A Presidential Quest
Louis Picone and His Passion for America’s Presidents
“Other passions I’ve had almost seem like really intense hobbies compared to this.” — Louis Picone
Louis Picone has always been a list guy.
All 50 states? Check. Every MLB ballpark? Done. All seven continents? Been there. His national park stamp book? Nearly filled.
Each mini quest became a fleeting obsession, consuming him until every box was checked. Then he’d move onto the next thing. But one of these quests — visiting every Presidential birthplace — was different. It wouldn’t just fill a list; it would change his life.
During a family road trip celebrating his parents’ anniversary, Picone had a thought: why not try to visit every place where each U.S. President was born? He had already been to a few — George Washington’s, James Monroe’s, and Grover Cleaveland’s — but 39 remained unexplored (George W. Bush was President at the time).
His list-checker instincts lit up.
At the time, history wasn’t even on his radar. Until that road trip, Picone jokes, he probably couldn’t have named the Presidents.
“Chester Arthur? Benjamin Harrison? These people were presidents, and I’d never heard of them before in my life,” he recalls, laughing.
Driving through Ohio, where seven presidents were born, he decided to visit as many as he could. His family, used to his obsessive lists, went along for the ride. He didn’t know it at first, but this trip would be different. It wasn’t just another fleeting quest. It was the spark that set him on the biggest journey of his life.
At first, Picone chalked it up to just another of his usual lists. But as he stopped at each site, his curiosity deepened. Some birthplaces were nothing more than roadside signs, while others were preserved as national park sites.
Lincoln’s birthplace, however, stood out. “You expect this little log cabin to be there,” he says. “But instead, there’s this massive neoclassical building that a log cabin is inside of. And then you find out it’s not really Lincoln’s log cabin. And the story just gets weirder and weirder.”
By the time he left that cabin — which turned out to be a carnival recreation that once sat on Coney Island — something had shifted for Picone. The list didn’t feel like enough. The stories were too strange, too fascinating to let go.
“It was kind of like the sky opened up,” he says. “The Presidents and visiting these places became a gateway drug.”
There was so much to uncover. Most information about Presidential birthplaces had to be pieced together retroactively, as it wasn’t widely documented until the mid-1900s. Adding to the challenge, most early Presidents were born in homes, not hospitals — and no one knows a future President at birth.
“If I was born in a log cabin somewhere, no one would care,” Picone jokes. “But if I became President when I was 60, all of a sudden, people start caring.”
The stories captivated him so much that he couldn’t keep them to himself. Sharing them felt inevitable — a hallmark of true passion. He decided he would write a book, something he’d always wanted to do.
At first, Picone didn’t tell anyone — not even his family. His day job had nothing to do with history, and he hadn’t yet convinced himself that he would finish the book or that this wasn’t just another passing phase. So he kept it to himself.
“My friends didn’t know me as ‘History Louis,’” Picone says.
At the time, no one — least of all Picone — would have ever predicted how this passion would reshape not just his expertise but his entire identity. The computer programmer who barely passed history class was transforming into someone who now lived and breathed Presidential stories.
It took him four years, but eventually, he finished what would become his first book, Where the Presidents Were Born: The History and Preservation of the Presidential Birthplaces. When the book finally came out, it was a moment of triumph.
But instead of feeling finished, Picone realized he was just getting started. Instead of checking “presidential birthplaces” off his list and moving on, he realized he’d only scratched the surface of U.S. Presidents. There was so much more to learn — his enthusiasm felt boundless.
He’d written about the birthplaces, but what about their deaths? While many books had explored individual presidents and their deaths, few examined how each president’s passing impacted American society. The question became the foundation for his next book, The President is Dead! The Extraordinary Stories of the Presidential Deaths, Final Days, Burials, and Beyond.
From there, everything took off. Realizing his interest in history wasn’t going away, Picone earned a master’s in history from William Patterson University and began teaching soon after. Then, on November 30th, 2018 — about a decade after that fateful road trip — George H. W. Bush passed away. Suddenly, everyone wanted to talk to him.
“I was on NPR, BBC News — my phone wouldn’t stop ringing off the hook,” he says. “I almost wanted to tell people who I was six or seven years ago. Like, I shouldn’t be speaking about this on the news.”
But by then, Picone had built more expertise on the subject than just about anyone else. That’s the power of curiosity and focus when it comes to our passions: we can go from knowing next to nothing to becoming the leading expert in the world, particularly if our passions are highly specific, in surprisingly little time. Passion leads the way.
Since then, Picone has written a third book — this time focusing on Ulysses S. Grant — and is now working on his fourth. As his passion has grown, so have his accolades: he is a member of the Authors Guild and the American Historical Association and serves as a trustee on the board of the Grover Cleveland Birthplace Memorial Association in Caldwell, New Jersey. He has spoken about U.S. Presidents and their impact on American society on nearly every major news outlet and stages around the world.
Looking back, Picone insists he never expected this passion to take hold so deeply.
“It’s kind of like you have amnesia. Like suddenly you look around and wonder, ‘How did I get here?’”
It wasn’t intentional, but hindsight, he says it all makes sense: “I was at a stage in my life where I was looking for something new. Something deeper,” he says.
Sometimes, that’s just how it happens: the right passion at the right time doesn’t just deepen our knowledge — it reshapes who we are. For Picone, what started as a casual curiosity turned into the foundation for an entirely new life and identity.
“After I found this passion, it got its hooks in me and I became obsessed,” he says. “Other passions I’ve had almost seem like really intense hobbies compared to this.”
Takeaways
Here is one big thing I learned this week about passion, one exercise you can do to stoke your own inner fire, and one aspect of Picone’s intense enthusiasm that rubbed off on me — and that I now want to learn more about, too!
One Lesson: Your Passion Can Become a Catalyst for Identity Change
What started as a simple list for Picone turned into a lifelong passion that reshaped his identity. The computer programmer who barely passed history class became a Presidential historian and one of the country’s top experts on Presidential commemorative sites. The takeaway? When you follow your curiosity deeply, it doesn’t just expand your knowledge — it can transform who you are.
One Exercise: Revisit Your Lists
If you have list-checker instincts like Picone, take a closer look at them. Are there any that spark lingering curiosities? Instead of rushing to check them off, slow down and explore one deeply. Whether it’s visiting a place, reading a book, or pursuing a project, it could lead to something bigger.
One Curiosity: A New Lens on Presidential History
Before speaking with Picone, I hadn’t thought twice about Presidential birthplaces or deaths. But now? I find myself curious. While I might not plan a national tour, I’d definitely go out of my way to visit one if I were nearby. It’s a reminder that every passionate person opens a door to a new world — and sometimes, it’s worth stepping through.
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