The Pittsburgh Press (September 8, 1944)
Wife of Socialist Norman Thomas expects never to be First Lady
Party won’t like it, but that’s her belief
By Jo Ann Healey
“I don’t know about the wives of other candidates, but I personally never expect to be the First Lady.”
So says Mrs. Norman Thomas, the wife of the Socialist Party’s five-time presidential candidate.
She said:
Of course, the party wouldn’t like me to express those sentiments, but there they are.
Mrs. Thomas, who has campaigned with her husband as his private secretary since he first ran in 1928, says she has noticed few changes in the country in the last 16 years.
Everything seems the same
She said:
Skirts are short again and of course there is the predominance of servicemen and women in the audiences, but other than that, everything seems much the same – with the exception of the Republican candidates, of course.
Mrs. Thomas, a small, alert woman, writes all her husband’s speeches from his dictation, and says she has not tired of listening to them. She admits:
However, I once did fall asleep while I was sitting on the platform, so now I always sit in the audience.
More and more welcome
The thrill of campaigning has not worn off, Mrs. Thomas asserts, although on election night her excitement comes not from hoping her husband will be President, but from seeing if he polled more votes than during the last campaign.
She says wistfully:
It takes the country a long time to recognize a great man, but each year Norman is more and more welcome in the cities where he speaks.
She hinted this might be the last campaign her husband would enter. She says:
I should miss it. But I realty never thought about being First Lady. I should like to entertain at the White House, but I should be frightfully shy, and I shouldn’t know about precedent and such.
Would like to entertain
Mrs. Thomas, who has five children and nine grandchildren, says that if by any chance she should ever become First Lady, she would lead a very sedentary life.
She says:
I can’t write at all and I never speak in public, but I should like to entertain all of the interesting people who come to the White House. I have never been there, you know.