ExclusiveBarbara Bush: The Nation’s Grandmother

Welcome to American Legends. My name is Tiffany Brannon. Each culture has its legends, and that could be myths or different stories, but here in America, our greatest legends are the wonderful heroes who are right from our history pages. Now, some of these heroes are very famous and some are obscure, but each person deserves to be discovered because each man or woman stands as a great example of how we can be better Americans It's an important role for any woman to be the wife of the president. It's also a very important role for a woman to be the mother of a president. Today we're going to talk about one of only two women who served in both roles. The role of a first lady is difficult because she must represent not only the generation from which she comes, but the generation which she's representing as the first lady of the country during her husband's presidency. For some of the older first ladies, it's a challenge for her to represent the current generation when oftentimes, to remain true to herself, she must continue to hold values of generations a few decades back. Barbara Bush, future first lady of the United States, was born Barbara Pierce in New York in the year 1925. She was the third of four children. She was actually related to 14th President Franklin Pierce. Although she spent a good deal of her childhood during the Great Depression, she enjoyed a good deal of comfort in her childhood because her family was quite well-to-do. She said that she always felt overlooked as sort of the middle child of this family, as all her other siblings gained more attention either through her younger siblings' childhood illness and one of her older siblings' delinquency. She adored her father and looked up to him as a mentor, but she did not get along well with her mother. She faced a lot of criticism and frequent arguments with her, although as she later faced a child's illness herself as a mother, she said she understood more what her mother had been facing. As a young girl, she received a lot of criticism and even bullying in school for being a bit overweight, but she also enjoyed very physical activities. She was very athletic. She liked riding horses, swimming, and playing sports. In her high school years, she became very socially active, and she was going to Phillips Academy in Massachusetts. When she was 16, she was going to a Christmas dance. There, across the room, she saw a young man who was a year older than she was, and that was George Bush. As soon as he saw her, he was instantly attracted and he asked to be introduced to her. They danced together and spent a lot of the evening sitting and talking because Bush didn't know how to waltz. They were instantly infatuated with each other, and they began seeing each other occasionally during the school year. She eventually attended his senior prom and saw his graduation. Shortly after he graduated, though, he enlisted in the U.S. Navy, and he was serving overseas during World War II. Whenever he came back home for a visit, they would go on a date, and during this continued courtship and correspondence by letters, they became secretly engaged. Of course, the secret didn't remain very long, as their parents quickly found out. After she graduated herself, Barbara began going to Smith College, but she was more interested in the social and athletic aspects of school than academics because she didn't intend to pursue any kind of career, since she was already planning to get married. She ended up dropping out after one year because she was planning her forthcoming marriage, and in 1945, when her fiancé returned to begin training back in the United States for a land invasion of Japan, they got married, and for the next several months, she would live with him in small apartments as he traveled all over the country to continue his training in the military. He never ended up being deployed again, especially for the invasion of Japan, because that never happened, as Japan surrendered. Shortly after their marriage, he began going to Yale University, and she took up residence with him in a small apartment that was near the university. She took a part-time job on the campus, since she had no interest in pursuing her further education, and shortly after that, she began having children. When he finished his education at Yale, they moved to Texas, and after a short while there, then they moved to California, but then they moved back to Texas. Their first child was George Bush Jr., who would be a future president. Then they had a daughter, Robin. Their third child was another son, Jeb Bush, who also would become involved in politics. When Robin was only three years old, though, she was diagnosed with leukemia. This was a terrible blow to both parents, but Barbara saw that it was her duty to be strong, not only for their daughter, but for her husband as well, and she refused to cry in front of her daughter. They brought her to New York for treatment in a hospital there, but tragically she died six months later. This was a terrible blow to both of them, and both parents maintain that this was the greatest tragedy of their life. Many reports say that it was at this point that Barbara's hair began to turn white, but she later said that wasn't true. Barbara's close relationship with her husband and her oldest son kept her going during this time of great grief, but it was very hard for her to move on from this tragic death. She said it was when she heard her young son, George, say to some other children that he couldn't play with them because he had to be there for his mother, that she really realized how much her grief was affecting her other children. So at that point she really realized she needed to continue living her life, and she vowed to continue having children until she had another daughter. She had two more sons, and then finally a daughter in 1959, so they had six children in all. Barbara enjoyed that they set up housekeeping in Texas, especially since they moved there within the first few years of their marriage, since it gave her an opportunity to be away from the criticism of her other relatives. They began building a good life for themselves there, but they did travel around a lot. In 1964, her husband first became involved in politics as he attempted to run for the U.S. Senate. Barbara became involved in helping him with his campaign. She went around and made public speeches and sought to learn people's opinions on him and the campaign issues. She was very personally hurt for him when he did not win, but that didn't keep her from continuing to campaign in his future elections. She helped him on the campaign trial when he ran for the House of Representatives two years later, and she enjoyed this position because it really enabled her to be a partner with him, both professionally as well as she had been personally. Bush regarded her advice and support very highly during all his political aspirations. During one campaign event, Barbara's hair dye began to run down her face, and at this point she vowed to never dye her hair again, and so she began going with white hair. Now from this point on, her appearance was criticized a lot because with her completely white hair and her heavier frame, many people thought she looked a lot older than her husband, but she didn't let that really bother her because she learned as early as childhood not to be affected by what people said about her, and she responded by having a self-deprecating sense of humor. Now when she was quite a young girl, she said that this was almost a two-biting of a wit, but she later softened it to merely be very endearing and very real. In the 1970s, Bush accepted a position as an ambassador, first in Washington and then he would later travel to China in this capacity. Now as soon as the Bushes became involved with Washington society, Barbara loved getting to know the other politicians and becoming part of the Washington scene, as early as the 1960s when her husband was a representative. Every Sunday, they would host a barbecue, which was a practice they had had back in Texas. These political connections that she helped her husband make would prove very valuable to him during his In 1973, President Richard Nixon asked Bush to become the head of the Republican National Committee. She advised him not to take this role, perhaps because of the growing Watergate scandal, but he didn't take her advice and he took that position anyway, and it proved to be a very stressful position for him since he would continue to be in that role as Nixon was facing the fallout of the Watergate scandal. Shortly after that, President Gerald Ford asked Bush where he would like to go as a foreign ambassador and he said that he'd like to go to China. Barbara accompanied him to China and she really enjoyed this experience of getting to live in another country and observe the different culture, seeing how Americans were viewed there and how those people dealt with their own problems. And she and her husband rode bicycles all over the countryside, visiting parts of the country where Americans had never really been. She said that this experience gave her a completely different outlook on life and helped her to re-evaluate all her priorities. Back in the United States, Bush accepted a position in the CIA. Barbara was devastated by the fact that she wasn't able to really have any involvement with his professional life during this time, as his day-to-day work was top secret. She fell into a deep depression during his year at the CIA, since all her children had left the house and her life felt useless and meaningless. Her depression became so severe that her husband recommended that she seek some kind of mental counseling, which she didn't take his advice and she later regretted that. But eventually, as he finished his time at the CIA, she was glad to be more involved in his life again. In 1980, Bush began to run for the Republican candidacy for president. He didn't win the nomination, but he became Ronald Reagan's running mate. Again, Barbara helped him on the campaign trail and as second lady, she was a very active hostess, hosting more than a thousand events at the vice presidential quarters during their eight years in that position. During that time, one friend she did not make was Nancy Reagan. First lady Nancy Reagan didn't really like either of the Bushes. They remained civil during the time that the Reagans were in the White House and Bush and Reagan were friendly with each other, but Nancy didn't agree with either Bush on many political issues and Barbara felt that she and her husband were excluded from a lot of state events and that Nancy didn't rely on the vice presidential couple as much as previous first ladies had. So Barbara sort of pursued her own agenda as she was the second lady and just focused on hosting events in her own way. In 1988, when George Bush ran for president in his own right, Barbara was contrasted with Nancy Reagan, sometimes unfavorably because she was viewed as not as fashionable, but many people saw that as a good thing because Nancy Reagan had been criticized a lot for how much emphasis she placed on her fashion. With her very white hair and her grandmotherly appearance, her fuller figure, Barbara Bush commented that many fat, white-haired, wrinkled old ladies would be glad to see that she was representing them and both she and her husband became viewed as a very lovable, grandparent-like couple, especially because they did have many grandchildren. Barbara quickly became a very popular first lady. People admired her grandmotherly, apolitical approach. As early as 1980, Barbara had selected her main project to be literacy. When her son Neil was diagnosed with dyslexia in the second grade, she became a real advocate for education, literacy, and learning. She became more and more passionate about this topic throughout her life, especially as she took a more visible role in the political scene because she saw that literacy was really the root of all the problems which the nation was facing, yet it wasn't divisive like a lot of other political issues could be. In 1990, she founded the Barbara Bush Foundation, a literacy non-profit organization which still is in operation today. She encouraged her husband to support a literacy bill. She also encouraged him to be more public in his support of the AIDS epidemic. That was extremely controversial at the time, not only because of the inherent lifestyle choices with which it was associated, but also because it was considered extremely contagious at the time. People thought that if you even touch someone who had AIDS, you could get it yourself. Barbara made a very bold but silent statement when she visited a children's hospital and was pictured holding an infant named Baby Donovan who had AIDS, and by holding him and smilingly comforting him, she was showing that she placed care for others over her own safety. Of course, we now know that AIDS is not transmitted by touch, but they didn't know that at the time. So this was just a very bold statement, and later she and the president would be shown visiting adult AIDS patients, shaking their hands and just showing their support for the individual overlooking the illness. And she was especially compassionate to people suffering from this disease because the way they were ostracized by society reminded her of the way people regarded her daughter's leukemia years earlier, the certain lack of understanding or concern for people with such a devastating disease. For years she had spent her free time volunteering at hospitals and helping those who were suffering with illness, and she continued to advocate volunteerism during her four years as First Lady. She accompanied her husband in visiting the Middle East during the Gulf War, and they famously spent Thanksgiving with the armed forces. There are many pictures of her wearing a camo jacket along with her signature pearl earrings, and she said it was the best Thanksgiving they ever spent. She was honored to share it with the military there and just represent every mother and grandmother back home that the soldiers missed on a holiday like that. Speaking about the importance of volunteerism, she once quipped that the Titanic was built by professionals, whereas the Ark was built by volunteers. One of her most high profile moments was when she was asked to give a commencement speech at Wellesley College. This was controversial because many of the students saw her as a strange choice. She was a woman who had only had a brief education in college, just about one year, before giving it up to just be a housewife, a wife and mother. She never really had any kind of a career, she wasn't that educated, so a lot of more outspoken feminists or women's liberation movement advocates felt that she was only given that honor because she was the wife of the president. The issue became so high profile that the speech ended up being televised the first time that the speech given by a first lady was broadcast nationally. She invited Soviet Union first lady Gorbacheva to accompany her, and it was very well received. Mrs. Bush downplayed the effect that the overall incident had, saying that it was sort of much ado about nothing by a bunch of 20 year olds, but it really bothered her personally that the people didn't see what she had tried to do with her life and that she had played an important role in society and that she had made a strong choice. It wasn't just that she couldn't do anything else. And this is where I say that she faced a difficult position. She was a young woman in the 1940s, she was born in the 1920s. During that time, it was a completely respectable and honorable position for a young woman to be a wife and mother. That was deemed as an important vocation, if not a profession. But by the late 80s and 90s, it was deemed if you didn't have a mainstream profession, you didn't really have a vocation. And although Barbara faced a bit of that criticism, I think that her enduring popularity throughout her husband's presidency showed that deep down people respected her for being a good wife, mother, and grandmother. Speaking of the Soviet Union, as President Bush helped end the Cold War with the tearing down of the Berlin Wall, a lot of the increasingly warm relations between the United States and the Soviet Union were because of the friendship which was developed between Mrs. Bush and Mrs. Gorbacheva. They became good friends during the frequent meetings and visits, and this really helped rebuild these international relationships. Although she was a huge advocate for literacy, Barbara Bush also placed a very strong emphasis on the role the family must play in educating a child, saying, the home is the child's first school, the parent is the child's first teacher, and reading is the child's first subject. Partly in response to the criticism she received for not having a profession outside of her family life, she emphasized the importance of placing one's family first and really prioritizing time spent with your family and loved ones, saying, at the end of your life, you will never regret not having passed one more test, not winning one more verdict, or not closing one more deal. You will regret time not spent with a husband, a friend, a child, or a parent. As President Bush's approval ratings dropped very low near the end of his presidency, largely because of the economic recession, Barbara Bush's approval ratings continued to rise, and thus she was used very actively in his campaign for re-election in 1992. She was compared a great deal with the wife of candidate Bill Clinton, Hillary Clinton, as they were very different women, one being a much older, more mature lady who had dedicated the majority of her life to being a wife and mother, whereas Hillary Clinton was much more of a businesswoman and much younger. In fact, Barbara Bush was the second oldest First Lady at the time of her husband's election, as she was 61. The only older First Lady was Anna Harrison, the wife of 9th President William Henry Harrison, who never moved into the White House because her husband died within one month of his inauguration. During her time in the White House, Barbara Bush wrote a book from the perspective of her beloved dog, Millie, which was a playful memoir from the dog's perspective of being in the White House, and it became a bestseller. She donated all the proceeds, which was $800,000, to her non-profit organization, the Barbara Bush Foundation. This was the most money that a First Lady had ever made while in the White House. After they left the White House, Barbara continued her writing, as she wrote personal memoirs, as well as her advocacy in organizations such as moral literacy, and she also was somewhat active in her two sons' political careers, as they both ran for governor, but she found that any defeat her sons faced politically was even more of a personal blow to her than her husbands had been, so she didn't want to be too involved with that. She was so busy in her time after leaving the White House that she said, being in retirement is so busy that I think I'll get a job so that I can have some relaxation. She lived a very long life and had a very long marriage with her husband, 71 years in all, being a well-regarded and respected matriarch to the family for many generations. She eventually died in 2018. Barbara Bush maintains a legacy of being one of the last very old-fashioned First Ladies in that she didn't have an active career outside of being active in her husband's own campaigns and political career. She put her family first, which was the tradition of First Ladies up until the mid to late 20th century. Because of her generally apolitical stance, Barbara Bush was very well regarded by people on both sides of the political aisle. Although her popularity wasn't able to win her husband a second term in office, she remained a beloved figure and could be considered sort of a grandmother to the nation. Thank you for spending this time with me, and I hope you'll join me next time for more American Legends.