# Hugh Rodham (born 1911)
**Hugh Ellsworth Rodham** (born 2 April 1911) was an American small-business owner, a Navy veteran of World War II, and the father of Hillary Rodham Clinton, the First Lady, senator, and presidential candidate. He ran a drapery-making business in the Chicago area for about 30 years, retired in 1970, and died in [Little Rock, Arkansas](https://www.edgepedia.org/little-rock-arkansas), in April 1993 during his son-in-law [Bill Clinton](https://www.edgepedia.org/bill-clinton)'s first year as president.[1](https://friendsmuseumwales.org.uk/Magazine/2016%20October.pdf) • [2](https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1993-04-08-mn-20468-story.html) • [3](https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/politics/1993/04/08/hugh-rodham-dies-at-82/80c3b803-0533-40e8-a5b9-209d1336bb5c/)
| Key fact | Detail |
|---|---|
| Born | 2 April 1911, in the United States, to a Welsh immigrant family settled in Scranton, Pennsylvania[1](https://friendsmuseumwales.org.uk/Magazine/2016%20October.pdf) |
| Education | Played football at Penn State; graduated in 1935 during the Great Depression[4](https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/national/2007/12/09/growing-up-rodham/1aa43d0c-7bcf-46df-8f33-a531ef5043d6/) |
| Wartime service | Navy drill instructor at Naval Station Great Lakes, training sailors in the Gene Tunney Program before deployment[5](https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/the-education-of-hillary-clinton/2016/07/22/488301e6-503c-11e6-a7d8-13d06b37f256_story.html) |
| Business | Drapery maker in Chicago for about 30 years; bought fabric, printed designs, sewed, and hung curtains for hotels, corporations, and airlines; retired in 1970[2](https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1993-04-08-mn-20468-story.html) • [5](https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/the-education-of-hillary-clinton/2016/07/22/488301e6-503c-11e6-a7d8-13d06b37f256_story.html) |
| Family | Married traveling-salesman colleague-turned-homemaker Dorothy Emma Howell in 1942; three children, Hillary, Hugh Jr., and Tony[6](https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/obituaries/dorothy-rodham-mother-of-hillary-clinton-dead-at-92/2010/09/21/gIQAwFWXcM_story.html) • [3](https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/politics/1993/04/08/hugh-rodham-dies-at-82/80c3b803-0533-40e8-a5b9-209d1336bb5c/) |
| Politics | Lifelong Republican voter; campaigned for his Democratic son-in-law in 1974 by appealing to fellow Republicans[5](https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/the-education-of-hillary-clinton/2016/07/22/488301e6-503c-11e6-a7d8-13d06b37f256_story.html) • [4](https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/national/2007/12/09/growing-up-rodham/1aa43d0c-7bcf-46df-8f33-a531ef5043d6/) |
| Died | 7 April 1993, Little Rock, Arkansas, three weeks after a stroke; buried in Scranton on 10 April 1993[3](https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/politics/1993/04/08/hugh-rodham-dies-at-82/80c3b803-0533-40e8-a5b9-209d1336bb5c/) • [7](https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1993-04-11-mn-21807-story.html) |
## Origins and early life
Rodham was born in the United States, as were his siblings William S. and Russell D., into a family of Welsh laborers who had immigrated by steerage to [Scranton, Pennsylvania](https://www.edgepedia.org/scranton-pennsylvania), a city of textile mills, coal mines, and train yards.[1](https://friendsmuseumwales.org.uk/Magazine/2016%20October.pdf) • [4](https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/national/2007/12/09/growing-up-rodham/1aa43d0c-7bcf-46df-8f33-a531ef5043d6/) His father had come from [Northumberland](https://www.edgepedia.org/northumberland), England, at age 4 and worked at the Scranton Lace Co.; Hugh worked there too, right out of college during the [Depression](https://www.edgepedia.org/depression), before leaving for New York and then Chicago.[5](https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/the-education-of-hillary-clinton/2016/07/22/488301e6-503c-11e6-a7d8-13d06b37f256_story.html)
He escaped the Scranton mills through football at Penn State, graduating in 1935.[4](https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/national/2007/12/09/growing-up-rodham/1aa43d0c-7bcf-46df-8f33-a531ef5043d6/) He next hopped a freight train to Chicago and covered the Midwest as a traveling salesman until World War II began, at which point he became a Navy drill instructor at [Naval Station Great Lakes](https://www.edgepedia.org/naval-station-great-lakes).[4](https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/national/2007/12/09/growing-up-rodham/1aa43d0c-7bcf-46df-8f33-a531ef5043d6/) • [5](https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/the-education-of-hillary-clinton/2016/07/22/488301e6-503c-11e6-a7d8-13d06b37f256_story.html)
## Business and family life
In 1937 he met Dorothy Howell when she applied for a secretarial job at the Columbia Lace Co., where he worked as a curtain salesman; they married in 1942.[5](https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/the-education-of-hillary-clinton/2016/07/22/488301e6-503c-11e6-a7d8-13d06b37f256_story.html) • [6](https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/obituaries/dorothy-rodham-mother-of-hillary-clinton-dead-at-92/2010/09/21/gIQAwFWXcM_story.html) Their daughter Hillary Diane Rodham was born in Chicago in 1947, followed by two sons, Hugh Jr. and Tony.[8](https://www.history.com/articles/hillary-rodham-clinton) • [3](https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/politics/1993/04/08/hugh-rodham-dies-at-82/80c3b803-0533-40e8-a5b9-209d1336bb5c/)
**The drapery business.** For 30 years Rodham ran a small textile business in the Chicago area, mostly making draperies: he bought the fabric, printed designs on it, sewed it, and hung the curtains, taking large orders from corporations, hotels, and airlines with only one regular helper.[2](https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1993-04-08-mn-20468-story.html) • [5](https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/the-education-of-hillary-clinton/2016/07/22/488301e6-503c-11e6-a7d8-13d06b37f256_story.html) In 1950 he bought the family's brown-brick mock Georgian house in Park Ridge, Illinois, for $35,000 in cash, the saved profit from the business, and he paid cash for his Cadillacs as well, refusing to buy on credit.[4](https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/national/2007/12/09/growing-up-rodham/1aa43d0c-7bcf-46df-8f33-a531ef5043d6/) He retired in 1970, and he and Dorothy moved to Little Rock in 1987 to be near their daughter's family.[3](https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/politics/1993/04/08/hugh-rodham-dies-at-82/80c3b803-0533-40e8-a5b9-209d1336bb5c/)
His household style left a mark on his daughter's account of her upbringing. He was a lifelong Republican voter who issued loud dinner-table pronouncements about self-reliance, turned off the heat at night, and never gave Hillary an allowance; when she brought home straight A's, he replied that she must attend "a pretty easy school."[4](https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/national/2007/12/09/growing-up-rodham/1aa43d0c-7bcf-46df-8f33-a531ef5043d6/) • [9](https://time.com/4416693/hillary-clinton-hardest-to-know/) Yet he also refused to curb her ambitions: he spent weekends teaching her to hit a curveball and let her join the boys' football routes against the elm trees.[4](https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/national/2007/12/09/growing-up-rodham/1aa43d0c-7bcf-46df-8f33-a531ef5043d6/)
## Politics and the Clinton connection
Rodham's conservatism shaped the household's political arguments, and his daughter described him as "an old-fashioned conservative with a small 'c'" who believed in hard work and personal responsibility.[4](https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/national/2007/12/09/growing-up-rodham/1aa43d0c-7bcf-46df-8f33-a531ef5043d6/) After Bill Clinton's first congressional race in 1974, the whole Rodham family moved to Little Rock to help him politically.[10](https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/politics/2001/02/23/for-hugh-rodham-family-connections-never-quite-clicked/ab7b90b8-ef9b-41f2-8dd8-312214731e75/) Rodham himself campaigned for his Democratic son-in-law among Republican voters, telling them, in Clinton's recollection of the story, that he thought Democrats were "just one step short of communism" but that "this kid's all right."[4](https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/national/2007/12/09/growing-up-rodham/1aa43d0c-7bcf-46df-8f33-a531ef5043d6/)
## Death
Rodham, reportedly in frail health, suffered a debilitating stroke on March 19, 1993, and died on the night of Wednesday, April 7, at St. Vincent Infirmary Medical Center in Little Rock, at age 82.[3](https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/politics/1993/04/08/hugh-rodham-dies-at-82/80c3b803-0533-40e8-a5b9-209d1336bb5c/) [Hillary Clinton](https://www.edgepedia.org/hillary-clinton) spent the first 16 days of his hospitalization in Little Rock, and the White House said the health care task force she headed would miss its May 3 deadline because of her absence.[3](https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/politics/1993/04/08/hugh-rodham-dies-at-82/80c3b803-0533-40e8-a5b9-209d1336bb5c/) President Clinton eulogized him at a memorial service in Little Rock, and the body was flown to Scranton, where he was buried in the family plot on April 10, 1993.[4](https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/national/2007/12/09/growing-up-rodham/1aa43d0c-7bcf-46df-8f33-a531ef5043d6/) • [7](https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1993-04-11-mn-21807-story.html)
## References
1. [Friends of Museum Wales Magazine, October 2016 (Hugh Ellsworth Rodham genealogy)](https://friendsmuseumwales.org.uk/Magazine/2016%20October.pdf)
2. [Hugh Rodham, First Lady's Father, Dies, Los Angeles Times, April 8, 1993](https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1993-04-08-mn-20468-story.html)
3. [Hugh Rodham Dies at 82, The Washington Post (AP), April 1993](https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/politics/1993/04/08/hugh-rodham-dies-at-82/80c3b803-0533-40e8-a5b9-209d1336bb5c/)
4. [Growing Up Rodham, The Washington Post, December 2007](https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/national/2007/12/09/growing-up-rodham/1aa43d0c-7bcf-46df-8f33-a531ef5043d6/)
5. [The Education of Hillary Clinton, The Washington Post, January 1993](https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/the-education-of-hillary-clinton/2016/07/22/488301e6-503c-11e6-a7d8-13d06b37f256_story.html)
6. [Dorothy Rodham, mother of Hillary Clinton, dead at 92, The Washington Post, 2010](https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/obituaries/dorothy-rodham-mother-of-hillary-clinton-dead-at-92/2010/09/21/gIQAwFWXcM_story.html)
7. [First Lady's Father Buried in Hometown, Los Angeles Times, April 11, 1993](https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1993-04-11-mn-21807-story.html)
8. [Hillary Rodham Clinton, HISTORY](https://www.history.com/articles/hillary-rodham-clinton)
9. [Hillary Clinton Is the Hardest One to Know, TIME, 2016](https://time.com/4416693/hillary-clinton-hardest-to-know/)
10. [For Hugh Rodham, Family Connections Never Quite Clicked, The Washington Post, February 2001](https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/politics/2001/02/23/for-hugh-rodham-family-connections-never-quite-clicked/ab7b90b8-ef9b-41f2-8dd8-312214731e75/)
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*Topic: Encyclopedia › Society and history › Politics and government › Government and public administration › Political spouses and families › Parents and siblings of political leaders*
*Initially written Sep 17, 2026 · Reviewed: Oct 25, 2026 · Edited: Oct 15, 2026; Oct 25, 2026 · Last review: Oct 25, 2026*
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License: Edgepedia Community License 1.0, https://www.edgepedia.org/edgepedia/license