In 2014, during a trip to investigate my family’s 1937 apartment building in Brno, Czech Republic, my friend Joan and I interviewed a sixty-something professor of engineering in Prague. We were Americans interested in a Czech perspective on America, and Joan asked the best question.
“Which American presidents have you most admired?”
“Woodrow Wilson and Ronald Reagan,” he replied.
“Why?” I asked, surprised. For all their accomplishments, Wilson was also a southern racist who segregated the U.S. government and the military, and Reagan worked to undo much of our social safety net. “Government is not the solution to our problem; it is the problem,” he said in his first inaugural address.
I had expected our Czech interviewee to say Kennedy or Obama—both young and charismatic during their terms, and popular in Europe.
“Because Wilson helped Czechoslovakia become an independent democratic nation after World War I,” he said, “and Reagan helped topple Soviet tyranny and restore democracy here in the 80s.”
That response reminded me that perspectives on the measure of greatness can change depending on geography and experiences, even among otherwise like-minded people.
My mother who had Jewish ancestry and fled Europe in 1941 for safety in America, would have chosen yet someone else. She was one of the lucky ones who made it here during World War II, despite widespread government resistence, including at times from the president, to admitting Jewish refugees during the war. “FDR,” she would have said, “because he saved my life.”
So it was that my parents often took our guests, as well as my sister and me, to FDR's home in Hyde Park which was just a few miles from where we lived in Poughkeepsie, New York. The house sits above the Hudson River, surrounded by majestic lawns and trees, and it remained Franklin Roosevelt’s cherished home base throughout his life. In recent years, I’ve also visited the FDR Presidential Library and Museum on the grounds; Val Kill, Eleanor Roosevelt’s cozy dwelling less than a mile away; and nearby Stone Cottage, FDR’s hideaway on a hill that overlooks the lush farmland and forests of Dutchess County.
But it’s more than nostalgia that draws me now to the Roosevelts. My mother and father were born in the 1920s in Austria and Czechoslovakia, respectively, and understood the extreme dangers associated with the end of a democracy. So I’m primed to worry about what is happening here now. The foundation of our centuries-old ‘government by the people’ has endured severe tests before, but is starting to crack due to malign acts by fellow citizens. Most concerning are Republican leaders' lies about ‘election fraud’ which are used to justify subverting the will of the people, and their sanctioning of violence for political ends. How would Franklin and Eleanor have responded?
At the end of September 2022, my husband Don and I traveled north from our home in Maryland with the ultimate goal of seeing another site associated with the Roosevelts. After attending a family wedding on Cape Cod, we drove through Massachusetts, first stopping in Lincoln where Walter Gropius, the German architect and founder of the Bauhaus, built a house for himself and his family in 1938 after leaving Germany and joining the faculty at Harvard. Then onto Concord and Walden Pond, just a mile away, reminding us of Henry David Thoreau’s wisdom about man and nature that has never felt more relevant than today. A few hours later we arrived in Portland, Maine where we stayed with friends for a couple of nights during the celebration of the Jewish New Year. Then, back on the road, always heading north, for one final stop in Maine – to see friends in Warren for lunch.
Later that day, as the sun was setting and a great fog settled around us, we fulfilled one of my lifelong dreams—to visit Franklin and Eleanor's summer home on Campobello Island. FDR spent almost every summer there—from 1893, when he was a year old, until he contracted polio in 1921 at age 39—and he knew every inch of the island and its surrounding coastal waterways. ER also loved it there and visited for the last time in 1962, the year she died.
The island, which belongs to Canada, is off the northern coast of Maine and easternmost part of the U.S. From Lubec, you make the short ride across the Franklin Delano Roosevelt Memorial Bridge, which forms a gentle arch over the Lubec Narrows, to get to the island and Canada’s border control.
We stayed in a B&B called the Owen House and Gallery and got a good night’s sleep before setting out the next morning to tour the island.
The “Roosevelt Cottage”—long and narrow and and appearing freshly painted in a deep red with green and white trim—was an easy stroll from the Visitor’s Center and stood fully exposed without sheltering trees or much in the way of shrubs to protect its frame. It seemed almost too accessible to have belonged to such luminaries. The house and the three other surviving properties that surround it are now part of the Roosevelt Campobello International Park jointly run by Canada and the United States.
Behind the house the grass slopes gently down to Passamaquoddy Bay, a scene similar to Hyde Park where the lawn leads down towards the Hudson River. Yet this place felt more private, in part because Campobello is a small island off the beaten path and had fewer visitors. We almost had the place to ourselves which may have been due to Covid. (Two days earlier, it took us an hour to navigate the on-line paperwork required to enter Canada—requirements that have since been dropped.) In any case, the adjacent park land and proximity to the water were so lovely, rustic, and peaceful, that it gave me the feeling of surreal intimacy amidst dreamily scenic surroundings.
But the setting is not entirely serene. The waters are known for their extreme tides and tricky narrows, and this is where FDR learned to sail.
ER writes in her autobiography that in the late summer of 1914 at Campobello, as she was recovering from giving birth to her fifth child and much of the world was at war, her husband, then assistant secretary of the navy, was demonstrating his prowess on the seas.
While I was still in bed, one of the destroyers came up and spent a few days cruising
around the coast. My husband gave all the young officers heart failure by insisting on
taking the ship through a place that looked to them extremely dangerous, but which his intimate knowledge of the waters made safe for navigation (p. 79).
It wasn’t just his familiarity with the waters, but his supreme confidence in himself, aided by having grown up as an only child with adoring parents, that helped FDR navigate the ship so flawlessly. And it was that perfect match-up of ability, experience, and self-confidence that subsequently enabled FDR as president to steer our country successfully through the Great Depression and World War II. Eleanor’s relationship with herself did not develop as smoothly.
Our docent for the house was a Canadian woman who has lived her entire life on the island. She was forty-something, small in stature, plainly dressed, and fluent in illuminating facts and anecdotes. She told us that ER loved Campobello because it was the first home since her marriage that she did not share with her mother-in-law. And the house looks as if ER and her family still lived there. The main floor includes a spacious living room with cheerfully upholstered furniture, a dining room with straight-back chairs around a rectangular table set for eight, and a sunny kitchen with a gleaming white-enameled wood stove. On the second floor we saw a tiny schoolroom and various small bathrooms and bedrooms, including the one belonging to FDR which faces the bay and is near the staircase. His double bed takes up much of the space in contrast to a single bed that is placed modestly out of the way under the window and is where ER slept during her husband’s early convalescence from polio.
ER was orphaned at ten, and before that her father was often physically absent and her mother detached and disapproving. Thus, as our docent told us, ER spent much time with the family’s servants which may have contributed to the empathy and rapport she had with those who did not lead her privileged life. “They nurtured her,“ I said mostly to myself, pondering this new insight into what had shaped ER’s character. Our docent looked at me and nodded with a smile.
One of the tours at Campobello is called “Tea with Eleanor.” It takes place in another of
the original 19th century houses on the compound, and is a short walk from the main house. Once settled inside among the round tables with white tablecloths, we were offered tea and homemade ginger cookies and an hour-long presentation given by two docents, while photographs from ER’s life flashed on a screen. Eleanor as a child, with her sad eyes and long lustrous hair, and, in another, leaning against the knee of her adored father, Elliot Roosevelt, the brother of Theodore. Eleanor as a young adult with her five strapping children, FDR, and her austere-looking mother-in-law Sara on the steps of the house at Campobello. Eleanor as First Lady and then as a citizen of the world, traveling far and wide to promote human rights.
The docents told us they were unscripted and could choose what to say about ER. They were young Canadian women, probably in their thirties, and they spoke excitedly - eager to share what they knew with the eight visitors gathered in front of them. The first presenter seemed self-conscious about her enthusiasm for her subject, laughing nervously from time to time. The second had more poise, perhaps because she was a little older and more experienced, having hosted this tea for seven years. She was clearly still moved by what she had learned about ER and made no apologies for it. You could hear it in her voice. Slightly pressured and emotional.
One story was of ER's interaction as First Lady with a squadron of Black pilots shortly before the U.S. entered World War II. The U.S. military was still segregated then and government documents demonstrate the overt racism that existed in the military at that time. Here is one of many shocking and despicable excerpts from the 1925 Army War College Report:
In the process of evolution, the American Negro has not progressed as far as the other subspecies of the human family. As a race he has not developed leadership qualities. His mental inferiority and the inherent weaknesses of his character are factors that must be considered with great care in the preparation of any plan of his participation in war (Opinion of the War College IV.1.).
In 1941, ER decided to visit the Tuskegee Institute where a squadron of Black pilots was being trained without plans to deploy them. Despite the reservations of the Secret Service, she insisted on going up with one of the pilots and they flew for an hour before landing safely. She made her point. As a result, ER was able to persuade FDR to use these Black pilots in combat missions the following year after America entered the second world war. The Tuskegee Airmen, as they were called, served with distinction.
The docent also described an episode that occurred in 1958. Because of her promotion of civil rights, ER had received death threats. Nevertheless, that year, at age 74, she committed to giving a workshop on nonviolent disobedience in Tennessee. The Ku Klux Klan placed a $25,000 bounty on her head and the FBI urged her not to go because they felt they could not protect her. ER went anyway with only a female friend in the car and a loaded revolver between them, and she managed to fulfill her commitment and get out without incident.
My mother never mentioned ER to me and the subject of refugees was not brought up by our docents. In fact, Eleanor Roosevelt made antisemitic statements when she was young, but as she grew older and took on more responsibilities, learned more, and developed close relationships with Jewish Americans, her opinions changed. While First Lady, she brought attention to the plight of Jewish refugees in Europe, sent money to organizations providing assistance, and used her influence at the White House and State Department to try to encourage a more open immigration policy.
Later, after we left the park and explored other parts of the island, I thought about the three women who had guided us that day. I realized that they spoke about both FDR and ER with respect and admiration for their deeds, but described ER with a kind of love and deep appreciation for her as a human being.
The anecdotes were compelling on their own but in that setting especially so. I was awed by these reminders not just of ER’s moral compass and physical stamina but her physical courage. Plus she was so relatable - down to earth and modest – and loved the island so much. It made me proud in these times of scary turmoil that an American woman could set such a positive example in another country and with a generation born long after she died. Her commitment to fighting for justice, civility, and democracy resonates now as much as ever.
***
Sometimes impulses converge. At the last moment before leaving home for this trip, I took with me a biography of another great leader, Václav Havel, and I thought of him throughout our visit.
Although Havel came from a different background (he was born in Czechoslovakia and made his reputation as a playwright before becoming a politician), he and Eleanor Roosevelt both lived during a tumultuous era and shared something fundamentally precious and rare: a profound understanding of what it means to live a moral life at a time of great risks.
After the Soviet Union and its allies invaded Czechoslovakia and crushed the Prague Spring in 1968, Havel spent years under political surveillance for speaking out against the regime, and was imprisoned at various times, including his longest incarceration from 1979-83. In 1989, he became his country’s first democratically-elected president after the Communists were booted out.
As described by his biographer, Michael Zantovsky, Havel’s philosophy was that “words do not mean anything in and of themselves… without the corresponding willingness to act on them” (p. 94) .
The following quote is from Havel’s 1991 book, Disturbing the Peace, which is based on
his interviews with a Czech journalist in 1985-86. It gives a sense of his political philosophy and what sustained him. I suspect ER would have concurred.
…Hope is a state of mind… not of the world. Hope, in this deep and powerful sense, is not the same as joy that things are going well, or willingness to invest in enterprises that are obviously heading for success, but rather an ability to work for something because it is good… (p. 181).
We are also living in extreme and dangerous times. But while not all of us are going to be in the history books, we can all help promote the good. Whether it is the Czech professor impressing two Americans with his laser focus on democracy after living under a police state. Or letter writers urging fellow Americans to participate in our elections to help stabilize our teetering democracy. Or simply voting and thereby affirming the role of citizen. Action follows conviction and neither counts without the other.
References
Breitman R. & Lichtman, A. J. (2013). FDR and the Jews. Cambridge, Massachusetts:
The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press.
Dropkin, L. (Aug. 2014). Campobello—FDR’s “Beloved Island.” Prepared for the Potomac
Association.
Roosevelt, E. (1961). The Autobiography of Eleanor Roosevelt. New York: Harper Perennial
Modern Classics.
https://www.fdrlibrary.org/documents/356632/390886/tusk_doc_a.pdf/4693156a-8844-4361-
ae17-03407e7a3dee
Zantovsky, M. (2014). Havel: A Life. London: Atlantic Books.
Havel, V. (1991). Disturbing the Peace: A Conversation with Karel Hvižďala. New York:
Vintage Books.
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