(As an American, you owe it to yourself (and your family) to see all seven episodes of THE ROOSEVELTS, an intimate history. It will be shown on PBS many times, and it will not be necessary to see it in any particular order. Bob Burns, the producer, and Gregory C. Ward, the script writer, were smart enough not to have made viewing one episode contingent upon seeing the previous one. Besides, where else can you hear Merle Streep, Edward Hermann, and John Lithgow doing the voices of Eleanor, FDR, and James Roosevelt — and Paul Giamatti immortalize the quotes of TR?)

Part Two

At the time, few had even heard of Lateral Sclerosis, then in its pre-conceptual stage. It turned out to be a debilitating malady usually seen onlt on a MRI — a ‘suggestion’ by a neurologist in 1952 (but not endorsed by the entire medical community until the 1970’s) that the brain experiences a malfunction because motor neurons fall suddenly and mysteriously asleep.

There are, science now believes, two types of Lateral Sclerosis —PLS and ALS, (Primary and Amyothoriac) — the former mostly acquired through the now-dormant upper motor neurons and normally not very painful, if at all, though progressive; the latter involves both the upper and lower motor neurons as they become useless, and this form of the disease is usually and eventually extremely painful and fatal.

What brings it on? No one knows for sure, not even today. PLS and ALS affects anyone, regardless of age or physical condition (not limited to older persons); many younger people are today being diagnosed with some symptom or other of a Primary Lateral Sclerosis, or an ALS — of one kind or the other).

One has to be only slightly more intelligent than his peers; artistic, adventurous, romantic — a different sort — excelling in one or more disciplines over another.

Why was not was, say, Albert Einstein a victim? Or Pytor Ilyich Tchaikovsky? Or Leonardo DiVinci? Michelangelo? Or Mozart? Or Ray Jobs?

True, they were all geniuses, yet none of them had PLS or ALS (that we know of). Nor were any of them considered to be the ‘luckiest man on earth’ (none were baseball players). There is, however, a current, well-respected, American football player, Steve Gleason, formerly of the New Orleans’s Saints, who has been diagnosed, victimized and is, at this writing, still alive.

None was Stephan Hawking, PhD, either, who became deformed, crippled and wheelchair-bound before he was twenty; he cannot walk, nor speak without mechanical amplification. He activates his thoughts by translation into speech, through eye-contact with a sensitized keyboard, an invention of his own.

Yet they may have had Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (in Hawking’s case, it’s a certainty), and, at last report, they have not died from such — except for Lou Gehrig, FDR, and countless others. And no, they are not free from pain.

What was different about Franklin Roosevelt and is different about Hawking, and so many others? Well, for one thing, they were not like other men; they were and are unique, though not necessarily geniuses — they were and are special, in that they had thoughts, ambitions and dreams that set them apart from others. They had a quality, which others do not have. They were and are, then and always, prime candidates for one of the Lateral Sclerosis.

FDR was stricken with ALS (probably) of the worst sort; he sometimes suffered great pain in his legs, back and lower body (he died at sixty-three, twenty-four years later), with what was then called by his personal physician, LCDR (of the Navy) Dr. Howard Bruenn, “an enlarged heart, or a cerebral hemorrhage.”

Roosevelt in order to stand up got to the point of needing ten-pound steel braces on both legs; he required crutches or the arm of a son or Secret Service agent, or the edge of a desk or podium to hold onto if he were making a speech to be elected to whatever position he sought — provided no one was the wiser, or had any indication, that he might be disabled. He later even had one of his automobiles gerryrigged at Warm Springs, GA, so he might drive it unassisted.

South Dakota, to where TR had taken a train while a NYC alderman, was where he’d shot a bull and become ‘hooked’. If he hadn’t let himself, against his wishes, be persuaded to become a vice presidential candidate, Theodore Roosevelt would never have become president (if President McKinley had not been assassinated).

Later, TR bought a ranch, formed the “Rough Riders,” and appointed himself their chief rider.

Speaking of Warm Springs, FDR took his ‘polio’ seriously enough to eventually buy the place, build his Little White House there (which my sweet wife and I visited many times), and set up a superb rehabilitation village for ‘people of all ages’ to come and experience transportation to and from the property. room-and-board, treatment, medical and nursing therapy, and swimming — all for free!

We came within a whisker of losing WWll. If FDR had not run for a 3rd and 4th term, we might have (Burns, to his credit, spent much time explaining the necessity of this). Truthfully, we could all be speaking German High Command or Imperial Japanese; if Franklin had trusted Harry S. Truman enough to have confided in him about the Manhattan Project and the terms of the Yalta Conference, we might have totally different world today. . . And then, we might not have.

Eleanor Roosevelt was the longest-serving, continuous First Lady we ever had. Together and at different times, Theodore and Franklin were Presidents of the United States for nearly ˝ of the first 44 years of the 20th century!

You must watch (be ready to discuss as an adult) all aspects of their lives. It matters not a bit which Party you favor — TR was a Republican, FDR was a Democrat, and Eleanor was a — well, you decide. If it helps, she was an independent spirit who wrote a syndicated column, My Day, three days each week for major newspapers, served on national committees that are still active today, and gave away more of the Roosevelt fortune than any of her cousins. She was, quite definitively, the muselage that bound the family together.

Perhaps Burns should have entitled his piece “Eleanor Roosevelt, an intimate history .”
******************************************************
Since Chris Holcomb ‘refuses’ to refer to himself by his earned title let me suggest we use the blank space in the black stripe after his name at the bottom of the screen: CHRIS HOLCOMB, Chief Meterologist, AMS logo, channel 11 logo. The “Chtis Holcomb, etc.” logo only stays up for 3 or 4 seconds. But it would be sufficient.

Darriuc Whatshisface is still with 11Alive and Brenda Wood still hasn’t been given a microphone, assigned a driver and given the street from which her reportage will emanate.

David W. should the Sportsman, since Sam Creshawi is no longer available, and Jeff Hullinger should alone be responsible for the bulk of the newscast.


Copyright 2014 by Robert A. Mills, all rights reserved, may not be published, nor re-written nor broadcast without the expressed permission of the author