We’ve crossed the Poughkeepsie Bridge to Route 9W northward to Hyde Park in New York State. The weather was beautiful making for a perfect day to visit the FDR National Historic Site. The Presidential Library and Museum, Roosevelt Estate Home, and Top Cottage are fascinating places.The site contains Springwood known as the birthplace, residence, and “summer White House” of our 32nd president elected to four terms.
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| Roosevelt home place known as Springwood |
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| Dogwood tree |
The 300-acre estate owned and overlooked by his mother Sarah Delano Roosevelt includes the Rose Garden where the President and Eleanor and their beloved dog Fala are buried. Hyde Park along the Hudson River was the nucleus of FDR’s life and place of retreat when he wasn’t in New York or Campobello for the summers.
He had a life-long emotional connection to Hyde Park which provided him with a place for reflection, solitude, personal restoration, and ideas for world-changing decisions through the Great Depression and WWII. Touring the Roosevelt home place we’ve learned much about FDR’s public and private life.
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| FDR's den at Springwood |
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| FDR and Eleanor's grave site at Springwood in Hyde Park |
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| Springwood carriage house and barn |
It has been great fun visiting all the Roosevelt home places. Both Springwood and FDR’s own personal private retreat at Top Cottage allowed us to better understand why FDR wrote, “All that is within me cries out to go back to my home on the Hudson River,” The grounds and estate of Springwood overlooking the Hudson River Valley are quite lovely.
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| FDR's private retreat called Top Cottage is isolated on the Springwood property |
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| Roosevelt loved Top Cottage as his small private retreat. Here he used his wheelchair freely away from the public. |
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| Top Cottage's back porch is delightful and peaceful to sit upon. |
Eleanor lived fulltime at her own little cottage of Val-Kill on the estate two miles to the east after FDR died. Here the First Lady had personal freedom to entertain world leaders informally, write a daily news column for years, draft many of her ideas on issues for humanitarian causes, and later further her efforts on civil rights and world peace with the United Nations.
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Val-Kill was Eleanor's own sanctuary in Hyde Park
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| Churchill, Queen Elizabeth, Kruschev, Neru visited Val-Kill for picnics |
We’ve crossed the Poughkeepsie Bridge to Route 9W northward to Hyde Park in New York State. The weather was beautiful making for a perfect day to visit the FDR National Historic Site. The Presidential Library and Museum, Roosevelt Estate Home, and Top Cottage are fascinating places.The site contains Springwood known as the birthplace, residence, and “summer White House” of our 32nd president elected to four terms. 
