Works Cited

"Anna Eleanor Roosevelt."Encyclopedia of World Biography. 2nd ed.
"Anna Eleanor Roosevelt." The White House. 7 Jan 2009 .
Beth. "My Hero Project: Eleanor Roosevelt." 27 09 2007. The White House. 7 Jan 2009 .
"Eleanor Roosevelt."Collier's Encyclopedia . 20. 2002.
"Eleanor Roosevelt."Compton's by Brittanica. vol 20. 2007.
"Eleanor Roosevelt 1884-1962 ." 1999. PBS. 11 Jan 2009 .
"Eleanor Roosevelt Biography." Franklin D. Roosevelt Presidential Library and Museum. 7 Jan 2009 .
"Eleanor Roosevelt: First Lady of the World." Franklin D. Roosevelt Presidential Library and Museum. 8 Jan 2009 .
"First Lady Biography: Eleanor Roosevelt." National First Ladies Library. 8 Jan 2009 .
Roosevelt, Eleanor. "Eleanor Roosevelt Quotations." Worldofquotes.com. 11 Jan 2009 .
The Eleanor Roosevelt Papers."Wiltwyck School for Boys." Teaching Eleanor Roosevelt, ed. by Allida Black, June Hopkins, et. al. (Hyde Park, New York: Eleanor Roosevelt National Historic Site, 2003). http://www.nps.gov/archive/elro/glossary/wiltwyck-school-for-boys.htm [Accessed January 11, 2009].

Images:

Anna Eleanor Roosevelt. Divas The Site. 11 Jan. 2009 .
Anna Eleanor Roosevelt. National Archives, College Park, Maryland. Anna Eleanor Roosevelt. 11 Jan. 2009 .
Eleanor Roosevelt. 11 Jan. 2009 .
Eleanor Roosevelt. Danjor.com. 11 Jan. 2009 .
Eleanor Roosevelt. The Other Side of Falsified Genocide. 11 Jan. 2009 .
Eleanor and Franklin Roosevelt. 11 Jan. 2009 .
Eleanor Roosevelt and her dog. 11 Jan. 2009 .
Eleanor and kids. 11 Jan. 2009 .
Eleanor Roosevelt at Red Cross Cecil Club. War History Collection, Alexander Turnbull Library, Wellington.
Eleanor Roosevelt at Val-Kill. Leanor Roosevelt National Historic Site. Eleanor Roosevelt (1884-1962), diplomat, humanitarian. 11 Jan. 2009 .
Eleanor Roosevelt holds the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in 1948. 11 Jan. 2009 .
Eleanor Roosevelt in Australia, 1943. Women At Work. 11 Jan. 2009 .
Eleanor Roosevelt in Canada. Wikimedia. 11 Jan. 2009 .
Eleanor Roosevelt meets three women from the Bakery. The Window Shop. 11 Jan. 2009 .
FDR and Eleanor Graves. Flickr. 11 Jan. 2009 .
Franklin D. Roosevelt at Hyde Park in a Wheelchair. 1941. 11 Jan. 2009 .
Madame Chiang Kai-shek with Eleanor Roosevelt, the White House lawn, 1943. New Hampshire commentary. 11 Jan. 2009 .
Picnic at the Wiltwyck School for Boys 1954. 11 Jan. 2009 .
School Portrait 1898. 11 Jan. 2009 .
Young Eleanor and family. 11 Jan. 2009 .

Quotations Continued

"When you know to laugh and when to look upon things as too absurd to take seriously, the other person is ashamed to carry through even if he was serious about it."

"One of the blessings of age is to learn not to part on a note of sharpness, to treasure the moments spent with those we love, and to make them whenever possible good to remember, for time is short."

"Remember, no one can make you feel inferior without your consent."

"Friendship with oneself is all important, because without it one cannot be friends with anyone else in the world."

"Since you get more joy out of giving joy to others, you should put a good deal of thought into the happiness that you are able to give."

Quotations

“You gain strength, courage, and confidence by every experience by which you really stop to look fear in the face. You are able to say to yourself, 'I lived through this horror. I can take the next thing that comes along.”

“Never allow a person to tell you no who doesn't have the power to say yes.”

"For it isn't enough to talk about peace. One must believe in it. And it isn't enough to believe in it. One must work at it. "

Address to the United Nations General Assembly

This is Eleanor Roosevelt's address to the United Nations General Assembly on the adoption of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights delivered on December 9, 1948 in Paris, France.

The following is part of her speech:

"Mr. President, fellow delegates:
The long and meticulous study and debate of which this Universal Declaration of Human Rights is the product means that it reflects the composite views of the many men and governments who have contributed to its formulation. Not every man nor every government can have what he wants in a document of this kind. There are of course particular provisions in the Declaration before us with which we are not fully satisfied. I have no doubt this is true of other delegations, and it would still be true if we continued our labors over many years. Taken as a whole the Delegation of the United States believes that this is a good document -- even a great document -- and we propose to give it our full support. The position of the United States on the various parts of the Declaration is a matter of record in the Third Committee. I shall not burden the Assembly, and particularly my colleagues of the Third Committee, with a restatement of that position here....."

Childhood and Early Life

Eleanor Roosevelt with her father, Elliott Roosevelt and her two brothers, Elliott, Jr. and Gracie Hall R.

Anna Eleanor Roosevelt was born October 11, 1884 in New York, New York. Her mom was Anna Hall and her father was Elliot Roosevelt, younger brother of President Theodore Roosevelt. Although the family was wealthy, they were not all that they appeared to be. Elliot suffered from severe depression and alcoholism while Anna was worried about the family’s image in the upper-class society. She was embarrassed of Eleanor because she wasn’t “pretty”. Elliot eventually entered a program for alcoholics and her mother Anna passed away when Eleanor was just eight years old. Eleanor and her brothers went to go live with their grandmother on New York where she later found out that her father had died about 2 years later.
By the time Eleanor was 15, her life would take a turn for the better. She was sent to England to attend Allenwood, an English finishing school outside London, run by headmistress, Marie Souvestre. Mlle. The teachers at Allenwood saw tremendous potential in Eleanor and began to help her overcome her fears and build her self confidence which would, in the long run, help her become the strong and powerful woman that she was. She returned back to New York when she was eighteen and she became involved in social service work, joined the Junior League and taught at the Rivington Street Settlement House.

Eleanor Roosevelt school portrait, 1898.

Marriage

The picture to the right is of Eleanor and Franklin Delano Roosevelt.

Franklin Delano Roosevelt was Eleanor’s fifth cousin. They had known eachother since they were children. During he coming out parties, she would talk to FDR about her work with the poor which began to captivate his attention. Shortly after, they began seeing eachother. They were two very distinct people. FDR was handsome and light hearted while Eleanor was plain and serious. FDR’s family didn’t approve of the couple. However, the two got engaged in November of 1904 and President Roosevelt, being Eleanor’s closest male relative, agreed to give his niece away. The two got married on March 17, 1905 in the adjoining homes of Eleanor’s aunts Mrs. Henry Parish and Mrs. E. Livingston Ludlow. Eleanor was only twenty years old at the time of the marriage.
During the course of their marriage, Franklin and Eleanor had six children; all of whom are now deceased.
Children:
1. Anna Eleanor Roosevelt (1906-1975)
2. James Roosevelt (1907-1991)
3. Franklin Roosevelt (1909-1909)
4. Elliott Roosevelt (1910-1990)
5. Franklin Delano Roosevelt, Jr. (1914-1988)
6. John Aspinwall Roosevelt (1916-1981)
During their early marriage life, Franklin and Eleanor lived in New York City and Hyde park. Their lives were controlled by Franklin’s mother Sara. When Roosevelt was elected to the state senate, they moved to Albany and away from Sara’s control. Eleanor began to attend legislative sessions and to build an interest in politics.

Eleanor, Elliott, Franklin Delano, Jr., John Aspinwall, Anna Eleanor and James in front of their home in New York.

Eleanor's Accomplishments: The Wiltwyck School For Boys

The Wiltwyck School for Boys was a school that originally opened its doors to African American juvenile delinquents in 1936. The school was located in Esopus, New York on the opposite side of the Hudson River from the Roosevelt's family home. In the beginning, the school had much success treating boys from troubled areas of New York. However, in 1942, there was a lack of funds and the school was in danger of closing.
Later on that year, many remarkable women, on of which was Eleanor Roosevelt, helped reorganize the school and joined the board. Seeing as how Eleanor Roosevelt was a former teacher, she was inspired and moved by the goals that Wiltwyck had for its students and she immediately wanted to help in any which way that she could. Later on that year, the school ended its affiliation with the protestant church and became in interracial treatment center for boys between the ages of eight and twelve.
Because of the fact that a great portion of the schools income came from donations, Roosevelt’s role in making money became that much more important to the survival of the school. She became dedicated to raising money for the school even until her death in 1962. The school managed to stay open for another nineteen years after Roosevelt’s death but it was forced to close its doors because of lack of money.

Political Life

Eleanor Roosevelt meets three women from the Bakery

When her husband, Franklin D. Roosevelt, was President, Eleanor Roosevelt was an active First Lady who traveled extensively around the nation. She visited relief projects, surveying working and living conditions, and then reporting her observations to the President. She was extremely dedicated to her work and she accomplished a lot during her time as First Lady.
She became an active member of the American Red Cross and volunteered in Navy hospitals. She also participated in the League of Women Voters, the Women's Trade Union League, and the Women's Division of the New York State Democratic Committee. She helped to found Val-Kill Industries, a nonprofit furniture factory in Hyde Park, New York, and taught at the Todhunter School, which was a private girls' school in New York City. She became an advocate of the rights and needs of the poor, of minorities, and of the disadvantaged. In the 1930s, she headed a housing project for West Virginian coal miners, and in 1934, helped instigate the National Youth Administration, which acquired employment rights for young workers. In World War II, she visited England and the South Pacific to foster good will among the Allies and boost the morale of US servicemen overseas.

Political Life continued

Franklin D. Roosevelt at Hyde Park in a Wheelchair

After Franklin D. Roosevelt was stricken with polio in 1921, Mrs. Roosevelt became increasingly active in politics both to help him maintain his interests and to assert her own personality and goals.Throughout Franklin's first presidential term, Eleanor spoke at meetings and conferences about the role of women in politics and her strong disagreement of segregation in the South. She took her passion for this topic very far; she resigned from the Daughters of the American Revolution (a feminist league) when it banned Marian Anderson, an African-American singer, from performing during its conference in Washington, D.C. The previous year, Eleanor also violated a segregation law when she refused to sit in the white section of auditorium at the Southern Conference for Human Welfare in Birmingham, Alabama. Her passion and devotion made her an easy target for political enemies, but she kept on treading forward and still treated everyone with friendliness and respect. At the age of 14 she had written, “‘…no matter how plain a woman may be if truth & loyalty are stamped upon her face all will be attracted to her...’”. And thus, her words became true.

After FDR's Death

Eleanor Roosevelt on the White House lawn, 1943

When her husband passed away, Eleanor Roosevelt became very saddened and hurt because her husband had been with Lucy Mercer, the woman he had had an affair with before, and it was Eleanor’s daughter, Anna, who had arranged the two of them to meet. Eleanor spent some time in seclusion after this event, but she resumed her public activities not long after. She became tremendously active in the postwar years and “it was during that time that she became a real stateswoman”.
President Harry Truman elected her to head the United Nations Human Rights Commission in 1945. Three years later, she was involved in drafting the Declaration of Human Rights. She was an important figure in the Democratic Party for the rest of her life. In 1952 and 1956 she supported Adlai Stevenson's campaigns for president, and in 1960 she was a significant presence at the Democratic convention.

Eleanor Roosevelt's Legacy

Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt' tombstone

“Eleanor's Legacy is dedicated to building a new generation of pro-choice Democratic women leaders in New York State. Since its founding in 2001, Eleanor's Legacy has elected 412 women to state and local office across New York State and equipped over 600 women with the skills they need to run and win.”
Eleanor Roosevelt continued a vigorous career until her strength began to wane in 1962. She passed away on November 7, 1962, in New York City and was buried at Hyde Park beside her husband.