Tag Archives: Teacher Politicians

Business teacher and former First Lady Pat Nixon

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Pat Nixon: The high school business teacher from Whittier, California, who became our nation’s 37th First Lady. She served from 1969 to 1974.

Many well-known political personalities were once schoolteachers. One of these is Pat Nixon, who served as our nation’s First Lady from 1969 to 1974. She was employed during the 1930s as a business teacher at Whittier Union High School in Whittier, California. In fact, Pat was working as an educator when she met her future husband, a young and ambitious city attorney named Richard Nixon.

Pat Ryan Nixon was born into a family of farmers on March 16, 1912, in Ely, Nevada. She grew up in a rural community now known Cerritos, California. Her mother died of cancer in 1924, when Pat was only 12 years old. After her mother’s death, the young girl kept house for her father and two older brothers, William, Jr., and Thomas. It was a big responsibility for such a young girl.

In spite of her challenges, Pat graduated from Excelsior High School in 1929, and then worked her way through college working a variety of odd jobs. These jobs included retail sales, pharmacy manager, typist, and telephone operator. After her high school graduation, she first attended Fullerton Junior College in Fullerton, California, and then transferred to the University of Southern California, where she earned her Bachelor’s degree in Merchandising, cum laude, in 1937.

In her first year of teaching, Pat Nixon earned only $180 a month, a princely sum considering the poverty in which she grew up. A pretty and popular teacher, the former Miss Ryan instructed courses in typing, bookkeeping, business principles, and stenography. On her performance evaluations, her supervisors wrote that she had a “splendid attitude toward young people,” they praised her ability to get “good results from them.” She was highly respected for her careful balance of friendliness, high expectations, and strict classsroom discipline. Her students remembered her fondly, writes daughter Julie Nixon Eisenhower in a detailed and personal biography published in 1986. The book is called Pat Nixon: the Untold Story, and is available on amazon.com.

In the political arena, Pat served her country as the wife of the Vice President from 1953 to 1961, and then as First Lady during her husband’s presidency, which spanned the years of 1969 to 1974. Her major platform as First Lady was to promote volunteerism. Through this platform, she encouraged Americans to address social problems at the local level through volunteering at civic organizations, hospitals, and rehabilitation centers. Like the First Lady, many teachers are known for emphasizing the importance of citizenship.

Pat Nixon passed away on June 22, 1993, in Park Ridge, New Jersey. She was 81 years old. She is interred next to her husband at the Richard M. Nixon Presidential Library and Museum in Yorba Linda, California.

Charismatic First Lady Grace Coolidge: She taught the deaf

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Grace Coolidge, former teacher of the deaf  and charismatic First Lady.

Several of our First Ladies have had experience as educators. One of these was Grace Coolidge, wife of President Calvin Coolidge. She taught at the Clarke Institute for Hearing and Speech in Northampton, Massachusetts.

Grace Goodhue was born and raised in Burlington, Vermont, She earned her Bachelor’s degree at the University of Vermont. Following her graduation, she traveled to Massachusetts to study and teach at the Clarke Institute. The school was made famous by Alexander Graham Bell, the inventor of the telephone, and other prominent educators of the deaf. There she worked first with students in the primary grades and later with middle school students. As a teacher, Grace had a reputation for being charismatic, and for bringing energy and warmth to her classroom. Her students loved her, and she felt she had truly found her calling.

While teaching at the Clarke Institute, she began to date a man who was known for being exceedingly shy and quiet. His name? Calvin Coolidge. In fact, he was so reserved that he became known as “Silent Cal.” During the time Grace and Calvin were dating, he gifted the young teacher with a beautiful illustrated children’s book to share with her students. In the book he wrote this inscription: “I wonder if your students realize what a good teacher you are.”

Grace and Calvin married in 1905, and, following the custom of the day, she retired from the teaching profession. Once they returned from their honeymoon, the ambitious but introverted man launched his career in politics. When President Warren G. Harding passed away in office in 1923, Calvin became president. Grace became First Lady, serving in that roll until her husband left office in 1929. During her tenure, Grace Coolidge did volunteer work for the Red Cross, the Civil Defense, and the Visiting Nurse Association. For this work, she garnered a gold medal from the National Institute of Social Science. In 1931 she was voted one of America’s twelve greatest living women.

To learn more about this amazing educator and First Lady, click on this link to the Encyclopedia Brittanica.

President Franklin Pierce: He served as a country schoolteacher

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Franklin Pierce, our nation’s 14th President, worked briefly as a country schoolteacher before he went into the field of politics.

While researching political figures who have also been educators, I’ve been surprised to learn how many residents of the White House fit the category. One of our former presidents who also worked as a teacher was Franklin Pierce, our 14th President. He served in the office from 1853 to 1857.

Franklin was born in Hillsborough, New Hampshire. As a youngster, he was never known for his scholastic abilities or for his diligence as a student. He was much more social than he was academic. After his graduation from high school, Franklin enrolled at Bowdoin College in Maine. There he was a popular fellow who, frankly, completed the least amount of work necessary to squeak by in his courses. He spent his time and energy socializing and pursuing outdoor activities such as hunting and fishing. In fact, at one point, his academic standing in his class was dead last.

One winter break, Franklin accepted a position as a country schoolteacher, even though he was only a teenager himself. He taught 50 students in a one-room schoolhouse, for which he was paid $12 a month. According to an account published later by one of his students, “Two or three of the older boys thought they would try the mettle of the young New Hampshire collegian, but it took only one or two old-fashioned floggings to cure them of all delusive ideas.” When the father of one of these students, greatly dissatisfied with Franklin’s classroom management strategies, angrily stormed the classroom to complain. The future politician met the disgruntled parent with an amiable smile, heartily shook his hand, offered him a chair, and expressed how pleased he was to see him. The parent was so impressed with Franklin’s friendly demeanor that he forgot the purpose of his visit and actually became fast friends with the neophyte teacher.

Franklin’s experiences in the classroom led to a turning point in his academic life. He became more serious about his studies and steadily improved his grades. By the time he graduated from Bowdoin College in 1824, he had risen from the last in his class to third from the top.

To learn more about Franklin Pierce as a student and a teacher, see the book From Classroom to White House: The Presidents and First Ladies as Students and Teachers by James McMurtry Longo, available from amazon.

Former First Lady Laura Bush: Teacher and school librarian

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Former First Lady Laura Bush also served her community as a teacher and a school librarian in her home state of Texas.

Laura Bush was just seven years old when she informed her parents that she wanted to be a teacher. And she never wavered from her decision. Before she became the nation’s First Lady, she served her community as a teacher and school librarian.

Like many teachers, Laura felt a calling to the teaching profession. As a youngster, she enjoyed lining up her dolls in the pretend classroom she established in her bedroom. There she and her childhood playmates would play school for hours on end.

Laura earned her degrees from Southern Methodist University, where she majored in Elementary Education and completed her student teaching semester. She inaugurated her career as an educator when she accepted a position as a third grade teacher in the Dallas Public Schools system.  At the tend of the school year, Laura moved to Houston, where she taught second grade at John F. Kennedy Elementary School.

After three years as a classroom teacher, Laura returned to college to earn her Master’s degree in Library Science. This done, she accepted a position as a children’s librarian at a public library in Houston, a job which suited her well. But she missed working in schools.

The following year she became a school librarian, working at a school with an inner-city population. Apparently, the students there were tough. One of Laura’s former colleagues described the future First Lady. She said, She was friendly and very loiving but very firm. She had her rules…and you followed them.”

Laura has said that she believes that children need dedicated teaches in their lives. She has often said, “Teachers have a more profound impact on our society and culture than any other profession.”

To read more about Laura Bush and her career as an educator, check out this book, From Classroom to White House: The President and First Ladies as Students and Teachers, by James McMurtry Longo, available on amazon.

Abigail Fillmore: The First Lady who was her husband’s teacher

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Former First Lady Abigail Fillmore: She was not only the wife of President Millard Fillmore, before she married him, she was his teacher!

Many of the Presidents and First Ladies in America’s past were former school educators. One of them was Abigail Fillmore, who actually taught the school her future husband, Millard Fillmore, attended.

Millard was 19 years old and largely illiterate when he decided he needed more education. He enrolled in a school in a nearby town in the state of New York. The 22-year-old teacher was Abigail Powers. Millard, the oldest student in her class, quickly fell in love with his teacher, but he was too poor and too shy to do anything about it. Seven years after he became her student, she became his wife.

When Abigail became Millard’s teacher, she had already established herself in her career. She had been teaching for six years. In 1814, she accepted a position as a part-time school teacher at the Sempronius Village School. In 1817, she became a full-time teacher, and in 1819 she took on another teaching job and began to teach at the private New Hope Academy. She was then asked to open up a private school in Broome County, she opened the school. In 1825, she returned to Sempronius to teach in her original position.

When Millard was elected president in 1850, Abigall became the nation’s First Lady. In fact, because she did not follow local custom and quit her job after her marriage, she was the first First Lady who came to her new position as a woman with a prior career.

As First Lady, Abigail Fillmore created a White House library for future residents of the People’s House. With her husband, she supported education and championed hospitalization for the mentally handicapped rather than imprisonment and punishment.

To rad more about this amazing First Lady, click on this link to History.com.