Mary Todd Lincoln

Mary Todd Lincoln was from a genteel family in Lexington, Kentucky. She was used to having fine things, and as first lady she understood the importance of keeping up appearances. Although she was perhaps the first to realize her husband’s potential for high office, she also knew there was a crude, “frontier aura” about him that she tried to temper for her own sake as well as his.
“They say Mrs. L. is awfully western, loud and unrefined,” quipped one Washington socialite. In part to counter such gossip, she refurbished the dowdy White House décor, hosted lavish balls, and spared no expense on her own wardrobe. This Mathew Brady photograph shows the new first lady in a festive ball gown in 1861, the first year of her husband’s administration.