Mrs. Calvin Coolidge at White Oak Mountain
Grace Goodhue Coolidge was a popular First Lady while her husband, Calvin, served as the 30th President of the United States during the 1920s. They were an unlikely pair. Grace was an outgoing, intelligent woman who loved having a good time, bright colors, animals, and sports, especially baseball. She even had a pet raccoon while living in the White House. There, Grace was one of Calvin’s most important assets. The Secret Service called her, “Sunshine.” However, she was never encouraged to share her opinions, political or otherwise, and she wasn’t even consulted about State Dinners where she was expected to be a charming hostess. And she always was.
courtesy The White House Historical Association
Despite his solemn manner, Calvin adored Grace and loved for her to dress in the fashion of the day. Some historians have referred to her as the first “Jackie O.” Grace Coolidge and Nancy Reagan were the only First Ladies dressed in bright red for their official White House portraits!
In 1929 the Coolidges retired to Northampton, Massachusetts so that Grace could be close to the Clarke School for the Deaf and Blind, an institution where she taught as a young woman and that she supported throughout her adult life. In 1933 the Republican former President suddenly dropped dead of a heart attack. Grace was lost. She told her friends, “I am a lost soul. Nobody is going to believe how I miss being told what to do. My father told me what to do; then Calvin told me what to do.”
She was not lost for long, due to her friendship with neighbor Florence Bannard Adams, who was already free of men telling her what to do, a Smith College alumna, a staunch Democrat and a divorcée. Her first Christmas after Calvin’s death, Grace accompanied “Florrie” to Slick Rock, a rustic (but New York architect-designed) vacation lodge on White Oak Mountain near Tryon built in 1918 by Florrie’s uncle, New York financier Otto Tremont Bannard. It would be the beginning of many such trips with Florrie driving south 950 miles from Northampton with fearless enthusiasm, taking only three days to cover the route. For the first few years, the ladies stayed at Slick Rock during their months-long visits. Grace’s signature can still be found in its guest book.
After Uncle Otto died in 1929, Florrie and Grace decided to build their own mountain retreat on land Mrs. Adams inherited from his estate. And what a residence it turned out to be, with ten rooms and wide glass windows to provide magnificent views of sky, sunsets, and gathering weather to both North and South. They engaged a contractor from Northampton to oversee the planning and hired Karl S. Putnam, professor at Smith College, to design. The residence was aptly named The Narrows, as it was carved into a narrow mountain ledge five miles up White Oak Mountain Road. They also built a simple caretaker’s house where they could stay while The Narrows was being constructed. On some visits they stayed at The Mimosa resort, between Tryon and Columbus, the Polk County seat. It was an unpretentious, comfortable place. On Sundays, Grace preferred to attend services at little country churches instead of a “town” church in Tryon.
Boston Globe May 6, 1935
The Narrows was finished in June, 1937 without Mrs. Adams’s need for any financial contribution from Grace Coolidge. She sold her Northampton mansion The Beeches where the Coolidges lived their few post-Presidential years together. With her Depression-diminished proceeds, Grace built a modest Massachusetts home for herself and surviving son. Florrie was close to her daughter Jane, who loved The Narrows and brought her new husband, a Princeton professor, down to spend Christmas 1939. Mrs. Coolidge had become so close to their family that when Jane was married that year she skipped the dedication of the grand new Coolidge Memorial Bridge, so she could attend the wedding ceremony.
Glimpse of The Narrows in 1945. During a subsequent ownership it burned to the ground in 1961.
Grace reveled in her freedom, sharing Florrie’s lifestyle. The former First Lady changed outwardly during the years when she vacationed on White Oak Mountain. She bobbed her hair, which caused a media frenzy; she began to wear trousers, and occasionally smoked in public. Grace and Florrie read voraciously, cross-stitched, played cards, and worked crossword puzzles. They often cooked outside and slept on the terrace. And they hiked all over the big mountain, most of it undeveloped. It became her restoring balm, a “place of uninterrupted solitude.”
Friends together at White Oak Mountain. Florence Adams at left, Grace Coolidge second from right. Photo courtesy Janet W. Dodge.
Newspaper articles tell how Coolidge and Adams were honored guests at the Tryon Riding & Hunt Club horse shows. Locals treated Grace with great respect and guarded their privacy. Mrs. Charles Dawes, wife of Calvin Coolidge’s Vice President, came by for an informal visit in 1938. During their husbands’ political times together, they’d had serious policy conflicts, but this was a relaxed social occasion.
In a letter to her son John, Grace wrote from the mountain, “I see miles and miles of red fields prepared for new seed. Here and there are patches of evergreen trees and green meadows with the Green River winding in and out. Beyond, the mountain ranges are tiered purple and a little smoky today as a few forest fires are burning. I took my book and went out to the Easter rocks.”
View from Sunrise Rock, courtesy White Oak Mountain Association
During the second World War, Adams and Coolidge families vacationed at The Narrows; Grace leased her Northampton home to WAVE military service women and lived at Florrie Adams’ house there. In ’47 they entertained guests from New England at White Oak Mountain. In ’48 Florrie sold The Narrows to poet Royal Fowler from Connecticut, and bought another property intended for the use of her daughter’s growing family. Grace Coolidge continued to visit the Tryon vicinity until 1950.
1939 letter on The Narrows stationery to her chauffeur John Bukosky who she called “Johnny-jump-up.” To Florrie, she’d write letters signed “Squeak.” They relished memorable adventures together in their touring convertible they called “Oliver.” In 1936 they sailed to Europe together for a six-month driving tour that covered ten countries and 12,000 miles.
As a resident on White Oak Mountain, I take great pleasure in knowing our Mountain gave such joy to a First Lady who gave so much to her husband, her family, her country, her friends, and those in need. Susan S. Speight April 2023
