T is for Telephone. This phone was used by FDR at his Oval Office desk. The phone has no dialing apparatus since the White House switchboard placed the President’s outgoing calls.
#AtHomeWithTheRoosevelts - Supervisory Museum Curator Herman Eberhardt looks at FDR’s Oval Office Desk – one of the most popular and important artifacts in our collection – where President Roosevelt signed twelve years of landmark legislation, met with world leaders, and even held press conferences. To learn more about the items on the desk, visit our Virtual Tour: http://www.fdrlibraryvirtualtour.org/…
Previously unseen and historically significant home movie footage of FDR “walking”!
The Franklin D. Roosevelt Presidential Library and Museum recently received footage of the 1935 White House Easter Egg Roll. Roosevelt historian and Library Trustee Geoffrey C. Ward believes the footage offers “the most vivid glimpse we’ve yet had” of President Roosevelt’s unique adapted walk made possible by the use of steel leg braces. FDR lost the use of his legs after contracting polio in 1921, at the age of 39.
In December 2017, the Roosevelt Library received a donation from Richard G. Hill, whose grandfather, Nevada ranch owner Fred Hill, captured 16mm home movie footage of the 1935 White House Easter Egg Roll.
Visit fdrlibrary.org/FDRwalking to read Mr. Ward’s article and to view the entire film online. Clipped from Film ID: MP 18-05: 0:53-1:23.
The Map Room - FDR’s Top Secret
Communications Center
In January 1942, FDR converted a small room on the ground
floor of the White House into a top secret communications center. Modeled loosely
after a room used by Winston Churchill, the “Map Room” was a place where
Roosevelt could monitor global military activities. Here reports, documents,
and coded messages were received, summarized, and filed. Maps posted in the
room were used to track the locations of land, sea, and air forces. The
drably-furnished office was staffed 24-hours a day by Army and Navy officers. Its
convenient location made it especially helpful to a president who had to move
in and out in a wheelchair. FDR could drop in at any time. Access to others was
highly restricted. Even the Secret Service was barred.
When FDR traveled, a “Portable Map Room,” staffed by
Navy and Army officers, went with him.
Experience the Map Room at the Roosevelt Library
There are only a few
existing photographs of FDR’s the top secret White House Map Room. They are
displayed here and in The Map Room exhibit at the Roosevelt Library. This Map Room exhibit is based on
these photographs and the recollections of an officer who worked there. George
Elsey, a young Navy ensign, was one of a handful of military aides assigned to
the Map Room during the war. In the early 1990s, he recorded his memories of
the room and worked with artists to create several sketches of it.
Photographs, objects, documents and more from the collections of FDR Presidential Library and Museum of the National Archives and Records Administration
