In the tradition of Like Water for Chocolate and A Tree Grows in Brooklyn, this exhilarating novel centered around a memorable immigrant family brings to vibrant life the soul and spirit of New York’s legendary Lower East Side. Up from Orchard Street... ...where three generations of Roths live together in a crowded tenement flat at number 12. Long-widowed Manya is the family’s head and its heart: mother of dapper Jack, mother-in-law of frail and beautiful Lil, and adored bubby of Elka and Willy. She’s renowned throughout the teeming neighborhood for her mouthwatering cooking, and every noontime the front room of the flat turns into Manya’s private restaurant, where the local merchants come to savor her hearty stews and soups, succulent potato latkes and tzimmes, preserved fruits and glorious pastries. She is just as renowned for her fierce sense of honor, her quick eye for charlatans, and her generosity to those in need. But Manya is no soft touch–except, perhaps, where her adored granddaughter Elka is concerned. It is skinny, precocious Elka who is her closest companion and confidante–and the narrator of this event-packed novel. Through Elka’s eyes we come to know the fascinating characters who come in and out of the Roths’ lives: relatives, eccentric locals, doctors, busybody neighbors–as well as the many men who try fruitlessly to win voluptuous Manya’s favors. We live through the bittersweet world of these blunt, earthy, feisty people for whom poverty was endemic, illness common, crises frequent, and zest for living intense. Money may have been short but opinions were not, and their tart tongues and lively humor invest every page. In this riveting story lies the heart of the American immigrant experience: a novel at once wise, funny, poignant, anguishing, exultant–and bursting with love.
A New York Times Notable Book, Eleanor and Harry sheds important light on the relationship between two giants of twentieth-century American history. While researching his previous book, Harry and Ike, Steve Neal came upon a trove of letters between President Harry S. Truman and Eleanor Roosevelt that had never been published. At the time they were written, the former first lady was Truman's appointee to the UN delegation -- the highest-ranking woman in his administration. These letters, collected in Eleanor and Harry, reveal the extraordinary story of a deep, often stormy, and enduring friendship throughout one of the most important eras in American history. Eleanor and Harry grew up in different worlds. Truman, who had spent much of his youth on a Missouri farm, reflected the values and work ethic of rural America. Eleanor, born into New York society, was a constant advocate of reform. Despite their differences--and sometimes opposing political traditions-- they maintained a warm and sympathetic correspondence after Truman took office, and he designated Mrs. Roosevelt the First Lady of the World. In more than 250 letters, readers will discover Eleanor and Harry's discussion of the beginning of the Cold War, the rebuilding of postwar Europe, the creation of the state of Israel, and the start of the modern civil rights movement. Mrs. Roosevelt pressed Truman to give women more influence in his administration and declined to endorse his renomination in 1948, but she supported his difficult decision to drop the atomic bomb, his military intervention in Korea, and his controversial firing of General Douglas MacArthur. Though they disagreed on several occasions and Mrs. Roosevelt oftenoffered to resign from the UN delegation, Truman valued her advice too much to allow her to quit. They remained close friends until her death in 1962. Eleanor and Harry is an uncommonly personal look at some of the momentous events of the twentieth century and offers a rare, intimate insight into the challenging and enriching friendship between two great Americans.
I think Eleanor Roosevelt has so gripped the imagination of this moment because we need her and her vision so completely. . . . She's perfect for us as we enter the twenty-first century. Eleanor Roosevelt is a loud and profound voice for people who want to change the world." -- Blanche Wiesen Cook Named "Woman of the Century" in a survey conducted by the National Women's Hall of Fame, Eleanor Roosevelt wrote her hugely popular syndicated column "My Day" for over a quarter of that century, from 1936 to 1962. This collection brings together for the first time in a single volume the most memorable of those columns, written with singular wit, elegance, compassion, and insight -- everything from her personal perspectives on the New Deal and World War II to the painstaking diplomacy required of her as chair of the United Nations Committee on Human Rights after the war to the joys of gardening at her beloved Hyde Park home. To quote Arthur Schlesinger, Jr., "What a remarkable woman she was! These sprightly and touching selections from Eleanor Roosevelt's famous column evoke an extraordinary personality." "My Day reminds us how great a woman she was." --Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Hailed as the First Lady of the World' by Harry S. Truman, Eleanor Roosevelt was one of America's great reforming leaders who changed national policy toward youths, blacks, women, the poor and the United Nations. The wife of President Franklin D. Roosevelt, she was one of the most active First Ladies as well as an esteemed public figure in her own right. Gathered here are quotations from her speeches, writings and interviews, conveying the indomitable spirit and passion of this woman who remains an inspiration to leaders of civil and women's rights movements around the world.
Experience the “heartwarming, smart, and at times even humorous” (Woman’s World) wisdom of Eleanor Roosevelt in this annotated collection of the candid advice columns that she wrote for more than twenty years. In 1941, Eleanor Roosevelt embarked on a new career as an advice columnist. She had already transformed the role of first lady with her regular press conferences, her activism on behalf of women, minorities, and youth, her lecture tours, and her syndicated newspaper column. When Ladies Home Journal offered her an advice column, she embraced it as yet another way for her to connect with the public. “If You Ask Me” quickly became a lifeline for Americans of all ages. Over the twenty years that Eleanor wrote her advice column, no question was too trivial and no topic was out of bounds. Practical, warm-hearted, and often witty, Eleanor’s answers were so forthright her editors included a disclaimer that her views were not necessarily those of the magazines or the Roosevelt administration. Asked, for example, if she had any Republican friends, she replied, “I hope so.” Queried about whether or when she would retire, she said, “I never plan ahead.” As for the suggestion that federal or state governments build public bomb shelters, she considered the idea “nonsense.” Covering a wide variety of topics—everything from war, peace, and politics to love, marriage, religion, and popular culture—these columns reveal Eleanor Roosevelt’s warmth, humanity, and timeless relevance.
From one of the world’s most celebrated and admired public figures, Eleanor Roosevelt, a collection of her most treasured sayings—the perfect gift for Mother’s Day, graduation, and a new generation of feminists. With a foreword by Speaker Nancy Pelosi No one can make you feel inferior without your consent. We’ve all heard this powerful Eleanor Roosevelt adage—it is, perhaps, one of her best known. A wise leader, she knew the power of words, and throughout her work as First Lady, a UN representative, and advocate for human rights, women, youth, minorities, and workers, she was a prolific writer and speaker. Eleanor’s wise words on government, race and ethnicity, freedom, democracy, economics, women and gender, faith, children, war, peace, and our everyday lives leap off the page in memorable quotations such as: · One's philosophy is not best expressed in words; it is expressed in the choices one makes. · Progress is rarely achieved by indifference. · I am convinced that every effort must be made in childhood to teach the young to use their own minds. For one thing is sure: If they don’t make up their minds, someone will do it for them. · Unless people are willing to face the unfamiliar they cannot be creative in any sense, for creativity always means the doing of the unfamiliar, the breaking of new ground. …and these are just a few. At this politically and culturally divided moment in our nation’s history, Eleanor Roosevelt’s quotes have an even deeper resonance—as moving and insightful as they are timely. What Are We For? is a celebration of a cultural icon, and a powerful reminder of Eleanor Roosevelt’s extraordinary contributions to our country, and the world.
The newspapers these days are becoming more and more painful. I was reading my morning papers on the train not so long ago, and looked up with a feeling of desperation. Up and down the car people were reading, yet no one seemed excited. To me the whole situation seems intolerable. We face today a world filled with suspicion and hatred. Some time we must begin, for where there is no beginning there is no end, and if we hope to see the preservation of our civilization, if we believe that there is anything worthy of perpetuation in what we have built thus far, then our people must turn to brotherly love, not as a doctrine but as a way of living. If this becomes our accepted way of life, this life may be so well worth living that we will look into the future with a desire to perpetuate a peaceful world for our children.
The only surviving member of the Snibjorn and Anna Grimson family, Pearl Grimson Lindstrom Bingham, gently and lovingly recounts the memories shared with her by her parents and connects them with her own first-hand experiences. Thus emerges a family's history--beginning with a young immigrant couple who claimed a tract of land through the Homestead Act of 1862 to the present-day fourth generation. Pearl received her higher education in Chicago where she met and married Harry Lindstrom. While she has had a successful banking career, traveled extensively, and enjoyed a full social life, Pearl's first priority has always been the best interest and the happiness of her children--and her grandchildren--who remain the source of her greatest pride and joy. In this delightful collection of her most precious "strands" of memory, Pearl reconstructs for her family and friends, life on the Great Plains of Northeastern North Dakota, the paths that led her away from her childhood home, and her journey to the present.
A candid and insightful look at an era and a life through the eyes of one of the most remarkable Americans of the twentieth century, First Lady and humanitarian Eleanor Roosevelt. The daughter of one of New York’s most influential families, niece of Theodore Roosevelt, and wife of President Franklin Delano Roosevelt, Eleanor Roosevelt witnessed some of the most remarkable decades in modern history, as America transitioned from the Gilded Age, the Progressive Era, and the Depression to World War II and the Cold War. A champion of the downtrodden, Eleanor drew on her experience and used her role as First Lady to help those in need. Intimately involved in her husband’s political life, from the governorship of New York to the White House, Eleanor would eventually become a powerful force of her own, heading women’s organizations and youth movements, and battling for consumer rights, civil rights, and improved housing. In the years after FDR’s death, this inspiring, controversial, and outspoken leader would become a U.N. Delegate, chairman of the Commission on Human Rights, a newspaper columnist, Democratic party activist, world-traveler, and diplomat devoted to the ideas of liberty and human rights. This single volume biography brings her into focus through her own words, illuminating the vanished world she grew up, her life with her political husband, and the post-war years when she worked to broaden cooperation and understanding at home and abroad. The Autobiography of Eleanor Roosevelt includes 16 pages of black-and-white photos.
In this volume the greatest and best-loved woman of her time shares the experiences - private and public - of her thirteen years since the death of her husband, Franklin Delano Roosevelt. She describes in intimate detail the problems she had to solve after her husband’s death, winding up his affairs and working out a pattern for her new life. That new life would include much traveling and diplomatic work around Europe, Russia and Asia for the United Nations, for her forthright humanitarian endeavors she was voted as ninth in Gallup’s List Of Most Widely Admired People Of The 20th Century.
More than two hundred columns, articles, essays, speeches, and letters, tracing Eleanor Roosevelt's development from timorous columnist to one of liberalism's most eloquent and outspoken leaders. From My Day columns on Marian Anderson, excerpts from Moral Basis of Democracy and This Troubled World, to speeches and articles on the Holocaust and McCarthyism.
Letters to Eleanor: Voices of the Great Depression examines how the flood of letters from ordinary Americans to the First Lady established a bond of hope and trust. Through this paper trail, Eleanor Roosevelt was able to help many petitioners find jobs, food, housing, and clothes. To others she offered the encouragement and support many need in the bleak Thirties. Through it all Eleanor Roosevelt exhibited a tradionalist social outlook by her support of homemakers and opposition to the Equal Rights Amendment. But as the New Deal matured, she became an ardent reformer who fought for an anti-lynching law and job opportunity for women in the federal service. Buy beneath her incessant activity to help others there was an inner Eleanor who constantly sought emotional support from female colleagues or her distant correspondents, a support she did not receive form FDR or her family.
In the tradition of Like Water for Chocolate and A Tree Grows in Brooklyn, this exhilarating novel centered around a memorable immigrant family brings to vibrant life the soul and spirit of New York’s legendary Lower East Side. Up from Orchard Street... ...where three generations of Roths live together in a crowded tenement flat at number 12. Long-widowed Manya is the family’s head and its heart: mother of dapper Jack, mother-in-law of frail and beautiful Lil, and adored bubby of Elka and Willy. She’s renowned throughout the teeming neighborhood for her mouthwatering cooking, and every noontime the front room of the flat turns into Manya’s private restaurant, where the local merchants come to savor her hearty stews and soups, succulent potato latkes and tzimmes, preserved fruits and glorious pastries. She is just as renowned for her fierce sense of honor, her quick eye for charlatans, and her generosity to those in need. But Manya is no soft touch–except, perhaps, where her adored granddaughter Elka is concerned. It is skinny, precocious Elka who is her closest companion and confidante–and the narrator of this event-packed novel. Through Elka’s eyes we come to know the fascinating characters who come in and out of the Roths’ lives: relatives, eccentric locals, doctors, busybody neighbors–as well as the many men who try fruitlessly to win voluptuous Manya’s favors. We live through the bittersweet world of these blunt, earthy, feisty people for whom poverty was endemic, illness common, crises frequent, and zest for living intense. Money may have been short but opinions were not, and their tart tongues and lively humor invest every page. In this riveting story lies the heart of the American immigrant experience: a novel at once wise, funny, poignant, anguishing, exultant–and bursting with love.
On the afternoon of December 7, 1941, as a stunned nation gathered around the radio to hear the latest about Pearl Harbor, Eleanor Roosevelt was preparing for her weekly Sunday evening national radio program. At 6:45 p.m., listeners to the NBC Blue network heard the First Lady’s calm, measured voice explain that the president was conferring with his top advisors to address the crisis. It was a remarkable broadcast. With America on the verge of war, the nation heard first not from their president, but from his wife. Eleanor Roosevelt's groundbreaking career as a professional radio broadcaster is almost entirely forgotten. As First Lady, she hosted a series of prime time programs that revolutionized how Americans related to their chief executive and his family. Now, The First Lady of Radio rescues these broadcasts from the archives, presenting a carefully curated sampling of transcripts of Roosevelt's most famous and influential radio shows, edited and set into context by award-winning author and radio producer Stephen Drury Smith. With a foreword by Roosevelt's famed biographer, historian Blanche Wiesen Cook, The First Lady of Radio is both a historical treasure and a fascinating window onto the power and the influence of a pioneering First Lady.
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