The Eleanor Roosevelt Papers, Digital Edition > My Day
My Day by Eleanor Roosevelt

[This column has emendations. View original version]

      

SCRANTON, Pa.—We left the cottage at Hyde Park at about a quarter past one yesterday and the drive over to Avon, Connecticut, was quite lovely. It is so much more wintry than anything I have seen of late, that I felt as though I had gone back a month or so in time. Even the willows are barely green, but it was a beautiful day and the sun was warm and we enjoyed every minute of our drive. In fact it seemed to me that the drive went more quickly than it used to go when I took it far more frequently in order to see my aunt, Mrs. William Sheffield Cowles, who lived in Farmington. Probably having driven a good many miles in the last few years, I drive more easily!

We knocked on Mrs. Alsop's door to be greeted with absolute surprise for she had not expected us by four o'clock. It gave us a chance, however, to go over the farm and I was tremendously interested. When people have talked to me about Vitamin D milk, I smiled to myself and wondered if there were really any difference in the milk. But here I actually saw the cows set apart and the different feed that they had. Mr. Alsop has about one hundred cows and he sells whole milk. He runs his diary in the most modern way and the milk comes in to the bottling room through pipes and the bottling and capping are done by a very efficient machine which I had never seen before.

The nursery for the calves was almost like a nursery in a hospital. Their food was as carefully prepared and given in the right quantities and they moved on according to age into their different pens in the most scientific way. Altogether it was a most instructive and illuminating afternoon. We are really much more scientific about cows than we are about people. Perhaps it would be better for the race if people had as few emotions as cows!

We had a very pleasant dinner with Mr. and Mrs. Alsop and got back early enough from the speech in Hartford to get a good night's sleep and be up this morning in time to breakfast at six-fifteen and leave the house at six-thirty daylight saving time. It rained almost all the way over to Scranton and I think the thing that seemed most lovely was the red of the young maples almost everywhere along the road, and the gurgling brooks which drank up the rain and seemed to be singing a riotous spring song.

We got into Scranton by standard time at about a quarter to twelve which was very pleasant for I felt as though I had found an hour. We were welcomed by the Democratic Vice Chairman of the Scranton Committee, Mrs. Mary S. McDonough and by Miss Margaret Davis chairman of the Program Committee of The Women Teachers Club of Scranton, under whose auspices I am speaking. In a few minutes I must be ready for my first lecture and before that I must sign the most minute book I have ever seen which belongs to Colleen Moore's doll house which she is exhibiting here at the present time.

E.R.



About this document

My Day by Eleanor Roosevelt, April 28, 1937

Roosevelt, Eleanor, 1884-1962
[ ERPP bio | LC | VIAF | WorldCat | DPLA | Wikidata | SNAC ]

Digital edition created by The Eleanor Roosevelt Papers Project The George Washington University 312 Academic Building 2100 Foxhall Road, NW Washington, DC 20007

  • Brick, Christopher (Editor)
    [ VIAF | ORCID ]
  • Regenhardt, Christy (Associate Editor)
    [ ISNI ]
  • Black, Allida M. (Editor)
    [ VIAF | ISNI ]
  • Binker, Mary Jo (Associate Editor)
    [ VIAF | ORCID ]
  • Alhambra, Christopher C. (Electronic Text Editor)
    [ VIAF | ORCID ]

Digital edition published 2008, 2017 by
The Eleanor Roosevelt Papers Project

Available under licence from the Estate of Anna Eleanor Roosevelt.

Published with permission from the Estate of Anna Eleanor Roosevelt.

MEP edition publlished on June 30, 2008.

TEI-P5 edition published on April 28, 2017.

XML master last modified on June 9, 2017.

HTML version generated and published on May 3, 2022.

Transcription created from a photocopy of a draft version of a My Day column instance archived at the Franklin D. Roosevelt Library. My Day column draft dated April 27, 1937, FDR Library, Hyde Park, NY
TMsd, 27 April 1937, AERP, FDRL