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Amenities & Living Comforts
The first bath tubs in the White House were portable and made of tin; water was hauled in buckets. Running water was piped into the White House in 1833. Gaslighting, installed in the White House in 1848, replaced candles and oil lamps. A central heating system was installed in the White House in 1837 when many people still warmed themselves with a log
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White House Tour
Following a competition for the design of the President's House in the spring of 1792, Irish architect James Hoban was commissioned to build a home and office for the President of the United States. With guidance from President George Washington, Hoban employed craftsmen brought from as far away as Scotland and oversaw a free and enslaved labor force that constructed one
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About Us
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Reading Lists & Bibliography
General White House Bibliography:Aikman, Lonnelle. The Living White House. Washington, D.C.: The White House Historical Association, 1996. Cunliffe, Marcus. The American Heritage History of the Presidency. New York: American Heritage Publishing Company, 1968. Dowd, Mary-Jane M., compiler. Records of the Office of Public Buildings and Public Parks of the National Capital - Record Group 42 Inventory No. 16. Washington, D.C.: National
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The Truman Renovation
Read Digital Edition Foreword, Robert L. BreedenReality and Illusion: The White House and Harry S. Truman, William P. O'BrienTempest in a Teapot: Truman's Failed Attempt at an Office Addition, Elizabeth Beard GoldsmithLorenzo Simmons Winslow: Architect of the White House, 1933-1952, William B. BushongPictures of the Operation: Abbie Rowe Photographs, the White House Renovation, Clay BauskePresident Truman's Televised Tour, Rex W.
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Bio
Caroline Harrison
Caroline Scott was born in Oxford, Ohio, on October 1, 1832 to educator Mary Neal Scott and John Witherspoon Scott, a Presbyterian minister and president of Oxford Female Institute. Caroline, or “Carrie,” studied languages, music, and drawing at the institute, graduating in 1852.1 She also met Benjamin Harrison, a student at nearby Miami University, while in school. They later married on October 20, 1853.2 In 1854, the
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Dolley Madison
Dolley Payne was born on May 20, 1768, the third of Mary Coles and John Payne Jr.’s nine children.1 Dolley was born in Guilford County, North Carolina, where her parents briefly moved to establish a Quaker community before returning to Virginia. Although John Payne owned enslaved people during Dolley’s early childhood, he freed them in 1783. It is unknown where Dolley was
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Scholarship
The Christmas Eve West Wing Fire of 1929
On Christmas Eve 1929 the White House experienced its most powerful fire since the British torched the Executive Mansion 115 years earlier. At approximately 8:00 p.m., White House messenger Charlie Williamson smelled smoke coming from the West Wing executive offices so he alerted White House police officer Richard Trice and Secret Service agent Russell Wood. Trice and Wood ran up a winding
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Scholarship
Inauguration of 1861
On December 20, 1860, South Carolina seceded from the United States. Mississippi, Florida, Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana, and Texas followed soon after. In the midst of an unprecedented sectional crisis, President Abraham Lincoln entered office on March 4, 1861, to assume leadership of an anxious and worried nation. The Baltimore Sun commented that the “close of an old and the beginning of a new administration of
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Scholarship
Martha Johnson Patterson: Hostess of the Andrew Johnson White House
Of her family’s role in the White House in the immediate aftermath of the Civil War, Martha Johnson Patterson, daughter of President Andrew Johnson, admitted, “We are plain people, from the mountains of Tennessee, called here for a short time by a national calamity.”1 One of the five children of President Andrew Johnson and First Lady Eliza McCardle Johnson, Martha
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Scholarship
Arts Advisors in the Kennedy White House
President John F. Kennedy and First Lady Jacqueline Kennedy’s advocacy for the performing arts endures as a vital part of the Kennedy White House legacy. From 1961 to 1963, the White House became a focal point for arts and culture as the administration hosted numerous concerts and performances. One of the most significant White House concerts during the Kennedy years took pl