LIFE First Ladies

How did we begin to refer to the wife of the president of the United States as First Lady, and what have we expected of the spouse of the commander in chief since the nation’s earliest days? Martha Washington, the first First Lady of all, was sometimes referred to as Lady Washington, but that title struck many as too reminiscent of English nobility and the class-conscious society the new nation was leaving behind. Other terms considered included the tongue-twisting “Presidentress” and “Mrs. President.” Dolley Madison, wife of the fourth president, James Madison, was once referred to as “Lady Presidentress.” Some argue that the first person to actually use the term “First Lady” was President Zachary Taylor, in his 1849 eulogy of Dolley Madison. Others point to Emily Briggs, the first…

1933—1945 “Do what you feel in your heart to be right. You’ll be criticized anyway.” Eleanor Roosevelt was not simply one of America’s most accomplished First Ladies. She was also one of the nation’s most remarkable women, period. The daughter of a prominent New York couple, Elliot Roosevelt (brother of Theodore) and Anna Roosevelt, she was orphaned by age 10. Anna died from diphtheria, and Elliot, to whom Eleanor was especially close, essentially drank himself to death. That this person, who was awkward and lonely as a youth, would evolve into the towering figure who tweaked the conscience of a president—her husband, Franklin—and of the entire nation is among the most stirring underdog stories in our history. Eleanor’s flowering began at England’s Allenswood school in 1899 at age 15 under…

1963—1969 “Children are likely to live up to what you believe of them.” Perhaps it was because she followed the incandescent Jackie Kennedy, or maybe it was due to the un-popular war in Vietnam that marred the presidency of her husband, Lyndon Johnson, but most Americans are not aware of how influential Lady Bird Johnson really was. In 1968, reporter Shana Alexander called her “quite possibly the best First Lady we ever had.” And while historians have been less effusive in their praise, they still have given her good marks: a poll in 2014 ranked her seventh, behind Eleanor Roosevelt, Abigail Adams, Jackie Kennedy, Dolley Madison, Michelle Obama and Hillary Clinton. Highly intelligent, Lady Bird (her nickname came from a nursemaid who declared the infant Claudia “pretty as a ladybird”)…

THE BALLS THAT celebrate the election of the commander in chief are a tradition that dates to the beginning of the republic—when George Washington’s supporters in 1789 organized a party to celebrate his election—but it was many decades before they became an inaugural fixture. Today, the events are major undertakings, organized by an official Presidential Inauguration Committee. Many consider the first semiofficial ball to be the one organized by Dolley Madison in 1809. Some 400 invitations were sent out for the extravagant party, held at Long’s Hotel in Washington. In the years that followed, the fetes were more or less modest—and often canceled—depending on the mood of the country and the First Couple. Franklin and Jane Pierce, devastated by the death of their son, canceled the ball in 1853. So…

1789—1797 “The greatest part of our happiness depends on our dispositions, not our circumstances.” Americans were fortunate that Martha Washington became their first First Lady. Formal enough to retain a hint of old-world nobility, relaxed enough to suggest respect for the democratic process, she established from the outset that she would willingly accept a public role at social and ceremonial functions, standing in for her husband, George, in some instances, standing at his side in others, but always presenting herself as a visible supporter of her husband’s presidency. Had she not done so, had she chosen instead to retreat from the public eye, the role of First Lady might have evolved quite differently. Martha’s regular Friday-night parties, which came to be known as “drawing rooms,” began in New York in…

1981—1989 “Yes, I gave Ronnie my best advice—whenever he asked for it, and sometimes when he didn’t.” Her tenure as First Lady was sometimes controversial, thanks in part to her spending habits, her reliance on an astrologer and her “Just Say No” anti-drug campaign. But Nancy Reagan was a fierce and crucial ally to her husband, Ronald, the nation’s 40th president, and the couple’s devotion was legend. With the Reagans’ arrival in the Washington, there was a marked a shift in style and tone at 1600 Pennsylvania Ave. Both husband and wife had been actors in the 1960s, before Ronald’s shift into politics, and the two were far more comfortable with Hollywood-style glamour than their predecessors Jimmy and Rosalynn Carter. Nancy favored high-end f ashions—James Galanos and Bill Blass were…