Smoking Room

Built by FDR's father, this octagonal room looks like a gentleman's sitting room. The nineteenth-century fad for octagonal rooms and octagonal houses was spurred by Orson Fowler's The Octagon House: A Home for All (published in 1848) which promoted practical benefits of a room or building with eight sides. Octagonal rooms are found throughout the Hudson Valley, but thousands were constructed all over the United States. The room's name suggests its original function, although it was used infrequently after James Roosevelt's death. Eleanor recalled that "the fireplace never drew very well and so this was never a popular room. I never knew it to be used for anything but a storeroom for extra books and collector's items which my husband was always accumulating." She also remembered election nights when FDR set up machines in this room and the dining room to track voting results.