Grace Goodhue Coolidge, a University of Vermont Pi Beta Phi, has the distinction of attending all of the Easter Monday egg-rolling events which took place on the White House lawn during her tenure as First Lady. She was the first First Lady to do so and she did it with her usual flair. From 1924 until 1928, she visited with the children who came to the event, often bringing the family’s pets along with her. One year, she and Rebecca, the First Family’s pet raccoon, greeted the children.
A raccoon was, no doubt, an unusual pet. It came as a gift and instead of becoming a meal, the raccoon became a White House resident. Biographer David Pietrusza, in his book Wombats and Such, has a description of Rebecca taken from one of the First Lady’s letters. Mrs. Coolidge described Rebecca, “…in the house she had her liberty. She was a mischievous, inquisitive party and we had to keep watch of her when she was in the house. She enjoyed nothing better than being placed in a bathtub with a little water in it and given a cake of soap with which to play. In this fashion she would amuse herself for an hour or more.”
Mrs. Coolidge and Rebecca at the White House Easter Egg Roll, 1927 (LoC)
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