For Immediate Release Contact: Pat Kremer/Nancy O’Shea (312) 665-7100 (For Media Use Only) Outstanding First Ladies: A Sample of the Century Every first lady has left her own mark on the position. And some, like Jacqueline Kennedy, have been fascinating and accomplished figures in their own right. Lucy Webb Hayes, for example, was the first first lady to hold a college degree. She crusaded for temperance in a liquor-soaked era and had an early interest in women’s rights—though she abandoned it to support her husband’s agenda. Lou Henry Hoover was the first woman to receive a geology degree from Stanford University; in collaboration with her husband Herbert, she translated a sixteenth-century Latin treatise on mining, De Re Metallica, that had long defied translators. She was also the first first lady to give speeches—including some remarkably feminist ones—on the radio. Many people today remember Betty Bloomer Ford’s candor about her breast cancer, which motivated women across the nation to get exams, and her treatment for dependence on prescription drugs, which led her to found the Betty Ford Center. Fewer remember her early career as a dancer with Martha Graham or her energetic efforts on behalf of the Equal Rights Amendment. And Nancy Davis Reagan, best known for her “Just Say No” antidrug campaign, is said to have strongly influenced her husband’s travel schedule, his hiring and firing, and even his political agenda. Following are some other first ladies of influence and personal achievement. Continue