The Eleanor Roosevelt Papers, Digital Edition > My Day
APRIL 15, 1938
[This column has emendations. View original version]
WASHINGTON, Thursday—I thought I was quite busy yesterday afternoon! I received the Campfire Girls and was asked innumerable questions about the trees and birds around the White House, few of which I was able to answer. Fortunately, some of the people in charge of the grounds knew the answers.
Then I motored out to the Washington Country Club to have tea and to talk briefly to a group of organized women voters. When I returned I didn't even wait to find out if my husband was going into the pool. I dashed into my bathing suit only to discover that he was still engaged with a large group of gentlemen and that I would have to swim alone. He was not back in the White House until seven-fifteen.
In the meantime, I had to go out again to talk on a radio program for cancer education. It seems to me so vital that people should realize that immediate discovery of cancer is our only hope for cutting down the death-rate from this disease, which has been so heavy during the past few years. The symptoms should be familiar to everybody, so that as few people as possible will suffer through ignorance.
These are such busy days for the President that I decided I had better not mention my own inconsequential activities to him. Immediately after his dinner, he worked until the wee small hours, whereas I, with Mrs. Scheider and various other friends, attended an annual dinner which Mrs. James Helm gives us in her charming apartment.
I do not know anyone who can think up more interesting and delicious dishes than Mrs. Helm's cook, Mary. Mrs. Helm always has a very congenial group and we spent a happy, pleasant evening together.
It was late when I came home and looked into the President's study, but I realized that no frivolity should intrude there and retired quickly to write a few letters and go to bed.
A woman named Maude Nichol, of Detroit, Mich., has sent me some cards with colored plastic rings to be used when knitting to mark the places where one should add or take off stitches. I am so delighted with them, that I think other knitters may be interested in hearing about them.
Miss Catherine Bauer, of the United States Housing Authority, came over this morning to tell my press conference about some of the new housing projects. I really wanted the information myself and encouraged the ladies of the press to ask questions in order that I might have the benefit of the information which such expert questioners would elicit. Now I am about to lunch with the wives of the members of the 75th Congress.
E.R.
(Copyright, 1938, by United Feature Syndicate, Inc.)
Names and Terms Mentioned or Referenced
Persons
- Bauer Wurster, Catherine, 1905-1964 [ index ]
American government official and academic
[ LC | ISNI | VIAF | Wikidata | SNAC | FAST | ANB ] - Helm, Edith Benham, 1874-1962 [ index ]
White House social secretary during the FDR and Truman administrations
[ LC | ISNI | VIAF | Wikidata | SNAC | FAST ] - Roosevelt, Franklin D. (Franklin Delano), 1882-1945 [ index ]
American politician; 32nd President of the United States
[ ERPP bio | LC | ISNI | VIAF | Wikidata | SNAC | FAST | US Nat. Archives | ANB ] - Thompson, Malvina, 1893-1953 [ index ]
ER's secretary
[ ERPP bio | LC | VIAF | Wikidata | SNAC | FAST | US Nat. Archives ]
Organizations
- Camp Fire Girls [ index ]
[ LC | ISNI | VIAF | Wikidata | SNAC | FAST ] - United States Housing Authority [ index ]
[ LC | ISNI | VIAF | Wikidata | SNAC | FAST | Other source ]
Geographic
- [ index ] Washington (D.C., United States)
About this document
My Day by Eleanor Roosevelt, April 15, 1938
Digital edition created by The Eleanor Roosevelt Papers Project The George Washington University 312 Academic Building 2100 Foxhall Road, NW Washington, DC 20007
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.
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