Maggie Rogers was born in Salem, Virginia on May 16, 1874.¹ Rogers worked as a beautician prior to being hired at the White House at the start of William Howard Taft’s presidency in 1909.² There, she worked as a housemaid and lady’s maid. Her duties included caring for linens, styling hair and managing clothing for first ladies, and seeing to the needs of overnight visitors at the White House. She often brought her daughter, Lillian Rogers Parks, along with her to work; she later secured a job for Lillian as a maid there, too.³ Maggie Rogers planned to retire in March 1939, but First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt requested that she stay until the summer to serve the British royal family during their June 1939 State Visit.⁴She retired afterward, and began compiling notes to publish a memoir; however, her health impeded her ability to do so. Later, Lillian Rogers Parks included Maggie’s story in her own memoir, My Thirty Years Backstairs at the White House.⁵ Maggie Rogers died on July 19, 1953, and was buried at Lincoln Memorial Cemetery in Maryland.⁶

Autobiographical information by Lillian’s mother, Maggie Rogers, Series II, Folder 10, MS 575 Lillian Rogers Parks Papers, 1939-1997, Historical Society of Washington, D.C.
Lillian Rogers Parks, My Thirty Years Backstairs at the White House (New York: Fleet Publishing Corporation, 1961), 107; Ellen A. Riley to Lou Henry Hoover, January 1929, Lou Henry Hoover Papers, Subject Files, Servants and Aides General 1929-1933, Herbert Hoover Presidential Library.
Ibid, 203-205.
“Intimate Views of Famous: Maggie Rogers, White House Maid 30 Years, Is Dead,” Kansas City Times (Missouri), July 22, 1953, pg. 17.
Lillian Rogers Parks, My Thirty Years Backstairs at the White House (New York: Fleet Publishing Corporation, 1961), 259-260.
“Rogers, Maggie,” Evening Star (Washington, D.C.), July 21, 1953, pg. 8.

Birthplace

Salem, Virginia, USA

Lincoln Memorial Cemetery

Related Workers: Lillian Rogers Parks
Housekeeping and Laundry, 1929 – 1960; Lillian Carter
Housekeeping and Laundry, 1913 – circa 1939; Katurah S. Brooks
Kitchen, Dining Room, Pantry, and Storeroom, Housekeeping and Laundry, 1931 – 1939; Cesar Carrera
Housekeeping and Laundry, circa 1939 – 1944; Margaret Sykes
Housekeeping and Laundry, circa 1939 – 1940

Related Association Content: https://www.whitehousehistory.org/a-white-house-maid-remembers-a-moment-of-panic; https://www.whitehousehistory.org/the-chandelier-club; https://www.whitehousehistory.org/from-the-white-house-to-the-publishing-house-white-house-residence-staff-memoirs