Theodore Roosevelt, 26th president of the United States, was a sickly child whose frequent bouts of ill health made his parents fear that he would not survive to adulthood. Determination and tragedy combined to toughen him up. Long before he became one of America’s most robust presidents, Teddy Roosevelt was the kind of guy who could take care of himself. As seen below, a good example of that was the time he beat up a barroom bully who mistook the bespectacled and smaller Roosevelt for a pushover.
Teddy Roosevelt’s Sickly Childhood
As a child, Theodore “Teddy” Roosevelt (1858 – 1919) often suffered severe nighttime asthma attacks. His concerned parents, a Manhattan socialite and a businessman philanthropist father, consulted the best doctors, but there was little they could do. As he described the bouts in later years, they felt as if somebody had sat on his chest and tried to smother him with pillows. A born fighter, Teddy did not despair, and discovered how to keep down the asthma and simultaneously keep up his spirits: vigorous exercise. When he was around eleven-years-old, Teddy traveled with his family to Europe. As they hiked in the Alps, the sickly child discovered that he could keep pace with his father.
It felt pretty good, and from then on, Teddy adopted a regimen of strenuous exercise and outdoors activities. He also took up boxing to learn how to fight, after he got bullied by two older boys on a camping trip. Teddy went to Harvard, where he boxed and rowed. He was good enough at the former to make it to second place in a Harvard boxing tournament. After Harvard, he spent a year at Columbia Law School, before he dropped out in 1881 to serve in the New York State Assembly. His political career showed early promise, and he made a name for himself, especially in his efforts against corporate corruption. Then came 1884, a horrible year for the future president.
A Tragic Valentine’s
On Valentine’s Day, February 14th, 1884, two days after she gave birth to their daughter Alice, Teddy Roosevelt’s wife died. His mother passed away a few hours later. The only entry on his diary that day was an ‘X’, and the notation “The light has gone out of my life”. That summer, he attended the GOP National Convention in Chicago, but his candidate lost. He felt burned out after the personal and political setbacks in quick succession, so he decided to quit politics and move out West.
Roosevelt had visited the Dakota Territory in 1883 to hunt buffalo, and fell in love with the lifestyle out West. So he invested $14,000 – a significant amount in those days – to become a rancher. He was more than just a rich East Coaster who went out West to play cowboy. In the summer of 1884, he established the Elkhorn Ranch on the banks of the Little Missouri River in the Badlands, about 35 miles north of what is now Medora, North Dakota, and put in the time and effort to get it off the ground.
Teddy Roosevelt, the Rancher
Teddy Roosevelt enthusiastically embraced his new occupation as a rancher, and set out to learn the ropes – literally – of the profession. He learned to ride, rope cattle, and hunt, and wrote three books about his experience. Later that year, Roosevelt went on a days-long horseback ride to clear his head and take in the scenery. He eventually came across the Nolan Hotel in Mingusville, Montana. The place looked like a seedy dive, and TR was reluctant to enter – especially after he heard gunshots coming from the bar.
Nightfall was near, however, and it and it was cold outside, so Roosevelt went in. He saw a “shabby individual in a broad hat with a cocked gun in each hand was walking up and down the floor talking with strident profanity. He had evidently been shooting at the clock, which had two or three holes in its face”. As soon as he saw Roosevelt, who wore glasses, he hailed him as “Four Eyes”, and announced to the bar that “Four Eyes is going to treat!” The future president tried to play it off as a joke, but the loudmouth followed him around. As seen below, it did not end well – for the loudmouth.
When Teddy Roosevelt Beat Up a Barroom Bully
As Teddy Roosevelt described his encounter with an armed bully in a Montana bar: “As soon as he saw me he hailed me as ‘Four Eyes,’ in reference to my spectacles, and said, ‘Four Eyes is going to treat.’ I joined in the laugh and got behind the stove and sat down, thinking to escape notice. He followed me, however, and though I tried to pass it off as a jest this merely made him more offensive, and he stood leaning over me, a gun in each hand, using very foul language… In response to his reiterated command that I should set up the drinks, I said, ‘Well, if I’ve got to, I’ve got to,’ and rose, looking past him.
As I rose, I struck quick and hard with my right just to one side of the point of his jaw, hitting with my left as I straightened out, and then again with my right. He fired the guns, but I do not know whether this was merely a convulsive action of his hands, or whether he was trying to shoot at me. When he went down he struck the corner of the bar with his head… if he had moved I was about to drop on my knees; but he was senseless. I took away his guns, and the other people in the room, who were now loud in their denunciation of him, hustled him out and put him in the shed”. The humiliated lout left town on a freight train the next day.
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Some Sources & Further Reading
History Halls – Abraham Lincoln, Hall of Fame Wrestler
Miller, Nathan – Theodore Roosevelt: A Life (1992)
National Park Service – Roosevelt’s Bar Fight
Thayer, William Roscoe – Theodore Roosevelt: An Intimate Biography (1919)
