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The Theodore Roosevelt Association, (TRA) is an historical and cultural organization based in Oyster Bay, New York, open to the general public. The organization's purpose is to honor the life and works of Theodore Roosevelt (1858-1919) and to educate the public on the 26th US President. The organization was founded in 1919 by friends and supporters of the late US 26th president originally as the Permanent Memorial National Committee. Soon renamed the Roosevelt Memorial Association, (RMA), it was chartered by an Act of Congress in 1920. In parallel with the RMA was an organization for women, The Women's Theodore Roosevelt Association that had been founded in 1919 by an act of the New York State Assembly. Both organizations merged in 1953 under the current name. Membership fees are modest.
History
The association was formally chartered by Congress "to perpetuate the memory of Theodore Roosevelt for the benefit of the people of the United States of America and the world...." Led in the years 1919-1957 by Secretary and Director Hermann Hagedorn (1882-1964), the Association engaged in a wide spectrum of programs and activities to preserve TR's memory. Dr. John Allen Gable served as executive director from 1974 until his sudden death in early 2005. Thereafter, for 16 months, writer and private investor Edward Renehan, who had long volunteered with the organization as a trustee and member of the executive committee, served 16 months as interim CEO while the organization sought a permanent replacement for Dr. Gable. Renehan was followed by Dr. Cathal Nolan, who lasted less than a year. The current president of the TRA is James Bruns, former president and ceo of the Atlanta History Center.
Preserving Rooseveltian Sites
The Association established four public sites: the reconstructed Theodore Roosevelt Birthplace National Historic Site, New York City, which it dedicated in 1923 and donated to the National Park Service in 1963; Theodore Roosevelt Memorial Park, Oyster Bay, Long Island, New York, which it dedicated in 1928 and gave to the people of Oyster Bay; Theodore Roosevelt Island in the Potomac in Washington, D.C., given to the federal government in 1932; and Sagamore Hill, TR's Oyster Bay home, which opened to the public in 1953 and, together with nearby Old Orchard, home to Theodore Roosevelt Jr., was donated to the National Park Service in 1963 (at the same time as the NYC Birthplace). The TRA currently owns Theodore Roosevelt's simple cabin "Pine Knot" near Charlottesville, VA, which is managed by a local board.
Theodore Roosevelt Collection
The TRA's ancestor organization, the Roosevelt Memorial Association (RMA), collected manuscripts, diaries, correspondence and other items relating to Roosevelt's personal and professional life. In 1923, the RMA opened a research library in New York City, and continued to build its archive. During 1943, the organization presented that entire collection of materials to Harvard University, Roosevelt's alma mater. Today the Theodore Roosevelt Collection is housed in Harvard's Houghton and Widener Libraries. The collection continues to be a major resource for the study of the life and times of the 26th president of the United States. (Note: The only larger Theodore Roosevelt Collection is that at the Library of Congress (LOC), which includes TR's Presidential Papers, donated personally by TR to the LOC.)
Theodore Roosevelt Film Collection
The compilation of the film collection was originally embarked upon by the RMA in January 1919. Later, during 1924, the RMA formally established the Roosevelt Motion Picture Library housed in the president's reconstructed NYC birthplace. During 1962, the TRA donated the Roosevelt Motion Picture Library to the Library of Congress.
Publications
The Association's Committee on Publications was established in 1920, with Mark Sullivan, former editor of Collier's, R. J. Cuddihy, publisher of Literary Digest, E. A. Van Valkenburg, publisher of the Philadelphia North American, and Arthur W. Page, editor of World's Work, as members. Roosevelt in the Bad Lands by Hermann Hagedorn, and Roosevelt in the Kansas City Star: TR's World War I Editorials, edited by Ralph Stout, were published by the Association in 1921. The Americanism of Theodore Roosevelt: Excerpts from Roosevelt's Writings, edited by Hagedorn, came out in 1923. In 1923-1926, the Association sponsored the Charles Scribner's Sons Memorial (24 volumes) and National (20 volumes) editions of the Works of Theodore Roosevelt, edited by Hagedorn.
1953 Name Change and Merger with the Women's Association
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In 1953, the RMA changed its title to the current name, the Theodore Roosevelt Association. and the modern organization was born. On January 6, 1955, the Women's Theodore Roosevelt Memorial Association officially merged with the TRA.
Annual Dinner/Meetings
Annual meetings of the Theodore Roosevelt Association - which normally take place in October - have been held in Boston, New York, Norfolk, Washington DC, Portland OR, Atlanta and elsewhere. These are generally small affairs attracting between one- and two-hundred die-hard members whom some have affectionately dubbed "Tedheads" and seen as the Rooseveltian equivalent of "Trekkies." The annual dinner frequently includes the awarding of the Theodore Roosevelt Distinguished Service Medal (DSM). The upcoming October 2007 annual meeting/dinner in Boston will feature historian/biographer Doris Kearns Goodwin as keynote speaker. No DSM winner has been announced.
Political Orientation of Executive Board
Although the TRA, itself, is officially non-partisan, some critics maintain that the political orientation of the TRA's executive board has demonstrated a move to the right side of the political spectum in recent years. These critics speak of a board dominated by conservatives some disquietude by some of the more liberal-leaning members in the same body, the latter wishing that the TRA would do more to celebrate TR's legacy as a Progressive and Conservationist. The TRA, however, has continued to to keep its focus on squarely on the life and legacy of Theodore Roosevelt and seeks to let TR's life serve as the role model for politicians from all political leanings and an inspiration to people all across the political spectrum well aware that Theodore Roosevelt was praised in the books of virtually all US presidential candidates for 2008. The TRA leadership is also aware that while George Bush is rated by democrats in 2007 polling as the sixth worst president and the republicans rank him sixth best, Theodore Roosevelt was ranked both democrats and republicans fifth. The TRA leadership continues to hold Roosevelt up as an example for national leadership in the political arena as well as the many other areas in whichhe contributed to the American national life.
During the 2006 annual meeting, the TRA welcomed Barbara Comstock to its Board of Trustees. Comstock is a conservative Republican stalwart who served as chief investigator for Representative Dan Burton during the period of the Whitewater investigations. Comstock subsquently worked as director of public affairs in John Ashcroft's Justice Department, and for a time led opposition research for the Republican National Committee. She is currently on the staff of the lobbying firm Black Rome. Another new trustee as of 2006 is Robert Charles, who worked in both the Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush White Houses, served as counsel to US House Speaker Dennis Hastert, and was President George W. Bush’s Assistant Secretary of State for International Narcotics and Law Enforcement. Other trustees include the Hon. Lee Yeakel, a Federal Judge appointed by President George W. Bush. That being said, incoming trustees in 2007 as well as the TRA's new director, Jim Bruns have no association with the Bush administration and are seen as more moderate politically.
Activities in modern times
In recent years, the organization's endeavors have been largely limited to the conduct of Theodore Roosevelt Police Awards (given in New York, Dallas, Boston, and other cities to police officers who have overcome handicaps), and the Theodore Roosevelt Teddy Bear program, which each year gives Teddy Bears to hospitalized children in New York City and Nashville during the December Holiday season. The TRA also publishes a quarterly journal, conducts occasional historical and educational conferences, and sponsors public speaking contests for high school students in New York.
2006-2007 Activities
In 2006 a new chapter was started in Washington State. WATRA, as it is known, has grown steadily since that time. WATRA will be hosting the Centenniel Celebration of the Arrival of TR's Great White Fleet in Seattle for May 23, 2008. Early in 2007, the TRA began to push recruiting, appointing a Michelle Bryant, who was heavily involved in activities of the US Navy's USS Theodore Roosevelt, as the wife of one of its former commanding officer, of Seattle, WA as the chair of the membership committee. In the summer of 2007, TRA members set up a information table at the Dickinson State University Theodore Roosevelt Symposium where they answered questions, handed out information packets and took membership applications from students at a new lower rate. Flyers on the 2007 TRA Annual Meeting in Boston, MA were also handed out. The Director of the school's Theodore Roosevelt Honors Leadership Program, Dr. Jon L. Brundvig, Ph.D. and several other faculty members including TR Scholar-in-Residence, Clay Jenkinson, indicated interest in starting a new TRA chapter at the University. Also a Bismarck, North Dakota chapter was discussed. Organizational materials are being prepared for them.
Current Theodore Roosevelt Museums and Sites
As noted above, Theodore Roosevelt's home, Sagamore Hill, and the adjacent Old Orchard (home of Theodore Roosevelt Jr.) were both given to the National Park Service by the TRA in the early 1960s, along with the Theodore Roosevelt Birthplace in New York City. All three museums remain open to visitors. Old Orchard was recently gutted on its ground floor and redone into a state-of-the-art museum featuring even more artifacts, as well as multimedia presentations documenting the life and career of TR. Not only does the National Park Service administer Sagamore Hill and Old Orchard in Oyster Bay, as well as the Theodore Roosevelt Birthplace in NYC, but also the aforementioned Theodore Roosevelt Island, an 80 acre tract in the Potomac at Washington, DC, which incorporates an imposing national memorial to Theodore Roosevelt dedicated in 1967. There is also the enormous (more than 70,000 acres (280 km²)) Theodore Roosevelt National Park in North Dakota which has a museum dedicated to TR's experiences as a rancher in the Badlands in 1884-1887. Theodore Roosevelt's face is enshrined on Mount Rushmore beside those of Lincoln, Jefferson and Washington. Additionally, hundreds of wildlife sanctuaries, dams, roads and college halls across the country bear his name.
Proposed Presidential Library/Museum
Press announcements in March 2007 concerning the appointment of James Bruns as president of the TRA noted a plan to build a "a world-class museum ...dedicated to the 26th president." In an interview with the Oyster Bay Enterprise Pilot, Bruns described the project as a challenge to build "a permanent home for and create a fitting place of national reflection in honoring the legacy of Theodore Roosevelt." An article published July 23, 2007 in Newsday indicated that the TRA intends to build its project in either Oyster Bay, Cambridge (Massachusetts), or Washington, D.C. Critics have wondered what the TRA will place in such a TR Museum, since the organization gave its collection of manuscripts and books to Harvard in 1943, and the organization's collections of objects related to the life of TR went in 1963 with the gift of Sagamore Hill, Old Orchard, and the Theodore Roosevelt Birthplace to the National Park Service. Defenders of the project point point out, among other things, to the millions of dollars of donor contributions that will fund modern digital information retrieval technology that will allow the new museum to digitize all Rooseveltian papers. Those digital facsimiles and word-for-word text technologies will make TR's 8 million plus words available to researchers and scholars worldwide as were the Thomas Jefferson papers when the University of Virginia digitized its collection of his papers. Thus, the actual physical location of Rooseveltian papers and artifacts will be irrelevant to researchers and scholars who would never have had access to them. In fact, these same technologies will preserve the Rooseveltian papers and physical artifacts from on-going deterioration as the result of human contact and interface. These same defenders also point out that neither Harvard, the National Park Service nor the Library of Congress have any such plans in place to digitize TR's papers and that the new library will provide precisely the resources needed for this important work of dissemination. Additionally, the new facility will be able utilize technologies like those found at the Abraham Lincoln Museum and Presidential Library to tell the TR story as it has never been told before also drawing millions of visitors to an exciting, educational and inspirational experience. Critics point out that while digitization is a worthy ambition, it obviates the need for a brick and mortar research library.
Membership
The TRA’s membership numbers under 2000. (For backup on membership figure see: Theodore Roosevelt Association Financial Statements as of June 30, 2006, Together with Auditor's Report prepared by Callaghan Nawrocki LLP. Copies available from the office of the Theodore Roosevelt Association pursuant to New York State Law.) The interests of the membership are as varied as were Theodore Roosevelt's own interests. Members include hunters and outdoor enthusiasts, supporters of the Navy, Rough Rider fans, political buffs and collectors, and TR impersonators. Some members join simply because they are serious collectors of "Teddy" bears. Even a few of TR's numerous descendants are actively involved, including great-grandsons Tweed Roosevelt and Mark Ames, both of whom serve on the TRA's Executive Committee.
Rights and Privileges of Members
Membership in the Association includes a subscription to the quarterly TRA Journal, and invitations to Association functions. Members also receive free admission to Sagamore Hill (Oyster Bay, NY) and the Theodore Roosevelt Birthplace in Manhattan, upon presentation of their membership cards.
Contacts
The Association can be reached by writing:
Theodore Roosevelt Association P.O. Box 719 Oyster Bay, NY 11771-0719
Telephone (516)921-6319 FAX (516) 921-6481
General e-mail: mailto:info@theodoreroosevelt.org President Jim Bruns: mailto:jbruns@theodoreroosevelt.org
Notes
- [http://hnn.us/readcomment.php?id=54209 Press notice of the death of Dr. John Gable
- [http://www.newsday.com/news/local/longisland/ny-litheo0322,0,3483935.story?coll=ny-top-headlines Newsday article on James Bruns taking over the leadership of the TRA
- [http://hcl.harvard.edu/libraries/houghton/collections/roosevelt.html Roosevelt Collection at Harvard University
- [http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/trhtml/trhome.html Library of Congress Roosevelt Collection
- [http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/collections/troosevelt_film/trffilm.html Library of Congress on the Roosevelt Picture Library
- [http://www.newsday.com/news/local/longisland/ny-litheo0322,0,3483935.story?coll=ny-top-headlines Newsday Article on new TRA facility
- [http://www.newsday.com/news/local/longisland/ny-litheo0723,0,4335908.story?coll=ny-linews-headlines Newsday Article on TRA facility location in Oyster Bay
See Also
External links
- http://www.theodoreroosevelt.org Theodore Roosevelt Association Official Site
- http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/collections/troosevelt_film/ Library of Congress - Theodore Roosevelt on Film
- http://www.publichistory.org/reviews/View_Review.asp?DBID=100 Review of the Theodore Roosevelt Association Web Site by Rich Hephner of the Public History Resource Center