[AnAmericanMother]

As long as you're not descended from John Randolph of Roanoke, you're probably o.k. His . . . ah, shall we say "quirks" . . . were probably due to childhood illness and not hereditary. And he had no offspring for the same reason.

He must have been a lot of fun to watch though - from a safe distance, and concealed.

[Verginius Rufus]

George H. W. Bush is a distant relative of Franklin Pierce, as is Barbara Bush, whose maiden name was Pierce.

The New York Times, with its usual level of accuracy, was in the habit of saying that George W. Bush is a descendant of President Franklin Pierce. President Pierce had three children, all of whom died in childhood (the last of them in a train wreck shortly before Pierce entered the White House), so he has no living descendants.