First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt waving and moving through a crowd of women, in March, 1933. She stands with son, James, at entrance to an American Airlines aircraft. Eleanor Roosevelt waving goodbye to a crowd, as she boards a railroad train on a trip across the country. She is seen attending an outdoor picnic event. Wearing a miners hat, she rides, with labor union representatives and members, on a train into a coal mine, where she inspects its interior and conditions. Eleanor Roosevelt visiting a facility for the aged, and speaking publicly about their problems. She is seen engaged in country dancing during one of her visits. Upon her return from the cross country trip, she remarks about enjoying and learning much from it, as she walks from Union station, in Washington, DC, to a waiting automobile. She pauses to pose for a photographer, and then enters the back seat of the car.
Life of the President of the United States Franklin Delano Roosevelt in the United States. American flag flying at half staff over the White House after the death of President Franklin Roosevelt. People gathered in front of the White House mourning Franklin D Roosevelt. View inside the Cabinet Room of the White House as Chief Justice Harlan Fiske Stone administers the oath of office to new President Harry S. Truman. Remainder of clip shows various scenes of Franklin D. Roosevelt from prior years: Franklin D Roosevelt greets people and talks to them as they enter a house in the 1920s. Franklin Roosevelt with family in a sailing yacht or boat. Franklin Roosevelt sits with wife Eleanor Roosevelt in a garden. Son John brings in granddaughter Eleanor (Sistie) Dall, son Elliott carries in Curtis (Buzzie) Dall, son Franklin Jr enters, then daughter Anna and her husband Curtis Dall. Franklin Roosevelt with family members in a swimming pool. Franklin Roosevelt as Secretary of the Navy during World War 1 as he walks toward a car, stands beside it, removes his hat and smiles for cameras. Franklin Roosevelt as a nominee for Vice President poses with his wife Eleanor, his daughter, and his mother. A crowd hold banner supporting Franklin Roosevelt as the next President during the Democratic Convention of 1932. Franklin D Roosevelt addresses people. Many banners and signs for Roosevelt for President. Franklin D Roosevelt takes the oath of office as President at the 1933 inaugural ceremony, and is seen speaking during his inaugural address.
American aviator Wiley Post returns to Floyd Bennett Field in New York after completing his solo flight around the world in a just under 8 days. People gather in a large number to welcome him. They gather around his aircraft. Scene shifts to streets of New York City where Wiley Post is honored with a ticker tape parade for his Around The World achievement. The aviator seated aboard a jeep passing by. People celebrate and greet him. He is bestowed with the Medal of Valor by New York City Mayor John P. O'Brien. Next segment shows plane of American aviator Roscoe Turner landing, after his record-setting flight from New York to Los Angeles in 10 hours and 5 minutes flying his Wedell-Williams Model 44 (WW-44) aircraft. This won him the 1933 Bendix Trophy. Close view of Roscoe Turner smiling from the cockpit of his aircraft. From a November 10, 1958 newsreel recounting events 25 years earlier.
Film regarding creation of the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA). Picture of United States Capitol building. Text of 1933 Congressional Act creating the TVA, appears progressively as background while scenes of the project are shown. Aerial view of power plant in Muscle Shoals, Alabama. A little girl stands alone, looking over a TVA dam. A utility worker stands on a large electric insulator. View from a barge as it passes under a bridge on the Tennessee River. Bridge under construction over Tennessee River. Aerial view of flooded area. Animated map shows Tennessee River Basin.
Great Depression scenes and recovery efforts in the United States. U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt inaugurated as President on March 4, 1933. Scenes of Roosevelt and outgoing President Herbert Hoover leaving the White House together in a top-down convertible limousine before the ceremony. Roosevelt at the U.S. Capitol building during the inauguration ceremony as President of the United States. Roosevelt delivering the famous line in his speech, "The only thing we have to fear is fear itself." Jobless American men wait in unemployment relief lines to get work or jobs. Men in a bread line. Unemployed man with a large sign "Will take any job." Scenes of families migrating in the United States, with vehicles filled with belongings. Families and children suffering poverty and in makeshift camps and tenement dwellings during migration (usually migration west). Troops and bands march with American flags on Constitution Avenue during the Roosevelt Inauguration parade. Exterior view of U.S. Capitol Building framed by tree limbs. Men in an office empty heavy mailbags filled with letters (presumably to congress and senate). Government officials at a long table working on emergency banking laws in March of 1933. Scene of people flooding into a bank and making a run on the bank to retrieve deposits. President Roosevelt signs Emergency Banking Act in his office on March 9, 1933. View of White House lawn and White House. The CCC (Civilian Conservation Corps) is created to put unemployed young men to work on various conservation projects. CCC boys and men working on planting trees with pick axes and mattocks. Men and women in line to sign up for Emergency Work Relief programs. Officials write down the information for each worker as they are put to work in a variety of projects. Women and men, including white and African American men are seen getting assigned to work projects. A sign "USA Work Program WPA" advertising a suspension bridge work project of the Works Progress Administration in Los Angeles, California. People build roads, bridges and post offices. Cable fed out of a large spool as construction of a suspension bridge is shown. People work in factories. Four steam railroad locomotives preparing to run on parallel tracks. Close up views of railroad train locomotive wheels as they start moving and the train on tracks near factories. Various factory scenes including smokestacks, groups of workers entering factory for work shift and two different closeup views of a steam whistle blowing to mark the start or end of a work shift. A coal mining operation. Automated tools dig coal in shaft. Two coal miners take a break and eat. Crane hoists material at mine. A steel factory and hot molten steel pouring from a ladle.
Discussion of the Tillamook Forest Fire of 1933 in Oregon. Men cutting huge fallen tree with two-man saw. A man works on a Steam Donkey, dragging cut logs. The end of a log in flames. Lumberjacks try to put out the fire. A ranger spots smoke rising from the forest. A phone call being made and organized firefighting crews including the Civilian Conservation Corps respond to fight fire. CCC men cross a log bridge and climb steep hill into the forest. Other responders seen in mule trains. Forester atop a burned out telephone pole, where wire had been destroyed. Firefighters using wireless radios. Smoke rises from the forests. Smoke rises from the hill. Suddenly, wind changes and fire explodes. Views of the actual Tillamook Forest fire storm of August 1933. Two weeks later, rain suppresses the fire. View of firefighters using shovels, axes and other tools to dig fire line by hand, next to smoking underbrush. View of man holding a "Pulaski" tool, half axe and half hoe. Men looking over the aftermath of the Tillamook burn. Lumberjacks chopping a huge standing tree with axes. Cut logs suspended from cables, being moved. Forester with backpack, hiking along trail. Firefighters suppressing small wild fires with hand tools. (Great Depression period)