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Returning to California, she married twice, to a policeman and a lawyer, and divorced twice. She tried going into the family business, acting, but without great success. She drifted into what she calls "the talk business," serving as hostess on TV talk shows in San Francisco, then Los Angeles. For the past 18 months she has been editor of Showcase U.S.A., a slick bimonthly designed to promote sales abroad.
On weekends she frequently campaigns for her father, praising his record as Governor and then taking questions. There are usually several involving ERA or abortion, about which she and Dad have agreed to disagree. "I am a feminist, and I say so," she reports.
Mike Reagan was adopted when he was just a few days old, because, according to family legend, Maureen wanted a brother (Jane Wyman had been advised by her doctor to have no more children). Mike too has pleasant memories of his father's ranch. "He sure can talk," says Mike. "You ask him what time it is, and he tells you how to make a watch." But, he adds, "we always felt that we were sharing him with a lot of others. We were basically raised by nannies and maids."
In three prep schools, Mike became a good enough football player to be offered an athletic scholarship at Arizona State, but he turned it down ("I played the game for fun"), tried a few courses at the University of Southern California, then took up speedboat racing. A crack-up a few years later tore his back muscles, dislocated both hips and persuaded him to try another vocation. His father, newly elected Governor, was concerned. "Dad kept asking me, 'What's your future going to be?' " he recalls. "I'd tell him, 'I'm a late bloomer, just like you, Dad.' I was a loner, having fun. It was a while before I found a direction."
Having acquired Reagan's gift for amiable banter, Mike became a salesman, and quite a successful one. He started by selling boats, but early this year he set up his own business, grandly titled Agricultural Energy Resources, which he runs out of his suburban home in the San Fernando Valley. His main activity is to sell gasohol equipment to farmers.
Mike's first marriage lasted less than a year ("A round-tripper," he calls it. "In and out fast"). He and his second wife, Colleen Sterns, have a son, Cameron, 2, the only Reagan grandson. Mike also campaigns for his father on weekends, mostly in California. "Sometimes," he says, "I argue with him about his style. I tell him he should come across strong more often. It takes a lot to make Dad angry, but when he's mad, he's mad."