DC -- Franklin Delano Roosevelt Memorial -- Event: Opening Ceremony (1997):
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- Description of Pictures: On May 2, 1997, President Clinton joined Mike Wallace, Master of Ceremonies, FDR Commission Co-chairs Senators Daniel K. Inouye and Mark O. Hatfield, David B. Roosevelt, Princess Margriet of the Netherlands and opera singer Denyce Graves to dedicate the Franklin Delano Roosevelt Memorial. The FDR memorial is only the third presidential memorial dedicated in the United States this century. The last time such a dedication took place was in 1943, when President Roosevelt dedicated the Jefferson Memorial.
The Franklin Delano Roosevelt Memorial Commission was established by the United States Congress in 1955 "for the purpose of considering and formulating plans for the design, construction and location of a permanent memorial. . ." to honor our 32nd President. In 1959, land was set aside in West Potomac Park for the memorial, following a layout established in 1901 by the McMillan "kite" Plan for monuments in the city of Washington. In 1978, after several design competitions, Lawrence Halprin's memorial design received final approval from the FDR Memorial Commission of Fine Arts.
The 7.5 acre memorial honors President Roosevelt in a landscape of four outdoor rooms with granite walls, statuary, inscriptions, waterfalls and thousands of plants, shrubs and trees. The memorial is located along the famous cherry tree walk on the Tidal Basin. The memorial's four outdoor gallery rooms offer visitors a historical narrative of the years 1933 to 1945, each symbolizing one of FDR's four terms in office.
Five sculptors were assembled by designer Halprin to create bronze sculptures placed throughout the memorial. They are: Leonard Baskin, Neil Estern, Robert Graham, Tom Hardy, and George Segal. Master stone carver John Benson inscribed the enduring words of FDR on the memorial,s meandering 800 foot granite wall. Among these are: "This generation has a rendezvous with destiny." "The only thing we have to fear is fear itself." "I pledge you, I pledge myself, to a New Deal for the American People."
The FDR Memorial marks the first time that a First Lady has been honored in a presidential memorial. It includes a bronze statue of Eleanor Roosevelt standing before a symbol of the United Nations, for which she served as America's first Delegate after the president's death. Also included is an exact replica of one of FDR's wheelchairs, on display in the Memorial Entry Building.
The FDR Memorial is maintained by the National Park Service and is staffed from 8 am to midnight every day of the year except Christmas. Entrance is free to the public.
The above was from http://clinton2.nara.gov/WH/New/html/fdr.html
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- Specific picture descriptions: Photos above with "i" icons next to the bracketed sequence numbers (e.g. "[1] ") are described as follows:
- FDRC_970502_026.JPG: This gives you an idea of how most of us saw the dedication; those big TV screens were the only way we could see faces. The people in front of the fence could get up, walk down the aisle, and take close-up pictures if they wanted to. Needless to say, I wasn't one of those.
- FDRC_970502_027.JPG: FDR Memorial Dedication; President Clinton
The little bitty figure at the podium is President Clinton. On the right of him were sitting mostly Capitol Hill (Senator and Congressman) types. To the left is Vice President Gore sitting to the left of either Hillary Clinton or Tipper Gore. (Don't you just love these little microscopic views?)
- FDRC_970502_033.JPG: Michigan's longest serving US Senator, Carl Levin passed on July 29, 2021. I saw him back in 1997 when he attended a ceremony for the newly opened FDR Memorial, on whose commission he served.
- FDRC_970502_034.JPG: Another picture of Carl Levin. Notice the SWAT-like team. Since the President and a number of other dignitaries was here, there were quite of few of these guys all over the place. They definitely look like I'm a risk here.
- FDRC_970502_037.JPG: Senator Daniel Inouye was one of the two co-chairs of the FDR Memorial Commission. The other was Senator Mark Hatfield.
- FDRC_970502_041.JPG: Senator Mark Hatfield was one of the two co-chairs of the FDR Memorial Commission. The other was Senator Daniel Inouye.
- FDRC_970502_043.JPG: Denyce Graves is an opera singer from Washington DC who sang the National Anthem and "America The Beautiful" for the ceremony.
- FDRC_970502_044.JPG: Another picture of opera singer Denyce Graves.
- FDRC_970502_045.JPG: Lawrence Halprin was the "environmental designer" who conceived of the winning FDR Memorial design and got the rest of it together. The actual sculptures and whatever are done by other people but this is the guy who figured it all out. He signed my program.
- FDRC_970502_051.JPG: What we're seeing in this photo is the main welcoming wall which is behind the "FDR Roses". These were special roses created by the Netherlands for the occasion of the dedication. Princess Margriet had delivered one of the speeches for the ceremony, talking about their royal family had fled to Canada during the war and how FDR had been her godfather during it all. The roses were orange for the House of Orange (her family) and showed the close connection they had to FDR and the United States because of the war.
The girl with the roses was being photographed trying to smell them. They apparently didn't have any odor at all. To the left is the Washington Monument.
The roses were only there for the dedication. The wall stands unadorned now.
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- Inouye, Daniel appears on:
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