This is the first of two biographical volumes on the life of Franklin D. Roosevelt covering the years from 1882 to 1905. FDR had what we would call a presidential temperament. The author is seeking the source of this temperament. The source is in his family history primarily.
James Roosevelt's first wife named Rebecca died. Mr. James later married Sara Delano, who was about 20 years his junior. Whence came Franklin D. Roosevelt. Sara always said that Franklin was more a Delano than a Roosevelt. I think the author is making the case. Warren Delano II, Sara's father, made his considerable money in China, much of it in the opium trade. The Delano family is more interesting than the Roosevelt history.
FDR could get furious at a fellow Episcopalian official. P. 1
The Delano family place was called Algonac. FDR was raised well-cocooned. P. 61
FDR fought to come out of his mother. It was a tough delivery. He may not have made it. A scary thought.
No moment of Franklin's day was unscheduled or unsupervised. Day after day. P. 125
"And he was expected always to evidence the breeding and good manners of a gentleman; it was the mark of his class, an example he owed to those less fortunate than himself." P. 126
"He was not notably rebellious. He knew that his parents wished him to study, so he did. But he was not a rigorous student, either, and it never took much to get him out of anything he found unpleasant." P. 150
Learned French from influential Mlle. Sandoz. P. 152
"From his earliest days, St. James and the dignified, restrained Episcopalianism it fostered embodied religious faith for Franklin Roosevelt." P. 156
He was a self-confessed rat pack. P. 158
FDR was an inveterate collector of man things like stamps, naval prints, and bird specimens. One things I don't like about him coming from this book is that he like to shoot birds. Please no! The author speculates that he could order his own world with these collections to escape the domination of his mother. P. 163
"Franklin Roosevelt already knew at ten that the power of his charm to disarm, that the best way for him to overcome his own insecurity was to act always as if it did not exist." P. 164
Franklin struggled to fit in at Groton, but his letters home were always bright and cheery. P. 182
Boy Franklin was sent to Groton for four years. Did he resent this from his parents? P. 186
He might have been embarrassed to be remembered mainly as "athletically too slight for success at Groton.
Only a passable athlete. Slightly better than average scholar. But perhaps a better debater. P. 187
Sara seems like something of a helicopter Momma when FDR was at Groton. P. 198
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