Marguerite LeHand

Who was Marguerite LeHand?

Marguerite Alice "Missy" LeHand was private secretary to U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt for 21 years. According to Roosevelt biographer Doris Kearns Goodwin, during FDR's presidency, LeHand became "the most celebrated private secretary in the country".

Born into a poor Irish-American family in New York, LeHand attended secretarial school, took a series of clerical jobs, and eventually began to work for the Democratic Party's New York office. There she came to the attention of FDR's wife Eleanor during his 1920 vice presidential candidacy and was hired as FDR's personal secretary. After FDR was partially paralyzed by polio, LeHand became his daily companion, to the extent of adopting his favorite hobbies, games, and drinks. She remained his secretary when he became Governor of New York in 1929 and when he became president in 1933, serving until a 1941 stroke left her unable to speak. She moved to her sister's home in Boston and died in 1944.

The exact nature of LeHand's relationship with FDR is debated by historians. It is generally accepted that their relationship contained a romantic element, though scholars remain divided on whether the pair had a sexual relationship.