In the Shadow of the White House: A Memoir of the Washington and Watergate Years, 1968-1978

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For her first forty years, Jo Haldemans life followed a conventional path. While her husband, Bob, built his career in advertising, Jo comfortably settled into her role as mother of four, housewife, and community volunteer.
In 1968, Jos world changed dramatically. Richard Nixon was elected President of the United States, and Bob was offered the job of a lifetimeWhite House Chief of Staff. As Jo and Bob discussed the opportunities and challenges that this move would entail, little did she anticipate the course that her life, and her relationship with Bob, would take over the next ten years.
In this insightful, poignant, and guileless memoir of those ten years, Jo shares her story as the wife of H. R. Haldeman, often referred to as the second most powerful person in the White House. She offers a window into the world of trips on Air Force One, weekends at Camp David, and events at the White House, as well as family vignettes and the growing stresses of her husbands demanding job.
Then a bungled burglary at the Watergate erupted into a national scandal. The news began to feature the Haldeman name. Blaring headlines and vicious political cartoons accompanied new revelations of a cover-up. Multiple investigations and Senate hearings followed. Criminal proceedings loomed.
Jos compelling account takes the reader on her journey from the heady heights of Washington life through an excruciating public resignation and trial to her husbands conviction and imprisonment. In a true period piece, Jo illuminates the story of the "woman behind the man" and personalizes the Watergate experience. Enhanced by her personal photographs and the immediacy of her present tense delivery, In the Shadow of the White House is a fascinating work of nonfiction that reads like a novel.

Reviews

"No president of the postwar era has been more consequential and more controversial than Richard Nixon. Bob Haldeman, his Chief of Staff, was there for almost every instant of those stormy and glorious and then sad days. So was his brilliant wife, Jo. Here is a must-read account of the days that changed the world from an authentic insider, devoted wife, and vital memoirist."
Ben Stein, bestselling author and former speechwriter to Richard Nixon and Gerald Ford

"Jo Haldeman has traced her journeythe highs and the lowsduring some very challenging and consequential times. It is an inspiring story. Our friend Jo is a strong, steady, and devoted woman, and she tells her story with love, with wisdom, and with perspective."
Joyce and Donald Rumsfeld

When President Nixon had blue hearts created for his senior advisors to recognize their valor in times of stress, he should have included a heart for Bobs wife, Jo. Always present with her camera and her genuine warmth, Jo wasand still isa class act. In this memoir, she shares what it was like to be the woman behind the man behind the president.
Henry Kissinger

What a terrific, moving, and wise book! It should be required reading for Washington wives and, maybe more importantly, their husbands. A very personal and sometimes painful booka story about service, the temptations of power, and the power of love.
Evan Thomas, New York Times bestselling author of Being Nixon

Jo, you have a story to tell.
H. R. Haldeman

Author Bio

Jo Haldeman was married to H. R. Bob HaldemanRichard Nixon's Chief of Stafffor forty-four years. She lives in Santa Barbara, California, and has four children and six grandchildren.