Christmas with Theodore Roosevelt
Theodore Roosevelt called Christmas "an occasion of literally delirious joy." As a father he kept the holiday the way he had known it as a boy: stockings opened on the parents' bed first thing in the morning, a table of presents for each child after breakfast, and often a long ride or tramp in the afternoon. One year, a son hid a Christmas tree in a White House closet.
Key Facts
| A favorite holiday | He wrote that Thanksgiving "in no way came up to Christmas." |
|---|---|
| Family custom | In his boyhood, stockings opened on the parents' bed before dawn, then a separate table of presents for each child |
| Christmases as President | Eight, 1901–1908 |
| Christmas tree? | The family usually did without one at the White House. No ban: in 1902, Archie hid a small tree in a closet. |
| Last Christmas | 1918. He left the hospital on Christmas morning and went home to Sagamore Hill. |
"Literally Delirious Joy"
T.R.'s Christmas began in the 1860s at his family's houses in New York, first on East 20th Street and later on West 57th Street. In his Autobiography he described the routine. The children hung up the biggest stockings they could borrow from the grown-ups. Before dawn they opened them sitting on their parents' bed. After breakfast the doors to the drawing room were thrown open on a table of presents for each child.
He kept the custom. "In the next generation," he wrote, "I tried to reproduce them exactly for my own children." Forty years later, in a letter to his sister Anna from the White House, he described the same routine: children hammering on the door at seven, stockings opened on the bed, and after breakfast "each child had his or her table with presents, just as all of us grown-ups used to when we were small."
A Shotgun on the Nile
Two boyhood Christmases took him far from New York. In 1869 the family spent Christmas in a hotel in Rome. Eleven-year-old Theodore wrote in his diary that he was awake at four, and that afterward the family went to St. Peter's and saw the Pope.
Three years later the family was traveling up the Nile. On Christmas Day 1872, at Beni Suef, the 14-year-old naturalist got a surprise from his father: "a beautiful breechloading double barrelled shot gun." He went out with it that same afternoon.
From the Badlands, Home for Christmas
In December 1884, T.R. was at his Chimney Butte Ranch near Medora. It was the first Christmas since February, when his mother and his wife, Alice, died on the same day. He stayed for a meeting of the Little Missouri stockmen on Friday, December 19. "On Saturday the 20th I start home," he wrote to his sister Anna, "and shall be in New York the evening of the 23d."
His infant daughter, Alice, was in Anna's care. A postscript to the same letter asked Anna to buy a present for their sister Corinne.
The Maltese Cross cabin on the Chimney Butte Ranch near Medora, photographed in 1904. (Joseph Kitchin / Library of Congress)
Sagamore Hill, c. 1904. Photograph by Edward S. Curtis
A Tree for the Cove School
At Sagamore Hill, in Oyster Bay, Christmas reached beyond the family. The Roosevelt children went to the little Cove School near the house, and by T.R.'s count the family gave the school its Christmas tree "for nearly thirty years." "Before the gifts are distributed," T.R. wrote, "I am expected to make an address, which is always mercifully short."
In 1896 he described the trip to his sister Anna. The family drove down "in the farm wagon on runners," twelve people in all, and son Ted "spoke a piece." In 1900, newspapers reported that Governor Roosevelt played Santa Claus at the school himself. In 1908, his last Christmas as President, the Roosevelts sent money from Washington for the children's presents.
Archie's Secret Tree
The Roosevelts usually did without a Christmas tree of their own at the White House, and newspapers reported it more than once. The children enjoyed the tree at their Aunt Bamie's house. On Christmas morning 1902 the President got a surprise. His son Archie, age eight, "had a little Christmas tree of his own which he had rigged up with the help of one of the carpenters in a big closet."
T.R. told the story the next day in a letter to a young friend, James A. Garfield, grandson of the late President. Each member of the family got a present off Archie's tree, and so did Jack the dog, Tom Quartz the kitten, and Algonquin the pony. Archie's tree became a family custom. By 1907 T.R.'s Christmas letter mentions it in passing: "Afterwards there was a Christmas tree of Archie's."
A Christmas myth. A popular story says T.R. banned Christmas trees from the White House to protect the forests. No record of a ban has been found. Newspapers at the time reported that the family skipped a White House tree, and in 1903 said Mrs. Roosevelt had decided to omit it. None of the reports mentions a ban or the forests. The children enjoyed trees at relatives' homes.
Archie Roosevelt on pony, "Algonquin," 1902. Photograph by Frances Benjamin Johnston
Mr. Roosevelt watching the boys bringing in the skin of the second big lion to camp, c. 1909. Photograph by Kermit Roosevelt
Christmas Far from Home
Twice, T.R. spent Christmas on expeditions far from home. In 1909, on his African expedition, the safari marched through Uganda on Christmas Day. "There is not much use in trying to celebrate Christmas," he wrote in African Game Trails, "unless there are small folks to hang up their stockings on Christmas Eve."
In 1913, on the journey that would take him down the River of Doubt, he reached Corumbá, Brazil, on Christmas Eve. "Christmas Day saw us making our way steadily up-stream against the strong current," he wrote, "and between the green and beautiful banks of the upper Paraguay."
The Last Christmas
In November 1918 T.R. was admitted to Roosevelt Hospital in New York. He had seen all four sons go to war and lost the youngest, Quentin, that summer. On Christmas morning he went home to Sagamore Hill. "I got out home Christmas morning," he wrote to his sister Anna three days later, "so that Edith and I, Ethel and Alice and Archie and Gracie, had Christmas dinner together."
Newspapers reported that he played Santa Claus for his grandchildren. Theodore Roosevelt died at Sagamore Hill twelve days later, on January 6, 1919.
Explore More
Timeline of T.R.’s Christmases
Where he spent Christmas, from Rome in 1869 to Sagamore Hill in 1918.
Thanksgiving with Theodore Roosevelt
Newsboys’ dinners, a Badlands Thanksgiving and his presidential proclamations.
Theodore Roosevelt’s Holidays
Follow T.R. through the days of the year that meant the most to his family.
Primary Sources
- Theodore Roosevelt’s Letters to His Children (1919)
- An Autobiography (1913)
- Letters from Theodore Roosevelt to Anna Roosevelt Cowles, 1870–1918 (1924)
- Corinne Roosevelt Robinson, My Brother, Theodore Roosevelt (1921)
From the Archives
Letters, cartoons and photographs about T.R.’s Christmases from the Theodore Roosevelt Center.