Sara Delano Roosevelt’s copy of her son’s biography with her initials, “SDR”, in pencil to the front free end paper, from the collection of Frederick Baldwin Adams, a relative of FDR and his mother. Sara Delano Roosevelt clearly read the book with close interest, as indicated by the marginal pencil lines scattered throughout the text. As these annotations are fairly extensive, albeit heavily concentrated in the latter two-thirds of the book which concentrate on F.D.R.’s political career (1910s-1930s), it is difficult to identify Sara’s precise points of interest, although there is the odd occurrence. For example, on p.96, a less-encountered double-line is pencilled next to a sentence regarding F.D.R.’s embarkation on a new destroyer, the
Dyer, during the First World War, on which occasion “since he was sailing under secret orders, neither his wife nor his mother could see him off” – perhaps a difficult memory that stuck in Sara’s mind. More broadly, sections concerning family friends and commentary regarding F.D.R.’s political achievements appear to have elicited the most interest. A touching relic, indicative of Sara’s famous devotion and steadfast support for her son, whom she lived to see elected three times as President of the United States.
An account of the life and character of President Franklin Delano Roosevelt by family friend, writer, and music critic Basil Maine (1894-1972). The present copy comes from the Franklin Delano Roosevelt collection of Frederick Baldwin Adams Jr (1910-2001), the son of Ellen Walters Delano, who was a first cousin to President Roosevelt. Adams became a passionate bibliophile who served as director of the Pierpont Morgan Library in New York City for two decades and compiled a significant personal collection relating to F.D.R.. In 1969 he married his third wife who was a Swedish princess and with whom he shared the final years of his life in France. Adams’ move to France explains the presence of his books in the United Kingdom.
First edition. Publisher’s original pink cloth with titles in gilt to the spine. Illustrated with nine black and white photographs. Panels of the original dustwrapper loosely laid in along with a newspaper obituary of Sir Sayaji Rao, Indian ruler of Baroda who was a guest at the White House in 1934. A very good copy, the binding square and firm with a little fading to the spine. The contents with toning to two text pages resulting from the insertion of the newspaper cutting are otherwise excellent throughout.
