This chapter uses the lens of feminine rhetorical style to examine how gendered expectations affect first ladies’ public speeches and how their rhetorical styles evolved over time. Selected speeches of first ladies from Eleanor Roosevelt to Melania Trump are analyzed and five recurring themes are reviewed. These include the discussion of feminine topics such as family and childcare and envisioning women’s role in society, addressing masculine issues such as war and politics through feminine rhetoric, connecting with audiences as peers, use of personal narratives, and use of expert sources and statistics. The chapter concludes that first ladies’ addresses are usually delivered within the bounds of stereotypical gendered expectations, though subtle deviations can be found depending on the first lady’s public image, her professional experience, and the popular opinion of the times. The analysis of first ladies’ rhetorical styles helps us better understand their evolving role in US politics.

“Trendsetter” first ladies show new ways of modeling femininity in a given era, often through attention to the visual. Because women in public long have been expected to be seen and not heard, fashion and image historically have provided a way of communicating nonverbally. Thus, first ladies who were considered trendsetters typically circulated new “looks” or images to a given public, drawing from the culture in which they operated to influence norms around femininity, beauty, and celebrity. This chapter assesses seven first ladies for their visual influence. Dolley Madison (1809-1817), Julia Tyler (1844-1845), and Frances Cleveland (1886-89, 1893-97) were the most notable of the nineteenth-century first ladies who found themselves positioned as style icons. Following in their footsteps were Mamie Eisenhower (1952-1960), Jacqueline Kennedy (1960-1963), Nancy Reagan (1980-1988), and Michelle Obama (2008-2016), who each leveraged the trendsetter role during their time in the White House.

In 235 years, only about two dozen women have experienced the role of “mourner in chief” as current or former first ladies grieving a presidential husband. This chapter examines the performances of six of these women in different historical contexts and under very different circumstances: Martha Washington, Mary Lincoln, Lucretia Garfield, Eleanor Roosevelt, Jacqueline Kennedy, and Nancy Reagan. This analysis considers first ladies’ performances of mourning during presidents’ illness or assassination; funerals and memorial services; and the expanse of time for which they survived their husbands. Through these case studies, the authors consider how a first lady’s mourning can shape her husband’s legacy, and what it can teach us about how Americans grieve.

Public memory denotes how groups recall the past and how those ideas take shape, evolve, and prompt differences or agreement about history’s events and actors. Examining first ladies through their tenures in office, memoirs, interviews, historic sites, and memorials often reveal how they wanted to be remembered. Biographies, dramatic films, documentaries, and historical fiction about them can determine how presidential wives’ legacies are preserved or morph in the public psyche over time. Siena College Research Institute’s scholar polls and Ranker online surveys rate first ladies among historians and the general public. This chapter applies such evidence to first ladies Abigail Adams, Dolley Madison, Mary Lincoln, Edith Wilson, Eleanor Roosevelt, Mamie Eisenhower, Jacqueline Kennedy, Betty Ford, Rosalynn Carter, Nancy Reagan, and Barbara Bush. Each exemplifies a variety of legacies—both positive and negative—and reflects how memorializations and public memories evolve.