Patricia Ryan Popular Books

Patricia Ryan Biography & Facts

Thelma Catherine "Pat" Nixon (née Ryan; March 16, 1912 – June 22, 1993) was the first lady of the United States from 1969 to 1974 as the wife of President Richard Nixon. She also served as the second lady of the United States from 1953 to 1961 when her husband was vice president. Born in Ely, Nevada, she grew up with her two brothers in what is now Cerritos, California, graduating from Excelsior Union High School in Norwalk, California in 1929. She attended Fullerton Junior College and later the University of Southern California. She paid for her schooling by working multiple jobs, including pharmacy manager, typist, radiographer, and retail clerk. In 1940, she married lawyer Richard Nixon and they had two daughters, Tricia and Julie. Dubbed the "Nixon team", Richard and Pat Nixon campaigned together in his successful congressional campaigns of 1946 and 1948. Richard Nixon was elected vice president in 1952 alongside General Dwight D. Eisenhower, whereupon Pat became Second Lady. Pat Nixon did much to add substance to the role of Second Lady, insisting on visiting schools, orphanages, hospitals, and village markets as she undertook many missions of goodwill across the world. As First Lady, Pat Nixon promoted a number of charitable causes, including volunteerism. She oversaw the collection of more than 600 pieces of historic art and furnishings for the White House, an acquisition larger than that of any other administration. She was the most traveled First Lady in U.S. history, a record unsurpassed until twenty-five years later. She accompanied the President as the first First Lady to visit China and the Soviet Union, and was the first president's wife to be officially designated a representative of the United States on her solo trips to Africa and South America, which gained her recognition as "Madame Ambassador"; she was also the first First Lady to enter a combat zone. Though her husband was re-elected in a landslide victory in 1972, her tenure as First Lady ended two years later, when President Nixon resigned amid the Watergate scandal. Her public appearances became increasingly rare later in life. She and her husband settled in San Clemente, California, and later moved to New Jersey. She suffered two strokes, one in 1976 and another in 1983, and was diagnosed with lung cancer in 1992. She died in 1993, aged 81. Early life Thelma Catherine Ryan was born in 1912 in the small mining town of Ely, Nevada. Her father, William M. Ryan Sr., was a sailor, gold miner, and truck farmer of Irish ancestry; her mother, Katherine Halberstadt, was a German immigrant. The nickname "Pat" was given to her by her father, because of her birth on the day before Saint Patrick's Day and her Irish ancestry. When she enrolled in college in 1931 she started using the name "Pat" (and occasionally "Patricia") instead of "Thelma" but she did not legally change her name.After her birth, the Ryan family moved to California, and in 1914 settled on a small truck farm in Artesia (present-day Cerritos). Thelma Ryan's high school yearbook page gives her nickname as "Buddy" and her ambition to run a boarding house.She worked on the family farm and also at a local bank as a janitor and bookkeeper. Her mother died of cancer in 1924. Pat, who was only 12, assumed all the household duties for her father (who died himself of silicosis 5 years later) and her two older brothers, William Jr. (1910–1997) and Thomas (1911–1992). She also had a half-sister, Neva Bender (1909–1981), and a half-brother, Matthew Bender (1907–1973), from her mother's first marriage; her mother's first husband had died during a flash flood in South Dakota. Education and career After graduating from Excelsior High School in 1929, she attended Fullerton College. She paid for her education by working odd jobs, including as a driver, a pharmacy manager, a telephone operator, and a typist. She also earned money sweeping the floors of a local bank, and from 1930 until 1931, she lived in New York City, working as a secretary and also as a radiographer.Determined "to make something out of myself", she enrolled in 1931 at the University of Southern California (USC), where she majored in merchandising. A former professor noted that she "stood out from the empty-headed, overdressed little sorority girls of that era like a good piece of literature on a shelf of cheap paperbacks". She held part-time jobs on campus, worked as a sales clerk in Bullock's-Wilshire department store, and taught touch typing and shorthand at a high school. She also supplemented her income by working as an extra and bit player in the film industry, for which she took several screen tests. In this capacity, she made brief appearances in films such as Becky Sharp (1935), The Great Ziegfeld (1936), and Small Town Girl (1936). In some cases she ended up on the cutting room floor, such as with her spoken lines in Becky Sharp. She told Hollywood columnist Erskine Johnson in 1959 that her time in films was "too fleeting even for recollections embellished by the years" and that "my choice of a career was teaching school and the many jobs I pursued were merely to help with college expenses." During the 1968 presidential campaign, she explained to the writer Gloria Steinem, "I never had time to think about things like... who I wanted to be, or who I admired, or to have ideas. I never had time to dream about being anyone else. I had to work."In 1937, Pat Ryan graduated cum laude from USC with a Bachelor of Science degree in merchandising, together with a certificate to teach at the high school level, which USC deemed equivalent to a master's degree. Pat accepted a position as a high school teacher at Whittier Union High School in Whittier, California. Marriage and family, early campaigns While in Whittier, Pat Ryan met Richard Nixon, a young lawyer who had recently graduated from the Duke University School of Law. The two became acquainted at a Little Theater group when they were cast together in The Dark Tower. Known as Dick, he asked Pat to marry him the first night they went out. "I thought he was nuts or something!" she recalled. He courted the redhead he called his "wild Irish Gypsy" for two years, even driving her to and from her dates with other men.They eventually married on June 21, 1940, at the Mission Inn in Riverside, California. She said that she had been attracted to the young Nixon because he "was going places, he was vital and ambitious ... he was always doing things". Later, referring to Richard Nixon, she said, "Oh but you just don't realize how much fun he is! He's just so much fun!" Following a brief honeymoon in Mexico, the two lived in a small apartment in Whittier. As U.S. involvement in World War II began, the couple moved to Washington, D.C., with Richard taking a position as a lawyer for the Office of Price Administration (OPA); Pat worked as a secretary for the American Red Cross, but also qualified as a price analyst for the OPA. He then joined t.... Discover the Patricia Ryan popular books. Find the top 100 most popular Patricia Ryan books.

Best Seller Patricia Ryan Books of 2024

  • Skylark synopsis, comments

    Skylark

    Patricia Ryan

    An international romance novel set in Rome and New York during the turbulent 1960’s. It deals with love thrown away and then regretted amid social and political upheaval across two...

  • How to Attend Any Networking Event and Be Cool, Calm and Confident synopsis, comments

    How to Attend Any Networking Event and Be Cool, Calm and Confident

    Patricia Ryan

    Would you like to build your business? Would you like to be able to meet people when you are out and about? Would you like to feel comfortable and confident when you need to atten...

  • Bones Are Forever synopsis, comments

    Bones Are Forever

    Kathy Reichs

    #1 New York Times bestselling author Kathy Reichs, a producer of the Fox hit show Bones, is back with her fifteenth “pulsepounding” (Publishers Weekly) novel featuring North Americ...

  • Changes of Heart synopsis, comments

    Changes of Heart

    Patricia Ryan

    These five short stories tell, each in their own way, what people do when change enters their lives.Written clearly and concisely, the stories are tragic, ironic, touching, and hop...

  • Red Butterfly synopsis, comments

    Red Butterfly

    A.L. Sonnichsen

    A young orphaned girl in modernday China discovers the meaning of family in this “heartbreaking, heartwarming, and impressive debut” (Publishers Weekly, starred review) told in ver...

  • Kill Me Once synopsis, comments

    Kill Me Once

    Jon Osborne

    Nathan Stiedowe is seeking perfection and he has been learning from the best. Recreating some of the most sickening murders in history, his objective appears chillingly simple, bu...

  • Improv for Actors synopsis, comments

    Improv for Actors

    Dan Diggles

    In this stepbystep guide, an actor and improvisational teacher brings his tested methods to the page to show how actors can take risks and gain spontaneity in all genres of scripte...

  • War in a Beautiful Country synopsis, comments

    War in a Beautiful Country

    Patricia Ryan

    A quirky mystery for serious readers.War in a Beautiful Country finds Regina, an artist, suddenly the target of a random danger she cannot understand in the form of bomb threats in...

  • Flash and Bones synopsis, comments

    Flash and Bones

    Kathy Reichs

    Kathy Reichs#1 New York Times bestselling author and producer of the FOX television hit Bonesreturns with a riveting new novel set in Charlotte, North Carolina, featuring America’s...

  • No Name Lane synopsis, comments

    No Name Lane

    Howard Linskey

    An unstoppable serial killer. A fifth girl missing. A longburied secret. A gripping crime thriller perfect for fans of LJ Ross, Mel Sherratt and Mark Billingham.There's a serial ki...

  • Patricia Marie Ryan v. State Florida synopsis, comments

    Patricia Marie Ryan v. State Florida

    Fourth District Court of Appeal of Florida

    Daniel E. Remeta appeals his conviction for firstdegree murder and sentence of death. We have jurisdiction. Art. V, § 3(b)(1), Fla. Const. We affirm both the conviction and the se...

  • Living with the Brooklyn Bridge synopsis, comments

    Living with the Brooklyn Bridge

    Patricia Ryan

    Why this book offers a unique perspective:With all that has been written about the Brooklyn Bridge, no other work offers the unique perspective of LIVING WITH THE BROOKLYN BRIDGE.A...

  • The Secret Chamber synopsis, comments

    The Secret Chamber

    Patrick Woodhead

    People have been disappearing in what the explorer Stanley called the black heart of Africa the impenetrable forests of northern Congo. But when a brilliant young English doctor v...

  • Angel of Death synopsis, comments

    Angel of Death

    Richard Shaw

    When Victoria is called in to investigate the theft of valuable marble statues from a north London cemetery, she soon finds out the lives of the cemetery staff are as tangled as th...

  • Bare Bones synopsis, comments

    Bare Bones

    Kathy Reichs

    “Fans of TV’s CSI: Crime Scene Investigation should be in heaven” (People) stepping into the world of forensic anthropologist Dr. Temperance Brennanshe works with the dead, but she...

  • Dear Cathy ... Love, Mary synopsis, comments

    Dear Cathy ... Love, Mary

    Catherine Conlon & Mary Phelan

    'Poignant, funny and highly readable. Would make a wonderful present.' Sue Leonard, Examiner'A real snapshot in time ... a celebration of female friendship ... fantastic such a g...