The Art of Manliness - July 31, 2025


#558： The Strenuous President


Episode Stats

Misogynist Sentences

2

Hate Speech Sentences

5


Summary

In the first year of his presidency, the press used Theodore Roosevelt s name in connection with the word strenuous over 10,000 times. And with good reason. From his youth, T.R. had lived and preached a life of vigorous engagement and plenty of physical activity. Today, on the show, Ryan Swanson, professor of sports history and the author of The Strenuous Life: Theodore Roosevelt and the Making of the American Athlete, discusses not only how T. R. was shaped by what was called the Strenuously Age, but how he shaped it in turn by promoting sports and participating in athletics himself.


Transcript

00:00:00.000 Brett McKay here and welcome to another edition of the Art of Manliness podcast.
00:00:11.340 In the first year of his presidency, the press used Theodore Roosevelt's name in connection
00:00:15.200 with the word strenuous over 10,000 times.
00:00:18.460 He was known as the strenuous president and with good reason.
00:00:21.320 From his youth, T.R. had lived and preached a life of vigorous engagement and plenty of
00:00:25.380 physical activity.
00:00:26.300 Today on the show, Ryan Swanson, professor of sports history and the author of The Strenuous
00:00:30.340 Life, Theodore Roosevelt, and the Making of the American Athlete, discusses not only how
00:00:34.380 T.R. was shaped by what was called the strenuous age, but how he shaped it in turn by promoting
00:00:38.680 sports and participating in athletics himself.
00:00:41.300 We began our discussion with what was going on during the late 19th century that got people
00:00:44.840 interested in what was then called physical culture.
00:00:47.180 We then turned the beginning of Roosevelt's introduction to vigorous exercise as a boy
00:00:50.620 and how he famously decided to make his body.
00:00:52.860 We discussed T.R.'s fitness routine when he went to Harvard and how he became a fan of
00:00:56.760 football there, which led to him supporting the preservation of the sport as a president.
00:01:00.560 We then discussed how T.R. lived the strenuous life while in the White House and thereby
00:01:03.900 inspired the American public to live vigorously too.
00:01:06.980 And then we take a fun look at what T.R. thought of the game of baseball, how he went to a health
00:01:10.500 farm at the age of 58 to get back in fighting shape, and what kind of exercise and athletics
00:01:14.420 T.R. would be into if he were alive today.
00:01:17.020 After the show's over, check out our show notes at awim.is slash strenuous president.
00:01:20.960 Ryan joins me now via clearcast.io.
00:01:27.540 All right, Ryan Swanson, welcome to the show.
00:01:34.140 Yeah, thanks.
00:01:34.860 Glad to be here.
00:01:35.660 So you are a professor of history at the University of New Mexico, and you've got a book out called
00:01:40.080 The Strenuous Life, Theodore Roosevelt and the Making of the American Athlete.
00:01:44.160 Let's start off talking about the culture Theodore Roosevelt grew up in, because I think that
00:01:48.060 explains, or helps explain, why there was a rise in interest in athletics and society
00:01:52.480 as a whole during his lifetime, and why T.R.'s idea of the strenuous life would resonate
00:01:57.220 so much with the public.
00:01:58.660 So what was happening in the late 19th century that helped birth an interest in what they
00:02:02.860 called physical culture?
00:02:04.720 Yeah, it's a really dynamic time.
00:02:06.280 If you look at the late 19th century, early 20th century, it's a really dynamic time in
00:02:10.540 U.S. history.
00:02:11.480 And, you know, it's tough to boil down, there's a lot of things going on, but if I were to
00:02:15.500 kind of point to two things, I would point to the fact that industrialization and urbanization
00:02:20.540 are really kind of peaking in terms of their influence in American society.
00:02:25.400 So, you know, translating those, not too complicated words, but translating them nonetheless, I'm a
00:02:30.480 professor after all, you know, more and more people are taking jobs working for somebody
00:02:34.340 else.
00:02:34.640 They're being employees of factories, in many cases, rather than working on a piece
00:02:39.480 of land with their family, as, you know, families had done for generations.
00:02:42.940 So people are working in different ways.
00:02:45.520 And then in terms of urbanization, it's at this point in American history, about the,
00:02:49.400 you know, the turn of the 20th century, when more than half of the population now resides
00:02:53.820 in cities.
00:02:55.120 And these cities are fascinating places with lots going on, but they're also really dirty
00:02:59.860 and crowded and dangerous.
00:03:01.980 And so life has fundamentally changed for the way that Americans live.
00:03:06.340 And so with all of that going on, there are benefits.
00:03:09.480 You know, I don't know about you, when I think of technology, my mind tends to just kind of
00:03:12.760 go towards positive, right?
00:03:14.420 New technology means a positive, generally speaking.
00:03:18.220 But if we look at the technology of the 20th century, yes, things are mechanized and consumer
00:03:22.240 goods are cheaper, but there's also a lot of negatives that come with that.
00:03:25.500 You know, these dirty cities, these cramped living quarters, people have to live close to where
00:03:29.980 they work, you know, because the automobile is still a couple of decades away from being
00:03:34.320 widespread.
00:03:35.840 So there's also during this time of industrialization and urbanization, kind of a rise in general
00:03:41.300 sickness.
00:03:42.620 People are going to the doctor and they don't have acute pain, but they go to the doctor
00:03:45.900 and they're kind of confused about what's going on.
00:03:48.120 You know, they'll report things like bloating or fatigue or loss of sexual desire or balding
00:03:54.680 or kind of all of these kind of factors.
00:03:57.760 And there's a general confusion.
00:03:59.320 You know, people look around and think, wait, you have all this progress and all this change.
00:04:02.820 Why is it then that myself and the people around me seem to be less healthy and less vibrant
00:04:07.800 than they used to be?
00:04:08.900 So there's kind of this just general concern about these changes going on.
00:04:14.060 And so sports become part of the way of addressing that.
00:04:16.760 This idea that with all this change, maybe I'm losing some of the core activities and realities,
00:04:22.980 you know, in terms of what it means to actually be a fully functioning human.
00:04:26.340 So rise in cities, rise in mechanization, rise in industrialization leads to this concern
00:04:31.360 about health.
00:04:32.420 And so those are some of the things that are going on here at the turn of the century as
00:04:35.840 Roosevelt is both growing up and then moving towards the presidency.
00:04:39.520 So there's a legitimate uptick of sickness and general feeling of malaise going on.
00:04:43.580 But you also highlight that there were all these articles written during this time talking
00:04:47.400 about the good old days when men were men back in 1800.
00:04:50.780 And here we are in 1895, we're weak, we don't have what it takes anymore, which is funny
00:04:56.040 because that's the same kind of thing you hear today, that with the rise in technology
00:04:59.700 and convenience, men aren't as manly or vigorous anymore.
00:05:03.160 So was there a romanticism for the past going on that magnified the problem?
00:05:07.500 I think so.
00:05:08.000 Absolutely.
00:05:08.480 We're seeing a combination or they're seeing a combination at that time of real issues arising,
00:05:12.380 but also, yes, a really intense case of nostalgia for the way that life used to be.
00:05:17.280 And the newspapers publish articles and magazines and pamphlets and speakers are going around
00:05:22.080 the country talking about how this nameless example from, let's say, the 1860s.
00:05:28.720 The Civil War is over and what do men do?
00:05:30.980 They come back from fighting a war, which had been glorious in and of itself.
00:05:34.220 It's oftentimes kind of portrayed.
00:05:35.980 And then they're working the land and they're working alongside their father.
00:05:38.800 And they're digging holes and they're raising crops and they're strong physically.
00:05:42.440 And when their head hits the pillow at the end of the day, they sleep contentedly because
00:05:46.780 they've been physically challenged and they're living the way you're supposed to live.
00:05:50.620 And so, yes, there's tons of these stories going around about how men are no longer men
00:05:54.540 because they're not working the land the same way that they used to.
00:05:57.060 They're not the same.
00:05:58.100 They don't have the same power over their own lives is oftentimes the narrative, too.
00:06:01.080 You're working for somebody else now.
00:06:02.340 We're all employees.
00:06:03.560 And I think these are absolutely analogous to some of the things that you're hearing about
00:06:07.840 society today and about men today.
00:06:09.700 You know, the saying or the idea of toxic masculinity is being much discussed now.
00:06:14.760 We didn't have that at the turn of the century, but there's more so this idea that
00:06:18.280 there's tainted masculinity.
00:06:20.240 What men used to be has been lost with all this so-called progress and technology.
00:06:25.060 So all that's kind of creating this brew of angst and opportunity and desires for change.
00:06:31.560 And some of those responses, like the physical fitness world, the physical culture world,
00:06:35.060 was very similar to some of the things you see today in response to some of the concerns
00:06:38.540 people have.
00:06:39.420 So back in the 1890s, you saw the rise of these sanitariums where people would go and
00:06:43.900 just spend time on a farm and be in nature and walk and hike and do all these things.
00:06:49.700 And it's similar to what you see today.
00:06:51.360 People would go outside and like, I'm going to be paleo so I can get back to my roots.
00:06:57.040 They were doing the same thing in 1895, too.
00:07:00.220 Yeah.
00:07:00.560 I mean, they are, to put it in our vernacular, they're all about the cleanse back then.
00:07:04.340 I mean, yeah, we're going to go to a place that isn't polluted by the kind of toxins
00:07:09.260 of the city.
00:07:10.160 We're going to eat things that come from the land.
00:07:12.500 There's even almost an anti-carb movement that goes on at this time.
00:07:15.900 Let's get back to meats and vegetables.
00:07:18.200 Yeah, bantene.
00:07:18.880 That's what they called it, bantene.
00:07:19.980 Yeah, yeah, yeah.
00:07:20.920 So, I mean, it's very analogous.
00:07:22.500 I mean, we, you know, if you do say the Whole30 or the paleo diet today, in some ways you
00:07:26.640 are echoing just what Roosevelt's, you know, time was doing it, you know, in the ways
00:07:31.280 that they understood.
00:07:31.860 The medicine was a little bit different, but there's this intense understanding that I
00:07:36.760 am not functioning as well as I could, and I need to change something.
00:07:40.500 And separating from the city and my job and getting back to nature and getting back to
00:07:44.940 a simpler way of eating, all those things are very popular.
00:07:47.920 Some of the things you read from the time of Roosevelt as this revolution is going on
00:07:51.120 in athletics could absolutely be written today.
00:07:53.840 The ideas are still pretty similar.
00:07:56.280 So, there's some nostalgia going on, but people are also grappling with real mental
00:08:00.700 and physical health problems that came along with urbanization and industrialization.
00:08:05.800 And part of the response to this is to get into physical culture, to exercise, to eat
00:08:09.940 better, to go outside.
00:08:11.380 And this is the world that Teddy Roosevelt came of age in and was shaped by.
00:08:15.120 But he himself also shaped this culture of physical vigorous activity that would become
00:08:19.500 known as the strenuous life.
00:08:20.740 And that's because he had a personal experience with the difference that pushing back against
00:08:25.360 softness can make.
00:08:26.680 So, let's talk about the origin story of where his idea of the strenuous life came from, which
00:08:31.540 is the story of how he turned his sickly, asthmatic boy body into a strenuous, vigorous machine.
00:08:38.060 So, tell us that story.
00:08:39.900 Yeah, it's a great story, and Roosevelt loves to tell it.
00:08:42.820 And I'm sure some of your listeners know it, but it bears repeating because it really shapes
00:08:47.120 the way Roosevelt thinks about sports.
00:08:48.600 So, I'll give you kind of the snapshot version, but Theodore Roosevelt is an amazing child in
00:08:54.080 a number of ways.
00:08:54.980 He's really smart.
00:08:55.900 He reads a ton of books.
00:08:57.340 He's got a real scientific mind.
00:08:59.240 He's always categorizing things and looking for the Latin name of this animal or that animal.
00:09:03.920 So, he's very precocious, as you might expect from the man that he goes on to be.
00:09:08.520 But his real Achilles heel from about age three until his early teen years is asthma, as you
00:09:14.460 say.
00:09:15.100 He has a terrible case of asthma.
00:09:16.900 And I always kind of, you know, urge my students, for example, or other people to separate Roosevelt's
00:09:23.480 experience with asthma from perhaps, you know, the kid that you knew back when you were in
00:09:28.440 elementary school who, yes, had asthma, but had his inhaler, but had to maybe sit on the
00:09:31.840 side during PE class.
00:09:33.440 And I'm not minimizing that experience.
00:09:35.260 But for Roosevelt, his asthma is this crisis.
00:09:37.940 It's a tragedy that's taking place on a daily basis.
00:09:41.160 And it absolutely defines his childhood.
00:09:42.880 So, the family is not able to put him in school.
00:09:45.920 He can't handle school because he's got these breathing attacks.
00:09:48.980 They try all sorts of crazy remedies to get him cured.
00:09:52.360 You know, they try bloodletting.
00:09:54.380 They have a seven-year-old Roosevelt smoking cigars.
00:09:57.540 The family will go out for rides in the, you know, January icy air to try to get his lungs
00:10:02.020 to open.
00:10:03.020 They have him do shock therapy.
00:10:04.900 Unfortunately, butyrol inhalers, which become, you know, a real step forward, aren't invented
00:10:09.040 until the 1950s.
00:10:10.380 So, Roosevelt is just dealing with this asthma on a daily basis, and it disconnects him from
00:10:14.560 his friends.
00:10:15.180 It really keeps him from living any sort of strenuous life as a child.
00:10:18.920 So, he's just a, you know, a boy with a brain who's a, you know, precocious thinker, but
00:10:23.520 he can't act like most kids do.
00:10:26.500 And so, Roosevelt tells this story over and over as an adult.
00:10:29.740 And he'll point to one kind of pivotal moment.
00:10:31.620 So, he struggles from, like I said, about age three until his early teen years with this
00:10:35.340 terrible asthma.
00:10:36.580 And then things kind of hit a crisis point.
00:10:39.100 And, you know, this struggle that Roosevelt was having put a huge strain on the family.
00:10:45.180 Basically, they're kind of revolving around Roosevelt and always trying to, you know, stop
00:10:49.180 this next attack from happening.
00:10:51.060 And so, Roosevelt's father, when Roosevelt is about 13, calls him in for a talk and basically
00:10:55.960 says, we're done.
00:10:57.320 And I think it's kind of, you know, as a father, I certainly think about this.
00:11:00.340 He basically says to Roosevelt, you've got to fix this problem on your own.
00:11:03.280 And that doesn't strike me as being particularly fair, right?
00:11:06.420 You know, fix your own asthma.
00:11:07.740 But basically, what Roosevelt's father says is he expresses his pride in his son.
00:11:12.140 He says, you're smart.
00:11:12.920 I'm proud of you.
00:11:13.940 And he says, to paraphrase, you've got the mind, and Roosevelt clearly does, but you've
00:11:18.540 got to make your body.
00:11:20.260 And so, Roosevelt takes this challenge.
00:11:22.200 And his sister is actually in the room, too.
00:11:23.860 So, she'll tell versions of this story as well.
00:11:25.900 He takes this challenge.
00:11:27.380 He stops for a moment and thinks about it.
00:11:29.140 And then, according to both of them, he kind of throws his head back and says, I will do
00:11:33.320 it.
00:11:33.620 I will.
00:11:33.980 I'll meet your challenge.
00:11:34.840 I'll make my body.
00:11:36.480 And so, Roosevelt, from there going forward, really dedicates himself to physical culture
00:11:40.720 and to exercise.
00:11:42.100 And he does it in the way that, you know, the best rich kid could.
00:11:44.940 He has his father build him a kind of mini gymnasium in the home.
00:11:48.120 And then he goes to work training under several professional boxers who are former champions.
00:11:52.820 And something really amazing happens.
00:11:55.220 Basically, Roosevelt's asthma goes away.
00:11:58.100 Now, it never completely goes away.
00:11:59.300 He'll struggle with it off and on throughout the rest of his life.
00:12:01.640 But it ceases to be this kind of tragedy, this crisis in his life.
00:12:05.780 It becomes more controllable.
00:12:07.760 And Roosevelt understands this as, you know, kind of a causal relationship.
00:12:12.760 I exercised and I pushed myself.
00:12:15.820 Therefore, I cured myself.
00:12:16.980 And my asthma has gone away.
00:12:18.600 And I think, you know, in fairness, I would understand it the same way.
00:12:20.840 You know, if I had some real big problem in my life and I set forth a dedicated plan to
00:12:24.460 solve that problem and that problem went away, I would say, you know, that's
00:12:27.660 that's what happened here.
00:12:28.800 I did it.
00:12:29.540 We know that it's pretty common now for kids to age out of the worst kind of effects of
00:12:34.780 asthma as they hit their teen years.
00:12:36.260 And that's probably what happens to Roosevelt.
00:12:38.020 It's not this vigorous boxing.
00:12:39.640 It's not this exercise which cures him.
00:12:41.560 Now, that helps.
00:12:42.520 But it's not as simple as Roosevelt understands it to be.
00:12:45.920 And so Roosevelt, for the rest of his life, though, will understand this relationship to
00:12:49.000 exist.
00:12:49.920 Push yourself and you will develop.
00:12:51.880 And he'll hold himself to this idea.
00:12:53.660 And as you know, I think more significantly, he'll kind of hold the nation to the same idea.
00:12:57.580 You know, if we are weak, we should push ourselves and we will get stronger.
00:13:00.900 So it's a really, really fascinating story about Roosevelt.
00:13:03.960 And I think one other way to think about Roosevelt, the kind of asthmatic, sickly child, it's kind
00:13:08.720 of the only version of up by your bootstraps that Roosevelt can tell about himself.
00:13:13.860 He comes from a rich family with political connections.
00:13:16.020 So he's not like Lincoln who can say, I'm a self-made man.
00:13:19.200 And the only way Roosevelt really can think of himself as a self-made man is in this context
00:13:22.940 of athletics.
00:13:23.740 And so perhaps that's why he loves to tell people about how sickly he was as a child once
00:13:29.080 he's kind of moved past it.
00:13:30.580 No, yeah, that story is great.
00:13:32.580 I love that story.
00:13:33.360 And I have been to his little home gym.
00:13:35.260 I went to his house in New York.
00:13:36.840 It's really cool.
00:13:37.500 I mean, it's not huge, but, you know, it's this little room sort of like off the, I think
00:13:40.940 it was a porch or a patio.
00:13:43.000 And they turned into Indian clubs, medicine balls, and the parallel bars.
00:13:46.100 And you can go see that stuff still there.
00:13:47.820 Yeah, it's absolutely worth seeing.
00:13:49.000 Yeah, I've been there as well.
00:13:49.940 And I think it really, yeah, it kind of shows you a physical manifestation of this challenge
00:13:54.680 that Roosevelt undertook.
00:13:56.420 And even as a boy, like, you know, he became known as this president who had this just vigorous
00:14:01.260 energy and did everything full bore.
00:14:03.800 He did that as a boy.
00:14:04.900 And you highlight in the book, you know, he was a meticulous record keeper about his fitness.
00:14:09.620 And you have a picture from 1875 of like he was, he'd always measure himself, his chest,
00:14:15.120 his waist, his biceps, and just kept details about that.
00:14:18.540 Or whether he beat his brother or not in running, like, even as a 13, 14 year old boy, he was like
00:14:24.980 a little 25 year old life hacker.
00:14:28.360 Yeah, that's a good way to put it.
00:14:29.700 I mean, I think, actually, I really got, I really got some kind of joy out of this story,
00:14:34.220 that part of the story.
00:14:35.020 It's kind of funny.
00:14:35.760 Roosevelt is self-absorbed, as many teenagers are, right?
00:14:38.540 And so, yeah, he's meticulously writing down, you know, the measurements of his biceps and
00:14:43.420 his chest.
00:14:44.100 And am I getting stronger?
00:14:45.480 But the best part is, yeah, the older brother competing against his younger brother or and
00:14:50.000 his younger cousins.
00:14:50.720 And when he wins, he writes it down in this kind of very fastidious official fashion.
00:14:55.080 I don't know.
00:14:55.500 Something about this just speaks to me as a middle child as like, you know, look what
00:14:58.460 these older brothers do, you know?
00:14:59.760 So, yeah, he's a really, I mean, he's obviously an amazing intellect and mind.
00:15:04.340 And so he's engaged, when he engages in athletics, he does it in a really unique way, a really
00:15:08.400 serious way to a certain extent and keeps all these records.
00:15:11.660 And so, yeah, that, that athletic diary that he keeps is a real treasure, I think.
00:15:16.440 So he, in high school, he starts building his body, the asthma starts going away.
00:15:20.220 He goes to college, goes to Harvard, which at the time was a hotbed for early sports in
00:15:25.340 America.
00:15:25.660 Nowadays, you don't really think of sports in Harvard, but then like that's where sports were
00:15:29.380 happening.
00:15:30.320 What was TR's athletic career like in college?
00:15:33.820 And what was he like in college?
00:15:35.300 Roosevelt, maybe as much as anything at Harvard, is a joiner.
00:15:39.780 He joins every club that will take him.
00:15:43.300 And, you know, in our vernacular today, I'd say he's got a case of FOMO, right?
00:15:46.680 Fear of missing out.
00:15:48.080 And this makes sense, given what he had experienced as a child, where he's kind of cut off from
00:15:52.160 opportunity.
00:15:52.640 So he joins all these clubs.
00:15:54.420 He goes in full bore, but he does it in a way which is really, it actually,
00:15:59.380 shows a lot of confidence.
00:16:01.300 He's not, he's not afraid of being different.
00:16:03.600 And so there's some really great memories of him in the, in the gym at Harvard.
00:16:07.660 And what a unique looking character he was.
00:16:11.280 One guy remembers meeting Roosevelt for the first time.
00:16:13.940 And he basically paints this picture of Roosevelt's over in the corner.
00:16:17.160 And he's got these high red stockings on, which look really weird.
00:16:20.700 And he's jumping rope.
00:16:22.460 And then he's working in the parallel bars and he's pushing himself like to the ridiculous
00:16:26.100 point of exertion.
00:16:27.700 And so this gentleman talks about, you know, Roosevelt goes crazy and he, and he's out of
00:16:31.580 breath and he's basically collapsing.
00:16:32.980 And he kind of falls down next to him and says, Hey, I'm Roosevelt.
00:16:35.680 Who are you?
00:16:36.380 You know, and introduces himself like that.
00:16:38.080 So he's a real character, not afraid to be unique, not afraid to be different.
00:16:41.780 But during his time at Harvard continues to really push athletically.
00:16:45.320 So Roosevelt will commit his freshman year to visiting the boxing gym five days a week,
00:16:50.480 he says, you know, so he goes every afternoon, he pushes himself, he spars with, you know,
00:16:55.560 any number of people he can get to compete against himself.
00:16:58.180 And of course he continues to keep notes.
00:16:59.960 You know, I beat this person.
00:17:01.040 I lost to this person.
00:17:02.360 I did these things.
00:17:03.420 So, um, you know, his experience at Harvard is he's finally at the point where he can compete.
00:17:08.600 He's not a champion by any means.
00:17:10.120 He's not a brilliant boxer, but for Roosevelt, the fact that he can be on a level playing
00:17:14.940 field and he can go after athletics is a huge move forward.
00:17:18.400 And he really embraces it.
00:17:20.000 It becomes part of his, you know, part of his development there at Harvard.
00:17:24.140 And he has ridiculously high standards for the kind of men that he wants to associate
00:17:28.580 with.
00:17:28.980 He talks about finding a couple of friends at Harvard who were willing to box and wrestle
00:17:33.500 for a couple of hours until about one in the morning.
00:17:36.700 And then he really liked them because then they were willing to let him read some Alfred
00:17:40.080 Lord Tennyson to them for a couple of hours after that.
00:17:43.100 I mean, so think about the standards here.
00:17:44.300 He wants a guy who can wrestle in box and then listen to Tennyson and talk about it into
00:17:48.240 the wee hours of the morning.
00:17:49.840 And so he's just, he's just a unique guy who's curious and passionate and vigorous and
00:17:55.100 joining everything he can get.
00:17:56.820 I mean, he's doing so at Harvard.
00:17:57.740 As you said, Harvard is big time athletics at this point.
00:18:00.460 You don't know, I don't know what you would think of as the biggest athletic schools today.
00:18:03.420 I don't know, you know, Alabama, University of Texas, USC, right?
00:18:07.740 OU, sorry.
00:18:08.800 Yeah, Oklahoma.
00:18:09.680 That's right.
00:18:10.200 Boomer Sooner.
00:18:10.940 Um, yeah, right.
00:18:12.760 So, I mean, we think of those as the big athletic schools.
00:18:15.000 And as you said, we don't, we don't put Harvard in there, right?
00:18:17.520 Because Harvard doesn't even offer athletic scholarships today.
00:18:20.360 But during Roosevelt's era, as he's kind of experiencing all these athletic things really
00:18:25.440 for the first time, he's at the big time athletic school.
00:18:28.180 Harvard is the football school.
00:18:31.020 They've got an amazing crew team.
00:18:32.500 They win lots of baseball games.
00:18:34.220 And so they are the OU of this time, you know, this kind of marquee athletic program.
00:18:39.520 And Roosevelt, you know, just to be clear, Roosevelt is nowhere near good enough to play
00:18:42.800 for any of the Harvard teams.
00:18:44.300 But he goes to games and he goes to the boxing gym and then he writes for the Harvard Crimson
00:18:48.680 about athletics.
00:18:49.900 And so he's kind of in this real hotbed of athletics as, as he's at Harvard during this,
00:18:54.780 you know, 1876 to 1880.
00:18:56.380 So it's a really interesting time in his life.
00:18:58.520 Let's talk about football a bit, which back then was a much rougher, more violent sport
00:19:02.460 than it is today.
00:19:03.520 Even though Roosevelt didn't play for the Harvard team, he's a big fan of the sport and remains
00:19:07.680 a fan throughout his presidency.
00:19:09.580 Absolutely.
00:19:10.220 He's a fan of football, no doubt about it.
00:19:12.240 He, he admires the game for a number of reasons.
00:19:16.000 If you think about, you know, kind of the Roosevelt picture I've been trying to, to paint a little
00:19:20.020 bit here, Roosevelt appreciates football as a tactical game.
00:19:22.940 You know, he sees it as something, although we're talking, you know, about a cluster of people
00:19:25.880 moving to organize, you know, a group of men to gain territory and to push the ball, takes
00:19:32.140 strategy and takes tactics.
00:19:33.700 And so he really admires the game for that.
00:19:35.940 He also admires it though on a much simpler level.
00:19:38.620 He thinks it's good that the sport is violent.
00:19:40.660 He thinks it's good that people get hurt and that you test yourself and that you learn how
00:19:44.340 to deal with an injury.
00:19:45.680 For Roosevelt, football is connected to war and to military.
00:19:49.300 And so he sees that as a real positive.
00:19:50.880 Not that he doesn't have concerns about the game, but he, he's always a fan.
00:19:54.420 He always enjoys it.
00:19:55.460 And he always sees it as important as well.
00:19:57.540 Yeah.
00:19:57.680 And I think a lot of people at the time thought football would be a great, it's a great way
00:20:01.180 to train young men for war later on if they have to go to war.
00:20:05.220 Absolutely.
00:20:05.900 I mean, you know, I'm not sure they articulated necessarily what they thought was coming out
00:20:10.320 of it.
00:20:10.580 But if you look at Roosevelt, for example, when he's raising the Rough Rider Regiment,
00:20:14.520 you know, in the, in 1897, 1898, Roosevelt's able to kind of organize the kind of man that
00:20:20.540 he wants to get for this regiment.
00:20:22.280 And he basically seeks out two, two types of people.
00:20:25.480 He seeks out people from the Southwest, you know, I'm from New Mexico.
00:20:28.340 We're tougher, I guess.
00:20:29.660 You know, he says he wants people from this frontier region of the country at that time
00:20:32.700 who are, you know, kind of making their own way.
00:20:35.060 They're tough.
00:20:35.700 They're kind of outside the normal system.
00:20:37.440 And then the second category he's looking for are our college football players, college
00:20:40.920 athletes.
00:20:41.800 So Roosevelt sees them as ready for war because they know how to work as a unit, because they
00:20:45.980 know how to suffer together.
00:20:47.200 So he absolutely makes this military football connection, which is, as I know, as I know,
00:20:52.240 you know, you know, still a connection which exists in our kind of general understanding
00:20:56.760 of football today.
00:20:57.940 Yeah.
00:20:58.100 I mean, I remember when I played football, like there was like, you got the, like the war pep
00:21:01.280 talk that your coach would give you, which pumps you up.
00:21:03.800 I mean, I get it.
00:21:04.580 So TR was a fan, but there was this point when his presidency, like shortly after he
00:21:09.020 became president, there was this crisis in football and college sports where people were
00:21:12.800 about to like, we're going to get rid of football.
00:21:14.520 Like presidents were like, we're tired of it.
00:21:16.260 It's corrupting our students.
00:21:17.800 People are dying.
00:21:19.060 And then Teddy Roosevelt as president of the United States thought it'd be, well, no,
00:21:22.320 I'm going to make this a priority as part of my agenda to save football.
00:21:26.880 What did that look like?
00:21:28.460 Yeah.
00:21:28.700 Uh, so Roosevelt, I would make the argument Roosevelt doesn't save football because no
00:21:32.980 one person could save football, but as you're saying, he does play a really important role
00:21:37.060 in the, in the kind of moving forward of football.
00:21:40.000 So to set the scene a little bit, um, you know, if you get to 1905, Roosevelt's just been
00:21:45.040 reelected president.
00:21:45.960 He's very popular.
00:21:47.300 He's got a lot of kind of political capital to work with.
00:21:50.400 And at the same time in 1905, his oldest son, Ted jr is playing football at Harvard.
00:21:56.080 So he's a football parent at that time, which I think is always important for Roosevelt.
00:22:00.040 He sees the world.
00:22:01.040 Yes.
00:22:01.220 As a president and yes, as an intellectual, but he also sees it very much as a father of
00:22:05.460 kids who are playing sports.
00:22:06.760 So in 1905, the violence that's always been part of football kind of climaxes are probably
00:22:13.100 the opposite since it's a bad thing.
00:22:14.360 But, uh, 1905, depending who you ask 18, 19, 20 young men die on the football.
00:22:20.400 Because of football injuries.
00:22:23.060 And so at that time, the abolition movement that exists, uh, there's a movement very much
00:22:28.640 arguing that football should go away.
00:22:30.160 They've got, they've got all the kind of material that they need.
00:22:33.080 So they seize on these injuries and really push to get rid of football, especially as
00:22:37.560 connected to educational institutions.
00:22:39.920 So the guy at the, really the forefront of this movement, ironically, is Charles Elliott,
00:22:44.640 who's the president of Harvard.
00:22:46.460 And Elliott has always disliked the violence of football.
00:22:49.560 He thinks it takes away from the educational mission of the school.
00:22:52.760 And so looking at all this, you know, the deaths that are happening, Elliott pushes
00:22:57.100 for Harvard to get rid of football, which in, which would be a huge injury to the sport
00:23:01.180 as a whole.
00:23:01.820 So I don't know who off the top of my head, the president of Oklahoma is, but imagine if
00:23:06.660 he came out and said, we're getting rid of football, right?
00:23:09.080 I can't, I can't really think of that happening, but, uh, it would be a huge deal.
00:23:12.360 Right.
00:23:12.760 Um, and so you've got, that's who's leading the abolition of football movement.
00:23:16.700 And so because of that, uh, Roosevelt gets pulled into this debate over the, where the
00:23:22.100 game is going.
00:23:23.360 And so Roosevelt's just won the Nobel peace prize.
00:23:26.200 So, you know, he's just been reelected.
00:23:27.900 And so football is kind of put onto his plate actually by the headmaster of the prep school
00:23:33.580 that his kids are going to.
00:23:34.560 He writes Roosevelt the letter and says, you know, the game is in danger.
00:23:37.540 If somebody doesn't do something, it's going to go away.
00:23:39.660 And that someone's got to be you, he says to the president.
00:23:42.640 So Roosevelt does get involved.
00:23:44.900 Basically he decides in October of 1905, something has to be done.
00:23:48.660 His own son has actually suffered a couple of injuries on the field as well.
00:23:52.400 So he calls a meeting and I always think this, you know, football is America's sport.
00:23:56.520 So what, you know, as George will said, it's got violence and meetings, right?
00:23:59.500 So Roosevelt calls a meeting at the white house.
00:24:02.100 He invites the, basically the coach and administrator from Harvard, Yale, and Princeton to come to the
00:24:09.440 white house for a football conference.
00:24:13.180 And so, you know, just imagine this scene, you know, you've got football coaches in the
00:24:17.000 white house sitting across the table from the president, the secretary of state attends this
00:24:21.100 meeting as well.
00:24:21.960 And for two hours, these men debate kind of back and forth over what should be done about
00:24:28.060 football.
00:24:28.760 And Roosevelt says at the forefront, you know, he's pro football.
00:24:31.120 He wants football to survive, but he also wants there to be some changes made.
00:24:35.040 And this meeting goes on for a couple of hours.
00:24:37.340 Unfortunately, there's no transcript.
00:24:39.260 There's a lot of newspaper reporting from the day after saying, here's what we've heard
00:24:42.060 happens, but we don't know exactly what happens.
00:24:44.420 But after this two hour meeting is over, Roosevelt has to go back to work.
00:24:47.760 And he basically tells the, you know, these, these leaders of football, I need a statement
00:24:52.480 right away.
00:24:53.400 That's going to point towards change.
00:24:56.360 What's interesting about the story in some ways is Walter camp, who's the leader of football
00:25:00.660 at Harvard or excuse me, at Yale.
00:25:02.360 I'm a really influential football kind of founding father.
00:25:05.580 He, he'd had a bad attitude the whole meeting.
00:25:08.540 He doesn't think Roosevelt should be involved.
00:25:10.560 And camp kind of leads this group as they're going home on the train to draft a really kind
00:25:16.520 of toothless statement saying that they met with the president.
00:25:19.960 They all agree football should survive.
00:25:21.600 And the path forward is simply to make sure that the rules that are in place are followed.
00:25:26.420 And as I say in the book, I suppose it's possible that this group could have done less in response
00:25:31.320 to the president, but I can't see how, you know, they basically do the bare, bare minimum.
00:25:35.860 But with that said, that's why I think it's tough to say Roosevelt saved football.
00:25:39.560 With that said, Roosevelt, you know, had done some important things.
00:25:42.220 He invited these coaches to the White House.
00:25:44.520 He gave the game another stamp of his approval.
00:25:46.960 You know, people already knew he was a fan.
00:25:48.280 And what happens after Roosevelt's, you know, meeting with these leaders is a series of additional
00:25:54.240 meetings are held, which will lead to the establishment of the NCAA in 1906.
00:25:59.420 And so football is saved for the time being.
00:26:01.940 And Roosevelt's a part of that process.
00:26:04.880 All right.
00:26:05.000 So as president, Roosevelt helps support athletics by lending his support to football.
00:26:09.000 But he really helps popularize this idea of the strenuous life in general back when he
00:26:14.340 was governor of New York with the speech he gave in 1899 in which he coined the phrase
00:26:19.340 the strenuous life.
00:26:20.640 And this stuck and inspired his fellow citizens.
00:26:24.160 And TR didn't just talk about the strenuous life.
00:26:26.300 He really lived it himself.
00:26:27.760 In the White House, he continued to box until he injured an eye.
00:26:31.300 Then he took up judo.
00:26:32.840 And he famously built, or his wife famously built, a tennis court outside of his office
00:26:37.700 where he hosted the tennis cabinet.
00:26:39.940 So who was a part of the tennis cabinet?
00:26:41.400 And besides playing tennis, did they do anything else strenuous together?
00:26:45.640 Yeah, the tennis cabinet is a group of about 35, mostly DC insiders, to put it in kind
00:26:51.640 of a broad term.
00:26:52.800 These are people who held positions in the government or the civil service, and they were
00:26:58.060 around Roosevelt.
00:27:00.260 And so this is a group that gathers together to play tennis, as you'd assume from the name.
00:27:05.140 And they become really important, unofficial advisors to Roosevelt.
00:27:09.280 So when you think about the tennis court, as you said, just to give some context to it,
00:27:14.520 Roosevelt comes into the White House in 1901, and the place is in terrible repair.
00:27:18.460 And so Roosevelt oversees a massive renovation of the White House.
00:27:22.660 About $600,000 is granted from Congress to do this.
00:27:26.340 A lot of important improvements are made, but right outside the executive office, I'm talking
00:27:30.600 like three or four feet from where Roosevelt sits and works, is a tennis court.
00:27:36.040 And there's some debate over who put it there, as you hinted at.
00:27:39.900 There's a pretty good case to be made that Edith, Roosevelt's wife, who oversaw the grounds
00:27:45.660 kind of renovation, had put it there in order to encourage her husband, who always battles
00:27:50.260 with his weight, to play tennis.
00:27:52.080 And so that's kind of why the court is there.
00:27:54.520 So this group develops of unofficial advisors who are always willing to come and play with
00:28:00.920 Roosevelt.
00:28:01.620 Three of them become the most important kind of to Roosevelt.
00:28:04.520 James Garfield, the son of the former president who works in the government, he kind of comes
00:28:08.600 and plays.
00:28:09.620 Gifford Pinchot, who's the director of forestry, a really important conservation voice.
00:28:14.120 And then Jules Joucheron, who's the ambassador from France.
00:28:18.320 And these are individuals who will come, for example, on a January day when it's raw and
00:28:23.680 cold in Washington, D.C. and Roosevelt wants some exercise.
00:28:26.920 So they'll come and play tennis or they'll toss around the medicine ball or, or as, you
00:28:31.740 know, it's kind of part of the book as well.
00:28:33.500 They'll head off for a strenuous walk through Rock Creek Park and they will ford rivers and
00:28:38.600 climb up, climb up granite cliffs and all the while talk about what's going on.
00:28:44.740 And so I think in some ways, these are both informal yet important kind of meetings.
00:28:49.740 Roosevelt very much works through ideas as he is exercising.
00:28:53.280 His whole life, basically, he's been trying to kind of combine mind and body.
00:28:57.100 And so the tennis cabinet is really a way that he does that.
00:29:00.200 And the tennis court itself becomes a kind of cultural touchstone.
00:29:04.500 You know, the idea, look at the president.
00:29:05.820 He's got a tennis court right outside of his office.
00:29:08.120 It's super hot in August, but he's still out there sweating through a three set match.
00:29:12.060 Why aren't you getting out of your office or why aren't you getting out of the factory
00:29:14.580 and doing the same thing?
00:29:15.460 So it kind of goes back again to this kind of broader understanding of athletics.
00:29:19.100 So did Teddy Roosevelt's vigorous lifestyle, did that have an influence on the American public?
00:29:23.540 Did like people look at him and be like, I'm going to exercise just like Mr. President is?
00:29:27.720 I think so.
00:29:28.500 I think so.
00:29:29.160 I mean, you know, in some ways tracking down the answer to a question like that is difficult.
00:29:32.300 But what we do know is the press over and over tell stories of the president exercising,
00:29:39.020 which means that there's obviously an appetite for these kind of stories.
00:29:42.100 So they will talk about Roosevelt playing tennis.
00:29:44.440 They'll capture the idea of him going for a long walk, a vigorous walk.
00:29:48.000 For example, on the night that Roosevelt of his 49th birthday, he goes for a three hour walk in the rain.
00:29:53.640 And the press tries to give him space.
00:29:55.500 But they also report on the fact that look at this guy.
00:29:57.580 He's turned 49 years old.
00:29:58.680 And he just went for a 10 mile walk in the cold rain of October.
00:30:02.200 So, yeah, absolutely.
00:30:03.020 I think the president's example makes exercise in athletics something more personal for many Americans.
00:30:11.120 And he's probably the first president that actually exercised, like in a sort of systematic way.
00:30:15.920 I can't imagine Garfield doing exercises or McKinley.
00:30:21.000 It was probably Roosevelt was the guy who started this whole thing.
00:30:24.260 Yeah, I think so.
00:30:25.000 I mean, I think there were presidents before him, certainly, who did physical labor, even, you know,
00:30:29.440 they'd get out and kind of work on the grounds or they, you know, when they went away from the White House,
00:30:34.600 they would chop wood, they'd do those kind of things.
00:30:36.820 But yeah, Roosevelt playing sports or going for these, you know, kind of trail runs.
00:30:42.180 This is something new.
00:30:43.640 You know, as I point out, in the first year of his presidency, more than 10,000 times in the press,
00:30:49.320 Roosevelt is described using the strenuous life kind of moniker.
00:30:52.580 The strenuous president, he's a strenuous walker, strenuous eater.
00:30:56.180 So yeah, this, the idea that Roosevelt is something new and exciting is absolutely part of the kind of appeal at this time.
00:31:04.120 Let's talk about another American sport that has a connection with Roosevelt, and that's baseball.
00:31:10.240 So Roosevelt, love football, was a fan, not so much with baseball.
00:31:16.160 Tell us a story there.
00:31:17.280 Yeah, that's putting it nicely.
00:31:19.940 Not so much with baseball.
00:31:21.760 So Roosevelt never likes baseball.
00:31:23.900 In the book, I, I trying to kind of summarize what's going on.
00:31:27.620 I say that Roosevelt has a cold war with baseball.
00:31:30.780 So baseball at this time is very popular.
00:31:33.680 It's by far the most popular professional sport in the United States.
00:31:37.000 And Roosevelt comes into the White House, as I said, 1901.
00:31:41.860 And during the time that Roosevelt is in the White House, from 1901 until 1909, baseball attendance at professional games doubles.
00:31:49.600 So the game is really popular.
00:31:50.760 Also during that time in 1903, the first World Series happens.
00:31:54.360 So baseball is booming.
00:31:56.380 Despite that, though, Roosevelt will not give it the time of day.
00:31:59.660 And, you know, I found it kind of funny, but over the period from 1904, 1905, 1906 into 1907, professional baseball leaders make increasingly desperate attempts to get Roosevelt's attention.
00:32:14.360 Because what they're noticing at this point is Roosevelt is strongly associated with, you know, strenuous activity and sports.
00:32:20.420 They also know that the president is really popular.
00:32:22.540 You know, he wins reelection in 1904 on, you know, by a landslide.
00:32:26.300 And they also notice he's, he just, you know, he talks about boxing, wrestling, football, these long walks.
00:32:31.860 But he never mentions baseball.
00:32:33.680 So what baseball leaders do is they come to the White House to visit the president.
00:32:38.280 And Roosevelt's always interested in interesting people.
00:32:40.900 He lets all kinds of guests, you know, visit him.
00:32:42.780 And so, for example, in 1905, the leader of the American League, Ban Johnson, comes to the White House and hand delivers to Roosevelt a golden ticket.
00:32:52.660 And this golden ticket gives Roosevelt entry to any game in the American League, especially, you know, the hometown Washington senators.
00:32:59.380 He can come for free at any time.
00:33:01.180 He can bring as many people as he wants.
00:33:03.320 Gold ticket.
00:33:04.420 Roosevelt thanks Johnson for the ticket and then promptly never uses it.
00:33:08.140 And then the same thing happens the next year.
00:33:09.900 The leader of what will become baseball's minor leagues, comes to the White House, gives Roosevelt a golden ticket, says you can come to any minor league game in any state for the rest of your life.
00:33:19.480 We'd love to have you.
00:33:20.660 Roosevelt, you know, accepts the golden ticket and never uses it.
00:33:23.700 And after this happens, you know, increasingly baseball friendly writers in the press kind of ask, what's the deal with Roosevelt?
00:33:31.340 Why won't he give the game attention?
00:33:32.620 And it becomes a rather awkward standoff, but Roosevelt digs in his heels.
00:33:36.600 He will not attend a baseball game.
00:33:38.580 He does not care about the World Series, which is starting.
00:33:41.380 And it's really unusual given how much he talks about and writes about sports otherwise.
00:33:46.780 And I do speculate best I can about why Roosevelt won't give baseball the time of day.
00:33:51.940 And there are a couple of reasons, which we don't have any kind of silver bullet explaining exactly what's going on.
00:33:56.740 But Roosevelt doesn't like that it's professional.
00:33:58.340 You know, he sees that as a problem.
00:34:00.160 But I think more practically than that, Roosevelt doesn't see baseball as fitting his paradigm of what a sport should be.
00:34:06.040 It's not violent, first of all.
00:34:07.400 It's not like football.
00:34:08.260 It doesn't teach men those skills.
00:34:10.280 And then it's also not kind of physically fatiguing.
00:34:13.880 You know, it's not the same as going for a 10-mile hike or playing five sets of tennis.
00:34:17.500 You know, you don't sweat a lot as a baseball player.
00:34:19.580 And it doesn't make you better in those ways.
00:34:21.460 So Roosevelt just ignores the game throughout his whole life.
00:34:24.780 And his daughter, Alice, will say at one point that father and us, she says, all hated baseball because it was too mollycoddle.
00:34:31.980 And you probably know that word or have heard that word.
00:34:33.920 It's basically, you know, it's not manly enough kind of thing.
00:34:37.180 It's a wussy game, according to Roosevelt.
00:34:38.640 It's a wussy game.
00:34:39.500 Well, but there's been some comeuppance in baseball since then.
00:34:43.780 You point out, so there's the Nationals.
00:34:46.800 They have that race with the presidents, right?
00:34:48.900 Like sort of like the bobblehead president-looking guy.
00:34:51.220 Right.
00:34:52.120 Roosevelt's never won the race, ever.
00:34:53.460 Well, actually, so for a long time, the Nationals.
00:34:56.960 So, yes, I point out that the Washington Nationals, for those people who aren't familiar with this and why would you be unless you lived in D.C., you know, fourth inning, they have a president's bobblehead race.
00:35:06.260 You know, these huge headed mascots race around the Nationals field, you know, to kind of keep the fans entertained during the mid-inning change.
00:35:13.420 The same as I think they have like sausages run around in Milwaukee and, you know, whatever else in other places.
00:35:17.620 And for 525 straight games, Roosevelt was not allowed to win the race.
00:35:23.080 And it became a real thing in D.C.
00:35:24.880 They did kind of a mock documentary and they had a call for Roosevelt to win.
00:35:29.160 And I argued that, you know, whether the Nationals knew it or not, this was really great historical comeuppance.
00:35:33.620 But to kind of bring it around, the Nationals did let him win.
00:35:37.420 And in fact, this season, he has won the season kind of championship among mascot races.
00:35:42.980 And so if you're paying, you know, for those of your listeners paying attention to baseball right now, you'll note the Nationals are in the World Series.
00:35:48.920 So perhaps Roosevelt is being totally forgiven by the baseball gods and the Nationals will win the World Series.
00:35:54.880 We'll know, I suppose, by the time this airs.
00:35:56.800 But yeah, it's been a, you know, the mascot race and the letteddywin.com community is kind of an interesting and fun way to think about Roosevelt's legacy in sports that still endures.
00:36:06.860 So all throughout his presidency, Roosevelt stayed active.
00:36:09.680 When he left office, he was very active.
00:36:12.680 You didn't talk about these parts in detail about his life, but he went on a safari in Africa.
00:36:16.500 Then he went, did the River of Doubt thing where he almost died and explored an uncharted part of the Amazon River.
00:36:23.480 But then the part you highlight, sort of his continuation of the strenuous life after his office, it's sort of like the end of his life where he goes to this farm to get in shape.
00:36:34.300 Tell us about that and why did you focus on that part of Roosevelt's strenuous life?
00:36:40.020 Yeah.
00:36:40.280 You know, to be honest, it's my favorite part of the book, my favorite part of the story, at least in terms of how it resonated for me.
00:36:47.640 So as you said, Roosevelt leaves the White House, you know, 1909.
00:36:51.260 He's only 50 years old.
00:36:52.640 He has plenty of adventures after, you know, the River of Doubt.
00:36:56.580 He runs for election again in 1912.
00:36:58.500 He does a lot of things.
00:36:59.840 He gets shot.
00:37:00.400 He gets shot and then gives his speech, right?
00:37:02.960 So, I mean, he's hardly living some ordinary sedentary life.
00:37:06.900 But I would argue that, you know, by the time 1917 rolls around, Roosevelt looks around and worries, as probably many of us do, that the world is passing us by.
00:37:15.740 You know, he's getting towards his late 50s.
00:37:17.640 He tries to get Woodrow Wilson to let him be a part of World War I.
00:37:21.500 It's kind of a delusional, I don't know, maybe noble, but certainly delusional, you know, idea that I'm going to kind of get a modernized Rough Riders and we're going to go over there and teach the Germans a thing or two.
00:37:30.600 Wilson doesn't go for it, of course.
00:37:32.060 You know, you're not going to send an old president over to this world war that's going on.
00:37:36.080 So with all that going on, in 1917, in October, Roosevelt decides to go off to training camp.
00:37:44.000 And so, you know, really at the urging of his wife, too.
00:37:46.840 As I mentioned, Roosevelt battles with his weight his whole life.
00:37:50.160 You know, he's really active, he's really vigorous, but he eats like a teenager, basically, his whole life.
00:37:55.440 You know, as much as he wants, whatever he wants, whenever he wants.
00:37:58.440 So he's always trying to burn off the calories, but the math doesn't quite work out in terms of how that plays out.
00:38:03.860 So in 1917, he goes off to Jack Cooper's Health Farm, it's called.
00:38:07.800 It's in Connecticut, and it's a place dedicated towards, kind of like we were talking about at the beginning, the idea of healing yourself from the ills of modern society.
00:38:15.720 And so individuals would show up and get this former boxing champion, Jack Cooper, to train them for a couple of weeks.
00:38:22.740 So in my mind, this is the best part of Roosevelt's athletic journey, because it's so relatable.
00:38:29.200 It's so, I don't know, intriguing, maybe even inspiring in certain ways.
00:38:33.840 So he gets there, he's 58 years old, he's about 30 pounds overweight, former president, winner of the Nobel Peace Prize, all these things.
00:38:41.520 He turns himself over to Jack Cooper and basically says, give me your worst, I'm ready, you know, I want to get back in shape.
00:38:47.140 And so Jack Cooper, for two weeks, works with Roosevelt and just puts him through the grinder.
00:38:52.320 You know, he gets him up at 5.45 to run three or four miles, then he puts him in the gym for some sparring, then he puts him, you know, gives him the medicine ball workout.
00:39:00.700 And then in between all these things, he has him kind of try some of the inventions, the exercise inventions he's got.
00:39:05.960 So, you know, he'll put him in a, you know, in a bicycle, which is cloaked in leather, which has a heater inside of it to try to get him to kind of sweat some of his weight off.
00:39:13.560 And then he'll have him massaged, and then he'll take a cold shower, and then he'll repeat the whole process over.
00:39:18.440 And so for two weeks, Roosevelt goes through this.
00:39:21.500 And what I think it shows is that at 58, with all of these things behind him and 30 pounds overweight, Roosevelt is still trying to live the strenuous life.
00:39:30.420 He's still getting after it, which I think is pretty interesting.
00:39:33.100 And on the last day of his time at Jack Cooper's farm, you know, he lets the press in.
00:39:38.520 Roosevelt still loves the attention, you know.
00:39:40.160 He's not above kind of talking to reporters to his own glory.
00:39:44.440 He lets the press in, and he also allows – or also, you know, someone who comes is John Mitchell, who's the mayor of New York City.
00:39:51.580 And so all these people are around, and Roosevelt's talking about the two weeks that he has, and he says, I've lost 14 pounds, and everybody's impressed.
00:39:58.020 And this is as World War II is ramping up, and the nation still cares so much about Roosevelt that this is front-page news.
00:40:04.380 And what's funny, I think, kind of to wrap things up is Roosevelt wants to show them the half-mile loop that he's been running every day to try to get back in shape.
00:40:11.980 And so he says, kind of, come with me.
00:40:13.040 I'll show you what I've been doing.
00:40:14.580 And so he heads off around this half-mile loop around a pond, and in typical Roosevelt fashion, he turns it into a race.
00:40:21.900 Kind of starts slowly jogging, and everybody gets spread out behind him.
00:40:25.200 John Mitchell, who thought he was there for this easy cameo, you know, to get some votes, ends up dropping out.
00:40:30.860 And a half-mile later, Roosevelt comes across, you know, what would be the finish line if it was actually a real race, and he's kind of victorious.
00:40:37.080 And the press all gathers around him and talks about how vigorous he is.
00:40:40.400 And Roosevelt, for one last time, gets to kind of expound upon how this strenuous life is a constant struggle.
00:40:46.700 Always get after it.
00:40:47.720 Always try to get it.
00:40:48.560 And so, yeah, this is why I end with Roosevelt here, because this comes, you know, shortly before his death.
00:40:53.880 He passes away at 60, but I think Roosevelt was always kind of going after this strenuous life.
00:40:59.080 So this story, which hasn't been much covered, I think was a good way to kind of round things out as his life is nearing its end.
00:41:06.620 Well, you know, your book's called Theodore Roosevelt and the Making of the American Athlete.
00:41:09.540 Like, what do you, after spending all this time with Roosevelt and his interaction with this sort of cultural movement in America,
00:41:16.000 what lasting legacy does he have?
00:41:19.400 Like, would sports be what it is today without Roosevelt, or did Roosevelt sort of supercharge things?
00:41:26.800 I would say, yeah.
00:41:28.020 I mean, I think both of those characterize it.
00:41:30.000 Sports would not be what it is today without Roosevelt, at least slightly.
00:41:33.280 I mean, he plays a role.
00:41:34.600 He's not the only part of the story.
00:41:36.100 But I think I like your idea, and I kind of used the reference to, like, a super collider this time, you know, or he supercharges sports.
00:41:43.300 So what I think Roosevelt does is at a pivotal moment in American history, he helps Americans understand how sports can play a role in making them better individually and collectively.
00:41:54.280 And Roosevelt supports things like sports in schools.
00:41:57.740 He supports college football.
00:41:59.060 He kind of buys into the paradigm of sports that's being put in place, which still basically exists today, by the way.
00:42:05.400 So I think Roosevelt's fingerprints are still all over our society as a whole, and especially athletically.
00:42:11.940 And so I think the connection is an important and valid one for us to understand.
00:42:17.140 So let's do some armchair psychology speculation, right?
00:42:20.680 You spent a lot of time with Teddy Roosevelt.
00:42:23.080 I'm curious.
00:42:23.980 We live in, I'd say, like a second strenuous age.
00:42:26.260 We have all this stuff, CrossFit, powerlifting, jiu-jitsu, MMA, rucking, obstacle races.
00:42:34.060 If Teddy Roosevelt was alive today, which activities do you think, which strenuous 21st century activities do you think you'd take part in?
00:42:43.400 Boy, that's a good question.
00:42:45.320 You know, so Roosevelt is, in some ways, he's trying to balance, right?
00:42:48.440 He's always looking for something that appeals to his kind of intellectual side, his curious side, but is also challenging.
00:42:53.760 I think Roosevelt would be in favor of, for example, CrossFit.
00:42:58.180 I think he would love the idea of broad participation.
00:43:01.580 Everybody can get in and do it, but at a different level, and we all go for the extreme.
00:43:06.320 You know, whether you start at kind of position zero or position 70, the point is to get as far away from your beginning point as possible.
00:43:13.180 So I think he'd like CrossFit.
00:43:14.940 Another thing, you know, kind of modern manifestation of this strenuous life that he'd like, I think he'd like some of the endurance, you know, 50K endurance races across really difficult terrain, you know, or like even the mud runs that exist now, you know, get out and get muddy and go over the obstacles and compete in that way.
00:43:33.360 I think he would like those kinds of things as well.
00:43:35.480 He was never, Roosevelt was never about being the champion.
00:43:38.540 You know, he famously said of himself, I never was a champion, but people can learn from my examples of kind of how to be an athlete anyway.
00:43:45.540 So he would favor broad participation, extreme kind of sports events.
00:43:51.000 And one thing, you know, kind of one key characteristic of Roosevelt in sports is he was never afraid to look stupid.
00:43:56.740 You know, he would try anything.
00:43:58.160 He didn't care if he got dirty.
00:43:59.220 He didn't care if he wasn't very good.
00:44:00.780 It was about effort.
00:44:01.900 And so those would be the kinds of things that he would like.
00:44:04.860 Like, I think more as opposed to, you know, MMA, which, you know, maybe he would participate on on some level, but, you know, I think it would be more towards CrossFit or, you know, one of these extreme endurance runs or something like that.
00:44:15.760 But it's fun to speculate, I think, for sure.
00:44:17.680 Right.
00:44:18.000 Well, speaking of that, sort of those endurance events, Roosevelt, I think, plays like a direct role in that.
00:44:23.800 So I think when he was president, he came with this idea that all officers in all branches in the military should be able to march 50 miles in a total of 20 hours.
00:44:33.600 And then, like, it kind of got forgotten.
00:44:36.120 And then JFK, when he was president, resurrected it.
00:44:40.280 And I think Bobby Kennedy decided he's going to try to do this 50-mile walk in his loafers.
00:44:46.740 And it was, like, wintertime.
00:44:47.860 And he did it.
00:44:48.960 And then now, then after that, you sort of saw this movement of people, like, in, like, the 60s, 70s, and 80s, they would do these 50-mile endurance walks.
00:44:55.660 Yeah, yeah, I think so.
00:44:56.720 All because of Teddy Roosevelt.
00:44:57.720 Yeah, I mean, I think, yeah, I think he absolutely kind of sets that example of, you know, it's not always the high profile, it's the struggle.
00:45:06.340 And so an endurance race or an endurance walk is an example of this struggle.
00:45:10.540 You know, it may not be this acute pain that you have at one moment.
00:45:13.560 There may not be this glorious, but can you stay at it for five or six or seven hours?
00:45:17.820 Can you get through this river or this mud?
00:45:19.780 And so, yeah, I think there's a real connection to Roosevelt because if Roosevelt as president gives it value, it allowed it to become more acceptable in society and more sought after.
00:45:29.540 And so I think that's, yeah, absolutely important.
00:45:31.940 Well, Ryan, where can people go to learn more about the book and your work?
00:45:34.800 Yeah, the book's being sold at all places.
00:45:36.940 Books are being sold, so they can find it there.
00:45:39.100 In terms of where you can see some of the other writing that I've done, both popular and otherwise, my website is ryanswanson21.com.
00:45:47.800 It's ryanswanson21.com.
00:45:49.700 And so I've got articles and things posted there that I'd love for people to check out.
00:45:53.800 Fantastic.
00:45:54.060 Well, Ryan Swanson, thanks for your time.
00:45:55.280 It's been a pleasure.
00:45:56.520 My pleasure.
00:45:57.240 Thanks for having me.
00:45:58.640 My guest today was Ryan Swanson.
00:46:00.100 He is the author of the book, The Strenuous Life, Theodore Roosevelt, and the Making of the American Athlete.
00:46:04.100 It's available on amazon.com.
00:46:05.420 Also, check out our show notes at aom.is slash strenuous president.
00:46:08.480 Where you can find links to resources, where you can delve deeper into this topic.
00:46:18.400 Well, that wraps up another edition of the Art of Manliness podcast.
00:46:21.480 Check out our website at artofmanliness.com, where you can find our podcast archives, as well as thousands of articles that have written over the year about physical fitness, how to be a better husband, better father.
00:46:29.220 And speaking of The Strenuous Life, check out our online membership program called The Strenuous Life, inspired by Teddy Roosevelt's idea of The Strenuous Life.
00:46:36.060 It's an online membership platform where we help you put into action all the things we've been writing about and talking about on the Art of Manliness website and podcast for the past 10 years.
00:46:43.320 We've got badges based around 50 different skills.
00:46:45.500 There's hard skills like self-defense, wilderness survival.
00:46:47.920 We also have a Teddy Roosevelt Rough Rider badge, where you do some things inspired by Teddy Roosevelt, like swimming in rivers, taking long hikes, things like that.
00:46:56.020 We also hold you accountable for your physical fitness, doing a good deed, thinking outside of yourself, and we provide weekly challenges that are going to put you outside of your comfort zone.
00:47:04.400 So check it out, strenuouslife.co.
00:47:06.640 Our next enrollment is in January 2020, so get your email on our waiting list, so you'll be one of the first to know when enrollment opens up in January 2020.
00:47:14.040 So check it out, strenuouslife.co.
00:47:15.920 One more time, strenuouslife.co.
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