Eleanor Roosevelt -- My Day (1943)

101

April 21, 1943

Fort Worth, Texas – (Tuesday)
I have received a letter with a statement in it which I think all of us, who are citizens of this country, should consider carefully. This letter comes from an individual who is an employee in a state institution, and it describes conditions which exist in one particular state. I would not write about it for the country at large, unless I realized that such conditions exist in almost every state and city. This is the paragraph:

I am an American. I feel I have the right to work for a living and also to vote as I personally see fit. Now it seems to be that in order to work I must cater to some machine or other. I am upset because that is the way Germany’s brutal way of life started… When it comes to the point that an American cannot obtain or retain a position without supporting some individual for political reasons, I think it is about time to do something about it.

This individual has done a good job, has been several years in a position which requires special training. The position is not in jeopardy because of inefficiency or lack of willingness to work. It is in jeopardy because all positions held under Civil Service, and even those which are thus safeguarded, are sometimes tampered with and used for personal ends.

I see many reasons why candidates for office should put before the voters their qualifications in the most persuasive manner possible. I see every reason why men in public life, who believe in the things which they advocate, should try to place people of similar beliefs in office.

Naturally, if fundamental changes in policy take place in government, unless you can persuade men working in the new program that these policies must be carried out, some of them will resign or have to be changed to other work. Requiring individuals, however, who are doing small technical jobs, or any citizen, to vote in a specified way or lose his job, seems to me a crippling of efficiency and a curtailing of the American right to make up your own mind as to what you believe in and to vote accordingly.

This type of procedure in either political party arises from the fact that we give too much power to small groups of people and allow them to develop a method by which our government is implemented. Not enough people are aware of their responsibility to make sure that people are never coerced, but are allowed to hear facts and arguments and to make up their own minds without being under the shadow of fear.

102

April 22, 1943

On board the President’s special train, Corpus Christi, Texas –
This is written as we leave Monterrey, Mexico, after some very busy hours. The President was greeted here by the President of Mexico. Though the news of his visit had only been announced at noon, the streets were lined with people as we drove to the Governor’s Palace. The two Presidents stood side by side on the balcony and reviewed the Mexican 1st Division, followed by some cavalry troops, which were as beautifully mounted as any I have ever seen.

Our two small grandchildren, Chandler and Elliott Jr., were fascinated and stood in front of the Foreign Minister and me. They watched with wide eyes the veteran division with a few of the young men brought in under conscription, passing by.

Besides the military bands, there was in the square across from us, a real Mexican orchestra playing some of the haunting Mexican songs which, as the Foreign Minister murmured in my ear, are meant for moments of peace and reflection, such as serenades at midnight.

Later, in a great field out at the military camp, the children of the School of Monterrey, gave an exhibition which they dedicated to me. Girls in costume danced very charmingly, and then to music, thousands of boys and girls went through a drill with poles and dumbbells. One group sang a beautiful song called “Americas Immortal,” which was written by a Mexican author and dedicated to all the Americas.

The pupils of a military school went through some very excellent drills. The little boys at the end of the line were hardly able to handle their guns, and yet manfully tried to keep in step.

I drove with the President of Mexico’s wife, Madame Ávila Camacho and liked her very much. Except for a very few words, which I managed to acquire as a result of my few Spanish lessons, our conversation was carried on through an interpreter.

We ladies went shopping for an hour and returned to the military academy in time for dinner. I do not think I have ever seen more beautifully arranged flowers than those which decorated the tables. I was only grieved that my Spanish was not up to understanding all of President Ávila Camacho’s speech.

The Minister of Foreign Affairs told me he hoped both speeches would be translated in Mexico and the United States, for this was a real occasion, since the Presidents of our two countries had not met face to face in 34 years. It seems a long time for countries not to bring their chief executives together when they are next door neighbors.

For our grandchildren it was a great day, perhaps their first lesson in Pan-American friendship. Let us hope that in their generation this friendly gesture will grow to very active cooperation for the mutual benefit of Mexico and the United States and all the other American republics.

103

April 23, 1943

Fort Worth, Texas – (Thursday)
We reached Corpus Christi, Texas, yesterday morning about 12:30, and proceeded at once to the Naval Air Training Station, where the gentlemen, including President Roosevelt and President Camacho, with three ladies, Mrs. Alfred Montgomery, wife of the Admiral in Command, Madame Camacho, and myself, lunched at the cadets’ mess. The other ladies of the party lunched with the WAVES. At the end of our meal, Mrs. Montgomery, Madame Camacho and I left the gentlemen and went to the WAVES for a short time, so I missed hearing my husband speak to the cadets.

There is quite a big contingent of WAVES here. I was amused to learn that some of the officers, who had been very much opposed to them, were now clamoring for more. These first graduates are doing pioneer jobs and, from all accounts, are doing them very well.

We returned to the cadets’ mess in time for Madame Camacho to stand beside her husband, while nine Mexican aviation cadets and their complete ground crews were presented to both their own President and to President Roosevelt. They are a fine-looking set of young men. I understand that at this training station there are also groups from other South and Central American countries, so we are putting a real good neighbor policy into action.

We drove all over the station, through the repair shop and, finally, out to a point of vantage where we could see many planes fly over us in formation. They gave us an exhibition of dive bombing, which was quite extraordinary and thrilling to watch. I had never realized how accurate these boys had to be and was told that those we watched were just students and still considered in the early stages of proficiency.

Back on the train, Madame Camacho and I sat listening while the two Presidents talked for an hour before we reached the junction where our two trains separated. When President and Madame Camacho boarded their own train and started for Mexico, we stood on the platform and waved them goodbye.

I vowed inwardly that, before we met again, I would know a little more Spanish than I do now. Inarticulate as I was, I still feel it was valuable to have this contact with our neighbors from across the border. I shall look forward more anxiously than ever to the day when I can really pay Mexico a longer visit.

I am back in Fort Worth this morning and spending another pleasant day at the ranch, with a chance to see little David again and to make some tentative plans with Ruth for future meetings. Tonight, Miss Thompson and I are on our way to Phoenix, Arizona, but I shall not be able to tell you about that day until Sunday.

104

April 24, 1943

Fort Worth, Texas – (Friday)
A call has gone out from the government to every housewife in this nation. If she does not actually run her own kitchen, then she should see that whoever holds sway there understands the importance of her particular war job – the salvaging of fat for the use of the government. Fats contain glycerin, glycerin makes gunpowder, explosives and medicine.

The Japanese occupation of the Far East has cut off much of our former imports of oils and fats. Our need and the needs of our Allies have greatly increased, and the place where we must meet them is in our own kitchens.

We should get a minimum of 200,000,000 pounds annually. The continental U.S. Army camps are salvaging about 60,000,000 pounds of waste fat a year. The Navy Department reports another 11,400,000, but so far, our household fat salvage collections are only running at the rate of 90,000,000 pounds a year. This still leaves some distance to go in our households, and yet that is the place where this whole balance must come from.

It is more difficult, of course for the smaller households to make a real contribution, and many a woman feels that half a cup of fat is not worth saving. But it is the multiplication of half cups which counts in the long run. We shall only reach our goal with the cooperation of the small households as well as the large ones, to turn in whatever they do not need for personal use.

A recent consumer study made by the Office of War Information reveals the astounding fact that 9 out of 10 women know that the country has a fat salvage program, but only 6 out of 10 are saving their kitchen fat. Only 3 out of 10 have turned over any of these fats to be made into glycerin.

One pound of used cooking fat will produce enough glycerin to make a pound and a half of smokeless powder. It is estimated that American women throw away a billion pounds of waste kitchen fat every year. That means that we are throwing away a billion and a half pounds of smokeless powder. We cannot afford to do that. Our boys fighting in every corner of the globe need that powder and this is one of the ways in which every woman can contribute to the fighting of the war.

I have heard many a woman ask how she could do her bit when her days were filled to overflowing with housework and the care of the family. Here is one very important way, and don’t let’s forget it.

105

April 26, 1943

Los Angeles, California – (Sunday)
At 8:30 last Friday morning, with several members of the War Relocation Authority Staff, we left Phoenix, Arizona, and drove to Gila. This is desert country which flowers only when water is brought to it. Water is available if you work hard enough to irrigate the land. The War Relocation Authority has leased some of this land for the Japanese evacuees from the Pacific Coast.

The contractors who built the barracks to house the fourth largest city in Arizona, simply scraped everything away, so there are temporary barracks set down in a field of sand and hard baked ground. When the wind blows everything is covered with sand.

The sun beats down on these rows of barrack buildings, which are divided into spaces about 25 by 20 feet, and in these spaces, families have begun their lives anew. Many of them have made screens out of anything they could find available, and these are used to create privacy.

Everything is spotlessly clean, and it is quite evident that the community washing centers, both for people and clothes, are frequently used. The community mess halls have nearly all been decorated with paper streamers, paper flowers and paintings. The food is adequate within the limits of rationing. We shared a meal that was served to the staff, minus meat, butter, sugar and coffee.

The people work and around almost every barracks you can see the results of their labor. Sometimes there are little Japanese gardens, sometimes vegetables or flowers bloom, sometimes bushes transplanted from the desert grow high enough to afford a little shade. Makeshift porches and shades have been improvised by some out of gunny sacks and bits of wood salvaged from packing cases.

There are several industries going on to aid the war effort. To take part in them, you must be an American citizen, and you must be checked by the FBI and the War Relocation Authority for loyalty to the United States.

The city, itself, can employ a good many people and the 7,000 acres under cultivation for the community require much work and attention. This is under the direction of an expert farmer and they produce an astonishing amount of food.

When the war came there were in the United States about 127,500 Japanese, two-thirds of whom were American-born and, therefore citizens. 112,000 were on the Pacific Coast. The center at Gila happens to have more agricultural land than some of the other centers.

Fortunately, many of the people have been specialists in the growth of some particular type of vegetable or flower. They are now learning to be more all-around farmers than they have ever been before. Of course, like any other city of its size, there is a great variety of backgrounds and a larger percent of college graduates than is usual in a town of about 13,000 inhabitants.

106

April 27, 1943

Los Angeles, California – (Monday)
To go on with my report on the Japanese relocation center, which I saw last Friday, and which I told you was fairly typical of all the others. I think the outstanding impression one receives is the feeling of respect for the staff and the problems which they must have faced at first.

When the barracks were unfinished, when water was not yet provided in sufficient quantity for the community and the people were moved in, the place must have been not only uncomfortable but very chaotic. The people, themselves, must have shown qualities of endurance and willingness to cooperate, or they would have despaired of ever making life livable and have become useless burdens on the government.

Great ingenuity has been used in planning schools. They have organized nursery, elementary, grade and high schools. They have no school buildings, so they use the barracks which are scattered all over the place. Two typewriters must serve all the pupils in the typing class, which means that they get a chance for ten minutes practice a day. Instead of being discouraged, they made keyboards out of cardboard with holes to represent the keys, and practiced on those.

The hospital is under the direction of an American doctor, but is staffed almost entirely by Japanese doctors, one of whom formerly had a very large practice outside of his own race. He is now doing a full-time job for $19 a month and his board and lodging.

You can divide the people into three groups.

  1. Those who came here many years ago and cannot be citizens, but who still do not wish to go back to Japan.

  2. Those who are American citizens by virtue of birth and have had all their education in this country.

  3. Those who were born in this country but returned to Japan for their education and only came back here in 1939 and 1940.

These last are probably the ones who have the least allegiance to any country. Many of the young American born and educated men are now joining the Army division made up of men from Hawaii and from these evacuation camps. Some of the sons of the older people were already in the Army before the evacuation took place and many of the American-born girls asked me whether they would have an opportunity in the women’s auxiliary services.

Arizona, New Mexico and parts of Texas have felt the war deeply because the regiments that fought and died in the Philippines, and some of whom are now imprisoned there, came largely from this part of the country. Their story is one of heroic bravery which will always live in the annals of the nation. It is natural that here the bitterness against the enemy Japanese should run high.

In spite of this, the people in this community, at least, have evidently won for themselves respect wherever they have had to go on business in the neighborhood. It speaks well for the enforcement of law and order, which is largely done by the evacuees themselves, and the people’s own law-abiding characteristics, that the record of crime or of any kind of disturbance of the peace, is lower than in any other city of its size in the country.

107

April 28, 1943

Los Angeles, California – (Tuesday)
Last Saturday morning, we reached Deming, New Mexico, after an overnight train trip from Phoenix, Arizona. We deposited our bags at the Park Hotel, which I remembered from a previous trip with my husband.

This small town hasn’t changed much in twenty years. We wandered down the street and went into a little restaurant for our morning coffee and the pleasure of shaking hands and talking briefly with a number of citizens. I only wish I could have seen more people in Deming, for I know how many anxious hearts there must be waiting even now to have final news of those they cared about, who took part in the fighting on Bataan and Corregidor.

Right after breakfast, I went to the bombardier training school and spent the morning seeing the post with Gen. Scanlon and Col. Milton Murphy. They were both kind and showed me many things of great interest. The Colonel has made a great effort to keep down the dust and sand, which is one of the great drawbacks in all these desert camps. Flying conditions are practically always good in these parts and very few days are lost, which is a great advantage in the training period.

After lunch, a young friend of mine, who is stationed here, drove us to El Paso, Texas. He and another friend, now in the Civil Air Patrol, had dinner with us and we made an early evening plane and arrived in Los Angeles around 1:00 a.m.

Easter Sunday was spent very quietly. It has been a pleasure to see our son Jimmy’s wife, and a number of old friends who are living here. On Monday morning we started off to visit the hospitals in the vicinity, which I came to see.

Corona, the first hospital visited on Monday morning, was once a health and pleasure resort. The grounds have been well landscaped and, as you go in, you think you are in an attractive hotel, which must be a pleasant atmosphere for the convalescent boys. There is an indoor swimming pool and individual baths, where the patients can have the benefit of hot sulphur water.

I should think there are great possibilities for therapeutic treatment of all kinds. There are under 700 patients here at present, but a complete tuberculosis hospital will soon be completed and there is plenty of room for expansion.

Long Beach is a permanent hospital, well planned and pleasant and airy on the inside. Since it is new, the grounds are not yet completely planted and there is no mistaking that it is an institution. Here also the men are evidently getting excellent care. In both hospitals the spirit of courage and confidence to meet the future seems to be instilled by the staff.

108

April 29, 1943

San Francisco, California – (Wednesday)
Here we are on our way home, and we have had two lucky breaks. I’ve had a chance to see our son, Johnny, and our daughter-in-law, Anne, and their children again, and to take a young soldier who will soon be overseas to dine at a restaurant.

When I opened one of my newspapers yesterday morning in Los Angeles I gasped with dismay. I was confronted with a statement that I had seen every patient in the two naval hospitals which I had visited on Monday and I had not only taken their names, but the names of their families and home addresses, and had rashly promised that my husband would write to everyone. Of course, I didn’t make such a promise and I know the men themselves will appreciate the fact that I couldn’t ask the President to write some 1,100 extra letters.

For a moment I couldn’t think how such a story could have begun. Then the germ of truth which so often starts these rumors came to me. In the Corona Hospital one of the men was a patient from the Houston who took several cruises with my husband. He told me he took the President fishing sometimes, so I did ask for his name and I know that my husband will be interested in hearing about him and will want to drop him a line.

We were taught in our childhood that great oaks from little acorns grow, and readers would do well to remember it, for there is usually some foundation for everything that is written, but it may be embroidered in the telling, or it may grow like the oak tree, or it may be misinterpreted. Worse yet, sometimes in the things which we write ourselves, we take for granted that other people will understand how we think and feel, forgetting that nothing should ever be taken for granted and that when you want to convey something, you should say it clearly and in unmistakable terms. In any case, this will clear up, I hope, the disillusionment which some people might have felt had they waited for a letter from the President because a relative or a friend happened to be in the hospital at Long Beach or Corona.

I finished two books on this trip, The Robe and The Human Comedy. Very different, and yet both of them teach very much the same lesson. The Robe, as you may remember, is the story of the Crucifixion, but the fight which all men of goodwill carry on in the world, began then, and The Human Comedy by Saroyan, points out that each individual stands to be counted in that fight, day by day, wherever he is.

109

April 30, 1943

San Francisco, California – (Thursday)
I wonder how many people have really read the facts published after a survey made by the Office of War Information, of the effects on the civilian population of the extensive depletion of the number of physicians and surgeons in private practice?

The problems brought about by taking 40-45,000 doctors into the armed services, and the inevitable increase which will come as the Army and Navy forces are augmented, seems to have placed almost unbearable burdens on the doctors who remain in many communities. Many of them are endangering their own lives in the effort to meet the demands made on them.

As I read the whole report, certain things stand out.

First of all, we must do all we can in our own communities to meet this changed situation. Older doctors, doctors who for one reason or another have been rejected by the armed services, will try to meet our needs. We must make sure that we will make no demands on them which cannot be met in some other way.

Wherever possible clinics should be established both in urban and rural communities, and people should go to them. Where people have not had long experience and have not been trained in simple care during illness, they should at once take the Red Cross home nursing course. All of us should know how to take temperatures and how to follow out the simple orders which a doctor gives us.

One important thing for every woman to know is what constitutes cleanliness which will prevent infection, because cuts, burns and bruises taken care of at once, will be only minor ailments if no infection sets in.

So far, we have tried to urge doctors voluntarily to move into the areas where shortages are acute. This, however, proved an unsuccessful method in Great Britain, and I am afraid we shall make the same discovery. In many cases, organized medical groups have been the stumbling block. Doctors who have gone into the services and given up practices they have built up, sometimes have not wanted them taken over by other young men while they are gone.

Men who have lucrative practices, do not want to move into an area which may need them badly, but which will give them inadequate income and, frequently, an impossible housing problem for their families. County medical societies and other groups have opposed, in many cases, anything which savors of government control, and at times even the sending of public health doctors.

These doctors, as a rule, are sent only in case of emergency or disaster. It looks to me, however, as if the health needs of the civilian population may force us to abandon our volunteer system and to submit to mandatory placement for the duration of the war.

110

May 1, 1943

Washington – (Friday)
Like everybody else in the country, I am deeply concerned about the possibility of a coal strike. I know only too well the difficulties under which the miners have worked and lived. I realize that by the end of the week, many a miner owes the company store almost more than he has earned, and, in the past, company store prices have been higher in many places than the prices in other nearby neighborhoods.

I think it is essential that these men be protected not only from the general rise in the cost of living, but from the abuses which company stores and company towns have brought about for many years.

Mine owners have a right to make, not only a reasonable return on their investment, but since, for a long time many mines have not been able to work, there are probably some legitimate charges which should be covered now that they are open again. The government should see that there is a fair deal for both owners and miners.

The right to strike is a right which men should never be forced to give up, but which in the face of grave national emergency they may give up voluntarily. The boys who need the things which will be lacking in case the mines close, are boys that come, many of them, from the home of the miners.

They will be the sufferers and I do not think the men in question quite understand that what they should demand is that their government protect them, but not for a minute should they allow themselves to be led in keeping the materials of war away from their sons.

We had the most wonderful flight back from the West Coast. Just a few bumpy spots, but outside of that we sailed along with a tail wind and spent an hour and a half in one airport, because we were that much ahead of time.

Arriving home yesterday afternoon, I found myself engulfed in all the little things which make me wonder how life ever progresses in a household when one is not at home.

Finally, I left my desk long enough to get ready for dinner. We had a nice leisurely, family meal and told each other all the things we had seen and observed from the time we separated until we met again last night.

I thought I would get to bed early, having spent a night and most of a day on a plane, but people kept coming in to talk to me, and I found so much writing to do, that it was well on toward 1:00 a.m. before I finally went to bed.

I have several appointments today with people who have been very patient and waited a long time to see me about their various interests. At 5:00, I am going to an exhibition for Russian War Relief.

111

May 3, 1943

Washington – (Sunday)
I have just read a book by Ethel Gorham, So Your Husband’s Gone to War! It is entertaining and full of good common-sense advice. I think pages 122 and 123 should be read and reread by every woman. It is a universal experience and sometimes it isn’t only what happens in marriage.

Sisters and brothers, mothers and sons, girls and their sweethearts have sometimes found that furloughs were not all that they had planned. The men they were with were not the men who went away. Somehow, they were entirely different – moody, perhaps too gay, quite evidently covering something by the gaiety, anxious to forget instead of telling all the experiences which they want so much to hear.

This is just a sample of many other things which you will find useful in this little book and which, on the whole, is quite delightful to read. I loved the little bit about the woman who tried to give up her home and send her child away and found that it created for her husband, off at the war, only a sense of terrible insecurity, because he felt he had no real home which he remembered anywhere in the background to which he could cling, and for which he was actually fighting.

Many a husband would not have been honest enough to stop his wife in time. He might have thought he owed it to the woman to let her do the thing she thought wisest. Yet, as a matter of fact, all she needed to make the effort to go on living as usual, was the knowledge that the home he knew meant security to the man somewhere for beyond her ken.

What it must mean to those men so far away to be able to turn their thoughts for a minute to something they feel is fixed and stable in their world of home, something they love, something that is their real life, not this interim which, somehow or other, they must fight through.

And now, to something in lighter vein. Franklin P. Adams has just gotten out an anthology of light verse. It is called Innocent Merriment, and while I know these poems are his favorites, I am sure you will find plenty of your own there, too. Who does not like Christopher Morley’s “The Gospel of Mr. Pepys” ending:

When kisses are a shilling each
We should adventure on a few.

No one could grow up without, somewhere along the road, having enjoyed Lewis Carroll’s “Father William.” So, when you want a pleasant hour, pick up Innocent Merriment.

112

May 4, 1943

Washington – (Monday)
Last Friday night, in Washington, I went to a play written by two young authors, Phoebe and Henry Ephron. It is a farce and, when it opens in New York City, it will be called Three’s A Family. Its purpose is to make you laugh, and judging by the audience last Friday night, it succeeds. In these days we should be grateful to those who bring us such release.

Saturday night, in New York City, I went to see, or hear rather, Rosalinda. This operetta with charming Johann Strauss waltzes, gives one a very pleasant gay evening. I was happy to have a chance to attend a performance.

Sunday afternoon, after having quite a large family gathering at lunch, I went to a meeting held in Harlem for the benefit of Bethune-Cookman College, and to honor Mrs. Mary McLeod Bethune. Mr. Roland Hayes sang and I enjoyed his part of the program very much.

I barely had time to eat a hurried supper and change before going back up town to the Horace Mann Auditorium for a meeting of the Columbia Graduate Club. After speaking there, I reached home in time to listen to the radio, keep an appointment with a young man who is on his way to England and, finally, make the train for Washington.

I am very glad to receive a little leaflet from the Children’s Bureau, which tells of the maternity and infant care which will now be available under the new congressional appropriation for the wives and infants of the men in the Armed Forces. Any man serving in the fourth, fifth, sixth or seventh grade of the Army, Navy, Marine Corps or Coast Guard, may have his wife taken care of:

…as long as similar services are not available through medical or hospital facilities of the Army or Navy, or by or through, official state or local health services.

This new service functions through grants made by the Children’s Bureau to the state health departments under plans approved by the Children’s Bureau. This will be of great help to many men in the service who, when they were inducted into the service, worried as to how their wives and children were going to receive proper medical care and had comparatively small pay from which to make allotments.

113

May 5, 1943

Washington – (Tuesday)
Yesterday morning we had the great pleasure of welcoming Madame Chiang Kai-shek here again. Her trip across our great country and the speeches she made, have been a very exhausting experience. I hope that during the next few weeks she can really rest and recuperate. She needs to build up her strength before returning to China.

Madame Chiang says she watched all of our countryside out of train windows, and was impressed by the similarity that exists between the Chinese and our own landscape. She has talked with many people individually and has met great crowds.

After an experience such as she has been through, she should need to see only very few people, and they should demand very little effort from her. To an outgoing person like Madame Chiang, it is difficult not to be drained of energy and strength after being with a great many people.

Some of you may remember a mention I made in my column of the heroic attempt of a foreman in the Pursglove, West Virginia, mine disaster. After escaping from a fire in the mine, he returned to try to free some of the other men who were lost and was himself killed. His name was Guy E. Quinn, and I heard today that the Carnegie Hero Fund Commission has awarded him a medal which is to be presented to his widow, who will also be paid monthly death benefits over a period of six years.

This fund was established by Mr. Carnegie in 1904. Since that time, the fund has paid the widows and other dependents of persons who lost their lives in the heroic saving, or attempt to save, the lives of others, the aggregate sum of $3,964,000. In addition, the fund has paid to heroes who performed such acts without losing their own lives, $1,875,000 to be used for educational expenses, the purchase of homes, or other purposes of permanent betterment.

In this particular mine disaster, looking up the case of Mr. Quinn, led to the discovery that Mr. Bradford Gainer had helped in the attempt to rescue ten other miners with Mr. Quinn, and was fortunate enough to come out alive. He has also been awarded the bronze medal and the sum of $500, which he can call upon for some worthy purpose approved by the executive committee of the fund.

I am happy that both these cases gained recognition. I think that we should be grateful for the spirit which recognized that deeds of heroism should be acclaimed. I am sure that every time a man or his dependents receive such recognition, it is of value to the country.

114

May 6, 1943

Washington – (Wednesday)
Late yesterday afternoon I spoke at one of the meetings of a group of members of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, who are now in Washington. With their friends, they filled the hall at the YMCA.

I was glad to have this opportunity to tell them something of my trip to Great Britain. It was particularly gratifying to find that many of those who had been in Great Britain on missions with the armed forces, seemed to have similar impressions and to agree with my conclusions.

Before leaving for the meeting, I had tea with the President and Madame Chiang and reached home again in time to greet our few dinner guests. Among them were some newspaper men from Australia on their way to Great Britain.

After dinner, two short Australian films were shown – one the Battle of the Bismarck Sea, in which Australian and American fliers took part and set such a remarkable record for air attack on naval forces. The other was a picture of the fighting in New Guinea, and the help which the natives have given the soldiers, both Americans and Australians.

It is the natives who act as stretcher bearers and carry the wounded over rough paths for six days to the nearest hospital at Port Moresby. When the rain comes, it seems to come in sheets and they must be soaked through. In fact, I can think of nothing more trying than this trip for wounded men. It must be agonizing for them, but they speak with praise of the gentleness of the native bearers and the kindness with which they treat them.

One thing stood out in both of the pictures, and that was the cooperation and comradeship which has grown up between the Australian and American boys. They “kid” each other apparently, and that is a good sign. When they are serious, they show real respect for the fighting qualities of the other fellow.

There has just come to my desk a plan which was originated and started by the Kiwanis Club of Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, some years ago. They call it the Junior Councillors Bethlehem Plan. I understand that the National Council of Women is hoping to spread it throughout the nation in the fight against juvenile delinquency and as a successful way of interesting the “teenage” group in the war effort.

They are making a drive for funds at the present time. I think that those who are in touch with this “teenage” group problem will be anxious to help in this undertaking. The plan, I think, requires a careful choice of sponsors and good leadership in each community, but it has great possibilities. If it can awaken a sense of responsibility in this age group, which has so often felt that it had no part in the functioning of democracy, it will be a good preparation for responsible adult citizenship.

115

May 7, 1943

Washington – (Thursday)
Yesterday morning Madame Chiang left us, and in the afternoon the President of Bolivia arrived. The Cabinet received with us on the lawn, and then we had tea on the South Portico.

I have begun to breakfast on the porch every morning and to have tea there every afternoon, but I am not quite sure that my desire to be out of doors does not outrun the season a little, for I notice that everybody else shivers!

Washington is a funny place. You jump from really cold weather into mid-summer weather. From wondering whether it is warm enough to eat out of doors, you suddenly find it is too hot at noon even to sit on the porch.

The President gave a stag dinner for our South American guest last night, and so Mrs. Henry Morgenthau Jr. and I had dinner together. Then I went to speak on the radio program put on by the National Safety Council, which is trying to bring home to all that accidents which occur in the home should be prevented as a patriotic duty.

I had really not given it much thought until I read the statistics and discovered that one of my husband’s pet remarks about many people dying in the process of taking a bath, is not a joke but a reality. We are all becoming more and more conscious of the fact that we have an obligation in wartime to keep ourselves well. This does not apply only to accidents, it applies to the general daily care and routine of life, because we know more and more the value of prevention rather than cure.

As we think back, it is quite interesting to note how our whole attitude toward health and the place of medical science is gradually changing. We used to think that the science of medicine was chiefly useful to cure the human ills and our public health service was largely devoted to the prevention of great epidemics.

Now I think we realize the science of medicine should find ways of building up resistance in human beings and of keeping them well, in order that they may not succumb to many of the dangers which surround them. On the other hand, we believe that the discoveries of medical science should remove many of the reasons which used to bring about epidemics and illness of various kinds, and so we gradually want to eliminate the need of the doctor and the nurse to take care of acute disaster and increase the usefulness of the research worker and the doctor and the nurse to use science to keep people well.

I have just received the outline of some nutrition courses which are being given to school teachers in Berkeley, California. This type of teaching may become one of the methods leading to better health in the future.

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May 8, 1943

Washington – (Friday)
I attended the British War Relief luncheon yesterday and saw a number of people by appointment in the afternoon.

One of the things brought to my attention recently is the effort which is being made to spread the observance of “Shut-In Day,” on the first Sunday in June. This year it will fall on June 16.

Canada, I think, first sponsored this day and it has already spread to a number of states and communities in our country. Many organizations – business, religious, civic and recreational – have cooperated to make it a day when handicapped people who cannot leave their homes will feel themselves specially remembered in their communities. Almost everyone knows someone who cannot leave his room, or his bed, or his chair.

These people rarely want sympathy. They strive in every way they know how to be of use in the world, to earn their own way if possible. Many of them have developed, because of their handicap, some very interesting ways of being of service to others. Nevertheless, few of them would deny, I think, that little attentions which show that other people have thought of them, mean a great deal.

Perhaps, this year, this day will have a particularly poignant significance for a great many people, for every day this war goes on, we are adding to our casualty lists, and some of these boys may be shut-ins in the future. They will want visitors, they will want suggestions, perhaps help in getting started in some new kind of work which is fitted to their particular capacity.

I have been thinking a good deal about these young men who are beginning to come into our military hospitals in considerable numbers. In spite of the fact that many of them will be able to continue to perform limited service in the armed forces, I have been wondering whether the Congress and the executive departments involved, might not make a survey to determine what would be most helpful to these men in making them useful in the future.

Many of them must have interrupted their education, and if they continued it at once, it might lead into professions or occupations which they could carry through quite well in spite of their handicaps.

I wonder if this isn’t something that needs to be done now instead of waiting until the war is over.

Congress is the only body which, of course, can decide what is the right attitude on the part of the government in this situation. I am quite sure that they are already giving it much thought, but sometimes we think so long we do not act, and I think action should be taken fairly quickly in the present situation.

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May 10, 1943

Washington – (Sunday)
I spent yesterday in New York City chiefly talking to young people’s groups. Just before ten in the morning, I was at the Society for Ethical Culture’s auditorium. It was the last meeting in a course which they organized largely for high school students.

Various speakers had covered such subjects as civil liberties, race relations, the postwar world, and the students had a discussion on the subject of what students can do while they are still students to make some contribution to this world at war and the future world at peace.

As I looked at the young and eager faces, I thought of how many problems lay before them, and it seemed as though the only thing one could say, no matter how much you embellished and embroidered it, could be contained in the brief words – be honest and have courage.

Afterwards, I looked through the school rooms where the poor children of the vicinity play on the weekends, and which will be open continuously during the summer as a play school.

In the afternoon I spoke at the meeting called by the United States Student Assembly. Forty colleges were represented, and I feel that this young group is moving forward and will build a good organization on a firm foundation. They should learn something through their activities about the citizenship which they will have to practice in the future.

Having had the privilege of a college education, I think they will also feel the obligation of working with the rest of the youth of the country and making as valuable a contribution as they can, because of their added educational opportunities. Mr. James Carey, Secretary of the CIO, made a very excellent, forceful and practical talk.

From the YWCA, where this meeting was held, I went directly to International House, where I had supper with the members of the Chinese Students’ Forum. This is the parent forum, but it has offshoots in many other places throughout the United States. They told me the very delicious food we had was typical of an ordinary family meal in China.

Their meeting began at 8:00 with singing by the Chinese students’ chorus, and some of them have beautiful voices. This period ended with the singing of the “Star Spangled Banner” and the Chinese national anthem. The flags of the two countries hung behind me as I spoke.

I have great hopes that this group may have the opportunity to know something of the family life of young people in this country and that through them we may learn more of the life and traditions of China.

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May 11, 1943

Washington – (Monday)
Today is the 10th anniversary of the very notorious day when Hitler, in Nazi Germany, ordered the burning of all books by such authors as Pearl Buck, Albert Einstein, Sigmund Freud, Ernest Hemingway, Selma Lagerlof, Sinclair Lewis, Thomas Mann, Stephen Vincent Benet and Sigrid Undset.

In doing this, Hitler thought he would destroy the ideas that inspired these authors and that came to the world through their words. He succeeded in Germany, but in the world, he stimulated interest. Instead of making people pay less attention to what these authors had to say, it made many more people read them, who, perhaps, had never read them before. Their contributions to the thinking of the world are probably far greater than they would have been without Hitler’s effort at suppression.

In the democracies of the world, the passion for freedom of speech and of thought is always accentuated when there is an effort anywhere to keep ideas away from people and to prevent them from making their own decisions. One of the best ways of enslaving a people is to keep them from education and thus make it impossible for them to understand what is going on in the world as a whole.

In the case of Germany, however, the people have always had the tools of learning. They have been a highly educated nation. Hitler had to use other methods, and he chose to go back to the practices of medieval days and burn the books whose philosophies were opposed to his. He knew that if these thoughts reached the people, they might stir up unrest and opposition to his own regime.

The second way of enslaving a people is to suppress the sources of information, not only by burning books, but by controlling all the other ways in which ideas are transmitted. Hitler used all of these methods and gained his ends within Germany for a time. In the end, and that end seems to be drawing closer every day, the people whom Hitler has enslaved will have to come in contact again with the world of free expression and thought, then Hitler will have to face the judgment of his own people.

To me this is one of the hopeful elements in an otherwise difficult situation. If the German people had accepted Hitler as a free people, with access to the thought and expression of the rest of the world, and freedom of expression at home, we would face a nation of Hitlers. Now we may hope that we shall face an enslaved nation, where access to freedom of thought and expression may make great changes in the people.

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May 12, 1943

Washington – (Tuesday)
Last evening Mr. Thomas Whittemore came with Mr. and Mrs. Robert Woods Bliss, to show us a film depicting the results of the work he has been doing on the Church of St. Sophia, in Turkey. The mosaics are the most beautiful color I have ever seen. One marvels at the patience and the beauty which were created so many years ago.

At my press conference yesterday morning, representatives from the Department of Agriculture came to talk about the mobilization of women for work on farms. Miss Florence Hall, from the Extension Service, has been appointed head of this work. She brought Miss Margaret Smith to model the work clothes, which are not obligatory but which are being suggested for work on the farm. The program is to be completely decentralized so that every state will do its own recruiting. They hope to set some standards for training, and also for the conditions under which women will work.

In Great Britain, of course, the women in the land army have many of the same benefits that the women in the factories have. They are included under Social Security and receive sickness insurance, pension and unemployment benefits.

We are dividing our program into full time, year-round workers and seasonal workers. The seasonal workers have to agree to do one month’s work, and there is a requirement that the women must be at least 18 years old. No ceiling on age has been set, so this may be a field in which some women over 45 may find useful employment.

Women are being asked if they will not only perform the work for which they have been especially trained, but if they will help out in the house, for many regular farm women feel that they are better equipped to work in the fields than some of the people who are trained for a short time. If they could be relieved of housework, they could do a great deal more out of doors.

Connecticut is running an all-year-round, two weeks course for would-be farm workers, and I imagine every state will gradually do something similar. Two of the training courses found most useful are those for women who wish to replace dairy and poultry men.

The Victory Corps high school group, which is also being recruited, work in a different way than this women’s land army. They will go out in groups during the summer and be under supervision, probably living in camps or in some central place.

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May 13, 1943

New York – (Wednesday)
I have just heard that 75 Red Cross Scholarships will be available July 1 for selected persons, who will be eligible for training in approved schools for social work. The need for trained personnel in home service activities has increased so much, that the Red Cross finds its obligations to the families of men in the armed forces can only be fulfilled by relieving this shortage of trained personnel at home.

This shortage of trained personnel is felt in many fields. We hear a great deal about the rise in juvenile delinquency and we often think of that as meaning only youngsters between 16 and 25. It really includes those youngsters from 7 years up, whose mothers have taken war jobs.

Instead of having more people to supervise playgrounds and after-hour school play, there are fewer of them. Instead of being able to develop more programs to interest these young people in games, new occupations and skills of different kinds, it is almost impossible to find people to carry on such programs as were already started before the war.

Industry, civic groups and the government have begun to do something by establishing day nurseries to meet the problem of the very young child, but we have done comparatively little as yet to face the more serious problem of the older children. Equipment will be needed in many cases, as well as trained personnel to take care of them.

It may not sound as though care of children was in any way a part of the war effort. Yet, if we really expect women to work in greater numbers than ever before in the factories and in any of the innumerable war time jobs that are now open, the communities will have to see that these services are available for the care of the children.

Mr. Robert Cleveland, who has written a delightful book for young children, which the Junior Literary Guild has taken, feels that he could contribute to this problem of occupation for the youngsters by putting some of his ideas on the screen. If he is right, we shall have a new medium for bringing activity and imaginative use of the ordinary materials to be found in almost every home within the reach of our children.

Yesterday afternoon, I had a succession of visitors, and most of them must have felt that I was a very unsatisfactory hostess, because they were conscious that somebody else was waiting to come in the minute they finished talking.

I spoke at an informal meeting at the National Catholic School of Social Science in the evening, and am in New York City today to attend a meeting of the United States Committee for the Care of European Children.