FIRST LADY MAMIE DOUD EISENHOWER - AUTOGRAPH LETTER SIGNED 10/20/1965 - HFSID 295464

MAMIE DOUD EISENHOWER
Handwritten letter to a good friend, with rich content on family matters, accompanied by the envelope addressed and signed in her hand.
Autograph Letter signed: "Mamie E", 2 pages (front and verso), 4x6. No place, but postmarked Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, 1965 October 20. To "Dear Frances" [Strecker], in full: "Thank you for writing and telling me about Mary Ryan. She was just my age - too bad. Rec'd a letter from Eileen and Miss Archibald other day saying she and Bob were moving into an apt. Her son John will live at 700 Lafayette. She is the last of the old timers to move from that block. All young families. We keep very busy. Just back from New York where Ike was decorated by the Austrian government. Spent his birthday at John & Barbie's. - children getting so big. Off for Augusta Natl. Golf Club on the 26th for a month. Not going to Desert until after Xmas. I am sure you are happier on the North Shore than Denver. Affectionate regards to you & yours". Accompanied by original envelope addressed and signed in her hand. On July 1, 1916, 25-year-old Second Lieutenant Dwight D. Eisenhower (1890-1969) and 19-year-old Mamie Geneva Doud (1896-1979) were married in Denver, Colorado, at the Doud family home, 750 Lafayette, he neighborhood mentioned in this letter. They had two sons: Dwight Doud Eisenhower (1917-1920) and John Sheldon Doud Eisenhower (born in 1923). As an Army wife for 37 years, Mamie grew accustomed to entertaining groups of influential people, a talent she drew upon during her eight years as the White House hostess (1953-1961). In their 53 years of married life, the Eisenhower's lived in 33 homes; their last in Gettysburg was the only home they owned together. During Ike's final illness, Mamie moved into Walter Reed Army Hospital to be with him during the final months of his life. Dwight D. Eisenhower, the fifth general to be elected President, served as the nations' 34th President from 1953 to 1961. The "children" mentioned in the letter are Ike and Mamie's grandchildren, including Dwight David Eisenhower, who would later marry Julie Nixon, daughter of Eisenhower's Vice President Richard Nixon. From the collection of George Strecker, an advertising executive at the Chicago Tribune who became close to the Eisenhower's through his wife, Frances, a long-time friend with Mamie Doud Eisenhower. Fold through center. Fine condition.