Nancy Reagan

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**Nancy Davis Reagan**

Born	July 6 1921 (age 88) Manhattan, New York, US
Occupation	First Lady of the United States
Predecessor	Rosalynn Carter
Successor	Barbara Bush
Spouse	Ronald Reagan
Children	Patti, Ron
Parents	Kennth Seymour Robbins and Edith Luckett

Nancy Davis Reagan (born July 6, 1921) is the widow of Ronald Reagan and was First Lady of the United States from 1981 to 1989. She was an actress prior to her marriage.

1 Early life
2 Actress
3 Marriage and family
4 First Lady of California
5 First Lady of the United States
6 Later life
7 References in pop culture
8 External links

[edit] Early life

She was born Anne Frances Robbins in Manhattan, New York to Kenneth Seymour Robbins and his actress wife, Edith Luckett. Although her parents divorced in 1928, they were separated for a while before that. Nancy was raised by her aunt and uncle for some part of her childhood, as her mother took acting jobs throughout the country. Nancy had no contact with her father during this time. In 1929, her mother married Dr. Loyal Davis, a neurosurgeon. Dr. Davis adopted Nancy, and she grew up in Chicago. Nancy's godmother was Russian-born silent film star Alla Nazimova, who was friends with her mother from the theater world. She received her formal education at Girls' Latin School and at Smith College in Massachusetts, where she majored in theater.

[edit] Actress

Soon after graduation she became a professional actress using the stage name Nancy Davis. She toured with a road company, then landed a role in the Broadway theatre stage musical Lute Song starring Mary Martin. It was her only Broadway show, but she continued performing in smaller theaters. One performance drew an offer from Hollywood.

She eventually signed on as a contract player at MGM Studios. Davis appeared in 11 feature films, beginning in 1949, when she appeared in minor roles in two feature films: The Doctor and the Girl starring Glenn Ford and East Side, West Side starring Barbara Stanwyck. She played a psychiatrist in the film noir Shadow on the Wall (1950) with Ann Sothern and Zachary Scott. Her first co-starring lead role (opposite James Whitmore who got first billing) was in the religious drama The Next Voice You Hear ... (1950). She then starred in the 1953 science fiction film Donovan's Brain. In her second to the last movie, Hellcats of the Navy (1957), she shared the screen for the only time with her husband. After her final film, the airplane disaster movie Crash Landing, released in 1958, she appeared in television dramas such as Wagon Train until 1962, after which she retired as an actress.

In most of her roles, Nancy Davis played decent, godly, morally incorruptible characters, whose overall unremarkableness limited her visibility as an actress. Critics have said her best performance was in The Next Voice You Hear ..., where she plays a surprisingly rationalist 1950s housewife who hears the voice of God from her radio. [1]Nancy's favorite screen role was that from East Side West Side.

She also served on the Screen Actors Guild Board for nearly 10 years, during which time she would marry Ronald Reagan, who was president of the guild. [2]

[edit] Marriage and family

Nancy and Ronald Reagan married in 1952.

She met Ronald Reagan in 1951, when he was president of the Screen Actors Guild (SAG) and an actress with the same name had appeared on the Hollywood blacklist. This name confusion with the other actress was a concern of Nancy Davis in maintaining her employment as a SAG actress in Hollywood, and she was put in contact with Reagan for help in getting her name off this list. On March 4,1952, they were married in a simple ceremony in the San Fernando Valley of Los Angeles in the Little Brown Church in the Valley. "My life really began when I married my husband," she would later say. [3]

The Reagans had two children born from their marriage. Daughter Patti Davis (referred to by her professional name) was born on October 21,1952, seven months after the couple's wedding. Son Ron Reagan was born on May 20, 1958. Nancy Reagan is also stepmother to Michael Reagan and the late Maureen Reagan, the children of Ronald Reagan's first marriage to actress Jane Wyman.

[edit] First Lady of California

Nancy Reagan was First Lady of California from 1967 to 1975, during her husband's two terms as governor.

She attracted controversy at the start of her stint when she moved out of the Governor's Mansion in Sacramento, after fire officials had described it as a "firetrap", and into a wealthy suburb. This move was perceived by many as snobbery. [4]

As California first lady, she visited veterans, the elderly, and the handicapped, and worked in conjunction with a number of charitable groups. [5] She began her involvement with the Foster Grandparent Program, which she would continue once in Washington. [6]

[edit] First Lady of the United States

Image:MrsReaganMrT.jpg

As First Lady, Nancy Reagan attracted controversy early on by announcing the purchase of $200,000 worth of new china for the White House — albeit paid for by a private foundation — at a time when the nation was undergoing a recession; together with her taste for expensive fashion, it gave her an image of being out-of-touch with the concerns of ordinary Americans. She was able to deflect some of this criticism in 1982 at the Gridiron Dinner when she self-deprecatingly donned ragged clothes and sang "Second-Hand Rose". [7]

Nancy Reagan was famous for the adoring look she fastened upon her husband during his speeches and appearances. Although most political spouses do this to some extent, Nancy's was so focused and attentive that it was given the nickname "The Gaze". [8] [9] Behind the scenes, though, Nancy Reagan had some influence in White House operations, especially over personnel matters and her husband's image and legacy. [10]. She became close friends with Katharine Graham, publisher of the Washington Post, having been introduced by their mutual friend Truman Capote, and throughout her later years in the White House met for weekly lunches with Graham and Post editorial page editor Meg Greenfield. Nancy Reagan is widely considered to have exercised a somewhat moderating influence over White House policy, particularly during the President's second term.

Reagan is well-remembered for conservative fashions emulated by many women of the time, for championing the "Just Say No" campaign against juvenile drug use[11], and for her personal use of astrology. She had, in fact, a personal astrologer named Joan Quigley during her time as First Lady; the astrologer(s) were particularly used after the 1981 assassination attempt when she became nothing short of obsessed with her husband's personal safety. It finally became a major embarrassment, as it was disclosed that Nancy influenced the White House time schedule of her husband. Days were color-coded according to the astrologer's advice, being classified as "good" days, "neutral" days, or days that should be avoided. The White House Chief of Staff, Donald Regan, finally became extremely frustrated with this regime, causing a power struggle between Regan and the First Lady. Regan resigned in 1987.

In October 1987, Nancy Reagan was discovered to have breast cancer and underwent a mastectomy. [12]

Kitty Kelley's 1991 book Nancy Reagan: The Unauthorized Biography became the fastest-selling biography in publishing history. It included controversial details about the former First Lady's involvement with astrology and White House meetings with Frank Sinatra.

In 1983 Reagan, along with former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger and philanthropists Barbara and Marvin Davis, appeared as herself in an episode of the highly popular primetime soap opera Dynasty. In addition, Reagan appeared as herself in an episode of the popular sitcom Diff'rent Strokes to underscore her support for her "Just Say No" anti-drug campaign.

[edit] Later life

Image:Mrs. Reagan.jpg

Nancy Reagan currently resides in Bel Air, Los Angeles, California, where she had tended to the former President who, before his death on June 5, 2004, was debilitated by Alzheimer's disease. She also urged President George W. Bush to support embryonic stem cell research, in the hopes that such research would lead to a cure for Alzheimer's disease. She has not been notably successful in changing the President's opinion.

In 2004, Warner Books published "Ronnie and Nancy: Their Path to the White House, 1911-1980" by Bob Colacello, a longtime Vanity Fair writer and friend of Mrs. Reagan.

Mrs. Reagan was briefly hospitalized in 2005 after she slipped and fell in her hotel room in London, where she had gone to visit Margaret Thatcher and Prince Charles.

[edit] References in pop culture

During her time as First Lady, her Secret Service code name was "Rainbow."
Sun City Girls have a song entitled "Nancy Reagan" on their 1987 album, Horse Cock Phepner.
The 1988 DC Comics limited series Millennium revealed the Nancy Reagan of the DC Comics universe had been killed by a race of evil robots known as Manhunters and replaced with an android duplicate. The android Nancy Reagan was still active following the end of the series, although any future activities in which she may have participated are unrecorded.
Melanie Chartoff and Terry Sweeney are known for doing devastatingly accurate impersonations of Nancy Reagan on their respective sketch comedy shows (Chartoff on "Fridays" and Sweeney on "Saturday Night Live").
Mission of Burma's 2006 album, The Obliterati, features a song titled "Nancy Reagan's Head" and contains the line "I'm haunted by the freakish size of Nancy Reagan's head / no way that thing came with that body."
The Violent Femmes have a song called "Old Mother Reagan".