Kathryn Smith

Kathryn Smith is a journalist and writer with a life-long interest in FDR and his circle. She recently authored The Gatekeeper: Missy LeHand, FDR, and the Untold Story of the Partnership That Defined a Presidency, a definite biography of the President's long-time assistant.

Ms. Smith worked as a daily newspaper reporter and editor, and has been the book columnist for the Anderson Independent Mail for twenty years. She has been involved through Rotary International in the worldwide effort to eradicate polio, called PolioPlus, and she has lectured and spoken on FDR’s leadership in that arena. Smith is the author of an oral history of World War II told by living veterans and civilians called “A Necessary War.”

and . She has lived all her life in Georgia and South Carolina, and earned a bachelor’s degree in journalism at the University of Georgia.

Articles by this Author

Missy LeHand: FDR's Influential but Largely Forgotten Assistant, Summer 2017 | Vol. 62, No. 1

She functioned as Franklin Roosvelt's de facto chief-of-staff, yet Missy LeHand's role has been misrepresented and overlooked by historians.

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