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For all the memorabilia, Mrs. Longworth is hardly one to live in the distant past. "Nostalgia? God, no! What more interesting time than this?" Though friends often ask, she usually declines to discuss the shaky current Watergate situation of President Nixon, a friend for 20 years. But she does offer a biting appraisal of the new Vice President: "I've never met him, but I used to spend time in Ohio, and they turn out Jerry Fords by the bale." Robert Kennedy was her favorite public figure of the 1960s; they traded friendly insults with gusto. She is charmed by Henry Kissinger, and regrets the fact that illness recently caused her to miss the chance to size up for herself U.S. District Court Judge John J. Sirica.
Since she was all of six years old when she was granted her first personal audience with a President-Benjamin Harrison, whom she described as "a solemn, bearded gnome"-she is not a bit awed by Chief Executives or their families. She mimicked Taft behind his back, called McKinley and his wife "a pair of usurping cuckoos," and found Harding "not the worst President-just the most inferior man." She can still deliver a devastatingly accurate miming of her cousin Eleanor Roosevelt, in a shrill and toothy impersonation. She confesses to writing ballads "too nasty for words" about Woodrow Wilson, and dismisses Dwight Eisenhower as "a poor boob."
Poison Ivy. Washingtonians regard an invitation to tea from Mrs. Longworth as the most prestigious in the capital. Presidents John F. Kennedy, Lyndon Johnson and Richard Nixon all made their way through the pachysandra and poison ivy, a characteristic personal touch, to call on her. Recently Julie Nixon Eisenhower asked Mrs. Longworth if people were as "mean" to White House occupants in her day as they are now. "Much worse," Mrs. Longworth blithely answered. "There were awful stories about us-how we laughed at them!"
Her interest in the world is constantly fed by the books she reads far into the night. She sleeps through the morning, skips lunch and begins her day at 2 p.m. She studies Greek, loves Greek poetry, in conversation is apt to quote passages verbatim from Pope, Kipling or the Bible. She is fascinated by modern science-quasars, DNA, space exploration, even quantum mechanics-and regularly prowls her favorite Washington bookstores, a familiar figure in her broad-brimmed hat.
Always rambunctious, but more fragile-looking than ever after undergoing serious operations in recent years, she used to describe herself as "a withered Twiggy," now avows brightly: "The tooth of time is gnawing at this ancient carcass." Still, her rollicking sense of fun has never left her. Not long ago at a dinner party given by Washington Columnist Tom Braden, she pretzeled herself into the lotus position and wrapped a live boa constrictor-the pet of a Braden daughter-around her neck, creating havoc among the astonished dinner guests. "I'm one of those show-off Roosevelts," she offers, as if explaining a gene mutation.
Soon after taking office, her father lamented: "I can either run the country or control Alice-but not both." Theodore Roosevelt took the easy way out. He ran the country.