Your TR Source
President Roosevelt will gladly support the monument to James Fenimore Cooper and suggests that Thomas R. Lounsbury contact Brander Matthews for additional help. Roosevelt would be pleased if Lounsbury could visit Washington, D.C. next winter.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1907-09-03
President Roosevelt read the article in The Atlantic Monthly. He agrees with Brander Matthews on James Fenimore Cooper and found the situation on controlling the gamblers entertaining. The reaction to Francis J. Heney in California is the same as the reaction from Wall Street to Roosevelt’s enforcement of the laws.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1907-09-02
President Roosevelt disagrees with the author of “Point of View,” who claims that featuring an automobile as the hero of a novel is a “purely modern” idea. He feels that James Fenimore Cooper made ships the true hero of his novel The Two Admirals, treating them much the same way modern authors treat automobiles.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1907-10-01
President Roosevelt directs Brander Matthews to The Wilderness Hunter and the first volume of The Winning of the West for “allusions to Cooper’s frontiersmen.” Roosevelt cannot remember where he has made reference to Cooper’s Indians.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1907-05-12
President Roosevelt has nothing to add to what he has already said about James Fenimore Cooper. He recommends Brander Matthews read his book The Winning of the West for more information. Roosevelt liked Thomas R. Lounsbury’s article.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1907-05-07
President Roosevelt heard about the blizzard from Peabody Endicott and is glad Kermit Roosevelt made “rather a narrow escape” from his adventure. He reports Children of the Night is a delightful read. Archibald and Quentin enjoy having James Fenimore Cooper’s The Pathfinder read to them. Of all his work, Roosevelt minds the dinners and banquets the most. Hopefully, he can go for a gallop in the recent snowfall.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1905-01-31
As part of the celebration of Cooperstown’s centennial, Brander Matthews is to prepare a speech on James Fenimore Cooper. Matthews asks if Roosevelt has any thoughts to add on his admiration for Cooper aside from what Jacob Riis has already said. Matthews recalls some of Roosevelt’s criticisms of what Cooper wrote about Native Americans.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1907-05-06
William H. White examines the writing of Theodore Roosevelt’s The Naval War of 1812. White compares Roosevelt’s work to those written by the British author William James and the American James Fenimore Cooper. White concentrates on the work of James who produced a very biased account of the naval battles in favor of Great Britain, and White argues that Roosevelt set out to “write an accurate and unbiased history” of the naval war and that Roosevelt succeeded in doing so. White concedes that Roosevelt does allow his opinions to flavor his work, but he argues that Roosevelt produced a work superior to James’s, one marked by quality research and Roosevelt’s determination to teach himself the intricacies of naval warfare in the age of sail.
A photograph of White, a page from Roosevelt’s research notes, and the cover of The Naval War of 1812 illustrate the essay.
Theodore Roosevelt Association Journal
2007-10-26
Four brief book reviews comprise the “Book Notes” column. John A. Gable reviews Michael Teague’s oral history of Alice Roosevelt Longworth and praises it for its use of 170 photographs, and he also examines Stephen Fox’s John Muir and His Legacy which not only looks at Muir’s life and work, but at many lesser known conservationists who comprise Muir’s legacy. Elizabeth E. Roosevelt reviews Thomas G. Dyer’s Theodore Roosevelt and the Idea of Race and finds its chapters on Native Americans and African Americans valuable while Janice Marino finds William L. DeAndrea’s novel The Lunatic Fringe worthless.
Theodore Roosevelt Association Journal
1981
Gable, John A.; Roosevelt, Elizabeth E.; Marino, Janice, 1931-2017