The United States entered World War I on April 6, 1917. In Europe, the war had begun in August 1914, millions had died, and a stalemate had been reached.

Franklin Delano Roosevelt and Eleanor Roosevelt moved to Washington, DC from their home on 65th Street in 1913 to serve the nation. As Assistant Secretary of the Navy during the war, Franklin was on the front lines of policy and operations. The lessons he learned about prosecuting and financing a war, as well as the terrible toll it took on lives, would stay with him for the rest of his life and influence his decisions during WWII. Eleanor Roosevelt became a Red Cross volunteer in Washington, where she inspired others and developed the extraordinary emotional skills she would use during WWII and later in her human rights work. She paid visits to injured soldiers at local military hospitals and advocated for more funding to improve their care and assist their families. In January 1919, she traveled to Europe with FDR and witnessed the devastation of the French countryside. Her experiences there and in Washington led her, like Franklin, to support President Wilson's League of Nations and seek new ideas for peace.

When you talk about the major accomplishments of Eleanor Roosevelt, you have to mention the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

On December 10, 1948, the United Nations General Assembly issued the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) - 30 rights and freedoms that we all share. Seven decades later, the rights they included remain the foundation of all international human rights law.

Eleanor Roosevelt was an outspoken supporter of civil rights and social activism. She was appointed chair of the United Nations Commission on Human Rights, which drafted the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Eleanor delivered a speech at the United Nations on the tenth anniversary of the UDHR titled "Where Do Human Rights Begin?" Part of her speech has become famous for elucidating why human rights are important to all of us in all aspects of our daily lives: "Where, after all, do universal human rights begin? In small places, close to home - so close and so small that they cannot be seen on any maps of the world. Yet they are the world of the individual person; the neighbourhood he lives in; the school or college he attends; the factory, farm, or office where he works. Such are the places where every man, woman, and child seeks equal justice, equal opportunity, equal dignity without discrimination. Unless these rights have meaning there, they have little meaning anywhere. Without concerted citizen action to uphold them close to home, we shall look in vain for progress in the larger world."

The UDHR made a significant step forward by asserting that all human beings are free and equal, regardless of race, creed, or religion. For the first time, a global agreement prioritized human beings over power politics.

Eleanor Roosevelt only became fully involved in the women's rights movement in the 1920s. By the mid-decade mark, Roosevelt had established a network of women leaders in New York's most influential organizations, including the League of Women Voters, the Women's Trade Union League (WTUL), the Women's Division of the New York State Democratic Committee, and the Women's City Club. She was particularly drawn to the League of Women Voters' social feminists and the Women's Trade Union League's labor feminism. These alliances resulted in Roosevelt's interest in the poor and working-class women, as well as legislation specifically designed to protect women in the workplace.

Perhaps most importantly, the WTUL became the central meeting place for reform-minded women interested in labor issues, and many of these women developed important political relationships through the WTUL. These women eventually became Roosevelt's staunchest supporters, giving the WTUL vital access to powerful politicians and ensuring that their voices were heard in the formulation of labor policy in Washington. Despite the league's close relationship with the Roosevelt administration, the WTUL's role became increasingly irrelevant once traditional labor unions allowed women to join on a widespread basis. WTUL's effectiveness was also hampered by mounting financial problems and declining membership numbers. Despite Eleanor Roosevelt's continued support for the League, the NWTUL was forced to disband in 1950 due to a lack of funds and personnel.

By 1927, when Eleanor Roosevelt and three friends—Nancy Cook, Marion Dickerman, and Caroline O'Day—joined forces to form Val-Kill Industries, the American Arts and Crafts Movement was in decline. She and her business partners funded the construction of a small factory to provide additional income for local farming families who make furniture, pewter, and homespun cloth using traditional craft methods. Most Val-Kill products were modeled on 18th-century forms in order to capitalize on the design movement known as Colonial Revival at the time. Disappointed by the movement's inherent inability to effect change in an industrial society, some supporters redirected their energy, drawing national attention to the craft traditions of America's colonial past.

Val-Kill Industries was influenced by both the Arts and Crafts and the Colonial Revival movements. These movements shared a love of simplicity and honesty in design and materials, nostalgia for a pre-industrial past, and an emphasis on agrarian values.

Eleanor Roosevelt would see Val-Kill Industries in a broader context over the course of its 10-year existence. She was instrumental in incorporating Arts and Crafts ideas and ideals into larger government-sponsored initiatives that adopted many of the movement's philosophical attitudes toward craft, labor, and human dignity. Val-Kill Industries and Eleanor Roosevelt achieved success where the Arts and Crafts movement had failed. Val-Kill Industries served as a model for some New Deal economic recovery programs when Franklin D. Roosevelt became President. Though Val-Kill Industries did not achieve the success Roosevelt had hoped for, it did pave the way for larger New Deal initiatives during her husband's presidency.

Franklin D. Roosevelt was elected President of the United States in 1932. He was re-elected in 1936 and 1940, and in 1940 he ran for a third term, defying the convention of no more than two terms. He won again, as well as the 1944 election. Following his presidency, the two-term convention became law. From March 1933 until FDR's death in April 1945, Eleanor Roosevelt was the longest-serving First Lady of the United States. Prior to her, the First Lady's role was limited to domesticity and serving as a hostess. Eleanor transformed the role and was more active than any previous First Lady. She continued her business and speaking agenda while using her position as a platform for social activism.

Mrs. Roosevelt understood social conditions better than any of her predecessors when she arrived in the White House, and she transformed the role of First Lady accordingly. She never shied away from official entertaining; she greeted thousands of people with charming friendliness. She also set a precedent by holding press conferences, traveling across the country, giving lectures and radio broadcasts, and expressing her candid opinions in a daily syndicated newspaper column called "My Day."

Eleanor Roosevelt famously declared in 1934 that she frequently experienced "moments of true terror when we might be losing this generation." During the Great Depression, American youth faced a variety of issues, including unemployment and the inability to afford an education. Mrs. Roosevelt founded the National Youth Administration and served as its adviser, planner, investigator, and publicist. Roosevelt had mixed feelings about the NYA halfway through the depression, owing to the shift in tides caused by World War II. Roosevelt believed that the majority of these workers should be sent to fight in the war. This resulted in FDR beginning to lean toward Congress to shut it down. Due to Eleanor Roosevelt's intuition regarding the decline of progress within the American youth, she urged her husband to allow her to "act as an extension of the presidency by moving in new directions or in areas where it was politically difficult for the President to operate directly." These "difficult areas" in which it was difficult for FDR to operate directly pointed toward the youth in America. Eleanor Roosevelt's efforts and contributions gave the American youth various opportunities including education, jobs, recreation, and counseling for male and female youth between the ages of sixteen and twenty-five.

Eleanor Roosevelt played a key in the formation of National Youth Administration. From 1935 to 1943, NYA assisted over 4.5 million American youths in finding jobs, receiving vocational training, and affording higher education. It was critical in allowing American youth to contribute to the war effort and boost the American war economy.

One of the major accomplishments of Eleanor Roosevelt is she was a leading activist for the rights of women and African Americans.

Eleanor Roosevelt spoke out strongly in support of the African-American civil rights movement. Despite criticism from conservative Southerners, Eleanor advocated for equal treatment of women and African Americans. She worked hard to get many women appointed to positions in government. She held press conferences for women only. When the Daughters of the American Revolution refused to let popular African-American singer Marian Anderson perform in their Constitution Hall in 1936, the First Lady resigned from their organization. She defied convention by inviting hundreds of African-American visitors to the White House. She was one of the few voices in the White House who insisted on equal benefits for Americans of all races. Eleanor also worked tirelessly for women's rights. She encouraged her husband, among other things, to appoint more women to federal positions, assisted working women in obtaining better wages, and held numerous press conferences for female reporters only, at a time when women were barred from White House press conferences.

She would continue to be an advocate for people everywhere, pushing for change and never being afraid to take the lead.

During her lifetime, Eleanor Roosevelt broke many barriers and traditions. She was the first First Lady to write a daily newspaper column as a First Lady. During the Great Depression, she frequently traveled across the country to assess Americans' living conditions.

From December 31, 1935, to September 26, 1962, Eleanor Roosevelt wrote "My Day," a nationally syndicated newspaper column (six days a week until January 1961, then three days a week thereafter). She didn't keep a diary, and her appointment books are woefully inadequate.

As a result, "My Day" is the only consistent account of her public actions that exists. Eleanor also hosted a weekly radio show, wrote a monthly magazine column, and held press conferences.

While the columns are not a complete record of Roosevelt's daily activities, they do reveal a lot about who she met, where she traveled, what books she read, which plays she saw, and how she dealt with the pressures of public life. They chart her transformation from awkward "diarist" to skilled advocate for the New Deal, civil rights, the United Nations, and a plethora of other domestic and international issues. To summarize, "My Day" provides an extraordinary glimpse into Roosevelt's public and political life.