The Roosevelts

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vicvanb

Guest
There sure is a lot of junk on TV but the PBS series produced by Ken Burns have been great. I watched the ones on the Civil War, on Lewis and Clark, on the National Parks and on baseball and have been watching and re-watching the latest one on the Roosevelts--Teddy, Franklin and Eleanor. It's a great history lesson from the first half of the 20th century. All three Roosevelts were remarkable people who affected the lives of millions of working people. My parents struggled during the Great Depression and would have been homeless without the programs of The New Deal. My father was a life-long Democrat because of Franklin's policies for the working man. Not many of our presidents were great but Teddy and Franklin are surely in that category. And Ken Burns illustrates why they are.
 
The Democratic party does not excist .

They stole the platform of the Socialist Workers Party.

GOOGLE Thomas Jefferson quotes. Co-founder of the Democratic Party. In realty he was the first LIBERTARIAN.

GOOGLE is your friend. A education that is unavailable in the public school system and university's.
 
Vinny,

Very true--J. P. Morgan hated FDR but for the working men (like my father) who lived through those years, most agreed that The New Deal changed their lives.
 
It's on my list to watch, his documentaries and some of the programing on PBS is the best thing on television.

It's nice to see that they bring so much without the outhouse full of crap most other networks put out there.
 
PURE FICTION. What FDR started was a slippery slope to Socialism. Teddy was not much better. James
 
Opinions do vary. To relate greatness with a political party doesn't jive either. Locally, during Johnstown Pa's last major flood in 1977, a republican mayor was in office and did rise to the occasion during the flood, then a democrat mayor took over and he also rose to the occasion during the aftermath. Both were highly regarded by most of the people involved. They both loved their city and did everything they could to protect and restore it. Lincoln and Reagan both loved this country and wanted to preserve it, and did not want to "fundamentally" change it. Bull Connor was a democrat. John L. Lewis voted mostly republican. Most of the safety institutions (OSHA, MESA, etc) for worker safety came into being by Nixon.
 
James M. said:
PURE FICTION. What FDR started was a slippery slope to Socialism. Teddy was not much better. James
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James ,I strongly disagree.FDR saved the working man during very hard times. I didn't live those times but my Father & Mother did. I grew up hearing the stories often. I remember many of those stories including this one. Being deep in West Virginia most were farmers,timbermen or coal miners at that time, there was little equipment most things were done by hand. The depression hit,banks in this area went broke, if one had money in them most of it and sometimes all of it was lost. No FDIC back then...There was a new gas pipeline to be laid from my grandfathers farm over several miles to a station. The word spread by mouth, No phones, No internet, No TV that the pipeline would hire a crew first of the week, hundreds of men showed up needing a job, about fifty were hired and here is how they were picked, the superintendent stood on the porch of a large tool shed and said " The first fifty men to come out with both a shovel and a maddock have a job the rest go back home. My grandfather watched as men fought for their lives literally to get tools.. Most left unemployed and bruised or bleeding just trying to get a job that paid ten cents per day. Then the programs came out and most of those men found work with the WPA they called it here, they did road work and built outhouses.Folks in West Virginia would have watched their families starve along with themselves if it had not been for FDR..

I have heard my Mother tell of the time her Father needed to mail a letter and didn't have the two cents to pay for the stamp. Can any of us truly even imagine not having TWO pennies ???????

My parents never got clear past that fear, They always stayed very conservative and deep down were always braced for the next great depression.
 
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Everyone can tell similiar events concerning their parents or grandparents. I can too, especially about the coal industry, being a third generation coal miner. What I was trying to point out was that a specific political party especially today doesn't mean greatness. I'll bet republicans and democrats were both fighting for those tools and democrats and republicans were thugs too. I believe the OP was connecting the parties with good and bad which isn't the case. They didn't invent a crisis back in the first half of the 1900's like they do now. They actually had them.
 
Everyone can tell similiar events concerning their parents or grandparents. I can too, especially about the coal industry, being a third generation coal miner. What I was trying to point out was that a specific political party especially today doesn't mean greatness. I'll bet republicans and democrats were both fighting for those tools and democrats and republicans were thugs too. I believe the OP was connecting the parties with good and bad which isn't the case. They didn't invent a crisis back in the first half of the 1900's like they do now. They actually had them. Someone of Japanese ancestry (an American citizen) or other might chime in and say it was embarassing and didn't sit right with them living in an interment camp in the US in the 40's.
 
I agree Dan, Great leaders have came from both parties over the history of this country... And Id guess you're right about men of both parties and maybe even no party at all were fighting for those tools.
 
FDR did not end the depression...WWII did. Teddy was a Republican before he became a Bull Moose. He was almost as sorry as FDR..but not quite. My Father and mother lived through the great depression and survived on a small farm in LA...despite FDR. James
 
My grandfather and father lived on a large farm in West Virginia during that time, I guess they must have survived as well, because I'm running the very same farm today, full time just like they did...
 
City Mouse/Country Mouse

Most farmers that lived outside the drought area (Dust Bowl) survived the Depression just fine. They raised most of their own food and sold the excess to others. Don't forget, at that time a huge hunk of the population still lived in rural areas, many on small family farms. School teachers did OK too. The people who were hurting were urban folks who had jobs in towns and cities. When the businesses that employed them went broke, they were out of work. No unemployment insurance, no welfare, no FDIC when banks closed and savings accounts were gone. Dark days indeed. FDR had the guts to take action and his programs were innovative.
 
My Grandfather, Grandmother, Father, Aunts, etc lived during that period. They praised FDR for his leadership in WWII because of the fact he knew we had to win. They also speak of how he ran as a anti-war president while building depots and ships to fight the war long before we entered into it. Also, they spoke very poorly and specifically about his economic policies. One thing for sure, he broke the tradition set by Washington of only holding the office for eight years.

Hovis
 
And FDR was instrumental in putting us on the long slippery slope that remains today. The growth of the Federal Government and rejection of the Constitutional requirements for limited Federal Government were started by TR, sped up by Wilson and perfected by FDR. They then lay somewhat dormant until LBJ and his war on poverty which continues today.

FDR was instrumental in electrifying rural america. I give him credit for that but look how that same program works today. Do we blame FDR or those that followed him?

The Ken Burns series was interesting but biased. Good intentions do not always bring good results. Many of the myths we have been taught in school (I'm kinda old they taught history back then) were reinforced. There are two sides to every story. bob
 
Indeed!!

bob finger said:
There are two sides to every story.
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Yes there are. Every president including the ones considered by most to be "great" had detractors--or worse yet, those who hated them and actively worked to defeat them. But that is true of every public figure whether they are athletes, entertainers or whatever. The real question is, do their positives outweigh their negatives? FDR had a hugely difficult task in dealing with the Depression and a lot of peoples' lives depended on his leadership. It's true that his vision of the role of the federal government was much different than in earlier administrations, but that was what was required at the time. I can't imagine what would have happened if Hoover or McKinley or Landon or Smith had been in office then instead of FDR.
 
Democrats-VS-Repulicans...........???

Despite the popularity factor of certain presidents/public officals..... no one person can accomplish much.But working as a team... they get things done......A leader surrounds himself with experts...not activists...
Then he unites.... not divides.....
Some say those dam rebpubs...others those dam dems.
Where have the AMERICANS gone...............???????
bill larson
 
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