Pat Nixon

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Thelma "Pat" Nixon
First Lady of the United States
In office January 20, 1969 – August 9, 1974
Preceded by	Lady Bird Johnson
Succeeded by	Betty Ford
Second Lady of the United States
In office January 20, 1953 – January 20, 1961
Preceded by	Jane Hadley Barkley
Succeeded by	Lady Bird Johnson
Born	March 16, 1912(1912-03-16) Ely, Nevada, U.S.
Died	June 22, 1993 (aged 81) Park Ridge, New Jersey, U.S.
Spouse	Richard Nixon
Children	Patricia, Julie
Occupation	First Lady of the United States
Religion	Methodist

Thelma Catherine Ryan "Pat" Nixon^[1] (March 16, 1912 – June 22, 1993) was the wife of former President Richard Nixon and the First Lady of the United States from 1969 to 1974. She was commonly known as Pat Nixon.

As First Lady, Pat Nixon promoted a number of charitable causes including volunteerism and oversaw the collection of more than 600 examples of historic art and furnishings for the White House, an acquisition larger than that of any other administration. She also encouraged women to run for political offices and became the most traveled First Lady in U.S. history up to that time, visiting about eighty nations; she was the first First Lady to visit a combat zone. Her tenure ended when, after being re-elected in the landslide victory of 1972, President Nixon resigned two years later amid the Watergate scandal.

Her public appearances became rarer in her later life. She suffered two strokes within ten years of returning to California and was later diagnosed with lung cancer. She died in 1993.

Contents 1 Early life 2 "I never had it easy" 3 Marriage and family 3.1 The early campaigns 4 Second Lady of the United States, 1953–1961 5 Her husband's campaigns—1960, 1962 and 1968 6 First Lady of the United States, 1969–1974 6.1 Major initiatives 6.2 Life in the White House 6.3 Travels 6.4 Fashion 6.5 Watergate 7 Later life 8 Death and funeral 9 See also 10 Footnotes 11 References 12 External links

[edit] Early life

Thelma Catherine Ryan was born in the small mining town of Ely, Nevada, the day before St. Patrick's Day. "She began life, she suspects, in a tent", a profile observed, "and seems to have spent the years of her youth getting out of it."^[2] Her father, William M. Ryan, Sr., was a sailor, gold miner, and truck farmer of Irish descent. Her mother, Katherine Halberstadt, was a German immigrant.^[1]

Pat was a nickname given to her by her father, referring to her birthdate and Irish ancestry.^[1] Upon enrolling in college in 1931, she dropped her first name of Thelma, replacing it with Pat and occasionally rendering it as Patricia, the name inscribed on her tombstone; the name change, however, was not a legal action, merely one of preference.^[3][4][5]

After her birth, the Ryan family moved near Los Angeles, California, and in 1914, settled on a small truck farm in Artesia (present-day Cerritos).^[6] During this time she worked on the family farm and also at a local bank as a janitor and bookkeeper. Her mother died of cancer in 1924.^[7] Pat, who was 12 at the time, assumed all the household duties for her father, who died in 1929 of silicosis, and two older brothers, William Jr. (1910–1997) and Thomas (1911–1992). She also had a half-sister, Neva Bender (born 1909), and a half-brother, Matthew Bender (born 1907), from her mother's first marriage.

[edit] "I never had it easy"

It has been said that few, if any First Ladies worked as consistently before their marriage as did Pat Nixon.^[1] As she told the writer Gloria Steinem during the 1968 presidential campaign, "I never had it easy. I never had time to think about things like...who I wanted to be or whom I admired, or to have ideas. I never had time to dream about being anyone else. I had to work."^[2]

After graduating from Excelsior High School in 1929, Pat Ryan attended Fullerton Junior College. She paid for her education by working odd jobs, including as a driver, a pharmacy manager, and a typist. She also earned money sweeping the floors of a local bank,^[1] and from 1930 until 1932, she lived in New York City, working as a secretary and an X-ray technician.^[7]

Determined "to make something out of myself",^[2] she worked her way through the University of Southern California, where she majored in merchandising. As a former professor noted, "She stood out from the empty-headed, overdressed little sorority girls of that era like a good piece of literature on a shelf of cheap paperbacks."^[8] The young Ryan held part-time jobs on campus, worked as a sales clerk in Bullock's-Wilshire department store, taught typing and shorthand at a high school, and supplemented her income by working as an extra in the film industry. She can be seen in a brief walk-on in the 1935 film Becky Sharp, as well as the 1936 film The Great Ziegfeld.^[9]

In 1937, Pat Ryan graduated cum laude from USC and accepted a position as a high school teacher in Whittier, California.

[edit] Marriage and family

While in Whittier, Pat Ryan met a young lawyer fresh out of Duke University, Richard Milhous Nixon. The two became acquainted at a Little Theater group when they were cast together in The Dark Tower. Known as Dick, Nixon asked Pat Ryan to marry him the first night they went out. "I thought he was nuts or something!" she recalled.^[10] He courted the redhead he called his "wild Irish Gypsy" for two years,^[11] however, even driving her to and from her dates with other men. She preferred to remain secret, but admitted, "That's true — but it's mean to repeat it."^[12] Eventually they married at the Mission Inn in Riverside, California on June 21, 1940. She said that she had been attracted to the young Nixon because he "was going places, he was vital and ambitious... he was always doing things."^[2]

While Richard Nixon served in the Navy during World War II, Pat worked as a government economist living in San Francisco. She campaigned at his side in 1946 when he entered politics, running successfully for a seat in the United States House of Representatives. That same year, she gave birth to a daughter and namesake, Patricia, usually called Tricia. In 1948, Nixon had her second and last child, Julie.

Although Pat Nixon was a Methodist, she and her husband attended whichever Protestant Church was nearest to their home, especially once in Washington. They attended the Metropolitan Memorial Methodist Church because it sponsored her daughters' Brownie troop, occasional Baptist services with the Reverend Dr. Billy Graham, and Norman Vincent Peale's Marble Collegiate Church.^[13]

By the time the Nixons reached the White House, some observers characterized them as "people who have lost whatever they once had between them." Judith Viorst in The New York Times wrote that "critics compare the Kennedy marriage ('As bad as it was, you knew that something was there') and the Johnson marriage ('He couldn't live without her') to the Nixons' ('Dry as dust')".^[2] A few White House insiders derided the marriage further, saying the President treated her with "the formality usually reserved for middle-echelon bureaucrats" and had an occasional habit of walking past her "without seeming to notice she was there. [Aides] have seen her reach out her arm to remind him."^[2] Author Kati Marton described the Nixons as "living virtually separate lives, carefully avoiding each other's company". As Marton stated, "In their marriage, the personal was always subordinated to the political".^[14] When asked about her husband's career, Pat herself once stated, "The only thing I could do was help him, but [politics] was not a life I would have chosen."^[15]

[edit] The early campaigns

Nixon ran for Congress in 1946 and his wife participated in her husband's campaign by doing research on his opponent, incumbent Jerry Voorhis. She also wrote and distributed campaign literature.^[16] Nixon was elected in his first campaign to represent California's 12th congressional district. During the next six years, Nixon saw her husband move from the U.S. House of Representatives to the United States Senate, and then be nominated as Dwight D. Eisenhower's vice presidential candidate.

[edit] Second Lady of the United States, 1953–1961

During the Presidential campaign of 1952 Pat Nixon's attitude toward politics changed when her husband was accused of accepting illegal campaign contributions. In response, he delivered his famous "Checkers Speech", so-called for the family's dog, a cocker spaniel given them by a political supporter. This was Mrs. Nixon's first national television appearance, and she, her daughters, and the dog were featured prominently. Defending himself as a man of the people, Nixon said of his wife, "I should say this, that Pat doesn't have a mink coat. But she does have a respectable Republican cloth coat, and I always tell her she would look good in anything."^[17][18]

Pat Nixon accompanied her husband abroad in his vice presidential years. On a trip to Venezuela, their limousine was pelted with rocks and the Nixons were spat upon as representatives of the U.S. government.

A November 1, 1958 article in the Seattle Times was typical of the media's favorable coverage of the future First Lady, stating that "Mrs. Nixon is always reported to be gracious and friendly. And she sure is friendly. She greets a stranger as a friend. She doesn't just shake hands but clasps a visitors hand in both her hands. Her manner is direct....Mrs. Nixon also upheld her reputation of always looking neat, no matter how long her day has been." A year and a half later, during her husband's campaign for the presidency, The New York Times called her "a paragon of wifely virtues" whose "efficiency makes other women feel slothful and untalented."^[19]

Pat Nixon was named Outstanding Homemaker of the Year (1953), Mother of the Year (1955), and the Nation's Ideal Housewife (1957), and once admitted that she pressed all of her husband's suits one evening. "Of course, I didn't have to," she told The New York Times. "But when I don't have work to do, I just think up some new project." Small wonder, the newspaper noted, that some observers described Pat Nixon as "a paper doll, a Barbie doll – plastic, antiseptic, unalive" and that she "has put every bit of the energy and drive of her youth into playing a role, and she may no longer recognize it as such." As for the criticisms, she said, "I am who I am and I will continue to be."^[2]

[edit] Her husband's campaigns—1960, 1962 and 1968

Vice-President Nixon ran for President of the United States in 1960 against then-Senator John F. Kennedy. He conceded the election to Kennedy, although the race was very close and there were allegations of voter-fraud.^[20] Pat Nixon was most upset about the television cameras, which recorded her reaction when her husband lost — "millions of television viewers witnessed her desperate fight to hold a smile upon her lips as her face came apart and the bitter tears flowed from her eyes."^[2]

In 1962, the Nixons embarked on another campaign, this time for Governor of California. Prior to Richard Nixon's announcement of his candidacy, Tom Ryan, a friend of the family's, said "Pat told me that if Dick Ran for governor she was going to take her shoe to him."^[21] Although she eventually agreed to another run, citing that it meant a substantial amount to him,^[21] Richard Nixon lost the gubernatorial election to Pat Brown.

Six years later, however, Nixon would make a political comeback with his presidential victory of 1968 over Vice-President Hubert Humphrey.

[edit] First Lady of the United States, 1969–1974

[edit] Major initiatives

While fielding ideas for a project as First Lady, Pat Nixon decided to continue what she called "personal diplomacy."^[22] One of her major initiatives as First Lady was volunteerism, encouraging Americans to address social problems on the local level through volunteering at hospitals, civic organizations, rehabilitation centers, and other outlets; she also was an advocate of the Domestic Services Volunteer Act of 1970.^[23] She became involved in the development of recreation areas and parkland, was a member of the President's Committee on Employment of the Handicapped, and lent her support to organizations dedicated to improving the lives of handicapped children.^[1] Early in the administration, she undertook a project of making the White House fully handicapped accessible, and printed White House brochures in multiple languages for foreign visitors.^[1]

[edit] Life in the White House

After her husband was elected president in 1968, Mrs. Nixon met with the outgoing First Lady Lady Bird Johnson and toured the private quarters of the White House on December 12.^[24] Eventually she asked Sarah Jackson Doyle — an interior decorator who had worked for the Nixons since 1965 and who decorated the family's 10-room apartment on Fifth Avenue in New York with French and English antiques — to serve as a design consultant^[25] and hired Clement Conger from the State Department to be the Executive Mansion's new curator.^[26]

Pat Nixon had an interest in adding artifacts to the Executive Mansion and built on Jacqueline Kennedy's more publicized efforts. She ended up adding more than 600 paintings and furnishings to the White House and its collections, the largest number of acquisitions by any administration.^[1] She opened the White House for evening tours so that the public could see the interior design work that had been implemented. In addition, she instituted a series of performances by artists at the White House in varied American traditions, from opera to bluegrass; among the guests were The Carpenters in 1972. These events, however, had mixed results, being described as ranging from "creative to indifferent, to downright embarrassing".^[2]

When they entered the White House in 1969, the Nixons began inviting families to non-denominational Sunday Church services in the East Room of the White House. The president later discontinued these services due to concerns over the separation of Church and State. Mrs. Nixon also oversaw the White House wedding of her daughter, Tricia, to Edward Ridley Finch Cox in 1971.^[27]

Mary Brooks, the director of the United States Mint, described the First Lady as "a good example to the women of this country, if they're not part of those Women's Liberation groups,"^[2] but despite her largely demure public persona as a traditional wife and homemaker, Nixon was not as self-effacing and milquetoast as her critics often claimed. When a news photographer wanted her to strike yet another pose while wearing an apron, she firmly responded, "I think we've had enough of this kitchen thing, don't you?"^[28] Though her impact on public discourse was modest and of debatable importance, she did speak out in favor of women running for political office and encouraged her husband to nominate a woman to the Supreme Court, saying "woman power is unbeatable; I've seen it all across this country."^[29] Nixon was a vocal supporter of the Equal Rights Amendment, though her views on abortion are mixed. Following the Court's 1973 Roe vs. Wade decision, Pat stated she was pro-choice.^[1] However in 1972, she said, "I'm really not for abortion. I think it's a personal thing. I mean abortion on demand—wholesale."^[30]

[edit] Travels

Nixon held the record as the most-traveled First Lady until Hillary Clinton.^[1] According to Helen McCain Smith, the First Lady's long-time press secretary, she was used to "doing her own thing whenever she wanted to do it," yet she was "caged in the White House."^[31] Notable journeys included the Nixon's historic visit to the People's Republic of China in 1972 and the Nixon-Brezhnev summit meetings in the Soviet Union. One of her first solo official trips abroad was to Africa (specifically Ghana and Liberia), where she addressed the nations' congresses and met with heads of state. Mrs. Nixon also flew to South America where she aided in taking relief supplies to earthquake victims of Peru, a trip that was heralded in newspapers around the world for her acts of compassion and disregard for her personal safety or comfort.^[2] On the trip, the Peruvian government presented her with the Grand Cross of the Order of the Sun, the highest Peruvian distinction and the oldest such honor in the Americas.^[1] Later, she visited Venezuela with the unique diplomatic standing of personal representative of the president, and during a trip to South Vietnam, became the first First Lady to visit a combat zone.^[1]

[edit] Fashion

The fashion press tends to take special interest in First Ladies, whose traditional role as the nation's hostess puts their personal appearances and styles under scrutiny, and their attention to Mrs. Nixon was lively. Women's Wear Daily claimed that Mrs. Nixon had "the best-looking legs of any woman in public life today,"^[32][33] but fashion writers tended to have a lackluster opinion of her well-tailored but nondescript American-made clothes. "I consider it my duty to use American designers," she said,^[34] noting that she preferred to buy readymade garments rather than made-to-order outfits. "I'm a size 10," she told The New York Times. "I can just walk in and buy. I've bought things in various stores in various cities. Only some of my clothes are by designers."^[35] She did, however, wear the custom work of some well-known talents, notably Geoffrey Beene, at the suggestion of Clara Treyz, her personal shopper, who was accused in Time magazine of having poor taste. Many fashion observers concluded that Pat Nixon did not greatly advance the cause of American fashion. Nixon's yellow-satin inaugural gown by Harvey Berin was criticized as "a schoolteacher on her night out", but Treyz defended her wardrobe selections by saying, "Mrs. Nixon must be ladylike."^[36][37][38]

Pat Nixon also was concerned about appearing conservatively dressed, especially so as her husband's political star rose. "Always before, it was sort of fun to get some one thing that was completely different, high-style", she told a reporter. "But this is not appropriate now. I avoid the spectacular."

[edit] Watergate

Further information: Watergate scandal

At the time the Watergate scandal broke to the media, Pat Nixon did not know of the secret tape recordings her husband had made. Julie Nixon Eisenhower stated in her biography of her mother, Pat Nixon: The Untold Story, that the First Lady would have ordered the tapes destroyed immediately had she known of their existence.^[39] Once she did learn of the tapes, she did just that.^[1] Believing in her husband's innocence, she also encouraged him not to resign and instead fight all the impeachment charges that were eventually leveled against him.

After President Nixon told his family he would resign the office of the presidency, Mrs. Nixon replied, "But why?" Eventually, however, she contacted White House curator Clement Conger to cancel any further development of a new official china pattern from the Lenox China Company and began supervising the packing of the family's personal belongings.^[40] On August 8, 1974, the family met in the solarium of the White House for their last dinner. Later Pat Nixon said of the photographs taken that evening, "Our hearts were breaking and there we are smiling."^[41]

The next morning, a televised twenty minute farewell speech to the White House staff took place in the East Room, during which the President read from Theodore Roosevelt's biography and praised his own parents.^[42] The First Lady could hardly contain her tears; she was most upset about the cameras, because they recorded her anguish, as they had during the 1960 election defeat. The Nixons walked onto the Executive Mansion's South Lawn with Vice President Gerald Ford and Betty Ford to Marine One, the helicopter that would carry them to Andrews Air Force Base; from there they would fly to California.^[43]

Pat Nixon later told her daughter Julie, "Watergate is the only crisis that ever got me down... And I know I will never live to see the vindication."^[44]

[edit] Later life

After returning to San Clemente, California and settling into the Nixons' home, La Casa Pacifica, Mrs. Nixon rarely appeared in public and only granted occasional interviews to the press. Appearing "frail and slightly bent",^[45] she did appear in public, however, for the opening of the Richard Nixon Library and Birthplace (now Richard Nixon Presidential Library and Museum) in Yorba Linda, California on July 19, 1990. She also attended the opening of the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library in Simi Valley, California, in November 1991.

In late May 1975, Pat went to her girlhood town of Artesia, California (present day Cerritos) to dedicate the Patricia Nixon Elementary School.^[46] In her remarks, Nixon stated: "I'm proud to have the school carry my name. I always thought that only those who have gone had schools named after them. I am happy to tell you that I'm not gone—I mean, not really gone.^[46]"

On that day, Mrs. Nixon informed many people that her public life after the resignation was not over, as many had come to believe. It was Pat's only solo public appearance in five and a half years in California.^[46]

Pat suffered a stroke on July 7, 1976 at La Casa Pacifica; it resulted in the paralysis of her entire left side. Physical therapy enabled her to eventually regain all movement.^[1] She said that her recovery was "the hardest thing I have ever done physically."^[47] She sustained another stroke in 1983.^[48] The former First Lady also suffered in her later years from a degenerative spine condition.

Her health problems were complicated by the fact that Nixon was "a heavy smoker although she never permitted herself to be seen smoking in public".^[49] This addiction led to bouts with oral cancer,^[50] emphysema, and ultimately lung cancer, with which she was diagnosed in December 1992, while hospitalized with respiratory problems.^[7]

[edit] Death and funeral

Pat Nixon died at her home in Park Ridge, New Jersey at 5:45 am on June 22, 1993, aged 81; she died the day after her 53rd wedding anniversary. Her daughters and husband were by her side.

The funeral service for Mrs. Nixon took place on the grounds of the Richard Nixon Library in Yorba Linda, California on June 26, 1993. The former First Lady was eulogized by speakers at the ceremony, including California Governor Pete Wilson, Kansas senator Bob Dole, and the Reverend Dr. Billy Graham. In addition to her husband and immediate family, former presidents Ronald Reagan and Gerald Ford and their wives, Nancy and Betty, were also in attendance.^[51] Lady Bird Johnson was unable to attend because she was in the hospital recovering from a stroke, and Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis did not attend either, also due to health reasons.^[51]

Mrs. Nixon's tombstone gives her name as "Patricia Nixon," the name by which she was popularly known, and the epitaph reads:

“

Even when people can't speak your language, they can tell if you have love in your heart.

”

A year after her death, actress Joan Allen portrayed her, as well as actress Julie Condra during her younger years, in the Oliver Stone film Nixon.

[edit] See also

• Pat Nixon Park

[edit] Footnotes

[edit] References

• Eisenhower, Julie Nixon (1986). Pat Nixon: The Untold Story. New York: Simon & Schuster. ISBN 0671244248. 
• Marton, Kati (2001). Hidden Power: Presidential Marriages That Shaped Our History. New York: Pantheon. ISBN 0375401067. 

[edit] External links

• Pat Nixon's Gravesite
• White House biography

Honorary titles
Preceded by Jane Hadley Barkley	Second Lady of the United States 1953-1961	Succeeded by Lady Bird Johnson
Preceded by Lady Bird Johnson	First Lady of the United States 1969-1974	Succeeded by Betty Ford

v • d • e First Ladies of the United States Martha Washington · Abigail Adams · Martha Wayles Skelton Jefferson · Dolley Madison · Elizabeth Monroe · Louisa Adams · Emily Donelson · Sarah Yorke Jackson · Angelica Singleton Van Buren · Anna Harrison · Jane Irwin Harrison · Letitia Christian Tyler · Priscilla Cooper Tyler · Julia Gardiner Tyler · Sarah Childress Polk · Margaret Taylor · Abigail Fillmore · Jane Pierce · Harriet Lane · Mary Todd Lincoln · Eliza McCardle Johnson · Julia Grant · Lucy Webb Hayes · Lucretia Garfield · Mary Arthur McElroy · Rose Cleveland · Frances Folsom Cleveland Preston · Caroline Harrison · Mary Harrison McKee · Frances Folsom Cleveland Preston · Ida Saxton McKinley · Edith Roosevelt · Helen Herron Taft · Ellen Axson Wilson · Edith Bolling Galt Wilson · Florence Harding · Grace Coolidge · Lou Henry Hoover · Eleanor Roosevelt · Bess Truman · Mamie Eisenhower · Jacqueline Kennedy · Lady Bird Johnson · Pat Nixon · Betty Ford · Rosalynn Carter · Nancy Reagan · Barbara Bush · Hillary Rodham Clinton · Laura Bush

v • d • e Second Ladies of the United States A. Adams · A. Gerry · H. Tompkins · F. Calhoun · L. Tyler · S. Dallas · A. Fillmore · M. Breckinridge · E. Hamlin · E. Johnson · E. Colfax · E. Hendricks · A. Morton · L. Stevenson · J. Hobart · E. Roosevelt · C. Fairbanks · C. Sherman · L. Marshall · G. Coolidge · C. Dawes · M. Garner · I. Wallace · B. Truman · J. Barkley · P. Nixon · C. Johnson · M. Humphrey · J. Agnew · B. Ford · H. Rockefeller · J. Mondale · B. Bush · M. Quayle · T. Gore · L. Cheney

Persondata
NAME	Nixon, Pat
ALTERNATIVE NAMES	Nixon, Patricia
SHORT DESCRIPTION	Wife of Richard Nixon
DATE OF BIRTH	March 6, 1912
PLACE OF BIRTH	Ely, Nevada
DATE OF DEATH	June 22, 1993
PLACE OF DEATH	Park Ridge, New Jersey