Your TR Source
Edgar Chambless reminds Theodore Roosevelt that they previously talked about his idea for Roadtown, and he left a book about it at Roosevelt’s office. He would like Roosevelt’s comments and criticisms on the Roadtown Foundation.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1911-07-17
George R. Howe was terribly disappointed that Theodore Roosevelt did not take the time to answer his previous letter himself. Howe feels that he is working for a worthy cause, and is sure that Roosevelt would find the materials he previously sent to be interesting. He hopes Roosevelt will reconsider supporting him.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1911-07-05
Ida B. Hiltz informs Theodore Roosevelt that he was elected as an Honorary Vice President of the American Association for the Conservation of Vision by its board of managers, alongside several other notable figures. Hiltz urges him to lend his name to the organization, which works toward the prevention of blindness.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1911-05-25
Joseph K. Van Denburg asks Theodore Roosevelt to denounce the proposed decrease in salary for male teachers in New York in his upcoming address. Van Denburg believes this proposition to be disastrous for male teachers in New York.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1911-05-09
In response to Theodore Roosevelt’s article “Race Decadence,” Fred V. Garey presents his personal situation. Even with a college education and a good job, Garey and his wife cannot justify having more children than the two they presently have. Doing so would mean each child receives less investment in the fundamentals of food, clothing, education, and attention, which could negatively impact their futures. In contrast, his Irish neighbor’s ten children are poorly cared for. He, therefore, questions if it is fair to lower the simple standard of living just to increase the population. Garey asks Roosevelt to clarify how the average family should practically approach the issues raised in his article.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1911-04-11
John S. Patton sends Theodore Roosevelt a copy of Charles William Eliot’s Barbour-Page lectures for 1909.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1911-01-28
Arthur S. Hider encloses a short story that he wrote for Harvard President Charles William Eliot’s amusement, which he hopes Theodore Roosevelt will enjoy. He asks Roosevelt to ask General W. L. Marshall if he has heard “the three-absolute story.”
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1909-11-06
President Roosevelt’s letter arrived just as Alexander Lambert was recovering from a problem with his back. Lambert would be glad to visit Roosevelt on July 11th and 12th, as they have much to talk about and it will take a couple days. Lambert is sorry that Roosevelt gave Charles William Eliot a chance to to attack him, as Eliot has never forgiven Roosevelt for being considered as Eliot’s successor as President of Harvard.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1908-06-25
Thomas W. Slocum sends President Roosevelt a copy of a letter he is sending to Harvard President Charles William Eliot. Slocum regrets the news coverage stemming from remarks Roosevelt made to the committee and hopes the letter to Eliot will put the matter to rest.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1907-06-05
Dean Hurlbut of Harvard College writes to President Roosevelt about the reported troubles and recent arrest of his son, Theodore Roosevelt Jr. Moran is turning it into a political matter, attempting to harm Roosevelt through his son, who was struck by the police when arrested. Francis R. Bangs and John Perkins will look after Theodore’s best interests. Hurlbut hopes the story comes to light and he apologizes for the president’s son’s poor treatment.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1906-10-05
Senator Lodge writes to President Roosevelt sharing his opinions about a letter by Harvard President Eliot. Senator Tillman requested that Lodge contact Roosevelt for a discussion regarding Senator Cullom. Lodge goes on to mention thoughts on the Standard Oil Company and their monopoly.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1906-06-22
Isaac Newton Seligman asks President Roosevelt if he will accept an appointment to the National Child Labor Committee. Seligman lists other notable members and states the committee will not require work from Roosevelt.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1906-04-27
Edward Brandegee suggests that following the end of his term, President Roosevelt succeed Charles William Eliot as president of Harvard University. If Roosevelt is interested in the opportunity, Brandegee will quietly work behind the scenes towards this end.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1906-03-03
Endicott Peabody believes that the new football rules are reaching the point where Harvard may consider allowing undergraduates to participate in it. He tells President Roosevelt at length about a visit from Roosevelt’s son Ted Roosevelt, during which Ted expressed some concerning ideas and positions regarding morality. Peabody tells Roosevelt so that when he sees his son he can “help him to a more sane point of view,” but asks Roosevelt not to tell Ted that he wrote about him.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1906-01-30
In his review of John J. Miller’s The Big Scrum: How Teddy Roosevelt Saved Football, Duane G. Jundt notes that Theodore Roosevelt does not figure prominently in its discussion of the problems facing college football in the early twentieth century until relatively late in the book. Jundt praises Miller for providing a well-written examination of the place football occupied in American culture, but he contends that Miller relies too much on speculative language in describing a football summit organized by Roosevelt, and he also asserts that Miller overstates Roosevelt’s role in saving football from those who would have banned it.
Photographs of the football coaches of Yale and Harvard and the front cover illustration from The Big Scrum supplement the text.
Wallace Finley Dailey presents an exhibit, “Roosevelt Reading: The Pigskin Library, 1909-1910,” that opened at Harvard University in September 2003. Dailey provides an introduction to the exhibit which consists of photographs, excerpts of letters, and illustrations of the numerous pigskin bound volumes that Theodore Roosevelt took with him on his African safari. The exhibit is divided into three parts: “Classics and the Continent,” History and Romance,” and “Americans.” Many of the book illustrations have captions taken from letters or articles written by Roosevelt that comment on the book and its author.
Theodore Roosevelt Association Journal
2013
Wallace Finley Dailey, curator of the Theodore Roosevelt Collection at Harvard University, recreates an exhibit on Theodore Roosevelt’s involvement with Harvard from his days as a student to his work as an overseer. The exhibit was displayed at Harvard in 1977, 1980, 1996, 2005, and 2012. The exhibit in article form consists of twenty-five photographs, including thirteen of Roosevelt, and numerous documents including letters, certificates, diary and notebook entries, and publications by and about Roosevelt. The accompanying text identifies each photograph and document, noting its source and providing context.
President Roosevelt tells Justice Holmes that he likes the book written by Charles William Eliot, the President of Harvard, and he wishes that Eliot could write more biographies of everyday Americans. Roosevelt also offers his thoughts on how people will be remembered once they have died. Roosevelt says some may be able to attain a degree of pleasure before they die knowing that those close to them will fondly remember them.
Theodore Roosevelt Association Journal
1904-12-05
John A. Gable examines the influence that Theodore Roosevelt’s service as a Rough Rider in the Spanish-American War had on the rest of his career. Gable argues that Roosevelt’s service was vital to his election as Governor of New York and as Vice President. He also contends that it made Roosevelt a more effective and convincing Commander-in-Chief as President, but Gable also believes that the power of the Rough Rider image overshadowed Roosevelt’s considerable talents as a writer and intellectual. Gable concludes by asserting that Roosevelt’s record as a Rough Rider made him the last member of a “Heroic Line” in American history stretching back to the Revolutionary War.
A photograph of Roosevelt in his Rough Rider uniform appears in the article.
Three works come under consideration in the “Book Reviews” section. Cole Patrick looks at both the 1941 and 1989 editions of the Theodore Roosevelt Cyclopedia. He comments on the work of Albert Bushnell Hart in compiling and editing the first edition, and he quotes from William Allen White’s foreword from 1941. Patrick explains the various additions made to the 1989 edition by John A. Gable of the Theodore Roosevelt Association (TRA), including a bibliography, a chronology of Theodore Roosevelt’s life, and a history of the TRA.
Tweed Roosevelt examines Bartle Bull’s Safari: A Chronicle of Adventure and highlights its coverage of Theodore Roosevelt’s African safari of 1909-1910, and he also looks at other figures, British and American, who made safaris. He praises the book’s organization and illustrations but faults it for not giving a sense of who the hunters were as people, Roosevelt included. Marilyn E. Weigold praises Elizabeth Winthrop’s novel, In My Mother’s House, for its “precise descriptions of life in Manhattan in the last few decades of the nineteenth century.” The novel’s main character is based on the life of the daughter of Corinne Roosevelt Robinson, Theodore Roosevelt’s sister.