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No, really, I went because Mrs. Roosevelt was interested in it. I was not really involved in it. It was only because I was devoted to her, and I may have given some money to it, but certainly not any large amount.

By this time you had developed a real friendship with her.

Yes, yes, and I admired her very much.

Well, in 1942, another interest outside of my life with my husband developed and that was that I read a book calledVictory through Air Power by a man called Major (Alexander) Seversky. I saw from it that if what he said was true, we were indeed in great peril, because the emphasis in the United States was for building tanks, and the priority for the building of aircraft, especially aircraft with long range, was very, very low.

Was this before the President laid down his 50,000-plane program?

This was in the spring of '42. The book came out in the spring of '42, and I think it was before his 50,000 plane program. But his idea about 50,000 planes wasn't related to range of planes. The idea was only that a mass of planes was necessary, and I think he was right about that, but actually we needed planes that could carry large bombloads and with great