Your TR Source
John H. Johnston encloses cards about great grandchildren to Theodore Roosevelt. He thanks Roosevelt for the photos, which he has framed alongside letters and photos from other notable men.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1911-09-21
Maurice Francis Egan sends President Roosevelt a book about the Icelandic-Celtic sagas and informs the president about giving Thomas J. O’Brien’s letter of recall to Danish King Frederick VIII on September 6, 1907. Egan recounts his visit to Frederik VIII and his wife, Queen Louise, mentioning his discussion with Louise about Christian Science and her opinion that Roosevelt was handling race relations and treatment of African Americans in a Christian way. Although Egan feels that Danish is difficult to learn, he believes he is getting along well.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1907-09-12
Senator Lodge expresses his admiration for President Roosevelt’s love of Charles Dickens’s works, and sends him a first edition of David Copperfield as a Christmas present.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1906-12-24
President Roosevelt writes to his son Kermit about the Peruvian telegram scandal. A telegram with Roosevelt’s name was written by Assistant Secretary of State Adee and included the phrase “me and my people.” Secretary of State Root did not catch it and the media deemed the phrase evidence of Roosevelt’s megalomaniac tendencies. Roosevelt decided no one was to sign his name but himself from now on. Roosevelt closes the letter with a passage from Charles Dickens that Henry Cabot Lodge gave him.
1908-03-04
President Roosevelt writes to his son Kermit to discuss his views on Charles Dickens and his work. Roosevelt also says that Ted visited and has decided to work with Jack Greenway.
1908-02-29
President Roosevelt writes his son Kermit to discuss his views on the work of Charles Dickens and William Makepeace Thackeray. He also talks about a poem by Philip Roosevelt and a visit from cousin Emlen Roosevelt, Christine, Frank Lowell, and his wife. Roosevelt closes by saying he had dinner with Ambassador Jusserand and Justice Moody.
1908-02-23
President Roosevelt tells Sir George Otto Trevelyan of his happiness regarding the recent 1904 presidential election, and remarks that he is glad people decided to support the positive message of the Republican Party, rather than the negativity of the Democratic Party. The president attributes his victory to the clear-cut message in his speeches and addresses as well as those canvassing for him. Roosevelt discusses the differences between the American president and other political leaders and believes the American president is more like the British prime minister than the French president. he additionally reflects on his intention not to run for a third term. Even without the convention of only two terms, the president believes it would be better for Secretary of War William H. Taft or Elihu Root to succeed him; they are similar in policy, but would have fresh thoughts and ways. Roosevelt concludes by discussing his recent reading. He praises a section from one of Abraham Lincoln’s speeches after his reelection and equates certain American political leaders to characters in Charles Dickens’s works.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1904-11-24
President Roosevelt approves of Archibald B. Roosevelt’s poetry interests and correspondence style. Roosevelt expresses grief at the death of his nephew Stewart Douglas Robinson and wishes he could do more for his sister, Corinne Roosevelt Robinson. However, Roosevelt stands firm that private life cannot overtake public duty, noting that as president, he had to greet the Great White Fleet.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1909-02-23
President Roosevelt sends Senator Lodge a quotation from William Wordsworth that is similar to a quotation from Charles Dickens.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1908-03-26
President Roosevelt appreciates receiving the note from Reverend Baltzly and likes the quotation from William Wordsworth that he sent. Roosevelt sends Baltzly a quotation from Charles Dickens about pacifists in return.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1908-03-26
President Roosevelt Kermit Roosevelt about an incident that happened in the State Department. President José Pardo y Barreda sent a telegram to Roosevelt, but Roosevelt never saw it, as Alvey A. Adee drafted a stock reply to it. Adee used a phrase that attracted significant criticism in the press, and Roosevelt could not explain the matter without revealing that he never saw the telegram in the first place. Roosevelt directed that no one should sign his name for him anymore in the future. President Roosevelt comments to Kermit about a quote from Charles Dickens that Senator Henry Cabot Lodge had sent him.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1908-03-04
President Roosevelt agrees with Kermit Roosevelt about the book Martin Chuzzlewit, and criticizes Charles Dickens’s character and inability to see the positive traits of America and Americans, which led to such great men as Abraham Lincoln. He concedes, however, that some of the negative characteristics that Dickens’s characters portray do persist in some Americans, including Senator Benjamin R. Tillman, William Randolph Hearst, and John D. Rockefeller. Roosevelt enjoyed a recent visit from Kermit’s older brother, Theodore Roosevelt.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1908-02-29
President Roosevelt updates his son Kermit about his mother’s and siblings’ lives, as well as the legislative progress he has made recently. Roosevelt has had difficulties with California, Japan, and Panama. He agrees with Kermit about the merits of Mark Twain and Robert Browning and their use of history as a narrative tool.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1906-02-16
President Roosevelt was interested in his son Theodore Roosevelt’s commentary about Charles Dickens in a recent letter he wrote to his mother, Edith Kermit Carow Roosevelt. He comments that “Dickens’ characters are really to a great extent personified attributes rather than individuals,” and offers several examples of the memorable examples Dickens created. Roosevelt provides a brief update on the progress of legislation, where he has been successful in passing a rate bill, but anticipates a fierce fight over the Panama canal bill. He has been too busy to get much exercise, but has occasionally been able to go horseback riding and play tennis.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1906-05-20
After talking with George Horace Lorimer, President Roosevelt went back and read The Plum Tree through all the way, after previously having read only half of it. The ending of the book reconciles Roosevelt to many of the problems he had with it throughout, but he still holds many issues with the book which he lays out for Lorimer. The author, David Graham Phillips, falls into the trap of overstating the sort of corruption that is present in politics, and while Roosevelt freely admits that corruption is present–which, he points out, he is working against–there are also many good people working in politics as well. In a postscript of several days later, Roosevelt comments on several of Phillips’s articles on the Senate, in which he acts similarly by taking “certain facts that are true in themselves, and […] ignoring utterly a very much large mass of facts that are just as true and just as important.” Roosevelt criticizes Phillips for working with William Randolph Hearst to achieve notoriety.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1906-05-12
President Roosevelt agrees with Secretary of State Hay on the matter of the Russian ship Lena, which recently arrived in San Francisco. It will be dismantled, disarmed, and its crew on parole in order to stick to a “rigid line of neutrality” in the Russo-Japanese War. Roosevelt urges Hay to tend to his health.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1904-09-16
Francis Arthur Jones thanks Theodore Roosevelt for the letter, and informs him that the dinner in honor of Charles Dickens has been postponed. He hopes that Roosevelt may be able to attend when the new date is decided upon.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1911-03-03
Harry Johnston tells President Roosevelt about some of his travels around the southern United States, and his observations of both the people and environment there. Johnston plans to spend some time in Louisiana before traveling to Florida, and thence to Cuba. Johnston also would like to travel to Haiti, but worries that potential unrest there will make it difficult for him to visit. He asks Roosevelt if he would consider writing a letter of introduction allowing him to visit, as “it would be rather disappointing to return to England without some glimpse of Haiti.” Harper’s will be publishing an article of Johnston’s describing his impressions of New York that Roosevelt helped review.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1908-12-01
Senator Lodge sends President Roosevelt a reminder of their conversation regarding Colonel George G. Greenough. Lodge asks that Roosevelt let him know what Colonel Clarence Ransom Edwards says, as he discussed Henry B. McCoy’s proxy for the Republican National Convention with him. He also encloses a short extract from Charles Dickens, which he thinks Roosevelt could make use of in a speech.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1908-03-02
Whitelaw Reid heard that President Roosevelt wanted to see the speech he gave at the Titmarsh Club in London, and encloses a brochure, noting that he was referencing Charles Dickens at the same time that Roosevelt was referencing Martin Chuzzlewit. He updates Roosevelt on the health of his wife’s father and provides a forwarding address. A handwritten postscript says that he spoke with Secretary of State Elihu Root about copies of old King George III commissions for libraries that were sent by the London Custom House.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1908-01-06