page_title: Nancy Reagan
section_title: Marriage and family
hierarchical_section_title: Nancy Reagan / Marriage and family
context_page_description: Nancy Davis Reagan was an American film actress and the second wife of Ronald Reagan, the 40th president of the United States. She was the first lady of the United States from 1981 to 1989.
  She was born in New York City. After her parents separated, she lived in Maryland with an aunt and uncle for six years. When her mother remarried in 1929, she moved to Chicago and later was adopted by her mother's second husband. As Nancy Davis, she was a Hollywood actress in the 1940s and 1950s, starring in films such as The Next Voice You Hear..., Night into Morning, and Donovan's Brain. In 1952, she married Ronald Reagan, who was then president of the Screen Actors Guild. They had two children together. Reagan was the first lady of California when her husband was governor from 1967 to 1975, and she began to work with the Foster Grandparents Program.
  Reagan became First Lady of the United States in January 1981, following her husband's victory in the 1980 presidential election. Early in his first term, she was criticized largely due to her decision to replace the White House china, which had been paid for by private donations.
context_section_description: During her Hollywood career, Davis dated many actors, including Clark Gable, Robert Stack, and Peter Lawford; she later called Gable the nicest of the stars she had met. On November 15, 1949, she met Ronald Reagan, who was then president of the Screen Actors Guild. She had noticed that her name had appeared on the Hollywood blacklist. Davis sought Reagan's help to maintain her employment as a guild actress in Hollywood and for assistance in having her name removed from the list. Ronald Reagan informed her that she had been confused with another actress of the same name. The two began dating and their relationship was the subject of many gossip columns; one Hollywood press account described their nightclub-free times together as "the romance of a couple who have no vices". Ronald Reagan was skeptical about marriage, however, following his painful 1949 divorce from Jane Wyman, and he still saw other women.
  After three years of dating, they eventually decided to marry while discussing the issue in the couple's favorite booth at Chasen's, a restaurant in Beverly Hills. The couple wed on March 4, 1952, at the Little Brown Church in the San Fernando Valley of Los Angeles, in a simple and hastily arranged ceremony designed to avoid the press; the marriage was her first and his second. The only people in attendance were fellow actor William Holden (the best man) and his wife, actress Brenda Marshall (the matron of honor). Nancy was likely already pregnant during the ceremony; the couple's first child, Patricia Ann Reagan (later better known by her professional name, Patti Davis), was born less than eight months later on October 21, 1952. Their son, Ronald Prescott Reagan (later better known as Ron Reagan) was born six years later on May 20, 1958. Reagan also became stepmother to Maureen Reagan (1941–2001) and Michael Reagan (b. 1945), her husband's children from his first marriage to Jane Wyman.
  Observers described Nancy and Ronald's relationship as intimate. As president and first lady, the Reagans were reported to display their affection frequently, with one press secretary noting, "They never took each other for granted. They never stopped courting." Ronald often called Nancy "Mommy"; she called him "Ronnie". While the president was recuperating in the hospital after the 1981 assassination attempt, Nancy wrote in her diary, "Nothing can happen to my Ronnie. My life would be over." In a letter to Nancy, Ronald wrote, "whatever I treasure and enjoy ... all would be without meaning if I didn't have you." In 1998, a few years after her husband had been given a diagnosis of Alzheimer's disease, Nancy told Vanity Fair, "Our relationship is very special. We were very much in love and still are. When I say my life began with Ronnie, well, it's true. It did. I can't imagine life without him." Nancy was known for the focused and attentive look, termed "the Gaze", that she fastened upon her husband during his speeches and appearances.
  President Reagan's death in June 2004 ended what Charlton Heston called "the greatest love affair in the history of the American Presidency".
  Nancy's relationship with her children was not always as close as the bond with her husband. She frequently quarreled with her children and her stepchildren. Her relationship with Patti was the most contentious; Patti flouted American conservatism, rebelled against her parents by joining the nuclear freeze movement, and authored many anti-Reagan books. The nearly 20 years of family feuding left Patti very much estranged from both her mother and father. Soon after her father's Alzheimer's disease was diagnosed, Patti and her mother reconciled and began to speak on a daily basis. Nancy's disagreements with Michael were also public matters; in 1984, she was quoted as saying that the two were in an "estrangement right now". Michael responded that Nancy was trying to cover up for the fact she had not met his daughter, Ashley, who had been born nearly a year earlier. They too eventually made peace. Nancy was thought to be closest to her stepdaughter Maureen during the Whit
caption: The Reagan family, c. 1967
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