Franklin D. Roosevelt

::FDR redirects here. For other uses, see FDR (disambiguation).

Private crises

Roosevelt was a charismatic, handsome and socially active man, while his wife Eleanor was shy and retiring, and furthermore was almost constantly pregnant during the decade after 1906. Roosevelt soon found romantic and sexual outlets outside his marriage. One of these was Eleanor's social secretary Lucy Mercer, with whom Roosevelt began an affair soon after she was hired in early 1914. In September 1918, Eleanor found letters in one of Franklin's suits which revealed the affair. Eleanor was both mortified and angry, and confronted him with the letters, presenting Franklin with an ultimatum: stop seeing Lucy or get a divorce. Franklin's mother Sara Roosevelt soon learned of the crisis, and decisively intervened. She argued that a divorce would ruin Roosevelt's political career, and pointed out that Eleanor would have to raise five children on her own if she divorced him. Since Sara was financially supporting the Roosevelts, this was a strong incentive to preserve the marriage.

Related Topics:
1906 - Lucy Mercer - 1914 - 1918

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Eventually a deal was struck. The facade of the marriage would be preserved, but sexual relations would cease. Sara would pay for a separate home at Hyde Park for Eleanor, and she would also fund Eleanor's philanthropic interests. When Franklin became President—as Sara was always convinced he would—Eleanor would be able to use her position to support her causes. Eleanor accepted these terms, and in time Franklin and Eleanor developed a new relationship as friends and political colleagues, while living separate lives. Franklin continued to see various women, including his secretary Missy LeHand.

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In August 1921, while the Roosevelts were vacationing at Campobello Island, New Brunswick, Roosevelt was stricken with poliomyelitis, a viral infection of the nerve fibers of the spinal cord, probably contracted while swimming in the stagnant water of a nearby lake. The result was that Roosevelt was totally and permanently paralyzed from the waist down. At first the muscles of his abdomen and lower back were also affected, but these eventually recovered. Thus he could sit up and, with aid of leg-braces, stand upright, but he could not walk. Unlike in other forms of paraplegia, his bowels, bladder and sexual functions were not affected.

Related Topics:
1921 - Campobello Island, New Brunswick - Poliomyelitis - Viral infection - Nerve - Spinal cord - Paraplegia

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Although the paralysis resulting from polio had no cure (and still does not, although the disease is now very rare in developed countries), for the rest of his life Roosevelt refused to believe that he was permanently paralyzed. He tried a wide range of therapies, but none had any effect. Nevertheless, he became convinced of the benefits of hydrotherapy, and in 1926 he bought a resort at Warm Springs, Georgia, where he founded a hydrotherapy center for the treatment of polio patients which still operates as the Roosevelt Warm Springs Institute for Rehabilitation (with an expanded mission), and spent a lot of time there in the 1920s. This was in part to escape from his mother, who tried to resume control of his life following his illness.

Related Topics:
Hydrotherapy - 1926 - Warm Springs, Georgia - Roosevelt Warm Springs Institute for Rehabilitation - 1920s

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At a time when media intrusion in the private lives of public figures was much less intense than it is today, Roosevelt was able to convince many people that he was in fact getting better, which he believed was essential if he was to run for public office again. (The Encyclopædia Britannica, for example, says that "by careful exercises and treatments at Warm Springs he gradually recovered", although this is quite untrue). Fitting his hips and legs with iron braces, he laboriously taught himself to walk a short distance by swiveling his torso while supporting himself with a walking stick. In private he used a wheelchair, but he was careful never to be seen in it in public, although he sometimes appeared on crutches. He usually appeared in public standing upright, while being supported on one side by an aide or one of his sons. Despite his known dislike of being seen in a wheelchair, a statue of him in a wheelchair has been placed at the Franklin Delano Roosevelt Memorial in Washington, D.C.

Related Topics:
Encyclopædia Britannica - Franklin Delano Roosevelt Memorial - Washington, D.C.

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