Speaker: Dolley Madison created role of first lady
Dolley Madison wasn’t the first first lady of American politics, but her charm, her support
of her husband and her ability to bring people together in an era of acrimony
and upheaval in Washington came to exemplify the role for more than a century and made her a merchandising icon, according to Holly Shulman, director of the
Dolley Madison Digital Edition at the University of Virginia.
Shulman’s lecture, “Dolley Madison and the Creation of the
First Lady,” drew more than 100 people Tuesday night as part of James Madison University’s
weeklong presidential inauguration festivities.
“She certainly held [Washington] society in her hand,”
Shulman said.
A widow who stole the heart of a reticent Virginia statesman
named James Madison and followed him to the nation’s capital for his tenure as secretary
of state and later as the country’s fourth president, Dolley Madison is perhaps
best known as “the hostess who served ice cream and saved George Washington’s
portrait” during British troops’ burning of the White House in 1814, Shulman
said.
Indeed, while her husband was busy developing into the role
of a wartime president, Dolley Madison played the part of the ceremonial hostess
to perfection, Shulman said. Unlike Philadelphia, the cosmopolitan former seat
of American government, Washington, D.C. — still a largely undeveloped and
impoverished city in the early years of the republic — offered Dolley “a blank
slate” on which to leave her mark, one free of the pressure of having to compete
with high society, Shulman said. In the new capital city, she said, the
Madisons could “easily outrank, out-dress and out-party any American.”
Dolley made a point to dress for social events in a
republican, rather than monarchical, style — velvet dresses and pearls as
opposed to the European women’s fashion of satin and diamonds — and with the
help of the architect Benjamin Latrobe, she decorated the public spaces of the
White House in a manner “fine enough for European dignitaries, but plain enough
for a good American harvest table,” Shulman said.
Her parties — known as “Wednesday night squeezes” — were
welcome diversions from the tedium of public service, and she used the events
to help ease the political tensions of the day, Shulman said. This was particularly
important during the Madison administration, she said, as two emerging factions
— Republicans and Federalists — wrestled for control of the new government.
Despite her many charms, Dolley Madison was not universally
loved during her husband’s tenure as president, Shulman said, and she faced
many of the same societal limitations as other women of her day.
“All first ladies become lightning rods for criticism of their
husbands,” she said. “Dolley was criticized, but she did manage to hold this society
together and, in doing so, probably helped James Madison as a leader.”
In her lifetime, Dolley became the symbol of the American
hostess, and her likeness, which grew along with the development of commercial
packaging and advertising, graced an array of products, from ice cream to
jewelry, well into the mid-20th century. Even long after her death, Shulman
said, she has remained “an icon of hospitality and of women’s leadership by
virtue of her tact, her generosity, her wisdom and her charm.”
Dr. Anthony Eksterowicz, professor emeritus of political
science at JMU and co-editor of the 2003 book “The Presidential Companion:
Readings On the First Ladies,” said Dolley Madison had a penchant for what
scholars have termed “parlor politics.” “She took politics out of the street,
where it was practiced vitriolically, and brought it into the parlor, where it
gained a measure of sensibility,” he said.
JMU’s own “first lady,” Mary Ann Alger, who was in
attendance Tuesday, said she is currently reading several books on Dolley
Madison and has drawn inspiration from her legacy.
“She was very cutting edge for her day,” Alger said. “Getting
people together and connecting people was a real strength of hers. I think I
would have liked her.”
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By Jim Heffernan ('96)
March 13, 2013
