President Teddy Roosevelt: Fun Facts to Share With Kids

Theodore Roosevelt during a visit to the Badlands of Dakota in 1885, after the death of his first wife. Photo by T W Ingersoll. MPI/Getty Images

As a teacher, I have enjoyed telling students about Teddy Roosevelt in my classes, as somehow there are a few specific tidbits about his life that are easy for kids to grasp, remember, and take with them as they grow and make their own life choices.

An Inspiring Fighter

Teddy was sickly as a child; his parents feared he might not make it to adulthood. He struggled tremendously with asthma and other ills, but didn’t let that get him down. Instead, with a nudge from his father, he decided—characteristic of Teddy—to take the bull by the horns. So, he trained to become an athlete, and then a soldier, and then became a war hero.

Needless to say, he turned a struggling body into a robust, fighting warrior body (though the asthma never completely left him). It took willpower and discipline.

Later in life, another tragedy struck: his mother and his wife died on the same day, in the same house, two days after his wife gave birth to their first child. This was on Valentine’s Day 1884. But, though Teddy mourned, he didn’t wallow in self-pity or stop fighting for better things. He went on to achieve greatness.

Teddy’s fighting spirit was legendary. When he was about to give a speech during a presidential campaign, someone shot him. The bullet hit Teddy’s chest, and he began to bleed. His companions tried to convince him not to proceed with the speech, but he insisted on completing what he was about to start. While bleeding, he stood, pale and shaky, and gave a speech for over an hour!

Like many of the early U.S. presidents, it seems like Theodore was divinely protected: Although the bullet entered his chest, it didn’t penetrate his heart. Why? He had a copy of his speech in his breast pocket, as well as his glasses case, and these were just thick enough to slow down the bullet and save his life. Now that’s a miracle.

What He Achieved

Not only did Teddy become president of the United States, but, as a great lover of nature, he established several national parks across the country, explored and mapped a dangerous Amazon River tributary, won a Nobel Peace Prize, and wrote over 30 books.  We have President Theodore Roosevelt to thank for establishing: 150 national forests, 51 federal bird reserves, 4 national game preserves, and 5 national parks, as well as saving the Grand Canyon from development.

The Teddy Bear

Teddy’s toughness was not without compassion, and his softer side partly accounts for how we got the name “Teddy bear.”

Teddy was an avid hunter, as was common of men of his station in those days, and on one trip, his companions caught a bear, tied it, and told Teddy to shoot it. But Teddy refused, considering this unsportsmanlike.

A cartoonist depicted this incident in a Washington Post comic in 1902. Soon the story spread, the first “teddy bear” was sold, and the stuffed toy took off.

Quotes for Kids

President Theodore Roosevelt was, in a sense, a quote machine. He said so many quotable things that it’s hard to choose only a few.

Keeping in mind content that may be helpful to kids, here are a few favorites:

• “Believe you can and you’re halfway there.”
• “The only man who never makes mistakes is the man who never does anything.”
• “It is hard to fail, but it is worse never to have tried.”
• “If you could kick the person in the pants responsible for most of your trouble, you wouldn’t sit for a month.”
• “Knowing what’s right doesn’t mean much unless you do what’s right.”
• “Courage is not having the strength to go on; it is going on when you don’t have the strength.”

And here is one last bit of inspiration from Theodore Roosevelt for our adult readers, as we navigate together through tough times in our country:

“It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat.”

Be sure to share the story of President Theodore Roosevelt with the kids in your life. As Teddy himself said, “To educate a person in the mind but not in morals is to educate a menace to society.”

Don’t forget to tell them where their teddy bears came from.