Nixon Administrations - Family Life

Family Life

After returning to Whittier to practice law in 1938, Nixon met Patricia Ryan when both were auditioning for parts in a play with the Whittier Community Players. They were married in 1940. Born Thelma Catherine Ryan in 1912, Pat (who legally changed her name in 1930) grew up in a poor, unhappy home. Her mother died in 1926 and her father in 1930, so at the age of 18 she was on her own. She gradually worked her way through college and graduated from the University of Southern California in 1937 with a teaching certificate. She began her first job at Whittier High School in September 1937, and met Nixon the following January. They were married more than 50 years and had two children: Patricia (1946) and Julie (1948).

Julie married David Eisenhower, grandson of President Dwight D. Eisenhower, in 1967, and Tricia married Edward Cox, a student who later became a successful lawyer, in 1971.