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

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NEW YORK—I left on a 6:30 a.m. train last Thursday to keep an engagement in Wilmington with the Delaware State Teachers Association. It is the first tteachers association to have its state convention televised and its program went on the air at 9:30 a.m.

I found that speaking for 50 minutes on TV was rather trying, because I like to be able to see my audience. Instead, the strong lights shone right into my eyes and I saw nothing but a black pit in front of me.

I tried to forget I should be looking at people's faces and thought only that I was talking on the radio to an invisible audience. In any case, the convention listeners were very attentive and kind, and afterwards I enjoyed a brief luncheon with some of the officers before returning to New York.

I had a few minutes before lunch to chat with my friend, Mrs. Charlotte Shedd, who brought along from her home in Arden her little girl of 19 months. The child seemed to enjoy the unusual surroundings but was reduced to complete silence. Her eyes took in everything and she was as good as gold, but I felt sure that once on her way home with her mother she would chatter unceasingly, and I regretted not having heard her talk.

The other day the U.S. Flag Foundation sent me a pamphlet entitled, "The Untold Story of Our Flag." It is an interesting story and one that should be in every school library, for the more we know about things that we take for granted, the more interested we are in our history.

All children learn the pledge of allegiance to the flag and they are taught also the respect due the flag, but the history of how we came to have this particular flag is quite vague in many young people's minds.

Lawrence Phelps Tower is the author of this pamphlet, which I found very pleasant reading.

The other day I received a large amount of material which included magazine articles, Congressional bills and government publications on hearings. Unfortunately my time is somewhat limited, so I have been able to glance through only some of this material.

I think, however, that the general public would be interested in the campaign for compulsory inspection of poultry, backed by the Amalgamated Meat Cutters and Butcher Workmen of North America, AFL-CIO. They want a law, similar to the Meat Inspection Act, to assure consumers of clean and healthy poultry.

“The lack of inspection," they say," has resulted in the unhindered flow of some adulterated and diseased poultry to market. Not only are consumers sometimes unwittingly buying trash, but an actual health danger exists both for them and for the poultry workers who do the processing.”

I think the need for this law should be brought to the attention of the public, and that is why I mention it here.

E.R.

(Copyright, 1956, by United Feature Syndicate, Inc.)


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About this document

My Day by Eleanor Roosevelt, October 31, 1956

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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Digital edition published 2008, 2017 by
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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.

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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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