ABSTRACT
Howes new job was as varied as Franklin D. Roosevelt's interests. He became, quite literally, Roosevelt with legs, doing all the innumerable things the boss would have done could he have walked. He stood in for Roosevelt at business, political, and philanthropic meetings, bought prints and antiques for him at auctions, ran family errands, even tried to be substitute-father for the Roosevelt boys on occasion. Roosevelt's annual birthday parties with the Cuff-links Club gave him his best opportunities. Once a year, Franklin D. Roosevelt could relax with the close friends to whom he had given gold cuff links as mementos of their arduous 1920 campaign. Under ordinary circumstances Roosevelt might have been barred from a further business career. Fortunately he had a reasonable amount of money to invest, as well as the firm friendship of his boss, Van Lear Black. What Black mainly expected from Roosevelt was the new business his name and friendships might bring.
