Resolute desk facts for kids

President Barack Obama sitting on the Resolute desk in 2009

The Resolute desk is a nineteenth-century desk used by several presidents of the United States in the White House Oval Office.

It was a gift from Queen Victoria to President Rutherford B. Hayes in 1880 and was built from the English oak timbers of the British Arctic exploration ship HMS Resolute. Franklin Roosevelt added a door with the presidential seal to hide his leg braces.

Many presidents since Hayes have used the desk at many locations in the White House.

The desk was removed from the White House after the 1963 assassination of President John F. Kennedy, when President Lyndon Johnson allowed it to go on a traveling exhibition with artifacts of the Kennedy Presidential Library. It was then put on display in the Smithsonian Institution.

President Jimmy Carter brought the desk back to the Oval Office in 1977, where it has remained with every president since, except George H. W. Bush.

Images for kids

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  The Resolute desk in William Howard Taft's Presidential Study before the kneehole panel was added

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  A view of Resolute, Intrepid, Pioneer, and Assistance, before they left Beechey Island

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  An engraving after the artwork of William Simpson, of Queen Victoria visiting HMS Resolute on December 16, 1856

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  An early plan for a "Design for a bookcase proposed to be made from the timber of "The Resolute" - By Messrs. Morant, Boyd, and Blanford" as found in the April 16, 1881 edition of The Builder, drawn by A.F. Brophy

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  Image of the unbuilt design for "Secretaire made from the timbers of the British Arctic ship Resolute" from the December 11, 1890 Frank Leslie's Illustrated Newspaper

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  Jules Cambon, signing the Treaty of Paris on behalf of Spain in 1899 at the Resolute desk during William McKinley's presidency. The daily bouquet is visible on the desk.

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  The desk in the Broadcast Room in 1952

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  Stanley Tretick's October 2, 1963 photo of John F. Kennedy Jr. playing in the kneehole of the Resolute desk

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  S. Dillon Ripley, Webb C. Hayes (great-grandson of President Hayes), and William Howard Taft III at a reception for the Resolute desk exhibition at the National Museum of History and Technology in 1967.

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  The Presidential call button and HMS Gannet pen holder on the Resolute desk in 2009

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  The Grinnell desk on display at the New Bedford Whaling Museum

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  The replica desk from The West Wing during a tour of the Warner Bros. Prop House