Mediaboss Marketing

Marian Robinson, who has died aged 86, was the mother of Michelle Obama, the former First Lady of the United States.

Marian Robinsons own father, the grandson of a slave in Georgia, had grown up in Alabama in the Jim Crow years, when he was barred from white-only lavatories, buses and restaurants. In 2008 she was sitting on the sofa with her son-in-law Barack Obama when he was declared Americas first black president.

The Robinsons had raised their daughter Michelle and her elder brother Craig on Chicagos South Side in a rented one-bed apartment smaller than the White Houses master suite. Marian sacrificed her career as a bank secretary to raise their children, while her husband Fraser who never missed a days work, despite suffering from MS was a pump operator for the citys water company.

They lived on a single working-class salary, but kept an immaculate Buick, forced their children to eat broccoli, and expected them to go to college a reality-check to the stereotype, as Michelle Obama put it, that African-Americans primarily live in broken homes, that our families are somehow incapable of living out the same stable, middle-class dream as our white neighbours.

Marian taught Michelle to read before she started nursery school. Later, when Michelle was stuck with a dud teacher, Marian marched down to the school and had her moved up a year.

At home, the Robinson children were treated as adults. Sex, drugs and politics were discussed at the kitchen table. Make sure you respect your teachers, but dont hesitate to question them, said Marian. Dont even allow us to just say anything to you. Ask us why.

To save money, Marian sewed all her daughters clothes, made Muppet toys out of socks and dyed her own hair (on one occasion, accidentally, green). When Michelle neglected to tell her parents about an expensive high school trip to Paris, assuming it was not an option, they were hurt. Neither one of them had ever vacationed in Europe, recalled Michelle Obama in her memoir, Belonging. They never took beach trips or went out to dinner. They didnt own a house. We were their investment, me and Craig. Everything went into us. Michelle was sent to Paris.

To Barack Obama, the child of a Midwestern mother and a Kenyan father who had vanished from his life, this tight-knit family was a wonder. When campaigning took its toll on the Obamas own marriage, it was the widowed Marian who stepped in, even though she had resumed full-time work, coming over at 4.45am to help with her two granddaughters, but she insisted: I am NOT going to be one of those old ladies who wont leave their kids alone just because theyve got nothing better to do.

When Michelle begged her to move with them to the White House, Marian refused, telling a reporter: I love my own house. The White House reminds me of a museum... How do you sleep in a museum? Later she relented, becoming First Granny and accompanying the girls to school every morning, but insisted on doing her own laundry, eating television suppers and moving without a security cordon. When she slipped out of the gates, strangers would tell her she looked just like Michelle Obamas mother. Yeah, I get that a lot, she would reply.

When people gushed to her about Michelle and Craigs achievements (he got a basketball scholarship to Princeton), Marian would say: Theyre not special at all. The South Side is filled with kids like that. Obama described her as a living, breathing reminder of who we were and where we came from, a keeper of values wed once thought ordinary but had learned were more rare than we had imagined.

Marian Lois Shields was born on July 30 1937 in Chicago, one of seven children, to Purnell Shields, a construction worker who had to make do with low-paid work because the white-controlled unions denied him a union card, and his wife Rebecca Jumper, a nurse; they later divorced.

In 1960 she married Fraser Robinson, who died in 1991; her son and daughter survive her.

Marian Robinson, born July 30 1937, died May 31 2024

Broaden your horizons with award-winning British journalism. Try The Telegraph free for 3 months with unlimited access to our award-winning website, exclusive app, money-saving offers and more.

Read more:
Marian Robinson, mother of Michelle Obama who lived in the White House as 'First Granny' obituary - Yahoo! Voices