THE COWBOY PRESIDENT

by Michael F. Blake

  37. Hermann Hagedorn, Roosevelt in the Badlands. New York: Houghton Mifflin, 1921, p. 467.

  38. Morris, The Rise of Theodore Roosevelt, p. 763.

  39. Brands, T. R.: The Last Romantic, pp. 410–11.

  40. When the exposition closed, the “Trip to the Moon” attraction was moved to Coney Island’s Luna Park.

  41. Leon Czolgosz was found guilty on September 24, 1901, of murder after the jury deliberated for one hour. He did not cooperate with his attorneys, nor make any statement in court. Czolgosz was executed in the electric chair on October 29, 1901.

  THAT DAMNED COWBOY!

  1. Letter dated September 23, 1901. H. W. Brands, The Selected Letters of Theodore Roosevelt. New York: Cooper Square Press, 2001, pp. 269–70.

  2. Albert Shaw, A Cartoon History of Roosevelt’s Career. New York: The Review of Reviews Company, 1910, pp. 13, 47.

  3. Ibid., p. 75.

  4. The Sherman Antitrust Act of 1890 was created to prevent corporate monopolies of a particular product or service. This law made it illegal for any company to enter into any contract that restrained trade or to form a single company that monopolized a particular market.

  5. The meeting was held in Theodore’s temporary offices at 22 Jackson Place, while the White House was undergoing extensive renovations. Theodore had changed the name from the Executive Mansion to the White House shortly after taking office.

  6. Letter dated October 3, 1902. Brands, The Selected Letters of Theodore Roosevelt, p. 285.

  7. Theodore Roosevelt, Theodore Roosevelt: An Autobiography. Norwalk, CT: The Easton Press, 1996, p. 508.

  8. The bear was not killed by a rifle shot, but stabbed to death. Douglas Brinkley, The Wilderness Warrior: Theodore Roosevelt and the Crusade for America. New York: Harper-Collins Publishers, 2009, p. 440.

  9. Clifford Berryman’s cartoon appeared in the Washington Post on November 17, 1902. In the first version of the drawing, Berryman had drawn a full-size black bear, but later changed it to a cuter-looking bear cub. Linda Mullins, The Teddy Bear Men: Theodore Roosevelt and Clifford Berryman. Grantsville, MD: Hobby House Press, 1998, pp. 32–33.

  10. Brinkley, The Wilderness Warrior, pp. 442–43.

  11. Two years later, in 1903, Porter directed The Great Train Robbery. Film historians consider it be the first Western narrative film—shot in the wilds of New Jersey.

  12. Edison Films, July 1901, p. 72.

  13. Variety, March 9, 1907, p. 8.

  14. Edmund Morris, Theodore Rex. New York: Random House, 2001, p. 363.

  15. Denver Republican, February 2, 1904.

  16. Robert K. DeArment, Gunfighter in Gotham: Bat Masterson’s New York City Years. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 2013, p. 80.

  17. Jack DeMattos, Masterson and Roosevelt. College Station, TX: Creative Publishing Company, 1984, p. 16.

  18. Ibid., pp. 22–23.

  19. DeArment, Gunfighter in Gotham, pp. 81–82.

  20. New York Times, March 29, 1905.

  21. Robert K. DeArment and Jack DeMattos, A Rough Ride to Redemption: The Ben Daniels Story. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 2010, pp. 16–17, 19–21.

  22. Theodore Roosevelt, The Rough Riders. New York: Fall River press (reprint), 2014, p. 37.

  23. DeArment and DeMattos, A Rough Ride to Redemption, p. 113.

  24. Ibid., pp. 117–18.

  25. Ibid., p. 147.

  26. David A. Wolff, Seth Bullock: Black Hills Lawman. Pierre, SD: South Dakota State Historical Society Press, 2009, pp. 126–27.

  27. Ibid., p. 145.

  28. Ibid., pp. 147, 154.

  29. Seth Bullock had been a lawman in Montana, before coming to Deadwood. He arrived in the mining town one day before Wild Bill Hickok was shot in the back of the head by Jack McCall. He also was a captain in the Rough Riders, a unit that mainly sat on their heels in the summer humidity of Georgia.

  30. Letter from Theodore Roosevelt to Theodore Roosevelt (Jr.). September 29, 1903. Theodore Roosevelt Papers, Manuscript Division, Library of Congress.

  31. Lew Wallace, a former Union general during the Civil War, is perhaps best known as the author of Ben-Hur: A Tale of the Christ (1880). He knew Garrett while serving as the territorial governor of New Mexico, during the Lincoln County War. Letter from Bernard Radey to Theodore Roosevelt, December 13, 1901. Theodore Roosevelt Papers, Manuscript Division, Library of Congress.

  32. Jack DeMattos, Garrett and Roosevelt. College Station, TX: Creative Publishing Company, 1988, p. 93.

  33. Brinkley, The Wilderness Warrior, p. 14.

  34. Teddy Roosevelt: An American Lion, Greystone Communications, Inc. / History Channel, 2002.

  35. The Great Loop Tour would take 66 days, traveling 14,000 miles. Theodore would give 260 stump and 5 major speeches. Brinkley, The Wilderness Warrior, p. 509.

  36. Before leaving the presidency, Theodore prohibited the killing of mountain lions in Yellowstone.

  37. John Burroughs, Camping and Tramping with Roosevelt. New York: Houghton Mifflin, 1907, p. 6.

  38. Ibid., p. 12.

  39. Ibid., pp. 32–33.

  40. Ibid., p. 40.

  41. Ibid., pp. 8, 80.

  42. Paul Russell Cutright, Theodore Roosevelt: The Making of a Conservationist. Chicago: University of Illinois Press, 1985, p. 225.

  43. Brinkley, The Wilderness Warrior, p. 523.

  44. Albert Bushnell Hart and Herbert Ronald Feleger, eds., Theodore Roosevelt Cyclopedia. Westport, CT: Theodore Roosevelt Association and Meckler Corporation, 1989, p. 217.

  45. Chris Epting, Teddy Roosevelt in California: The Whistle Stop Tour that Changed America. Charleston, SC: The History Press, 2015, p. 69.

  46. Theodore Roosevelt, Theodore Roosevelt: An Autobiography. Norwalk, CT: The Easton Press (reprint), 1996, p. 347.

  47. Epting, Teddy Roosevelt in California, pp. 93–94.

  48. Upon his return to Washington, Theodore quickly worked to have both Yosemite Valley and Mariposa Grove included as part of Yosemite National Park. At the request of John Muir, he also extended the forest reserves in the Mount Shasta area.

  49. The area where Theodore, Muir, Leidig, and Leonard camped is now marked with a sign.

  50. Epting, Teddy Roosevelt in California, p. 96.

  51. Brinkley, The Wilderness Warrior, p. 540.

  52. Ibid., p. 624.

  53. Trees found in the Wichita Mountains include red cedar and post and blackjack oaks. The grasslands are dominated by little bluestem, but also include switchgrass, Indian grass, and blue grama.

  54. Frederick Enterprise, April 15, 1905.

  55. John R. Abernathy, Catch ’em Alive Jack: The Life and Adventures of an American Pioneer. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 2006, p. 102.

  56. Ibid., p. 103.

  57. Theodore Roosevelt, Outdoor Pastimes of an American Hunter, Birmingham, AL: Palladium Press (reprint), 1999, p. 114.

  58. Brinkley, The Wilderness Warrior, p. 608.

  59. Ibid., p. 613.

  60. Roosevelt, Outdoor Pastimes of an American Hunter, pp. 71–72.

  61. Charles “Buffalo” Jones had hunted the shaggy beasts on the Great Plains. He had a change of heart and established a buffalo farm near Yellowstone to help save the species. Theodore visited Jones’s herd during his 1903 trip. Jones was appointed game warden of Yellowstone in July 1902.

  62. The National Bison Range has a population of close to six hundred buffalo today.

  63. In May 2016, President Obama signed into law a bill that designated the American buffalo as the official mammal of the United States.

  64. Taft got his wish in 1921, when President Warren G. Harding nominated him as chief justice. Taft served until 1930, resigning due to health issues.

  THE OLD LION’S AUTUMN

  1. Teddy Roosevelt: An American Lion, Greystone Communications, Inc. / History Channel, 2002.

  2. The expedition amassed a collection of 23,151 natural history specimens. The mammals alone numbered 5,013 spe
cimens, including 9 lions, 13 rhinoceros, 20 zebras, 8 warthogs, and 4 hyenas. It took eight years to catalog all of the material.

  3. The magazine paid Theodore a $50,000 fee for twelve articles. The articles, as well as additional material, would become his eighteenth book, African Game Trails (1910).

  4. H. W. Brands, T. R.: The Last Romantic. New York: Basic Books, 1997, pp. 658–59.

  5. Letter from Theodore Roosevelt to Seth Bullock, May 17, 1909. Theodore Roosevelt Collection. MS Am 1834 (94).

  6. Brands, T. R.: The Last Romantic, p. 662.

  7. Albert Bushnell Hart and Herbert Ronald Feleger, eds. Theodore Roosevelt Cyclopedia. Westport, CT: Theodore Roosevelt Association and Meckler Corporation, 1989, p. 387.

  8. Letter from Theodore Roosevelt to Seth Bullock. May 17, 1909.

  9. David A. Wolff, Seth Bullock: Black Hills Lawman. Pierre: South Dakota State Historical Society Press, 2009, p. 160.

  10. Edmund Morris, Colonel Roosevelt. New York: Random House, 2010, pp. 82–85.

  11. Ibid., p. 89.

  12. Ibid., p. 170.

  13. Brands, T. R.: The Last Romantic, p. 713.

  14. Schrank was found guilty by reason of insanity. He was given a life sentence, and sent to the Central State Mental Hospital in Wisconsin, where he died in 1943 at the age of sixty-seven.

  15. Morris, Colonel Roosevelt, p. 331.

  16. Ibid., pp. 336–40.

  17. Ibid., pp. 389–90.

  18. Theodore had enlisted Seth Bullock to compile a list of men who would want to serve, much like his Rough Riders.

  19. Teddy Roosevelt: An American Lion.

  20. Ted Jr., Archie, and Kermit were wounded during the war, but survived.

  21. Ted Jr. was buried in the World War II Normandy American Cemetery in Colleville-sur-Mer in France. In 1955, Quentin’s remains were buried next to his older brother.

  22. Rolf Sletten, Medora: Boom, Bust, and Resurrection. Medora, ND: Theodore Roosevelt Medora Foundation, 2013, p. 186.

  23. Andrew Vietze, Becoming Teddy Roosevelt: How a Maine Guide Inspired America’s 26th President. Lanham, MD: Down East, 2010, p. 151.

  24. Ibid., p. 142.

  25. Sletten, Medora: Boom, Bust, and Resurrection, p. 189.

  26. Ibid., pp. 124–25, 148–49.

  A LASTING MEMORIAL

  1. The smaller park boundary would have been fourteen miles wide, extending ninety miles along the Little Missouri River from Marmarth to the eastern swing of the river south of Watford City. David Harmon, At the Open Margin: The NPS’s Administration of Theodore Roosevelt National Park. Medora, ND: Theodore Roosevelt Nature and History Association, 1986, pp. 6–7.

  2. Ibid., p. 13.

  3. Ibid., p. 22.

  4. The family that held the park concession for providing the trail rides retired in early 2015. As of this writing, there are no immediate plans to offer horseback rides through the park.

  5. Birds that reside in the park year-round include golden eagles, wild turkeys, black-capped chickadees, white-breasted nuthatches, and great horned owls.

  6. Highway 85 runs in a north-south direction on the western side of South and North Dakota. In 2012, this author saw a herd of a dozen pronghorns running alongside the highway in an open field. Driving at fifty-five miles per hour, the pronghorns were easily keeping up with the car.

  7. Mike Thompson, The Travels and Tribulations of Theodore Roosevelt’s Cabin. San Angelo, TX: Laughing Horse Publications, 2004, p. 57.

  8. Ibid., pp. 38–40.

  9. The Maltese Cross Ranch property is now privately owned. The owners have erected a sign marking the original site of Theodore’s cabin.

  10. H. Paul Jeffers, The Bully Pulpit: A Teddy Roosevelt Book of Quotations. Lanham, MD: Taylor Trade Publishing, 2002, p. 30.

  11. “USGS Releases New Oil and Gas Assessment for Bakken and Three Forks Formations,” US Department of the Interior, April 30, 2013.

  12. A wellbore is the hole that forms a well, generally encased in steel or cement.

  13. Ryan Howell, “North Dakota’s Oil Boom Is a Blessing and a Curse,” Governing.com, August 2011.

  14. John McChesney, “Theodore Roosevelt’s Elkhorn Ranch, the ‘Walden Pond of the West,’ Threatened by North Dakota’s Oil Boom.” Stanford University, Rural West Initiative, The Bill Lane Center for the American West, April 23, 2013.

  15. “The Fight for the Elkhorn,” The Arena (newsletter), Theodore Roosevelt Association, January/February 2015.

  16. Jenny Buddenborg, interview with author, Denver, Colorado, February 18, 2015.

  17. Jenny Buddenborg, “US Forest Service Approves Elkhorn Gravel Pit at Theodore Roosevelt’s Elkhorn Ranch,” National Trust for Historic Preservation (website), January 9, 2015.

  18. Edmund Morris, “Bad News for the Badlands,” New York Times, June 7, 2012.

  THE ROMANCE OF HIS LIFE

  1. H. Paul Jeffers, The Bully Pulpit: A Teddy Roosevelt Book of Quotations. Lanham, MD: Taylor Trade Publishing, 2002, p. 131.

  2. John Burroughs, Camping and Tramping with Roosevelt. New York: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1907, pp. 12–14.

  3. Douglas Brinkley, The Wilderness Warrior: Theodore Roosevelt and the Crusade for America. New York: HarperCollins Publishers, 2009, p. 641.

  4. Clay S. Jenkinson, A Free and Hardy Life: Theodore Roosevelt’s Sojourn in the American West. Washburn, ND: The Dakota Institute of the Lewis & Clark Fort Mandan Foundation, 2011, p. 11.

  BIBLIOGRAPHY

  BOOKS

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  Blevins, Win. Dictionary of the American West. Seattle, WA: Sasquatch Books, 2001.

  Brands, H. W. The Selected Letters of Theodore Roosevelt. New York: Cooper Square Press, 2001.

  ———. T. R.: The Last Romantic. New York: Basic Books, 1997.

  Brinkley, Douglas. The Wilderness Warrior: Theodore Roosevelt and the Crusade for America. New York: HarperCollins, 2009.

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  DeArment, Robert K. and Jack DeMattos. A Rough Ride to Redemption: The Ben Daniels Story. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 2010.

  DeMattos, Jack. Garrett and Roosevelt. College Station, TX: Creative Publishing Company, 1988.

  ———. Masterson and Roosevelt. College Station, TX: Creative Publishing Company, 1984.

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  ———. Roosevelt in the Badlands. New York: Houghton Mifflin, 1921.

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  ———. Roosevelt the Explorer: Teddy Roosevelt’s Amazing Adventures as a Naturalist, Conservationist, and Explorer. Lanham, MD: Taylor Trade Publishing, 2003.

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  ———. Theodore Roosevelt in the Dakota Badlands: A Historical Guide. Dickinson, ND: Dickinson State University, 2008.

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  ———. The Rise of Theodore Roosevelt. New York: Random House, 1979.

  ———. Theodore Rex. New York: Random House, 2001.

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