Streetcar (Eleanor Roosevelt)

Born to privilege, Eleanor Roosevelt dedicated her life to helping others.

According to author Blanche Cook, in 1900, when Roosevelt was a freshman at New York’s Barnard College, she joined other like-minded students and worked for the Junior League for the promotion of Settlement Movements.

And while other volunteers–like her friend Jean Reid–would often make the trip downtown in private carriages, Eleanor instead chose to use the Fourth Avenue streetcar.

“Even in the evenings, no matter how cold and dark, she refused Jean Reid’s offer of a ride home. She preferred to walk through the streets and to observe the Bower’s lost and lonely men…They gave [her] yet another level of insight into the ravages of alcoholism, and the costs to the children who moved her so deeply.”(1)

Eleanor Roosevelt was born to privilege but always treated privilege as a responsibility to help others. Later, more than any woman of her day, she would play an important role in politics, furthering the cause of civil rights, public policy and social work.

(1)Blanche Wiesen Cook, Eleanor Roosevelt, Volume I (New York, NY: Penguin Books, 1992) p. 134-135.