Malvina Thompson

Malvina "Tommy" Thompson (1893 – April 12, 1953) was a private secretary and personal aide to First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt. She was a pioneer of the East Wing staff, being the first staffer for a First Lady of the United States who was not a social secretary.^[1]

Career

Thompson was born in New York City in 1893. A high school graduate, she later became a self-taught

"Tommy" soon became an integral part of Eleanor Roosevelt's staff. Her formal role was that of Roosevelt's scheduler, personal travel assistant, and office secretary. The First Lady relied upon Thompson to cut off her own tendencies to be sympathetic and over-generous to petitioners.[1]

When the Roosevelts moved to the White House in March 1933, "Tommy" continued and intensified her role. Roosevelt and Thompson began operating nationwide to encourage and inspect the divisions and departments performing New Deal relief, traveling as much as 40,000 miles (65,000 km) per year. Continuing to serve as Roosevelt's personal assistant and scheduler, Thompson also took on the pioneering role of First Lady press secretary, organizing and overseeing Roosevelt's all-female press conferences and her syndicated daily newspaper column, My Day.^[1] In 1940, she strongly discouraged Roosevelt from addressing the Democratic National Convention, which no First Lady had ever done; she later told Lorena Hickok, "I did not want to see Mrs. Roosevelt sacrificed on the altar of hysteria."^[3] Roosevelt spoke at the convention nonetheless, and her speech was widely regarded as a "triumph".^[4]

One of Eleanor Roosevelt's biographers, Blanche Wiesen Cook, summarized Thompson's character and role in the Roosevelt Administration:

Entirely loyal to ER, she was efficient, protective, and open-hearted. Tommy smoked cigarettes from morning to night, drank Scotch at day's end, and saw something funny in almost every situation. ER relied on her quick-witted support, and her fabulous sense of humor. Tommy's robust and hearty laugh lit up many tense situations, and she had a good time wherever she went.^[5]

In 1939, when Eleanor Roosevelt had the opportunity to transform the

In 1921, Thompson married Frank Schneider, a public school teacher. They had no children, and divorced in 1939.[6] On rare, formal occasions, she would refer to herself or be referred to as Malvina Thompson Schneider, but was usually referred to as Malvina Thompson.^{[citation needed]}

Gossip was also published during the Roosevelt Administration about an alleged relationship between Roosevelt and Thompson. For example, in February 1936 an unnamed reporter for the newsweekly Time referred to Thompson, Nancy Cook, and Marion Dickerman, all of whom lived at various times at Val-Kill, as members of the First Lady's "troupe of handmaidens."^[7]

This was how Lorena Hickok summarized Thompson's final years at Val-Kill:

So Mrs. Roosevelt had spent the summer following his death moving out the things the family wanted to keep. And on April 12, 1946, the first anniversary of his death, the big house would be formally accepted by President Truman, on behalf of the American people. Mrs. Roosevelt had settled down with Tommy in a rambling two-story house that she called her "cottage," three miles away from the river and the big house.^[8]

Following Thompson's death in April 1953, some of Eleanor Roosevelt's relatives and close friends sent her letters and notes of