Presented By Rathkamp Financial
(Chillicothe) — Enjoy ice cream, cakes, lemonade, and other refreshments for the birthday of Chillicothe’s First Lady, Lucy Webb Hayes. On Saturday, August 28th, 2021, enjoy your food outdoors in the side yard of the Lucy Hayes Heritage Center, or drive by and pick it up, at 90 West Sixth Street in Chillicothe. The wife of President Rutherford B. Hayes was born in the home in 1831.
Tours of the birthplace are available from 1pm to 2pm, with the social following from 2pm to 4pm. Admission is free, with a suggested food ticket donation of $5 for adults, $3 for children.
On August 28, 1831, in a fine wood frame house at 56 East Fifth Street in Chillicothe, the third child and first daughter was born to Dr. James Webb and Maria Cook Webb.
She lost her father three years later and the family moved out of the house and eventually out of town (and the house itself was moved), but Lucy Ware Webb grew up to be the first First Lady of the nation to have a college degree.
In 1852 she married Rutherford B. Hayes, a Cincinnati attorney. He felt abolition of slavery was too radical, but with Lucy’s anti-slavery sentiments, he soon began defending runaway slaves crossing the Ohio River.
Rutherford fought for the Union and was wounded in the Civil War, then was immediately elected to Congress. He then served three terms as governor of Ohio where Lucy served as First Lady of the state.
As First Lady of the U.S. from 1877 to 1881, she was a more egalitarian hostess than previous First Ladies. She invited the first African-American professional musician to appear at the White House.
Oh, and she supported her husband’s decision to ban alcohol from the White House…and was called “Lemonade Lucy” for her choice of alternate drinks.
The Lily of the Valley planted at the location where her birthplace was moved to in 1883, the Lucy Hayes Heritage Center at 90 West Sixth Street, is said to have been starts from plants at the White House.
Help us celebrate Lucy’s birthday there in a week and a half – rain or shine – in our annual Ice Cream Social.
Learn more in the “Lucy Webb Hayes Heritage Center” Facebook page. Event page: facebook.com/events/1872054852976074
