Theodore Roosevelt's Strenuous Life

Doctors Called Him Frail. He Made Vigor a Way of Life.

Theodore Roosevelt seated on horseback
Athletics

A Life of Physical Vigor

A frail, asthmatic boy willed himself into a boxer, wrestler, and horseman — and never stopped moving.

Theodore Roosevelt in a fringed buckskin suit holding a rifle in a studio portrait
The Hunter

Sport, Ethics, and Conservation

Hunting was central to Roosevelt’s identity from his teenage years on — and it shaped his code of sportsmanship and his conservation ethic.

Expedition members with a loaded dugout raft on a jungle river
The Explorer

A Life of Discovery and Adventure

Roosevelt could not remain still. Even after the presidency, he sought out the wild — from African savannas to unmapped South American rivers.