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First Father, First Daughter: A Memoir
Offers an inside account of the workings of the Reagan administration and of the President's relationship with his elder daughter, presenting many never-before-published anecdotes about the president
444 pages, Hardcover
First published April 3, 1989
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Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
June 12, 2024
This is a sensitive, unrestrained look at the relationship between a famous father and his oldest daughter. It is highly sympathetic to Reagan, but it held my interest, and I found no dead spots in the book that would have kept me staring at the progress bar to see how much of the book remained.
This is largely a chronological look at her life and that of her father. It will sadden you as you read about the negative impact of divorce on a seven-year-old girl. They shipped her off to boarding school almost simultaneously, and she felt a great sense of isolation and disconnect. It felt as if she had no real home anywhere.
One of the funniest stories from this period in her life involved a goat Ronald Reagan purchased for Maureen’s brother, Michael. Maureen and Michael sneaked the goat into the back seat of Reagan’s car, and he transported the two kids back to Jane Wyman’s house. Maureen describes her mother as quite formal, and when the goat took a dump on a new white carpet in a new house, poor Jane went apoplectic. Being a busy man, Ronald couldn’t drive back to pick up the goat until the next morning. Her telling of the story is wonderfully humorous.
There’s a tender chapter here on the horrors of spousal abuse, especially as it was in the early ‘60s when Maureen married for the first time. The cop beat her mercilessly, but it was the night he nearly killed her cat she determined she had to leave. Reagan looks at the aftereffects of that kind of abuse, and it’s a chapter worth reading.
You’ll read about her role in the governor campaign of 1966 and 1970, or rather, her lack of it. Ronald Reagan’s campaign consultants didn’t want the candidacy plagued with talk of divorce, so the two children born to Jane Wyman could not participate in the campaign in any way. You can imagine the bruising that caused to the feelings of both Maureen and Michael.
This is a memoir that ranges throughout all the issues of the ‘80s including the ill-fated Equal Rights Amendment which Maureen supported wholeheartedly.
You’ll travel with her to women’s conferences in far-flung Africa, and you’re there when her dad appoints her as chair of the Republican National Committee.
What I haven’t managed to do is convey to you the excellence of Maureen’s writing style and her ability to move you forward in time throughout the ‘80s especially. She doesn’t go into detail about the assassination attempt on her dad, for example. Instead, she shows you the incident from her perspective as the daughter. You get a good idea as to her early-on terror that evolved into a raging anger against the would-be assassin.
She writes about her clashes with then-Chief of Staff Donald Regan. You get her perspective on the Iran-Contra scandal, and while you may know a great deal about Iran-Contra, her take on it will add to your knowledge.
You get a front-row seat on the scuttled nomination of Robert Bork to the high court. The paragraphs on Nancy Reagan’s breast cancer surgery were brief but engaging.
The epilogue is a kind of bitter/sweet experience as you might expect when something as momentous as a presidential father concludes. The bottom line is this entire book is highly readable. I was frankly surprised by how much I enjoyed this.
This is largely a chronological look at her life and that of her father. It will sadden you as you read about the negative impact of divorce on a seven-year-old girl. They shipped her off to boarding school almost simultaneously, and she felt a great sense of isolation and disconnect. It felt as if she had no real home anywhere.
One of the funniest stories from this period in her life involved a goat Ronald Reagan purchased for Maureen’s brother, Michael. Maureen and Michael sneaked the goat into the back seat of Reagan’s car, and he transported the two kids back to Jane Wyman’s house. Maureen describes her mother as quite formal, and when the goat took a dump on a new white carpet in a new house, poor Jane went apoplectic. Being a busy man, Ronald couldn’t drive back to pick up the goat until the next morning. Her telling of the story is wonderfully humorous.
There’s a tender chapter here on the horrors of spousal abuse, especially as it was in the early ‘60s when Maureen married for the first time. The cop beat her mercilessly, but it was the night he nearly killed her cat she determined she had to leave. Reagan looks at the aftereffects of that kind of abuse, and it’s a chapter worth reading.
You’ll read about her role in the governor campaign of 1966 and 1970, or rather, her lack of it. Ronald Reagan’s campaign consultants didn’t want the candidacy plagued with talk of divorce, so the two children born to Jane Wyman could not participate in the campaign in any way. You can imagine the bruising that caused to the feelings of both Maureen and Michael.
This is a memoir that ranges throughout all the issues of the ‘80s including the ill-fated Equal Rights Amendment which Maureen supported wholeheartedly.
You’ll travel with her to women’s conferences in far-flung Africa, and you’re there when her dad appoints her as chair of the Republican National Committee.
What I haven’t managed to do is convey to you the excellence of Maureen’s writing style and her ability to move you forward in time throughout the ‘80s especially. She doesn’t go into detail about the assassination attempt on her dad, for example. Instead, she shows you the incident from her perspective as the daughter. You get a good idea as to her early-on terror that evolved into a raging anger against the would-be assassin.
She writes about her clashes with then-Chief of Staff Donald Regan. You get her perspective on the Iran-Contra scandal, and while you may know a great deal about Iran-Contra, her take on it will add to your knowledge.
You get a front-row seat on the scuttled nomination of Robert Bork to the high court. The paragraphs on Nancy Reagan’s breast cancer surgery were brief but engaging.
The epilogue is a kind of bitter/sweet experience as you might expect when something as momentous as a presidential father concludes. The bottom line is this entire book is highly readable. I was frankly surprised by how much I enjoyed this.
June 22, 2012
I am a huge Reagan fan. He is by far my favorite President. This book was written by his oldest child. There is good insight into Reagan's first marriage and a little info about the adoption of Michael. Did you know that Maureen was a Republican before her dad was? She was also instrumental in getting an autographed baseball signed by both President Reagan and General Secretary Gorbachev for the great baseball player Joe DiMaggio This book also reveals was Maureen like and disliked in the Reagan administration. It details the time she ran for office and gives an overview of her three marriages. Anyone who wants to learn more about the Reagan family will enjoy this book.
January 1, 2011
Not my favorite prersident
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews