Alice Roosevelt
'I can do one of two things, I can be President of the United States or I can control Alice. I cannot do both.' - Theodore Roosevelt
'If you can't say something good about someone, sit right here by me.' - Alice Roosevelt
Roosevelt once threatened to throw his elder daughter out of a White House window. But Alice Roosevelt was a descendant of a long line of strong-willed women in his family. (One, Adrienne Cuvelier Vigne Damen, shocked her seventeenth-century contemporaries by kicking severed heads like footballs where the World Trade Centre once stood.) Alice outdistanced her ancestor; her rebellious nature had blossomed by the time her father unexpectedly became the 26th President of the United States in 1901.
Alice Lee Roosevelt was born in a house in 57th Street on February 12, 1884, named for her mother, whose maiden name was Lee. She never knew her mother. By February 14, 1884, Theodore Roosevelt had lost his wife and his mother within hours of one another. The loss of Alice was wrenching; as he wrote in his diary that day: 'The light of my life has gone out.' Roosevelt never allowed anyone to mention his first wife. (Tellingly, he cut her out of his autobiography.) Baby Alice was Baby Lee.
Consumed by grief, Roosevelt took off for the wilds of North Dakota, leaving Baby Lee with his elder sister. His letters reveal that he missed 'Mousiekins'. But he was absent for the first two years of her life. Alice did not mind; she adored living with her Auntie Bye in Madison Avenue. ('If Auntie Bye had been a man, she would have been president.')
Then Roosevelt married again, in 1886. Edith Kermit Carow was an old friend; she had even attended his first wedding. Which is not to suggest that Edith was ever a friend of the bride; if anything she was threatened by the shadow she continued to cast. And she was jealous of the beautiful first Mrs Roosevelt, as Alice would discover to her cost. It might have been better for 'Baby Lee' to have lived with her beloved Auntie Bye, but her father wanted her with him and his new wife. And Auntie Bye, most unexpectedly, got married for the first time at forty. She and her new husband went to London, staying for years. Alice would not see much of Auntie Bye until her teens, by which time she and Edith were enemies. It did not help that Alice resembled her beautiful mother. In a fit of pique, Edith told Alice that her mother had indeed been lovely to look at, but was vapid, even a fool in the bargain. Edith twisted the knife by telling her stepdaughter that her mother would have bored Roosevelt. And after Roosevelt became governor of New York, Edith proposed that Alice be sent to boarding school in New York. Roosevelt approached his daughter, who was determined to stay put:
'If you send me away I will humiliate you. I will do something that will shame you. I tell you I will.'
She meant what she said and Roosevelt knew it. He backed down. Alice, wise beyond her years, was well aware that her father harboured hopes of higher office. And she may have known that the puritanical Roosevelt father was a figure of fun to many when Commissioner of Police of New York City. (It was a classic case of a square peg pounded into a round hole: notoriously, New York City was an island of vice at the time, suiting many New Yorkers just fine.) Alice was interested in politics from an early age, thrilled when her father became President in 1901. President William McKinley was shot by an anarchist but was the victim of a common sewing needle - and one none too clean at that - as much as the bullets that tore his flesh, perhaps more so: infection quickly set in, ravaged his body, leading to pancreatic necrosis and death. The circumstances of his sudden elevation, though tragic, did not change the fact that Roosevelt was the next occupant of the White House - with Alice in tow.
She made her debut the following year, wearing a shade of azure blue that the press promptly dubbed 'Alice blue'. Alice was a celebrity now, on both sides of the Atlantic. Sudden fame agreed with her. Alice had always loved being the centre of attention, a trait she claimed to have inherited from her father. But only Alice thrived on shocking others. She quickly crossed the line between fame and notoriety by accepting rides from admirers who had automobiles, smoking in public, even dancing the hula. And Alice loved to party, attending several hundred receptions, dinner parties and balls in little over a year. Then there were the snakes: Alice kept at least one, spinach-green in colour, as a pet. She never met Marchesa Luisa Casati, but both women loved wearing snakes in lieu of jewellery. At the White House, strangers might shake hands with Alice - then notice the snake coiled around her wrist. (On at least one occasion she turned up with a boa constrictor draped around her neck.)
There was one way of getting Alice far away from the White House: send her to the Far East. At twenty-one, Alice was deemed responsible enough to lead a diplomatic delegation there. (Future President William H. Taft may have been along just for the ride.) She was soon up to her old tricks. One day on deck, Alice jumped into the swimming pool. Then she dared delegate Nicholas Longworth to dive in. She was wearing a summer skirt and blouse but may have anticipated that the wet linen would cling, possibly why the story shocked Attorney-General Robert F. Kennedy decades later. (Alice calmly reiterated that she was fully clothed at the time.)
The part of her tour she remembered most fondly was her presentation to the Empress in the Forbidden City. Empress Cixi was clearly impressed with Alice, presenting her with a Pekinese. The tour had another benefit - short term, as it would turn out - Alice had a chance to get to know Nicholas Longworth better. He soon proposed. They were married in February 1906, delighting the public. As unconventional as ever, Alice wore a blue wedding dress. And it was she rather than the groom who cut the cake with a sword. Her stepmother was thrilled: 'I want you to know I am glad to see you leave,' she hissed. 'You have never been anything but trouble.'
Perhaps predictably, Alice would be nothing but trouble to Nicholas Longworth. The marriage was doomed, and almost from the start. Alice and her groom had almost nothing in common. And the bride remained obsessed with attracting attention. Alice punished Longworth for failing to make her the centre of his world by having a string of ill-concealed affairs. Longworth did not leave her; divorce was frowned upon at the time. And he had political ambitions. So Alice amused herself by campaigning against him. (Longworth lost.) She felt justified: Longworth would not campaign for her father, eager to serve a second complete term.
Then Roosevelt lost. Alice was furious: she would no longer have access to the White House. So she made a voodoo doll of the new First Lady, Nellie Taft, studding it with pins before burning it on the White House lawn. Washington was not sorry to see Alice leave the White House. (She was quickly banned by the Taft administration and Woodrow Wilson followed suit after Alice told a dirty joke - this was in 1916 - at his expense; she retaliated by campaigning against the League of Nations.) But Alice stayed in Washington: Longworth was the Speaker of the House of Representatives for many years. She played at least one cruel prank there, glueing a tack to a seat. The Representative who sat down leapt up in a hurry. (Alice took tacitly took credit by making a point of looking away.)
She continued to have affairs and at forty-one, unexpectedly gave birth to a daughter she named Paulina. Alice joked that she should have named the baby Deborah, underlining the fact that the father was Senator William Borah. By this time, all that mattered to Alice was pleasing herself: any pain her husband and her daughter (and the long-suffering Mrs Borah) experienced was collateral damage she was in no way responsible for. Paulina outlived Longworth but would end her misery with an overdose of sleeping pills. Disturbingly, Paulina discussed her desire to end her life with Alice, whose overriding concern was the fate of her only grandchild, Joanna. (Joanna went to live with Alice, who confounded everyone she knew by lavishing the little girl with love.)
Alice harboured a sense of decency. At a time when racial prejudice was alarmingly common and when American society was more stratified than today, Alice befriended Richard Turner, her African-American chauffeur. Happily, they became close friends. Once in 1965, Turner inadvertently stopped short in front of a taxi. The driver slammed on his brakes, then got out of his taxi, snarling: "Whaddya think you're doing, you black bastard?"
Turner was too dignified to reply. His passenger was not. "He's taking me to my destination, you white son-of-a-bitch!" Alice retorted. Finally, in her ninth decade, Alice emulated her late first cousin Eleanor Roosevelt by doing the right thing.
Given her liberal views, Alice was warmly received by the Kennedys. But Robert Kennedy soon tired of her barbs. She knew her acid tongue alienated others, but Alice saw no need to change. She even bought a needlework pillow for her sofa that read: 'If you can't say something good about someone, sit right here by me.' Small wonder she and the notoriously waspish Truman Capote got on well. Alice received a highly coveted invitation to his Black-and-White Dance at the Plaza Hotel, the event of 1966. (An excluded socialite threatened suicide; her husband persuaded the writer - In Cold Blood paid for the Dance - to reconsider, possibly aware that Capote's mother had taken her life.)
Alice softened slightly at this time and found herself invited to visit the White House. She flirted with Lyndon B. Johnson, announcing she had chosen a wide-brimmed hat to stop him kissing her. Richard Nixon invited Alice (and granddaughter Joanna) to his younger daughter's White House wedding. Alice fascinated Nixon; he said there was no better conversationalist. He thought she was as charismatic as ever ("No one, no matter how famous, could ever outshine her.") In 1974, the year Nixon resigned in disgrace, Alice was as interesting as ever. She went on 60 Minutes and confessed she was a 'hedonist'. Alice was ninety at the time. She died in 1980, days after her ninety-sixth birthday. Gone but by no means forgotten.
© Katja Anderson 2020
'If you can't say something good about someone, sit right here by me.' - Alice Roosevelt
Roosevelt once threatened to throw his elder daughter out of a White House window. But Alice Roosevelt was a descendant of a long line of strong-willed women in his family. (One, Adrienne Cuvelier Vigne Damen, shocked her seventeenth-century contemporaries by kicking severed heads like footballs where the World Trade Centre once stood.) Alice outdistanced her ancestor; her rebellious nature had blossomed by the time her father unexpectedly became the 26th President of the United States in 1901.
Alice Lee Roosevelt was born in a house in 57th Street on February 12, 1884, named for her mother, whose maiden name was Lee. She never knew her mother. By February 14, 1884, Theodore Roosevelt had lost his wife and his mother within hours of one another. The loss of Alice was wrenching; as he wrote in his diary that day: 'The light of my life has gone out.' Roosevelt never allowed anyone to mention his first wife. (Tellingly, he cut her out of his autobiography.) Baby Alice was Baby Lee.
Consumed by grief, Roosevelt took off for the wilds of North Dakota, leaving Baby Lee with his elder sister. His letters reveal that he missed 'Mousiekins'. But he was absent for the first two years of her life. Alice did not mind; she adored living with her Auntie Bye in Madison Avenue. ('If Auntie Bye had been a man, she would have been president.')
Then Roosevelt married again, in 1886. Edith Kermit Carow was an old friend; she had even attended his first wedding. Which is not to suggest that Edith was ever a friend of the bride; if anything she was threatened by the shadow she continued to cast. And she was jealous of the beautiful first Mrs Roosevelt, as Alice would discover to her cost. It might have been better for 'Baby Lee' to have lived with her beloved Auntie Bye, but her father wanted her with him and his new wife. And Auntie Bye, most unexpectedly, got married for the first time at forty. She and her new husband went to London, staying for years. Alice would not see much of Auntie Bye until her teens, by which time she and Edith were enemies. It did not help that Alice resembled her beautiful mother. In a fit of pique, Edith told Alice that her mother had indeed been lovely to look at, but was vapid, even a fool in the bargain. Edith twisted the knife by telling her stepdaughter that her mother would have bored Roosevelt. And after Roosevelt became governor of New York, Edith proposed that Alice be sent to boarding school in New York. Roosevelt approached his daughter, who was determined to stay put:
'If you send me away I will humiliate you. I will do something that will shame you. I tell you I will.'
She meant what she said and Roosevelt knew it. He backed down. Alice, wise beyond her years, was well aware that her father harboured hopes of higher office. And she may have known that the puritanical Roosevelt father was a figure of fun to many when Commissioner of Police of New York City. (It was a classic case of a square peg pounded into a round hole: notoriously, New York City was an island of vice at the time, suiting many New Yorkers just fine.) Alice was interested in politics from an early age, thrilled when her father became President in 1901. President William McKinley was shot by an anarchist but was the victim of a common sewing needle - and one none too clean at that - as much as the bullets that tore his flesh, perhaps more so: infection quickly set in, ravaged his body, leading to pancreatic necrosis and death. The circumstances of his sudden elevation, though tragic, did not change the fact that Roosevelt was the next occupant of the White House - with Alice in tow.
She made her debut the following year, wearing a shade of azure blue that the press promptly dubbed 'Alice blue'. Alice was a celebrity now, on both sides of the Atlantic. Sudden fame agreed with her. Alice had always loved being the centre of attention, a trait she claimed to have inherited from her father. But only Alice thrived on shocking others. She quickly crossed the line between fame and notoriety by accepting rides from admirers who had automobiles, smoking in public, even dancing the hula. And Alice loved to party, attending several hundred receptions, dinner parties and balls in little over a year. Then there were the snakes: Alice kept at least one, spinach-green in colour, as a pet. She never met Marchesa Luisa Casati, but both women loved wearing snakes in lieu of jewellery. At the White House, strangers might shake hands with Alice - then notice the snake coiled around her wrist. (On at least one occasion she turned up with a boa constrictor draped around her neck.)
There was one way of getting Alice far away from the White House: send her to the Far East. At twenty-one, Alice was deemed responsible enough to lead a diplomatic delegation there. (Future President William H. Taft may have been along just for the ride.) She was soon up to her old tricks. One day on deck, Alice jumped into the swimming pool. Then she dared delegate Nicholas Longworth to dive in. She was wearing a summer skirt and blouse but may have anticipated that the wet linen would cling, possibly why the story shocked Attorney-General Robert F. Kennedy decades later. (Alice calmly reiterated that she was fully clothed at the time.)
The part of her tour she remembered most fondly was her presentation to the Empress in the Forbidden City. Empress Cixi was clearly impressed with Alice, presenting her with a Pekinese. The tour had another benefit - short term, as it would turn out - Alice had a chance to get to know Nicholas Longworth better. He soon proposed. They were married in February 1906, delighting the public. As unconventional as ever, Alice wore a blue wedding dress. And it was she rather than the groom who cut the cake with a sword. Her stepmother was thrilled: 'I want you to know I am glad to see you leave,' she hissed. 'You have never been anything but trouble.'
Perhaps predictably, Alice would be nothing but trouble to Nicholas Longworth. The marriage was doomed, and almost from the start. Alice and her groom had almost nothing in common. And the bride remained obsessed with attracting attention. Alice punished Longworth for failing to make her the centre of his world by having a string of ill-concealed affairs. Longworth did not leave her; divorce was frowned upon at the time. And he had political ambitions. So Alice amused herself by campaigning against him. (Longworth lost.) She felt justified: Longworth would not campaign for her father, eager to serve a second complete term.
Then Roosevelt lost. Alice was furious: she would no longer have access to the White House. So she made a voodoo doll of the new First Lady, Nellie Taft, studding it with pins before burning it on the White House lawn. Washington was not sorry to see Alice leave the White House. (She was quickly banned by the Taft administration and Woodrow Wilson followed suit after Alice told a dirty joke - this was in 1916 - at his expense; she retaliated by campaigning against the League of Nations.) But Alice stayed in Washington: Longworth was the Speaker of the House of Representatives for many years. She played at least one cruel prank there, glueing a tack to a seat. The Representative who sat down leapt up in a hurry. (Alice took tacitly took credit by making a point of looking away.)
She continued to have affairs and at forty-one, unexpectedly gave birth to a daughter she named Paulina. Alice joked that she should have named the baby Deborah, underlining the fact that the father was Senator William Borah. By this time, all that mattered to Alice was pleasing herself: any pain her husband and her daughter (and the long-suffering Mrs Borah) experienced was collateral damage she was in no way responsible for. Paulina outlived Longworth but would end her misery with an overdose of sleeping pills. Disturbingly, Paulina discussed her desire to end her life with Alice, whose overriding concern was the fate of her only grandchild, Joanna. (Joanna went to live with Alice, who confounded everyone she knew by lavishing the little girl with love.)
Alice harboured a sense of decency. At a time when racial prejudice was alarmingly common and when American society was more stratified than today, Alice befriended Richard Turner, her African-American chauffeur. Happily, they became close friends. Once in 1965, Turner inadvertently stopped short in front of a taxi. The driver slammed on his brakes, then got out of his taxi, snarling: "Whaddya think you're doing, you black bastard?"
Turner was too dignified to reply. His passenger was not. "He's taking me to my destination, you white son-of-a-bitch!" Alice retorted. Finally, in her ninth decade, Alice emulated her late first cousin Eleanor Roosevelt by doing the right thing.
Given her liberal views, Alice was warmly received by the Kennedys. But Robert Kennedy soon tired of her barbs. She knew her acid tongue alienated others, but Alice saw no need to change. She even bought a needlework pillow for her sofa that read: 'If you can't say something good about someone, sit right here by me.' Small wonder she and the notoriously waspish Truman Capote got on well. Alice received a highly coveted invitation to his Black-and-White Dance at the Plaza Hotel, the event of 1966. (An excluded socialite threatened suicide; her husband persuaded the writer - In Cold Blood paid for the Dance - to reconsider, possibly aware that Capote's mother had taken her life.)
Alice softened slightly at this time and found herself invited to visit the White House. She flirted with Lyndon B. Johnson, announcing she had chosen a wide-brimmed hat to stop him kissing her. Richard Nixon invited Alice (and granddaughter Joanna) to his younger daughter's White House wedding. Alice fascinated Nixon; he said there was no better conversationalist. He thought she was as charismatic as ever ("No one, no matter how famous, could ever outshine her.") In 1974, the year Nixon resigned in disgrace, Alice was as interesting as ever. She went on 60 Minutes and confessed she was a 'hedonist'. Alice was ninety at the time. She died in 1980, days after her ninety-sixth birthday. Gone but by no means forgotten.
© Katja Anderson 2020
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