The Roosevelts and Fiorello La Guardia

  

As La Guardia looks on, President Roosevelt  

signs proclamation naming December 15 as

‘Bill of Rights  Day’ at the White House, 1941

For more photos click here and here

At rally to fight for enactment of Fair Employment Practices Act, La Guardia speaks with FEP committee co-chairman A. Philip Randolph and Eleanor Roosevelt, 1946

Steven A. Levine

Coordinator for Educational Programs

This past Sunday, PBS began airing “The Roosevelts: An Intimate History,” Ken Burns’s documentary about the lives of Theodore, Franklin, and Eleanor Roosevelt.  In 1934 FDR gained a great ally when Fiorello La Guardia became mayor of New York City.  La Guardia defeated Tammany Hall and brought clean and efficient government to NYC, while successfully creating a direct relationship to the White House to fund New Deal projects.  La Guardia, the son of immigrants, came from a humble background, while Eleanor and Franklin descended from one of America’s oldest families.  They nevertheless developed close political friendships, based on shared goals. Under La Guardia’s leadership, New York City used New Deal funds to employ hundreds of thousands to build highways, subways, schools, hospitals, parks, housing and other infrastructure. 

The importance of the relationship between La Guardia and Franklin and Eleanor can be found in the La Guardia and Wagner Archives’ collection, containing 16 photos of Eleanor and 20 photos of Franklin.  If you would like to learn more about La Guardia, the Roosevelts and the New Deal, please feel free to contact me

   

President Roosevelt, Governor Lehman, and Mayor La Guardia campaign together in the 1940 election   campaign.

La Guardia,head of joint U.S.-Canada Defense Board, meets with President Roosevelt and military brass at the White House, 1940          

La Guardia, union leader Sidney Hillman,and Eleanor Roosevelt talking at a dinner honoring Eleanor at the Hotel Commodore, 1941

La Guardia and FDR at the annual Roosevelt Picnic at Hyde Park, NY, 1938 

VIDEO: Professor Emerita Janet Lieberman Remembers Prohibition

         

  Professor Emerita Janet Lieberman

Steven A. Levine 

Coordinator for Educational Programs

Eighty one years ago today, the United States ended Prohibition, its failed experiment in making alcohol, the nation’s  most popular drug, illegal.  From 1920-1933, the 18^th Amendment to the Constitution banned the "manufacture, sale, or transportation of intoxicating liquors for beverage purposes."  Watch a video of La Guardia Professor Emerita Janet Lieberman describing how easy it was to consume alcohol during Prohibition and a Universal Newspaper Newsreelproduced when Prohibition was repealed.

Fiorello La Guardia was also a leading opponent of Prohibition.  To learn more about his views on Prohibition and their similarities to current arguments in favor of marijuana legalization; you can read “Marijuana Legalization Arguments Similar to La Guardia's Arguments Against Prohibition” on the Archives’ blog. 

If you are so inclined, you can also make a toast to the 21^st Amendment that made your drink possible today.

Public Housing Discussion on Brian Lehrer's CUNY TV progam

Archives staff Tara Hickman and Steven Levine and public housing historian Nicholas Bloom discuss the history of NYC public housing and how the Archives uses the NYCHA collection in teaching at LaGuardia Community College on Brian Lehrer.TV.  Check it out on You Tube.  The public housing segment begins at minute 31.

Happy Birthday Eleanor Roosevelt, October 11, 1884

First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt and Mayor Robert F. Wagner, 1956

Steven A. Levine

Coordinator for Educational Programs

In 1963, a year after Eleanor Roosevelt’s death, Mayor Robert F. Wagner memorialized her at the National Roosevelt Day Dinner of the Americans for Democratic Action, the liberal organization she co-founded in the late 1940s. Click here to read Mayor Wagner's speech.

Wagner's relationship with President Roosevelt and First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt was closer than the ones he had with most New York politicians. His father, Senator Robert F. Wagner was a close confidant of the president, going back to their days in the New York State Legislature and the young Wagner knew the future president and first lady from his childhood. But in his years as mayor, Eleanor Roosevelt became both critic and adviser to him. “She instructed me, she criticized me, both publicly and privately. On more than one occasion, she censured me, to my profit, I might add. . . . She was more than a great lady, more than a great personality, more than a great humanitarian. She was a great phenomenon in a phenomenal age.”

If you want to learn more about Eleanor Roosevelt or use other Roosevelt related materials in your classroom, please contact me or Tara Jean Hickman thickman@lagcc.cuny.edu at the Archives.

Social Security Act Became Law August 14, 1935

Steven A. Levine
Coordinator for Educational Programs

President Franklin D. Roosevelt, Postmaster-General James A. Farley,

and Senator Robert F. Wagner, circa 1936.

Seventy seven years ago today, President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed the Social Security Act into law.  New York’s Senator Robert F. Wagner was the law’s lead sponsor in the Senate and he had been a fierce advocate of this legislation to protect the elderly, unemployed and children.*  In May of 1935, he gave a speech on WEVD, a mostly Yiddish language radio station, to rally support.  In the midst of the Great Depression and mass unemployment, he set forth a vision of the United States based on economic security for all, particularly the most vulnerable.

The time has come when our government, backed by overwhelming sentiment of the American people, is prepared to raise men from a level below that of machines and place them on a higher level.  It is our objective to lighten the burdens of unemployment, of uncared for childhood, and of neglected old age, thus making life more enjoyable and secure for the vast majority of Americans.  (Senator Wagner’s complete speech can be read here.)

As the presidential candidates today debate the future of the programs begun by the Social Security Act in 1935 and our nation and the world confront a new economic crisis, Senator Wagner’s words and vision are well worth remembering.

*While the law increased security for many Americans, it also excluded many women, African-Americans and other minorities by not initially covering agricultural workers, domestics, teachers, nurses, and social workers.  Southern Democrats in Congress used their political power to prevent the inclusion of most African-Americans.  

Professor Emerita Janet Lieberman Remembers the 1939 New York World's Fair

Professor Emerita Janet Lieberman 

Remembers the 1939 New York World's Fair

Steven A. Levine

Coordinator for Educational Programs 

On Sunday April 30, 1939, the New York World’s Fair officially opened with a formal ceremony that included a speech by President Franklin D. Roosevelt. The Fair’s opening was selected to coincide with the 150th anniversary of George Washington’s inauguration as the first president of the United States in New York City.

In commemoration of the Fair’s opening, the La Guardia and Wagner Archives has posted on its YouTube channel a video containing footage of the Fair and the memories of La Guardia Community College Professor Emerita Janet Lieberman visiting the Fair. The video was compiled and edited by Sandy Chase.

The 1939 New York World’s Fair offered a vision of a utopian city of tomorrow—one in which life was going to be easy thanks to new technology that would revolutionize transportation, home economics and daily life. Yet, the Fair made no mention of war, no sense of a troubled present, in spite of the looming world nightmare.