DEAR MR. PRESIDENT:
FRANKLIN DELANO ROOSEVELT
Letters from a Mill Town Girl
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In the early 1930's, the Great Depression touched every corner of the country. One quarter of the workers in America didn't have jobs. Banks in thirty-eight states had closed their doors, and many others were about to collapse.
Imagine a girl named Emma Bartoletti who lived in a Massachusetts mill town. Imagine that Emma wrote to President Franklin D. Roosevelt and that the president wrote back.
September 13, 1933
North Adams, Massachusetts
Dear Mr. President Roosevelt,
Last week, my father was making $20 a week and now he only gonna be making $14. He says you are President and you know best, but I'm not so sure about that. So please explain to me what you are thinking.
Your friend,
Emma Bartoletti
October 14, 1933
The White House
Dear Miss Emma Bartoletti,
I'm wondering if you have a radio, and whether you are able to listen to my fireside chats. At the end of July, I gave the country a talk on what the NRA is supposed to do and how important it is for the general prosperity of our whole country...I appreciate hearing from you and ask that you keep in touch and let me know more about your family and your situation. Down here in Washington, where everybody talks and nobody listens, it is refreshing to hear a clear voice from New England.
Very sincerely yours, Franklin D. Roosevelt