The historic 2016 presidential election keeps on producing first-ever landmarks, and that includes the next first lady of United States, Melania Trump.
So what kind of FLOTUS will she be? According to first-lady historians, here’s a hint: Think Jackie Kennedy, not Eleanor Roosevelt, Hillary Clinton or Michelle Obama.
“In terms of the evolution of the first lady, I see (Trump) moving us back to the more traditional role,” says Jean Wahl Harris, who studies the role of the first lady at the University of Scranton. “A very traditional social hostess is something I think she will be comfortable with.”
But she will be expected to be front and center, not shy and retiring like Bess Truman in the 1940s. But Trump was hardly on the campaign trail so what’s to stop her from doing the unexpected as first lady?
“Starting with Kennedy, the expectations have ratcheted up, it’s not just about being a good wife and mother,” Harris says. “Americans expect (the first lady) to be a celebrity, to be seen, to support your husband, to have a project that’s good for the nation. And we expect to see you.”
She “will surely rise to the rather rigid strictures of a job whose very existence is something of an anachronism,” adds Elizabeth Mehren, professor of journalism and expert on first ladies at Boston University. “Mrs. Trump has signaled that her ’cause’ may be cyberbullying, a safe bet for the mother of a 10-year-old, but less safe for the wife of someone who sends mean tweets at 3 in the morning.”
What makes Melania Trump historic?
First foreign-born FLOTUS in 191 years: Born in Slovenia in Eastern Europe in 1970, Trump will be the first first lady not born in the USA since Louisa Adams, wife of President John Quincy Adams, who was born in England in 1775, when America was still an English colony, and took office in 1825.
First Wife No. 3: Past presidents have had multiple wives (Reagan, Ford, Wilson and Theodore Roosevelt among them), but no one else before President-elect Trump has been married and divorced twice before marrying a third time.
First former fashion model: Trump made her living as fashion model Melania Knauss before and after she came to the U.S., and met Trump at a fashion party. They married in 2005, and have one son, Barron.
First to have posed nude: She took it all off for photographers at least twice: The New York Post ran one set of images in July of Trump in her birthday suit in 1995 when she was 25. British GQ ran its own set of images, from 2000, in March, and again online on Tuesday, of Trump sprawled on a fur throw, wearing nothing but jeweled bracelets and a handcuff.
First for whom English is not her first language: Her native language is Slovenian but she also speaks four others: English, French, Serbian and German.
This fluency could come in handy, as it did for President Kennedy, whose wife spoke French and Spanish.
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SOURCE: Maria Puente
USA TODAY
