The Universe of Discourse

Emoji for U.S. presidents

Content warning: something here to offend almost everyone

A while back I complained that there were no emoji portraits of U.S. presidents. Not that there a Chester A. Arthur portrait would see a lot of use. But some of the others might come in handy.

I couldn't figure them all out. I have no idea what a Chester Arthur emoji would look like. And I assigned 🧔🏻 to all three of Garfield, Harrison, and Hayes, which I guess is ambiguous but do you really need to be able to tell the difference between Garfield, Harrison, and Hayes? I don't think you do. But I'm pretty happy with most of the rest.

Honorable mention: Benjamin Franklin 🪁

Dishonorable mention: J. Edgar Hoover 👚

If anyone has better suggestions I'm glad to hear them. Note that I considered, and rejected 🎩 for Lincoln because it doesn't look like his actual hat. And I thought maybe McKinley should be 🏔️ but since they changed the name of the mountain back I decided to save it in case we ever elect a President Denali.

(Thanks to Liam Damewood for suggesting Harding, and to Colton Jang for Clinton's saxophone.)

[ Addendum 20221106: Twitter user Simon suggests emoji for UK prime ministers. ]

[ Addendum 20221108: Rasmus Villemoes makes a good suggestion of 😼 for Garfield. I had considered this angle, but abandoned it because there was no way to be sure that the cat would be orange, overweight, or grouchy. Also the 🧔🏻 thing is funnier the more it is used. But I had been unaware that there is CAT FACE WITH WRY SMILE until M. Villemoes brought it to my attention, so maybe. (Had there been an emoji resembling a lasagna I would have chosen it instantly.) ]

[ Addendum 20221108: January First-of-May has suggested 🌷 for Maarten van Buren, a Dutch-American whose first language was not English but Dutch. Let it be so! ]

[ Addendum 20221218: Lorrie Kim reminded me that an old friend of ours, a former inhabitant of New Orleans, used to pass through Jackson Square, see the big statue of Andrew Jackson, and reflect gleefully on how he was covered in pigeon droppings. Lorrie suggested that I add a pigeon to the list above.

However, while there is a generic "bird" emoji, it is not specifically a pigeon. There are also three kinds of baby chicks; chickens both male and female; doves, ducks, eagles, flamingos, owls, parrots, peacocks, penguins, swans and turkeys; also single eggs and nests with multiple eggs. But no pigeons. ]

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