Encyclopedia > Tecumseh's curse

  Article Content

Tecumseh's curse

The term Tecumseh's curse or Zero Year Curse is sometimes used to describe a chain of events that began with the death of United States President William Henry Harrison from pneumonia. Commonly attributed to Indian chief Tecumseh (and sometimes to his brother Tenskwatawa[?]), who was defeated in the Battle of Tippecanoe by Harrison, the "curse" is said to have proclaimed the death of all presidents elected every 20 years. In fact, all American presidents elected in a year divisible by 20 between 1840 and 1960 died in office:

Zachary Taylor, the only other President to die in office, was elected in 1848 and died in 1850 of "acute indigestion".

Additionally, Franklin Roosevelt had already served three terms when he died. Although he was elected in 1980, Ronald Reagan survived an assassination attempt during his presidential term and did not die in office.

Regardless, the "curse" is taken seriously by some Christian groups, who have called for prayer to avert catastrophe from Presidents Reagan and George W. Bush in the election years 1980 and 2000. The group Intercessors for America believes they have broken the curse through "warfare prayer" in 1980.



All Wikipedia text is available under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License

 
  Search Encyclopedia

Search over one million articles, find something about almost anything!
 
 
  
  Featured Article
Brazil

... people of Tupi and Guarani language stock. Intermarriage between the Portuguese and indigenous people or slaves was common. Although the major European ethnic stock of ...

 
 
 
This page was created in 42 ms