The future president of the United States sat on a crate, gazing obediently at the camera. His blonde hair flowed softly over the shoulders of a frilly white dress. In his tiny hands he held a feathered bonnet. The hem of his skirt spread out demurely just below his knees. On his feet he wore a pair of black patent leather shoes. In an instant, the light above the camera flashed—POP!—and forever captured two-and-a-half-year-old Franklin D. Roosevelt’s image just as his mother wanted to remember him: dressed like a girl.

In those days, it wasn’t unusual for boys to wear dresses for formal photographs. In fact, it was considered fashionable. But eventually young Franklin reached the age when he wanted to cut his hair short and to dress like other boys, and that’s when the trouble started. His mother, Sara Delano Roosevelt, cried when the barber cut off his beautiful golden curls. She agreed to put away the dresses only if Franklin would agree to wear a miniature navy blue sailor suit. In the Roosevelt house, this was considered a grand compromise.

She simply refused to let him wear the clothes he wanted to wear—or to do many of the things he wanted to do.

Franklin’s mother managed every moment of her son’s day: He woke up at 7 a.m. He ate breakfast at 8. He took his lessons from 9 to noon. Then he ate lunch. He was allowed an hour for play, followed by more lessons until 4 p.m. After that he was allowed two more hours to play games that his mother approved of before supper was served at 6 p.m. Two hours later, at 8 p.m., Franklin was put to bed. The same schedule was observed day after day, month after month, year after year.

Franklin also had no privacy. His mother followed him everywhere. Once, when Franklin came down with scarlet fever, the doctor banned all visitors from his bedside. But his mother would not be denied. She leaned a ladder against the side of the house so that she could climb up and peep in on her son through his bedroom window.

Wary about letting her only child fall in with the wrong crowd, Sara insisted on selecting Franklin’s playmates. Few neighborhood kids wanted anything to do with the strange rich kid whose mom was constantly hovering over him. Sara was reduced to begging children to come over and play with Franklin. When she couldn’t find anyone, he would bang his head against the wall in frustration.

But if playtime was bad, bathtime was worse. Franklin wasn’t allowed to bathe by himself until he was almost nine years old. That brief taste of freedom was enough to prompt him to write home in triumph to his father from his grandmother’s house: “Mama left this morning, and I am to take my bath alone!” The very next day, Franklin’s mother went back to overseeing his tub time.

Eventually, this maternal overprotection began to take a toll. Franklin loved his mother very much, but he felt like he never had any solitude or independence. It’s totally normal to want to be alone with yourself, but his mom didn’t seem to understand.

One day she found Franklin sitting all alone, looking sad. She did what she could to cheer him up, but he remained stuck in a melancholy funk. “Are you unhappy?” she asked. Franklin paused. Then he lifted his head and replied with great weariness: “Yes, I am unhappy.” When his mother asked why, Franklin was silent again for a moment. He clasped his hands and struggled to explain that he needed a little freedom.

His mother was shocked. She had never seen her son so despondent. What did it mean? She asked Franklin what he would do if he had complete freedom. He said he didn’t know. But clearly it was something that was very important to him.

The next morning, Franklin’s parents took him aside. They told him that, for one whole day, he could do whatever he desired. He could ignore his daily schedule, disobey every rule his mother had laid down, and go anywhere he wanted, doing whatever he pleased. Needless to say, Franklin was ecstatic!

Almost immedietly, he ran out the door.

And didn’t return until late that night—hungry, tired, and covered in dirt.

Franklin didn’t say a word about where he had been or what he had done. His parents were mystified.

Was he out wrestling a bear?

Was he running atop a moving train?

Did he foil a bank robbery?

Was he trampled by a herd of angry Bigfoots?

No one ever found out. In fact, for the rest of his life, Franklin D. Roosevelt kept the secret of his “Day of Freedom” all to himself. He never told anyone in his family, not even his wife, Eleanor, where he went that day.

But we can’t help but wonder if the Day of Freedom unleashed something special in Roosevelt. Perhaps the taste of autonomy sparked something that allowed him to become a strong, independent person who would one day be elected president of the United States.