Escapes From The White House
When Washington gets to be too much, presidents need to get away. A look at their private worlds
Over his 12 years in office, Franklin Roosevelt made 134 trips to his home at Hyde Park, N.Y., spent more than 500 days there, and savored an additional 175 days at a health resort in Warm Springs, Ga., where he received treatments for polio. Kennedy found solace during the depths of the Cold War by spending long, lazy weekends at his family estate in Hyannis Port, Mass. Dwight Eisenhower and Ronald Reagan each spent a total of a year of their eight-year terms at their private getaways--Ike at his farm in Gettysburg, Pa.; Reagan at his ranch near Santa Barbara, Calif.
It was George Washington who, as in so many things, set the pattern as the nation's first president. The picture that emerges of Washington at home may surprise those familiar only with his historical image as a military and political leader. He considered himself primarily a Virginia planter, and he took pride in being recognized as one of the leading farmers of his time. Despite his reputation as the man who refused to be king, at home Washington lived as what historian Henry Wiencek called "a colonial potentate," enjoying fine foods and wines.
As did Washington, most other presidents let down their guard at home--something they rarely do anywhere else. The full dimensions of Lyndon Johnson's outsize personality, for example, were nowhere more evident than on his ranch in the Hill Country along the Pedernales River in west central Texas. Despite his talk about how the ranch brought him serenity, the estate became a frenzied hive of activity when Johnson was there. Dozens of advisers, cabinet secretaries, clerical staff, and security personnel accompanied LBJ on his visits there. Johnson loved taking guests on tours, sometimes shocking them by getting out of his big white Lincoln Continental convertible and relieving himself at the roadside. He also had a particular fondness for an amphibious car, which operated on land and in water. Without telling his passengers about the vehicle's aquatic capabilities, he would drive to a spot near the Pedernales River or nearby LBJ Lake and head toward the water. Suddenly he'd shout, "The brakes won't hold!" and the car would plunge in with a huge splash. Johnson would roar with laughter as his frightened passengers gradually realized the car could float.
Ronald Reagan found solace at Rancho del Cielo, which, he once confided, "can make you feel as if you are on a cloud." Reagan and his wife, Nancy, made the ranch and its simple, two-bedroom adobe house into a love nest where they could forget their official lives, mostly keeping to themselves in a routine of daily horseback rides, cozy lunches and dinners, and TV or old movies by the fireside.
George Herbert Walker Bush escaped to his family estate in Kennebunkport, Maine. Located on a gorgeous promontory called Walker's Point, it was a gathering place for his extended family, for friends, even for casual acquaintances. After Iraq invaded Kuwait in August 1990, Bush spent hours bluefishing with his national security adviser, Brent Scowcroft, pondering an overarching theory about the post-Cold War world. The next step in U.S. foreign policy, Bush concluded, should be the building of a "new world order" in which the United States would take the lead in organizing international coalitions, including Arab nations, to combat the world's thugs and brigands.
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