September 12, 2006 Host: Judith Earley Guest: Robert Clark, Supervisory Archivist, Franklin D. Roosevelt Presidential Library
Robert Clark discusses the history and development of the Roosevelt Library and Museum Duration: 00:18:15
Judith: We are here today with Robert Clark, Supervisory Archivist from the Franklin D. Roosevelt Presidential Library in Hyde Park, New York.
Judith: Hello, Mr. Clark.
Clark: Good Afternoon.
Judith: First of all, could you tell us a little bit about the history of the Roosevelt Library and museum?
Clark: Sure, I'd be happy to. The Roosevelt Library was the first Presidential Library in America, and it was really the brain-child of Franklin Roosevelt. In 1937, in the middle of his second term, Roosevelt was actually anticipating following the two term tradition, and retiring in 1941 to his home in Hyde Park. But, he had a real problem. He was not only an avid collector, but the United States government had grown so much as a result of his New Deal, that the White House had an immense amount of historical documents and other materials that needed to be preserved. In addition to that, Roosevelt also had his papers from his time as Governor of the State of New York, as Assistant Secretary of the Navy during the Wilson administration, and as New York State Senator for the Duchess County New York area where Hyde Park is located.
Judith: Ok.
Clark: Plus all of his family collections, and his own collection of ship models and things related to the Navy that he loved so much.
Judith: Wow!
Clark: He needed a place to put all of these materials, and he started searching around for examples of what his predecessor presidents had done with their materials, and he was really disturbed. As an amateur historian himself, he was greatly troubled by the fact that presidential historical materials really did not have a very good track record for surviving. Collections were split up, collections were lost to autograph hunters, collections were sold to make the former presidents and their families money. Some of them might end up in the Library of Congress or split between two institutions or disappear all together. And he was very, very troubled about that. So, what he did was, he established a committee, which was a great thing for a New Deal-er to do. He established a committee of historians, and it included the archivists of the United States, to survey his collections and give him a recommendation. And what this group of historians and scholars did was they recommended that a separate institution be established to maintain all of Roosevelt's collections separately for the purposes of scholarship. And so, what the president decided to do, and he announced in 1938, was the formation of a private company, private corporation, to raise money from private citizens to build a historical library on the land, on his estate in Hyde Park. That would all be turned over to the government; his own collections would be deposited there and also turned over to the government. And it would be open to all scholars and to the public as a place to study and research and learn about the history of his administration.
Judith: Oh, ok.
Clark: What ended up happening, of course, was that as this project progressed, the onset of World War II, of course, took place. He ran for a third term and then for a fourth term. The library was completed and dedicated in June of 1941. The museum galleries, where many of his collections were on display, were open to the public at that time. His historical materials and documents began coming up from the White House and from his other homes at about that time as well. Of course, he died in 1945. The collections—the research room—was opened to the public in 1946, and about 85% of the presidential materials were open to the public for research in the early 1950's.
Judith: Oh. Now, is all of the library and museum open to the public?
Clark: It is. It is. The museum galleries themselves see about a quarter million visitors per year. The research facilities, over which I am supervisor, include the archival materials, the printed material collections, the photograph collection, and of course, the research. We're consistently one of the top two busiest libraries in the Presidential Library system. We see about 600 on-site researchers a year doing about 1,500 visits, and then we receive about 8,000 research inquiries via email, telephone, and fax.
Judith: Wow. Now, what kinds of papers, exactly, are housed in the library, versus what's housed in the museum?
Clark: Sure, the museum collections include what you would think of as 3-dimensional objects. State gifts, the president's clothing, objects that he used in daily life, or objects that Mrs.Roosvelt used in daily life, their family heirlooms, that kind of thing. The research and archival operations have more 2-dimensional things or documentary materials. We have about 17 million pages of manuscript material. Six million pages of those are the president's presidential materials from the period during his administration. About another three million of those are Mrs. Roosevelt's, Eleanor Roosevelt's, papers covering her entire life. The balance of that collection are more of FDR's materials from his jobs prior to the presidency. And then one of the really unique things about this institution and about the Presidential Library system that grew out of it is the fact that Roosevelt wanted the library to be large enough to house collections of materials that related to his administration. So, it was built with plenty of room to house the papers of his cabinet officials, New Deal administrators, war-time administrators, diplomats, and other related people. So that really, this would be a one-stop shop for studying the Roosevelt era.
Judith: Now, how is the library paid for? And where does the funding come from?
Clark: That's a great question. As I indicated in my earlier comments, the building itself was financed with private funds. There was about $450,000 that were raised privately. And not all of that was used, amazingly enough, in this project. It came in under budget and on time. So, the building itself was built with private funds. The 16 acres on which the library sits was actually part of the Roosevelt estate, and the Roosevelt family gave that to the government at the time that the library was built. Now, the building, its contents, and the land, were given to the government. The building is now maintained by the federal government through the regular budgetary process, as a part of the National Archives and Records Administration.
Judith: Ok. Does the Roosevelt Library offer any kind of educational programs for school children?
Clark: We do. The national archive, in last decade and a half, has been really committed to making sure that the young people in the United States have a real understanding of the country's history. And so, the Presidential Libraries have been committed to having very strong educational programs. And so, through our website, as well as through our education staff, there are educational materials, lessons plans, and programs that we do for children of all ages. From kindergarteners, where someone dressed in a costume like Fala the dog, you know, visits with the children about the Roosevelts, up through very intensive post-high school document based research projects that are overseen by the education staff.
Judith: Oh, ok. Now can you tell us a little bit about how the Presidential Library system came into existence—the history of it?
Clark: Absolutely, and again, this gets back to Roosevelt. Roosevelt was very foresighted in seeing the need for a Presidential Library, at least for himself, but also for what would certainly be his successors. And so, the Roosevelt model for how he built his library actually became law, in terms of how presidential libraries were established after him. So, the Presidential Libraries Act from the 1950's actually established that a Presidential Library must be built with private funds, as was Roosevelt's. It would be built to national archive standards, and then the building and the contents would be turned over to the government and to the national archives for staffing and maintenance. So, every library since then has been established based on the same model. And so, what you see is that with every library there is the support foundation or private organization that helps support the library initially in terms of raising money to build it and then also to assist it with its programs after the library becomes established.
Judith: Now, is it sort of automatic that, as soon as a president takes office, the process begins to make sure that there is a library for him after his term is over?
Clark: Sure, it's not necessarily automatic. The way presidential materials, the papers themselves, have been handled has kind of evolved over time. During Roosevelt's time—under the law at the time—the president's papers were considered to be his personal property, and he could do with them what he wanted. And up through, up to Richard Nixon, that was still the case. And so, a president could choose whether or not he wanted to build a library, or to do with what he wanted, in terms of where to deposit his papers. So, it wasn't mandatory. The law was, essentially, set up to provide a means for it to be accomplished. When Richard Nixon resigned office in 1974, the government was presented with a very unique situation in that, under the law, Nixon's papers were really his personal property. But the government wanted to ensure that any possible evidence of criminal conduct would be preserved. And so, the congress immediately passed the Presidential Recordings and Materials Act which, essentially, placed a hold on Richard Nixon's tapes and papers and deposited them in the national archives for safe keeping. There has been much discussion between the Nixon family and the government in terms of who really owns those materials. That was legally resolved in the last few years. And finally there is going to be a Nixon Presidential Library established out in California that will be run by the national archives; and Nixon's materials, presidential materials, will be deposited out in California. In the aftermath of that whole incident, what then happened was Congress passed the Presidential Records Act of 1978. What that law said was that as of the swearing in of the president beginning in 1981, meaning—Ronald Regan is who it ended up being—that beginning with the Ronald Regan's administration, presidential documents and materials would be automatically considered to be property of the federal government. So that, regardless of whether a president decided to build a presidential library or not, th ose documents will remain in the custody and care of the National Archives and Records Administration.
Judith: Ok, so the Richard Nixon Library that's in Yorba Linda, CA, that's private—that's not associated currently with the Presidential Library system?
Clark: Well, and that's why this interview is so great, because it kind of allows us to update what's happening with the Nixon Library. And although I am not intimately involved with that, what's going on right now, I do know that initially that library out there was a private library that held Nixon's pre-presidential and post-presidential materials. An agreement has been reached between that institution and the national archives and the federal government where that library will transition to become a full Presidential Library. So, that transition is happening now. The facilities need to be brought up to national archive standards, and some additional facilities need to be built to store the large amount of materials. But it ultimately will become the full Presidential Library run by the National Archives and Records Administration, with national archive staff, open to all scholars and people interested in the Nixon administration.
Judith: Oh ok, that's very interesting. Now, how soon after a president leaves office are his papers and records available for researchers?
Clark: It kind of depends on the nature of the content of the materials. Of course, materials within presidential papers that are classified or relate to military secrets or to the defense of the nation or to protection of the president, those can remain closed for quite a number of years, just because of the need to protect that information. Other materials that don't have classified or restricted information can be open fairly quickly. One of the problems that you see with newer administrations, though, is just the sheer quantity of materials. You know, Franklin Roosevelt was in office for 12 years and saw the country through the two greatest crises of the 20th century—the Depression and World War II—and his presidential materials only total about six million pages. The Clinton Library that just opened in Little Rock a couple of years ago, it has about 78 million pages of presidential materials, plus an additional 80 million documents in electronic format.
Judith: Wow!
Clark: And the staffing between the two institutions isn't really—there really isn't a great difference in the number of staff people at either in institution. So, the newer libraries have a real problem of just trying to keep up requests under the Freedom of Information Act or special requests for information. While there are—some materials are restricted statutorily or by executive order because of the nature of the information in them, some material is not open yet simply because there aren't enough staffing resources to get them processed and opened quickly for researchers.
Judith: Now, is there a difference between what's available for a researcher versus what's available for the general public?
Clark: No. The national archive believes—our mission is to provide ready access to our holdings to all of the American people and any interested person of the world. So, you don't need to be an eminent scholar or a PhD to use our research rooms. You can be junior high student working on a history project or a Boy Scout or Girl Scout trying to earn your merit badge or a college student working on a term paper or a PhD student working on your dissertation. Our research rooms are open to anyone with a topic that we can help them with.
Judith: What happens to papers that are classified? Are they housed at the library or are they kept some place else?
Clark: In general, those types of materials are housed at the particular library associated with that administration. Some materials may be housed at the national archives. There are regular review periods that all documents go through that are set by statute and by executive order. And so, you know, those materials are continually being reviewed and material that can be declassified—working in the conjunction with the affected agencies, such as the defense department or the atomic energy commission—the archivists will push the process along to see that materials are declassified at an appropriate time.
Judith: Is there a relationship between the Presidential Library system and the Library of Congress?
Clark: Well, we're part of the same government, but there's not a formal relationship between the two. The Presidential Libraries are part of the National Archives and Records Administration that was established in 1934 by Franklin Roosevelt, incidentally. The Library of Congress, of course, is a much, much older institution. The Library of Congress, for the most part, does not house federal records. What they house are research materials or personal paper collections. The National Archives, its mission is to house the federal records of the government. The Presidential Library system is kind of something in between; we house federal records, but we also house the personal papers of presidents and their associates. But technically, the Presidential Libraries are part of the National Archives and Records Administration.
Judith: Ok. Is there anything else that I've neglected to ask you that you might want to tell us about the Presidential Library system or the Roosevelt Library?
Clark: I just want to encourage anyone to take advantage of our holdings. I know that this discussion is also aimed at law students and law professors and people interested in the legal profession. The Presidential Libraries hold an amazing amount of resources related to how our government functions, and I think that's one of the most important things that the libraries do, is they help educate the people of the United States about how their government functions. And as a legal professional, one should always consider the Presidential Libraries as, perhaps, an untapped resource for them to learn about how laws are established and agencies operate and how the government functions.
Judith: Great! Well thank you so much, Mr. Clark. I really appreciate it. This is very interesting, and I thank you for you time.
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