Publisher's Weekly Review
This sympathetic and competently crafted biography of President Eisenhower's first lady is written by her granddaughter, founder of the Center for Post-Soviet Studies (Breaking Free: A Memoir of Love and Revolution). The Eisenhowers were married for 53 years and, despite the difference in their backgrounds (she was wealthy, while his family struggled financially), according to the author, they were devoted to each other. Because "Ike" had embarked on an army career, Mamie (1896-1979) had to adjust to a life of constant moves and separations. Drawing on letters and conversations with Mamie, the author chronicles her long career as an army wife and gives a brief overview of the White House years. Included is a moving account of the tragic death of Ike and Mamie's young son. A traditional wife, Mamie focused on homemaking and, although disturbed by rumors of her husband's affair during WWII, she believed his denials. The author discounts rumors of Mamie's alcoholism, blaming her supposed instability on inner-ear problems. Photos not seen by PW. (Nov.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Kirkus Review
A sentimental biography of a First Lady best remembered- -perhaps unjustly--for her hairstyle. As Hillary Clinton's constantly changing hairstyles may reflect a search to define herself in her White House role, Mamie Eisenhower's stubborn loyalty to the famous Mamie bangs may reflect the loyalty to friends and family that was her outstanding characteristic. That, at least, is how granddaughter Eisenhower (Breaking Free, 1995) sees her. As the author describes Mamie, she was a wife and mother who ``was right for the 1950s . . . an era when the postwar nation was busily engaged in raising its children and rebuilding.'' Lively, charming, and ``rotten spoiled,'' Mamie Doud was one of four daughters in a very comfortable, if not wealthy, Denver family. Married at 19, she began a successful 50-year career as Dwight Eisenhower's wife. She learned discipline and self-control and made homes for him in two barren rooms in Texas, in a vermin-infested house in Panama, and, of course, in the White House. She was a skilled hostess and a tactful helpmate, enhancing the very important social side of her husband's army career but never interfering in his professional duties. Enduring the death of their three-year- old son, her own sometimes problematic health, plus prolonged separations when Ike was assigned overseas, Mamie behaved with dignity and discretion, even when rumors of an Eisenhower romance with his driver, Kay Summersby, flew across the Atlantic. There was no such romance, says the author, who also scotches rumors that Mamie was an alcoholic. Much information for this biography comes from family papers and letters, but even with these privileged documents, the Mamie who inspired a half-century of devotion from her famous husband never comes to life. For readers who are Eisenhower buffs and can fill in the great historical and personal gaps that mar this I-remember- Grandma chronicle. (65 b&w photos, not seen)
Booklist Review
There was more to her than just those bangs! So insists Mamie Eisenhower's granddaughter, who has authored an enlightening biography. Based on unpublished family letters and documents, Susan's judicious treatment of her grandmother follows Mamie Doud from the proper, functional, socially conscious family environment into which she was born, to her early married years to Ike Eisenhower (who was raised in far different circumstances), to the war years as home-front wife of the Allied commander, and to her years in the White House, where she functioned as the perfect 1950s First Lady. Mamie comes out from under Ike's shadow here, and the author reveals a woman who stood by her man but did it in her own fashion. The reader will come away from the book with an understanding of Mamie as a woman who was definitely of her time but who, nonetheless, was "centered, confident, and unapologetic about who she was." Sure to be in demand, particularly among readers who look at the 1950s as more than just a boring interlude between World War II and the 1960s. (Reviewed Sept. 1, 1996)0374215146Brad Hooper
Library Journal Review
More than fond memories from a granddaughter, this study is based on unpublished family letters and documents. Here, Mamie comes across as no powder puff but tough, independent, and brave. (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.