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

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HYDE PARKI travelled around yesterday from house to house, leaving my Christmas packages for my neighbors at Hyde Park, and I was struck by the number of new small houses which have sprung up around us. Before we know it, this is going to be a real suburban development.

Two of our neighbors brought us a most marvelous fruit cake, which my husband and I enjoyed greatly. These friends make these cakes every year, and I should think their friends would be most grateful for this welcome addition to the Christmas table. It came on a red plate, done up in red cellophane and decorated with holly and red ribbon. It was such a pretty package, I almost hated to open it. Once opened, however, everyone enjoyed it.

Our second gift was a cake also and it was made by my daughter's cook, Katie. She has been a member of our family for so long that we look forward from year to year to her Christmas cakes and chocolate fudge, which she makes for us as a special mark of favor. So our Christmas has begun early and we are adding pounds.

The only person not allowed to eat all these goodies is the youngest member of the family, baby Johnny who came with the rest of his family to visit me at my cottage yesterday afternoon. He was put down on the floor on a white bear rug and immediately seized upon a magazine and, before we knew it, he had evidently bitten off a corner of the page. He chewed it contentedly and we thought he was still munching on a piece of zwiebach. Finally, we discovered our mistake, but, of course, printer's ink must appeal to him. Being a newspaperman's son, he must develop these tastes early!

Sis and Buzz and all the family had rides yesterday. The children rode old "Brownie," whom a friend of ours lets us use for those who need gentle, quiet horses.

I forgot to tell you that on Monday night I attended the tenth anniversary party of the Roosevelt Home Club in Hyde Park, where the former presidents of the Club, Mr. Leonard, Mr. Moses Smith, and Mr. Erden Ackert each said a few words. The main speech was made by Mr. Hardy Steeholm and, after we left, the active entertainment of the evening began when the chairs were cleared away and everybody took to dancing.

I wish that the President could have been present to receive in person the framed painting of a ship in full sail, which was given to him for the new library. I took it home to him before he left to take a late train back to Washington and he was much pleased. Then we drove to Highlands and saw him off and I am afraid Miss Thompson and I gloated a bit on our way home, because we were going back to enjoy our own beds instead of returning to Washington by train.

E.R.

(COPYRIGHT, 1939, BY UNITED FEATURE SYNDICATE, INC.)


Names and Terms Mentioned or Referenced

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  • Hyde Park (Dutchess County, N.Y., United States) [ index ]
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About this document

My Day by Eleanor Roosevelt, December 21, 1939

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)
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  • Regenhardt, Christy (Associate Editor)
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  • Black, Allida M. (Editor)
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  • Binker, Mary Jo (Associate Editor)
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  • Alhambra, Christopher C. (Electronic Text Editor)
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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.

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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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