Thanksgiving with Theodore Roosevelt
Theodore Roosevelt spent Thanksgiving feeding newsboys, riding through Rock Creek Park and the country outside Washington, and at least once at his ranch in the Badlands. As President he wrote eight Thanksgiving proclamations about duty and character. There is no record that he pardoned a turkey.
Key Facts
| Proclamations | Eight as President (1901–1908), two as Governor of New York (1899, 1900) |
|---|---|
| Thanksgiving Day | The last Thursday of November in every year of his presidency |
| The White House turkey | Sent by Horace Vose of Westerly, Rhode Island, who supplied White House turkeys from 1873 until his death in 1913 |
| Turkey pardon? | No pardon by T.R. has been found. The pardon became an annual White House tradition in 1989. |
| His ranking, as a boy | "Thanksgiving was an appreciated festival, but it in no way came up to Christmas." |
His Father's Thanksgiving
T.R. learned the holiday from his father, Theodore Roosevelt Sr., a New York philanthropist who was particularly interested in the Newsboys' Lodging-House, a shelter for boys who sold papers on the streets. T.R. remembered in his Autobiography that on Thanksgiving or Christmas in the city, his father "was always back in time to go to the dinner at the Newsboys' Lodging-House."
His father died in February 1878. On Thanksgiving 1880, a month after his wedding to Alice Hathaway Lee, the 22-year-old carried on the custom. He wrote in his diary, naming his cousin Emlen Roosevelt: "Emlen and I gave the newsboys a big dinner; about a hundred came." That evening, he added, "Alice looked like a little Queen."
Courting Alice Lee
Within weeks of meeting Alice Lee, T.R. spent Thanksgiving with her. As a Harvard junior in 1878, he spent the holiday in Chestnut Hill, outside Boston, with Alice and her cousin Rose Saltonstall. His diary called Alice "one of the sweetest, most ladylike girls I have ever met."
A year later he was back at the Lees' for Thanksgiving dinner, with games, dancing and charades afterward. They married on October 27, 1880, his 22nd birthday.
Mrs. Theodore Roosevelt (Alice Hathaway Lee), three-quarter length portrait, between about 1880 and 1884
The Maltese Cross cabin on the Chimney Butte Ranch near Medora, photographed in 1904. (Joseph Kitchin / Library of Congress)
A Badlands Thanksgiving
In November 1884, T.R. went west to his cattle ranches on the Little Missouri River. Newspapers reported that he planned to stay "until the holidays." It was his first Thanksgiving since February 14, when his mother and his wife died on the same day.
His diary for that week is brief. On Monday he went out to wait for bears and shot three grouse. On Tuesday he and Bill Sewall rode up to see their neighbor Lang. On Thanksgiving Day, Thursday, November 27, he wrote two words: "Rode home." The diary doesn't mention the holiday at all.
Eight Presidential Proclamations
Presidents of T.R.'s era set the date of Thanksgiving each year by proclamation. T.R. issued eight, from 1901 to 1908, and each named the last Thursday of November. He used them to talk about duty, not just abundance.
In 1901, weeks after William McKinley's assassination, he wrote: "Let us remember that, as much has been given us, much will be expected from us; and that true homage comes from the heart as well as from the lips and shows itself in deeds." His last, in 1908, put it plainly: "in the nation as in the individual, in the long run it is character that counts."
President Roosevelt signing his 1902 Thanksgiving Proclamation act. Photograph copyrighted December 3, 1902
President & Mrs. Roosevelt on horseback, c. 1902
Thanksgiving at the White House
On Thanksgiving 1902 he took the family and friends, including Senator Henry Cabot Lodge and General Leonard Wood, on what he called "a three hours' scamper" on horseback. That evening, after dinner in the new State Dining Room, "we cleared away the table and danced," he wrote to his son Kermit. He and Mrs. Lodge danced the Virginia Reel.
In 1904, two weeks after winning a full term, he strained a leg jumping a fence on his horse Rusty, a few days after first straining it boxing with Ted and the boys. That night he left for the World's Fair in St. Louis. There he saw "the North Dakota Exhibit, with my old cabin," his cabin from the Badlands. In 1905 the family spent Thanksgiving at Pine Knot, Edith's cabin in Albemarle County, Virginia, and in 1907 he went to Montpelier, James Madison's home, where he laid flowers on Madison's tomb.
A Cornerstone on Thanksgiving Day
His last Thanksgiving as President, in 1908, combined the holiday with public work. After a ride through Rock Creek Park, he laid the cornerstone of the new YMCA for Washington's Black community on 12th Street NW, before a crowd of thousands. He shook hands with Levi Adams, the Black mason setting the stone, and spread the first trowel of mortar himself. The Twelfth Street YMCA still stands and is a National Historic Landmark.
Did T.R. Pardon a Turkey?
No pardon by T.R. has been found. The White House Historical Association traces the first presidential turkey "pardon" to a story about Abraham Lincoln and his son Tad sparing a Christmas turkey, and the annual tradition to 1989.
T.R. did eat Rhode Island turkeys. Horace Vose of Westerly, Rhode Island, sent turkeys to the White House for Thanksgiving, a custom that began with President Grant in 1873. Newspapers reported Vose turkeys on the White House table in 1906, 1907 and 1908.
"Turkey hunting in the Old Dominion," cartoon by Clifford K. Berryman, 1906
Far from Home, and the Last Thanksgiving
In 1909 T.R. spent late November hunting on the Uasin Gishu plateau in British East Africa. In 1913 he was in Chile on a speaking tour of South America, the trip that led to his descent of the River of Doubt. Edith had started for home from Santiago the day before Thanksgiving, while T.R. went to the coast at Valparaíso.
His last Thanksgiving, in 1918, came in a hospital bed. He had been admitted to Roosevelt Hospital in New York on November 11, Armistice Day, and stayed until Christmas Day. Ten days before Thanksgiving, newspapers printed his request that the body of his son Quentin, killed in France in July, stay where it was buried. The War Department agreed.
Explore More
Timeline of T.R.’s Thanksgivings
Where he spent Thanksgiving, from Harvard to the White House to a New York hospital.
Christmas with Theodore Roosevelt
Archie’s secret tree, the Cove School and his last Christmas at Sagamore Hill.
Theodore Roosevelt’s Holidays
Follow T.R. through the days of the year that meant the most to his family.
Primary Sources
- T.R.’s Thanksgiving proclamations, 1901–1908 (American Presidency Project)
- T.R.’s diaries (Library of Congress)
- Letters to His Children (1919)
- An Autobiography (1913)
From the Archives
Letters, cartoons and proclamations about T.R.’s Thanksgivings from the Theodore Roosevelt Center.
Recommended Reading
- African Game Trails (1910)
- Through the Brazilian Wilderness (1914)
- White House Thanksgiving traditions (White House Historical Association)