Seeing the president , two exr president s, all sorts of ambassadors and other diplomatic people, very important people, that really dawned on me, my gosh, she really was important. We never thought of her in that way. We never viewed my grandmother. She was only a grandmother to us, and that is all she ever wanted to be to us. 3, 1942. N in january my father was elliott, and elliott was the second oldest of the sons and third oldest of the children, so my dad kind of fell right in the middle. I think he always felt that he was the middle child, but you claimmy uncles used to that he was my grandmothers favorite. I am not sure that was true, but that is what they claimed anyway. My mother and father were divorced when i was only two, and my time with my father was really quite limited and as a consequence, you know the rememberg that i can was howim talking about he almost felt somewhat estranged from my grandmother because i mean, he loved her she was so busy that it was almost he felt that she didnt have time for him. My grandmother, by her own admission, was not a particularly good mother. Experience of not having a mother to grow up with she never learned how to be a mother, good or bad. And as a consequence, i think she paid special attention to her grandchildren to make up for not being a good mother. I can remember going for quite lengthy walks in the woods with my grandmother, and she was always would always want to know what my interests were. As a child at 7, 8, nine years old, gosh, here is my grandmother paying attention to me and wanting to know how my life is going. About,y seldom talked until we were much older, she very seldom talked about her work and the things that she did , as i said, until we were considerably older. She was a typical grandmother, but my grandmother was a horrible cook. She did not cook. Know, she always made time for the grandchildren that were there. And they had a very special run ofand we had the valkill, of the place. No. Ere very, very busy, but she was i just remember the times i had with her and remember being with her and really basking in her love. How was she has a grandmother . Was she any type of disciplinarian, or was she an indulgent grandmother . David roosevelt she was very indulgent. She was absolutely no disciplinarian whatsoever. Yes, she was very, very indulgent of all of us. , you know, there were a lot of times when she would have someone who was quite famous visiting her, and you know, the grandchildren would disturb her or disturb them, and she would never scold us. She would just say, you know, that is my grandchild, or whatever, and that was it. It was no problem. You dont remember any particular dignitary or person of importance that you guys were particularly maybe obnoxious . David roosevelt well, there is the story of a little sevenyearold who was out in the pool with his cousins and of course, we were not allowed to go into the Stone Cottage which is where the pool is. And of courseoom, you as a child you always waited until the absolute last moment. So the story goes this little boy ran right through grand meres office going to the restroom, water flying off of him and whatnot, and right past my grandmother and madame chiang kaishek. And grandmere said that was my grandson david, and i will introduce him on his way back. Scolding there was no whatsoever. That is the way it was. Did you ever at any point you mentioned you did not get how famous your grandmother was until her funeral, but was there any indication of her fame or her Public Service growing up . David roosevelt oh, sure. There were times when i would accompany my grandmother to various activities that she was doing. I remember one down in texas when she came, and she was going church downa black in i believe it was houston, i believe. And i went with her, and to see the adoration that these people and people were lined up in the streets waiting for her. Nd it was so touching of course i was older at that time. Times when she did not receive such warm welcomes as well. Now i did not have the opportunity to travel with her internationally. My brother and sister dead, some of my other cousins, but i did not unfortunately. What were some of those things, the negative perception that your grandmother received, and what was your reaction to that . David roosevelt you know, i can remember a few cases of where there would be, within the crowd there would be signs, you know, that were derogatory towards my grandmother. And you know, it did not bother me so much because i knew that she at the time i knew she was controversial. Now i dont know if you realized that during her lifetime, there were 19 attempts to assassinate her. And so, you know, she was not universally loved by any stretch of the imagination. Thereean, what do you sit what is the talk of the dinner table when, you know, everyone is talking and someone says, they just tried to kill grandma . What does the family do . David roosevelt for the most part it was not talked about. It was certainly not discussed. In a lot of cases, it was just it happened. The k. K. K. Is the largest had the largest bounty on her ead. There was one occasion when some of the kkk had an opportunity to assassinate her, and a very good opportunity. The story goes they couldnt bring themselves to kill this woman. It was very real. A very real. Did your grandmother ever speak about a . Never. And certainly not to her grandchildren. She never had personal protection whatsoever. I think she just accepted that er work was too important to allow any kinds of threats to disturb her. She just went right on doing her thing. Do you remember at all any of your relationship with fdr, and did eleanor talk about him as you all were growing up . It is interesting. I was too young to really remember my grandfather, but i dont recall my grandmother ever specifically discussing fdr with us. Hey had an interesting relationship. Certainly it was not the kind of marriage that one would think of as a normal marriage, and yet they had such a strong artnership, and such respect for each other and each others work that it really made it quite a special relationship, i think. If i would ask my grandmother about fdr, she would answer, and it was always very positive, very loving. But she did not dwell on that at all. I dont think my grandmother really enjoyed being first lady, being married to the president , although i think she realized after fdr became president that it placed her in position where she could have impact in areas that she was really interested in herself. Civil rights, human rights, things like that, education. It really was quite a striking artnership between the two. When your grandmother passed away . 1962. Do your member the day that you are do you remember the day you were told that she had passed . Oh yeah. Was in texas. I immediately left to come back up here. It was a terrible shock. Its funny, i dont think i ever really believed that she would never pass away, that she would ever pass away. It put quite a hole in my heart. Why do you decide why did you decide to write a book about your grandmother . Thats interesting because i really had no interest in writing yet another biography of my grandmother, and i thought it would be kind of fun for people to know about my grandmother from the perspective of a grandchild who knew her. I think theres a lot of misconception about my randmother and what she wanted to try to accomplish. The thing that impresses me most about my grandmother is she really didnt care what other people thought. She would do what she felt was in the best interest of her helping people, helping mankind, actually. That was always the thing that impressed me the most. The only thing that i recall and i think she told everyone of her grandchildren was be roud of your heritage. Be proud of the traditions of your family, but never feel that you have to live up to that legacy. You must be your own person. That is something that all of us carried with us for our ntire lives. A childs hobby that became the passion of a president. He really made stamp collecting what it became. Because when he was 8 years old and his mother and his father, james and sara roosevelt, introduced him to stamp collecting, it was thought to be a childs hobby. And adults would never waste their time on stamp collecting. It was too trivial for them. And so what was interesting about f. D. R. Was he was never interested in the condition of the stamp, the value of the stamp. He was more interested in the person, place or event pictured n the stamp. He got an education out of stamp collecting. And that came back stomb him very well. I can tell you a very short story when he was president of the United States and we got into world war ii. He was in the war room with all the generals and admirals and they were going over and planning an attack on a certain country. He would always seem to weave stamp collecting into his speeches and he was so enthusiastic that finally adults, other adults, were saying, wait a minute, if this is good enough for the governor of new york, why shouldnt i be collectingings . And suddenly just the mindset of the country started changing and people were at fifth avenue cocktail parties discussing heir latest stamp acquisition. It definitely changed the whole office of the post Office Department at that time. When he ran for president in 1932 he was sworn in on march 4, 1933, but he selected another up and coming politician and a very savvy businessman, his name was james folly. And he made him his Campaign Manager and folly seized on the fact that f. D. R. Was touching people personally, well, he collects stamps and im collecting stamps. He was a regular guy because of that. So he actually designed campaign envelopes that had f. D. R. s imprint, his picture on the outside of the envelope, and it said, elect the stamp collecting president. You know, member of the american association. Because he wanted that message floating around the country. Between followy, once he got into the oval office, for instance, ill give you some changes that took place. F. D. R. Personally took away a job from an assistant post master general and he insisted on reviewing and giving final approval to every stamp that came out during his four terms as president. That happened to be 206 stamps. On top of that, he designed several stamps, his most famous walz the admiral bird. He was very good friends with admiral bird and he was doing his second expedition and f. D. R. Personally designed the stamp. Also with f. D. R. And james followy, you had his close ally as post master jeb and you had a stamp collector sitting in the oval office. And they did so many things to change the face of the post office. One of them was putting in at f. D. R. s suggestion a philatelic window. And what that was, he said, i dont like stamp collectors being rushed when theyre looking at stamps at a normal window because theres a customer with a heavy parcel mumbling behind them. So he put in the windows that were only to be usde by stamp collectors. So you could take all your time at that window because the person behind you was going to do the same thing. They introduced firstday ceremonies which still go on today. And that was james follys idea. He said, we have to get people excited about stamps. So the first time they would see a new stamp is when they went to the window and bought a sheet of stamps. Folly didnt like that. He said, we have to have ceremonies to get the networks out and the newspapers so thats still ongoing. And its a very good tool to get that information out there. So they really, really the two men really changed the face of the post Office Department. This is actually a piece that belonged to the f. D. R. Collection and i have an interesting story to tell about this. On the back, the auction house, h. Harner incorporated, which were auctioneers in new york ity and in london. Any starped the back and stamped the back. You see, it was going to the secretary of state. When f. D. R. First got in the oval o he found that his predecessor was also a stamp collector but not nearly on the level as f. D. R. And he initiated a program with the state department that once the contents were taken out of these envelopes, all the envelopes this one in particular is from 1935, all the envelopes would be forwarded, the empty enveloped, to the oval office to see if the president needed the stamps for his collection. Well f. D. R. , he went a step higher. He once wrote a letter in pencil on white house stationary and got it in my hands when i was researching for the book and it was from the president to the secretary f state. It was a handwritten in pencil letter to the secretary of state where f. D. R. Was a accusing the state Department Employees of holding back some of the empty envelopes and he insisted that the secretary of state oversee that operation. And he any stamps that he didnt need, his first secretary as president would snip them off and when she got 25 she put them in, today we call it a plastic baggy, because he was getting thousands of letters from children saying, mr. President , i started a stamp collection, and missie would send them a letter on behalf of the president wishing them well with their collection and starting them off with 25 stamps. So f. D. R. Was in every facet of the industry at that time. He had a portion of his stamp collection with him everywhere he went. That includes, well obviously he had it at springwood, his house. When he was governor, he had a portion of his stamp collection with him in the top left drawer of his desk. And there were certain memos that i read that when he was on a particularly boring conversation as governor, he would slide the drawer open and start working with his left hand on his stamp collection until the torment of the boring conversation ended. And then he had it obviously at the white house with him. He had a portion of his collection at warm springs, georgia. He even brought a portion of his stamp collection to the famous war conference with churchill and stalin. And he was said to work on his stamp collection every single day for one hour before going to bed. And one of the reasons he said was to, you know, let him unwind from the hectic day that he had. Especially during the war period. The war years. He passed away while he was down at warm springs, georgia, on april 12, 1945. He worked on them that morning when he got up. It was part of his routine. Then he, you know, of course he died that afternoon at 3 35. Now, his son, james, was the executor of the will. Believe it or not, james could not find one member of the roosevelt family that even wanted one item from the stamp collection. I dont have an exact number on how many items were in the collection, but when he decided to turn it over to an auction house, james finally decided, my father would probably want to share this with other collectors. There were so many items that they had to do the auction over seven days in four separate sessions, all day sessions. And while his collection was estimated at 85 thourks which surprises a lot of people because 85,000, which surprises a lot of people, because he was a man of worth, but he didnt care if the stamps were bent or there was oil from his fingers, they raised 2ds25,000. Everyone was furious to get a piece of the collection. Franklin roosevelts president ial Library Curator tures the librarys permanent exhibit dedicated to president roosevelts four terms in office during the Great Depression and world war ii. The library embarked on ambitious plan to look at the entire museum and really bring it all up to date. The completely new galleries opened in 2013. And basically everything you see at the museum now dates from that 2013 reopening. Its all brand new. A fresh look at both the lives of franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt and of the roosevelt presidency. The exhibition begins in 1932. The year Franklin Roosevelt was elected president of the United States. In 1932 was a year of tremendous crisis for the nation and the world. The country was in the third year of the Great Depression. In 1929, when the depression began, unemployment in the United States was at 3. 2 . By the time roosevelts running for president in the fall of 1932, its almost 25 . So the context of the election was of a nation really in a state of disarray and a state of fear. This gallery really points that out. We have some dramatic photography which shows you the state of affairs nationally. He have dramatic photography which shows you the state of affairs nationally. This photograph in particular is poignant. This is a photograph of new yorks central park in 1932, and in the foreground a shantytown, one of many like this that had sprouted up across the nation. Many of them were nicknamed hoovervilles. This particular one, people are living in the shantytown in the shadow of the metropolitan museum of art. It is a very poignant reminder of the scale of human suffering in the year 1932 when roosevelt is running for president. The 1932 Democratic Convention was held in chicago, and when roosevelt was nominated, he received word of the nomination in albany, and he did something unprecedented in american politics and quite dramatic. He flew out to the convention to accept the nomination in person. Up to that point, when american president ial candidates received the nomination of their party, they would receive a delegation formally at their home or a political site in their home state, but they did not go to the convention and did not deliver the speech at the convention. Roosevelt broke with that convention in a radical way. He is delivering his acceptance speech to the convention. It is an electrifying moment in american political history, and it is this speech where he first uses the expression a new deal. Mr. Roosevelt i pledge myself to a new deal for the American People. That new expression becomes highly associated with the presidency, but it appears first when he delivers his acceptance speech. Roosevelt was elected in a landslide. In those days, after the election, there was a long period between when the election took place and when the president took the oath of ffice. On march 4, 1933, fdr takes the oath of office as president , nd he takes the oath on this enormous and historic family bible. This is a dutch family bible that had been in his family for generations. It had come over in the 17th century when the family came over to america. Its a unique level in many regards. Most importantly, it is the only bible used by a president for four different inaugurals. Subsequently, there was a constitutional amendment passed which limits all president s to two terms. Roosevelts 1933 inaugural is famous for many reasons, the most enduring line from his speech is something we remember. President roosevelt let me assert my firm belief that the onl