Eugene Allen served in the White House for 34 years. Assisting eight presidents, Allen’s top priority was to make the White House a comfortable residence for each chief executive and his family. Allen was born in 1919 on a plantation farm near Scottsville in central Virginia.1 During his youth, he worked as a waiter at a resort in Virginia and at a

President John F. Kennedy and First Lady Jacqueline Kennedy had developed a bond with White House doorman Preston Bruce. The slain President's brother, Attorney General Robert Kennedy, invited Bruce to walk with members of the Kennedy family to JFK's memorial service at St. Matthew's Cathedral. Here are some of Bruce's recollections:"My heart ached to see Mrs. Kennedy march up

The White House has many holiday traditions, some of which are historic and others more recent. New arrivals to the Executive Mansion often bring unique familial rituals that they celebrate alongside time-tested White House and presidential customs. During the holiday season, the president and first lady participate in public traditions such as receiving a tree for the Blue Room, lighting

The White House Chief Usher serves as the general manager of the Executive Mansion. In addition to administrative and fiscal responsibilities, the chief usher supervises Executive Residence staff, as well as organizes and directs construction and remodeling projects within the home and on the White House Grounds. This position is considered prestigious and well-established, but this was not always the

Jeremiah “Jerry” Smith worked at the White House through eight presidencies. Government documents listed him as a laborer, but he took on a variety of unofficial roles, including valet, footman, custodian, and most notably, duster. Throughout his thirty-year tenure, Jerry witnessed three White House weddings, the aftermath of two assassinations, the installation of electricity, the construction of the West Wing, and

When First Lady Pat Nixon’s outgoing Chief of Staff and Press Secretary Constance Stuart sat for her White House exit interview in 1973, Stuart stated that “there isn’t a reader in America who really wants to know all the details of how this staff operates.”1 Since Stuart’s declaration, historians have become more interested in the role played by first ladi

In the fall of 1976 “Keep Betty’s husband in the White House” campaign buttons erupted all over the country—a tribute to a woman unknown to most Americans only three years earlier—and to her grace, candor and lack of pretension.It was my good fortune to have been chosen by Mrs. Ford to serve as her White House social secretary.

For evening receptions, Grace Coolidge favored gowns with trains. Columnist Vylla Poe Wilson remarked in January 1926, " Mrs. Coolidge does not let the fact that she wears a train . . . interfere with the careful line of the gown itself. . . . [It] is never allowed to drag the gown."1Maggie Rogers, who served as Grace Coolidge's maid, regularly ensured that the First Lady's costume

A reunion picnic on June 24, 1983, was the scene of hugging, kissing, and backslapping, as former White House domestic staff greeted one another with laughter, emotion, and plenty of memories.1The 1980s began a series of reunions of former White House workers. Retired chief usher J. B. West was the organizer of the 1983 event. Lillian Rogers Parks, a former maid and

After the United States entered World War II, British Prime Minister Winston Churchill was a frequent guest in the Roosevelt White House. Although the Prime Minister's visits were associated with weighty issues, White House workers remembered Churchill with delight and amusement. "The most colorful visitor ever to appear at the wartime White House was Winston Churchill," J. B. West records

One of the most important 19th-century accounts of life in the White House was Behind the Scenes, or Thirty Years a Slave and Four Years in the White House. Behind the Scenes was the memoir of Elizabeth Keckly, dressmaker to Mary Todd Lincoln. Keckly (her name on some documents is spelled “Keckley”) was an independent businesswoman, and not technically a memb

Benjamin Henry Latrobe, Architect of the Capitol and Surveyor of Public Buildings under Jefferson, had advised the Madisons about changes to the White House even before they arrived in 1809.1 He continued to consult with Mrs. Madison about her household until about 1813.2Latrobe once visited the White House in Mrs. Madison's absence, to make sure that the curtains had been laundered.