The First Ladies

The First Ladies, co-written by Marie Benedict and Victoria Christopher Murray, is a novel that explores the partnership between First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt and civil rights activist Mary McLeod Bethune. Their unlikely friendship, rooted in shared beliefs about women’s rights and education, transcended racial and societal boundaries and played a significant role in shaping the modern civil rights movement. Through meeting at a function to forming a lasting friendship over many years, Eleanor and Mary formed a meaningful, supportive union. They shared goals, and together they worked for desegregation, equal rights, anti-lynching laws, and education for all. The First Ladies is Benedict and Murray’s second joint-venture novel. Their first, The Personal Librarian, is also based on a real person, Belle da Costa Greene, J. P. Morgan’s personal librarian. They divided the chapters of The Personal Librarian according to “interest and area of expertise,” but decided they would each take a character for The First Ladies (Macomber, Debbie. “Author Spotlight: Marie Benedict & Victoria Christopher Murray.” Welcome Home. 23 June 2023). Murray wrote the Mary chapters, and Benedict wrote the Eleanor chapters.

This study guide refers to the 2023 Kindle e-book edition published by Berkley, an imprint of Penguin Random House.