Unlikely Heroes

Franklin Roosevelt, His Four Lieutenants, and the World They Made

De: Derek Leebaert

Narrado por: L. J. Ganser

Drawing on new materials, Unlikely Heroes constructs an entirely fresh understanding of FDR and his presidency by spotlighting the powerful, equally wounded figures whom he raised up to confront the Depression, then to beat the Axis.

Only four people served at the top echelon of President Franklin Roosevelt’s Administration from the frightening early months of spring 1933 until he died in April 1945, on the cusp of wartime victory. These lieutenants composed the tough, constrictive, long-term core of government. They built the great institutions being raised against the Depression, implemented the New Deal, and they were pivotal to winning World War II.

Yet, in their different ways, each was as wounded as the polio-stricken titan. Harry Hopkins, Harold Ickes, Frances Perkins, and Henry Wallace were also strange outsiders. Up to 1933, none would ever have been considered for high office. Still, each became a world figure, and it would have been exceedingly difficult for Roosevelt to transform the nation without them.

By examining the lives of these four, a very different picture emerges of how Americans saved their democracy and rescued civilization overseas. Many of the dangers that they all overcame are troublingly like those America faces today.

©2023 Derek Leebaert (P)2023 Blackstone Publishing

FDR cabinet

Long and at times tedious. At times referencing by first name made it challenging to follow who the subject was. Averill I found the book more negative on Roosevelt than I expected.

Long but worth every minute

things I should’ve known, but never didn’t know this book taught me. The author unknown to me but fluid and rewrites like a novelist.
Born in 1942 I never knew the background and backstory of the first two decades of my life. Things for whatever reason I didn’t learn while I was in college and graduate school. I can now readily find on the Internet that’s the positive side of the Internet.

Too negative.

Crushingly negative regarding people’s personalities. Important times unfortunately viewed by someone deeply depressed. Far better written histories exist. Don’t waste your time on this one.