Perhaps FDRs charm did mask an emotional iciness, and ERs high-mindedness did make her almost as hard on others as she was on herself, and Lucys ability to live a gilded life while one-third of the nation was ill-housed, ill-clad, ill-nourished was unconscionable. When his terrifying mother, Sara Delano Roosevelt, bullied his young wife, he refused to take sides. [29] At his first memorable presidential inauguration on March 4, 1933, Roosevelt made arrangements for Rutherfurd to attend and witness his swearing-in. Her collapse actually occurred on June 4, 1941not on Christmas Eve and not with Martha present. Eleanor Roosevelt was not with him on the trip. 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. Widely considered the firstand onlyfemale presidential chief of staff, Marguerite Missy LeHand was the right-hand woman to Franklin Delano Rooseveltboth personally and professionallyfor more than twenty years. Week after week I saw Martha get off the train wearing high heels and black silk stockings. 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. She showed no hesitation in using the sliding door to come and go as she pleased. Marguerite Alice "Missy" LeHand (September 13, 1896 July 31, 1944) was a private secretary to U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt (FDR) for 21 years. According to LeHand's biographer Kathryn Smith in The Gatekeeper, she eventually functioned as White House Chief of Staff, the only woman in American history to do so. [1] 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. Franklin and Eleanor were acquainted as children but came to romance and courtship as young adults in 1902. Throughout his life, Franklin Roosevelt was surrounded by remarkable women. Unlike a formerly unpublished letter from which I finally got permission to quote, it wasnt even classified. She admitted later in life that "It did not come naturally to me to understand little children or to enjoy them." She traveled with them and paid their bills, acted as hostess when Eleanor was away, provided advice on personnel, personal and political matters, and kept the White House secretarial staff operating at a remarkably high level of effectiveness under constant stress. The Gatekeeper: Missy LeHand, FDR, and the Untold Story of the Partnership That Defined a Presidency by Kathryn Smith finally gives Missy LeHand her due. Eleanor discovered the affair in in 1918 when she found love letters in her husband's suitcase. 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. Schiff's biographer, Jeffrey Potter, claimed in his 1976 book, 'Men, Money and Magic: The Story of Dorothy Schiff,' that she admitted to having an affair with FDR between 1936 and 1943. When his daughter Anna was grown and newly divorced, she took up residence in the White House and became her father's confidante. One of Franklin Delano Roosevelt's numerous rumored affairs will be revisited in the coming weeks with the release of 'Hyde Park on Hudson,' a film depicting the American president's quasi-incestual affair with his distant cousin, Margaret 'Daisy' Suckley. that it would be best if you answered it now? she insisted. 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. Eleanor Roosevelt, born in 1884, had the more difficult time of it. There were supposedly several dinners in the White House's second-floor private quarters during Roosevelt's last year which were attended by Rutherfurd in a group with Anna's presence and obvious acceptance. A soldier-historian looks at how the world has changed in the past decade and finds that America is both hostage to history and likely to be saved by it. 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. He started the first unemployment program and fought a corruption scandal with the mayor of New York. In the 1950s and 1960s she was the fearless, indefatigable, right-minded woman every girl who knew there was more to life than cheerleading wanted to emulate. It is generally accepted that their relationship contained a romantic element, though scholars remain divided on whether the pair had a sexual relationship. Even during the terrible years when he was battling to walk again, he delighted in company. The blog of the Franklin D. Roosevelt Presidential Library and Museum. hbspt.enqueueForm({ She called the White House and her former assistant Grace Tully took a message for the President, but he did not call her back that day. On June 4th, at a party in the White House, Missy collapsed, probably from a combination of a stroke and a heart attack. But in 1960, when ER refused to come to the telephone because she suspected the caller wanted something from her, her surprised secretary asked if she didnt believe people could like her for herself. Two weeks after the June collapse, LeHand suffered a major stroke and was never again able to speak intelligently. As a result, practically everyone left the presidential presence convinced his own argument had won the day. Her parents squandered a fortune with stunning panache, and one morning she and her sister awakened to find they were stranded penniless at their convent school in Austria. FDR relished rich foods and fine wines. The demands Eleanor Roosevelt made on herself could take a fearful toll on others, especially her husband. 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. The young FDR did not take socially unsanctioned sex lightly. These were without doubt the most difficult years of his life, and those who were with him during that period became his most trusted confidants and advisers. I pitied Eleanor. 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. 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. UVA's Miller Center speculated that Sara Delano Roosevelt would likely have disapproved of any possible match for her son. She lived quietly, if splendidly, on a great estate in rural New Jersey and a handsome retreat in fashionable Aiken, South Carolina. Dont you think, Franklin, that you should answer it promptly? she urged. Language links are at the top of the page across from the title. More than this, she referred to them as her own. In addition, the relationship was covered in an episode of The President's documentaries for the PBS American Experience series on American history, as well as in the 2014 PBS miniseries The Roosevelts, directed by noted documentary film-maker Ken Burns, with an accompanying companion pictorial book by Geoffrey Perrett. 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 become romances. One of many women: Franklin D. Roosevelt was said to have carried on a 20-year affair with his secretary, Marguerite 'Missy' LeHand. The decision would have profound consequences for the nation. [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. The least disputed of Roosevelt's supposed affairs, however, was with Lucy Mercer, his wife's social secretary when he was assistant secretary of the Navy in 1916. WebThe Missy LeHand Archive, comprising some 1,400 pieces, is the most important grouping of original documents still in private hands from such a central figure in FDRs political and personal life. 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. After all the experts and advisers have rung in, one man must make the decision to cut the meager pensions of World War I veterans, to give Americans numbers to ensure their social security, to send abroad precious ships and arms that may soon be needed at home. I shared her frustration when FDR declined to make an antilynching law a top priority, and refused to open the door to the Jewish victims of Hitlers persecutions, but wasnt she sufficiently astute to appreciate the adage that to be a great statesman, one must first be a good politician? The wife of his aide Edwin ("Pa") Watson called him the loneliest man in the world. In 1943 FDR told his distant cousin and close companion Margaret Suckley, Im either Exhibit A or left completely alone.. region: "", To license content, please contact licenses [at] americanheritage.com. [8], In June 1917, Mercer quit or was fired from her job with Eleanor and enlisted in the US Navy, which was then mobilizing for World War I. 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.". There was no shortage of people eager to try. STill, if FDR could not save his wife, he did not have to betray her. He always enjoyed other peoples discomfort, Averell Harriman observed. Throughout her life, ER blamed her early inadequacy as a mother for her childrens unhappiness and took on radio engagements, writing assignments, and other endeavors to further their careers and shore up their finances. 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. WebBesides children and grandchildren, several other longtime aides and friends also lived in the White House during the Roosevelt years. Even Earl Miller, the slippery, selfaggrandizing New York State trooper who started as her bodyguard, was unstinting in his devotion. His mother Sara Delano, his wife Eleanor, his Secretary of Labor Frances Perkins the first woman to be appointed to the cabinet, and his distant cousin Daisy Suckley. In conjunction with Glenn Horowitz Booksellers, we are offering the archive, intact, directly from Ms. LeHands heirs. [8] Mercer and Franklin continued to see one another privately, causing widespread gossip in Washington. Their correspondence is filled with romantic expressions and longing, though whether they had a physical relationship isn't known for sure; at least in regards to her marriage, Eleanor maintained that shared connection and common interest trumped lusty urges. He left the table to answer the letter. The context of Eleanor's attitude is worth bearing in mind. [13] Persico also doubts that this was a factor, observing that Mercer's mother Minnie had divorced and remarried, and that the family had come to Roman Catholicism only recently. Missy came into the Roosevelt world in August 1920 when she was offered a job as a secretary to support Franklin Roosevelts Vice Presidential campaign. Grace performed dictation and typing, managed the President's mail, and served as primary files manager for the White House. The series creators/writers reveal whats real history and whats not. 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. Although her official title as personal secretary was relatively humble, her power and influence were unparalleled. My mother hated FDR. Her descendants speak of the insouciance with which she met early hardship. Another woman close to FDR was Princess Martha of Sweden, a royal who was forced to flee Scandinavia in 1941 after the Nazi invasion, Denial: Dorothy Schiff, a former publisher of the New York Post who is pictured in 1963, admitted to her biographer that she had an affair with Roosevelt, then later recanted, according to the biographer, Gifts from Suckley: Franklin D. Roosevelt relaxes with his Scottish terrier, Fala at Hyde Park. 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. 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? LeHand dropped unconscious at the end of a late dinner with White House staff. FDR and Marshall had to build a fighting force able to take on the Nazis, against the wishes of many in Congress. In the first decade of their marriage, Eleanor was pregnant five times, four within the first four years. When I looked at their early prejudices, I saw signposts indicating how far they had traveled. Rowley also notes how many of those weeks Eleanor Roosevelt was with him: just four. In her autobiographies she admitted to a tendency, when hurt or angry, to withdraw into a punishing silenceher Griselda mood, she called it. Whatever his reasons, Franklin chose to reconcile with his wife and promise to stop seeing Mercer. portalId: 20973928, Roosevelt faced the challenges of a widened war at the moment when he lost a key member of his circle. 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 Readmore about the magazine >>, The magazine was forced to suspend print publication in 2013, but a group of volunteers saved the archives and relaunched it in digital form in 2017. [12] Eleanor Roosevelt biographer Blanche Wiesen Cook expressed skepticism that this had been a serious obstacle, noting the depth of Mercer's feelings. She was also romantically involved with the dashing and daring William Bullitt who served as FDRs secret spy and later as Ambassador to Russia and France. They mention her soft heart. 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. I became unpopular, Trohan continues. Franklin D. Roosevelt (c. 1919) and Eleanor Roosevelt (1933), Marriage and continued contact with Roosevelt, Charles Spencer-Churchill, 9th Duke of Marlborough, his first memorable presidential inauguration, "Franklin Roosevelt Was Not Diplomatic as Wife", "FDR's Secret Love: How Roosevelt's lifelong affair might have changed the course of a century", "Paid Notice: Deaths KNOWLES, BARBARA RUTHERFURD", "MISS RUTHERFURD BECOMES FIANCEE; BETROTHED | Member of Noted Family WIll Be Wed to Robert Winthrop Knowles, Jr. of Boston", "MISS RUTHERFURD MARRIED IN AIKEN; Fermata School Graduate the Bride of Robert W. Knowles Jr., Former Service Man", "February 2011: FDR Letters to Lucy Mercer Rutherfurd", "Anna Eleanor Roosevelt Boettiger Halsted (1906-1975)", "New light on the revelations of Franklin Roosevelt's 30-year affection for Lucy Mercer Rutherfurd", Military history of the United States during World War II, Springwood birthplace, home, and gravesite, Little White House, Warm Springs, Georgia, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Lucy_Mercer_Rutherfurd&oldid=1152540330, Short description is different from Wikidata, Articles with unsourced statements from November 2022, Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License 3.0, This page was last edited on 30 April 2023, at 21:24. But this was FDRs first shot at national political office and he went at it with his trademark gusto. When FDR and Lucy, who was by then Mrs. Winthrop Rutherfurd, began to meet again in 1941, while ER was importuning FDR not to sacrifice social progress to military imperatives, Lucy was referring to him as the Source I Do Not Question. Even more moving than the words she wrote about FDR to others is a letter she sent to him that was until now locked away among the classified documents in the FDR Library. Warnings around that unlucky number proved apt on this occasion; this was the year, according to Biography, that Eleanor first discovered her husband's infidelity. As the years passed, she developed a resigned and cynical attitude toward intercourse with her husband. Franklin Roosevelt died on April 12, 1945, not long after his election to an unprecedented fourth term as president. She functioned as FranklinRoosvelt's de facto chief-of-staff, yet Missy LeHand's role has beenmisrepresented and overlooked by historians. [14], In the end, Franklin appears to have told Mercer disingenuously that Eleanor was not willing to grant a divorce. The home is now a tourist attraction, Lifelong 'friend:' Lucy Mercer, pictured in the 1930s, stayed in FDR's life until his death in 1945, and she was with him when he took his last breaths, Box office: One of FDR's numerous rumored affairs will be revisited with the Dec. 7 release of 'Hyde Park on Hudson,' a film depicting his quasi-incestual affair with his distant cousin, Margaret 'Daisy' Suckley, Another affair? But nothing changed upon Franklin's return to the United States, and he gently but persistently made clear to his mother that he was leaving the nest. Yet when I came across it, I heard the subversive rasp of a key turning in a lock. White House cuisine became so notorious that Martha Gellhorn surprised her future husband Ernest Hemingway by wolfing down several sandwiches in preparation for dinner there. Missy lived with her sister and two nieces for several years, and finally passed away on July 31, 1944. 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 become romances. He was physically fearless, but he could be emotionally craven. She would be the first woman to hold the position of the secretary to the president. 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. In a tragic situation that tested all three individuals, each behaved with honor and dignity. It was with the help of these accomplished attorneys, social workers, journalists, and activists that she found her voice and defined her causes. Eleanor Roosevelt was 13 years into her marriage in 1918. Despite all of her work in helping bring FDRs dream of a presidential library to fruition, on June 30th, 1941, when it was dedicated, Missy was not there. 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. [28] On the rare occasions when she was less than that, ER owned up to her failings scrupulously. But the woman who is perhaps least remembered but most important was Marguerite Missy LeHand, his personal secretary and closest confidant for more than 20 years. 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. Historians have also debated whether, as a Roman Catholic, Mercer would have been willing to marry a divorced man. FDR Atlantic Crossing | Fact or Fiction: Inside Episode 6 - PBS FDR's love nest in the park: How president took FIVE A Vermont Farmer Preserved the Worlds Most Ephemeral Art for Posterity. Mercer stayed in FDR's life until his death in 1945, and she was with him when he took his last breaths, even though she eventually married another man. [45] Well-known historian Arthur Schlesinger Jr. (19172007) stated of the affair that if Rutherfurd "in any way helped Franklin Roosevelt sustain the frightful burdens of leadership in the second world war, the nation has good reason to be grateful to her."[46]. The relationships were intense, the disappointments profound, the fallings-out fierce. formId: "5b72fde8-e7e4-4048-9244-483412ab8fe3", It was not only that Eleanor, with her public achievements, personal tragedies, and flair for emotional undressing in public that would have warmed the heart of a latter-day talk-show host, could not help upstaging her; it was also that Lucy had a passion for privacy. After the election, Eleanor asked Missy to come to her home in Hyde Park and help finish up the correspondence. WebMissy LeHand was FDRs longtime personal secretary and confidante. At this stage in their marriage, the Roosevelts were also maintaining distance in their private lives. But after she accidentally started a fire while lighting a cigarette the decision was made to send her home to Somerville, Massachusetts. To fully understand why Missy LeHand had such influence in the White House it is important to look at her role during the years FDR was out of public view recovering from polio. Marguerite Missy LeHand: FDRs Right Hand Woman When I thought about their personal flaws, I marveled at the public good to which they put them. [30] When her husband later suffered a stroke, she contacted Roosevelt to arrange for him to be cared for at well-regarded Walter Reed Army Medical Center in Washington, D.C.[31] Historian/author Doris Kearns Goodwin speculated that an entry in the White House ushers diary for August 1, 1941 included a code name for Lucy Rutherfurd, suggesting that she attended a private dinner with the president then. Missy LeHand, FDR's closest companion for two decades, was crippled by a stroke followed by a nervous breakdown. They insisted every man she met fell in love with her. Another woman close to FDR was Princess Martha of Sweden, a royal who was forced to flee Scandinavia in 1941 after the Nazi invasion. FDR's mother definitely wanted to keep her son a mother's boy, notes theNew York Review. Mrs. Nesbitt told him it was unavailable, though when his secretaries chipped in to buy some, they managed to find it in the local stores. Marguerite LeHand, Personal Secretary to President 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. During this period Missy had a serious medical issue with her irregular heartbeat and Eleanor grew deeply concerned about her health. Could any husband, or any other human being, have healed ERs wounds? When the stock market crashed in October 1929, Governor Roosevelt immediately took action. 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. This was in part a matter of logistics; some of these trips were to do with Franklin's rehabilitation from polio, while Eleanor had the family to look after. Teddy's daughter, Alice Roosevelt, would later put it that, "My father lived up to his reputation of being the bride at every wedding and the corpse at every funeral. She speaks of how much you have given . In a review for the Washington Post, Stacy Schiff details the first lady's long-term relationship with reporter Lorena Hickok. It took a heavy toll physically and emotionally. Roles of Tully and LeHand were by this time well defined and accepted. Now in his fifties, Rutherfurd was considered one of society's most eligible widowers. Presidential historian Doris Kearns Goodwin links some of Missys increased stress to Marthas entry into Roosevelts life. the grandniece of Marguerite A. A few years later, when FDR contracted polio and was paralyzed from the waist down, their lives changed. Missy LeHand, Roosevelts longtime aide. Grace Tully described Missy as the Queen of the White House staff, and her authority was rarely challenged. She already resented having the timeline and circumstances of their engagement dictated by her future mother-in-law; with a lengthy cruise separating them, she wondered if Franklin might not return her affections afterwards. Getting to know FDR, ER, and Lucy Mercer was not an unalloyed pleasure. "Attention and admiration were the things through all my childhood which I wanted," Eleanor later remarked, "because I was made to feel that nothing about me would attract attention or bring me admiration.".
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