Cycles in U. S. History Presidential Generations

Strauss and Howe gave a great deal of credit for the "Secular Crisis" that occurs in each cycle to the maturing of the Civic type generation and their willingness to change the world. If you look at this table, however, the first thing you notice is that the Crisis is always during the Idealist's watch. I think you could make a case for Idealist zeal, when reaching a position of power, as being at least a contributing factor in the Crisis. I suppose it is impossible to separate the Idealist chicken from the Civic egg.

I have one gripe I suppose. Nobody from my Generation (Silent) seems to have made it into the Whitehouse. Oh well. And by the way, you may have noticed, that after a couple of Boomer Presidents, we have just elected our first President from the Generation X (13th) crowd. President Obama will be the first Reactive having to deal with a Crisis event.

Note: The bold years are election years. If a president came into office without being elected, the date of his entering office is in regular type.