanoe Explained

Will President Joe Biden die in office? If he does, some will blame the so-called "Curse of Tippecanoe," or "Tecumseh's Curse." That Mr. Beat dude explains.

Produced by Matt Beat. Music by Electric Needle Room (Mr. Beat's band) and Bad Snacks. All images and video owned by Matt Beat, used under fair use guidelines, or found in the public domain. A special thanks to the AP Archive for use of some of their footage.

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The Curse of Tippecanoe is the supposed pattern of deaths in office of every single American President elected in a year ending in zero going back to the 1840 election. But is it truly a curse? Or just...ya know...another weird series of coincidences.

In 1840, William Henry Harrison does get elected President, but after just 31 days in office, dies from pneumonia. He is the first American President in history to die while in office. Flash forward 20 years later, and Abraham Lincoln is elected President. Lincoln is assassinated after being re-elected on April 15, 1865. He is the first American President in history to be assassinated. 20 years after Lincoln is first elected, James Garfield is elected President. Garfield is the second President assassinated, on September 19, 1881. 20 years after Garfield is elected, William McKinley is re-elected President. He is the third President assassinated, on September 14, 1901. 20 years after McKinley is re-elected, Warren Harding is elected President. Harding dies of a heart attack on August 2, 1923. 20 years after Harding was elected President, Franklin Roosevelt is re-elected for an unprecedented third term. On April 12, 1945, after being re-elected an unprecedented FOURTH term, he dies of cerebral hemorrhage. 20 years after Roosevelt is re-elected a third time, John F. Kennedy is elected President. Kennedy is the fourth President assassinated, on November 22, 1963. 20 years after Kennedy is elected, Ronald Reagan is elected President. Reagan is assassinated on March 30, 1981.

Wait hold up. Reagan didn’t die because of that shooting. He survived the shooting! The curse is broken!

So obviously there are a lot of coincidences here, but there are plenty of folks who criticize the so-called Curse of Tippecanoe.

There are logical fallacies left and right. This supposed curse is an example of confusing correlation with causation, cherry picking information to fit a narrative, and moving the goalposts in order to make the narrative work. This is a similar case to all those Lincoln-JFK coincidences. While the Curse of Tippecanoe is fascinating, the closer you look at it, the less fascinating it becomes. For example, what about Zachary Taylor? He died while in office but was elected in 1848. What about the fact that FDR was still in office LONGER THAN ANY OTHER PRESIDENT AND LITERALLY DID MORE AND HAD MORE OF AN EFFECT ON THE COUNTRY THAN ANY OTHER PRESIDENT? What about the fact that all the Presidents died in different ways and in different situations?

#americanpresidents #ushistory #politicalhistory

[iammrbeat]

UPDATE- Joe Biden survived his presidency!

[thegerardshow]

Fun fact: Ronald Reagan was the first president since James Monroe to be elected in a year ending in zero and not die in office

[Kylefassbinderful]

Teddy gets shot in 1912 and turns to some onlookers and says, "No, I WILL not die. You must take notice that the year is 1912 for this assasination attempt is premature and I will survive. BULLY!"
Nobody can take down TR!!!

[suckerforclassics]

Supposedly, the Curse extends to the residents that live around the Tippecanoe River. Some of my family members believe that if you don't take a jar with the river water with you when you move away, you'll end up back by the river until you die.

[nathaniel]

Fun Fact: every president before Jimmy Carter has died

[UsefulCharts]

I was hoping you'd do a video on this.

[sptownsend]

I had a scoutmaster who once told me "Never let the truth get in the way of a good story." I'm definitely adding this story to my file.

[Walkerman]

I feel like the Garfield assassination should mention that he didn't die due to the bullet wound. He died from an infection months later because the doctors didn't wash their hands before surgery.

[abeIincoIn]

"A Mr. Beat a day keeps the questions away"

[thecoasterboss]

Teacher: "Why are you chuckling?"
My brain: *Tippecanoe and Tyler too*

[chilln]

A lot of people mention the fact that Zachary Taylor died in office but wasn’t elected in a year ending in zero. Zachary Taylor, however, did die in the year 1850, which does end with zero.

[davidswift]

“Tippecanoe and Tyler too” the best campaign slogan ever😀

[joecombs]

I remember when Reagan was shot. I just got back to the barracks from class. We ran up to our room & turned on the tv. He was at the hospital. We didn't know if he was okay or not. We just sat there quietly watching the tv.
The first guy to say something said, "It's that curse."
Fortunately we didn't lose another president. I hope we never do again.

[lucabennito]

I bet that the curse was broken when Raegan’s and Bush’s assassination attempts failed.

[RiyadhElalami]

We are good at making patterns out of nothing.

[bessboy]

Apparently Reagan surviving his assassination attempt broke the curse.

[trisgilmour]

People love a good story, no matter if it’s true or not

[KJJDS]

The curse of Tippecanoe is a very interesting subject to me, so it’s really nice to see that you are making a video on it.

[vickijaehnert]

As a direct descendant of Tecumseh, I have never heard about Prophet making any curse. Good story though. You also left out that Tecumseh was invited to speak with a governor, and while they sat outside on a bench, Tecumseh kept moving closer to the governor, and the governor would move over. Tecumseh kept doing this until the governor finally said, “if you keep moving over I will fall off this bench”, Tecumseh replied, “is that not what you are doing to my people”? Smart man.

[yarielrobles]

"If biden survives his presidency"
Given how old he is, that's not a small if