President Franklin Delano Roosevelt

Franklin Delano Roosevelt is generally regarded as one of the United States’ most effective Presidents. Whether the accolades are entirely justified or Roosevelt’s effectiveness was simply a product of the time period in which he served as President will always be debated. However, one thing that no one can deny is that Roosevelt took an atypical route on his way to becoming President. Whether he was fighting an illness or coping with the death of a loved one, Roosevelt always managed to keep himself on track and to persist towards his goals and those of the country. People remember FDR for his actions during the Great Depression and World War II, but those actions were preceded by and intertwined with a tough, yet interesting, life that prepared him for his future endeavors.

On January 30, 1882, Franklin Delano Roosevelt was born in Hyde Park, New York to Sara Delano and James Roosevelt (whitehouse.gov). In 1886, at the age of four, Franklin and his family permanently settled into a house in Campobello, New Brunswick, Canada, which was previously a summer getaway (Conkin 34). Two years later, Roosevelt began his formal education under a governess of Archibald and Edmund Rogers. It was here that Roosevelt learned to speak German and received the opportunity to study abroad the next year. While abroad, however, he contracted a mild case of typhoid fever, the first of a multitude of illnesses that he would battle during his life. He returned to Hyde Park in 1890, and was tutored by Miss Riensberg. On September 28 of the same year, Roosevelt began studies under a Swiss governess, Jeanne Sardoz, which lasted for two years. Sardoz taught him some of the ins and outs of the British lifestyle in addition to teach...

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...ed to accomplish. Only death could remove him from office. Likewise, only death could bring a halt to Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s success.

Bibliography:

Asbell, Bernard. The FDR Memoirs. Garden City, New York: Doubleday and Company, Inc., 1974.

Conkin, Paul K. FDR and the Origins of the Welfare State. New York: Thomas Y. Crowell Company, 1967.

Diggins, John P. The Proud Decades. New York: W and W Norton and Company, 1988.

Eisenhower, Milton S. The President Is Calling. Garden City, New York: Doubleday and Company, Inc., 1974.

Ginna, Robert and Robert Graff. FDR. New York: Harper and Bow Publishers, 1963.

Internet. 17 March 2014. Available WWW: http://www.whitehouse.gov/WH/glimpse/presidents/html/fr32.html/

Internet. 25 March 2014. Available WWW: http://www.nscds.pvt.k12.il.us/nscds/us/apushist/roosevelt/time.html#1880