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The
primary Easter Monday entertainment at the White House
has always involved egg rolling. Participants roll dyed,
hard-boiled eggs across the grass to see whose will go
the furthest before cracking. Other egg sports enjoyed
in the early years were egg ball, toss and catch, egg
croquet and egg picking—a contest where eggs are
pecked together until they crack. After a few days, the
odor of all the eggs broken in these free-form games “could
be smelled three square miles away.”
In 1929, First Lady Lou Hoover hoped to end the rotten
egg stench by introducing folk dancing. Her successor,
Eleanor Roosevelt, thought it better to impose a sense
of structure to egg-based activities. First Lady Pat Nixon’s
staff arranged the first—and last—Easter egg
hunt with actual eggs. Unfound eggs quickly reminded people
of why Mrs. Hoover had favored folk dancing. In 1974,
the Nixons hosted the first egg roll races, an event which
has become an Easter Monday favorite.
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