Theodore Roosevelt Biography

Theodore Roosevelt:

Writer, Explorer, Soldier, and President

Theodore Roosevelt (1858-1919) was the youngest man ever to become president of the United States. He overcame illness and then pursued the life of a rugged outdoorsman and politician. Roosevelt is one of only four presidents whose faces are carved into Mt. Rushmore in South Dakota.

Theodore Roosevelt was born the second of four children to a New York family. His family called the younger Roosevelt “Teedie.” He was named for his father, whom he admired as “the best man I ever knew.” His father was a wealthy glass importer.

As a boy, Roosevelt suffered from severe asthma. In addition to asthma, the thin, weak boy suffered from nearsightedness. He wore glasses from an early age. When he turned 12, his father advised him to strengthen his body so that his mind could develop fully. The following year, Roosevelt proved too weak to fight off two bullies. They had tormented him on a vacation in Maine. Afterward, the boy began to exercise regularly in the gymnasium his father had built at home. He soon built up his strength.

Roosevelt loved to read. He also adored being outside. Studying nature combined both of these interests. With his gun and a taxidermy kit, he hunted and cut apart birds for study. His older sister did not like the way he or his new hobby smelled. Roosevelt continued enthusiastically. Once, he cut up a kestrel. He was delighted to discover inside it the remains of a lark, a lizard, and some beetles.

Education and First Marriage Tutors guided Roosevelt’s education until he left for Harvard at the age of 18. He earned good grades. In addition, young Roosevelt also became a good horseman, boxer, and marksman. He and a friend cooperated in writing and publishing a report on the birds of the Adirondacks. Roosevelt also wrote two chapters of a naval history of the War of 1812.

Roosevelt graduated from Harvard in 1880. Four months later, he married Alice Lee. The young couple then moved to New York. Roosevelt was elected to the first of three terms in the New York State Assembly. Participating in politics satisfied two needs for Roosevelt. Public office gave him the power he loved. It also helped him do good for other people. He later described his theory of government in this way: “If on this new continent we merely build another country of great but unjustly divided material prosperity, we shall have done nothing.”

But in the middle of Roosevelt’s third term in the state assembly, tragedy struck. On the same day, February 14, 1884, both his mother and his young wife died. Roosevelt’s infant daughter, Alice, was only two days old. Somehow, Roosevelt managed to finish the legislative session. Then he set out for his ranch in western Dakota. He called it “a land of vast silent spaces, a place of grim beauty.”

For a time, the young widower thought he might continue living a life of hunting, ranching, and writing. He published two more books and began a four-volume series on the settling of the West. But a new love and politics soon called Roosevelt back East.

A Return to Politics In 1886, Roosevelt decided to remarry. He and his second wife, Edith, raised young Alice. They also had five children of their own.

Roosevelt served as assistant secretary of the navy under President William McKinley. Roosevelt championed war with Spain. As soon as war was declared, he resigned his post. He organized the First U.S. Volunteer Cavalry regiment. Military combat, Roosevelt later said, gave him the chance to cut his “little notch on the stick that stands as a measuring rod in every family.”

Roosevelt believed that war tested a nation’s strength. He argued that if the United States did not fight to expand its influence, the country would lose its own power.

Roosevelt’s group, nicknamed the Rough Riders, fought bravely in a tough battle. The Rough Riders’ charge up San Juan Hill brought Roosevelt and his Rough Riders fame back in America. It later helped to win Roosevelt the governorship of New York. Years afterward, he recalled, “San Juan was the great day of my life.”

An Accidental President Theodore Roosevelt became president by accident in 1901. The reform-minded governor was unpopular with some members of his own party. Republican party boss Thomas C. Platt wanted to get Roosevelt out of state politics. He pushed the governor into accepting the Republican nomination for vice-president in 1900. Roosevelt was bored by the vice-presidency.

Roosevelt’s boredom did not last long, however. When President McKinley died, the victim of an assassin’s bullet, Roosevelt became president at the age of 42. In 1904, he won election to a second term by a record-setting margin.

During his presidency, Roosevelt pursued progressive policies. He persuaded Congress to build the Panama Canal. The canal was his proudest achievement. When he visited Panama in 1906, he became the first sitting president to travel to a foreign country. The nature-loving president added millions of acres to the national forests. He also established federal bird reservations and game preserves.

Final Years Roosevelt lost his bid to regain the presidency on a third-party ticket in 1912. Then he kept himself busy with a jungle expedition to Brazil and with his writing. He strongly supported America’s involvement in World War I. His youngest son was shot down over France in 1918. Roosevelt said: “It is very dreadful that he should have been killed, (but) it would have been worse if he had not gone.” One year later, Roosevelt himself died in his sleep at the age of 60.

America's History Makers

McDougal Littell