Not so surprisingly, most Americans can only name a handful of US presidents.In 2014, The Washington Post wrote about a study that looked at surveys conductedat Washington University at St. Louis between 1974 and 2014 to measure forgetfulness when it comes to past presidents.The surveys all asked students to write down the names of as many presidents as they could,and to organize them in chronological order."What they found was a pretty clear pattern" writes Roberto A. Ferdman. "Nearly everyone in each of the four surveys was able to identify the first fewpresidentsGeorge Washington, John Adams, Thomas Jefferson, and James Madison, specificallyas well as the most recent handfulBut by and large, the ability to name presidents faded over time, and often to a point of near non-remembrance."So, if you want to impress your friends this Presidents' Day, you may want to consider memorizing all 44 names.Turns out, it isn't all that hardand you can do it in 60 minutes or less."It is very possible for almost anyone to memorize the US presidents in a very short amount of time," says Ron White, a two-time national memory champion."A 6-year-old girl asked me if I could teach her all the namesso I did. She memorized them in perfect order in about 60 minutes. After completion, she could say the names of all US presidents forwards and backwards."White says he taught her to memorize all 44 names using a technique known as the Mind Palace, which has been around for at least 2,500 years and is written about in the "Sherlock Holmes" booksand utilized by Shakespeare in the Globe Theatre."It's where you visualize what you want to recall on furniture in your home," he explains.White says it will take you about 20 minutes upfront to build a Mind Palacemeaning, to select pieces of furniture in your home or office. "But once you do that, you can use this Mind Palace for the rest of your life for so many other things," he explains. "And once you do and you have some practice with the technique, you should be able to memorize 44 names in less than10 minutes."That kind of thing takes White less than four minutes, he says.Here are the steps you'll need to take:SEE ALSO:7 memory skills that will make you smarterStep 1: Pick furnitureFirst you need toselect44 pieces of furniture in your home."I personally recommend that you do five items in each room because over time it will be easier to learn the numbers that way," White says. "If you don't have enoughrooms in your home, then you could use things like the front yard, back yard, or the parking lot.'"He suggests choosing larger items, like TVsortables, rather than smaller ones, like tea cups or picture framesand says to select items that are spread out throughout the room.Another thing to keep in mind: If youselecta chair in one room, don't use another chair in a second room.Step 2: Assign numbersNext you need to assign numbers to thefurniture.To do this, you should stand in the doorway of aroom, start on your left, and move around the room clockwise numbering five large items.In the first room, you'll number the furniture items 1-5; in the second room, number them 6-10; and so on.Step 3: ReviewReview these over and over in your mind until you know them, says White."Say them forward and backwards over and over again, until you know them coldor until someone could say, 'What was number 10'' and you could say what it was just like that," White says in his YouTube tutorial of the process.See the rest of the story at Business Insider
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