Our Presidents
             Franklin Delano Roosevelt
                     Thirty-second
                      1933 - 1945

"President Franklin Delano Roosevelt", our thirty-second President was born in Hyde Park, New York the son of a wealthy father. President Franklin Delano Roosevelt went to "Harvard University" and "Columbia Law School", and married "Anna Eleanor Roosevelt" (a distant cousin) in 1905.

President Franklin Delano Roosevelt and Anna Eleanor Roosevelt were blessed with five children. During two terms in the "New York Senate" President Roosevelt was concerned with reform and the interests of farmers.

President Roosevelt's second term was cut short by appointment to the post of Assistant Secretary of the Navy" by "President Woodrow Wilson". In 1920 President Roosevelt was defeated for the "Vice Presidency", and in 1921 President Roosevelt caught "Polio", which paralyzed his legs.

During the long recovery President Roosevelt learned to walk with braces and a cane, and he kept up with Democratic politics. President Roosevelt was elected "Governor of New York" in 1928 and served two terms, after which he became the "Democratic candidate for President".

The "financial crash", unemployment, and his promise to repeal "Prohibition" made his victory sure. President Roosevelt was elected by a huge electoral margin and popular margin. President Roosevelt immediately plunged into the work of easing the "Great Depression".

President Roosevelt's programs were called the "New Deal" and consisted essentially in "pump priming", or using Federal money for relief and public works to create jobs. President Roosevelt was re-elected in 1936, carrying all but two states.

In President Roosevelt's second term he ran into trouble with the "Supreme Court", which had struck down several of the "New Deal" agencies. President Roosevelt tried to reform the Supreme Court by adding six additional members but was still unsuccessful.

When "World War II" began in Europe, President Roosevelt held firmly to a neutral policy, although "United States" relations with "Germany" and "Japan" had deteriorated because of their aggression in Europe and China. In 1940 however, President Roosevelt traded fifty overage destroyers to Great Britain and in 1941 signed the "Lend Lease Bill", which further increased supplies to the Allies.

President Roosevelt accepted a third term in 1940, the first President to do so. Finally on "December 7, 1941", Japan attacked the "U.S. Naval Base at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii" and Congress declared war on Japan and soon afterward Germany, and Italy declared war on the United States.

As the United States mobilized to produce men and supplies for the war, President Roosevelt concerned himself with securing co-operation among the Allies. President Roosevelt traveled all over the world to meetings with the heads of Allied governments to plan overall war strategy.

In 1944, in spite of poor health, which was an issue in the campaign), President Roosevelt was elected to a fourth term. At a time when victory was certain, President Roosevelt went to Warm Springs, Georgia to rest for a meeting to establish the "United Nations". Two weeks before the meeting President Roosevelt died on April 12, 1945.

Written by:
Karen Palumbo
Photography "NOT" by:
Robert Palumbo
6/10/2010