The Library

The Library. W.D. Urbin/NPS Photo

This room reflects FDR's wide-ranging interests. Built largely to accomodate the needs of an ardent collector, the Library is furnished with ample bookcases, display cases, and print cases. Surrounded by ancestral portraits, political memorabilia, important memorabilia, and paintings from his naval collection, FDR spent many hours in this room reviewing his collections of stamps, prints, books, and manuscripts. The room is furnished with important artifacts from the life of FDR and his mother Sara. The east fireplace is flanked by the chairs he used during two consecutive terms as governor of New York from 1928 to 1932. Display cases along the north and south walls feature coins, medals, political and campaign memorabilia. Hidden cabinets behind the panels flanking the west fireplace held a collection of books authored by his cousin, Theodore Roosevelt. The winged victory at the southeast corner of the room was a gift to Sara from the French government. The Library holds over 3,000 volumes of novels and books on a variety of subjects.

 

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Furnishings of Note

 

FDR's Wheelchair

The wooden seat (a modified oak task chair) is mounted on a black metal frame with two large wheels at the front, two small pivoting wheels at the back. The wheelchair is one of several built to FDR's specifications. Commercial wheelchairs of the era were typically large and cumbersome, and would have been difficult to maneuver around FDR's house. This is one of four known wheelchairs used by FDR—two are in the collection at the Home of Franklin D. Roosevelt National Historic Site, one is at the FDR Presidential Library, and one at Warm Springs, Georgia.

 

Isaac Roosevelt

Isaac Roosevelt (1726-1794) was FDR's great-great-great grandfather. A known patriot, Roosevelt was elected to the New York Provincial Congress in 1775 and was one of the Committee of One Hundred that took control of the state government in May of that year. Though he was initially a moderate hoping to prevent conflict, he withdrew from New York when the British occupied the city, and spent the period of occupation in Dutchess County, serving with the Sixth Regiment of the Dutchess County Militia. Following the American Revolution, Roosevelt served as one of ten representatives from New York City that deliberated on the adoption of the United States Constitution. He was a member of the New York State Senate from 1777 to 1786, and from 1788 to 1792. Roosevelt’s fortune from sugar refining, and his political accomplishments, became a foundation of the family's wealth, prominence and influence.

 

Campanino Chair

This elegant side chair was manufactured in Chiavari, a small town located in the Liguria region of Italy. In the nineteenth century, Chiavari became famous for their most popular export—a range of lightweight, but sturdy, delicate chiars, each component engineered for specific physical stresses. This model, the Campanino, is based on the original design created in 1807 by a local cabinetmaker Giuseppe Gaetano Descalzi. Following his succes, many small factories opened in Chiavari and surrounding towns, offering a range of lightweight chairs that appear in other rooms throughout the Roosevelts' house.

 

Franklin Delano Roosevelt

This painting by Ellen Emmet Rand represents the first portrait FDR sat for after his election to the presidency in 1932. Unsatisfied with the results, Rand began a second version that FDR accepted as the official White House portrait. Years later, in 1939, Sara purchased this first version from Rand and placed it in the living room at Springwood.

Ellen Emmet Rand, one of the preimenent portraitists of her time, excelled at The Art Students League of New York where she received instruction from William Merritt Chase and Kenyon Cox. In 1896, she moved with her family to England where she received many commissions for portraits. She returned to New York in 1911 and set up a studio in Washington Square.

 

Winged Victory