Did you know...?

President Obama has made several trips to the briefing room at the White House in the last couple of weeks to talk about debt ceiling negotiations. But did you know that the briefing room is built over a swimming pool that was installed by President Roosevelt in 1933 as a place for physical therapy while suffering from polio? President Nixon turned the pool into quarters for the press in 1970. Thirty years later, the room was named for James S. Brady, the White House Press Secretary who was injured during the assassination attempt on President Reagan.