Famous Midwesterners Talk Motherhood

June 01, 2012
Behind every great Midwesterner, there's a great Midwestern mom. Comedians, writers, presidents and other important heartland heroes interpret the roles of motherhood.
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She inspires

"I remember my mother's prayers and they have always followed me. They have clung to me all my life."--President Abraham Lincoln, who spent most of his youth and early career in the Midwest

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She's always there

"Grown don't mean nothing to a mother. A child is a child. They get bigger, older, but grown? What's that suppose to mean? In my heart it don't mean a thing."--From the novel "Beloved," by Toni Morrison, born Chloe Anthony Wofford in Lorain, Ohio, in 1931"She never quite leaves her children at home, even when she doesn't take them along."--Minnesota-born writer Margaret Culkin Banning

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She accepts

"The story of a mother's life: Trapped between a scream and a hug."--Cartoonist Cathy Guisewite, born in Dayton, Ohio

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She reads

"You may have tangible wealth untold; Caskets of jewels and coffers of gold. Richer than I you can never be -- I had a mother who read to me."-- Poet and humorist Strickland Gillilan, who attended Ohio University at the turn of the last century

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She helps

"If evolution really works, how come mothers only have two hands?"--Comedian Milton Berle, who held an honorary degree from McKendree College in Lebanon, Illinois

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She protects

"Sweater, n.: Garment worn by child when its mother is feeling chilly."--Writer Ambrose Bierce, born in Ohio in 1842

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She understands

"Having a baby makes you forgive your own mom, fast."--Comedian Ana Gasteyer, who attended Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois

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She drives...a lot

"A suburban mother's role is to deliver children obstetrically once, and by car forever after."--Chicago-born writer and satirist Peter De Vries

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She loves

"The most important thing a father can do for his children is to love their mother."--The Rev. Theodore Hesburgh, president emeritus of Indiana's University of Notre Dame

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She rocks your world

"In God's great vaudeville, Mother is the headliner."--Writer Elbert Hubbard, born in Illinois in 1856

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She struggles

"At work, you think of the children you have left at home. At home, you think of the work you've left unfinished. Such a struggle is unleashed within yourself. Your heart is rent."--Former Israeli Prime Minister Golda Meir, who grew up in Milwaukee

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She's empowering

"To describe my mother would be to write about a hurricane in its perfect power."--Writer Maya Angelou, born in St. Louis

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