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

      

WASHINGTON, Wednesday—One has to live in Washington to know what a city of rumors it is. Sometimes the rumors are based on fact, sometimes they are just based on what somebody said to somebody else!

Yesterday I was interested to hear a number of such rumors. First, that I wanted to be a special delegate to the San Francisco Conference. I had to tell Congresswoman Norton that I could not possibly go, and beg her not to make a speech about it.

Then, I heard a rumor that I was going to run for a Federal elective position and, finally, that I was a candidate for Secretary of Labor! I had to tell several people quite forcibly that nothing would induce me to run for public office or to accept an appointment to any office at the present time.

* * *

I have two jobs that I consider myself obligated to do and that I want to do. My daily column I have always looked upon as a job which I wanted to have considered on its merits. Because I was the wife of the President, certain restrictions were imposed upon me. Now I am on my own, and I hope to write as a newspaper woman. I certainly should have background to bring to the job, and if I have not developed powers of observation and correct reporting in the past years, that will soon be discovered.

My magazine page is also a contract that I wish to fulfill as well as I possibly can. Outside of these two occupations, I hope I shall be able to do an occasional article on subjects which are of interest to me and to others.

For the next few months, however, there is a great deal of business which I feel it is an obligation to attend to both because of my husband and my children. My husband was a collector, with a great interest in history. This means that the children and I have many things which we must go over and which we cannot consider from the purely personal point of view, since, in acquiring them, my husband thought of their historic interest to the public and their value to future generations rather than of their value to us as a family.

* * *

The sad news has just come to us that Ernie Pyle has been killed at the front with our boys on Okinawa. To thousands and thousands of people all over the world, his column has brought the best understanding of the human side of our fighting men.

Mr. Pyle wanted above everything else to see them and to be with them in the Pacific. I am glad he had the opportunity but, like many others, I shall miss his column, with its gracious understanding of human beings. I shall never forget how much I enjoyed meeting him here in the White House last year and how much I admired this frail and modest man who could endure hardships because he loved his job and our men.

E.R.

(COPYRIGHT 1945 BY UNITED FEATURE SYNDICATE, INC.)


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About this document

My Day by Eleanor Roosevelt, April 19, 1945

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

  • 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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