How I Discovered the Real Eleanor Roosevelt Through Her Photographs at Val-Kill
Guest Column by Holley Snaith
A fresh blanket of snow covered the grounds of Val-Kill, Eleanor Roosevelt’s retreat in Hyde Park, New York. The site was closed to visitors for the winter, and the only sounds were the wind moving through the bare trees and the occasional creak of the old house. Alone inside the cottage, I carried a large brown binder filled with black-and-white photographs from room to room, comparing images taken shortly after Eleanor’s death in 1962 with the walls around me. Those images offered clues to the people and memories the longest serving former first lady and activist chose to surround herself with during the final years of her life.
At the time, I was at the beginning of my career as a historian, yet the Roosevelts had already been part of my life for several years. I started researching Franklin and Eleanor …
