Barbara Pierce Bush, one of only two women in American history to be the wife of one U.S. president and the mother of another, died Tuesday.

She was 92 and had been recently reported by Jim McGrath, a family spokesman, to be in failing health. McGrath did not immediately specify the cause of death.


Bush joined Abigail Adams (wife of John Adams, mother of John Quincy Adams) in her distinctive feat, though she also achieved her own stature in public life, especially as an advocate for literacy. She was also widely admired for her devotion to family and her sharp-tongued and full-throated defense of one of America's most prominent political families (dogs included).

"One thing was for sure, Barbara Bush was willing to speak her mind," her son George W. Bush wrote in “41: A Portrait of My Father,” his biography of George H.W. Bush.

Her presidential son added: "Her willingness to speak her mind stood in contrast to some tightly scripted political spouses. As a result of her wide following, she helped many Americans understand and love her husband. Many people told me that anyone who married Barbara Bush had to be a good man."

In a 2003 book, biographer Pamela Kilian dubbed her "Matriarch of a Dynasty."

"Once she got to the White House," Kilian wrote, "Barbara became a symbol for the millions of women who put home and family first."

But, particularly as America's first lady, Barbara Bush was anything but a passive figure.

"Some people share in their husband's work and some don't," she told the Los Angeles Times during her husband's 1992 reelection campaign. "That's going to depend upon the marriage or their wife's work. But you have to have influence. When you've been married 47 years, if you don't have any influence, then I really think you're in deep trouble."

The White House issued a statement Tuesday night paying tribute.

“President Donald J. Trump and First Lady Melania Trump join the Nation in celebrating the life of Barbara Bush,” it said. “As a wife, mother, grandmother, military spouse, and former First Lady, Mrs. Bush was an advocate of the American family. Amongst her greatest achievements was recognizing the importance of literacy as a fundamental family value that that requires nurturing and protection. … The President and First Lady’s thoughts and prayers are with the family and friends of Mrs. Bush.”

Barbara Pierce was born June 8, 1925, in Rye, New York, daughter of a publishing executive and distant cousin of President Franklin Pierce. In 1943, she graduated from a South Carolina boarding school and enrolled at Smith College, though she dropped out in 1945 to marry George Herbert Walker Bush, a Navy pilot recently returned from service in the Pacific.

The two had met at a Christmas dance in 1941, and he had gone off to war with her in his heart, something that remained true when he was shot down in September 1944 and waited perilous hours in the sea to be rescued. "His downed plane," his biographer Tom Wicker wrote, "had been named Barbara." They were married only weeks after he came back to the United States.

"My father agreed to a first dance," George W. Bush wrote of his parents, "but warned Mother it would be the last time he danced in public. Obviously he never dreamed that he would one day have to dance at 12 inaugural balls."

As her husband concluded his military service, went to Yale and then moved to Texas to enter the oil business, Barbara Bush was by his side and became the mother of their six children. The firstborn was George W., and No. 3 was John Ellis Bush, who would be known as "Jeb" when elected governor of Florida decades later.

Between them was a daughter named Robin, who succumbed to leukemia before her fourth birthday. It was a crushing blow.

"At first, it seemed like Barbara Bush could not survive the blow," Wicker wrote in “George Herbert Walker Bush,” his 2004 biography. "In later years, she often said that, in those terrible times, George Bush saved her." (After Robin's death, three more children were born: Neil in 1955, Marvin in 1956 and Dorothy in 1959.)

The Bush family in 1964. | AP Photo

As the children grew, her husband ascended the nation's political ladder, with her in the background. Marjorie Williams' 1992 Vanity Fair profile portrayed her as a mom driven to be the best — "her children had the best, most elaborate birthday parties in the neighborhood, as well as the most carefully name-tagged clothes" — even as "she soldiered her way" through the obligations of a political spouse.

"She was the one that taught us right and wrong, I can promise you that," Jeb Bush would say years later.

In 1980, after a stab at the GOP nomination, George H.W. Bush was picked to be Ronald Reagan's running mate. Barbara Bush would spend the next eight years as second lady of the nation, and the 1988 election brought a promotion, as her husband bested Democrat Michael Dukakis to win the presidency.

Like her predecessor as first lady, Nancy Reagan, she developed a reputation for being tough as nails in protecting her family. "She will freeze out anyone who does damage to her husband or sons," Kilian wrote.

On occasion, the public got a look at her harder side. One example came in 1984, when she pounced on Democratic vice presidential nominee Geraldine Ferraro. "I can't say it," Bush said in specifying a word to describe Ferraro, "but it rhymes with rich."

The 1992 Vanity Fair profile painted her as someone who inspired fear among current and former associates: "Privately, she is a caustic and judgmental woman, who has labored to keep her sarcasm in check — with incomplete success."

But for the most part, her public life was one of dignity and unquestioned loyalty; it was said that her warmth and sharp wit made her more popular than her husband. A 1992 Los Angeles Times interviewer noted her image as America's grandmother, something she made light of.

While in Washington, she was known for her efforts on behalf of literacy, a cause near and dear to her heart because of her son Neil's dyslexia. She wrote a book about the family dog, “C. Fred's Story,” with the proceeds going to the cause of literacy. That 1984 book was followed six years later by another canine children's book, “Millie's Book: As Dictated to Barbara Bush.”

In 1989, she launched the Barbara Bush Foundation for family literacy. On the organization's website, one of her quotes is highlighted: "The American dream is about equal opportunity for everyone who works hard. If we don't give everyone the ability to simply read and write, then we aren't giving everyone an equal chance to succeed."

Barbara Bush sits between one former president, her husband George (left) and one future president, her son George, the day before her son's 2001 inauguration in Washington. | AP Photo

Unlike Nancy Reagan, she made a point to call attention to the AIDS epidemic by visiting Grandma's House, a home for infants with AIDS. Her embrace of babies with AIDS was considered groundbreaking. "The message was clear," Kilian wrote. "It's OK to get close to someone with AIDS."

In June 1990, she and Soviet first lady Raisa Gorbachev addressed the commencement ceremonies at Wellesley College. Bush's speech was widely praised — Tom Shales of the Washington Post would say afterward: "Our first lady sure beats their first lady."

"Cherish your human connections — your relationships with family and friends," Bush told the graduates. "For several years, you've had impressed upon you the importance to your career of dedication and hard work, and, of course, that's true. But as important as your obligations as a doctor, lawyer or business leader will be, you are a human being first, and those human connections — with spouses, with children, with friends — are the most important investments you will ever make."

Later she quipped: "Somewhere out in the audience may even be someone who will one day follow in my footsteps, and preside over the White House as the president's spouse. I wish him well."

Two years later, she would be a featured speaker at the Republican National Convention, where she talked about how much she enjoyed "the chance to meet so many American families and be in your homes." The president did not win a second term, however, struggling not only against Democrat Bill Clinton, the eventual winner, but third-party candidate H. Ross Perot. (Perot's candidacy would remain a sore spot with the Bush family for years after.)

After her husband's defeat, she became the nation's most prominent political mom, campaigning for Jeb and George as they became governors of their states — and then, in 2000, becoming "first mom" as George was elected president. Abigail Adams was deceased by the time her son become president, but Barbara Bush made it back to the limelight a mere eight years after her time as first lady ended.

"There is a myth in the United States — you've heard it many times. It says that all American mothers hope that their child will grow up to be president of the United States," she would write later. "In my case that certainly is a myth. I never dreamed that any of ours would; there were days when I hoped that they'd just grow up!"

On the campaign trail once again, Barbara Bush jokes with her son Jeb while introducing him at a New Hampshire school on Feb. 4, 2016. | Jacquelyn Martin/AP Photo

Over the years of her son's presidency and its aftermath, she would remain with her family in the public eye. Occasionally, there would be controversy, as with the unsympathetic remarks she made about storm-battered victims of 2005's cataclysmic Hurricane Katrina who had taken refuge in Texas. ("What I'm hearing, which is sort of scary, is they all want to stay in Texas.") For the most part, however, she remained a figure praised for her public service and devotion to her husband.

Illness put both her and her husband in the spotlight on occasion. She had surgery in 2008 related to an ulcer; in 2009, she underwent aortic valve surgery. In 2013, she was hospitalized for pneumonia.

In 2016, she found herself drawn back to the trail, this time in support of Jeb Bush, who was seeking the presidency. She was dubious this time — in 2013, she told NBC's Matt Lauer, "We’ve had enough Bushes” — but was drawn in as Jeb Bush struggled to gain traction against Donald Trump, of whom she clearly did not approve.

“He’s so polite," she said of Jeb in February 2016. "We brought him up that way, and he does not brag like some people we know.”

In January 2015, meanwhile, Barbara and George H.W. Bush became the first presidential couple to celebrate 70 years of marriage. Jimmy and Rosalynn Carter reached that milestone in 2016.

"When asked on his 90th birthday," first son George W. Bush had written, "what the happiest moment of his life had been, Dad said it was the day he married my mother."

