Description
C-SPAN's year-long history series, "First Ladies: Influence and Image", featured interviews with more than 50 preeminent historians and biographers. In this informative book, these experts paint intimate portraits of all 45 first ladies—their lives, ambitions, and unique partnerships with their presidential spouses. Susan Swain and the C-SPAN team elicit the details that made these women who they were: how Martha Washington intentionally set the standards followed by first ladies for the next century; how Edith Wilson was complicit in the cover-up when President Wilson became incapacitated after a stroke; and how Mamie Eisenhower used the new medium of television to reinforce her, and her husband's, positive public images.
First Ladies: Presidential Historians on the Lives of 45 Iconic American Women provides an up-close historical look at these fascinating women who survived the scrutiny of the White House, sometimes at great personal cost, while supporting their families and famous husbands—and sometimes changing history. Complete with illustrations and essential biographical details, it is an illuminating, entertaining, and ultimately inspiring read.
Susan Swain was the moderator for C-SPAN's special year-long history series, "First Ladies: Influence and Image." Swain is C-SPAN's co-CEO and, in addition to her senior management role at the network, has been an on-camera host for C-SPAN for more than 30 years, interviewing public officials, historians, and journalists for the public affairs network. This is her ninth book project with C-SPAN and PublicAffairs.
Museum Story
The Smithsonian's National Museum of American History is responsible for the collection, care and preservation of more than three million objects. The collections reflect the breadth, depth and complexity of the experiences of the American people, from social and cultural history to the history of science, medicine and technology.
Details
- Paperback
- 496 pages, black and white illustrations throughout
- 8.3" x 5.6"
- Written by Susan Swain and the C-SPAN team
- Foreword by Richard Norton Smith
