On April 4, 1841, President William Henry Harrison became the first U.S. president to die in office—just thirty-one days after his inauguration. For generations, the story was told the same way: an aging man caught in the cold, refusing a coat, delivering the longest inaugural address in history, and paying for it with his life. Pneumonia, they said, brought on by his pride.

But the truth may be far more unsettling. Modern researchers argue Harrison’s death wasn’t a cautionary tale of hubris, but the result of Washington, D.C.’s primitive infrastructure—a city where waste seeped into the very water drawn for the White House. What followed was not a chill turned deadly, but a gut-wrenching infection that stripped the president of his strength, leaving him delirious and dehydrated in his final days.

It’s a mystery at the intersection of medicine, politics, and folklore—one that forces us to rethink the legacy of America’s shortest presidency.

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