Q: Talk about the dynamics between Sara, the children, and the parents.
A: My father and his siblings were quite spoiled by their grandmother. And again, I believe perhaps the elder siblings were even more spoiled than my father and Uncle Franklin, the younger ones. But when my father or any of the children would suggest that it would be lovely to have a horse or a pony or whatever, then suddenly one would appear in the stable in Hyde Park, and the children would have access to practically anything they wanted. And this was never discussed with the parents. It was just provided for by Sara Roosevelt.
Q: Why did Sara do that?
A: I don't believe Sara was trying to drive a wedge between her grandchildren and their parents. I think she felt, as the grandmother, that this was her right to spoil the children, and that they weren't really being spoiled. And as long as she could provide these lovely things for her grandchildren, she was going to.
Q: She controlled Franklin and Eleanor, didn't she, because she held their purse strings?
A: Sara Roosevelt held the purse strings for the entire family. So that when my grandparents reached the time when they needed their own house to live in, it was Sara Roosevelt who purchased the house. The dynamics between Sara and her own son were that Sara's decision on where they should live was fine by him. Franklin never seemed to object, and my grandmother, feeling that it was her role to just go along with it, went along with it.
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