Ann Romney Would Be the Only First Lady Since Mamie Eisenhower Who Has Never Worked a Paying Job

Ann Romney looks on during a campaign rally for her husband, Mitt Romney, at the Pinkerton Academy field house …No one is disputing the fact that staying home to raise your children is hard work. And Hilary Rosen's attempt to undermine Ann Romney's economic expertise ended up insulting women around the country. But a quick look at previous first ladies' lives shows that, if Mitt Romney makes it to the White House, Ann Romney would be the only First Lady since Mamie Eisenhower who hasn't held a paying job at some point in her life, even while single or childless.

As the Daily Beast points out, Michelle Obama's career history is well known: She worked as an attorney while juggling her career and family responsibilities.

Laura Bush taught second grade for two years before earning her master's degree and working as a school librarian. She gave up that job when she married George W. Bush in 1977.

Hillary Rodham Clinton chose to work and raise her child simultaneously; she was a lawyer for years before Bill Clinton became president and, after she left the White House, she returned to work, this time as a U.S. Senator from New York. She's now the U.S. Secretary of State.

Barbara Bush stayed home to raise her children, but was working in a factory when she met George H.W. Bush, spent time as a Lord & Taylor employee, and even got a job at the Yale Coop "to help bolster the family finances" while she was pregnant with future president George W.

Nancy Reagan worked as a sales clerk in a department store and was a nurse's aid before becoming an actress. She made eight films before she married fellow actor Ronald Reagan, and brought home the bacon by making three more movies while he was looking for work.

Rosalynn Carter worked at a hairdresser's studio for a while, but ended up taking over the financial accounts for Jimmy Carter's father's peanut farm and writing five books.

Betty Ford modeled at a Michigan department store as a teenager, and ended up opening her own dance studio as a young adult. She went on to model for the John Roberts Powers Modeling Agency and dance in the Martha Graham Auxiliary Dance Company in New York before working as a fashion coordinator, clothing buyer, ballroom dance instructor, and -- less glamorously -- a food processor at a frozen-food plant.

Thelma Catherine Ryan -- also known as Pat Nixon -- held half a dozen jobs before she married Richard Nixon. "Few, if any first ladies worked as consistently before their marriage as Pat Nixon," the National Library's reports. Among her paying jobs: janitor as a bank, bookkeeper, x-ray technician, pharmacy manger, typist, lab assistant, psychology professor's assistant, office assistant, waitress, librarian, beauty-product tester, movie extra, teacher and faculty advisor, and economist for the U.S. Office of Price Administration. -- and that doesn't count all of the work she did around her family's farm.

Lady Bird Johnson was manager and chair of her own radio station for 40 years, keeping the books, hiring the talent, and recruiting the station's sponsors.

Jackie Kennedy was a book editor at both Viking and Doubleday after she left the White House, but before JFK took over the Oval Office she had a career as a journalist at the Washington Times-Herald, and won a prize for her designed of an entire issue of Vogue.

And that brings us to the Eisenhower Administration. Born in 1896 and married at age 19, Mamie Eisenhower's "occupation before marriage" is described by biographers at the National Library this way: "Thus, while she was raised with creature comforts including household help, jewelry and fine clothing, she remained extremely conscientious about cost and was expert at saving money. She played the piano, the electric organ and enjoyed dancing, bridge and canasta."

Ann Romney also married at 19 -- she and Mitt attended brother-and-sister private schools in Bloomfield Hills, Michigan, got "informally" engaged during his senior prom, and married while still in college. She's been involved with several charities, was the director of the children's charity Best Friends, and has served as a board member for the New England chapter of the National Multiple Sclerosis Society and for the United Way.

But while her husband has urged poor women to put their kids in daycare and get jobs outside the home so that they could "have the dignity of work," Ann has been a stay-at-home mom to an empty nest ever since their youngest son, Craig, left for a missionary assignment in Chile in 2000. To be fair, one could argue that she's worked as her husband's consultant since at least 1999, when Mitt decided he "could not turn around the Olympics without her daily counsel" and she moved to Utah, leaving Craig to finish out his senior year of high school under the watchful eye of his older brother, Matt. She was very active during her husband's failed 2004 presidential bid, and she's made more than 215 even appearances for his current political campaign so far.

This isn't part of the stay-at-home mom vs. working-mom war -- most of the first ladies here gave up their jobs when they got married. Still: When it comes to the experience of earning a living, as far as first ladies go, Ann Romney may have more in common with the one born in 1896 than any of those born in the 20th century.

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