#fdr library

President Franklin D. Roosevelt, speaking to the Teamsters Union on September 23, 1944 while campaigning for his unprecendented fourth term in the White House, and responding to baseless claims from Republican opponents that he had wasted taxpayers' money by sending a U.S. Navy destroyer to pick up his dog, Fala, after allegedly leaving the dog behind during a visit to Alaska,

According to FDR, Fala's "Scotch soul was furious" over the allegations and the President added that "I am accustomed to hearing malicious falsehoods about myself...but I think I have a right to resent -- to object -- to libelous statements about my dog."

FDR, of course, went on to defeat Republican Governor Thomas E. Dewey of New York on Election Day in 1944, but died just 82 days into his fourth term. Fala died in 1952 and was buried near President Roosevelt in Hyde Park, New York. And while Fala was understandably "furious" about having his name dragged through the mud by Republicans during the 1944 campaign (despite being a very good boy), he got the last laugh because he was immortalized with a statue alongside FDR at the Franklin Delano Roosevelt Memorial in Washington, D.C.

One more from the FDR library - a poster that is part of a display about the Royal Visit of King George VI & Queen Elizabeth to America. 🇺🇸 🇬🇧

Franklin D Roosevelt

Mary McLeod Bethone with National Youth Administration youth, image here.

Mary McLeod Bethune to Return to Capitol Hill (as an impressive addition to Statuary Hall)

By Miriam Kleiman, Public Affairs

We continue our celebration of Black History Month (Feb) and Women's History Month (March) with Civil Rights icon and DC power broker extraordinaire Mary McLeod Bethune (1875-1955).

Dr. Bethune will soon join the Old Boys Club on Capitol Hill (90 of the 100 statues there are of men), as an impressive 3 ton, 11 foot statue in the Capitol's National Statuary Hall. Created by sculptor Nilda Comas, the statue's pedestal reads: “Invest in the human soul. Who knows, it may be a diamond in the rough.” Women’s History Month bonus! Comas will be the first Latina artist to have a sculpture in the National Statuary Hall.

Mary Jane McLeod Bethune was born in South Carolina in 1875, the 15th of 17 children to former slaves Samuel and Patsy McLeod. She was a passionate educator, community organizer, presidential advisor, Civil Rights and women's rights activist, decades-long public servant (60 years), and patriot, in addition to mother, grandmother, and great-grandmother. Her long list of achievements include:

1st Black woman to lead a federal agency.

1st Black women with a university founded in her name.

Founder of the National Council of Negro Women to advocate for and advance rights for Black women, their families and communities.

Leader of FDR's unofficial "Black Cabinet." Used this position to creating jobs for Blacks in the federal government and New Deal agencies.

As Director of Negro Affairs, she was the highest paid Black government employee in 1939—with a $5,000 salary (equivalent to $100,000 today.

VP of the NAACP in 1940, a position she held for the rest of her life.

Helped establish the Women’s Army Corps (1942) and ensured it was racially integrated.

Archivist and chronicler of Black women's history.

Bethune was the only Black woman at the founding conference of the United Nations in 1945.

Despite the attitude of some employers in refusing to hire Negros to perform needed, skilled services, and despite the denial of the same opportunities and courtesies to our youth in the armed forces of our country, we must not fail America and as Americans, we must not let America fail us.

Her life was celebrated with a memorial statue in Washington DC in 1974, and a stamp in 1985.

“We have a powerful potential in our youth, and we must have the courage to change old ideas and practices so that we may direct their power toward good ends.”

Bethune and Hoover President Hoover invited her to the White House Conference on Child Health and Protection, and then appointed her to a commission to plan a “National Memorial Building” in DC “as a tribute to the Negro’s contribution to the achievements of America.” Congress did not back the project and private fundraising also failed. More than 80 years later, this vision became reality when the National Museum of African American History and Culture opened in DC.

Bethune and FDR In 1935, President Roosevelt invited her to DC to serve as a Special Advisor to the National Youth Administration, and then named her National Youth Association Director of Negro Affairs, making her the first Black woman to lead a federal agency. During World War II she advocated for African American women to be allowed to serve in the Women’s Auxiliary Army Corps (WACS) and Women Appointed for Voluntary Emergency Service (WAVES).

Bethune and Eleanor Roosevelt

None of us certainly can say that as yet we have perfect democracy, nor even the democracy that Abraham Lincoln and others of our great men envisioned. But I for one am proud that our country could produce a Mrs. Bethune. Your achievements are a tribute to our nation even more a tribute to your own individual spirit and effort. Eleanor Roosevelt.

Portrait of Mary McLeod Bethune, NARA ID 559194. From the Harmon Foundation, a nonprofit, private foundation for African art. More online.

Mary McLeod Bethune, Eleanor Roosevelt and others at the opening of Midway Hall, "one of two residence halls built by the Public Buildings Administration of Federal Works Agency for Negro government girls..." May 1943, NARA ID 533032.

Eleanor Roosevelt receives Mary McLeod Bethune Human Rights Award from Dorothy Height, National Council of Negro Women President, 11/12/1960, NARA ID 196283.

In her last will and testament from 1955, Dr. Bethune wrote:

I leave you hope. The Negro’s growth will be great in the years to come. Yesterday our ancestors endured the degradation of slavery, yet they retained their dignity. Today, we direct our strength toward winning a more abundant and secure life. Tomorrow, a new Negro, unhindered by race taboos and shackles, will benefit from more than 330 years of ceaseless struggle. Theirs will be a better world. This I believe with all my heart. Correspondence Between Harry S. Truman and Mary McLeod Bethune, Truman Library,

See also:

Before Kamala: Black Women in Presidential Administrations, Rediscovering Black History

Official Personnel Folder for Mary McLeod Bethune, NARA ID 158329664.

Mary Bethune: Adviser to Presidents, Hoover Heads blog

Providing a New Deal for Young Black Women: Mary McLeod Bethune and the Negro Affairs Division of the National Youth Association, Rediscovering Black History.

Featured NARA public program: Vanguard: How Black Women Broke Barriers, Won the Vote, and Insisted on Equality for All

Mustering Out: the Navy’s First Black Yeowomen, Rediscovering Black History

Franklin D. Roosevelt funeral in Hyde Park, 4/15/1945 

On this day in 1937, Secretary of Agriculture (and future Roosevelt Vice President) Henry Wallace and Secretary of State Cordell Hull arrive at Washington, DC’s Union Station to welcome home President Roosevelt. He was returning from an over two-week fishing trip off the Texas coast. FDR traveled home through Fort Worth where his son Elliott hosted a barbecue in his honor at the ranch of Amon Carter. The President was also greeted by the First Lady.

Presidential libraries are such important and previous gifts of history, both to researchers and the American people. I wish more people would visit them because although they do reflect much of the bias of their subject's supporters, they're also filled with contemporary artifacts -- including genuine examples of some of the hatred they inspired from their fiercest critics -- and larger than life, floor to ceiling images and videos that bring to wondrous life the drama of the times.

You also can't help but reflect on current political events when you walk through these libraries, packed as they are with details of each president's accomplishments as well as failures. FDR's museum had an entire section devoted to his First 100 Days, when he addressed the banking crisis -- so close we were to the complete collapse of the entire system (I had no idea it was that bad) -- the rural farming crisis, and the crippling unemployment (25%! 1 in 4!).

This was a man who not only couldn't walk more than a few feet, and even then had to use thick, rigid and heavy steel leg braces, and likely suffered constant physical pain, not to mention a failed assassination attempt his first year in office. (Failed only because it missed FDR but the mayor of Chicago wasn't so lucky...he died in hospital from his gunshot wounds.) Crippled he might have been, but he got shit done. A lot of it. And much of it, we still benefit from today like Social Security, the SEC, minimum wage and unemployment laws, and the FDIC.