Barbara Pierce

Barbara Bush (June 8, 1925 – April 17, 2018) was the first lady of the United States from 1989 to 1993, as the wife of George H. W. Bush, the 41st president of the United States.

Barbara Pierce was born in New York City on June 8, 1925, to Pauline Pierce (née Robinson) and Marvin Pierce.

Her father was a businessman who worked at the McCall Corporation; he descended from the Pierce family that included U.S. president Franklin Pierce.

She had a close relationship with her father, and she considered him a mentor in many aspects of her life.

Pierce's mother, the daughter of a Supreme Court of Ohio justice, was a housewife who was involved in the gardening community.

Barbara was the third of her parents' four children, and she often felt overshadowed as a middle child: her older sister Martha was well liked and modeled for Vogue, her older brother Jimmy was a delinquent, and her younger brother Scott had a bone cyst that led to several surgeries throughout his childhood.

Barbara felt especially neglected by her mother, with whom she often argued.

Noticing her mother's poor financial habits and general pessimism about her life, Barbara came to see her mother as an example to avoid, instead believing that she had to choose to be happy with what she had.

She later came to understand the ordeals faced by her mother, particularly after Barbara had a sick child of her own.

Pierce grew up in Rye, New York, where she lived in relative comfort with servants assisting the family.

She later described herself as a "very happy fat child".

While the family lost some of their comforts during the Great Depression, her father's successful career kept them from poverty.

In her youth, Pierce was athletic and enjoyed swimming, tennis, and cycling.

For the first years of her schooling, Pierce was a public school student, attending Milton School.

Insecure about her appearance as a child, she adopted a self-deprecating sense of humor and harshly judged her schoolmates.

She also took on more traditionally masculine interests, such as playing football.

In her teenage years, she became more popular and was often sought after as a partner in her dance classes.

Pierce attended the Rye Country Day School from seventh to tenth grade.

She then attended Ashley Hall, a boarding school in Charleston, South Carolina, for eleventh and twelfth grade.

When Pierce was 16 and on Christmas vacation, she met George H. W. Bush.

They met at a Christmas dance at the Greenwich Country Club, when he saw her across the room and asked a friend to introduce them.

After a dance together, they instead sat and talked because Bush did not know how to waltz.

Among her children are George W. Bush, the 43rd president of the United States, and Jeb Bush, the 43rd governor of Florida.

She and Abigail Adams are the only two women to be the wife of one U.S. president and the mother of another.

At the time she became first lady, she was the second oldest woman to hold the position, behind only Anna Harrison, who never lived in the capital.

Bush was generally popular as first lady, recognized for her apolitical grandmotherly image.

Barbara Pierce was born in New York City and grew up in Rye, New York.

She met George H. W. Bush at the age of sixteen, and the two married in 1945.

Bush had six children between 1946 and 1959, and she had to endure the loss of her four-year-old daughter Robin to leukemia in 1953.

They moved to Texas in 1948, where George was successful in the oil industry and later began his political career.

She lived in Washington, D.C., New York, and China while accompanying her husband in his various political roles in the 1960s and 1970s.

She became an active campaigner for her husband whenever he stood for election.

She was previously the second lady of the United States from 1981 to 1989, and founded the Barbara Bush Foundation for Family Literacy.

Bush became second lady after her husband became vice president in 1981.

She took on the role of a social hostess as second lady, holding frequent events at the vice president's residence, and she traveled to many countries with her husband on his diplomatic missions.

Bush became first lady in 1989 after her husband was inaugurated as president.

She enjoyed the role and life in the White House, though her experience as first lady was complicated by her protectiveness over her family and her diagnosis of Graves' disease in 1989.

She frequently carried out charity work, including her projects to promote literacy and her support for people with AIDS.

Among the most prominent of her actions as first lady was the commencement speech she gave at Wellesley College; it saw considerable publicity and her selection was controversial, but it was widely regarded as a success.

She remained active in political campaigning after leaving the White House, as two of her sons ran for office in both gubernatorial and presidential campaigns.