Rye Native Barbara (Pierce) Bush and Her First Encounter with George

A few days ago we mentioned the Bush anniversary – former Barbara (Pierce) Bush is originally from Rye. Here is an article that explains the first encounter between the former Fist Lady and President:

"At Christmastime 1941 — barely two weeks after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor — previously scheduled society events needed to proceed as planned, so 16-year-old Barbara Pierce of Rye, N.Y., home on vacation from her Ashley Hall girls’ finishing school in Charleston, S.C., wore her pretty, bright new red and green dress to a country club dance in nearby Greenwich, Conn.

She was happily dancing the night away when a lifelong friend cut in and took her to meet someone new, a tall (6-foot-2), lanky 17-year-old senior at Phillips Academy in Andover, Mass., who sported the odd nickname Poppy. (Poppy’s original nickname had been Little Pops, to distinguish him from his four young uncles, a name that had evolved into Poppy; he detested both sobriquets but learned to live with Poppy, as his friends called him and as he was introduced to Barbara Pierce.)…

…At Oceana Naval Air Station, near Norfolk, Va., he helped train new torpedo pilots and prepared for a second tour of duty in the Pacific. But just weeks after his return from the Pacific, he took a leave of absence from the Navy and married his sweetheart, whom he still calls “Bar,” at First Presbyterian Church in Rye, N.Y., a New York City suburb. The wedding of Barbara Pierce to George Herbert Walker Bush, sometimes known as Poppy, sometimes as Skin, and more recently as Mr. President, on Jan. 6, 1945, took place 69 years ago this past week."

Read the entire account in The Huntsville Item.