Teddy Roosevelt and his siblings had an interesting upbringing. I heard about it in Mornings on Horseback, by David McCullough (1981). Since I listened to it as an MP3 download from Netlibrary, I had a time trying to keep the Roosevelts straight. I ended up buying a hardback copy of the book because the audio was longer than my MP3 player battery and I ran out of juice before McCullough ran out of adventures. If nothing else, I appreciated the family tree endpapers in the print version!
There are dozens of memorable passages in the book, but one of the most moving concerned the death of Theodore Roosevelt, Sr. He had been nominated to become collector of the Port of New York Custom-House, a very powerful position. The Senate rejected the nomination on December 12, 1877. Father Roosevelt became very ill shortly after and he died of stomach cancer on February 9, 1878. Obviously the cancer was not the result of the rejected nomination, but the rapid progress of the disease in a 46-year-old man with plans and ambitions is stunning.
Young Theodore was in his second year at Harvard when his father died. The only firsthand account of their father's last day on earth was made by his younger brother, Elliott Roosevelt, who was three weeks shy of his 18th birthday. Elliott writes of the nausea his father experienced and goes on:
There are dozens of memorable passages in the book, but one of the most moving concerned the death of Theodore Roosevelt, Sr. He had been nominated to become collector of the Port of New York Custom-House, a very powerful position. The Senate rejected the nomination on December 12, 1877. Father Roosevelt became very ill shortly after and he died of stomach cancer on February 9, 1878. Obviously the cancer was not the result of the rejected nomination, but the rapid progress of the disease in a 46-year-old man with plans and ambitions is stunning.
Young Theodore was in his second year at Harvard when his father died. The only firsthand account of their father's last day on earth was made by his younger brother, Elliott Roosevelt, who was three weeks shy of his 18th birthday. Elliott writes of the nausea his father experienced and goes on:
he would be quiet a minute, then with face fearful with pain [he] would clasp me tight in his arms. ... The power with which he would hug me was terrific and then in a second he would be lying, white, panting, and weak as a baby in my arms ... (p. 184)Elliott Roosevelt would become the father of Eleanor Roosevelt. Someday he would have a grandson named Elliott Roosevelt but he didn't live to see that. He died an alcoholic at the age of 34. McCullough says that his father's death shattered Elliott. "It was as if, in the convulsive grip of his father's arms, he had had something crushed irreparably within. Theodore's death was the ultimate disaster from which he would never quite recover." (p. 186)