William Howard Taft was an American statesman and jurist who served as the 27th president of the United States from 1909 to 1913.

He joined the Skull and Bones, of which his father was a founding member. Also known as Order 322 or The Brotherhood of Death, Skull and Bones has become a cultural institution known for its powerful alumni and association with various conspiracy theories. It is one of the "Big Three" societies at Yale, the other two being Scroll and Key and Wolf's Head Society.

Many Americans in the Philippines viewed the locals as racial inferiors, but Taft wrote soon after being appointed civilian governor of the Philippines by President William McKinley in 1901, "we propose to banish this idea from their minds". Taft did not impose racial segregation at official events, and treated the Filipinos as social equals. Nellie Taft recalled that "neither politics nor race should influence our hospitality in any way."

At the 1908 Republican National Convention, Taft faced no serious opposition, gaining the party's nomination with a first-ballot victory.

Taft's opponent in the general election was William Jennings Bryan, who had served as the Democratic nominee in three of the last four presidential elections. Taft began the campaign on the wrong foot, fueling the arguments of those who said he was not his own man by traveling to Roosevelt's home at Sagamore Hill for advice during the campaign, but he won in the end by a comfortable margin, defeating Bryan 321 electoral votes to 162.

At 5 feet 11 inches (1.80 m) and 350 pounds (154 kg), Taft earned the nickname "Big Lub" as the heaviest president on record. He was often the butt of jokes for reported incidents of belching and flatulence, as well as suffering from sleep deprivation due to apnea. Urban legend had it that, due to his size, Taft once got stuck in a bathtub while serving as president, but historical accounts suggest the story is most likely false.

On April 14, 1910, President Taft was among the thousands of baseball fans who had thronged to the ballpark in Washington, D.C., to watch the Washington Nationals play the Philadelphia Athletics in their first game of the season. But Taft wasn't just there to watch the game. He made history that day by becoming the first sitting U.S. president to throw out the ceremonial first pitch on Opening Day--a tradition that has been continued by every U.S. president since except Jimmy Carter and Donald Trump.

Toymakers were concerned that their big moneymaker, the Teddy Bear, might not sell once the toy's namesake, president Teddy Roosevelt, left the White House. So, they decided to make a new toy--a stuffed opossum named in honor of new president William Howard Taft. The toy companies were sure they had struck gold, but the "Billy Possum" never caught on.

Taft made six appointments to the Supreme Court. Only George Washington and Franklin D. Roosevelt have made more.

Taft was one of the last presidents to keep a cow on the White House grounds. He brought his cow Mooly Wooly with him to Washington. When Mooly Wooly died, Taft accepted another cow named Pauline as a gift from Senator Isaac Stephenson of Wisconsin, selected from the many purebred cows on his farm. In 1911, Pauline went missing for two days when her train car somehow got lost on the way to a dairy show. After a massive "cowhunt", Pauline was discovered in a Chicago stockyard, where she just barely avoided getting slaughtered.