Will it be a White House Wedding?

There is already much discussion about will Jenna Bush decide to marry Henry Hager in the White House. If so, it would be the 10th such wedding in Executive Mansion history.

Nine presidential children have been married in the White House. It would be the first White House wedding of a President child in 36 years, since Tricia Nixon tossed her bouquet from the grand staircase. Miss Nixon was married in June 1971, when the country was mired in a different war. Traditionally, White House brides have been married in the formal East Room, where state dinners are held. But Tricia Nixon chose the more relaxed Rose Garden. Her ceremony was not lavish by the standards of the day, with the exception of her 355-pound wedding cake stretching more than seven feet high and five feet across. The East Room can seat about 400 people — not a small wedding, but also not big enough to invite every political friend who wants an invitation.

Other presidential daughters to have all or part of their weddings at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue include: President Johnson’s daughter, Luci Baines Johnson Nugent, who had her wedding reception at the White House

in August 1966, Lynda Bird Johnson Robb, who married her husband in the East Room in December 1967; and Alice Roosevelt Longworth, the daughter of President Theodore Roosevelt, who was wed at the White House in 1906 and Elizabeth Tyler Waller who married William Waller in January of 1842.

One interesting White House Wedding tradition holds that you must invite the last bride of the last White House wedding, thus Maria Monroe was at the wedding of Elizabeth Tyler who attended the wedding of Nellie Grant who attended the wedding of Alice Roosevelt who attended the wedding of Tricia Nixon. Lynda Bird Johnson was missed. So Tricia Nixon would be invited to the Jenna Bush wedding or see the chain broken.