During a 1936 visit to a research facility devoted to finding a cure for children's lung ailments, First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt was remembered by a reporter for having blurted out a highly insensitive question: "What is the use of saving babies, if they can't earn a decent living when they grow up?" With two years to think about her impulsive inquiry, the reporter responded with outrage in formulating an answer. This column, by First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt, was an articulate effort at make some sense of her husband's death, which took place during one of the most critical periods in world history:
"Perhaps in His wisdom, the Almighty is trying to show us that a leader may chart a way, may point out the road to lasting peace, but that many leaders and many peoples must do the building. It cannot be the work of one man, nor can the responsibility be laid upon his shoulders, and so when the time comes for peoples to assume the burden more fully, he is given rest."
Attached is a 1947 article that reported on the post-FDR life of "The Widow Roosevelt" since assuming the position of the United States delegate to the newly established United Nations:
"Mrs Roosevelt's performance during the first session of the U.N. General Assembly in London during the winter of 1946 surprised and pleased even those who had once been her husband's most bitter foes." In 1947 former First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt penned this nifty essay about her least favorite word:
"I do not like the word tolerance.
If you tolerate something, you do not like it very much."
A very self-conscious column regarding the American class structure.
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