Your TR Source
Article discusses reporters experiences in the White Houses of Theodore Roosevelt, William H. Taft, and Woodrow Wilson. It focuses on the relationships Roosevelt built with some reporters during his time as president.
Sagamore Hill National Historic Site
1913-1921
President Roosevelt has written a statement about his association with Scribner’s Magazine during his upcoming African safari as requested by Robert Bridges, but requests Bridges be vague about the exact itinerary and timing of the trip, so as to avoid unwanted followers in the field, and asks that Bridges emphasize that the trip is associated with the National Museum of Natural History. Roosevelt emphasizes that his work with The Outlook magazine will in no way conflict with his work for Scribner’s.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1908-08-14
President Roosevelt hopes he made it clear in his last letter to Lawrence F. Abbott that he disagreed with the part of the Labor World article about his running for a third term. He has “moved heaven and earth” to prevent his renomination and believes Secretary of War William H. Taft will be nominated on the first ballot. Roosevelt does not feel Abbott can understand how much work he has put into preventing his renomination.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1908-04-24
President Roosevelt thanks John D. Kernan for his letter and informs him although he may commit other errors, “there is no danger of my failing to persevere in the conflict we now have on hand.” Roosevelt thinks that one of the “serious incidental evils of the present regime” is that subservience of metropolitan papers to moneyed interests and to demagogues.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1907-09-11
President Roosevelt thanks Senator Lodge for sending the piece from Baron F. A. Channing, which he will quote. It is apparent that Roosevelt’s Provincetown speech did not make matters worse, as the Sun, Times, and Evening Post had said it would. An expert has recently confirmed for Edith Kermit Carow Roosevelt that only Grace Wilson Vanderbilt and Senator John Kean have comparable Madeira cellars. Roosevelt also includes a quote from Secretary of War William H. Taft praising Lodge’s speech.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1907-09-04
President Roosevelt strongly objects to Charles Erskine Scott Wood publishing quotations from their personal correspondence and will immediately cease writing if that were to ill-advisedly occur.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1907-08-19
President Roosevelt thanks Thomas T. Fauntleroy for the letter and editorial from the Pasadena Daily News, especially since most letters and press are hostile.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1907-08-17
President Roosevelt expresses his displeasure with H. E. Miles over recent press coverage regarding a meeting between Miles, Roosevelt, and Illinois Senator Albert J. Hopkins, in which it was reported that the three had reached an agreement about the tariff. Roosevelt points out that Congress must be consulted about the tariff, and therefore Roosevelt thinks it was unwise for Miles to even allude to any conversations he had with Roosevelt on the topic.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1907-07-18
President Roosevelt tells William Dinwiddie that he has misquoted him, and instructs him to not quote private conversations between the two. He may decline to meet with Dinwiddie in the future.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1907-01-15
President Roosevelt thanks Frederick William Holls for the letter. He was very pleased with Nicholas Murray Butler’s essay.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1901-10-07
Senator Lodge returns the papers pertaining to the matter of the colliers. In his opinion, it is fine if the Department sends coal in foreign vessels just as long as there are not any more American vessels that can carry it. Lodge also mentions that some New York newspapers say he supports a third term. In fact, Lodge would like to “smash them thoroughly.”
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1907-09-11
Judge Speer provides historical justification for President Roosevelt’s actions in the Brownsville affair, involving the mass dishonorable discharge of African American soldiers, citing George Washington’s similar discharge of rowdy troops. Speer also mentions the Raid on Deerfield during Queen Anne’s War and the siege of Magdeburg during the Thirty Years’ War. Speer disagrees with Senator Tillman’s assessment that Roosevelt “lynched” the discharged soldiers, as did the editorial boards of several prominent Georgia newspapers.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1907-01-14
Albert Shaw discusses his new magazine Country Calendar and updates President Roosevelt on the arrangements for articles featuring Roosevelt.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1905-06-28
Andrew Hussey Allen informs Secretary of State Hay that the Department of State cannot publish “a bulletin of the popular vote for Presidential electors.” He goes on to support his opinion, citing the Acts of February 3, 1887, and October 19, 1888, that define the duties and powers of the Secretary of State. Allen tells Hay that he advised the managing editor of The Washington Evening Star that his paper must publish “everything in full.”
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1904-12-19
Winfield Scott Holt notifies President Roosevelt that the Arkansas Democrat has been suspended from the Associated Press for publishing Roosevelt’s speech to Congress before it was released. Holt states that publication was a blunder and vouches for decency and accuracy of the Democrat. A waiver from the President is required to reinstate the Democrat to Associated Press service.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1904-12-14
Assistant Secretary of State Loomis has received Secretary Loeb’s letter regarding malicious articles concerning the Roosevelt family which appeared in the Boston Herald. Loomis has provided executives in the State Department with copies of the White House press release on the matter.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1904-11-30
David R. Francis, president of the Louisiana Purchase Exposition, was disappointed to hear that President Roosevelt may not be able to visit the Exposition, and strongly encourages Roosevelt to attend.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1904-11-04
Robert J. Collier recently met with Albert Shaw, who helped explain President Roosevelt’s view of the situation in Missouri. Collier hopes to be able to make it up to Roosevelt after his reelection to show that the Weekly does not hold the sorts of hostility towards Roosevelt that has been exhibited in the recent letters of Samuel Hopkins Adams.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1904-11-03
At “Ananias Botanical Garden,” there are a number of potted plants with men’s heads in them: “Tillmanus,” “Forakeria,” and “Harrimanium Americanus.” For the last one, the tag lists “Nativity. . . . Wall Street,” “Stock,” “Veracity,” “Acquisition,” “Aspiration. . . . Senate,” and “Analyzed by Prof. T. Roosevelt, B.S., P. Du, P.D.Q.”
The visual cliche, or device, of political figures as plants in a flower show or botanical garden was frequently employed for decades. In this version (by an anonymous artist in an unidentified publication — at least insofar as the White House scrapbook’s annotation) — the hothouse is named for the Ananias Club. This was President Roosevelt’s partly jocular designation of a fraternity for those whom he considered liars in politics and purveyors of fake news in journalism.
President Roosevelt writes to Joseph Bucklin Bishop to discuss cartoons depicting him as a dictator and the effect they may have on the presidential campaign. He also asks Bishop to visit him and Nicholas Murray Butler.
1904-06-04