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LUCY MERCER RUTHERFURD

Eleanor’s Rival, FDR’s Other Love

CHRISTINE M. TOTTEN

What more could there be to know about FDR, given how exhaustively his life has been written about? As it happens, there is more and that focuses on Lucy Mercer Rutherfurd, the queen of her Washington social circle, later FDR’s friend and love—and Eleanor's rival, as the title of Christine Totten's work points out.

In Lucy Mercer Rutherfurd: Eleanor's Rival, FDR’s Other Love, Totten presents a carefully structured case for a deep and lasting but chaste love between Lucy and FDR, against the prevailing view that they were clandestine lovers. Totten’s research into the personal memories of the Rutherfurd family and the public holdings of the FDR Library establishes a new, rich understanding of Lucy Mercer Rutherfurd—her early life, her education, and her role in the social and political scene in Washington.

This work gives Lucy Mercer Rutherfurd her due, as a woman in her own right as well as FDR's valued soul mate and friend.

CONTENTS

Prologue
Ways to Discover Lucy

I. LUCY AS MISS MERCER

Chapter 1
Born of the Bluest Blood

Chapter 2
The Silver Spoon Slips Out

Chapter 3
Rescue from Overseas

Chapter 4
Return to Reality

Chapter 5
1917–1918: Lucy and Eleanor

Chapter 6
Hidden Romance, Open Fallout

 

II. LUCY AS MRS. WINTHROP RUTHERFURD

Chapter 7
Eleanor, Franklin, and Lucy in New Orbits

Chapter 8
Franklin Reaches Out to Lucy, 1926–1928

Chapter 9
Lucy and the President

Chapter 10
Sundown Solace

Epilogue
Two Widows

Notes

Bibliography

Acknowledgments

Index

ISBN 978-0-9898249-7-2/paperback/418 pp./illus./July 2018/$34.95

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