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

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TUMBLING DW RANCH, Nev., Sunday—A very pathetic case has come to my attention. The architect of the Lincoln Memorial in Washington was Mr. Henry Bacon. Every visitor to Washington and everyone who lives there, knows what that Memorial means to the people of the country. It is one of the things that expresses something we keep hidden within us, but we like to have someone say it for us and this Memorial does it better than almost anything else in the District of Columbia.

Artists are not always good businessmen, however. Sometimes they do not get paid all they think they are going to be paid. In this particular case, Mrs. Bacon, who is now an old lady, finds herself totally without funds, except those contributed by friends of her husband or by people who love the Lincoln Memorial. A committee has been formed to receive contributions, large or small, which may help to make Mrs. Bacon's life more comfortable for her remaining years. Mr. Fletcher Collins, one of the members of this committee, and a member of the Architectural League of New York, 115 East 40th Street, New York City, is the person to whom you may write if you are at all interested in this situation.

I have had a letter from Mr. Frederick Newlin Price about an exhibition which was held last month in New York City. It was a most interesting exhibition of paintings by famous American artists and the suggestion is made that it should be sent to various labor centers. It could be shown in a cafeteria or an assembly room and it could travel from one place to another and anyone who cares about music and art will see at once, I think, that something of this kind might be of infinite value at the present time. A picture may tell a story, just as a song or a musical composition, and you can suddenly understand things which never meant a great deal to you before. This might be a way of awakening people to the danger of race riots; to the need for working at top speed in order to save the lives of our boys at the front. If the exhibition does nothing more than rest those who are weary and give them a few minutes of relaxation and pleasure, it will have fulfilled a great purpose and I hope that someone in the government will be able to help Mr. Price to get this exhibition routed throughout the country. We are not using either art or athletics enough in the home front fight!

E.R.

(Copyright, 1943, by United Feature Syndicate, Inc.)



About this document

My Day by Eleanor Roosevelt, July 12, 1943

Roosevelt, Eleanor, 1884-1962
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Digital edition created by The Eleanor Roosevelt Papers Project The George Washington University 312 Academic Building 2100 Foxhall Road, NW Washington, DC 20007

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MEP edition publlished on June 30, 2008.

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Transcription created from a photocopy of a UFS wire copy of a My Day column instance archived at the Franklin D. Roosevelt Library.
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