FLOTUS

Florence, the daughter of Amos Kling, the richest man in Marion, Ohio, having fallen in love with a neighborhood alcoholic, Henry De Wolfe, defies her father, who wants her to marry Marions’s second richest man. She elopes with Henry after she becomes pregnant. Henry, violent and abusive, disappears and abandons Florence and their three-month-old son, Marshall. Florence returns to Marion, but her father, still smarting from Florence’s defiance, would not let her into his lavish estate. Florence and Marshall become homeless. She begs for alms on the steps of Epworth Methodist Church where her father is a deacon. After church members protest, Amos lets Florence and Marshall into his estate. Florence ekes out a living as a piano teacher. Soon, Amos plans for Florence to marry his friend, recently widowed President Benjamin Harrison, so he could add her to the pantheon of US Presidents from Ohio and their spouses on his living room wall. Florence, already madly in love with a young editor and band leader, Warren Harding, defies Amos again. Amos, believing that Warren Harding has African blood, is incensed and is determined to destroy Warren. When Florence informs him that Senator Warren Harding would run for President, Amos chides her for losing the chance to be on his wall because of her poor decision making. He vows to prevent Warren from becoming the President of the United States. Florence counter-vows to return to her father’s compound only as the First Lady of the United States to join the pantheon after she makes Warren President. Florence consults an astrologer, Marcia Champney, who assures her that despite Warren’s philandering and other flaws, if he runs for President, no force on earth can stop him. Next, Florence must convince her extremely reluctant, self-doubting, and vacillating husband to run for President. She is forced to have an abortion that is complicated by the loss of one kidney. She must also contend with her father’s bruising, no-holds-barred effort to stop Warren, and the humiliation of Warren’s continuing, multiple affairs. Against all these odds, Florence succeeds in installing Warren in the White House in 1920. She returns to her father’s mansion and takes her rightful place in the pantheon after her father apologizes for his misbehavior.