Recollections of full years - Helen Herron Taft

I went up in the spring to Beverly Farms, with my friend Miss Boardman, and inspected houses for three days, finally selecting one, principally for its location. It stood near the sea and its velvety green lawns sloped all the way down to the sea-wall. From its verandah one could see out across Salem Harbour to Marblehead.

The house itself was a modern frame cottage, as simple as anything well could be, with a fine verandah and a dormer windowed third story. It was large enough for the family and for such visitors as we inevitably would have to accommodate, but besides the Taft family, which was numerous enough at that time, there were Captain Butt and a large corps of secretaries and stenographers, to say nothing of the Commander of the Sylph, the President’s smaller yacht, who all had to be within call when they were wanted. Then, too, there was the necessity for Executive Offices and I didn’t think it would seem like having a vacation at all if the Executive Offices could not be somewhere out of sight so that they might sometimes be out of mind. The President didn’t expect to be able to spend much of his time away from Washington the first summer but when he did come to Beverly I wanted him to feel that he was at least partially detaching himself from business. So another house was found in the town, yet on the seashore, and was fitted up for Executive Offices and as a home for the office staff and Captain Butt. The secret service men, like the poor, we had with us always, but it never seemed to me that they “lived” anywhere. They were merely around all the time. They were never uniformed, of course, and looked like casual visitors. They used to startle callers by emerging suddenly from behind bushes or other secluded spots—not I am sure because of a weakness for detective methods, but because they concealed comfortable chairs in these places—and asking them what they wanted. It was sometimes most amusing and sometimes rather trying, but as long as there are cranks and unbalanced persons such precautions will be necessary for the protection of Presidents, and anyhow, one gets so used to the men as almost to forget what they are there for.

We did not go to Beverly the first summer until the third of July. Captain Butt preceded us to make final arrangements for our reception on the Fourth, and the servants and motor cars had been sent on several days before. I was still in such ill health that it was necessary to avoid the excitement of the inevitable crowds, so when our private car “Mayflower” arrived in Beverly the welcome ceremonies were purposely subdued. A great crowd was present at the station, but at Mr. Taft’s request no speeches were made. Shortly after we arrived at the house the Mayor of Beverly, with a committee of citizens, called, an address of welcome was delivered, to which Mr. Taft responded and cordial relations were established. But nothing more occurred even though it was the Fourth of July.

Mr. Taft spent just one day with us, then hurried away to keep a bewildering number of engagements here and there before he returned to Washington, where Congress was still in stormy session over the tariff bill.

He came back in August to spend a month with us, and then the little sea-side colony, which we had found as quiet as the woods, except for the lavish hospitality of its people, became indeed the nation’s summer capital. Nobody found it inconvenient to come to Beverly to see the President and he was just about as busy there as he ever was in Washington. He had a game of golf every day on the Myopia links and grew jubilant over his scores, but for the most part he seemed always to be attending to the business of being President. There was an Executive Office, as I have said, but nearly always one could find four or five men sitting on the verandah waiting to see him. Fortunately he had a large room to himself with a private entrance, but we grew so accustomed to running into strangers that we came almost not to notice them and to enjoy our supposed privacy as if they were not there.

The most interesting callers we had that summer were their Imperial Highnesses, Prince and Princess Kuni of Japan, who were making a tour of the world. They were accompanied by Madame Nagasaki, the wife of the Court Chamberlain who officiated at my husband’s first audience with the Emperor, by Colonel Kukurita, a military aide and Mr. Matsui, Chargé d’Affaires of the Japanese Embassy in Washington. They were escorted by representatives of both the State and War Departments. I had never met these Imperial personages, but when Mr. Taft and Miss Alice Roosevelt were in Japan they had been presented to their Highnesses, so Mr. Taft invited Miss Roosevelt, then Mrs. Longworth, and her husband to meet them.

The day following the visit of the Prince and Princess Mr. Taft left for a long trip through the West and I didn’t see him again until the late autumn when we all returned to Washington.

The social season in Washington always opens with the Cabinet Dinner in December. This is one of the regular State Dinners which are carefully scheduled and jealously regarded as such. The others were formerly the Diplomatic Dinner and the Supreme Court Dinner, but we inaugurated a Speaker’s Dinner, so there are now four. These are state functions pure and simple, but by the exercise of a little art one can manage to make them most enjoyable affairs. To the Cabinet Dinner only the Vice-President and his wife, the members of the Cabinet and their wives and a few especially distinguished outsiders are invited.

The hostess doesn’t have to worry about seating the Cabinet officers because it is all a matter of precedence and is attended to by the Social Executive Secretary. The rank of a Cabinet officer is determined by the date on which his office was created and not, as one might think, by the relative importance of his official status.