John Quincy Adams’ Alligator
An alligator definitely doesn’t sound like an ideal pet, but John Quincy Adams kept one in the White House. He received the gator as a gift from the Marquis de Lafayette. The story goes that Adams decidedly to keep the reptile in a bathroom and often used it to scare his guests.
Adams’ gator wasn’t the only one to be kept at the White House, Allan Hoover, Herbert Hoover’s son, also owned not one but two gators while living at the presidential home. Feeding those gators must have been a scary experience.