Laura F Delano

Laura Franklin Delano was the very definition of eccentric: as a little girl sherefused to drink anything other than Apollinairis Water, an imported carbonated mineral water, earning her the nickname "Polly" But she was the favorite of her famous cousin, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt, whom she served till his death as a longtime confidante and friend. Polly Delano, along with another cousin, Margaret "Daisy" Suckley, was always at the President's side. Polly was born in 1885, the fourth child of Warren Delano III, President of the Delano Coal Company in Pennsylvania, and Jennie Walters Delano, daughter of a famous Baltimore art collector. Polly grew up with her five siblings on the Delano family estate Steen Valetje in Rhinebeck, New York, which her father had inherited from his uncle, not far from where her cousin, Franklin Delano Roosevelt, the son of Warren's sister, Sara Delano, grew up. As a child she displayed an affinity for animals winning numerous awards for carriage driving at the annual Duchess County Fair. It was at one of these events, many years later in 1920, that Warren Delano III was killed in a freak carriage accident. Growing up, she developed a close relationship with cousin Franklin, often traveling with him and future-wife Eleanor when they were older to Campobello Island, When he launched his campaign for the White House in the 1930's, she often accompanied him on his stumping, along with other members of the family. She also became an active breeder of Irish Setters and Dachshunds, something she would do for most of her life, and a member of the Westminster Kennel Club. Often she was labelled the troublemaker of the family, She began an affair with her chauffeur and later fell in-love with the first secretary of the Chinese Embassy, Saburo Kurusu, a prince in the Japanese royal family, and tried to marry him, though pressure from both families forced them to end it. Laura didn't get along with her brother Lyman, who had inherited Steen Valetje upon their father's death, and when her uncle Henry Walters, founder of the Walters Art Gallery in Baltimore, died, she used the money she inherited from him to hire John Russell Pope to design an estate of her own in the Hudson Valley: a cottage known as Evergreen Lands, which would become the scene of her famed cocktail parties, which many a dignitary visiting during the FDR presidency. Polly was a frequent visitor to the White House along with Daisy Suckley. FDR found his cousin's eccentricities humorous, her endless gossip entertaining, her presence a comfort and her insight invaluable. While Franklin delighted in her, Eleanor was disgusted and annoyed. It was to Laura that FDR uttered his final words, as she and the others carried him to his bed: "be careful!" Polly continued living and operating as she always had even after FDR's death. She was an active member of the Walter Art Gallery, and continued to raise her animals at Evergreen Lands. She attended Eleanor Roosevelt's funeral in 1962, and died in 1972, She was survived by two sisters, Mrs. Frederick B. Adams and Mrs. Sara D. Redmond.