From left, Allan Pinkerton, President Abraham Lincoln, and Major General John A. McClernand stand on the battlefield at Antietam, Maryland during the Civl War. October 3, 1862.Library of Congress Early "Secret Service" (actually, Union Intelligence Service) department headquarters at Antietam. October 1862. Matthew Brady/Buyenlarge/Getty Images Secret Service agents on each side of the carriage for President Roosevelt's inauguration. March 4, 1905. Bettmann/Getty Images A Secret Service agent rides on the running board of President Woodrow Wilson's automobile as Wilson waves his hat during his League of Nations peace tour visit to San Francisco. September 1919.Bettmann/Getty Images President Woodrow Wilson surrounded by Secret Service. 1919.Library of Congress/Corbis/VCG via Getty Images President Franklin D. Roosevelt on an inspection tour of the Douglas Aircraft Company's factory in Long Beach, California. Date unspecified.Bettmann/Getty Images President Truman leads the way across Pennsylvania Avenue in Washington, D.C., flanked by Secret Service.Bettmann/Getty Images President Dwight D. Eisenhower and his wife, Mamie, sit in the motorcade during his inaugural parade in Washington, D.C. January 21, 1957. NBC NewsWire/NBC/NBCU Photo Bank via Getty Images With a Secret Serviceman close by, President-elect John F. Kennedy takes daughter Caroline for a walk around the block near his Georgetown home in Washington, D.C. November 25, 1960.Bettmann/Getty Images A demonstration of the retractable outside foot stands for agents on President Kennedy's new Lincoln. June 15, 1961.Bettmann/Getty Images President Kennedy takes a stroll in Boston's Copley Square with his Secret Servicemen. October 19, 1963.Bettmann/Getty Images Mrs. Kennedy leans over the dying President Kennedy as a Secret Service agent climbs on back of the car. Dallas, Texas. November 22, 1963.Bettmann/Getty Images Secret Service agents walk alongside President Lyndon Johnson's black limousine in his inaugural parade down Pennsylvania Avenue. January 1965.Dean Conger/Corbis via Getty Images Flanked by Secret Service, President and Mrs. Johnson leave church services in Washington D.C. January 14, 1968.Bettmann/Getty Images President Richard Nixon waves with both arms from the sunroof of a limousine during his inauguration ceremonies. January 20, 1969.Henry Groskinsky/The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images Police and Secret Service officers run to protect President Gerald Ford during an assassination attempt by Lynette "Squeaky" Fromme in Sacramento, California. September 5, 1975.CORBIS/Corbis via Getty Images Amy Carter, daughter of President Jimmy Carter, goes to school accompanied by a Secret Service agent. Washington D.C. Circa late 1970s.Chuck Fishman/Getty Images Surrounded by police and Secret Service agents, President Jimmy Carter, First Lady Rosalyn Carter, and their daughter Amy walk down a Washington D.C. street during his inauguration parade. January 20, 1977.CORBIS/Corbis via Getty Images President Jimmy Carter waves from the roof of his limousine as Secret Service agents run alongside. New Brunswick, New Jersey. October 25, 1979.Wally McNamee/CORBIS/Corbis via Getty Images President Ronald Reagan and first lady Nancy Reagan wave from the sun roof of the presidential limousine during the 1981 inaugural parade down Pennsylvania Avenue.Wally McNamee/CORBIS/Corbis via Getty Images Seconds before President Reagan was shot. This photo shows all four people who were shot in the assassination attempt: Press Secretary James Brady, President Reagan, D.C. Policeman Thomas K. Delahanty, and Secret Service agent Timothy J. McCarthy. Washington, D.C. March 30, 1981.Bettmann/Getty Images Secret Service agents, police officers, and bystanders take action seconds after the shots were fired at President Reagan.Bettmann/Getty Images Barrage of Secret Service agents holding down shooter John Hinckley and tending to the wounded during the assassination attempt of President Ronald Reagan.Dirck Halstead/The LIFE Images Collection/Getty Images Secret service agents rush Hinckley. This photo shows the door on the presidential limousine being closed (right) after Reagan was pushed in, and Press Secretary James Brady and patrolman Thomas Delahanty on the ground after being hit by gunfire.Bettmann/Getty Images Chaos surrounds shooting victims immediately after the assassination attempt on President Ronald Reagan.Dirck Halstead/The LIFE Images Collection/Getty Images Secret Service agents cling to a car following President Ronald Reagan's. Cheyenne, Wyoming. March 2, 1982.Bettmann/Getty Images Secret Service agents surround Jesse Jackson, candidate for the Democratic presidential nomination in 1984, while he gives an interview on the airport tarmac along the campaign trail. Location unspecified. March 2, 1984.Jacques M. Chenet/CORBIS/Corbis via Getty Images President Ronald Reagan glances out the window from a holding room near Omaha Beach in Normandy, France while participating in ceremonies commemorating the 40th anniversary of D-Day. June 6, 1984.Wally McNamee/CORBIS/Corbis via Getty Images Campaign rally for President George Bush in New Jersey (note Secret Service on the roof). November 2, 1992.Wally McNamee/CORBIS/Corbis via Getty Images President Bill Clinton and his daughter Chelsea are accompanied by security personnel as they walk back to the White House. May 23, 1993.Robert Giroux/AFP/Getty Images President Bill Clinton and his wife, Hillary, running and cycling on the beach while on vacation. Coronado Island. March 31, 1994.Larry Downing/Sygma/Sygma via Getty Images President and Mrs. Clinton walk down the stairway from AF-1 arriving in Denver, Colorado, under the watchful protection of the Secret Service. June 22, 1997.Wally McNamee/CORBIS/Corbis via Getty Images Uniformed Secret Service agents detain a man who attempted to jump the fence on to the North Lawn of the White House July 31, 2006, in Washington DC. The man was detained without incident. Joshua Roberts/Getty Images Members of the US Secret Service stand guard as US President George W. Bush exits his limousine on the South Lawn of the White House in Washington, DC, after a security alert on the White House grounds, October 28, 2008. Bush was returning from a visit to the Republican National Committee headquarters on Capitol Hill. Saul Loeb/AFP/Getty Images Democratic presidential candidate Sen. Barack Obama waves to the crowd as Secret Service agents keep watch June 27, 2008 in Unity, New Hampshire. Obama and Clinton appeared together in a show of unity for Obama's presidential campaign. Mario Tama/Getty Images Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump is surrounded by Secret Service agents during a campaign event on March 12, 2016 in Dayton, Ohio. The agents were responded to a protestor that had rushed the stage while Trump was speaking. Brooks Kraft/Corbis/Getty ImagesLike this gallery?
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36 Images Of The Secret Service In Action From Lincoln To Trump View Gallery
The Secret Service was established in 1865 as an agency dedicated to protecting the validity of the country's currency against counterfeiters. But after President William McKinley was assassinated in 1901, the Secret Service assumed its current role of protecting the leaders commonly depicted on that currency.
That's not to say that the president and other top leaders didn't have a dedicated security force prior to 1901. In 1861, Allan Pinkerton's Union Intelligence Service foiled an assassination plot while guarding Abraham Lincoln in Baltimore. In 1865, ironically enough, signed legislation to create the Secret Service was on Lincoln's desk the night he was murdered.
But it was McKinley's assassination — he was shot at close range while shaking hands with the public — that changed everything. Instead of a mixed crew of private guards and local law enforcement, the Secret Service officially took over protecting the president starting in the last few years of McKinley successor Teddy Roosevelt's tenure.
The move was not without debate, however. Some in Congress wanted the United States Army to be charged with the task of protecting the president.
In the decades that followed, the Secret Service thwarted high-profile assassination attempts against the likes of President Taft and President Truman. Then, following the assassination of President John F. Kennedy in 1963, the Secret Service recruited more agents and sharply increased the gathering of intelligence — a tragic echo of the call-to-action heeded post-McKinley.
After Kennedy, the Secret Service was able to stop assassination attempts on President Ford and President Reagan, while their mere presence has likely deterred many other attempts. Indeed, the Secret Service itself investigates thousands of incidents each year of people threatening the president.
Today, more than 4,000 dedicated Secret Service members protect not only the president, but also the vice president, their families, former presidents, presidential candidates, and many others. The gallery above offers just a snapshot of both dramatic and routine days from this past century of the Secret Service.
Still curious? Learn more about some of the strangest presidential assassination attempts in United States history. Want more? Check out 39 haunting Kennedy assassination photos that most people have never seen.
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