When Franklin Roosevelt fell for his distant cousin Eleanor, his mother Sara took him on a cruise to dissuade him from pursuing the shy, orphaned debutante. Nevertheless the couple married on March 17, 1905. As a wedding present, Sara built her only child and his bride a townhouse on Manhattan’s Upper East Side, designing and furnishing it herself. What the Roosevelts didn’t realize when they accepted her generous offer was that the plan included an adjacent home—complete with connecting doors on every floor—for Sara to inhabit. During the early years of her marriage, Eleanor lived in the shadow of her domineering mother-in-law, who ordered the future first lady to abandon her charity work, managed the household and spoiled the Roosevelt children. Eleanor finally gained some independence when her husband got elected to the New York State Senate and moved the family to Albany, leaving Sara behind.