01/05/2023

Nancy Kegan Smith

Ms. Smith worked for the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) as an archivist from 1973 until 2012 when she retired. She started her career as an archivist at the Lyndon Baines Johnson Presidential Library in Austin, Texas. In 1989 she co-edited and compiled the book, Modern First Ladies: Their Documentary Legacy. In that same year she moved to Washington, DC, first working for NARA’s Office of Presidential Libraries and later becoming the Director of the Presidential Materials Division, the Division at NARA that advised the White House on Presidential, Vice Presidential and First Lady’s records and gift issues and handled moves of Presidential records at the end of the administration. 

She has authored numerous publications, teaches and lectures on access to Presidential records, the Presidential Library system and First Ladies and their papers. She is co author of the article “A Historical Review of Access to Records in Presidential Libraries” and gave a series of lectures at Oxford University on Access to Presidential records. She had just finished co authoring the first college textbook on first ladies U.S. First Ladies Their Lives and Legacies along with Anita Mc Bride and Dr. Diana Carlin.