Ellen Axson Wilson

Ellen Louise Axson Wilson (May 15, 1860 – August 6, 1914) was the first wife of President Woodrow Wilson and the mother of their three daughters. Like her husband, she was a Southerner, as well as the daughter of a clergyman. She was born in Savannah, Georgia, but raised in Rome, Georgia. Having an artistic bent, she studied at the Art Students League of New York before her marriage, and continued to produce art in later life. She was the first lady of the United States from Wilson's inauguration in 1913 until her death. During that period, she arranged White House weddings for two of their daughters. She was the third First Lady, and the most recent, to die during her tenancy. Biography Ellen Louise Axson, born in Savannah, Georgia, was the daughter of the Reverend Samuel Edward Axson, a Presbyterian minister, and his wife Margaret Jane (née Hoyt) Axson. Ellen became a woman of refined tastes with a fondness for art, music, and literature. When she was eleven years old, she began studying art at Rome Female College in Rome, Georgia. After her graduation in 1876, Ellen's drawing titled School Scene was submitted to the Paris International Exposition. where it won a bronze medal for excellence. In April 1883, she met Woodrow Wilson when he was visiting his cousin Jesse Woodrow Wilson in Rome, Georgia, on family business. At that time, she was keeping house for her widowed father. Woodrow Wilson thought of Ellen, "What splendid laughing eyes!" They were engaged 5 months later, but postponed the wedding while he did postgraduate work at Johns Hopkins University and she nursed her ailing father. Ellen's father committed suicide while hospitalized for depression, after which she went North to study at the Art Students League of New York.