A Day for First Ladies
Saturday marks second annual National First Ladies Day as organizers seek making the recognition a permanent federal holiday.
Scattered across the country, a little-known contingent of influential people are working diligently behind the scenes to help give America’s first ladies the recognition they say is long overdue.
They are the descendants of first ladies, the Canton-Ohio based National First Ladies Library & Museum, historians, and community builders that make up the National First Ladies Day Commission (NFLDC), created in 2021. And, they are on a mission to help establish a federal holiday—National First Ladies Day.
Already, their work has seen some success. On March 30, 2022, the National Day Calendar in cooperation with the NFLDC recognized the last Saturday in April as National First Ladies Day. This year, the recognition in its second year, will be celebrated on Saturday, April 27.
“I've always admired the women who've been first lady,” Rev. Nicholas Inman, who launched the commission in 2021, tells East Wing Magazine in a recent phone interview. “And I think that's because I was raised by a single mother, and was raised to always look upon those roles with such respect.”
Indeed, Inman’s admiration for history and first ladies dates back to a childhood memory of First Lady Nancy Reagan. Inman, who hails from Marshfield, Missouri, vividly recalls taking a pledge to the “Just Say No” campaign of the former first lady’s that was meant to encourage children to reject using drugs by simply saying “no.” Later as a young high school student, Inman badgered his mother to take him to volunteer for The Presidents’ Summit for America’s Future in Philadelphia where he was assigned to check press credentials from the national media in attendance of the event.
But it wasn’t until Inman founded the Missouri Cherry Blossom Festival in 2006, not long after returning from a student internship in Washington D.C., that he came in more frequent contact with first ladies. The festival, in its 19th year and Marshfield’s signature annual event, sprouted from Inman’s vision to bring Cherry Blossom trees, like the ones he saw in the nation’s capital, back to Marshfield. Since then, the Missouri Cherry Blossom Festival routinely has drawn presidential descendants as featured speakers. This year is no exception. But on Saturday in observance of the second annual National First Ladies Day, presidential spouses will be celebrated.
“A first lady does so much for her country,” Inman says. “She's often the person behind the scenes who is helping with diplomacy and so many other things that often go unnoticed and unrecorded.”
It wasn’t long before Inman started reaching out to others who he thought might also share a similar vision—to recognize that first ladies give so much to their nation, yet they're unelected and unpaid.
“They have such expectations placed upon them and such scrutiny that comes with that role,” Inman says.
He thought it would be fitting to have a day honoring their contributions. Presidents Day, he notes, has been whittled down to businesses having sales without much focus into the presidency. He saw something different for National First Ladies Day. The day commemorates the founding first lady of the United States, Martha Washington, in conjunction with the inauguration of President George Washington on April 30, 1789. National First Ladies Day is an occasion to showcase service in action, according to Inman.
“These women have rolled up their sleeves and taken on national projects and have really made a difference,” he says. He hopes that can-do spirit from first ladies, perhaps inspired by the national day, catches on in every community across the nation and motivates citizens to give back to their communities through local service projects.
The making of a federal holiday
Getting National First Ladies Day recognized by the National Day Calendar was the first step. Now, the commission has its sights set on establishing it as a federal holiday. They are open-minded about how that would take shape. It could be done by executive order or through a presidential proclamation, Inman suggests. They are not seeking a non-working holiday, but one that would be federally recognized and inspire education about the contributions of first ladies in tandem with service. Already talk is taking place between commission members and lawmakers.
Commission member Larry Cook, author of Symbols of Patriotism: First Ladies and Daughters of the American Revolution and presidential historian, set out by approaching his local congressmen—Matthew Cartwright a Democrat in Pennsylvania’s 8th Congressional District and Daniel Meuser a Republican in Pennsylvania’s 9th Congressional District. They are both receptive to the idea, Cook says.
In fact, almost anywhere Cook travels for speaking engagements he shares with audiences the work of the commission and their goal to establish a federal holiday for first ladies. The audiences’ unwavering response, he says, is along the lines of, “Wow! Everybody should be for that,” he says. And sometimes the idea elicits unprompted applause.
“I’m going to continue to spread the word to as many politicians as I can,” Cook says. “We’re dedicated to getting this done. I feel so confident that we’re going to get this holiday established.”
Helping get the word out is another commission member, Andrew Och, an award-winning television producer who spent more than a year beginning in 2012 documenting the lives of every first lady of the United States for the C-SPAN series First Ladies: Influence And Image. The series, made in collaboration with the White House Historical Association, aired in 2013 to great acclaim and helped reveal the untold stories of presidential spouses. The experience was so profound for Och that he wrote about his experience in Unusual For Their Time: On the Road with America’s First Ladies Volumes 1 and 2 and coined himself the “First Ladies Man.”
“Women have always been in the room,” Och says. “It’s not a matter of inviting women into the room. It’s not even a matter of listening to women. We’ve been listening to women from the very beginning. It’s a matter of giving them the recognition that it was their idea or their thought process or their collaboration that made this stuff happen.”
When Rosalynn Carter died on Nov. 19, 2023, at age 96, Och was invited to participate in 14 national television interviews to talk about Carter.
“I talked about how we’re going to celebrate [Carter] this First Ladies Day,” he says. “That reaches people and they ask, ‘Oh, What’s First Ladies Day? I didn’t know there was a First Ladies Day.’”
That line of questioning gives Och and the commission the opportunity to let people know what the day is all about and how people can participate in their own communities. The commission wants people to begin in their own communities and by personally learning more about first ladies.
“Meet with your city council. Meet with your library. Meet with your parks and rec. Find out what your community needs and how you can honor the first ladies in doing civil service,” Och says. “We’re making the world a better place.”
What would a first lady think?
It’s hard to gauge exactly what first ladies would think about National First Ladies Day. To date, according to Inman, Rosalynn Carter has been the only first lady to acknowledge the effort. On April 30, 2022, Rosalynn Carter drafted a note to the NFLDC thanking them for a Cherry Blossom tree they sent to the former first lady.
“Thank you very much for the beautiful cherry tree you sent me in celebration of national First Ladies Day,” Carter writes. “I am touched by your thoughtfulness and kind expression of friendship.”
Carter went on to wish the committee a successful event, which was the inaugural year of National First Ladies Day.
Clifton Truman Daniel, the oldest grandson of President Harry S. Truman (1945-1953) and First Lady Bess Truman believes his grandmother would be “astounded” that anybody would want to do a First Ladies Day. If she were honored singularly, he notes, she would have fought it. But, in the company of all other first ladies, she would be happier. Now, Daniel serves on the NFLDC advocating for the holiday and the national recognition of first ladies, which he says is long overdue.
“Presidents don’t exist in a vacuum,” Daniel says. “They are married to smart people.”
While Bess Truman preferred not to say too much publicly, Daniel says, she was active in politics behind the scenes.
“This is a woman [Bess Truman] who says the job of a politician’s wife is to sit next to her husband, keep quiet and make sure her hat is on straight,” Daniel says. “Weirdly, she didn’t do that. She knew what was going on and she liked to be informed.”
Stepping out from the presidential shadow
The efforts of the commission are part of a growing chorus of sentiment from scholars, activists, historians, authors, community organizers, entrepreneurs, influencers, citizens and journalists—including those who write for this publication—who believe the contributions of America’s first ladies have long been overlooked.
But now more than ever, there are reasons to believe a shift is taking place.
For instance on Friday, the First Ladies Association for Research and Education (FLARE) will hold its first-ever national conference on first ladies. The conference is being held in partnership with the Gerald R. Ford Presidential Foundation, the Gerald R. Ford Presidential Library and Museum, and American University’s School of Public Affairs. The event being held at the Gerald R. Ford Museum in Grand Rapids, Michigan, will honor former First Lady Betty Ford. The half-day conference will feature two discussion panels—one on Ford’s leadership as first lady and the other on the historic 1984 conference, the first-ever first ladies conference convened by Ford.
And, First Lady Dr. Jill Biden is expected to be the guest speaker at the Gerald R. Ford Presidential Foundation’s Annual First Ladies Luncheon being held just prior to the conference. It marks the first time a sitting first lady will join the event as the keynote speaker, according to the foundation.
On Saturday, National First Ladies Day, the National First Ladies Library & Museum in Canton, Ohio, will hold an exclusive VIP Champagne Reception unveiling the museum's newest exhibit “Leaders in Literacy: First Ladies as Teachers, Educators, and Librarians.” The exhibit features more than a dozen first ladies including Barbara and Laura Bush, Eleanor Roosevelt, Abigail Fillmore and Helen Taft, who have advanced the cause of literacy and education. First lady descendant Patricia Taft, great grand-daughter of Helen Taft, is slated to give remarks.
Other notable events include:
Thursday, April 25, 2024:
The White House Historical Association will feature History Happy Hour: Three First Ladies and Four Great Speeches. Two speeches given by Eleanor Roosevelt, one by Barbara Bush, and one by Hillary Clinton will be the focus of the discussion that explores the entrance of first ladies onto the public speaking platform. History Happy Hour takes place at 6 pm EDT and will feature Dr. Diana Carlin, speaking alongside Chief Education Officer and historian Dr. Matthew Costello, who will moderate the episode.
April 27, 2024:
The NFLDC will honor First Lady Rosalyn Carter, who died on Nov. 19, 2023, at 96, with a floral wreath to be placed in her hometown of Plains, Georgia.
At the Missouri Cherry Blossom Festival, the 3rd Annual Rosalynn Carter Luncheon will feature relatives and longtime friends of former President Jimmy Carter and First Lady Rosalynn Carter who will be interviewed as part of the program. Later that evening, the 14th Annual State Dinner will feature Clifton Truman Daniel, grandson of President Harry S. and Bess Truman, as the keynote speaker. His speech will be in honor of National First Ladies Day.
And in Midland, Texas, the Bush Family Home State Historic Site will commemorate National First Ladies Day with free admission for the public to participate in self-guided tours, games and crafts for children, first ladies trivia with prizes and an exhibit about first ladies and their causes.
“We look forward to shining a light on the importance of first ladies in our nation’s history who are often overshadowed by the presidency,” says Don Zavodny, Bush Family Home educator, in a news release.
And last fall, the first-ever college textbook on first ladies U.S. First Ladies: Making History and Leaving Legacies was published followed by the companion trade book Remember the First Ladies: The Legacies of America’s History-Making Women by co-authors Anita B. McBride, Diana B. Carlin and Nancy Kegan Smith. The motivation behind the books, according to the authors, is to strengthen the research and education of first ladies. And most recently, American Woman: The Transformation of the Modern First Lady, From Hillary Clinton to Jill Biden, by New York Times White House Correspondent Katie Rogers hit the stands earlier this year.
All of this gives Inman the confidence that the commission’s pursuit of a National First Ladies Day is not only warranted, but needed.
“When we see a first lady pass away, those [remaining living first ladies] have to be sitting there thinking, ‘How’s the country going to remember me when it’s my turn?’” he says. “There are instances when the current first lady has opportunities to honor one of her predecessors, but she doesn’t get to honor all of them all the time.”
He hopes this day will become a permanent marker in history that honors first ladies and their legacies and inspires citizens to remember by rolling up their sleeves and taking action.