Pat Nixon stood stoically as her husband, Richard, the Republican nominee for vice president in 1952, furiously sputtered that there were no mink coats for the Nixons and that he was proud that his wife wore “a good Republican cloth coat.” In 1960, she visibly choked up and held back tears as he conceded the presidency to John Kennedy. She was derisively referred to as “Plastic Pat.” A Time cover story from the era claimed that her critics found her “too serene, too tightly controlled; that she smothers her personality with a fixed smile and a mask of dignity.”

Pat Nixon retained that composure as she and her husband, disgraced after the Watergate scandal, boarded the helicopter Army One and left the White House for the last time.

For The Mysterious Mrs. Nixon: The Life and Times of Washington’s Most Private First Lady (St. Martin’s Press), Heath Hardage Lee conducted deep research that stretched across the country, from Colonial Williamsburg and Whittier College to the Richard Nixon Presidential Library and Museum, and the archives of Nixon daughters Julie and Tricia. She interviewed many who knew Pat Nixon, ranging from Henry Kissinger to Bob Woodward, in her determination to present a more nuanced portrait of the former first lady.

With the 50th anniversary of Richard Nixon's resignation on the horizon, Hardage Lee has drawn on a rich array of sources to revise Pat Nixon's image, presenting her as a "practiced political partner" rather than a1960's Barbie doll in a cellophane-sealed box "to be seen and admired, but not heard." Hardage Lee traces the arc of Pat (Ryan) Nixon's birth in desolate Nevada through southern California to the White House and the klieg lights of the Watergate era. She stood by her husband, but was "strongly-pro women," Hardage Lee writes, supporting the Equal Rights Amendment and a woman's right to choose and she pushed women for high-level government appointments, including the Supreme Court. Hardage Lee spoke about the mystery of Pat Nixon with The National.

Q: How did your previous book The League of Wives: The Untold Story of the Women Who Took On the U.S. Government to Bring Their Husbands Home lead you to Pat Nixon? What make you think there could be more to “Plastic Pat,” as she was often known?

A. I spent a lot of time at the Richard Nixon Presidential Library and Museum in Yorba Linda researching the Vietnam-era POW and MIA wives and how they intersected with the Nixon administration for my previous book. While there, I ran across a photo of Mrs. Nixon hosting a tea for POW-MIA wives. This was one of many photos of Pat Nixon actively out and about working with everyday people during her time as first lady. The images I saw showed a vibrant, engaged and enthusiastic Pat Nixon—much different than the media image of “Plastic Pat” I had always heard about. This made me think there must be much more to this woman than most Americans ever knew.

Q: One of the first surprises of your book is that you find Pat Nixon’s origin story in the West, in Nevada in particular. How did you go about excavating the story of her childhood?

A, Pat Ryan—later Pat Nixon—was born in Ely, Nevada, in 1912 and then moved to Artesia, California. She grew up on the Western frontier in a pioneer environment. Her childhood was spent with her hard-working parents who did not have much money, and she lost them both by the age of 17. It was a tough existence. It made her self-sufficient and used to adversity from an early age. I was fortunate that several oral history projects had been undertaken in the early 1970s by Whittier College and CSU-Fullerton College to capture the memories of those who knew Pat from childhood onwards. These archival documents gave me a wealth of materials to mine to find out who she really was. As her son-in-law David Eisenhower told me later, she “came from a kind of Annie Oakley background. … Her spirit is Western and California.”

Q: Both Richard and Pat Nixon have been depicted as very rigid. You penetrated that image and exposed their very close relationship.

A: During the time the Nixons were in politics, showing affection in public was not common. The culture was not like today where everyone posts about the relationships online! Both Richard and Pat were very private people who did not think private feelings were appropriate to share with the public. (For the record, President Kennedy and Jackie Kennedy were also rarely physically affectionate in public during their White House years.) The media, however, took the Nixons’ lack of public displays of affection and portrayed their marriage as cold and distant. What changed my mind about the relationship was reading Richard’s courting letters to Pat. He was clearly smitten and pursued her with tenacity until she fell in love with him and the two married. The letters between them from World War II were also game changers for me: several of the letters that I was allowed to read had not been seen before by any other researcher. The love and commitment between them jumped off the page.

Q: You show that in many ways Pat Nixon was conservative and certainly did not wish to be termed a “feminist.” Simultaneously, you show that she pushed her husband to be more liberal.

A: Pat would not have considered herself a feminist in the second wave sense. However, she was incredibly “pro-women” for her time or any period in history. She strongly supported the ERA and a woman’s right to choose before Roe v. Wade. She supported the effort during the Nixon administration to get women into higher levels of government service, and she pushed hard publicly to get a woman on the Supreme Court. She planted seeds to help women’s causes during her time that came to fruition later on. Sandra Day O’Connor for instance was identified during the Nixon administration and a decade later became the first female Supreme Court justice.

She pushed her husband to embrace progressive causes: Title IX, the EPA, OSHA all came about during the Nixon administration. Nixon also wanted to appoint a black female lawyer, Jewel Lafontant, to the Supreme Court as far back as 1969! Pat was behind all this, supporting it and pushing her husband to make things more equal for women.

Q: At the same time, she resisted the traditional “first lady” role of redecorating the White House, even though it had become rather dingy.

A: The Johnsons had been reluctant to change anything after JFK was assassinated, so the White House was desperately in need of a refresh by the time the Nixons arrived. However, Pat was reluctant to take on that task because it was seen by feminists at the time as typical “women’s work” and not serious enough. Pat proved you could do it all, though, by working for women’s rights behind the scenes and by renovating and restoring the White House simultaneously. She acquired more art and objects during her time as first lady than any other before or since her time—over 600 items. Most Americans think Jackie Kennedy did all of the acquisition of objects for the White House, but Pat Nixon took the good work Mrs. Kennedy had done in that area and ran with it. She rarely gets any credit for this outstanding work.

Q: Pat Nixon emerges from your book as an embattled woman, trying to protect her husband from his close aides John Ehrlichman and H.R. (Bob) Haldeman. What do you think she could see in them that her husband could not?

A: Pat had a very good sense of people, their motivations and their character. I would argue her “people sense” was sharper than her husband’s. Her radar was always keen for people who might be trying to manipulate or take advantage of her husband and his position. Haldeman and Ehrlichman, known in the press as “the Germans” for their Germanic names, built a wall around the president, isolating him from his old advisers, the “Old Nixon Team,” replacing these trusted allies with themselves and their assistants. In the process, they also isolated the president from Pat and his daughters as well as many of their old friends.

The first lady could see this early on: she didn’t like or trust either of these men. Bob Haldeman was her especial nemesis. I believe she saw that these men wanted proximity to power, and she knew well that power often corrupts. She never wanted power or the spotlight for herself, so she could see those who hungered for that clearly—and was wary of them.

Q: What did Pat Nixon’s stoicism mask?

A: She weathered so many storms in her life from childhood onwards that most people would be crushed by. Her stoicism got her through many of these traumatic events and allowed her private thoughts and feelings to stay private. That is why she still seems a bit mysterious today. I hope my book will remove that mask to some extent so readers can understand the real Pat Nixon better.

Q: Can you explain what she really thought about Watergate?

A: I think she thought the whole scandal was rubbish and just a way for the Nixons’ enemies to get to them. She had seen this happen repeatedly and was weary of the whole Washington swamp. She almost expected things like that to happen and was used to staying in the battle and fighting until the end. She had done this before many times, and her husband had been knocked down only to get back up for another round.

She thought that the Nixon tapes were like love letters and that they should have been burned and not shared with the public. She also did not think her husband needed a pardon after Watergate. She was always loyal and supportive and convinced of his innocence.

Q: You write that Carl Bernstein and Bob Woodward’s book The Final Days depicted Pat Nixon as “a recluse and a heavy drinker crushed by the Watergate scandal.” Is there any truth to that?

A: I spent years interviewing people who knew Pat well and digging into many different archives including those of Woodward and Bernstein themselves. I found not one shred of evidence to support their claims that Pat was drinking heavily. I also interviewed Bob Woodward and asked for names and evidence that led him to claim this. He would not/could not provide one name to support this characterization of her. Their characterization of her as a heavy drinker ring false to me.

The official White House records shatter the Woodward and Bernstein claim that she was reclusive during Watergate. She was actively participating in outward-facing duties as first lady until three weeks before the resignation and during those last weeks was working full days with her staff on the White House restoration and renovation projects. So that part of their claims is easily disproved.

Going after the first lady is another way the media goes after the president. Look at the current-day claims that Jill Biden acted as “Lady Macbeth,” forcing her aged husband to stay in office. It’s a sexist way to minimize first ladies and aggrandize them at the same time. Even today, no first lady—Democrat or Republican—is immune from negative media portrayals.

Q: Richard and Pat Nixon, with their daughters, Julie and Tricia, seemed like a very tight unit apart from, as you put it, the “Fifth Nixon”—Rose Mary Woods. History may only remember her for the infamous 18.5-minute gap in the Watergate tape, but what role do you think she played for the Nixons?

A. Rose Mary or “Rose” Woods became a true family member to the Nixons. She was like an aunt to the two Nixon daughters, and she became a dear friend and trusted confidante to Pat. I describe her as President Nixon’s “work wife.” She could say things to him Pat could not, and she was the gatekeeper for most of her career to Nixon. She stayed loyal to the Nixon family until the end and always remained in good touch with them. The accusations about the 18.5-minute gap on the tape hurt her deeply, however (they were never proved), and the Watergate scandal was crushing for her.

Q: You write so movingly about Pat Nixon’s death in 1993 and the burial of her and her husband in Yorba Linda. Can you explain the inscription on her gravestone that reads: “Even when people can’t speak your language they can tell if you have love in your heart”?

A: One of Pat’s greatest legacies is her international diplomacy, both public facing and her private “soft diplomacy” efforts behind the scenes with her husband as both second lady and first lady. She was by Nixon’s side for significant meetings in Russia, China and the Middle East, among many others. She also acted as a global solo ambassador for her husband in Peru and Africa. She became one of the most traveled first ladies ever, visiting over 80 countries during her time in that role. Through all these travels and meetings with cultures and people so different than herself, she could always connect through her warmth, her hugs and her one-on-one charm. She knew that where language often fails, eye contact, interest in the other person and a warm hug can make all the difference. People of all ages from children to older people could tell she was always genuinely and authentically herself.