On this day in 1939, President Franklin D. Roosevelt laid the cornerstone of something no American president had done before: a library dedicated to his own presidency. Construction began on the 1st Presidential Library on November 19, 1939.  

The Setting: Hyde Park, New York

Until that moment, presidential papers were private property, which made this idea so radical for the time. Many of the papers vanished. Some ended up sold or scattered. FDR had a different vision.

He wanted to preserve it all —letters, speeches, memos, press clippings, even personal notes —and wanted the public to have access. In doing so, he invented the modern presidential library.

The Result

Roosevelt didn’t just pitch the idea; he planned it. In 1937, he sketched out the design himself. Dutch Colonial style. Fieldstone walls. A steep roof that nodded to Hudson Valley traditions. Architect Henry Toombs, a longtime collaborator of Roosevelt’s, helped shape the vision. By mid-1939, Louis A. Simon had signed on as principal architect, and construction was set in motion.

On July 24, 1939, FDR and his family deeded the land to the federal government. Just weeks later, construction crews broke ground. By November 19, with the walls rising from the fields of Hyde Park, Roosevelt stood before a crowd of nearly 1,000 people and placed a metal box into the cornerstone.

Inside the box? More than just documents:

• The Articles of Incorporation for the Roosevelt Library
• Congressional records and property deeds
• A speech by U.S. Archivist R.D.W. Connor
• Copies of local newspapers from the day

Roosevelt addressed the crowd with a promise: “This wholly adequate building will be turned over… to the Government of the United States next summer without any cost whatsoever to the taxpayers.” He noted that the collections would be open to the public by the spring of 1941.

The Aftermath

That comment sparked rumors: Was Roosevelt signaling an end to his presidency? He wasn’t. In fact, he would go on to win not only a third term but also a fourth. Still, the FDR Library opened its doors on June 30, 1941. It was the first time in American history that a president’s papers were organized, preserved, and made accessible while he was still in office. The research room opened a bit later, after he died in 1945.

What Roosevelt began that day reshaped the management of presidential legacy. By 1955, Congress passed the Presidential Libraries Act, formalizing the process. Today, more than a dozen presidential libraries span the country, built on the foundation that Roosevelt laid.