George Bush Presidential Library Six first ladies -- (from left) Lady Bird Johnson, Pat Nixon, Nancy Reagan, Barbara Bush, Rosalyn Carter and Betty Ford -- at the dedication of the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library in November, 1991.

By Marylynne Pitz
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

Ever since Martha Washington gave money to poor American Revolution veterans or lobbied on their behalf for presidential pardons, first ladies have embraced a public responsibility.

		First Ladies: Political Role & Public Image Where: Senator John Heinz Pittsburgh Regional History Center, 1212 Smallman St., Strip District. When: Friday through Feb. 28, 2007 at the Admission: Adults, $7.50; $6 for seniors over 61, $5 for students with school ID; $3.50 fro children ages 6 to 18; free to members and children under 6. For information on special tours and a mother-daughter tea planned around the exhibit, visit www.pghhistory.org. Photo Journal First Ladies: Political Role and Public Image

And that was in addition to all the other first lady tasks they undertook -- adviser, confidant, campaigner, secretary, speech writer, social activist and hostess for state dinners with long guest lists.

No wonder the amiable Lady Washington, as the veterans called her, got up at dawn.

How much influence have America's 46 first ladies wielded as they fulfilled this demanding job and tailored it to their own agendas? How did they manage, damage or salvage their public image?

Those are the themes of a traveling exhibition from the National Museum of American History in Washington, D.C. That branch of the Smithsonian has closed for an 18-month renovation and reopens in 2008.

"First Ladies: Political Role & Public Image" opens Friday at the Senator John Heinz Pittsburgh Regional History Center and runs through Feb. 28, 2007.

This show's eye candy index is high. A dozen gowns or dresses, displayed in glass cases, are arranged around the museum's first-floor gallery.

For her husband's second inaugural, Frances Folsom Cleveland wore a moire silk gown with a plunging neckline that changed from green to magenta, depending on the lighting. Adorned by black satin lace, beading, bows, ribbons, netting, sequins and a fur-trimmed hem, the gown includes a bustle.

"It's a pretty amazing dress -- the height of everything but the kitchen sink decoration. Every time you looked at it there was something new to see," said Lisa Kathleen Graddy, a Smithsonian curator who helped create the permanent and touring versions of this exhibition.

Mamie Eisenhower never wore the pink and charcoal gray gown she received in 1958 from the wife of the president of the Philippines. But the pina cloth dress, studded with pearls and rhinestones, is a stellar example of floral applique and metallic embroidery, said Ruth Trevarrow, registrar with the Smithsonian Institution Traveling Exhibition Service.

Jackie Kennedy's simple, gray brocade dress sparkles, echoing an era when she made the White House shine by overseeing a restoration of the mansion that returned many antiques and artifacts to their rightful places.

Here, too, is the beaded winter white dress and matching boucle jacket designed by Oscar de la Renta that Laura Bush wore to her husband's second inauguration.

Mrs. Bush's ensemble epitomizes elegance while the black pantsuit Hillary Rodham Clinton wore in New York during her successful campaign for the U.S. Senate is a study in minimalism.

Mrs. Clinton's practical, businesslike outfit is nearly a century and several cultural revolutions away from the midnight blue velvet gown Harriet Lane Johnson wore in 1898 during a private audience with Queen Victoria.

Great expectations

Dressing for this role on the international stage is just one of a first lady's many considerations.

"The biggest challenge these women faced was what everybody expected of them. It might not be in their character to be outgoing," said Kathleen Wendell, deputy museum director at the Heinz History Center.

But graciousness was a key trait of Dolley Madison, who excelled at organizing salons and led Washington society for 16 years.

From 1801 to 1809, Mrs. Madison served as hostess for President Thomas Jefferson, a widower. From 1809 to 1813, Mrs. Madison fulfilled the same role for her husband and often gathered intelligence at these parties that served his interests.

"Dolley Madison created this showplace, this backdrop for politics. You can't tell who her husband's friends or enemies are. Everyone was welcome. Politicking could happen over tea, over ice cream, while music was playing, at the weekly reception," said Ms. Graddy, a curator at the National Museum of American History.

That's one reason the local exhibition's setting evokes the spirited salons of the 18th and 19th centuries.

"The salon was important for political reasons. It brought people together who might not agree. They had to behave socially and get to know one another's points of view," Mrs. Wendell said.

In the White House, "There are a few paintings of the Lincoln inauguration showing the salon. There's a large chandelier with people seated underneath it."

Two local companies have lent lighting or created furnishings for the exhibition. Lighting by Erik, a Dormont business, has loaned a magnificent, $10,000 chandelier made of draped crystals.

Beneath it sits a blue-tufted suede sofa where weary visitors can imagine the lively exchanges between congressional rivals. The circular conversation sofa is courtesy of Gene Sanes, a Strip District upholsterer and fabric store.

Other pros at hosting social functions included Mamie Eisenhower, the wife of a career military officer, Jackie Kennedy, creator of the Camelot image for her husband's administration, and Barbara Bush, a veteran politico.

Meeting and using the media

To hear radio broadcasts by Lou Hoover or Eleanor Roosevelt, visitors to the museum can relax on a floral brocade couch that typifies furniture fashions of the 1940s. The sofa, Mrs. Wendell said, looks new because it was sealed in plastic for decades.

Mrs. Hoover uses a prim tone as she praises members of 4-H clubs. Mrs. Roosevelt speaks to the nation right after Japanese pilots bombed Pearl Harbor on Dec. 7, 1941.

Mrs. Roosevelt's aristocratic voice rings with determination as she speaks to "the women in the country" and asks them to do everything possible to build morale during the war that has just begun.

"I have a boy at sea on a destroyer. For all I know, he may be on his way to the Pacific," the first lady added.

Mrs. Roosevelt, who embraced labor unions, and aimed to improve the lot of the poor and civil rights, also wrote two newspaper columns, "My Day" and "If You Ask Me."

The woman often compared to Mrs. Roosevelt is Rosalynn Carter, who was her husband's political adviser, honorary chair of his Commission on Mental Health and a supporter of the home building charity, Habitat for Humanity.

After she left Washington in 1981, Mrs. Carter worked with her husband to eradicate the guinea worm from a village in Nigeria. In 1995, the people of Amorie Village thanked her for those efforts by giving her a beaded yellow crown, which is also in the show.

The wit of the women who make up this select sorority is also revealed.

Modern women will no doubt empathize with the comment made by Sarah Childress Polk, first lady from 1845 to 1849.

If her husband was elected president, the well-educated woman said, she would, "neither keep house nor make butter."

Mrs. Polk's writing case, which stored the pens and paper she used to edit her husband's speeches, is part of the exhibit.

Betty Ford, whose candid televised discussion with Morley Safer about adultery and pre-marital sex prompted public censure as well as support, may have said it best.

"I do not believe that being first lady should prevent me from expressing my views. Being ladylike does not require silence."