The First Ladies (13 page)

Writing a brief volume about some of the lesser known First Ladies presents a challenge on several fronts. Some explanation to the reader is in order.

First: Economy. This book is not intended to be a litany of almanac facts. All the pertinent details of birth, death, marriage, and related information are readily available about these women elsewhere. The challenge is thus twofold: a) to make each of these fine (and usually neglected) women come to life in a thousand words or so, and b) to avoid the redundancies of their lives in general. Faced with few opportunities to command attention on their own, their lives became similar to each other and to their contemporaries. They grew up, married, bore and raised children, and suffered the usual slings and arrows.

In order to keep the reader interested, huge and important historic events may be glossed over in a brief phrase, e.g., “after the Civil War.” Sometimes including certain important episodes tends to lead down a channel from which it can be difficult to extricate oneself in a brief sentence or two. Sometimes it is just more feasible to avoid them entirely. Many excellent sources provide in-depth consideration.

The whole idea then is to focus on that part of each First Lady’s personality or life segment or accomplishment or whatever made her unique among her sister Ladies. It is truly a challenge to surgically cut without killing the patient.

Second: Why end with Mamie Eisenhower? This is a personal choice. I decided long ago to limit my scholarship with the Eisenhowers. They were the last presidential couple born in the nineteenth century, which makes it as good a place as any to put a period at the end of a sentence.

More importantly, it becomes increasingly obvious as time goes on that Ike and Mamie were the end of an era. With the 1960s came an explosion of instant communication, television, transportation, and an all-consuming in-your-face media. The rules changed. The expectations changed. The role of a pleasant-looking housewife who could be a graceful hostess or accepter of bouquets became irrelevant. Now a First Lady had to be attractive. If she wasn’t blessed with the face and figure of Jacqueline Kennedy, she would have handlers assigned to oversee her diet, her complexion, her hair and wardrobe, and make her an “image.” She was expected to be educated, politically savvy and well-schooled in high-level diplomacy. She was expected to lend her name, her time, and her prestige to some noncontroversial social or cultural or civic issues on her own, such as ecology or education. And finally, she was expected to be everywhere, doing everything, every day, dressed and coiffed to perfection, with a smile on her face. The eyes of the world were upon her. She could no longer be a private person, and she
had better measure up. She could never get sick, tired, irritable, angry, sad, or, heaven forbid, bored. No more free rides for a First Lady. These new “qualifications” are not about to change.

Furthermore, many of the post-Mamie First Ladies have written their own books, and dozens have been written about them. Some are praising; some are downright vicious. No aspect of their lives is off-limits to prying eyes. Truth does not even have to be in the mix. We probably know more than enough about every detail, and I, personally, do not wish to dredge for sludge. Our First Ladies are entitled to whatever shreds of privacy remain to them.

Therefore, more than a century of very nice “old gals” have been summarily rejected as non-entities, a disparaging and often untrue connotation. Some excellent scholars have begun to research deeply into the contributions of some of those neglected presidential wives, in an effort to revitalize the perceived role of women in an age when they were vital only to propagate the race and make men more comfortable. In other words, an age when women were mothers first, then adornments worn on the arm of their prosperous husbands.
The First Ladies
, with its condensed chapters, is not meant to be compared to these academic achievements. This is not a dissertation. It is an hors d’oeuvre.

Finally: Their “legacies.” These are not legacies of tangible accomplishment. How can any one of the early First Ladies compete with the seemingly endless list of Eleanor Roosevelt’s substantial activities? Pitting these “old gals” against our
modern First Ladies only serves to trivialize them and make them seem even more inconsequential.

They were definitely
not
inconsequential. They were paragons for their times and must be considered in that context. They were what every man wanted his wife to be like, what every parent wanted their daughters to be like, and what every little girl wanted to be like when she grew up. That, in itself, is
very
consequential.

The “legacies,” therefore, are those of character or personality that are worthy of emulation. They are not mere banalities. Some may be qualities that many of them share, but I have tried to assign them to that particular Lady who best personified the trait. Every one of our old First Ladies had something to offer, if only to her husband. In many cases, an audience of one was enough.

And finally, my overwhelming aim in
The First Ladies
is to make these mini-lives of our old First Ladies readable, readable, and then readable. If someone is inspired to read further, dig deeper, or want to know more, I have accomplished my purpose.

-FSF

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