The Senior Couple Missionaries enjoyed another ADVENTURE on Monday, Sept 19, 2016-- to Hyde Park (not quite London-- but exciting and interesting). This is the location of the home and estate of one of the prominent Roosevelt families, in New York and in the USA. It is where Franklin Delano Roosevelt was raised and where he lived after he married. It is located to the north of NYC--by about not quite 2 hours. We traveled by train--this time departing from Grand Central Station on the Metro-North rail line--Hudson Valley Region. Grand Central Station is an amazing place--but that is another story for another day! We traveled along the Hudson River all the way north--past Poughkeepsie, New York, to the area known as Hyde Park. It was a beautiful day--some light drizzle as we left our apartment building minutes before 8:00 am, but cleared up as we began traveling north.  Here is some interesting information about the Roosevelts.
"All that is within me cries out to go back to my home on the Hudson River" FDR

This quote captures FDR's connection to Springwood, the estate that he loved & the place he considered home. The first US Presidential Library was started by FDR here-- the only President elected to four terms.
The Roosevelt family has been associated with many prominent institutions, including Harvard University and Groton School, which was first attended by Franklin Roosevelt and later many of both his and Theodore's children and descendants. The Roosevelt family is an American business and political family from New York whose members have included two United States Presidents, a First Lady,[1] and notable merchants, politicians, inventors, clergymen, artists, and socialites. Descendants of a mid-17th century Dutch immigrant to New Amsterdam, many members of the family became locally prominent in New York City business and politics and intermarried with prominent colonial families. Two distantly related branches of the family from Oyster Bay on Long Island and Hyde Park in Dutchess County, Upstate New York achieved national political prominence with the elections of Presidents Theodore Roosevelt (1901–1909) and his fifth cousin Franklin Delano Roosevelt (1933–1945), whose wife, First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt, was Theodore's niece.
We were able to see most of this huge estate and really wished we had stayed longer at the FDR Library--as there were many exhibits and displays with so much interesting information about this 4-term President who truly launched the original "New Deal" to bring this country out of the affects of the Great Depression of the 1930's.

There were several "homes" on this estate and acres acres of lawn. One of the most amazing things we learned was that someone in that family had 450,000 trees planted to add to the beauty and splendor of what New England and much of the East coast already boast as "woods"!


Welcome to "Springwood"
Home of Franklin Delano Roosevelt

Eleanor and Franklin "sitting" in the garden outside the "Welcoming Center" at the FDR estate in Hyde Park, NY



THE BURIAL GARDEN-SITE
Where both FDR and Eleanor are interred
The Rose Garden surrounding the FDR burial site on the estate

Gardens behind the FDR estate


One of the many varieties roses found in the Rose Garden


The 12 x 12 foot room in the Springwood Estate house--(Roosevelt "family home") --right wing--where FDR in consultation with others, decided to drop the atom bomb 

A view from the porch of the main house overlooking the Hudson River Valley in Poughkeepsie area 
of New York ( S Mumford on the stairs)



Our Group enjoying a meal before we board the train in Hyde Park to return to Grand Central Station and home to Manhattan



Sunset over the Hudson from restaurant window in Hyde Park ( near train station) 


Looking straight onto the patio behind the Library--there are "cut-outs" of 
Eleanor and Franklin made from materials from the Berlin Wall 
Our Group in front of the patio
L to R--Buchanans, Rogers, Sister Wilson, Mumfords, Grimley's, and Elder Harris (back row) 
Bust of FDR


Bust of Sir Winston Churchil 


On another estate known as the "Vanderbilt Mansion"-- the beautifully terraced gardens







Looking down upon the beautiful gardens at Vanderbilt Mansion 

A "lily pond"

Gardens that are "cut out" 

So many flowerbeds!! 

There are several "homes" located on the property which makes up this beautiful estate.

Val-Kill cottage (in the winter)



Val-Kill cottage as is seen today

The "'cottage"  known  as Val-Kill is Eleanor Roosevelt's "escape from the crowds" and where she lived after FDR's death until her own death in the 1962.  Eleanor's stone cottage at Val-Kill two miles east of Springwood and its surrounding 
property of 181 acres (0.73 km2), that had been her home after the death of her husband and the only residence she had ever personally owned,[77] in 1977, it was formally designated by an act of Congress as the Eleanor Roosevelt National Historic Site, "to commemorate for the education, inspiration, and benefit of present and future generations the life and work of an outstanding woman in American history.


Top Cottage was FDR's retreat home
Franklin Roosevelt built Top Cottage at the eastern most end of his estate on land purchased in 1937 on what his cousin and close friend Margaret Suckley called "the nicest Hill in Dutchess County." FDR imagined Top Cottage as a place where he could return to private life after his second term as president. When he was elected to an unprecedented third term in 1940, Roosevelt realized that the little retreat would be an excellent place to "escape the mob" at Springwood. He also brought close friends and political allies there to discuss the state of the world or simply relax. Like Eleanor Roosevelt's Val-Kill Cottage, the FDR Library and the addition to Springwood, Top Cottage was designed by FDR to emulate the Dutch colonial architecture found throughout the Hudson River Valley. FDR planned the cottage with accessibility in mind to accommodate his wheelchair and give him greater independence. Top Cottage became part of the Home of Franklin D. Roosevelt National Historic Site in May 2001.
The other site we visited on this trip north--located in the same area was the Vanderbilt Mansion and estate. It was a mansion built in what Historians have labeled the "Guilded Age"-- certainly a time of much "excess and opulence"! It was almost "disturbing" to me--so I focused my pics on the beautiful gardens on this estate.  No one can have too many "gardens", right?! (The pics are found above after the ones from FDR's estate ).
More pics of the Springwood Estate trip and our Group

Sister Grimley having "chat" with Eleanor and FDR

Our Group on the "Roosevelt Ride" shuttle from the train

Behind the Springwood Estate--overlooking the Hudson (that you cannot see because of the 450,000 trees on the property)

Returning "home" on Subway from Grand Central Station
L to R-- S Buchanan, S Grimley (my high school friend), S Wilson, S Rogers and S Mumford

It was a long day--but such a wonderful group of people to be with. We 💕 Our Missionary Friends!!