The Triumph of Nancy Reagan

by Karen Tumulty

  Vietnam Veterans Memorial on the National Mall: Kuhn, author interview, February 28, 2019.

  “If we weren’t comfortable with it… it wouldn’t happen”: Joe Petro, interview by author, New York, February 23, 2017.

  the two of them had been talking once a year or so ever since: Joan Quigley, “What Does Joan Say?” My Seven Years as White House Astrologer to Nancy and Ronald Reagan (New York: Birch Lane Press, 1990), 43.

  take off on the day of a debate: ibid., 60–61.

  “Oh, my God.… shoot at him again.”: Nancy Reagan with Novak, My Turn, 37–39.

  Nancy was soon confiding… health of her parents: ibid., 36–45.

  “Was astrology one of the reasons?… I’m not sorry I did it”: ibid., 38–39.

  “If it makes you feel better… odd if it ever came out”: ibid., 42–43.

  “Mike is a born chamberlain… servant to the great”: Regan, For the Record, 74.

  “When I look back… innocent enough quirk”: Deaver, Nancy, 138–39.

  Deaver would dither over making a decision… by medical advice on how to avoid jet lag: Henkel, author interview, October 17, 2017.

  “I assumed it had to do with checking their social engagements and public commitments… dates and desirability of a visit”: Roosevelt, Keeper, 205.

  “He was beating the shit out of me,” Henkel said: Henkel, author interview, October 17, 2017.

  He began keeping a color-coded… commence negotiations with foreign powers”: Regan, For the Record, 4.

  “The president’s schedule… movements of the planets,” he wrote later: ibid., 82.

  “At the end of the day… deep admiration for her”: Henkel, author interview, October 17, 2017.

  “What it boils down to… except, possibly me”: Nancy Reagan with Novak, My Turn, 44.

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  “There is a secret thought that the offspring of famous people… deep inside us, we think they’re right”: Patti Davis, The Long Goodbye (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2004), 226.

  “During Ronnie’s presidency… sometimes fell short of those values”: Nancy Reagan with Novak, My Turn, 124.

  “a talented dancer who has worked very hard and who has done extremely well for a late starter”: Anna Kisselgoff, “Joffrey Ballet’s Gala: Diana Ross and Ron Reagan,” New York Times, March 16, 1981, B6.

  “He thinks we’re interfering with his privacy.… reasons of the Nation’s welfare”: Brinkley, Reagan Diaries, 85. This comes from the following entries into Ronald Reagan’s diary: May 15, 1982: he wants to Sign off Secret Svc. for a month. S.S. Knows he’s a real target—lives in a N.Y.C. Area where the Puerto Rican terrorist group is active in fact he’s on a hit list. He thinks we’re interfering with his privacy. I can’t make him see that I can’t be put in a position of one day facing a ransom demand. I’d have to refuse for reasons for the Nation’s welfare.

  May 23, 1982: At home all day. Ron came down from N.Y. He’s a little rebellious and wanted us to sign off S.S. protection for a month. He’s the only one of the kids who is on the hit list of groups like FALN, etc. Ed Hickey came over and it’s all straightened out.

  The weekend of March 19–20, 1983: Ron came down for a talk at the W.H. Same old problem—his itchiness at having S.S. protection. I wish he’d be more thoughtful of what it means to me to have him do that.

  April 7, 1983: This evening Ron called all exercised because S.S. agents had gone into their apartment while they were in Calif. to fix an alarm on one of the windows. I tried to reason with him that this was a perfectly O.K. thing for them to do.… I told him quite firmly not to talk to me that way & he hung up on me. End of a not perfect day.

  May 1, 1983: Nancy phoned—very upset. Ron casually told the S.S. he was going to Paris in a few days. I don’t know what it is with him. He refuses to cooperate with them.… I’m not talking to him until he apologizes for hanging up on me.

  May 19, 1983: Meets with Regan, who as Treasury secretary is in charge of the Secret Service, about “Ron & his paranoia about S.S. protection. I think he’s being ridiculous & d—n unfair to the guys who are trying to protect his hide. This is settled—we let him sign off permanently—no protection.”

  “He worked hard at a small space… never used his status to his advantage”: Weinberg, Movie Nights with the Reagans, 137.

  a 1986 ad for American Express… continue the conversation in privacy: “American Express Card with Ron Reagan Jr. Classic TV Commercial 1986,” YouTube, 0:55, Front Seat Media, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=va2Mhd5VWaE.

  “These are issues of unique concern to women… also family concerns and community concerns”: Maureen Reagan, First Father, First Daughter, 296–97.

  “Well, Maureen was a little worked up… I shouldn’t have said, too”: Ed Rollins with Tom DeFrank, Bare Knuckles and Back Rooms: My Life in American Politics (New York: Broadway Books, 1996), 101–2.

  “chatting like schoolgirls”: Speakes with Pack, Speaking Out, 98.

  “Michael Reagan always had schemes for making money… ‘Well, Sonny Boy’s at it again.’ ”: ibid., 99.

  “He was a wheeler-dealer.… you just had to know that”: Kuhn, author interview, October 7, 2018.

  It got even dicier… They suggested he get psychiatric help: Michael Reagan with Hyams, Outside Looking In, 219–40.

  “I felt attacked… his Achilles’ heel: Nancy”: ibid., 228.

  “We’ve tried to keep a little fuss private… as all families do from time to time”: Reagan Presidential Library, Subject Files, WHORM, PP 0005-01 095999, 247108 5300 4620 PP00J.

  “The wounds are healed”… “Michael, I love you”: ibid., 243–45.

  “They frolicked… worth the price?”: ibid., 250.

  “I love you”: Nancy Reagan with Novak, My Turn, 134

  “It was the first time… I was elated”: Michael Reagan with Hyams, Outside Looking In, 263–68.

  “Ironically, this book… a better relationship”: Nancy Reagan with Novak, My Turn, 134.

  “a literary striptease… a First Family parlor game”: Scot Haler, “The Problem of Being Patti,” People online, February 24, 1986, https://people.com/archive/cover-story-the-problem-of-being-patti-vol-25-no-8.

  “one of the most painful and disappointing aspects of my life… we seem to square off”: Nancy Reagan with Novak, My Turn, 136.

  “Tell you what… happen in my life”: Patti Davis, The Way I See It, 264–66.

  “being used”: ibid., 267–68.

  Caldicott’s later account… Reader’s Digest: Ronnie Dugger, “The President and the Peace Activist,” St. Petersburg (FL) Times, September 30, 1984, 4D.

  “I had hoped that Patti’s wedding… people would understand”: Nancy Reagan with Novak, My Turn, 140–41.

  “Ron’s reaction hurt me more than anyone else’s… motivation in it”: Patti Davis, The Way I See It, 311.

  “Patti was excited that night about her book… such a thing”: Ron Reagan to author, email, August 20, 2019.

  “I think sometimes… only silence and distance”: Patti Davis, Long Goodbye, 80–81.

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  “a steady drumbeat”: “President Reagan’s and Nancy Reagan’s Interview with Chris Wallace for Upcoming NBC Special, Camp David, Maryland,” May 18, 1985, YouTube, 36:23, Reagan Presidential Library, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EhIeW-fbYiM.

  if Ronnie’s name were not at the top of the ticket: Rollins, author interview, January 26, 2018.

  “For a while, we talked about it every night… ‘I’m not crazy about it, but okay’ ”: Nancy Reagan with Novak, My Turn, 224.

  internal numbers: Cannon, President Reagan, 197.

  “I think it’s going to be a tough, personal, close campaign… glad when the next nine months are over”: Nancy Reagan with Novak, My Turn, 225.

  $21 million budget for the 1984 primary season: Rollins with DeFrank, Bare Knuckles, 125.

  She started to worry more… Hart, the insurgent in
the race: Stuart Spencer, quoted in Wallace, First Lady, 116–17.

  “She could smell fear all over you, Rollins. You’re doomed”: Rollins with DeFrank, Bare Knuckles, 137.

  “Don’t forget who your clients are.… Their friends are going to see the commercials”: Rollins, author interview, January 26, 2018.

  “These days… more relaxed speaker”: Maureen Dowd, “A More Relaxed Nancy Reagan Tours the South,” New York Times, October 14, 1984, 28.

  hefty 55-percent-to-37-percent lead… 8 percent of voters undecided: Cannon, President Reagan, 475.

  “I’m against debates… defend his own record”: Nancy Reagan with Novak, My Turn, 225.

  “the worst night of Ronnie’s political career… that debate was a nightmare”: ibid., 226.

  cold as ice: ibid., 226–27.

  “a Reagan without confidence would not be Reagan… must interpret all tales of Nancy Reagan’s ‘ruthlessness’ ”: Garry Wills, Reagan’s America: Innocents at Home (New York: Open Road Integrated Media, 2017), loc. 4781 of 13714, Kindle.

  “In recognizing the actor’s truth… may have been to Baker and Darman”: Cannon, President Reagan, 484.

  “Well, you better be right… better be right”: Rollins with DeFrank, Bare Knuckles, 149–50.

  “Although Nancy Reagan did not realize it… no longer Morning Again in America”: Cannon, President Reagan, 487.

  “If, by some miracle, I could take back one decision… this new arrangement would lead to a political disaster”: Nancy Reagan with Novak, My Turn, 267.

  “a bad omen”: ibid., 230.

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  “It also made me squirm… weakened both the Justice Department and the presidency”: Nancy Reagan with Novak, My Turn, 203.

  “listened to our words… did not occur to me”: Regan, For the Record, 251.

  “He seemed to be absorbing… settled by some absent party”: ibid., 255.

  “blending the gifts of Ronald Reagan with the proper pageantry”: Deaver, Behind the Scenes, 179.

  license to use the president’s first name to his face: ibid., 195–97.

  allow him unfettered access to the White House grounds: Fred Ryan, interview by author, Washington, DC, January 22, 2020.

  “Could be”: Henkel, author interview, October 17, 2017.

  “snake-check that son of a bitch for everything he’s worth”: Deaver, Behind the Scenes, 185.

  “Everything we were doing… that Joan didn’t plan on”: Henkel, author interview, October 17, 2017.

  “a nightmare”: Cannon, President Reagan, 67.

  “his agony… transmitted itself, via television, into millions of human hearts”: Morris, Dutch, 532.

  “We survived… …would have been a blip on the screen”: Rollins with DeFrank, Bare Knuckles, 164.

  “Her power was everywhere… She was everywhere”: Peggy Noonan, What I Saw at the Revolution: A Political Life in the Reagan Era (New York: Random House, 1990), 163.

  “Suddenly, looming up in full view of the scope… and perhaps the world?”: Hutton, interview, April 15–16, 2004, Miller Center.

  “It’s cancer.”: Speakes with Pack, Speaking Out, 186.

  “Her aplomb was extraordinary… we then explained the procedure we would perform”: ibid.

  “Goddamn it,” she said. “I knew he was going to do that”: Kuhn, author interview, February 28, 2019. Kuhn was in the room with Nancy Reagan.

  “Because in her opinion he couldn’t be tired out this way… looked very peculiar”: Donald Regan, interview by Lou Cannon, May 17, 1989, transcript in Lou Cannon Papers, University of California at Santa Barbara.

  “cancel the damn helicopter”: Regan, For the Record, 14–15.

  never again to withhold medical information about him from the public: Speakes with Pack, Speaking Out, 194–202.

  A little over two years later… “It will be all right”: All dialogue comes from Hutton, interview, April 15–16, 2004, Miller Center.

  “lifted me from the pit I was in and kept me out of it”: Ronald Reagan, An American Life, loc. 10328 of 12608, Kindle.

  “It was full of love and concern… wishing it had come from my own daughter”: Nancy Reagan with Novak, My Turn, 255–56.

  “Believe me, no one knows… it really isn’t so bad”: Nancy Reagan to Betty Cuniberti, 1988; letter provided to author by Cuniberti.

  He had never seen his wife in such pain: Ronald Reagan, An American Life, loc. 10356 of 12608, Kindle.

  Ronnie delivered a graceful eulogy… “already broken heart”: Nancy Reagan with Novak, My Turn, 263.

  “Those first few months in the White House… side by side”: Morris, Dutch, xiii–xvii.

  “When I began writing… what feels good in one’s heart is usually sincere writing”: Wendy Smith, “Edmund Morris: Writer Behind the Throne,” Publishers Weekly online, October 11, 1999, https://www.publishersweekly.com/pw/print/19991013/29478-edmund-morris-writer-behind-the-throne.html.

  “Well, he’s pretty simple as far as I’m concerned… no big mystery here”: Deaver, interview, September 12, 2002, Miller Center.

  “I still don’t fully understand my father… more clues, more threads to tie together”: Patti Davis, “Finally Seeing My Father—Through Edmund’s Eyes,” Washington Post online, October 10, 1999, http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/WPcap/1999-10/10/034r-101099-idx.html.

  “comes as near as any book I’ve read to capturing my father’s elusive nature”: Ron Reagan, My Father at 100, 6.

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  “At first, we thought it was gay men… Haitians—which was a mistake”: Dr. Anthony Fauci, interview by author, Bethesda, MD, January 30, 2018.

  Annals of Internal Medicine: Anthony S. Fauci, “The Syndrome of Kaposi’s Sarcoma and Opportunistic Infections: An Epidemiologically Restricted Disorder of Immunoregulation,” Annals of Internal Medicine 96, no. 6 (June 1, 1982): 777–79, https://doi.org/10.7326/0003-4819-96-6-777.

  Though more than half of those stricken… on the inside pages: Randy Shilts, And the Band Played On: People, Politics, and the AIDS Epidemic (New York: Penguin Books, 1988), 191.

  “It was clear that there was sort of a muted silence… bully pulpit to sound the alarm”: Fauci, author interview, January 30, 2018.

  “By that time… 20,849 had died”: Shilts, And the Band Played On, 596.

  “Jail will kill him”: Michael K. Deaver and Mickey Herskowitz, “The Invincible Nancy,” Washington Post online. February 21, 1988, https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/opinions/1988/02/21/the-invincible-nancy/24c8ed84-aff5-40aa-a645-37b881bc6803.

  Their family friend Doug Wick… changed the perceptions of some in his circle who misunderstood her: Wick, author interview, July 13, 2017. Another account of the episode at the wedding reception: Trish Bendix, “The ‘Lesbian Writer’ Who Danced with Nancy Reagan,” Into More online, April 3, 2018, https://www.intomore.com/culture/the-lesbian-writer-who-danced-with-nancy-reagan.

  “maybe the Lord brought down this plague” because “illicit sex is against the Ten Commandments”: Morris, Dutch, 458. Confirmed in author interview with Morris, August 7, 2017.

  “ ‘If those fellows don’t leave me alone, I’ll just slap them on the wrist’ ”: Speakes with Pack, Speaking Out, 103.

  “I don’t have it. And you? Do you?” German Lopez, “The Reagan Administration’s Unbelievable Response to the HIV/AIDS Epidemic,” Vox, last modified December 1, 2016, https://www.vox.com/2015/12/1/9828348/ronald-reagan-hiv-aids.

  The reaction… was laughter: Richard Lawson, “The Reagan Administration’s Unearthed Response to the AIDS Crisis Is Chilling,” Vanity Fair online, December 1, 2015, https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2015/11/reagan-administration-response-to-aids-crisis.

  during a meeting with his national security advisers… San Francisco officials demanded an apology, both to the city and to people infected with the disease: Bob Woodward, “Gadhafi Target of Secret US Deception Plan,” Washington Post, October 2,
1986, A1; Associated Press, “Report of AIDS Jokes Roils San Franciscans,” New York Times, October 3, 1986, 7.

  “How do you know?… How do you know?”: Kuhn, author interview, February 28, 2019. Kuhn said that Hutton related the account to him.

  Nancy sent Hudson a set of photos… turned out to be Kaposi’s sarcoma: Daniel Bates, “We Have Recently Had Sex Together and… I May Have AIDS,” Daily Mail (UK) online, last modified December 5, 2018, https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-6464365/Book-reveals-Rock-Hudson-sent-letters-lovers-diagnosed-AIDS.html.

  When Hudson collapsed… “in their thoughts and prayers”: Shilts, And the Band Played On, 574–79.

  for nearly two years: The next mention in the Reagan diaries comes on March 30, 1987.

  treatments would do no good: Shilts, And the Band Played On, 574–79.

  Hudson’s heroic public acknowledgment… more than twice as much as had been collected in all of 1984: “Rock Hudson,” People online, December 23, 1985, https://people.com/archive/rock-hudson-vol-24-no-26.

  “It was commonly accepted now… the power the news media exerted in the latter portion of the twentieth century”: Shilts, And the Band Played On, 585.

  “You mean like the measles virus… no immune response?”: Hutton, interview, April 15–16, 2004, Miller Center.

  tattooing HIV-positive people—on the upper forearm if they were IV drug users and the buttocks if they were homosexual: William F. Buckley Jr., “Crucial Steps in Combating the Aids Epidemic; Identify All the Carriers,” New York Times online, March 18, 1986. http://movies2.nytimes.com/books/00/07/16/specials/buckley-aids.html.

  a facelift in New York in 1986… Gloria Vanderbilt: Higdon and Kuhn, author interviews, April 7, 2018, and February 28, 2019, respectively.

  first significant initiative… major report on it: Bernard Weinraub, “Reagan Orders AIDS Report, Giving High Priority to Work for Cure,” New York Times, February 6, 1986, B7.

  Parvin didn’t win everything, but by invoking Nancy’s name… None of the revisions he wanted was made: Speechwriting: White House Office of: Research Office, 1981–1989, box 322, Reagan Presidential Library.