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{
    "localId": "354584253",
    "label": "\"The White House\" [Extract from \"Washington City and Capital\"]",
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    "id": "354584253",
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    "contentType": "document",
    "title": "\"The White House\" [Extract from \"Washington City and Capital\"]",
    "citationUrl": "https://catalog.archives.gov/id/354584253",
    "collections": [
        "President's Secretary's Files (Truman Administration)",
        "White House Files"
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            "logicalDate": "1937-01-01",
            "year": 1937
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{
    "seq": 13,
    "pageIndex": 0,
    "type": "photo",
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    "ocrText": "White House is a colonial structure merely reflecting the Renaissance\nwhose husband was then Secretary of State, and the annals of White\ninfluence in America; that it symbolizes the Nation's founders in\nHouse hospitality began forthwith. The two gave frequent dinners\nAmerican eyes, and that therefore it is the logical place for assem-\nto numerous guests, and entertained them lavishly. Jefferson had his\nbling the best of beautiful American craftsmanship in furniture.\nown very positive \"observations on soup\", and his own receipt for\nThe opposing arguments were that early American furniture varied\nsponge cake to be served with wine. He spent $10,000 on fine wines\ntoo much in different regions to make a uniform system of decoration\nduring his 8 years in the White House. He did away with the\nanything but sectional-for New England, Central and Southern\nformal daily receptions or dances which Washington had instituted\ncraftmanship, though all beautiful, varied widely while the archi-\nin Philadelphia and which the Adamses had striven to maintain.\ntectural style of the White House offered a basis for a uniform deco-\nInstead he received persons of all stations at any seasonable hour,\nration of accepted value that would not be inconsistent with our\noften receiving callers in a dressing gown and slippers. He abolished\nhistory. They pointed to the widespread use of French Renaissance\nprecedence rules, ignored titles, and instituted an etiquette that dis-\nfurniture in early days to support this claim.\ncouraged aristocratic practices. One result was that the British\nThe result has been a compromise in which both schools are repre-\nMinister was offended when his wife was once left unattended to\nsented with amazing harmony and success, though there are still many\nfind herself a place at dinner. Jefferson's informality was widely\ngrotesque inconsistencies to be overcome. The east room still retains\npopular, but John Adams, who was being criticized by implication,\nthe imperial atmosphere of its design. Mrs. Hoover contributed 50\nremarked that he really did not think that he was less of a democrat\ngilt chairs of its style and period, to be used when the occasion\nor more of a monarchist because he preferred to curl his hair, where-\ndemanded. In several other rooms the colonial influence predomi-\nas Jefferson wore his straight.\nnates. Lincoln's four-poster 9-foot walnut bed still remains in the\nThen James Madison became President, and Dolly Madison, now\nLincoln bedroom on the second floor, and Mrs. Coolidge covered it\nmistress of the White House in her own right, became the most bril-\nwith a crocheted bedspread which she spent 2 years in making. An\nliant hostess the Capital ever knew. For 8 years thereafter she\nenthusiast for colonial furniture, she also secured many interesting\nexercised her tact and charm to mollify political opponents, and win\npieces for the several colonial rooms.\nthe confidence of provincial and hesitant guests. At the weekly\nMrs. Hoover's sitting room, on the second floor, was once the private\nstate dinners she generally took the head of the long table while\nparlor of Mrs. James Monroe, SO she made a permanent restoration of\nthe President, preoccupied with his administrative problems, sat\nthis room by having the original furniture in the Monroe Museum at\nsilent at a place halfway down. Her entertainments were expensive,\nFredericksburg, Va., duplicated. The Smithsonian donated an Astor\nfor her table was lavishly supplied. Dinners and balls were bril-\npiano to complete its fittings.\nliant reproductions of pre-Revolutionary soirees in Paris. At din-\nIt was not the furniture SO much as the habitability of the White\nner, a servant stood behind each guest. Levees were held every\nHouse itself that perplexed its earlier mistresses. The Adams family\nweek, and grand receptions on New Year's and Independence Days.\nhad a trying 4 years of it, and conditions were only slightly better\nSo far as social functions were concerned the President seemed\nby the time Jefferson succeeded Adams. The east walls of the house\ncontent to play a secondary part. On a visit to the Capital in 1811\nwere still unplastered and the grounds unimproved when he took\nWashington Irving wrote: \"Mrs. Madison is a fine, portly, buxom\npossession, but he made the mansion fully habitable, besides carrying\ndame, who has a smile and a pleasant word for everybody.\nthrough some unrealized features of the Hoban plan. These included\nBut as to Jemmy Madison-Ah! poor Jemmy !-he is but a withered\nterraces in the form of wings adjoining the east and west facades\nlittle apple-John.\"\nalong lines very similar to those which Hoban later rebuilt. But\nMany of Dolly Madison's coreligionists in the Society of Friends,\nJefferson marred their appearance with long rows of one-story\nor Quakers, and many democratically minded citizens as well, were\n\"offices\" in front of them, which served also as \"meat house, wine\noffended by the luxury of the Madison household; for its mistress\ncellar, coal and wood sheds and privies.\"\ndrove about in a chariot costing $1,500, and clothed herself in\nJefferson was a widower. For official entertainments he called to\ngowns, jewels, shoes, and turbans from New York and Paris. She\nhis aid as mistress of the White House the inimitable Dolly Madison.\nused rouge, dipped snuff, and played at \"One Hundred\", a contem-\n20\n21"
}