Transcripts For CSPAN3 First Ladies Influence Image - Eleanor Roosevelt 20240712

Transports loaded with lumber on its way to hawaii. By tomorrow morning, the members of congress will have a full report and be ready for action. Youve been listening to some of Eleanor Roosevelts radio address hours after the attack on pearl harbor in 1941. In fact, she gave that address before her husband, fdr, even spoke to the nation. For the next two hours, were going to get to know this transformational first lady. Shes consistently ranked first in first ladies and were going to look at her life, relationship and her time in the white house from 1933 to 1945. Well, good evening and welcome to cspans first ladys influence and image series. Joining us to evening to talk about Eleanor Roosevelt, anita black whos the leader of the project at George Washington university, and a historian. And another historian, whos also an author from rice university. Thank you both for being here with us this evening. Doug, briefly, march, 1933. The roosevelts are being inaugural rated. What are they talk walking into . Fdr didnt even get to walk in. He came in in a wheelchair and the r very fact that he was a cripple, we have nothing to fear but fear itself. Tha perhaps the most famous phrase out of any inauguration. What people were fearing was unemployment, chaos, agricultural angst. Topsoil had blown all over. Dust bowls, the october 1929 crash of the stock market. Our country was really in tatters and there is roosevelt. This man has overcome such odds in his personal life. Overcoming polio and being sidelined from politics. Now ushering in a new, progressive era, and offering 100 days of the new deal program right off the bat what people called the alphabet soup of the new teal. Trying to get banks to run properly. Starting thesy civilian conversation core that would plant 2 million trees. Starting to create in the wta and the like. Workers progress, get unemployment back up. Jobs, jobs, jobs. In the first 100 days, what was Eleanor Roosevelt doing . She struggled to define her role because she was exceedingly active before she we want into the white house. She edited all of the democratic publications as well as the new york state publications. She was on the board of labor union, social reform organizations. She talked civics, history, at a girls school. She was a Major Political force in our own right. So much so that during the campaign, all of the major newspapers in the United States would run full page stories on own political kcareer and her on ambitio ambitions, but when she comes into the white house, fdr says, you have to resign all your positions. You have to stay really and be the traditional first ralady. She tells friends at the thought of liveing in the white house fills her with the greatest sense of possible dread that the white house eats women. That she fears a lifetime where shes running with gloves down the banister to see if the dust have been taken off and so she says to fdr, let me help you with your mail. He says no. She says well, let me help you. He says no. Let me go out and be your eyes and ears. He says no. Shes in white house, desolate. She loves her husband. She wants him to be happy, but its what has happened to my life . What has happened to my hard earned independence so literally from the first day shes in the white house, shes trying to figure out how to resurrect her own voice in a way that will give her the latitude she needs to be herself while at the same time, not undercut her husbands agenda. Very quickly, what were some of the issues she got involved with . Shes the great first lady. Harry truman of the world. Civil rights. Got very vofinvolved with get getting africanamericans equal rights. Working in West Virginia with the coal. The forgotten people, the downtrodden. Womens issues ch getting women into the forefront of american political life. She had no role model as first lady. She created this all on her own. Really nobody quite like her. Here she is in 1933 on the radio talking to women about their need to volunteer. If the women are women who do things, its going to help their neighbors, i think well win out. Well win out not because of money. Not even because of our leaders. But because as a people, we had a a a vision and worked for it and weve seen it through. She spent a lot of time on the radio. Absolutely, she did. She was on the radio before fdr. She had her own radio show. She will have become her own syndicated columnist in 1935, beginning in 1936. By the end of her life, shell write over 8,000 columns. More than 500 articles. Give 75 speeches a year. Write an average of 150 letters a day without a ghost writer but if i could go back and piggy back, eleanor hit running on policy in ways that we dont really think about. Eleanor doesnt hit the ground on race. Eleanor doesnt hit the ground on education. Eleanor hits the ground on employment first. The second day of the roosevelts administration, the day im sorry t day after fdr closed the banks, he says the economy asked congress which is going to cut federal employment by 45 . The Unemployment Rate, the official Unemployment Rate is 25 . Anybody with a brain over tea will know its really about 40 because its the first time that weve really started taking the Unemployment Rate and it doesnt take into account the 12 years the depression has hit the south and the west. So to take 25 of the federal payroll out in the middle of the depression and to say to federally employed women that youre going to lose your jobs if youre married to a federally employed man. Eleanor gets through and she issues in this first week of her husbands presidency, her own opinion piece saying this legislation is wrong. So they have editorials in the paper. In all of the Democratic Party press over the injustice of this act and she just went out. Which is why shes so intense about women in that speech. True, but its something that fdr and the white house doesnt like and a eleanor was very cognizant that you just cant be on wrong message with your husband all the time. That youre going to have to find common ground, otherwise youre going to create shambles of things. She did a marvelous job of holding her own. Writing letters to Harry Hopkins, but phrasing anytimeei way that wasnt being comen deering, but saying can you look into this one case for me . Shes mentioning the one time it got a crossed wire out of the gate. But still i think we can give the public examples of good friends who respect each other can disagree. I will argue that fdr knew u she was going to do this. The correspondence shows that, so what theyre trying to do is to bring this issue front and center and buy support and curtail some of the backlash. That same day, fdr seized her information about 3. 2 in the white house. Right after prohibition. We see eleanor in her own press conferences in to release this. So they coordination and when they go at each other, they do it deliberately to get the country engaged, i think. Before we end this snapshot, at what point did fdr and his inner circle learn to use her as his eyes and ears and as an asset . I dont think theres one day or one particular time. I think smart people like Harry Hopkins knew she was in important and she had the president s ear and what he said mattered. She represented the liberal wing of the new deal. Fdr had the win over southern democrat conservatives. Fdr was very scared on issues of race during his presidency because he had to run for reelection. He was worried, something Eleanor Roosevelt really pioneered an ability to be with africanamericans, be in photo ops. She helped fdr a lot. They were working in unity, but she was a force to be reckoned with. I think of it in world war ii when she got to go to europe and london and britain and everybody just loved seeing her. Then she went to the pacific and said we never had somebody that was so beloved by the troops quite like her before. So she became kind of an ambassador for the president and when ever, she would just walk in, there was a new yorker cartoon that was famous of showing a coal miner underground saying whats Eleanor Roosevelt doing here . A stalking horse for system of his policies, putting up trial balloons and things of that nature. Well i would disagree ch. I would say that the reason eleanor got to go to the pacific because she had been arguing to go for several years because she wanted to cover the pacific the way that ernie pile covered the military responding in the atlantic and they kept turning her down because he didnt want her to go. He would later say that his biggest mistake in the war was not going. They turned her down in europe because she wanted to go with the red cross there and if you kidnapped Eleanor Roosevelt, the its a disaster. We dont want to exaggerate. But i do want to say since doug brought up the trip to the pacific, its clear on this. Henry wallace writes he gets to go to the pacific because the negro situation is too high. She goes right after the race riots in detroit where shes blamed but i think that for the audience to really understand the progression, we need to look at eleanor before she really starts race. If eleanor really doesnt start race until 35 and 36. And thats what were going to do. Were going to go back and well come back to the war as we go on this evening. We have two hours to talk about Eleanor Roosevelt and her influence and image. Were going to put the numbers on the screen. Youre a regular watcher of cspan, you know all of our programs, many of our programs are interactive. We want to hear from you and we want your participation. 2025853830. If you live in the east and central time zones. You can also put a comment on facebook at facebook. Com cspan. Youll see the first lady section right there. Or send us u a tweet at first ladies or hash tags first ladies and well get to as many of those as we can. Professor Doug Brinkley, what kind of world was Eleanor Roosevelt born into . Well, she was born in new york city. Part of that social swirl, social societal. The roosevelt name is as good a name as youre going to get and of course her father is elliot, the brother of theodore. Elliot was quite a character in his own right. Ended up having problems with alcohol opiates and the like, but he was a Great Outdoors person. A great hunter. Something eleanor loved madly, her father, even though he was absentee quite a bit and the key thing for eleanor is they both died when shes quite young. She loses her mother and her father and thats quite dramatic, but beyond that, as she moves up to the hudson river valley, the hutddson is a great story in america. All that transpired along that river. Whether its George Washington at newburgh or the steam boat. Courier and ives on the hudson river. She grew up from Franklin Roosevelt, her distant cousin. Did she have a happy childhood . No. She writes the only place she ever felt safe was climbing to the top of a cherry tree pining for her father to come get her. Theres significant evidence that some of her uncles who were alcoholics took odd shots at her out of the windows. The thing that is very remarkable about Eleanor Roosevelt is the extent to which shes able to transcend that status. She writes a young boy in the 50s, were you severely beaten in a school, a young boy. 6 or 7 years old. He goes toup to a water fountai to get a plastic cup, paper cup. Hes really, hes beaten so badly, he bleeds on the cup. And he writes her. And he says, you know, basically, im in school and now im terrified. What do i do . Young africanamerican boy. And she writes him back and he sends her the cup. Ive held the cup in my hand. And she writes him this extraordinary letter that says that she can only imagine how violated he must feel because school was supposed to be a a safe place but she understands pain aful childhood. She understands disappointment and violence and the only advice that she can offer him is what shes told herself and that is courage is more exhilarating than fear and in the long run, it is easier. All we have to have is the courage to look ourselves in the mirror and take one step at a time. And so in many ways, what Eleanor Roosevelt is doing, not in the sense of engaging in history by in means, but she is expanding her circle of family and learns through a series of ups and downs that family is really what you construct for yourself. Who was marie souvest . She was the head mistress of alans wood academy and eleanor goes to london when shes 14. After her parents died. Her mother dies when shes 6, her father when shes 10. Shes riding with her maternal grandmother, who loves her, but whos very strict and wont let her play a lot and really doesnt see to her education. So much so that eleanor becomes an embarrassment for lack of education to other members of the family. And so her mothers sister says to her grandmother, well, we promised anna, eleanors mother, that we would send her to alans wood. So she goes to the academy, which is basically where Centre Court Wimbledon is today. Where she is in school with 33 girls. And she works with a woman who she later calls a closet boll chevroletic. And she sees in eleanor, this spunk and this mind that nobody sees. And she teaches her that the only way to really a be sure about what you think is to be able to argue both sides of an issue with equal conviction. And so eleanor writes in her diary, she didnt keep a diary, but sometimes, she would just write notes to herself. Said i finally learned that i have a brain. I have argued with madame moe zell and i have won each time. So shees so she doesnt want to go home. Who would want to go home when you have this. So she stays in h summer with her and in 15 seconds, if you will, she says to her, you can stay with me, but you have to learn to be independent. We can travel, but you must set a budget. You have to learn to make reservations. And when you go to places, remember that you are a guest and you dont just do the opera, shop, you also work in is et lment houses. You volunteer in hospitals and you try to learn the language of the community that youre in and so when eleanor leaves at the age of 18, madame writes her a letter that eleanor will carry with her the rest of her life. It says of course you must go home and make your debut. You are a roosevelt, but first and foremost, you were my eleanor and i expect great things from you in your own right in this world. What was her relationship with the president . He loved her. He would say he loved her and i think he was very hard on her, the father. Elliot, he had gotten a woman pregnant that was working a in house and he was angry. Called him a blandering swine, hes embarrassed the brother. He could be hard if you broke propriety. He beat up on his brother. He loved him tremendously. He wrote his most gree vous time was going hunt uing in western iowa with her you know wrk the father, but when he commits suicide, i think tr felt a real special kinship to eleanor, but just nice ly said, eleanor had a great sparkle in her eye and a great intelligence and she developed her courage over a period of time and i think Theodore Roosevelt admired that about her so he was there to give them away when she married Franklin Roosevelt in new york city on st. Patricks day and it was tr who arranged to be part of two roosevelts getting married. It sounds like she had developed a sense of social issues. She had an exposure to them. She had an interest, but shes still very caught between two worlds. Shes caught between the world in london that she loved and wants to stay in. She wants to teach. She wants to live there. She doesnt want to come home. And so shes caught between the demand of being the daughter of the most beautiful debutante in new york a as the New York Times repeatedly called her mother and the social of the president. So shes trying to figure out that dance. And Theodore Roosevelt became a a bigger than life figure. Hes a big influence on her and later, i always found it interesting when i think it was like 1936 or Something Like that, she edited a volume of her fathers big game hunting letters, where in that she kept it in her home tiger skin of her father. The reason i find it interesting, she had every reason to be angry at her dad. He was a bit of a dead beat father, but never really held any angst against him and she had a forgiving nature in the end. And so were talking very early 20th century here and it was in 1905 though that she met fdr. Or when they got they became acquainted. They met apparently when they were young at springwood so they were cognizant of each other, but they met on a train windridd started a romantic interlude through letters and seeing each other and it just snowballed. From 1905 through the 1920s, it was a very busy time in the roosevelts life, but they went to live in, at springwood, with Franklin Roosevelts mother. We visited springwood. Heres a little video. When she fell in love with Franklin Roosevelt back in 1905 when they got mare rid, they would move in with franklins mother, sarah. Sarah owned and operated this home and estate known as springwood is since the year 1900 when sarahs elderly husband, mr. James roosevelt, who fathered franklin, had passed away. Because this was sarahs home, she made the decisions here. She also handled the finances of the family. And was most definitely the m e matriarch of the family. This is where the family gathered for the daily meals. The activities in this room were important because it reflects the interaction of the family. Sarah sat at the head of the table. Franklin at the other end and eleanor would find which ever seat was comfortable for her. She did not have an assigned seat at this table. This is the bedroom that franklin and eleanor shared as adults. Up until 1918, when infidelity was discovered within the marriage. From that point on, mrs. Roosevelt insisted on not share ing the same bed with Franklin Roosevelt. At that time, mrs. Roosevelt chose a bedroom right next to this room and has a doorway coming right in. This was an area where she could be by herself. It was a bit of a private space for her. The furniture in this room was used by mrs. Roosevelt. One of the few areas in this house where she could get some privacy. When she was in hyde park and Franklin Roosevelt was also here, it was a given that he would both sleep here in the big house. If for some reason, franklin was not no hyde park, mrs. Roosevelt would choose to spend her time as value kill, which is only a a couple short miles away from this site. In this direction, we had the entrance to sarahs bedroom and as you can see, mrs. Roosevelts bedroom is sandwiched between sarah and her husband. The same as in her lifetime, she herself was sandwiched between franklin and his mother, sarah. Little bit of talk there about her motherinlaw. What was sarah like . Well, franklin was her only child. Now f drdr had a half brother, his father, james roosevelt, was a fine man. He died when, as a freshman at harvard in 1900, so sarah was left meeting, he was born in 2 192, but u sarah could be very domineering. Very overprotective of franklin in a good way. He used to go play and bird watching, which was a big advocation of his. Joined the American Club union. Yu used to climb trees and do a lot of things on the grounds and she kept a very tight eye on him. There are photos of him wearing kind of a dress and having long haired to a large degree. But i think she was a good mother in the sense of loving and taught him well. Really kept her eye on her husband. I often feel bad for eleanor having to deal with her out of the gate, but as mothers go, she was, she was i think very, very intensely loving and caring and fdr cared the world about her. He was seen sometimes to be happenes happiest when she was around. She was opposed to their marriage. Sarah. Very much so. And said please, youre going to put the family in shame. Why are you doing this . That was his coming out, really saying mother, ive got to marry eleanor. Im going to do this. And she came along to some degree with the wedding and things like that. The fdr Eleanor Roosevelt story, is it a love story . Yes, but id like to go back and talk about eleanor and sarah if i can for a minute because i think so much of that is sort of, as doug has referenced, put in like little cookie cutter things. Eleanors mother died when she was 6. Her mother called her granny. She was so embarrassed by her daughter and so the relationship with eleanor and sarah is very intracat and intimate and it changes over time. When they first, when eleanor falls in love with fdr, she very much hopes that a sarah will be a surrogate mother to her and so youll see lots of overtures to this. And as doug so aptly said, sarah created this cocoon of love around fdr. To say that sarahs love for f drdr gave him the cushion to really take the that he needed the take to lead later on. I think when they come together, we dont know a lot because Eleanor Burns their courting letters when she finds out about lucy. And so we really cant reconstruct that. What we can do is suppose based on the best evidence weve got and i think that the record is pretty clear that fdr confided in eleanor early. She didnt laugh at him. She saw him as this veeral, handsome, charming hunk. Everybody saw him as a dapper pretty boy. He was a hunk. If you were to see him walking and swimming and so what they are is he made her laugh. He could see in those sparkling blue eyes something that was there that other people didnt see and so the level of trust thats there that they Stay Together for a year despite mamas best intentions to keep them apart and then they have this very sort of teenage idealic crush. Theyre too young to get married. They have you know, hormones. And then they you know, but they learn to love each other in different ways. Married in 1905 then the next ten years, they have six children, five living to adulthood. Thats important. She raised. So one of the child died as an infant, but she ended up raising a lot of boys and youre raising a lot of boys, its a will the of work. I think sometimes, we lose sight of that. We said at the outset, its this remarkable wife, but she was also a remarkable, loving mother with her kids and only had one daughter and was able, fdr was an absentee father a lot and eleanor was the one that kept the unit together. I think kept the rhythm of it. In fact, when fdr would show up, the kids went crazy for him. But it was only because he was gone so much and she didnt have to be the disciplinarian. He could be the fun play mate type of father. Exactly. Lets get our audience involved here. Our guests are anita black, the author of the Eleanor Roosevelt papers project and doug brink y brinkley. Marian in west grove, pennsylvania. Please go ahead with your question. Yes, thank you. I was wondering why is Eleanor Roosevelt viewed as the most disliked and loved first lady of all time and if she was here today, how would she deal with the 24 7 media . Oh, i got that one. Okay. Well, eleanor took profoundly controversial stands on the issues of civil rights, on women working. On womens traveling. Unescorted. She spoke out by the second term on legal and institutional questions that made people nervous. And especially the daughters of the American Revolution who looked at her and called her an unset woman and really did not want her in the white house. But her poll numbers threw out and the letters she received as well as the hate mail and the largest fbi file that weve had in American History up until that time, shows the extent to which the American Public really revered her. But the people that disliked her, disliked her intensely. She was a war shot for what you thought about democracy and a the social uphee value at the time. If you thought it was good for the government to be engaged. If you thought it was good for people who disagreed with each other, who didnt look like each other to be at the table, if you thought women should have a strong voice, then you stood with Eleanor Roosevelt. If those things made you uncomfortable, you really didnt. And i agree with all of that and also i think the fact as i mentioned earlier, so much with africanamericans. Theres jim crow in the south. Heres Eleanor Roosevelt constantly meeting with africanamericans. It angered the right of that period tremendously, but i think she would have done very well on the modern circuit. After all, she wrote columns from 1936 to 1962, six days a week. What blogging is today, isnt it . Almost doing a daily thing. This is what i think. This is what i feel. People liked her because she told people what she thought and i think authenticity comes through in the end and she had a jegenius for that. And shes clear. The one other thing that the press got it wrong, eleanor said the press got it wrong and she held her own press conference about it. So in a great way, she was her own press secretary and shaped her own image in the news. And brought women journal, first lady said i want women journalists. They were all being exclouded ad she started having regular press conferences for women and bringing journalists. If youre talking, looking today at the great women correspondents we have, Eleanor Roosevelt in many ways was their patron saint because she began saying theyre doing just as great as work as the men are. We have a tweet here from jeremy. And were going to introduce another name that was very formative in the, with the roosevelts. Did louis howe have much influence in developing eleanors skills and persona . He became the inhouse roosevelt family political adviser, a wizard and extended member of the family. My friend, julie, recently wrote a book about him. But he was able to have, howe was able to coach Eleanor Roosevelt on some of the intricacies of american politics and was able to take her seriously. Basically howe said look, youre at asset, but dont ever mistake that he became, once the polio, once he was struck with polio in 1921. Howe and Eleanor Roosevelt believed in fdrs political future where sarah said retire, be a country gentleman, you have money. You can run your property. So they kind of doubleteamed him and said, lets go. Its a tripod almost in some ways on the political process. Two very important years events in Eleanor Roosevelts life. 1918. The lucy mercer. And then 1921, with Doug Brinkley just mentioning about polio. Very quickly walk us through those two incidents. Well, when eleanor discovers that franklin has fallen in love with lucy mercer, in the interest of historical accuracy, we dont know if it was an affair, but we know without a doubt is that they are in love with each other. Emotionally. Emotionally in love with each other. And eleanor reads letters which she finds when shes unpacking his trunk coming home and she leaves. Offers a divorce. She takes the children. And he considers it. And howe says to him that a, theres never been a divorced president. B, that lucy is catholic. And that the pope will never bless a marriage where a man leaves his wife and five children to marry and his mother says to him, son, if you do this, i will cut you off and youll never have a penny. And so the roosevelts come back together and they learn to develop a new relationship, which gives them space. Space that goes beyond their sort of infatuated high school you know Julia Roberts crush love story. Two adults finding ways to love each other, trust each other in different ways, but live two independent and somewhat overlapping lives. Polio changes that. 1921. By that point, eleanor has become exceedingly political and this is really before howe and a eleanor bond on the railroad car. Fdr has run for Vice President of the United States and thats when eleanor and howe spend the most time together. Theyre on a Campaign Train together, but eleanor is very political before that. Shes very much involved with unions so shes working with the international ladys garment workers union. Shes working with the national womans trade union league. Shes working with immigrant groups. She knows how to lobby, build petitions, build coalitions. What she doesnt know how to do is speak in public. So howes big first tutelage of her is how to speak without that voice. They formed an intractable team for fdr to say to him, and this man is so disabled to talk about the intimacy in their marriage. Polio so debilitates him that eleanor has to give him enemas. She has to insert a glass catheter in his penis. She has to lift him up and turn him over. And at the same time, in her mind, she is thinking, i love this man. What is happening to him . We have to keep his spirits up. And at the other half, shes thinking, oh my god, ive finally gotten my life and now my life is gone and im, you know, and i could be here doing this for the rest of my life. And they figure out how to navigate that and that is a remarkable testament to both of them. Can i just add to that, maybe for our listeners, he wins in 1910. The state senate. So hes in albany. Promoting a lot of different issues. Conversation and theyre interested in the Union Movement but after being in albany, he welcobecomes assistant secretar the navy for the wilson administration. At one point, he gets to do an inspection in europe then in 1920, he teams up the james cupp of ohio. A progressive. Fdr goes like banshee acrosscountry promoting the league of nations and they go down in hard defeat. Ushers into the 1920s the era of the three republican president s. Harding, coolidge and hoover. Hes sad he lost in 20 and now in 21, he gets polio. Out of the the moment when the day he, we think he contracted the polio from a boy scout pool in bear mountain, new york, where he picked up the virus and went up to maine and went out putting out a forest fire with his son and just had terrible chills and camped out and went to bed with the shakes then woke up and couldnt feel his lower half. Eleanor roosevelt was there for him like nobody else. With that utter hell he was living, that anybody would feel. She showed her true colors, her friendship, loyalty, love, in a way that was just described and i think that realigned their march. After that, i mean, he adored her for more reasons. She became somebody who took care of him when he was beyond down. Before we move into the white house here, want to introduce one more character. A tweet from chris. How important was Eleanor Roosevelts friend, marina hickock in helping her adjust to her new role as first lady. When did they become friends . Its hard to overestimate the impact that f drdr called her. Hick was the leading political journalist of the era. She was only woman who would write on the front page of newspapers and get her own byline. She had been assigned to cover eleanor. Fell in love with eleanor during 1932. And theres an intimate trust that develops between the two and the love that develops between the two. Emotional love or physical love . We dont know and theres no doubt in my mind that hick was in love with eleanor. We know that eleanor will help hick later when she falls in love with marian and they build a home together. And when marian dies as hick struggles with diabetes and other things, eleanor will support her. You cant put these in a box. But what we can say about hick is that hick taught eleanor how to deal with the press in a way where eleanor could define her own message. And when hick, when eleanor becomes first lady, hick resigns her position and moves in to the white house. And because shes fallen in love with eleanor and she cant be objective and eleanor then goes to fdr, who also liked hick, to say, you know, i want to send you out and look to investigate what the new deal is doing. What its not doing. I want dwrou get the hopes and fears and put your journalist craft on paper in very private reports to us. And so what we get is the most incredibly honest and powerful assessment of how the depression is affect aing individual people and hick is involved in that. And eleanor will never make a major career decision without talking to hick. One thing that we didnt mention, shes with the associated press. Thats why she was able to get these front page stories. She was very, very good, but she wasn a lesbian and Eleanor Roosevelt was married and she had a possibility of all the children, all of, and becoming first lady, so she had all these lives so i think the hick really, she said fell in love with eleanor. I think eleanor loved her, but Eleanor Roosevelt had a lot of other responsibilities. Eleanor wasnt really taking care of the kids then. The moms really doing that. Eleanor very much has her own life. Eleanor and hick vacationed together. They traveled together. Eleanor and hick talked three and four times a day on the phone. They write a lot of those letters were burned. I mean we dont know. What we do know is that hick is in the white house that she, that she is a person that is respected by fdr. Respected by hopkins. Respected and trusted by eleanor. And so its, hick is, its hicks idea that eleanor should have women only press conferences because the women would lose their jobs. Its hick that suggested to hopkins the wta, so shes a force. And you mentioned that Lorena Hickok moved into the white house at one point. We have a map of the second floor of the white house. And if you Doug Brinkley, if you could start, if you could walk us through this, you can see er is elizabeth elizabeth, Eleanor Roosevelt, of course. And you can see down in the far left Lorena Hickok has a room across from ers room. And then er seems to have a monopoly on a third of the white house down there at the end. Well, yeah, and thats a nice map. And, of course, the oval office, that term starts getting used by Franklin Roosevelt, because of his wheelchair, and gets designed for getting himself easier access. We never want to forget that this is a man in his wheelchair and all that has to do with his life. And then you could see how close the speechwriters are and how important i think they were to Franklin Roosevelt, because he was doing more speeches and traveling and, of course, his fireside addresses affecting the country so greatly, where he was communicating you know, radio was there when Calvin Coolidge was president , but its fdr that kind of beams into peoples home through the Great Depression and world war ii. And Sara Roosevelt is fdrs mother, correct, on the far right . Yes. And is that where she would stay when she was there . Yes. But its important for your viewers to know that this is not a static map. Right. I mean, where the roosevelt boys are and where Winston Churchill and sara are, there would be filled with guests. The boys were only there when they were home from school or when they were visiting over the holidays. Churchill only comes in you know, in 40, in 41, when they come. So and hopkins moves into the white house in 1937. So its not like everybody is in these rooms all the time. More importantly than even that, and which is true, but he spent Something Like a quarter of his time at sea cruising all over, fdr, not just going to conferences, but going down to florida or fishing in the gulf, so he was constantly around. And then he would had his home in warm springs, georgia, where the therapeutic pools were, and he would go down and spend a lot of time in the little white house down there, and then he would get up to springwood as much as he can, so its not a president just sort of stuck in the white house. Fdr moves around an awful lot. Well, we want to show you some inauguration video from the roosevelts inauguration, as we take this next call from cathy in aurora, colorado. Hi, cathy. Caller hello, how are you . Good. Caller thank you so much for your cspan. Ive enjoyed so many of the first ladies, and i wanted to say thank you. My question a little bit has been answered already regarding lucy mercer, but i did have a couple more other questions. Did eleanor know about all of the other arrangements that was made for lucy and mr. Roosevelt to get together . Did anna have involvement in this . And lucy mercer, was she married . I think she was. And did she have any children . And what year did she pass away . And did she have any books that lucy mercer ever wrote regarding being a private secretary for mrs. Roosevelt or anything like that . All right, cathy, thank you. More about lucy mercer. Who wants to start . Well, ill just do it briefly so we can get onto no disrespect intended, but to an important part of the eleanor story. Eleanor did not know about the arrangements that some of the staff had made for lucy to return to fdrs life. She does marry a wealthy South Carolina businessman, winthrop rutherfurd. Eleanor anna roosevelt, the daughter, brings lucy back into her fathers life at her fathers request during the war, and lucy is with fdr in warm springs with another cousin the day that fdr dies of a cerebral hemorrhage. And it created some embarrassment for Eleanor Roosevelt that lucy mercer is there. If we could, if we could go back to that map of the white house very quickly, how much of did the public know about the living arrangements in the Roosevelt White house . Oh, they knew people who were coming and going. Eleanor put it my day. They knew did they know Lorena Hickok had a permanent room there . Oh, yeah, people yeah, i mean, it wasnt a permanent room. Remember that shes traveling. Shes traveling all over the country. But when shes in washington, she stays there. I mean, they knew hopkins was in there. I mean, the roosevelts this is sort of an ahistorical analogy but with the fords, okay, when you come into the white house after watergate, betty and gerald ford opened the white house up and it becomes the home of the American People again, you know . Its no longer the siege. Its no longer the nixonian bunker. Well, the same thing is true of the Roosevelt White house in the sense that its not the hoover bunker. And so it was very clear who was coming and going, especially when my day starts getting published, because eleanor says whos there, whos spending the night, what they talked about and what they had for dinner. So and you also would have her own press conferences where she would tell people who the guests were and who was living there. So, yes, people knew. But, also, i mean, it was a different era with the press and the media. I mean, we dont people wouldnt even take photographs of fdr in his wheelchair. We only have a couple of him incapacitated because it was considered could you imagine in our youtube era today . And people would didnt start covering Peoples Affairs or dalliances in the way they would be rumored. Things would percolate, but it didnt take on a cast if somebodys watching like the clintons had to deal with during their presidency, when the media was, you know, dna and reading all of this in gossip columns. People left them somewhat alone. Dennis, heres a tweet from dennis. How did her early years as wife of fdr prep her for the white house for being white house first lady . Wow. I think being look, she came from a famous family. She had Theodore Roosevelt, you know, who was already in the white house. She had been governor of new york from she was first lady, or whatever youd like to call of new york, from 28 to 32. And new york was a big deal back then, being governor. And so she had a lot of scrutiny, and also she shared in these new deal type of programs that fdr started doing when he was as governor. Ive been looking at the conservation aspect, and there are models thats happening during the governorship that he immediately adopts when he becomes president. So shes very equipped policywise, i think, for, you know, the difficulties that you might find as being a first lady under all that kind of scrutiny. But they also learned to live separately. The roosevelts are never together for more than six months out of the year, you know, from the time he gets polio until fdr dies. And so what she learns through the governorship years is specifically how to develop her own voice and her own alliances and support policies in ways that will get fdr to Pay Attention to them. So in many ways, you know, the 20s for eleanor was her own political laboratory. And she used the media quite effectively, too, didnt she . Absolutely. Absolutely, yeah. Well, just to give you a sense of some of the first of Eleanor Roosevelt, here are some of her firsts. She regularly held press conferences. She had that syndicated column, my day, that weve talked about a couple of times. She had a radio show. She held an official government position, which well talk about a little bit later. She addressed a National Political convention. Was that in 1940 . 40. She earned money lecturing, and she chaired a white house conference. She traveled solo overseas, so she did had quite a few firsts. Heres a little bit of heres the radio address if you remember at the beginning of the show, we showed you a portion of the radio address right after the bombing of pearl harbor. Here it is in its entirety from 1941. Good evening, ladies and gentlemen. Im speaking to you tonight at a very serious moment in our history. The cabinet is convening and the leaders in congress are meeting with the president. The state department and army and Navy Officials have been with the president all afternoon. In fact, the japanese ambassador was talking to the president at the very time that japans airships were bombing our citizens in hawaii and the philippines and sinking one of our transports, loaded with lumber on its way to hawaii. By tomorrow morning, the members of congress will have a full report and be ready for action. In the meantime, we the people are already prepared for action. For months now, the knowledge that something of this kind might happen has been hanging over our heads, and yet it seemed impossible to believe, impossible to drop the everyday things of life and feel that there was only one thing which was important preparation to meet an enemy, no matter where he struck. That is all over now, and there is no more uncertainty. We know what we have to face, and we know that we are ready to face it. I should like to say just a word to the women in the country tonight. I have a boy at sea on a destroyer. For all i know, he may be on his way to the pacific. Two of my children are in coast cities on the pacific. Many of you all over this country have boys in the services who will now be called upon to go into action. You have friends and families in what has suddenly become a danger zone. You cannot escape anxiety. You cannot escape a clutch of fear at your heart, and yet i hope that the certainty of what we have to meet will make you rise above these fears. We must go about our daily business more determined than ever to do the ordinary things as well as we can, and when we find a way to do anything more in our communities to help others, to build morale, to give a feeling of security, we must do it. Whatever is asked of us, i am sure we can accomplish it. We are the free and unconquerable people of the United States of america. To the young people of the nation, i must speak a word tonight. You are going to have a great opportunity. There will be high moments in which your strength and your ability will be tested. I have faith in you. I feel as though i was standing upon a rock and that rock is my faith in my fellow citizens. Now we will go back to the program which we had arranged for tonight. Allida black, i want to ask you, first of all, before we get to the substance, her voice change from the 1933 radio address absolutely. That we heard to a much more modulated, lower tone. Well, shes in her own element. And shes now saying what she wants to say. And she very much appreciates the gravity of pearl harbor. I mean, shes got as she says boys in the pacific. She had toured battlefronts in world war i. She had seen hundreds of soldiers piled up into piles with their stomachs exploding because they had not been buried yet. And she was very much involved in the effort for the league of nations and the world court. In fact, fdr sends her to the radio to debate hoover over the world court when the Senate Begins to vote on the legislation. So for her, this is a defining moment. And she is telling fdr and has told fdr for at least two years prior to that, because they both understood that war was inevitable. They were trying very hard to stay out of it. But she says to him that we must remember that the lesson of world war i is that we won the war, but we lost the peace. And so what shes trying to do here is not only calm the nation, but to sort of set the stage for what she will begin to say the following day, which is this is no time for hyphenates. We are all americans. Lets go back to your calls. And this is renee in los angeles. Renee, this is our first lady series. Caller yes, and its very wonderful, and thank you for doing it. Completely educational, and i would like to know what role eleanor played during the womens Suffrage Movement. Okay. Eleanor was opposed well, she eleanor really didnt get involved in the Suffrage Movement until fdr came out for suffrage. She was involved in the only progressive womens movement, in the sense of the living wage, maximum hours, minimum wages, sanitation, and to really get involved somewhat in temperance, but she was not a suffragist until fdr came out for it. Ironically, by 1920, she is very much involved in organizing women to vote and she develops candidate training schools and canvassing clinics for women to become involved. And by 1921, she will begin to help build the Womens Division of the Democratic Party in new york state. Doug brinkley, if i could, what about criticism of Eleanor Roosevelt and throughout her 12 years as first lady . I mean, were people critical of her . Weve kind of had a little bit of a love affair so far tonight. Well, of course they were. And because people didnt like fdr. Theyre a polarizing president , but he killed the opposition in 32 and 36 and 40 and 44, and i promise you, Eleanor Roosevelt was not an albatross, as i mentioned before. She was a huge asset. With that said, i think some people thought her issue, pushing of labor unions and supporting of coal miners, if you were a coal owner, you would not have liked it. In the south, as i mentioned, africanamerican issue was very, very controversial. In fact, theres one letter she wrote to an africanamerican person, i believe, in chicago that or that the person wrote her because one of her my day columns, she called black people darkie. And that this africanamerican person rightly said, how could you, whos helping africanamericans, use the word darkie . And she said it was kind of a fond old word, you know, from my childhood. But this was a period where she was pioneering on civil rights, in a way. I mean, the language of what it meant wasnt even really known yet. And with womens issues, i mean, this speech you gave, while she has we play the gravitas there, is thats a were all in this together speech. This is no longer democrats versus republicans, liberalsconservatives speech, and not just that, on the womens issue in world war ii, she does and africanamerican, she does a lot of things. She supports the Tuskegee Airmen, even flies in a plane with one of them, and she promotes women working in factories and industrial places, including our first really daycare for women that are working in factories and have children. So shes constantly pushing the envelope. And fdr kind of allows it, which is remarkable, and many people you know, some people, if youre a real liberal, you preferred Eleanor Roosevelt really to fdr, because as president , he had to modulate himself in a certain way for votes. Was there criticism in congress of Eleanor Roosevelt or within the government itself . Well, lets just lets do politics and then well do congress. The First Campaign button that the republicans made in 1936 was we dont want eleanor, either. So theres a long history of mocking eleanor in political cartoons. Also, there are lots of cartoons of eleanor coming out of the mine with soot on her face, inferring that she had black blood. In fact, j. Edgar hoover was convinced that she had, quote, unquote, colored blood, tried to convene a secret meeting of the Senate Judiciary committee to have her declared colored, stripped of her citizenship, and sent to liberia to live with her people, the coloreds. So the fbi component of eleanor and race is you know, is so the fbi kept a file on her . Oh, she had the largest fbi file in American History prior to the assassination of malcolm x. When did it become public . In the late 1980s. A lot of it is still classified. If i win the lotto, well get the court suit and well get the rest of them declassified. Chris is in new haven, connecticut. Chris, allida black and Doug Brinkley are our guests. Caller well, thank you. I think that shes everything that Abigail Adams was to john adams and to American History in her day and age, Eleanor Roosevelt was for the early 20th century. Its almost as if shes a reincarnation of her. And im wondering if Hillary Clinton is maybe a reincarnation of her, too. Its just there are these women who have a place in history, and Abigail Adams and Eleanor Roosevelt definitely strike me as ones. All right, thank you, chris. Doug brinkley, whats your response to that . Well, nobodys a reincarnation of everybody else, but the callers right. I mean, Abigail Adams was a great first lady, and also her correspondence with her husband is quite remarkable. And the fact that abigail was an intellectual, and thats what youre seeing with Eleanor Roosevelt. This is somebody whos an intellectual, not just a political life or something of this, and she has deep and interesting ideas about america that she develops not just as first lady, but later. Shes thinking in civil rights in terms of human rights before most people are. And shes thinking about how we what democracy really means, and shes also you mentioned the fbi not liking her, embracing of the Union Movement. You know, there the fear of strikes in this, and Eleanor Roosevelt often sided with the workers of america. But and then Hillary Clinton, of course, is in a category of her own. Eleanor roosevelt never ran for office, okay . Thats a big difference between Hillary Clinton, who was the senator from new york and is always being talked about as running for president. Some people wanted Eleanor Roosevelt to run for senator or governor of new york after her husband died in 45, but she, of course, said no to that. Well, weve discussed quite a few times the my day column that Eleanor Roosevelt wrote. Up at hyde park, at the fdr National Historic site, we talked with one of the park rangers about her column. This is Eleanor Roosevelts typewriter. It was on this typewriter that mrs. Roosevelt wrote her my day columns. She wrote her first my day column on december 31, 1935, and then continued six days a week for 26 years, amassing almost 8,000 columns. She was a prolific writer, and she wrote books that focused on her interests. Some of her books were about international politics. Some were about her time in the white house. Others were of interest to children. Often mrs. Roosevelt wrote alone, but sometimes she would write with other authors. This book, ladies of courage, she wrote with her friend and colleague, Lorena Hickok. Id like to take you back to archives now and show you some of mrs. Roosevelts more significant my day columns. What i have here are the original drafts of some of the my day columns that i wanted to share. This first one is actually Eleanor Roosevelts first my day column, and it appeared in december 31, 1935. And it sets the tone for the my day columns to follow. This is a day for taking up a more or less regular routine again. The house is filled in and off with guests of the children, and the president and i take up full schedules today. At 11 00 a. M. , i met with the ladies of the press. I always enjoy this hour on monday mornings. So what shes talking about here are the comings and goings in the white house as theyre getting back to the regular schedule after the holiday season. The next one i wanted to share is from december 7, 1941. And this my day column is written by mrs. Roosevelt, and shes talking about whats going on in the white house as the attack at pearl harbor and the information thats coming into the white house. And so what this does is it gives sort of an eyewitness account from the inside of what was going on. As i stepped out of my room, i knew that something had happened. All the secretaries were there, two telephones were in use. The senior military aides were on their way with messages. I said nothing, because the words i overheard on the telephone were quite sufficient to tell me that finally the blow had fallen and we had been attacked. The next column is from february 6, 1961, and here mrs. Roosevelt is talking about how shes gotten back from a speech by dr. Martin luther king. And she says, ive had the opportunity of hearing dr. King speak. Hes a very moving speaker because he is simple and direct and the spiritual quality which has made him the leader of nonviolence in this country touches every speech he makes. So far, weve seen the drafts of mrs. Roosevelts my day columns, but we thought it would be interesting to show you what they actually looked like when they appeared in the newspapers. This clipping is a my day clipping from november 6, 1940, election day. And in here, mrs. Roosevelt writes about how they had a quiet afternoon. Some of us took a walk and returned to the big house for tea, where we found johnny and anne, and their little dachshund persie had arrived from boston. Later on she talks about how at midnight a larger crowd that usual came in from hyde park with a band and torches and wonderful placards. The president went out to greet them. This was a tradition on election day. The roosevelts would come to hyde park, gather family around, and await the election results. When they were announced, the folks from hyde park would march down and the president would come out and greet them. Doug brinkley, what was your comment while we were watching that . Oh, well, its just shes such an intellectual, Eleanor Roosevelt, and i think that differentiates her from a lot of other first ladies. She was a brilliant writer. And, you know, when you read Doris Kearns Goodwins no ordinary time, she deals with franklin and eleanor, and you could see her thinking through the Second World War and her strategy ideas. She wanted to bring in, for example, in world war ii many more european dislocated people, and she later regretted that she couldnt help more jews immigrate into the United States during that period. But she was wide ranging in her interest in anybody who wrote, you know, socially provocative books and literature magazines, but the sheer discipline of doing what she did and this is a gold mine and id like to tell some of the viewers, Blanche Wiesen Cook has you know, blanche has done a marvelous job, two volumes on Eleanor Roosevelts life that if anybody really is interested needs to read, and shes writing a third right now on the Second World War. It brings out this intellectual side of eleanor quite well. Would you like to add anything to what doug said about Blanche Wiesen Cook and her volumes . Well, i think blanche is extraordinary, and shes given us a gift. And i think that one of the things that both blanche and to a large extent secretary clinton have done has reintroduced eleanor to a new generation. And i would also like to send viewers to the Eleanor Roosevelt papers website, where many of the articles and speeches and books that geoff showed or transcribed i mean, she wrote a marvelous book in 1938 im sorry, 1939 called the moral basis of democracy, which Nelson Mandela had smuggled into Robben Island to read when he was imprisoned. She wrote, this troubled world, which is a marvelous pre canon appeal for containment. So there you know, theyre serious books. They didnt sell very well, because they were profoundly serious books. But eleanor thought that her job was to really help the American People grasp the information that they needed to have to handle crises and to resurrect their own selfrespect. And so that tone resonates through everything that she writes. Allida black, what was arthurdale, West Virginia . Well, arthurdale was a homestead, a Resettlement Community out of reedsville, West Virginia. And it was the poorest spot in the country. Coal miners had lived there. The mines had shut down. There was no electricity, no running water, very few latrines. The vegetation was so desolate that the kids stayed alive by eating dandelions or poke salad. And so eleanor hick did an investigative story there. Eleanor read about it. She was so appalled by what she read that she drove out there its about four hours then for her to drive outside of washington to see it. She drove up unannounced without secret Service Protection, because well talk about that in a minute, and she became passionately committed to arthurdale, in the sense of trying to get housing, develop a Model Community there, to get schools for the kids. She worked with a financier, bernard baruch, and marshall field, the Great Department store magnate from chicago to try to get businesses there. And so while she was able to really help restore this community and really promote it, she didnt succeed in attracting businesses to it. But the houses that are there with their indoor toilets, their schools, and their Community Centers are in use today. Was it a failure . No. It was not a failure . People will say its a failure because she could not attract businesses there. But lets look at the literacy rates. Lets look at the disease rates. Lets look at the construction thats there. Lets look at the morale thats there, the suicide rate, the education rate. It was not a failure. It was not the success it could have been, but it was not a failure. Joel in monroe, michigan, this is the first ladies and Eleanor Roosevelt is our topic and youre on cspan. Caller yeah, thank you very much. I would like to ask you about, what was the relationship like between eleanor and her cousin, alice . And also another question there. Is it true that when franklin was seeing lucy, that alice used to invite them to her home behind eleanors back . No, the second question. That is part of the folklore that surrounds the franklin and eleanor sort of carryingon, so to speak. There was alice did not like eleanor. I mean, she just did not she spread wicked, barbed stories about her. She would say, well, you know, you cant help but feel sorry for franklin because he was married to eleanor. She would say that franklin contracted polio because he had syphilis because he was married to eleanor. So alice was as my mother would say, a piece of work. And the way to really conceptualize alice is to imagine that youre walking in to her parlor and youre there for tea. And she will pat the sofa and say, please come sit to me, and there will be a needlepointed pillow on that sofa that says if you dont have anything nice to say, come sit next to me. Dave shea posts on our facebook page, Doug Brinkley, what was Teddy Roosevelts reaction to fdrs affair with lucy mercer . And how did Teddy Roosevelt feel about fdr . Well, he loved fdr, admired him a great deal, wrote a very warm note to him thats right when the engagement with eleanor took place, and saying that youve got many golden years ahead of you and this is even being president is nothing compared to making a marriage work. And, of course, we mentioned before he came there to preside over the marriage. But Theodore Roosevelt dies in 1919, in january of 1919. And at that point, fdr had been in the wilson administration, and theyre on opposite side of the equations. I mean, Theodore Roosevelt was a republican, and fdr was a democrat. And so they didnt get along in that regard at the very end, because, you know, i read recently because im working on a book on Franklin Roosevelt, and i read a story where one of Theodore Roosevelts sons would go wherever fdr went in 1920 around the west and speak right after him and dispute everything and say fdrs an embarrassment to my side, the oyster bay side of the family. And if i could, just one other point, because i think we havent made it clear. We never really have developed what valkill is, and were talking about, you know, that this is i think if anybody wants to learn about Eleanor Roosevelt, go to valkill. Its right next to springwood, or very close, and its her home. And there you can really feel Eleanor Roosevelt. What do you mean its her home . Fdr acquired property in valkill is a creek there in duchess county. And they built this lovely home, eventually developed there was a furniture factory for a while. Its a longer story, but this was eleanors place of peace of mind, a place she could get away. Theres a Swimming Pool there where she would swim. And its now part of our National Park service as a standalone home. I mean, its there with the Vanderbilt Estate and fdrs home, but to go i encourage people that care about president ial history, dont just go to the fdr home and see franklin and eleanors grave. Visit nearby valkill, because its huge insights into her personality there. And she would have inner city kids come there, poor people to come and talk. Shed have World Leaders and president s would visit her there. Its quite a spot. What year was that built . Well, valkill was built in 1925. And it was built along the valkill creek. And it was built because the roosevelts loved to picnic, and they loved to picnic away from the main house, because thats where they could get away from mama and just hang with their friends. And a lot of the political cronies that mama did not like would come up for picnics. And so eleanor remarks to fdr in the winter that this was how sad it was that it was their last time that they could picnic this year. And they picnicked with at that point nancy cook and marion dickerman, two women with whom eleanor had developed a close political working relationship with, both of whom were very involved in the Democratic Party, one of whom had run for office. And so fdr offers to sell the land to them for a 99year lease will give them a 99year lease and the three women will each put in a third to build the cottage. And the cottage would be called valkill. And that was an extraordinary place for eleanor, but they its also a political experiment, because the women build a furniture factory there during to help farmers in the Hudson Valley learn marketable skills in the winter. The women have a falling out in 1935. All three women . All three women. Well, nan and marion and eleanor have a falling out. And in 1937, i think, eleanor buys them out. And so she converts the furniture factory into her own home, and thats what she will thats her only home of her own and her most special place. And she will live there until she dies. And for this program, we visited valkill. Heres a look inside. Lets go upstairs to where the bedrooms are located, and well climb an historically creaky staircase. Roosevelts master bedroom. In this particular room, Franklin Roosevelt takes prime footage over the fireplace area with the largest portrait in the room. Mrs. Roosevelts bed is somewhat interesting in its depiction and it shows how mrs. Roosevelt preferred her laundry to be delivered by the household staff, folded and placed upon her bed, and she would place it throughout the cottage. A close examination of the laundry reveals that its all monogrammed. We have mrs. Roosevelts monogram on the main towels here. We also have nancys monogram on some of the linens. Some of the linens are jointly monogrammed with the initials emn, eleanor marion nancy, and that was pretty consistent throughout valkills operation. When i look through this room, it just surprises me that a lady who was born into wealth, that married into wealth, and generated wealth in her lifetime, would live in such a simple fashion. The bed is surely not an elaborate bed for a lady who was five feet, 11 inches tall, but she had a simple lifestyle. And that stands out. This is Eleanor Roosevelts sleeping porch. Its a very important area here at valkill cottage. This is where mrs. Roosevelt would come in the evening at approximately 11 oclock, after saying good night to her guests, and it was private space for her. The little scottish terrier dog named fala that is so famous within the roosevelt story would accompany mrs. Roosevelt to this area and spend the night here with her. This is where she would sit, do some lastminute letter writing, maybe some lastminute reading, and then retire for the evening. She referred to this area as being like a treehouse. Its surrounded with glass, screenedin areas. She can overlook her property, the fallkill creek, the fireplace where the picnics were held, the tennis and badminton court, the cutting garden, the stone cottage, which was so important in the early years. This is her private space where she could get away from the activities of valkill cottage for a short while and be with herself. And we are back live. Theres a little quick look at valkill and kind of her private life there. When she was there, did she have a simple lifestyle . Well, she had people visiting her all the time, but she lived and can live so simply and i thought that was very eloquently said. Ive been impressed about how spartan both franklin and eleanor can live. Right next to valkill was fdr was building his dream house top cottage that would have no electricity and be on kind of a rustic mountaintop. And if you go to the little white house down in georgia, and youre amazed that this mans willing to live in such strippeddown circumstances. It reminds me a lot of jimmy carter, Eleanor Roosevelt, in plains, and mrs. Lillian, jimmy carters mother, was an Eleanor Roosevelt democrat. She just loved Eleanor Roosevelt. But the ability to kind of live with furniture thats made there, like carter makes his own furniture in his home and they used to have a furniture factory, very spartan, but yet very warm and pleasant, an emphasis on gardens and the outdoor life, but the bringing of the natural world. And we i cant emphasize enough to listeners what a special place that part of the midhudson is in duchess county. And one of and the great love and friendship of franklin and eleanor, from shared neighbors, shared friends, shared topography, in knowing all the little back roads and things together, it was a big part of both of their happiness. Allida black, did she use that while she was first lady to get away . Yes, but she also used it for her own space to conduct business. I mean, valkill is eleanors home and her office. Eleanor was very rarely alone at valkill. I mean, victor did an extraordinary job in giving you a sense of the feel that eleanor had and how much she loved it, but eleanor was always surrounded by hordes of people at valkill that she would invite. You know, there would be neighbors, there would be dignitaries, there would be friends, thered be reporters, thered be painters, thered be performers, there would be Winston Churchill, there would be steinbeck came to valkill, pauli murray came to valkill. You know, i mean, so valkill was a hub, it was Eleanor Roosevelts unrestricted space. You referred to this a little bit earlier. You intimated that she did not like the secret service. No. Well, see, this is the thing to me or having them around, i should say. That is the most extraordinary thing about Eleanor Roosevelt and to a great deal about franklin. I want to go back a little bit to february 1932. Fdr has just finished speaking in an open convertible in a park in miami. You know, hes just unlocked his steel braces so that he could slide back down from sitting on the top of the car into the seat. An assassins bullet rings out. It kills the mayor of chicago, who is literally closer to fdr than doug is to me. And they have both been through the attempts on Teddy Roosevelts life. They have a personal conversation we dont know what they said but they both reference the conversation in different correspondence with their children about the physical sacrifice that it takes to lead the country when theyre in a war. And they both saw the depression as a war on the american spirit and a war on the soul and the economic soul of the United States. And so eleanor absolutely refused to have secret Service Protection in the white house, because she said, first of all, it would impede her ability to have a conversation with the American People, and she saw her number one job responsibility as helping bring the government to the people so that people could understand the human face. And so this woman traveled without secret service from 1933 until 1962. I can document 15 assassination attempts on her life, 17 that i dont have all the information on. We know the ku klux klan placed the largest bounty in its history on her head. We know people shot at her. We know they dynamited trees outside clapboard churches where she spoke. We know that they wrapped dynamite around the axles of her tires. We know that they placed nitroglycerine in lecterns where she stood. And she said that it was her responsibility to be able to have a talk with the people of the United States. She wanted to meet her neighbors. And so anybody that interfered with that interfered with her ability to do her job, and she would have no part of it. How did she protect herself . Well, she had a friend, a new york policeman, that was with her sometimes as a little bit of one of her closest friends and security, but i think the important point is that the roosevelts wanted to meet people. They didnt feel that they were better, that they were an elite family. And thats something that they shared. I mean, i was reading fdr the other day taking a going bird watching and making the secret service have no lights on a road because he wanted it dark to go see a particular bird, and they and he would just blow them off, the secret service, to take country drives. And, you know, he loved going fast in his automobile, because he could shift it with that no lower half. I might if i could just say one other thing i apologize. Were getting a little heavy on time oh, okay. A little light on time here. But when it came to protecting herself, she learned how to shoot a gun. Well, absolutely. Earl miller did not travel with eleanor when she was in the white house. The deal that she made was that he would she learned to shoot. But eleanor would carry a gun in some circumstances. The bullets were not in it. The bullets were in a separate spot in the car. And for all of the people who are going to email me about this, she had permits in every single space that she went to. And in speaking of which, that is our featured item this week on the first ladies series. If youve been to our website, cspan. Org firstladies, youll see that its quite comprehensive and a lot of added material is there. And this week, were featuring her gun permit, which they pulled out of her wallet in 1962 when she died. Thats whats featured on our website, cspan. Org firstladies. Tanya in coatesville, pennsylvania, youve been very patient. Please go ahead with your question. Caller well, thank you so much, guests. My question is complicated. One of the things that i met Eleanor Roosevelt through her work with the junior league. But my question is and, douglas, you hit on it earlier could you please tell me or could you tell the listeners about the relationship she had with the Tuskegee Airmen a little bit more, like why was that controversial . And also, her relationship with two other africanamericans, and thats Mary Mcleod Bethune and then also a. Philip randolph. Thanks. Well, three big topics, in a way. But, you know, in world war ii, we had 1 million africanamericans who served, and Eleanor Roosevelt was very concerned that they were being treated as secondclass citizens. There are stories of her going into georgia and seeing africanamericans in a hospital that had smaller rooms and worse medical condition and would kind of blow her top and say, youre treating africanamericans the same. Tuskegee in alabama is a Historic Place where booker t. Washington and George Washington carver made famous. And aviation was going to be a big part in the war effort, and she went down there and not just embraced the Tuskegee Airmen, but gave them the publicity that they were part of were in this together. And she went up i forget the exact amount of time but like an hour flight flying over the airspace with an africanamerican pilot. Remember, Theodore Roosevelt got hammered for having booker t. Washington in the white house. Now Eleanor Roosevelt, his niece, is flying with the Tuskegee Airmen, you know, over southern, you know, airspace. Ill let you take on the naacp and all that. Eleanor had worked very closely when the draft was being put into place to really encourage fdr to support the naacps effort to get africanamericans more involved in the war effort. Fdr did not want to fund the tuskegee i mean, he did not want the Tuskegee Airmen to fly. The secretary of war, henry stimson, said leadership is not embedded in the negro race. It was a felony to give plasma that was collected from a person of one race to the person of another race, even though plasma was perfected by an africanamerican physician. Eleanor roosevelt went down to tuskegee to force fdrs hand. She gets in she goes to the air base. They do not know shes coming. She comes up. She has the movie camera. She gives the movie camera to and the still photographer i mean, the still camera to people on the ground to photograph this, and she takes them back to fdr and puts them on fdrs desk to say, when are you going to do this . Eleanor is blamed for race riots in the United States because of her promotion of housing for some of the 6 million africanamericans who have relocated from the south to the north for the defense industry. In fact, the detroit race riot in 1943, when shes blamed for that by the Mississippi Press and the new york press, is why she finally gets to go to the pacific. To answer briefly your callers the questions about bethune and a. Philip randolph, lets give sara credit. Sara Delano Roosevelt is the person who takes Mary Mcleod Bethune to meet Eleanor Roosevelt in the 20s when bethune is founding bethunecookman college. They will become devoted friends. They will both call each other their closest friends in their own age groups. Eleanor will become good friends and colleagues with a. Philip randolph, especially when they begin to Work Together in 1939 over the Marian Anderson concert which is not just about her resignation from the dar so that Marian Anderson could perform in the district, but its her ability to say, why curse hitler and support jim crow . Why curse mein kampf and silence Marian Anderson . So Marian Anderson, a. Philip randolph, who was really one of the leaders of the march of the Marian Anderson event, as well as the first march on washington, which is planned for to ban to force fdr to ban discrimination in federally im sorry, to ban discrimination in the defense industries, eleanors right in there with him, too. So shes very close. Well, we only have a halfhour left, and as you mentioned, Eleanor Roosevelt did travel to the pacific. And heres a speech she made to some of the troops. An officer found a private feeling very sad, looking very depressed. And he said, whats the matter with you . And he said, oh, i just cant go home. I havent shot a jap. And so the officer said, well, listen, ill tell you what to do. You go up to that ridge over there and jump up, all of a sudden, and say, to hell with hirohito, and theyll jump up, other people all around, and if you shoot first, youll get a jap. So he came by a little while later, and the marine was still looking very gloomy, and he said, did you do what i told you to do . And, yes, sir, yes, i ran up there and i did just what you told me to do, and i said to hell with hirohito, and they jumped up just as you told me they would, but they all shouted, to hell with roosevelt. Doug Brinkley, how did did she serve as fdrs eyes and ears during the war, as well . You know, some, but in these trips, its a bit like the uso, right . Its about getting the morale up of troops. And the very fact that Eleanor Roosevelt and she writes beautifully about it in my day of going over the pacific but went all the way over there, and how much the soldiers loved her. You know, early on, we were talking in 1933, you had the bonus march of veterans here in washington, right at the time of fdrs inaugural. And, you know, hoover sent the army on a previous bonus march, of veterans wanting better rights. Eleanor roosevelt went and talked to the bonus march soldiers, and so she had a lot veterans and people that admired her in the military. Were talking a lot about her as a left figure and a liberal, but she was very beloved by the admirals, in particularly bull halsey, as we mentioned earlier, in the pacific. This was a very successful tour in 43 of the pacific. Allida black, you said during that video that you wanted to say the prayer that the wartime prayer. Well, you see eleanor walking through here. You see her tell that joke. But what you dont understand is what happened to her in the flight going over there. She flew an uninsulated military aircraft. Im talking theres a shell, theres no pressure. Her eardrum shatters. She goes deaf in one ear. She will walk 50 miles of hospital corridors in two days. The arches will fall on her feet. She will never be able to stand again without special shoes. The war this trip changes Eleanor Roosevelt. She begins to carry a prayer in her wallet that says, dear lord, lest i continue in my complacent ways, help me to remember that somewhere someone died for me today. And if there be war, help me to remember to ask and to answer, am i worth dying for . What you see are the news reels. You dont see her in hospital rooms. You dont see her in foxholes. You dont see her tending to wounded, all she did on this trip. Doug brinkley, april 1945, her final month as first lady. How did she find out about fdrs death . Well, when it got reported. It was unfortunate. She didnt know she wasnt down there in warm springs with him. Theres a wonderful half portrait of fdr when he died, and suddenly it was like everybody said, the moon and stars dropped on her. Whatever their the wounds of having people down around her that she didnt know about, the beauty was that she ran the Funeral Service so wonderfully at hyde park, and fdr wanted a very simple headstone, his name and his years and eleanor. And it tells you the love of him. He wanted to be rest in eternity. And when she finally dies in 1962, she gets buried there with him. Next call for our guests, lynn in daytona beach, florida, youre on cspan. Caller im a professor at Daytona State College and did a book about a woman who became very Close Friends with Eleanor Roosevelt when she was 17 years old. She fixed her hair and put her clothes out and pressed her clothes, and eleanor was so impressed with her that she had her do the research on the Dumbarton Oaks conference. But what i wanted to say was that she would go out and work in the garden with the girls and attended some of the classes and would bake pies. And whatever they were doing, that she would be right there beside her. And when she found out that when may walker was trying to get equal pay for black teachers and got her home fireburned, that Eleanor Roosevelt then got her a scholarship at bank street college. And when she taught at the little red schoolhouse, would go over all the time to the third grade class and take her little dog, fala, so that she kept on a very personal level and was willing, you know, to trust even a 17yearold girl. And i find that very remarkable for someone who at the time was first lady of the United States. Thank you, lynn, for that call. Allida black, i wanted to ask you, she spent 17 years as exfirst lady. First of all, how quickly did she get out of the white house in april 1945 . She was out within a week. I mean, it was truman said that she could stay longer. She said, no, she wanted to get out. She famously said the story is over, but the story was not over, and she knew it would not be. People already lobbying her to run for the senate, to be governor, to be secretary of labor, to be president of one of the major colleges, to run one of the Major Political action organizations in the country. What was her relationship with harry and bess truman . Well, if i could have seen one thing in the harry eleanor dance, it would have been when she told thenVice President truman that roosevelt had died. Eleanor was three inches taller than harry truman, and with heels, she was seven inches taller than harry truman. And so when he is summoned back from drinking bourbon with sam rayburn into the white house, eleanor stands up to meet him and she puts her hand on his shoulder and she says, harry, the president is dead. And he said, mrs. Roosevelt, oh, im so sorry. Is there anything i can do for you . And she says, thats the wrong question, because youre the one thats in trouble now. Did she move back to valkill at that point . Yes, she moves back to valkill to settle the family estate. Meanwhile, she keeps in Constant Contact with the First American delegation to the planning meeting of the u. N. In san francisco, and by august, she is so frustrated with truman that she begins a full court press on trumans politics, so much so that truman appoints her to the First American delegation to the United Nations to get her out of the country. And she lives in new york city a lot. She stays at a place at greenwich village, right in the village, an apartment, and then lives out of a Sheraton Hotel there for a while, and then back to the village, back to the sheraton, and then tried to get a house in manhattan, but eventually retreats back to valkill. Well, you both have talked about how she used valkill as a political meeting ground. Heres a little bit of the public Eleanor Roosevelt at valkill. This is valkill cottage, the building that operated formally as a furniture factory. After the death of fdr, mrs. Roosevelt turned this into her primary residence, and thats when it was actually named valkill cottage. These are the steps in the entranceway that mrs. Roosevelt and numerous world figures, such as john f. Kennedy, nikita khrushchev, Winston Churchill, and many other notables would have entered the home with mrs. Roosevelt. The desk here is where she worked on her my day column, some of her books, Magazine Articles, and tremendous correspondence with the American Public. And of course, thats the desk with the misspelled nametag. The nametag was presented to mrs. Roosevelt by a young man in hyde park. He crafted the item in his shop class, having no idea that he misspelled her name. She accepted it as a gift, gave her gracious thank you. It found a home on her desk and stayed for the duration. Aside from her writing, this is the reception area, so when dinners went on here at the site, this would be where the cocktail hour was enjoyed. The dining room is an important room in the activities here at valkill. The table setting here was derived from an early Magazine Article in the 1950s in mccalls magazine, which was titled how how eleanor lives at valkill. Its set up as a buffet, and thats what mrs. Roosevelt would prefer when she had numerous guests here at the site. This is the living room here at valkill cottage. As we look through the room, we notice an alcove area, very significant in the story, because thats where john f. Kennedy would sit with mrs. Roosevelt. He was seeking her support with his president ial bid, and thats because mrs. Roosevelt was at one time the most powerful woman in america and, of course, the matriarch of the Democratic Party. Eleanor described her varied chairs here in the cottage as being representative of her visitors at valkill. What she was referring to is that they came in different shapes, sizes and colors, but when she grouped them together, they seemed to function well here. We also see the walls decorated with many photographs that were important to mrs. Roosevelt, such as several pictures of louis howe are incorporated in this room. Theres always a good picture of franklin Delano Roosevelt. Well see a picture of mrs. Roosevelts motherinlaw, sara Delano Roosevelt. Well see mrs. Roosevelts uncle, Theodore Roosevelt, in this room. Well see interesting personalities, such as amelia earhart, who would have given mrs. Roosevelt her first flying lesson back in 1933 over the skyline of baltimore, maryland. Valkill was very important to mrs. Roosevelt because it was her first and only home that she owned on her own, and this is where she would start to refer to, if feels so good to be home. And allida black, while we were watching that, you home. In the alcove you see the picture of eleanor and jack kennedy. She switched the chairs so she would look down at him and he would have to look up. If she argues him to take a specific stance, which he does take belatedly. Youre watching the cspan first ladies series. Yes, i have a question for both. Where are the descendents of them these days and what would they think about the direction of the country odd. All of the children are dead. The grandchildren are very much alive and active. Some of them are involved in great Public Service efforts, in good will, in teaching in schools, in running Public Health programs. Once eisenhower was elected, what did eleanor do . She wasnt thrilled. She was a liberal contract. We were talking about true man a little bit ago, but she represented the liberal wing of the Democratic Party. So she was very disappointed that stevenson lost in 52. She loved stevenon, but we probably have under played this so far. Were talking about the death of fdr and his great legacy was the United Nations. And Eleanor Roosevelt started to work with the un and famously authors ted the declaration of human rights. And here she is at the u. N. Talking about it. We stand today on the threshold of a great event. This universal declaration of human rights may well become the international magna carta of all men everywhere. We hope its proclimation will become that of the man. The declarations at different times in other countries. And that was Eleanor Roosevelt in 1948. Eleanor was, we would not have the declaration of human rights without el nar roosevelt. Now i want to ask your viewers to imagine one thing. You have people around the table. You dont agree on god or if there is a god. But marriage is, what labor is, citizenship is and the purpose of government. And you have them constantly negotiating who the leaders are. And you have a stand up in opposition to the horrors of the holocaust, and the fear that another world war may start in ten years without Eleanor Roosevelts skills, everyone was exalted. And it is rather than having it being passed unanimously. It took more than 3,000 hours. I want to say wrone thing its interesting, also, she kind of had a u. N. Declaration that outed the soviet union for not caring. They didnt want anything to do with human rights. And so in her own way, she was a lawyer by exposing the soviet union for what they were. She is still beloved there today and had a great sympathy for the plight of the jewish people. It was deep and incredible mourning. Dwight eisenhower, harry truman, all of the world kind of came to be there. She had become beloved in the as a champion of the underdog and the under class. If anyone should have won a noble peace prize and didnt it was Eleanor Roosevelt. They were certainly not friends. We have these pictures of them all stand iing together. It has been she invited my family, i was 11 years old, to come to her townhouse in man hatha manhattan. She insisted that we eat them with our fingers because it was the only way to do this. What year was it . 1953. And that summer we came up to hyde park to spend the weekend with her grand kids and there was a game room on the property where my father and i had to sleep and my mother slept in the house with eleanor and my 2yearold sister. From there when i went off to college eleanor invited my roommate and i to come across the hudson river and they had numerous this was all because your father corresponded with her about my day . Yes. No political connections . No. Happened all of the time. Happened all of the time. All of the time. Yes, my cousin Gertrude Wood was in georgia with the d. A. R. , and she invited eleanor to come talk to the womens farmers in the area, and they didnt expect that she would accept it, but she did accept it and she came down and when she was talking instead of going up on the stage, she just came down to the front row and sat between two africanamerican Women Farmers and the dar didnt know what to do about that. Thank you for sharing that story. You mention youre writing a new book on fdr . Yes, rightful heritage. Im looking at his relationship, it is really an environmental history of the conservation history of the 1930s and 40s, how he worked to save the eastern forest, but also other places. He could go to yellowstone. One of the joshua tree more significantly his love of birding. He created fly ways and credited our migratory waterwaterfowl, a spearheaded the protection unit. It was intensely involved in Soil Conservation and the land and how to rehabilitate hand. And how to make america better. Did Eleanor Roosevelt ever function as a traditional first lady . Yeah, she bentertained. You had the easter eggs, the parties, private dinner parties where she would bring people in that she thought the president should meet or, you know, she served those functions quite well. Well we have a final tweet, and this is called influence and image. What would eleanor describe as her most important contribution to contribution to universal health care. I would Say Something else. She has seen everything that is horrible to see about democracy, slaughter, violence, poverty, discrimination. She never gave up. She kept going when people tried to kill her, disparaged her husband, mocked her children. She believed in democracy, the promise of america, the promise of human rights so profoundly that she risked everything she had to try to make us get there. And i think that shows undaunting and fierce courage. That and on civil rights, we had a wonderful call a minute ago of her going down to georgia, sitting next to two africanamericans in that kind of setting, and how backwards we were on Race Relations in america in the 30s and 40s. And she had a place of honor in the civil rights mooumt and she is in the same feelings. We have a companion book for this series. And it is available to you as well. At cost, were not making any money off of it, but if you would like to see the profiles of all of the first ladies up through michelle obama. We would like to thank our partners in this series. And we thank them for everything they put together for our pam. Were going to live you with a little bit of Eleanor Roosevelt talking about what it means to be a liberal. Thank you. This is really you have become known as the leader of what is loosely called the liberal movement in this country, what used to be the liberal movement in this country. Some people call this do gooders and the rest of it. Could you define a liberal for us . In your own words . I would feel that a liberal was a person that kept an open mind, was willing to meet new questions with new solutions, and that you could move forward, you didnt always have to look backwards and be afraid of moving forward. Next on first ladies we talk about the life and influence of first lady bess truman. President harry truman likes to refer to his wife. He had little to say to the media, destroyed many of her