Nellie Lynch
Cite this Page
"Nellie Lynch," White House Workers History Project, White House Historical Association, 2026, https://whha.whirlihost.com/Detail/workers/778.
- Position
- Cook
- Years in President's House
- circa 1931 – 1933
- Legal Status
- Free Person
- Gender
- Female
- Race/Ethnicity
- White
- Presidency
- Herbert Hoover
- Biography
- Nellie Lynch was listed as a White House cook in the 1931 and 1932 Christmas lists prepared by First Lady Lou Hoover.1 She was among the domestic servants relieved by First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt in 1933. Mrs. Roosevelt reduced the size of the staff due to budgetary restrictions and relieved several White workers of their positions on the domestic staff, as they were paid more than their African-American counterparts. Biographer Blanche Wiesen Cook wrote that Roosevelt “explained that it was easier for white employees to find alternative jobs in Depression America.”2 Still, White House Cook Katherine Buckley noted that Lynch struggled with her unemployment and the Great Depression, writing “Nellie Lynch lost all her savings in the Mattapan Bank, Boston.”3 The popularity of this name in Washington, D.C. at this time makes it difficult to confirm other details about her life.
- White House Employees, 1932, Lou Henry Hoover Papers, Subject Files, White House Christmas 1932, Herbert Hoover Presidential Library; Xmas List 1931, Lou Henry Hoover Papers, Subject Files, White House Christmas 1931, Herbert Hoover Presidential Library.
- Blanche Wiesen Cook, Eleanor Roosevelt: The Defining Years Vol. 2 (New York: Penguin Books, 1999, pg. 57-59.
- Katherine Buckley to Eleanor Roosevelt, January 30, 1933, Letter in Vincent Carmody, Kathy White House: From William Street to the White House (Ireland: Poundlane Publications, 2023), pg. 44.
- Birthplace
- Unclear from Context
- Unclear from Context