43 Facts About Louis Howe

Louis McHenry Howe was an American reporter for the New York Herald best known for acting as an early political advisor to future 32nd President Franklin D Roosevelt.

Louis Howe married Grace Hartley and became a journalist with a small paper that his father purchased.

Louis Howe spent the next decade freelancing for the larger prominent New York Herald in New York City and working various jobs.

Louis Howe was then assigned to cover the New York state legislature in 1906, and soon became a political operative for Thomas Mott Osborne, a Democratic Party opponent of the dominant Tammany Hall political machine in New York City and state.

Louis Howe oversaw Roosevelt's campaign for the New York State Senate, worked with him in the US Navy Department when FDR was Assistant Secretary of the Navy during the First World War era in the presidential administration of 28th President Woodrow Wilson.

Louis Howe subsequently acted as an advisor and campaign manager during young Roosevelt's 1920 vice presidential election campaign run.

Louis Howe arranged Roosevelt's 1924 "Happy Warrior" inspiring speech at the 1924 Democratic National Convention that returned him to the public eye, and four years later helped to run Roosevelt's narrowly successful 1928 campaign to become Governor of New York in the state capital of Albany.

Louis Howe then spent the next four years laying the groundwork for Roosevelt's campaign and presence at the 1932 Democratic National Convention in Chicago, where he secured the Democratic Party's nomination and subsequent landslide 1932 presidential election victory, during the deepest darkest years of the economic hardships and mass unemployment of the Great Depression of the 1930s.

Louis Howe however grew ill shortly after Roosevelt's election, and died before the end of his first term in 1936, and was not able to lend much advice or assistance in FDR's reelection campaign for a second term in the greater landslide victory of the 1936 US elections.

Louis Howe acted as a political advisor to Franklin's wife, Eleanor, and he encouraged her to take an active role in politics, introducing her to women's groups and coaching her in public speaking.

Louis Howe had two stepsisters, Maria and Cora, from his mother's previous marriage.

Louis Howe was sickly and fragile as a child, suffered from asthma, and was generally kept home by his parents; he never grew to more than five feet tall.

When Louis Howe was seven, the family lost their home, moving to Saratoga Springs, New York, with help from Eliza's family.

Grace's mother had given the couple a large house for a wedding present, which Louis Howe mortgaged in an attempt to save his father's newspaper from bankruptcy.

The Sun was nonetheless sold, and Louis Howe fired in 1901, though he soon after successfully begged to return to his job.

Louis Howe continued working as a freelancer for the Herald; one of his most notable stories was to interview Vice President Theodore Roosevelt on his return to Washington, DC after the death of President William McKinley.

In 1903, after a failed attempt to make a living writing fiction, Louis Howe worked for a time as a manager for a Saratoga country club.

In January 1906, Louis Howe began covering the New York State Legislature in Albany, New York for the Herald.

Later that year, Louis Howe was hired by Thomas Mott Osborne, a rich Democrat, as a political operative.

Louis Howe employed Howe to oppose the gubernatorial candidacy of William Randolph Hearst, the Democratic nominee, newspaper magnate, and ally of Tammany.

Louis Howe pursued a permanent position with Osborne, declining an opportunity to go to Jamaica as a correspondent for the Herald, and was hired in November 1906.

Louis Howe lost interest in Osborne as a patron and began searching for another upcoming name with whom to associate; Osborne fired him in 1909.

Louis Howe interviewed Roosevelt for the Herald, and they began to regularly meet to discuss politics, becoming good friends in the process.

Louis Howe managed the final six weeks of Roosevelt's campaign, focusing particularly on rural areas that he felt politicians traditionally neglected.

Louis Howe's initiatives included a mass mailing to farmers telling them that Roosevelt was likely to become chairman of the Senate Agricultural Committee.

Louis Howe helped Roosevelt make connections with labor leaders by encouraging Roosevelt to personally inspect work conditions and meet with workers.

In 1914, Howe managed a brief Roosevelt campaign for the US Senate, but Roosevelt was easily defeated by Tammany candidate James W Gerard in the Democratic primary.

Louis Howe appears to have been opposed to Roosevelt's run for the Senate, feeling that Roosevelt was moving too fast; Louis Howe described his role as "to provide the toe weights" to slow down the ambitious younger man.

In mid-1921, Louis Howe was vacationing with the Roosevelts at Campobello Island when Franklin began to run a high fever and reported paralysis in his legs.

Louis Howe remained by Roosevelt's bedside throughout the early days of his illness, cheering him up, tending to his needs, and even changing his bedpans.

Louis Howe emphasized the need for everyone to keep the extent of Roosevelt's paralysis a secret, setting in motion a campaign of concealment that lasted for the rest of Roosevelt's life.

In collaboration with Roosevelt's secretary Marguerite LeHand, Louis Howe wrote a series of letters to the press, supposedly written by Roosevelt, assuring the public that Roosevelt would not suffer any "permanent effect" from his illness.

Louis Howe encouraged Eleanor to become active in politics through women's suffrage organizations; to this end, he introduced her to Marion Dickerman, who became one of Eleanor's closest friends.

Louis Howe predicted disaster, believing that a Republican challenger was sure to beat Roosevelt in what was expected to be nationally a Republican year.

In 1931, Louis Howe began raising money for the campaign from Democrats like Henry Morgenthau, Sr.

Louis Howe described his role in the administration as the president's "no-man", checking Roosevelt's natural enthusiasm and preventing unsound proposals from reaching wider discussion.

Louis Howe was a strong supporter of the Civilian Conservation Corps, one of the many public works programs of Roosevelt's "New Deal".

Louis Howe's health declined in 1934, and he was hospitalized for heart problems and breathing difficulties.

Louis Howe spent the last two years of his life in and out of Bethesda Naval Hospital; in March 1935, he went in to get treated for bronchitis.

Louis Howe knew that I was bewildered by some of the things expected of me as a candidate's wife.

Louis Howe encouraged her to express herself in print as well and acted for a time as her literary agent.

Louis Howe encouraged her to break with her predecessors as First Lady and make the role more active and political.

Louis Howe was portrayed by Ed Flanders in the 1976 television miniseries Eleanor and Franklin;, Walter McGinn in Eleanor and Franklin: The White House Years, the 1977 American television film and a sequel to Eleanor and Franklin, and by Hume Cronyn in the 1960 movie Sunrise at Campobello.