CRAWFORD, Texas – Jenna Bush couldn't see herself getting married at the White House surrounded by antique furniture and oil portraits of presidents. She and Henry Hager said “I do” yesterday at President Bush's ranch in Crawford where the corn is thigh-high, roads have names like Cattle Drive and the Texas flag is painted on the rooftops of barns.
The president and the bride picked “You Are So Beautiful” for their father-daughter dance, said band leader Tyrone Smith of Nashville, Tenn. Smith and his 10-piece party band, The Tyrone Smith Revue, was asked to do “Lovin' in My Baby's Eyes” by Taj Mahal for the newlyweds' first dance. Smith, who promised the couple a “get down” party, talked earlier in the week on the condition that the information not be released before the wedding.
Away from the glare of television cameras that have beamed other first family weddings into American living rooms, Jenna's outdoor wedding at the ranch reflected her family's penchant for privacy and her preference for the casual over the grandiose.
Even without the prying eyes of strangers, Jenna's marriage to her longtime boyfriend, Henry Hager, made presidential history. It will be remembered as an upbeat moment of Bush's two-term presidency beset by terrorism, war and the nation's current limp economy.
“This is a joyous occasion for our family, as we celebrate the happy life ahead of her and her husband, Henry,” Bush said in his radio address yesterday. “It's also a special time for Laura, who this Mother's Day weekend will watch a young woman we raised together walk down the aisle.”
Jenna, 26, is the latest of 22 children who have gotten married while their father was president. Their ceremonies have ranged from Tricia Nixon's extravagant wedding broadcast live from the Rose Garden in 1971 to the 1992 Camp David wedding of Jenna's aunt, Dorothy Koch. That one was kept so secret that the media didn't find out about it until it was over.
