But in 1941 Missys health problems finally caught up with her, as they would with FDR four years later. The Sad Truth About Franklin And Eleanor Roosevelt's By Paul M. Sparrow, Director, FDR Library. That is undoubtedly true. FDR And His Women - AMERICAN HERITAGE 00:00. Surely the monumental demands ER made on her husband were proof of her belief in his ability to rise to them. Throughout his life, Franklin Roosevelt was surrounded by remarkable women. Another woman close to FDR was Princess Martha of Sweden, a royal who was forced to flee Scandinavia in 1941 after the Nazi invasion. Opinion | FDRs private secretary who served also as his While the letters are suggestive, some historians say argue they do not provide hard evidence of a physical love affair. Pregnant Princess Eugenie and Princess Beatrice are joined by British MasterChef judge Jock Zonfrillo 'was secretly battling bowel cancer' before he was found A musical climax! . She would be the first woman to hold the position of the secretary to the president. Roosevelt's longest supposed affair was with his secretary, Missy LeHand, which some historians believe he became romantically involved with beginning in 1921, when he was serving as governor of New York. FDR and ER, in contrast, battled endlessly to make America a more inclusive society at home and a force for democracy abroad. FDR's mother definitely wanted to keep her son a mother's boy, notes theNew York Review. The affair lasted 20 years, according to some, and it was cataloged in a book written by FDR's son Elliott, who said the relationship was common knowledge. "Your mother only bore you," she went so far as to tell young James Roosevelt. . All three lingered in my consciousness long after the need for adolescent mutiny faded. Unlike a chronology of events I later unearthed, the note was not a new discovery. FDR himself was suffering from a range of medical problems during the spring of 1941 the pressure of the war in Europe was taking a toll. Their daughter Anna tells of one evening in the White House when her mother so infuriated her father with her insistence that he address a sheaf of papers this high during the 20 minutes permitted for two very small cocktails that he flung the entire stack across the room. It takes place during the June 1939 weekend that the British king and queen visited Roosevelt at his upstate New York cottage in Hyde Park, where FDR was said to take a number of mistresses. [43], The MercerRoosevelt affair became wider public knowledge in 1966 when revealed in The Time Between the Wars, a memoir by Jonathan W. Daniels (19021981), a Roosevelt aide from 1943 to 1945. Missys very capable protg Grace Tully took over the administrative responsibilities, but her personal relationship with FDR was not the same as Missys. Fact or Fiction: FDR's private secretary Missy LeHand suffered a sudden collapse at a White House dinner. My love affair with her husband, which came later, was more personal and had to do as much with my adolescent yearnings as the great mans achievements. Could any husband, or any other human being, have healed ERs wounds? This knowledge did not keep him from straying again. "[16] Eleanor later wrote, "I have the memory of an elephant. [22] The Rutherfurds had one child, Barbara Mercer Rutherfurd (June 14, 1922November 6, 2005),[23][24] who married Robert Winthrop "Bobby" Knowles, Jr. in 1946. Per the Washington Post, Eleanor burned the love letters she uncovered from Mercer to Franklin. you have breathed new life into its spiritand the fate of all that is good is in your dear blessed and capable hands. Still, she cannot help wishing for the soft life of joy & the world shut out.. Du Bois supported it. Both parents were dead by the time Eleanor was 10, leaving her and her brothers in the care of their strict grandmother. She remained in the White House, and it was there she received the sad word of her husband's passing. As he dragged his legs back and forth between two parallel bars, or swung beneath them, or went through other agonizingly repetitious exercises, he kept up a marathon of dazzling conversation designed to distract and entertain. Fact or Fiction: Inside Episode 5 The historical consensus is that Lucy Mercer gave FDR the unquestioning adoration ER could not. "[17] The incident marked a turning point in her life; disillusioned with her marriage, she became active in public life, and focused increasingly on her social work rather than her role as a wife.[18][19]. She later commented, "He deserved a good time. Although her official title as personal secretary was relatively humble, her power and influence were unparalleled. But when the book was published, she denied the affair, even though Potter claimed she had reviewed the manuscript and never asked to have that information retracted. In an era when it was very difficult for women to rise to the highest levels of government, she was truly FDRs Right Hand Woman. Hopefully The Gatekeeper will finally put to rest the sexist gossip that Missy gained her power because she was FDRs mistress. By the time of his final campaign in 1944, many noted his gaunt appearance and declining faculties, according to UVA's Miller Center. According to the FDR Presidential Library and Museum, Franklin and Eleanor were acquainted as children but came to romance and courtship as young adults in 1902. [35], In early April 1945, Anna arranged for Rutherfurd to come over from her South Carolina estate in Aiken to meet her father at his "Little White House" in Warm Springs, Georgia, the small plain rustic cottage built at the polio therapy center by the heated mineral water springs resort that Roosevelt helped develop beginning in the 1920s. The next four years in Albany provided FDR with a powerful platform to re-establish his national profile. Presidential historian Doris Kearns Goodwin links some of Missys increased stress to Marthas entry into Roosevelts life. Language links are at the top of the page across from the title. . Her presence and control were so all-encompassing that Eleanor later recalled weeping before Franklin, telling him through her tears that "I did not like to live in a house which was not in any way mine, one that I had done nothing about and which did not represent the way I wanted to live" (via Rowley's book). This week marks the 72nd anniversary of the death and subsequent funeral of President Franklin Roosevelt. Missy was part of FDRs most inner circle, those few people who crossed over from the political to the personal worlds of the Roosevelts. Her relationship with Eleanor cooled when her mother learned Anna arranged Mercers clandestine visits, but the pair later co-hosted a radio discussion show. Dont you think, Franklin, that you should answer it promptly? she urged. At the time of their marriage, Eleanor's uncle Theodore Roosevelt joked that "there's nothing like keeping the name in the family." LeHand loved the president dearly, and Franklin was very fond of her. There was more heartbreak waiting for Eleanor when she arrived in Warm Springs. He loved to gather a group around him while he mixed cocktails, told stories, and traded gossip and jokes. The offices, ambitions, and illnesses of Franklin Roosevelt saw him frequently away from home. She was there when the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor. Trusted Writing on History, Travel, and American Culture Since 1949. [2] Though they were both from wealthy, well-connected families, Mercer's parents lost their fortune through the Financial Panic of 1893 and subsequent great recession/depression which curtailed their lavish spending. Funding for MASTERPIECE is provided by Viking and Raymond James, with additional support from public television viewers and contributors to The Masterpiece Trust, created to help ensure the series' future. Rowley also notes how many of those weeks Eleanor Roosevelt was with him: just four. One such instance was over the internment of Japanese-Americans during World War II. Marguerite LeHand Sign up to get the latest news on your favorite dramas and mysteries, as well as exclusive content, video, sweepstakes and more. I waded through the syrupy tributes in hope of a crumb of real insight. Roles of Tully and LeHand were by this time well defined and accepted. WebMissy LeHand was private secretary to Franklin D. Roosevelt (32nd US President of the United States) for over two decades. LeHand's work on the campaign and her evident personal devotion to FDR caught the eye of the Roosevelts. In early 1921, FDR hired her as his personal secretary and she moved to New York where Roosevelt practiced law and served as Vice President of the Fidelity and Deposit Company. [20] Winthrop Rutherfurd had proposed to socialite Consuelo Vanderbilt (18771964) in 1896, only to see her social-climbing mother instead force her into marriage with Charles Spencer-Churchill, 9th Duke of Marlborough (18711934) (cousin to later British prime minister Winston Churchill). Eleanor Roosevelt was the greatest obstacle I faced when I started the research for Lucy, a novel about the love affair that altered and almost derailed twentieth-century history. FDR and Eleanor Roosevelts Children: Who Were They? But the woman who is perhaps least remembered but most Continue reading But the siren call of political life drew FDR back into the arena and in 1928 he ran for Governor of New York and won. Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt wed on St. Patrick's Day of 1905 in New York City in the home of Eleanor's grandmother, perHistory Today. During the early days of their marriage, ER wrote her mother-in-law that the Jew party at Bernard Baruchs was appalling. Two weeks after the June collapse, LeHand suffered a major stroke and was never again able to speak intelligently. Aware of Rutherfurd's role in her parents' early marriage, Anna was at first angry that her father had put her in such a difficult position. Eleanor Roosevelt, born in 1884, had the more difficult time of it. Even during the terrible years when he was battling to walk again, he delighted in company. }). She advocated unsuccessfully against the internment policy; when it went through, she kept up a pragmatic front in public speeches and mitigated and challenged interment where she could in private. When Franklin finally broke the news to her two years later and added that they planned to marry, Sara was aghast; besides her own wish to keep her son to herself, Franklin and Eleanor were only 22 and 20, respectively. Where Franklin believed that the war effort superseded civil liberties, Eleanor argued that wartime was when belief in the Bill of Rights most counted. . If Lucy Mercer had been a weaker, less generous-spirited woman, FDR might not have become one of Americas greatest Presidents.) Besides such material concerns, Rowley believes that Franklin still genuinely loved Eleanor. 17:41 25 Nov 2012, updated 13:35 18 Sep 2014. It is covered with a penciled note in the kind of cryptic shorthand I and most writers I know use when insight or inspiration strikes. WebMissy LeHand was FDRs longtime personal secretary and confidante. But while the two shared a broadly liberal vision of the United States, they had areas of strong political disagreement. Most historians ascribe FDRs metamorphosis from callow politician to visionary statesman to his contracting polio in the summer of 1921, but some contemporaries, such as Joseph Alsop and his mother, Corinne, who was ERs first cousin, thought that loving, and losing, Lucy Mercer was the fire that began to forge his strength and patience even before his illness. Crowds flock to beaches and parks as traditional May Day celebrations One of many women: Franklin D. Roosevelt was said to have carried on a 20-year affair with his secretary, Marguerite 'Missy' LeHand. Contrary to his promises never to see Rutherfurd again after their 1918 affair, Franklin maintained a friendship with his former mistress, going so far as to invite her to White House dinners. But she did. Missy LeHand FDR's affinity for the company of women was always well known and some historians dispute stories of his alleged affairs, saying his friendships never grew to Joseph Lash was a faithful intimate during ERs life and an excellent friend in the books he wrote about her after her death. hbspt.enqueueForm({ She made a point to be photographed with Japanese-Americans when she traveled to California after the attack. FDR and Marshall had to build a fighting force able to take on the Nazis, against the wishes of many in Congress. After resigning his job FDR left for an extended cruise on a houseboat in Florida with Missy, his personal valet LeRoy Jones and a rotating cast of old friends. In June 1942, two squads of saboteursall U.S. residents who returned to Germany to serve the Reichwere dropped by U-boat on beaches in New York and Florida, respectively. A few years later, when FDR contracted polio and was paralyzed from the waist down, their lives changed. Missy suffered a terrible stroke in 1941 and left the White House, so her assistant Grace Tully took over for her. Home Movies Show the Private Lives of the WebMissy LeHand expresses her feelings to Martha. Mercer's friendship with Franklin Roosevelt was portrayed in the well-regarded TV mini-series Eleanor and Franklin, with Mercer portrayed by actress Linda Kelsey in the 1976 telecast, based on the best-selling biography of the same name by Eleanor's personal friend Joseph P. Lash, published in 1971. Already getting in the party mood! From Nazi saboteurs washing up near Marthas vacation home, to secretary Missy LeHands collapse and the press implying the President and Princess were an item, theres a ton of drama in Episode 6 of Atlantic Crossing. Her relationship with FDR transcended her role as his secretary. He hated to be alone. [40][41] Rutherfurd is buried, along with her husband, in Green Township, New Jersey. FACT: The American press wrote openly about the amount of time FDR spent with Martha, says series creator, director, co-writer and executive producer, Alexander Eik. Lucy Mercer Rutherfurd - Wikipedia Historians have also debated whether, as a Roman Catholic, Mercer would have been willing to marry a divorced man. She was, according to Jean Edward Smith's "FDR," the president's constant companion for 21 years, his attendant on excursions where Eleanor was not present, and the only one to refer to him with the pet name "F.D." The more I admired the three of them, the less I wanted to gloss over their faults. FDR relished rich foods and fine wines. But didnt she understand that her husband desperately needed a brief escape from the burden of reopening the banks and dreaming up Lend-Lease and responding to the worst naval defeat in Americas history? Their marriage may have been a failure, but their partnership was a triumph. Marguerite LeHand, Personal Secretary to President Her stress was a trigger for heart problems, say the series co-writers, adding that the medication LeHand took gave her mood swings, depression and anxiety. [27] Historian/author Persico speculates that these letters may have been the cause of the 1927 nervous breakdown of Roosevelt's long-time unmarried first secretary Marguerite "Missy" LeHand (18981944), as LeHand was also reputedly in love with Roosevelt and no medical cause for her breakdown was found. At a time when interest in their war just keeps on rising, why arent Americas World War II poets better remembered? (If FDR had not fallen in love with Lucy Mercer, ER might never have become a force for peace and social justice. For example, FDR's principal strategist and trusted adviser, Louis Howe, lived in the White House from 1933 until his death in 1936 as did FDR's secretary Missy LeHand who stayed until she suffered a stroke in 1941. Lucy Mercer Rutherfurd (ne Lucy Page Mercer; April 26, 1891 July 31, 1948) was an American woman who was best known for her affair with US president Franklin D. Roosevelt. However, she ultimately relented and set up a meeting in Georgetown. Kathryn Smith is a biographer and author of The Gatekeeper: Missy LeHand, FDR and the Untold Story of the Partnership that Defined a Presidency (Simon &Schuster, 2016). But if his need for company was prodigious, it could also be promiscuous. That was a given. During the four years I spent with Franklin D. and Eleanor Roosevelt, I never stopped wondering at the imaginations of those two children of privilege who came to intuit hardship they had never endured. When he returned in September, sick with pneumonia in both lungs, Eleanor discovered a packet of love letters from Mercer in his suitcase. One Roosevelt son called her a lady to her fingertips. FDRs mother wrote to her daughter-in-law, Miss Mercer is here, she is so sweet and attractive and adores you, Eleanor. I could not believe FDR had sacrificed the complicated, redoubtable, and, in her youth, lovely ER for this saccharine Victorian clich. ", Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt shared a mutual respect and affection. Daisy Bonner, who cooked for Franklin Roosevelt for twenty years in the Georgia White House, recalled his favorite dish. After the election, Eleanor asked Missy to come to her home in Hyde Park and help finish up the correspondence. While J. Edgar Hoovers FBI claimed credit for their quick arrests, the saboteurs plot was actually foiled from within: The groups leader, 39-year-old George Dasch (2nd from lower right in photo), called the FBI to volunteer their plans. AsTIMEreports,Eleanor was quick to ask for calm and understanding after the attack on Pearl Harbor. She left only a handful of letters and no diaries, or at least none that have come to light. Now in his fifties, Rutherfurd was considered one of society's most eligible widowers. But the demands ER made on herself could take a fearful toll on others, especially the man with whom she had linked her destiny when she was only 20 and he had just turned 23. As I came to know Lucy Mercer Rutherfurd, I began to shed my predilections and prejudices and admire the strength of her convictions, the delicacy of her principles, and the size of her heart. After a major White House renovation in 1934 Missy was moved into a prime office with a view of the rose garden, and a door that opened directly into the new and improved Oval Office. FDR continued to have other affairs, including one with his secretary, Missy LeHand. By Hayley Peterson He paid all of her medical bills and changed his will so that half of the proceeds of his estate would go to help support her until she died. Sara Roosevelt's attentions helped give her son a happy childhood, but she remained protective of him well into adulthood, a tendency that would later mar his marriage to Eleanor. [39][44] When the news of the memoir's contents broke, Franklin Delano Roosevelt Jr. (19141988), said that he had no knowledge of an affair between Rutherfurd and his father,[45] while Rutherfurd's daughter Barbara flatly denied that any such romance had occurred. In 1941 she re-entered the paralyzed Presidents life bearing an additional gift. FDR was physically fearless, but he could be emotionally craven. Find out about new shows, get updates on your favorite dramas and mysteries, enjoy exclusive content and more! Both branches of the Roosevelt family enjoyed wealth and privilege, yet the future first family were raised in markedly different circumstances. After two decades of cruising the Florida waters and sharing a Warm Springs cottage with FDR, sitting by his side as he sorted his stamps when she knew he needed silence, and arranging impromptu dinners and late-night poker games when she sensed hed like company, Missy, who was only 43, had suffered a stroke the night beforebrought on, some said, by her effort to keep up with FDR. Atlantic Crossing | Fact or Fiction: Inside Episode 6 - PBS His removal from friends and peers was made up for by the love and support of his family, particularly his mother. Admirers compared her voice to velvet and swore her smile was radiant. She came to work for FDR as his private secretary at age 23 and stayed for more than 20 years. 'The bottom dropped out of my world,' she later said. She expected her husband to do well. Nonetheless, FDR had his standards of conduct. and how much more must still be given this greedy world . Although her official title as personal secretary was relatively humble, her power and influence were unparalleled. A nationwide gene-purity movement promoted methods that eventually were adopted by the Third Reich. Per Hazel Rowley's "Franklin and Eleanor: An Extraordinary Marriage," the four-time first lady went so far as to tell her grown daughter, Anna Roosevelt Halsted, that sex was "an ordeal to be borne.". She once bought out an entire farm stand so the woman running it could close for the day. Her collapse actually occurred on June 4, 1941not on Christmas Eve and not with Martha present. WebMore About a Remarkable Donation. [12] Eleanor Roosevelt biographer Blanche Wiesen Cook expressed skepticism that this had been a serious obstacle, noting the depth of Mercer's feelings. Franklin allowed Eleanor to build a personal cottage, Val-Kill, on the family's Hyde Park estate, where she could host whomever she liked or be left alone. Per NPR's review of the book "Franklin and Eleanor: An Extraordinary Marriage," she engineered a cruise with herself, Franklin, and Franklin's best friend that winter, a move that left Eleanor worried. FDR flattered and flirted with them all, but it was Lucy for whom he had almost left his wife before he had polio, and Lucy whom the White House operators were instructed to put through no matter when she called, and Lucy whom he was with when he succumbed to a cerebral hemorrhage on that clement April afternoon in Warm Springs. Once againEleanor did not care for the informal lifestyle and poverty stricken countryside, so Missy became thehostess for FDRs Warm Springs home. Because of her efforts, women as well as men had Civilian Conservation Corps camps, and children no longer drank tainted milk, and blacks got a share, if not a fair one, of the defense miracle that was wresting the nation out of the Depression and into World War II. Missys role as Gatekeeper gave her enormous influence in who the president spent time with. As a wedded couple, however, they encountered difficulties almost from the beginning, one of them in the bedroom. Goodwin writes in No Ordinary Time that it was disturbing for Missy to be replaced by another woman.. When his terrifying mother, Sara Delano Roosevelt, bullied his young wife, he refused to take sides. Eleanor did not enjoy or entirely approve of the bohemian lifestyle FDR was engaging in, fishing and drinking and frivolous pastimes, and so she spent little time onboard. Eleanor also had to contend with her mother-in-law Sara Delano Roosevelt. While fond of his niece, Theodoremade the wedding into a St. Patrick's Day "pit stop," according to Marc Peyser and Timothy Dwyer's book "Hissing Cousins." Everybody wants something, ER replied. [1], As a young woman, Lucy Mercer worked in a dress shop. In her autobiographies she admitted to a tendency, when hurt or angry, to withdraw into a punishing silenceher Griselda mood, she called it. I wrote all this in the newspaper. I am not talking about giving up a career to stay home and raise children, or nursing an aging parent, or other instances of worthy self-sacrifice. A sexual dalliance would have risked a pregnancy that could derail Franklin's family and career and Mercer's reputation. [25][26], Despite Roosevelt's promise to Eleanor, he kept in contact with Lucy Rutherfurd after her marriage, corresponding with her by letter throughout the 1920s. the grandniece of Marguerite A. In the years before widespread birth control for women, sex was coupled with potential pregnancy, and the one surefire prevention abstinence was rarely appreciated by young husbands with healthy sexual appetites, as Franklin was. WebIts true that in his spare time between 1941-1945, FDRs most frequent companion was Martha, though others were often with them as well. He was married to Eleanor. When President Roosevelt died, Grace Tully took all of her and many of Missys papers with her.