Franklin Delano Roosevelt lived one of the most eventful lives of anyone of his times, and left behind a remarkably detailed accounting of his life and achievements in the form of the thousands of personal letters, manuscripts, documents, speeches, magazine articles, photographs, and official correspondence now housed in the Franklin Delano Roosevelt Library at Hyde Park. My own research on Roosevelt’s life, and how it related to the U.S. Navy, began there, and I am indebted to the staff members of the library, who were invariably helpful and often went out of their way to find material I did not even know I needed. I am equally indebted to the many writers who have come before me, and whose works helped shape my own understanding and interpretation of FDR and his times. Chief among these I include:
Alsop, Joseph. FDR: A Centenary Remembrance. New York, 1982.
Ashburn, Frank D. Peabody of Groton: A Portrait. New York, 1944.
Bullitt, Orville H. (ed.). For The President, Personal And Secret. New York, 1972.
Burns, James MacGregor. Roosevelt: The Lion and the Fox. New York, 1956.
Burns, James MacGregor. Roosevelt: The Soldier of Freedom. New York, 1970.
Burns, James MacGregor, and Susan Dunn. The Three Roosevelts: Patrician Leaders Who Transformed America. New York, 2001.
Churchill, Allen. The Roosevelts: American Aristocrats. New York, 1965.
Cross, Robert F. Sailor in the White House. Annapolis, 2003.
Davis, Kenneth S. FDR: The Beckoning of Destiny. New York, 1971.
Dows, Olin. Franklin Roosevelt at Hyde Park. New York, 1949.
Evans, Harold. The American Century. New York, 1998.
Fenster, Julie M. FDR’s Shadow: Louis Howe, the Force that Shaped Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt. New York, 2009.
Freidel, Frank. Franklin D. Roosevelt: The Apprenticeship. Boston, 1952.
Freidel, Frank. Franklin D. Roosevelt: The Ordeal. Boston, 1954.
Kilpatrick, Carroll (ed.). Roosevelt & Daniels. Chapel Hill, 1952.
Larrabee, Eric. Commander in Chief: Franklin Delano Roosevelt, His Lieutenants & Their War. New York, 1987.
Lash, Joseph P. Eleanor and Franklin. New York, 1971.
Lindley, Ernest K. Franklin D. Roosevelt: A Career in Progressive Democracy. Indianapolis, 1931.
Marolda, Edward J. (ed.). FDR and the U.S. Navy. New York, 1998.
Perkins, Frances. The Roosevelt I Knew. New York, 1946.
Persico, Joseph E. Franklin & Lucy. New York, 2008.
Roosevelt, Elliott (ed.). F.D.R.: His Personal Letters, Early Years. New York, 1947.
Roosevelt, Elliott (ed.). F.D.R.: His Personal Letters 1905-1928. New York, 1948.
Roosevelt, Theodore. The Naval War of 1812. Annapolis, 1987.
Rosenau, James N. (ed.). The Roosevelt Treasury. New York, 1951.
Simpson, Michael. Anglo-American Naval Relations 1917-1919. London, 1991.
Smith, Richard K. First Across!: The U.S. Navy’s Transatlantic Flight of 1919. Annapolis, 1973.
Sprout, Harold and Margaret. The Rise of American Naval Power 1776-1918. Annapolis, 1990.
Symonds, Craig. Historical Atlas of the U.S. Navy. Annapolis, 1995.
Tuchman, Barbara W. The Zimmermann Telegram. New York, 1985.
Ward, Geoffrey C. Before the Trumpet: Young Franklin Roosevelt. New York, 1985.
Ward, Geoffrey C. A First Class Temperament: The Emergence of Franklin Roosevelt. New York, 1989.
Willis, Resa. FDR and Lucy: Lovers and Friends. New York, 2004.
A book is often more of a collaborative effort than is generally understood, and there is no way this particular book could have seen the light of day had it not been for two particularly important midwives: first, my agent, Al Zuckerman, who had the original idea that eventually evolved into the present work; and second, my publisher and editor, Claiborne Hancock, who guided me through a sometimes troubling birthing process with wisdom, patience, enthusiasm, and good humor. In addition, I would like to express my thanks to Phil Gaskill, whose awesome erudition in such diverse disciplines as naval nomenclature and baseball history was extremely helpful, and Maria Fernandez, whose design skills show up on every page. To my closest collaborator, my wife Belinda, I can finally offer a future in which every dinner hour will not necessarily be given over to a discussion of Woodrow Wilson’s assistant secretary of the Navy.