Franklin D. Roosevelt

A Youth Of Privilege

With the possible exception of Abraham Lincoln, who led the Country through the difficult years of the Civil War, no American president has been faced with the challenges of Democrat Franklin Delano Roosevelt. From a personal standpoint, there was the polio he contracted at age thirty-nine—a disease that left him paralyzed from the waist down. Despite years of effort, Roosevelt spent the latter part of his life largely confined to a wheelchair, unable to walk without the assistance of crutches and heavy, metal braces. Even so, Roosevelt remained active in politics; ultimately leading the country through two of the most severe crises in is history: the Great Depression of the l930s and World War II. In the process he became one of the most popular and hated men of his day. To Americas less fortunate, Roosevelt was a kind father figure who cared deeply about their problems and used the presidency to help “the forgotten man.” Too many of America's rich, however, Roosevelt was “a traitor to his class,” reviled for passing reforms that muted the power of big business and gave relief to America poor. Refusing to utter his name, Roosevelt's detractors called ham “that man in the White House.” Still, by the time he died, at the start of his fourth term, Roosevelt had earned the grudging respect of even many tough Republicans. After the horrors of World War 1(1917—1918), most Americans had no desire to fight another European war. But by the mid-1930s, Roosevelt realized that Germany, Italy, and Japan posed threats that had to be taken very seriously. As Adolf Hitler marched through Europe, Roosevelt did what he could to get the United States involved in the war. After the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor, a U.S. military base in Hawaii, in 1941, Roosevelt drew on the expertise of Republicans and Democrats alike to prepare the nation and rallied the country to win the war. Like many young men of his era, the former senator Bob Dole of Kansas served in World War II. Though a Republican, Dole called Roosevelt an “energetic and inspiring leader during the dark days of Depression” and “a tough, single-minded Commander in Chief during World War II, and a statesman.” (Roosevelt, 5)

Growing Up At Hyde Park

In the spring of 1880 there was a dinner party in New York City. The hostess was Mrs. Theodore Roosevelt, the mother of the future twenty-sixth president. In attendance were two family friends, twenty-five-year-old Sara Delano and a fifty-one-year-old widower named James Roosevelt. Despite their age difference, James and Sara hit it off the couple was engaged that summer and married on October 7, 1880, on a beautiful autumn day. A little more than a year later, on January 30, 1882, Franklin Delano Roosevelt was born. In his diary his father called him “a splendid large baby boy. He weighs ten pounds, without clothes.” James Roosevelt was a member of the sixth generation of Roosevelt's, who had finally settled along New York's Hudson ...