You're Not My Real Founding Fathers!
America loves its Founding Fathers, and the nation's 250th anniversary makes for a fine opportunity to celebrate them. But wait—who are these imitators? These are actors, and musicians, and authors, and athletes! Their John Hancocks are very similar, but these aren't the real Founding Fathers! Starting apropos on Father's Day, here are a whopping fifty goos to challenge your knowledge of patriotic trivia. Can you identify these fifty fake signatories to a Declaration of Independence that never was? With luck, you\ll hold these goos to be self-evident.
This celebrity goo was created by Scott Hardie.
publication date: Sunday, August 2, 2026 - the answer will be revealed on Sunday, August 9
category: 
Justice
clue: He isn't an uncle from Pennsylvania. He's a corporate lawyer most famous for his advice about which apprentice to fire.
intended difficulty: medium
solved by: no one yet
Know the answer? Please log in or register in order to guess.
This celebrity goo was created by Scott Hardie.
publication date: Saturday, August 1, 2026 - the answer will be revealed on Saturday, August 8
category: 
Television
clue: She isn't a lawyer from North Carolina. She's a TV actress who must have so enjoyed playing a ship captain and eventual wife in Star Trek: Deep Space Nine that she went on to play a different kind of captain in Castle, a different kind of wife in 24, and in a different kind of Star Trek in The Orville.
intended difficulty: easy
solved by: Russ Wilhelm and Richard Slominsky
Know the answer? Please log in or register in order to guess.
This celebrity goo was created by Scott Hardie.
publication date: Friday, July 31, 2026 - the answer will be revealed on Friday, August 7
category: 
Theater
clue: He wasn't a planter from Virginia. He was a Tony-nominated character actor who turned up in nine Spike Lee joints.
intended difficulty: medium
solved by: Russ Wilhelm and Richard Slominsky
Know the answer? Please log in or register in order to guess.
This celebrity goo was created by Scott Hardie.
publication date: Thursday, July 30, 2026 - the answer will be revealed on Thursday, August 6
category: Justice
clue: He isn't a mayor from New York. He's a defense attorney whose talk was widely heard even though it urged other people to stop talking.
intended difficulty: hard
solved by: Russ Wilhelm and Richard Slominsky
Know the answer? Please log in or register in order to guess.
This celebrity goo was created by Scott Hardie.
publication date: Wednesday, July 29, 2026 - the answer will be revealed on Wednesday, August 5
category: 
Sports
clue: She isn't an ironmaster from Pennsylvania. She's a British triathlete who, earlier this decade, tied for the best Olympic performance of all time in her sport.
intended difficulty: medium
solved by: Russ Wilhelm and Richard Slominsky
Know the answer? Please log in or register in order to guess.
This celebrity goo was created by Scott Hardie.
publication date: Tuesday, July 28, 2026 - the answer will be revealed on Tuesday, August 4
category: 
Religion
clue: He wasn't a judge from Rhode Island. He was a Unitarian preacher and theologian whose influence spread far beyond the Baltimore church that he founded.
intended difficulty: medium
solved by: Russ Wilhelm and Richard Slominsky
Know the answer? Please log in or register in order to guess.
This celebrity goo was created by Scott Hardie.
publication date: Monday, July 27, 2026 - the answer will be revealed on Monday, August 3
category: 
Movies
clue: He isn't a governor from Maryland. He's a film producer with ten #1 openings, including such hits as Ride Along, Think Like a Man, Obsessed, Girls Trip, and Stomp the Yard.
intended difficulty: medium
solved by: Russ Wilhelm and Richard Slominsky
Know the answer? Please log in or register in order to guess.
Earlier Goos
These goos were also part of this theme.
S.S. Adams
He wasn't a politician from Massachusetts. He was a merry prankster who practically buzzed with joy whenever his customers made people itch, sneeze, or dribble. Go »
John Lee Hancock
He isn't a merchant from Massachusetts. He's a filmmaker who has made tearjerkers out of stories set across the American South, including a doomed battle in San Antonio, a murder trial in Savannah, a football player's adoption in Memphis, an over-the-hill amateur's tryout in Tampa, and a boy and dog's friendship in small-town Mississippi. Go »
William Petersen
He isn't a judge from New Jersey. He's an actor who played many law enforcement agents, including Will Graham, Richard Chance, Pat Garrett, Gideon Walker, and most famously, Gil Grissom. Go »
Dick Stockton
He isn't a lawyer from New Jersey. He's a retired broadcaster whose career spanned numerous sports, networks, and decades, having called such memorable moments as Carlton Fisk's winning homer in game 6 of the 1975 World Series, Michael Jordan's buzzer-beater in game 1 of the 1989 NBA Playoffs, and Dan Jansen's gold-medal finish at the 1994 Olympics. Go »
Lu Parker
She isn't a merchant from New York. She's a beauty queen who spent two decades at KTLA, though her path to fame did briefly get perilous due to a conflict of interest dating the mayor. Go »
James G. Madison
He isn't a statesman from Virginia. He's a convicted murderer with what must have been an expensive collection of head coverings. Go »
Frank Hopkins
He wasn't a songwriter from New Jersey. He was a horseman who definitely performed for the Ringling Brothers, probably didn't do tricks for Buffalo Bill, and almost certainly didn't race across Arabia. Go »
Bill Williams
He wasn't a merchant from Connecticut. He was a Kit who made a Katt. Go »
Richard Hudson
He isn't a lawyer from South Carolina. He's a Congressional representative from central North Carolina, whose wife worked for Kellyanne Conway. Go »
Robert T. Morris
He isn't an investor from New York. He's a cyber-criminal who went on to co-found the influential Y Combinator and the not-so-influential Yahoo! Store, although he is the "RTM" in the proprietary RTML language of the latter. Go »
James McHenry
He isn't a surgeon from Maryland. He's a legal officer who was briefly the second first Attorney General of Donald Trump. Go »
Richard Speight Jr.
He isn't a politician from North Carolina. He's an actor, best known as an angel who lied for a yuk to the Supernatural brothers and a soldier who died in the muck with the Band of Brothers. Go »
El Gerry
No es un comerciante de Massachusetts. Es un popular cantante mexicano y estrella de las redes sociales que recordó bien su promesa de regresar. Go »
Grizzly Adams
He wasn't a lawyer from Massachusetts. He was an outdoorsman who risked death many times to get up close and personal with the beasts who would become his legacy, turning up years later in such places as the Bronx Zoo, an NBC TV series, and the flag of California. Go »
Jimmy Smits
He isn't a surveyor from Pennsylvania. He's an actor who started out as an L.A. lawyer before becoming a sad NYPD detective and eventually a candidate to occupy the West Wing. Go »
Matt Thornton
He isn't a physician from New Hampshire. He's a retired baseball player and 2010 all-star whose skill at pitching was a thorn in opponents' sides. Go »
John Williams
He isn't a university founder from North Carolina. He's one of the most beloved film composers of all time, having written iconic themes for Darth Vader, Indiana Jones, Harry Potter, E.T., Superman, Kevin McCallister, Jaws, and countless more. Go »
William Rufus King
He wasn't a statesman from Massachusetts. He was possibly America's first gay vice president, definitely America's first vice president sworn in on foreign soil, and probably America's first vice president to have both a county in Washington that was named after him and a city in Alabama that he named become far more associated with a civil rights icon with his last name. Who's the king? Go »
Richard Henry Leigh
He wasn't a statesman from Virginia. He was an admiral who preferred the classroom to the war room, though I heard some submarine crews were not fond of him. Go »
Flavor Flav
He isn't a planter from South Carolina. He's a frequent reality TV cast member and the most famous hype man in hip hop, known for his tasty nickname and horological fashion sense, boyeee. Go »
John Harvey Kellogg
He wasn't a builder from Virginia. He was a sanitarium director whose beliefs about racial superiority and holistic medicine put the flake in cornflakes. Go »
Jonathan Dickinson
He wasn't a lawyer from Delaware. He was a merchant whose journal after a famous shipwreck in Florida has been hailed as one of the great survival-in-captivity tales, but spoiler warning: He lived to become the mayor of Philadelphia. Go »
George Washington Carver
He wasn't a military commander from Virginia. He was an agricultural scientist and inventor, the arc of whose life—being born into slavery, witnessing race crimes, overcoming educational discrimination, joining the faculty of an esteemed school, devoting his career to teaching poor Southerners who spurned him how they could grow new crops like peanuts in soil that was depleted by cotton, and surviving until the eve of the post-war boom—inspires hope that America will spend its second 250 years fully embodying the principles that it established in its first. Go »
Frances Dana Barker Gage
She wasn't a lawyer from Massachusetts. She was a universal suffragist and abolitionist who refused to sit on her fanny in the face of injustice, until an accident forced it. Go »
John Witherspoon
He wasn't a minister from New Jersey. He was Ice Cube's weekday father, Kid & Play's annoyed neighbor, Robert Townsend's fast-food boss, Eddie Murphy's vamping victim, and a very animated granddad. Go »
June Blair
She wasn't a judge from Virginia. She was an actress who married into a TV-perfect 1950s family, complete with Ricky Nelson as the best man. Go »
Caroline Charles
She wasn't a millionaire from Maryland. She was a leading figure in the British fashion wave of the 1960s despite being in her early 20s, taking her Mod designs around the world and dressing celebrities for the next 50 years in her fashion. Go »
Samuel Holden Parsons
He wasn't a doctor from Massachusetts. He was a Connecticut lawyer who took up arms as a revolutionary and later commander, finding more luck against royal redcoats than against river rapids. Go »
Benjamin Harrison
He wasn't a planter from Virginia. He was a president whose career peaked before and after Cleveland. Go »
Tree Paine
She isn't a lawyer from Massachusetts. She's a music-industry professional known for quickly shutting down rumors and leaks concerning her #1 client, but before launching her own firm, she worked with artists such as the performer of "Head Like a Hole." Go »
Sam Huntington
He isn't a politician from Connecticut. He's a screen actor who tired of being a human turned werewolf, took photos of a Superman's return, and lured Tim Allen out 2 a jungle. Go »
Joan Collins
She isn't a politician from Rhode Island. She's a British movie star who, long before she was made a dame by the queen, began her career playing a beauty queen in Lady Godiva Rides Again and then riding in The Bravados, played half of a clandestine marriage in The Virgin Queen but not in The Clandestine Marriage, played someone who became a queen by marrying a king in Esther and the King but not in My Duchess, and played a princess screwed over by a hateful pharaoh in Land of the Pharaohs but a prince's wooed who's not on the straight-and-narrow in Hard Time for Princes. Go »
Euan Morton
He isn't a farmer from Pennsylvania. He's a Broadway actor known for playing two different British Georges, one of them diametrically opposed to this theme, and an audiobook narrator known for his interpretations of James Islington and Frank Herbert. Go »
Patrick Morrisey
He isn't a statesman from New York. He's an attorney with a long history of fighting the EPA, and now the top elected official in West Virginia. Go »
Johnny Hart
He wasn't a politician from New Jersey. He was a cartoonist known for two famous comic strips, one of which inspired The Flintstones, and the other of which was inspired by The Wizard of Oz. Go »
