Buried: Franklin D. Roosevelt Library and Museum, Hyde Park, New York
Thirty-second President - 1933-1945
Born: January 30, 1882, in Hyde Park, New York
Died: April 12, 1945, in Warm Springs, Georgia
Age at death: 63
Cause of death: Cerebral hemorrhage
Final words: “I have a terrific headache.”
Admission to Franklin Roosevelt Library
and Museum: $14.00
Franklin Delano Roosevelt, master of the fireside chat, was the only president elected to four terms. He was at the nation’s helm during two major events of the twentieth century: the Great Depression and World War II. Governor of New York when he won the Democratic presidential nomination in 1932, Roosevelt spoke of a “New Deal” for the American people, which became a hallmark of his administration.
In addition to the economic crisis at home, events overseas occupied much of the president’s attention. On December 8, 1941, FDR asked Congress to declare war on Japan after the bombing of Hawaii’s Pearl Harbor. Soon thereafter, the United States enjoined the Allies in Europe. The war lasted through the remainder of Roosevelt’s service as president.
Franklin Roosevelt was a cousin of our twenty-sixth president, Theodore Roosevelt. He was also a distant relative of two other U.S. presidents (Ulysses S. Grant and Zachary Taylor) and of British Prime Minister Winston Churchill. FDR married yet another distant cousin: Anna Eleanor Roosevelt, his fifth cousin once removed. Eleanor Roosevelt became an activist first lady, holding regular press conferences and speaking out on social issues.
Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s Hyde Park home
During his third term in the White House, Franklin Roosevelt grew increasingly fatigued. He’d been stricken with polio at age thirty-nine which left his lower body paralyzed. Though unable to walk without crutches, his energy had always seemed boundless. But by March 1945, Roosevelt felt the need to retreat to Warm Springs, Georgia—a spot dubbed the “Little White House”—for some much-needed rest.
Surrounded by friends, including his onetime mistress, Lucy Mercer Rutherfurd, Roosevelt soon seemed like his old self again. The group went for leisurely drives in the country by day and spent their evenings with long meals and conversation. On the morning of April 12, his guests thought FDR looked better than he had in weeks. Lucy Rutherfurd’s friend, Elizabeth Shoumatoff, was sketching the president’s portrait when he raised his hand and said, “I have a terrific headache.”
Those were his last words. FDR fell unconscious. He was carried to his bedroom by his valet and butler. The doctor came almost immediately, but nothing could be done. The president had suffered a massive brain injury. He died just before 3:30 that afternoon without regaining consciousness. For propriety’s sake, Lucy Rutherfurd and Elizabeth Shoumatoff made a hasty departure from the “Little White House.”
The First Lady was summoned back to the White House from a charity event she was attending. When she arrived, Press Secretary Steve Early and Dr. Ross McIntire told her that the president was dead. Soon after, Eleanor Roosevelt broke the news to Harry Truman that he was president.
At 7:00 p.m. that evening in Washington, D.C., Harry Truman took the oath of office. A few minutes later, Mrs. Roosevelt flew to Warm Springs. The next morning, Eleanor began the 800-mile trip back to Washington on the presidential train, her husband’s bronze coffin visible through the windows. Hundreds of thousands lined the route, crying and praying. When the train pulled into Union Station, a military procession escorted the late president’s body back to the White House. There, Eleanor was alone with her husband for the last time, placing her gold ring on his finger.
A simple funeral service was held in the East Room. The Roosevelt family was joined by the new president and his family, government leaders and heads of state. Mrs. Roosevelt remained stoic while others wept. Hymns were sung, including “Faith of Our Fathers,” the president’s favorite. The service ended with the famous line from FDR’s first inaugural: “The only thing we have to fear is fear itself.”
Before his death, Franklin Roosevelt indicated his wish to be buried at the family estate in Hyde Park, New York. His body was borne home for the last time on the presidential train. On arrival, the casket was placed on a caisson drawn by six horses, led by a riderless horse. The cortege was met at the gravesite by President Truman, the cabinet, numerous dignitaries, family, and friends. A military band played. Cannons were fired. A gun salute sounded. The longest-serving president was laid to rest beneath a monument listing only the dates of his birth and death.
Eleanor Roosevelt continued to lead an active life for nearly twenty years. She died of tuberculosis in 1962 and is buried next to her husband in Hyde Park. Franklin Roosevelt’s beloved Scottish terrier, “Fala,” is also buried near his master.
Touring the Tomb at the Franklin D. Roosevelt Library and Museum in Hyde Park, New York
The Franklin D. Roosevelt Library and Museum is open daily from 9:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m., except New Year’s Day, Thanksgiving, and Christmas. April through October, the site remains open until 6:00 p.m. Hours are subject to change and visitors are advised to call for further information. Self-guided tours of the museum and FDR home are available. There is a $14.00 admission fee for visitors sixteen years and older. Children fifteen and under are admitted free. Tours of the museum are $7.00, and tours of the home are an additional $7.00. A combination admission ticket to both the museum and the home of Franklin D. Roosevelt is $14.00. To visit the home with a group of ten or more, you must make a reservation by calling (800) 967-2283. The grounds and burial site are free and open from dawn to dusk.
From Manhattan/Albany/New Jersey: Take the New York State Thruway to exit 18 at New Paltz. Follow Route 299 East to Route 9W South. Cross the Mid-Hudson Bridge to Route 9 North. The Library is on the left, four miles north of Poughkeepsie.
From Long Island: Take the Long Island Expressway to the Cross Island Parkway. Cross the Whitestone Bridge. Follow the Hutchinson River Parkway to Route 684 North, then Route 84 West to Route 9 North. The library is on the left, four miles north of Poughkeepsie.
From Connecticut: Take Route 84 West to Route 9 North. The library is on the left side of Route 9, four miles north of Poughkeepsie.
To reach the tomb from the ticket booth, walk toward the west end of the parking lot leading into the site. Follow the signs to the FDR Rose Garden. The gravesite is located in the middle of the Rose Garden.
For additional information
The Museum of the Franklin D. Roosevelt Library
4079 Albany Post Road
Hyde Park, NY 12538
Phone: 1-800-FDR-VISIT or (845) 486-7770
Fax: (845) 486-1147
www.fdrlibrary.marist.edu
“In Berlin, Hitler’s propaganda chief, Joseph Goebbels, called for champagne on learning of Roosevelt’s death.”
—Richard Norton Smith
On the final morning of his life, surrounded by newspaper accounts of the steady advances being made by Allied armies in Europe and Asia, Franklin D. Roosevelt chatted with Lizzie McDuffie, a two-hundred-pound housekeeper who interrupted her dusting of the “Little White House” at Warm Springs to discuss theories of reincarnation. If there were such a thing, said Lizzie, she hoped to come back to life as a canary bird—an image whose very improbability caused FDR to roar with laughter. It was a perfect sendoff for the Happy Warrior of whom Churchill once said that meeting him was like opening a bottle of champagne.
In Berlin, Hitler’s propaganda chief, Joseph Goebbels, called for champagne on learning of Roosevelt’s death. In Moscow, Joseph Stalin asked Averell Harriman what the Soviet Union could do to show its admiration for the late president. “Send Molotov to the San Francisco Conference,” replied Harriman. The conference was called by Roosevelt to organize the postwar United Nations.
Stalin nodded. “The Foreign Minister will go.”
At the New York Times an editorial writer composing a tribute for the next day’s editions tapped out, “Men will thank God on their knees a hundred years from now, that Franklin D. Roosevelt was in the White House.” At Warm Springs, an Atlanta mortician named Fred W. Patterson struggled to embalm the president’s arteriosclerotic body. Patterson and his co-workers finally resorted to individual injections by hypodermic syringe.
Mrs. Roosevelt asked Grace Tully, FDR’s secretary, if he had left instructions regarding his burial. As it turned out he had, but they would not be found until after the Hyde Park funeral. (The local selectmen had to be tracked down at their homes, since a special permit was required to allow the president to be buried on his own estate.) According to Tully, Roosevelt had asked to be buried at sea in the event of his death while on the water. The sea had always seemed like home, he remarked.
Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt’s gravesite. FDR’s dog Fala is also buried there.
Otherwise, FDR expressed his preference for a service “of utmost simplicity” in the East Room of the White House. No lying in state. A simple ceremony in the Capitol Rotunda, with two hymns and “no speaking.” A funeral train to arrive in Hyde Park at 8:00 p.m., followed by a brief service at St. James Church “for old neighbors.” A final evening in front of the fireplace of his mother’s “Big Room.” Burial the next morning in Sarah Roosevelt’s rose garden, with the president’s dark wood casket to be carried to the grave by workers on the nearby estates.
There was to be no public viewing—on that score Franklin and Eleanor were as one. Regarding his tombstone, FDR asked for an austere marker containing only the names and dates of his wife and himself. Thus Eleanor’s wish to have inscribed the famous line “The only thing we have to fear is fear itself” on the marble block was overridden by her husband’s preferences.
—RNS