$6,000,000 Secret Hideout Built for Roosevelt in Mexico
- Title:
- $6,000,000 Secret Hideout Built for Roosevelt in Mexico
- Alternate Title:
- $6,000,000 Secret Hideout Built for Roosevelt
- Collection:
- Persuasive Maps: PJ Mode Collection
- Creator:
- Christian Nationalist Crusade
- Other Creators:
- Christian Nationalist Crusade, publisher
- Date:
- 1951
- Posted Date:
- 2024-04-25
- ID Number:
- 2513.03
- File Name:
- PJM_2513_03.jpg
- Style/Period:
- 1940 - 1959
- Subject:
- Communism & Cold War
Deception/Distortion
World War II - Measurement:
- page 28 x 22 (centimeters, height x width)
- Notes:
- This is a case in which a straightforward, accurate map was used to add credibility to a phony conspiracy theory.
In winter of 1951, amid McCarthyite claims about Americans who allegedly supported communism, the French newspaper Le Figaro reported on a dramatic letter quoted in the memoirs of a retired Spanish diplomat. The letter was purportedly written by President Roosevelt to Jacob Zabronsky (misspelled Zabousky in the letter), president of the National Council of Young Israel, in 1943. The letter confirmed that Zabronsky and his organization would be "acting in the role of intermediary between me and our mutual friend Stalin." In that capacity, Zabronsky was instructed to "assure Stalin" of various commitments for the post-war world, including an equal voice with the U.S. and England; a port on the Mediterranean; agreement to "accede to [Russia's] desires with respect to Finland and the Baltic in general;" recognition that Czechoslovakia and Yugoslavia "have been temporarily snatched from great Russia;" and "a vast field of expansion in the little countries of Eastern Europe." In exchange for this, Roosevelt required that "the American continent will remain outside all Soviet propaganda and under the exclusive influence of the United States." See ID ##2513.01-02.
On March 11, 1951, the New York Journal-American featured this story under the headline "F.D.R.'s Secret Offer to Share World Power with the Kremlin," and it appeared in other Hearst papers across the country. Time Magazine, March 26, 1951, p.62. The following day, the Department of State issued a detailed press release denouncing the letter as a fake, "ingeniously fashioned from fact, half truth, rumor, and inaccuracy," with an "illusion of authenticity" that "fades under scrutiny." Department of State Bulletin 24: 496-98, March 26, 1951 (reprinting the March 12 press release). The Hearst organization issued a formal retraction stating that a "thorough investigation" revealed that "the Roosevelt letter was a fraud" apparently "constructed for German wartime propaganda purposes." Congressional Record 97/3: 4063-64. That is consistent with other reporting that in 1943 the letter had allegedly "fallen in the hands of" Generalissimo Francisco Franco. New York Times, March 13, 1951, p.15.
Coincidentally, at almost the same time, the Los Angeles Times published an apparently unrelated article that was distributed nationwide: Ainsworth, Ed., "Mexican Village Was Hideout Built for F.D.R., Rumors Insist - $6,000,000 Facilities in Remote Spot." Los Angeles Times, March 14, 1951; Congressional Record - Appendix 97/12: A1547-48, March 5(?), 1951. The article describes an "imposing palace" built in 1943 in the isolated village of Punta Penasco, which "does not even appear on many maps." The site is accessible by a "fine, paved highway," a "handy harbor," and a "big airport . . . capable of handling the largest planes." The U.S. government denied any knowledge of the project, and the Mexican government said that it had been intended for a planned meeting between President Roosevelt and the President of Mexico. The Times article, however, reported "persistent stories" that the project was a "hide-away . . . for the personal safety of President Roosevelt." Ibid.
This four-page pamphlet was produced by the Christian Nationalist Crusade, an anti-semitic, anti-Communist, white-nationalist organization founded by Gerald L.K. Smith. (For a similar publication by this organization, see ID #2463, "World Government Plan - Alien Troops to Police U.S.A." (1962).) The pamphlet is entitled "F.D.R. Secret Letters. Stalin and Roosevelt plotted with Jew Zionists to divide the World." The first three pages (ID ##2513.01-02) summarize and then reprint in full the fake letter. The fourth page (ID #2513.03), "$6,000,000 SECRET HIDEOUT BUILT FOR ROOSEVELT IN MEXICO," summarizes the Los Angeles Times article and includes a large map of the area from Punta Penasco north to California and Arizona, as far as Phoenix.
The map, which seems geographically accurate, adds authenticity to the mystery of the "hideout." And the punchline immediately adjacent to the map ties the two apparently unrelated subjects together: "A logical guess: Could it be that this was to become the super capital of the Western Hemisphere to be ruled under F.D.R., as per the proposed agreement contained in the secret correspondence between Roosevelt and Stalin?"
Cornell University Library is pleased to present this digital collection of Persuasive Maps, the originals of which have been collected and described by the private collector PJ Mode. The descriptive information in the “Collector’s Notes” has been supplied by Mr. Mode and does not necessarily reflect the views of Cornell University. - Format:
- Image
- Rights:
- For important information about copyright and use, see http://persuasivemaps.library.cornell.edu/copyright.