Professor Hamilton's Diary: April 28, 1935

President Roosevelt gives Fireside Chat, shares optimism about recovery

Professor Hamilton leaves us a blank page today, which gives me space to devote to President Roosevelt’s Sunday night Fireside Chat, delivered from the “oval room” — oval office today — at the White House. His talk today was aimed at building support for the new Works Progress Administration, which would spend an unheard-of $4.2 billion getting unemployed people back to work. Although many people believe Roosevelt spoke over the radio every week, he actually gave only 31 talks over more than a dozen years in office, zeroing in on topics of great importance to his New Deal and victory during World War II.

There was such a high degree of interest in the president’s chat that the text was carried in full in the Reading Times on April 29.

Paid subscribers can read on. Won’t you upgrade? It costs just 16 cents a day.

The photo of President Roosevelt seated behind a bank of microphones is from the collection of the Library of Congress.