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The second First Lady was the first to take an interest in politics and was a staunch supporter of US independence from Great Britain. Her extensive correspondence with her husband, John Adams, has been well preserved, allowing us to read Abigail Adams’s early reminders for him to prioritize women’s rights. She said in one 1776 letter she wrote while he prepared to write an early draft of the Declaration of Independence, “If particular care and attention is not paid to the ladies, we are determined to foment a rebellion.”

This glamorous divorcee had President Woodrow Wilson courting controversy when he married her in 1915 shortly after the death of his first wife, Ellen Wilson. Edith Wilson famously brought in sheep to graze on the White House lawn during World War I, opposed women’s suffrage (though it became legal during Woodrow Wilson’s administration), and may have even run the country for five months—when he suffered a stroke during his second term, she took charge of his correspondence. Critics grumbled that the US was under a “petticoat government.”

Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s illustrious wife changed the game for First Ladies by becoming a politician in her own right. Two days after his 1933 inauguration, she held her first women-only White House press conference, a recurring event that not only made it necessary for newspapers to employ women reporters to get scoops but inserted Eleanor Roosevelt’s agenda into the headlines regularly. She was particularly influential in children’s issues, housing, and rights for women and Black people.

Previously a modern dancer, Betty married Gerald Ford one month before his first election to the House of Representatives. In 1974, their first year as the presidential couple, the radically candid Betty shared news of her mastectomy, a key step in promoting breast cancer awareness. She championed pro-choice politics (he was pro-life) and the Equal Rights Amendment, and became an important voice for mental health after leaving the White House. Her legacy lives on in a Southern California rehab center she founded after overcoming her painkiller dependency.

Having worked hard on the political career of her husband, Jimmy Carter, in the Georgia state senate and governor’s mansion, the practical Rosalynn Carter continued her efforts in the White House. She made sure her chief of staff was paid as much as Jimmy Carter’s, and became known for her pragmatism, planning low-cost state meals and wearing the same gown for various important occasions. Her main political issue was mental health, about which she testified in front of a US Senate committee in 1979, making her the first First Lady to appear before Congress since Eleanor Roosevelt.

Like her husband, Ronald Reagan, Nancy Reagan was a former Hollywood actor, bringing a shiny gloss to the White House quite contrary to Rosalynn Carter’s strict budgeting. When counseled to dial down the glitz, Nancy Reagan released a dramatic anti-addiction campaign, coining the phrase “Just Say No.” As with many First Ladies before her, naysayers said she had too much influence over policy. She replied, “For eight years I was sleeping with the president, and if that doesn’t give you special access, I don’t know what does.”

President George H. W. Bush’s wife presented herself to voters as a “traditional” First Lady, which to her meant keeping her political beliefs largely to herself. She was very active in encouraging reading skills, perhaps motivated by her son Neil Bush’s dyslexia. She carried out her First Lady duties and established the Barbara Bush Foundation for Family Literacy while undergoing radiation treatment for Graves’ disease, an autoimmune disease of the thyroid. She wrote two children’s books narrated by the family’s cocker spaniels, Millie and C. Fred.

Princeton and Harvard graduate Michelle Robinson met Barack Obama when he was hired at the law firm where she was a junior associate. As he climbed the political ladder, she served as the Chicago mayor’s assistant, founded a leadership training program, and worked in community outreach for the University of Chicago. In the White House, the country’s first Black First Lady promoted healthy living, memorably planting a veggie garden on the lawn of the presidential home. Her 2018 book, Becoming, helped drum up speculation that she would run for office. She says she prefers “a normal life.”

Few First Ladies have succeeded in maintaining their private life as well as Donald Trump’s third wife, the Slovenian former model Melania Trump. She’s rejected the First Lady’s characteristically chummy relationship with the press and didn’t relocate to the White House until months after her husband’s inauguration so that their son, Barron, could finish his school year in New York City. In office she has spoken out against online bullying and the country’s opioid addiction crisis. She’s reportedly mastered five languages and is the only First Lady of the last two hundred years not to have been born a US citizen.