Updated:
October 6, 2006
s a child, Richard Nixon often visited Riverside and the Mission Inn. His mother’s sister, Edith Timberlake, her husband Philip, and their three children lived in Riverside. Philip Timberlake worked at the state Citrus Experiment Station.
Following his graduation from Whittier College and Duke University of Law, Nixon returned to California to practice law. In 1938, he met schoolteacher Patricia Ryan; they were married at the Mission Inn on June 21, 1940. The wedding took place in the Presidential Suite, named for President Theodore Roosevelt after his May 1903 stay at the Inn. The couple held their reception in the Spanish Art Gallery. Nixon’s mother Hannah made the wedding cake, and carefully balanced it on her lap for the automobile trip from Whittier to the Mission Inn. Richard and Pat Nixon honeymooned in Mexico. Prior to their departure from the hotel, their friends removed the labels from the cans of food packed away in the couple’s car. Every can they opened was a surprise.
The Nixons often returned to the Mission Inn. In 1952, they were staying at the Mission Inn when Nixon received a telegram notifying him that he had been chosen to run as General Eisenhower’s Vice President. Eisenhower won the election later that year. On January 21, 1953, eight days after his fortieth birthday, Nixon took the oath of office as Vice President.
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