Wilson Roosevelt Jerman (January 21, 1929 – May 16, 2020) was an American

butler A butler is a person who works in a house serving and is a domestic worker in a large household. In great houses, the household is sometimes divided into departments with the butler in charge of the dining room, wine cellar, and pantry. Some a ...

who served 11 different

U.S. presidents The president of the United States is the head of state and head of government of the United States, indirectly elected to a four-year term Term may refer to: * Terminology, or term, a noun or compound word used in a specific context, in pa ...

in the

White House The White House is the official residence and workplace of the president of the United States. It is located at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW in Washington, D.C., and has been the residence of every U.S. president since John Adams in 1800. ...

. He was one of the White House's longest serving employees.

Biography

Jerman was born in

Seaboard, North Carolina Seaboard is a township in Northampton County, North Carolina, United States, created as a company town by the Seaboard and Roanoke Railroad, approximately 10 miles northeast of Weldon in the mid-1840s as a place for railroad employees to live. T ...

, in 1929, the son of a farm worker. He dropped out of school at the age of 12 to work on a farm. In 1955, Jerman moved to

Washington, D.C. ) , image_skyline = , image_caption = Clockwise from top left: the Washington Monument and Lincoln Memorial on the National Mall, United States Capitol, Logan Circle, Jefferson Memorial, White House, Adams Morgan, ...

and worked as a caterer before being hired as a cleaner by the White House in 1957 during the administration of

Dwight D. Eisenhower Dwight David "Ike" Eisenhower (born David Dwight Eisenhower; ; October 14, 1890 – March 28, 1969) was an American military officer and statesman who served as the 34th president of the United States from 1953 to 1961. During World War II, ...

. Jerman was promoted to butler under

John F. Kennedy John Fitzgerald Kennedy (May 29, 1917 – November 22, 1963), often referred to by his initials JFK and the nickname Jack, was an American politician who served as the 35th president of the United States from 1961 until his assassination i ...

;

Jackie Kennedy Jacqueline Lee Kennedy Onassis ( ; July 28, 1929 – May 19, 1994) was an American socialite, writer, photographer, and book editor who served as first lady of the United States from 1961 to 1963, as the wife of President John F. Kennedy. A pop ...

gave Jerman two signed paintings that he hung in his home. He continued as a butler in the White House until his retirement in 1993 during the

Bill Clinton William Jefferson Clinton ( né Blythe III; born August 19, 1946) is an American politician who served as the 42nd president of the United States from 1993 to 2001. He previously served as governor of Arkansas from 1979 to 1981 and agai ...

administration. He returned to the White House in 2003 in the

George W. Bush George Walker Bush (born July 6, 1946) is an American politician who served as the 43rd president of the United States from 2001 to 2009. A member of the Republican Party, Bush family, and son of the 41st president George H. W. Bush, he ...

administration. Jerman worked as a

maitre d' Maitre or Maître is a French-language title, associated with lawyers. It is also a surname, equivalent to the English "Master" Notable people with the surname include: *Jean-Philippe Maitre (1949–2006), Swiss politician *Romain Maitre (born 19 ...

and elevator operator for

Barack Obama Barack Hussein Obama II ( ; born August 4, 1961) is an American politician who served as the 44th president of the United States from 2009 to 2017. A member of the Democratic Party, Obama was the first African-American president of the U ...

before his final retirement in 2012. To commemorate his 50-plus years of service in the White House, President Obama presented Jerman with a series of plaques depicting all 11 presidents he served. First Lady

Michelle Obama Michelle LaVaughn Robinson Obama (born January 17, 1964) is an American attorney and author who served as first lady of the United States from 2009 to 2017. She was the first African-American woman to serve in this position. She is married t ...

included a picture of her and the president in an elevator with Jerman in her best-selling memoir, '' Becoming''. Jerman was married twice and had five children. His first wife, Gladys, died in 1966;

Lyndon B. Johnson Lyndon Baines Johnson (; August 27, 1908January 22, 1973), often referred to by his initials LBJ, was an American politician who served as the 36th president of the United States from 1963 to 1969. He had previously served as the 37th vice ...

asked his personal physician to treat her before she died. Jerman's second wife, Helen, died in the 1990s. Jerman died from complications of

COVID-19 Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) is a contagious disease caused by a virus, the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). The first known case was COVID-19 pandemic in Hubei, identified in Wuhan, China, in December ...

on May 16, 2020, at the age of 91, during the

COVID-19 pandemic in Virginia The COVID-19 pandemic in Virginia is part of the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic. The first confirmed case was reported on March 7, 2020, in Fort Belvoir, and the first suspected case arrived in Virginia on February 23, 2020, which was a man who had ...

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Jerman, Wilson Roosevelt 1929 births 2020 deaths People from Seaboard, North Carolina White House staff American butlers 20th-century African-American people Deaths from the COVID-19 pandemic in Virginia