re: #366 CuriousLurker

Seriously, she wouldn’t let him in the house? Sheesh.

Yep, she retreated from DC when Truman was president and lived in their white clapboard home in Independence, Mo. I don’t think she could deal with it.
They had a strong marriage.
“Bess found the White House’s lack of privacy distasteful. As her husband put it later, she was “not especially interested” in the “formalities and pomp or the artificiality which, as we had learned…, inevitably surround the family of the President Harry Truman.” Though she steadfastly fulfilled the social obligations of her position, she did only what she thought was necessary. When the White House was rebuilt during Truman’s second term, the family lived in Blair House and kept their social life to a minimum. In most years of her husband’s presidency Mrs. Truman did not live in Washington other than during the social season when her presence was expected.”