Norman Rockwell art that ignited a lawsuit and a love story is now on public view

Norman Rockwell's 1943 series So You Want to See the President! Click to enlarge. Bruce M. White/The White House Historical Association hide caption toggle caption Bruce M. White/The White House Historical Association Norman Rockwell's 1943 series So You Want to See the President! Click to enlarge. Bruce M. White/The White House Historical Association Norman Rockwell's So You Want to See The President! appeared in The Saturday Evening Post magazine in November 1943, at the height of World War II. In the foreground are a string of people waiting to see President Franklin Delano Roosevelt as well as the Secret Service officers watching over them. White House reporters, Miss America, a bored cameraman, a Scottish soldier, military officials and others sit on red sofas and chairs. As for FDR, he appears in a small sketch at the end of the illustration in the lower right hand corner. And that was the point. It was FDR's longtime press secretary Stephen Early who commissioned Rockwell to create the piece. "Early wanted to show President Roosevelt as accessible, as being engaged with the American people at a time when you could only know what was going on in the White House by reading the newspaper or listening on the radio," said Stewart McLaurin, president of the White House Historical Association. …