In this issue: Roosevelt and the Atomic Bomb; How FDR Won the 1936 Election; Black Americans, Civil Rights, and the Roosevelts Exhibit; FDR Advisor Justice Robert Jackson; FDR's Favorite Portrait of Eleanor #FDRtheCollector; Go on a Picnic Summer Activity; Einstein's Letter to FDR.
The quest to defeat the Nazis pushed the Allies to the very limits of scientific understanding – and then beyond. FDR Library Education Specialist Jeffrey Urbin explores America's massive effort to beat Hitler in the development of the ultimate super weapon.
Conversation: Voting Deliberately: FDR and the 1936 Presidential Campaign
Pennsylvania State University Professor and author Mary Stuckey examines four elements of the 1936 reelection campaign that combined to give FDR his landslide victory: the creation of public opinion, the attention paid to local organizations, the focus on specific kinds of interests, and the public rhetoric that tied it all together. A conversation with FDR Library Director William Harris.
A new special exhibition developed in collaboration with a distinguished committee of scholars that centers on the historical voices of many Black community leaders, wartime service members, and ordinary citizens who engaged the Roosevelt administration directly and who pushed for progress. Within this context, the exhibit examines the political evolution of both Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt regarding racial justice.
Robert Jackson served as attorney general, a Supreme Court Justice, and the chief US prosecutor of the Nuremberg Trials. He was also an important advisor to President Roosevelt. Texas Tech Law School Professor examines Justice Jackson's relationship with FDR.
(Originally broadcast July 31, 2019; 56:09 minutes)
This was FDR’s favorite portrait of Eleanor. The Roosevelt children presented the painting by Otto Schmidt to their father as a birthday gift on January 30, 1933.
All throughout the nice weather months President and Mrs. Roosevelt would take every opportunity they got to picnic with friends and family. Sometimes they set up their basket right out on their own lawn, other times they would seek out special places in the woods near a pond or a stream.
Why not plan a picnic for your own family or friends?
This August 2, 1939, letter was personally delivered to the President on October 11, 1939 (the outbreak of the war intervened) by Alexander Sachs, a longtime economic adviser to FDR. After learning the letter’s contents, President Roosevelt told his military adviser General Edwin M. Watson, “This requires action,” eventually leading to the Manhattan Project.
"Whatever our individual circumstances or opportunities, we are all in it, and our spirit is good... and do not let anyone tell you anything different." FDR, Oct 12, 1942, fireside chat.
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