Identity area
Type of entity
Person
Authorized form of name
Roosevelt, Eleanor
Parallel form(s) of name
Standardized form(s) of name according to other rules
Other form(s) of name
Identifiers for corporate bodies
Description area
Dates of existence
October 11, 1984 - November 2, 1962
History
Anna Eleanor Roosevelt served as First Lady of the United States through her husband's, President Franklin D. Roosevelt, four terms in office from 1933-1945. She was born in New York City to Anna Hall and Elliott Roosevelt (younger brother of President Theodore Roosevelt). Eleanor lost both her parents as a child, and at 15 was sent to the Allenswood school for girls in England. She returned to New York at the age of 18 and in 1905 married Franklin Delano Roosevelt, her fifth cousin, with whom she had six children. During World War I she became involved in the American Red Cross and volunteered in Navy hospitals. She became more involved with politics after her husband was stricken with polio., and participated in the League of Women Voters, joined the Women's Trade Union League, and worked for the Women's Division of the New York State Democratic Committee. In 1933 she held her own press conference, the first, First Lady to do so, and allowed only female reporters to attend. She also traveled extensively around the country, observing working and living conditions, and relief projects, and reporting back to her husband. She became an advocate of the rights and needs of the poor, of minorities, and of the disadvantaged. Following her husband's death, she continued her advocacy, serving as as chair of the Human Rights Commission, as an American representative to the World Federation of the U.N. Associations, and volunteering for the American Association for the U. N. She also served on the National Advisory Committee of the Peace Corps and the President's Commission on the Status of Women.
Eleanor first visited the Roosevelt family home on Campobello Island in 1903. While Franklin did not return to Campobello after he was stricken with polio, Eleanor returned often with her children, and continued to visit the island after her husband's death, even though the family home had been sold.
Sources: https://www.fdrlibrary.org/er-biography https://mynewbrunswick.ca/roosevelt-cottage/