Collection
The Nixon White House 1969 - 1974
Presidents
Scholarship
Jerry Smith
Jeremiah “Jerry” Smith worked at the White House through eight presidencies. Government documents listed him as a laborer, but he took on a variety of unofficial roles, including valet, footman, custodian, and most notably, duster. Throughout his thirty-year tenure, Jerry witnessed three White House weddings, the aftermath of two assassinations, the installation of electricity, the construction of the West Wing, and
Scholarship
The Life and Presidency of Richard M. Nixon
Richard Milhous Nixon was born on January 9, 1913, in Yorba Linda, California. The second of five sons, he graduated from Whittier College and Duke University School of Law and returned to California to practice law. Around this time, he met Patricia Ryan, and the couple began dating. They were married on June 21, 1940, and raised two daughters together—Patricia (called “Tricia”) and Julie.
Scholarship
George DeBaptiste
President William Henry Harrison’s famously brief month-long tenure at the White House makes it difficult to research the inner workings of the Executive Mansion during his administration, and an 1858 fire at his family’s home in North Bend, Ohio, destroyed many documents related to this particular period of Harrison’s life.1 However, obituaries and recollections reveal a fascinating individual who wo
Scholarship
Dan Jansen
Speed skater Dan Jansen’s gold medal victory is one of the most inspiring Olympic stories in American history. The four-time Olympian and seven-time World Cup champion won a gold medal in his final Olympic race in the 1994 Winter Games in Lillehammer, Norway. Jansen’s road to the gold was riddled with disappointments, family illness, and personal challenges, yet he pers
Scholarship
The Tale of Two White Houses: Espionage during the Civil War
In the nineteenth century, two mansions sitting approximately one hundred miles apart were both called the “White House.” The White House in Washington, D.C., was constructed to serve as the executive seat for the President of the United States. During the War of 1812, British troops burned the building but it was quickly rebuilt and re-occupied by 1817. The following year, a sm
Scholarship
NAACP and the White House
The Board of Directors of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) met with President Lyndon B. Johnson at the White House on June 24, 1964. The forty-five minute meeting took place in the Cabinet Room of the West Wing.1 The meeting was off the record, so no official press coverage or documentation of the conversation exists. However, White
Scholarship
"self determination without termination"
The first Americans—the Indians-are the most deprived and most isolated minority group in our nation. On virtually every scale of measurement—employment, income, education, health—the condition of the Indian people ranks at the bottom.This condition is the heritage of centuries of injustice. From the time of their first contact with European settlers, the American Indians have been oppres
Scholarship
Calvin Coolidge and Native Americans
President Calvin Coolidge’s relationship with Native Americans is frequently summarized by a passing reference to his signing of the Indian Citizenship Act in 1924, if it is mentioned at all.1 While Coolidge’s support of the legislation is unquestioned, reducing his many interactions with Native Americans to a single piece of legislation is misleading and inaccurate.Coolidge’s interest in Native