In 1970, the Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt Institute (then
known as the Four Freedoms Foundation) initiated the planning
of a memorial to FDR in New York. The Four Freedoms
Foundation entered into discussions with city and state leaders,
including Edward J. Logue, President of the Urban
Development Corporation (UDC), which was planning a new,
self-contained community on what was then called Welfare
Island. As a result of those discussions, the site on the southern
tip of Welfare Island was selected for the memorial and
because the island was to contain this memorial, the island
was renamed in honor of FDR on September 24, 1973.
Naming the Island for Franklin D. Roosevelt was the first step
in a project that was to culminate in the construction of the
memorial on the southern tip.
The announcement of these plans was first made on April 12,
1972 at the Annual Award Dinner of the Four Freedoms
Foundation, at which then-president of the Foundation Joseph
Robinson said:
I wish to announce that after consultations with Governor [Nelson
A.] Rockefeller, Mayor [John V.] Lindsay, Edward J. Logue, President
of the New York State Urban Development Corporation, and August
Heckscher, New York City Administrator of Parks, Recreation and
Cultural Affairs, and other state and city officials, an understanding
has been reached whereby approximately two acres of land on the
southern tip of Welfare Island will be made available to the Four
Freedoms Foundation, for the construction of an appropriate memorial
to the late President Franklin D. Roosevelt [...] The memorial,
when completed, will be turned over to the New York City Park
System or the National Park Service or other appropriate governmental
agency for maintenance and care and the public's use.
In July 1973, two months prior to the dedication ceremony, the
New York Times ran an editorial announcing the memorial and
the name change:
Even more than the name itself, the island is to have an appropriate
tribute to FDR in the form of a memorial to be constructed at its
southernmost point. Of all the spots in the country, this is surely
the most suitable for the purpose. Standing there, the traveler coming
to pay FDR's respects will look squarely at the capitol of the
United Nations which [FDR's] vision encompassed, see in the river
and the harbor beyond it the ships that so filled his life, and finally
extend his gaze to the Atlantic Ocean which President Roosevelt
saw as the bond and unifier of the Western World.
I recall how at the dedication ceremony on September 24,
1973, Mayor Lindsay announced the plans for the memorial,
publicly pledging the city's commitment to the memorial and
using the rechristening of the island as the memorial's launching
event. One of our century's greatest architects, Louis Kahn,
was commissioned to design the memorial and did so shortly
before his death. His design for the memorial has been called
«one of the noblest unbuilt projects in New York» by the New
York Times. Indeed, the noted architect Robert Gatje has
assured me that the architectural community is emphatically
united in its determination that the project be built – the wait
is far outweighed by the historic and artistic benefits to future
generations of a Louis Kahn memorial to FDR.
Fundraising commenced as soon as the project was conceived.
In 1974, Governor Malcolm Wilson included $2.2 million
for the FDR Memorial in his budget message and the Four
Freedoms Foundation asked Mayor Abraham Beame for an
equal amount from New York City. The Four Freedoms
Foundation planned to raise the remaining funds for the memorial
from private sources (the estimated cost of the memorial
at the time was $6 million) and had secured pledges totaling
$250,000 from foundations. However, the financial crisis in
New York City and New York State in the mid-1970s prevented
these plans from materializing.
Although the Roosevelt Island Operating Corporation (RIOC)
General Development Plan of 1990 for Roosevelt Island simply
calls for a park at the end of the island, the record clearly
shows that the UDC, the original planners of the Roosevelt
Island development, intended to build the FDR Memorial on
that site. The participation of the city and state governments in
the project before the fiscal crisis prevented further action and
the commissioning and approval of the Kahn design indicate
that all the parties involved made a commitment to building the
Kahn-designed memorial on the designated site. In 1985, the
Roosevelt Memorial Commission appointed by Governor Mario
Cuomo, and co-chaired by leading Republican and longtime
Attorney General Louis Lefkowitz, and by former New York
City Mayor Robert F. Wagner, reviewed the site and plans for
the memorial and reaffirmed that commitment. The
Commission unanimously recommended that «the Memorial
designed for Roosevelt Island in the East River by the late
Louis Kahn, one of America's greatest architects, be adopted
and moved to completion with all possible speed.»
Because of continuing fiscal difficulties, federal, state, and city
funding has not been available in recent years, but in these
prosperous times, New York State, New York City, and a partnership
of private donors can surely be organized. Some
progress has been made toward realizing the ultimate goal of
building the memorial. The ruins of the Old City Hospital at the
southern end of the island, have been torn down. And in 1994,
RIOC filled, shaped and graded the site of the memorial in
accordance with Kahn's design. It had also planned to rebuild
the sea walls around the memorial site before its capital
budget was cut.
As we know from the Washington, Lincoln, Jefferson, and
FDR memorials in Washington, the selection of a site, the
designing of and the raising of funds to build memorials is a
difficult and lengthy process. In the case of the Roosevelt
Memorial on Roosevelt Island, the architectural community and
other interested parties are unanimous in their agreement that
the site and the design are outstanding; the only remaining
obstacle – one which can certainly be overcome – is the money
with which to build it. In the interim, the site could be named
Franklin D. Roosevelt Park and, as RIOC has demonstrated in
the past, it could be used for special events in keeping with its
ultimate purpose.
We are exploring the legal commitment made by the city and
state to this project. I have personal knowledge of the moral
commitment, made by the city and state in the earliest days of
the project and reaffirmed time and again by both, to the creation
of a memorial to FDR on the southernmost tip of the
island. I trust that RIOC will not disregard history and will honor
that longstanding commitment by only entertaining those proposals
for development of Southpoint which preserve the
acreage at the tip set aside in the General Development Plan
for its intended – and symbolically perfect purpose... the
long-awaited memorial to Franklin D. Roosevelt, a son of New
York and the greatest President of the twentieth century.
Delivered at a meeting of the Roosevelt Island Operating Corporation
Southpoint Development Advisory Committee. Published as «A
Glimmer of Hope for FDR Park at Southpoint,» in The Wire, March 7,
1998.
Ambassador William J. vanden Heuvel was President of the Four
Freedoms Foundation from 1984–87 and President of its successor,
the Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt Institute, from 1987 to 2000. He has
served as Deputy U.S. Permanent Representative to the United
Nations and as U.S. Representative to the European Office of the
United Nations. |
