Kindred Souls

The poignant and unforgettable true account of the deep, loving friendship between a handsome physician and the former First Lady, as seen on PBSs The Roosevelts: An Intimate History I love you as I love and have never loved anyone else. Eleanor Roosevelt in a letter to Dr. David Gurewitsch, 1955 She was the most famous and admired woman in America. He was a strikingly handsome doctor, eighteen years her junior. Eleanor Roosevelt first met David Gurewitsch in 1944. He was making a house call to a patient when the door opened to reveal the wife of the president of the United States, who had come to help her sick friend. A year later, Gurewitsch was Mrs. Roosevelts personal physician, on his way to becoming the great ladys dearest companiona relationship that would endure until Mrs. Roosevelts death in 1962. Recounting the details of this remarkable union is an intimately involved chronicler: Gurewitschs wife, Edna. Kindred Souls is a rare love storythe tale of a friendship between two extraordinary people, based on trust, exchange of confidences, and profound interest in and respect for each others work. With perceptiveness, compassion, admiration, and deep affection, the author recalls the final decade and a half of the former First Ladys exceptional life, from her first encounter with the man who would become Mrs. Gurewitschs husband through the blossoming of a unique bond and platonic love. Blended into her tender reminiscences are excerpts from the enduring correspondence between Dr. Gurewitsch and the First Lady, and a collection of personal photographs of the Gurewitsch and Roosevelt families. The result is a revealing portrait of one of the twentieth centurys most beloved icons in the last years of her lifea woman whom the author warmly praises as one of the few people in this world in which greatness and modesty could coexist.