Her Life in Boone
Mamie Geneva Doud, named, in part, after the popular song, Lovely Lake Geneva, was born November 14, 1896 at 718 Carroll Street in Boone, Iowa, the second of four daughters born to Elivera Mathilde Carlson and John Sheldon Doud. She grew up to become the wife of the 34th President of the United States, Dwight David Eisenhower.
The Douds emigrated to the U.S. from England, settling first in Connecticut and later in Rome, New York. Mamie’s paternal grandfather entered the meat packing business in the 1870s and moved his family to Chicago. By the early 1890s, Mamie’s father was managing a subsidiary meat packing enterprise in Boone where he met and, in 1894, married the daughter of Carl and Johanna Maria Carlson.
On July 1, 1916, Mamie Doud married Dwight D. Eisenhower at her parents’ home in Denver, Colorado. The photo on the lower right was taken just before the ceremony—Eisenhower remained standing to avoid wrinkling his freshly ironed uniform. The couple honeymooned in Colorado and Abilene, Kansas, before settling at Fort Sam Houston in San Antonio, Texas, where Ike was stationed. Mamie’s miniature West Branch engagement ring is now on display at the Eisenhower Presidential Library and Museum in Abilene—a worthwhile stop for history lovers.
Mamie’s maternal grandfather, Carl Carlson, a Swedish immigrant, settled in Boone County in 1868. The following year he sent to Sweden for his wife and his oldest son. Mamie’s mother, Elivera, was born in Boone ten years later. Mr. Carlson entered the milling business in 1870, which was later purchased by the Doud family.
When Mamie was nine months old, the Douds moved to Cedar Rapids, where John Doud became a buyer for the T. M. Sinclair Co. By 1905, after making a fortune in the meat-packing industry, John Doud—at age 36—partially retired and moved his family to Colorado, settling first in Pueblo, then in Colorado Springs, and finally in Denver. The Douds spent winter vacations at their second home in San Antonio, Texas.
Eisenhower wore a Nettie Rosenstein gown to the 1953 inaugural balls. It was a pink peau de soie gown embroidered with more than 2,000 rhinestones. It is one of the most popular in the Smithsonian National Museum of American History’s collection of inaugural gowns. Mamie paired the gown with matching gloves, jewelry by Trifari, and carried a beaded purse by Judith Leiber. Her shoes by Delman had her name printed on the left instep.
Mamie’s fondness for a specific shade of pink, often called “First Lady” or “Mamie” pink, kicked off a national trend for pink clothing, housewares, and bathrooms.
As First Lady, Mamie was a gracious hostess but carefully guarded her privacy. A victim of Ménière’s disease, an inner-ear disorder that affects equilibrium, she was uneasy on her feet, which fed rumors that she had a drinking problem; she did not.
Mamie never lost contact with her mother’s Boone family, the Carlsons. Throughout the 1940s, 1950s, and 1960s, the Eisenhowers regularly visited Boone, especially during Ike’s presidency and after his retirement. Mamie was also quite active with her favorite charities, served on the boards of three colleges, and performed other civic duties.
After eight years in the White House, Mamie and Ike retired to their home in Gettysburg in 1961; they also had a retirement home in Palm Desert, California.
In 1968 David Eisenhower, Mamie’s grandson, married Richard Nixon’s daughter, Julie, bringing the two families closer together. The Nixons regularly invited Mamie to the White House, including her in their Christmas dinners. After her husband’s death in 1969, Mamie continued to live full time on the farm until she took an apartment in Washington, D.C. in the late 1970s. She appeared in a campaign commercial for her husband’s former Vice President, Richard Nixon, in 1972.
After Ike’s death in 1969, Mamie continued to visit Boone, making her last trip in 1977, two years before her death. She suffered a stroke on September 25, 1979 and was rushed to Walter Reed Army Medical Center, where her husband had died a decade before. She remained in the hospital, and on October 31st, announced to her granddaughter, Mary Jean, that she would die the next day. She died in her sleep very early the morning of November 1,1979, at the age of 82. Mamie was buried beside her husband on the grounds of the Dwight David Eisenhower Presidential Library and Museum in Abilene, Kansas.
Mamie with her and Ike's second son, John Sheldon Doud Eisenhower. John was born on August 3rd, 1922.
On June 22, 1980, Mamie’s birthplace in Boone was dedicated as a historic site; Abigail Adams is the only other First Lady to be so honored. The main east–west street in Boone (Fourth Street) is now called Mamie Eisenhower Avenue.
Because of her connection with the city of Denver and the area surrounding, a park in southeast Denver was given Mamie’s name, as well as a public library in Broomfield, Colorado, a suburb of Denver. Mamie was inducted into the Colorado Women’s Hall of Fame in 1985.
Mamie was only the second First Lady to be born west of the Mississippi River. The first, also an Iowan, was Lou Henry Hoover, born in 1874 in Waterloo, Iowa. Mamie was the last First Lady to be born in the 19th century.
Information provided by Boone County Historical Society.