by Oliver Kobs

Created on: October 26, 2009

To read the history of Theodore Roosevelt is to look into the life of a boisterous adventurer. He was a man unafraid of speaking his mind, and whose actions were as bold and daring as his speech. Roosevelt was an outspoken conservationist, a published historian, a seasoned explorer, champion boxer, and, not least of all, the 26th President of the United States.

Roosevelt was born in 1885 in the modern-day Gramercy section of New York City. As a child he was asthmatic and sickly, despite his illness, however, Roosevelt was active and, upon his father's recommendation, took to exercise and vigorous activity, including boxing lessons. In his adult life, Roosevelt commented on the influence his father had on him as a child. He said of his father, "I would have hated and dreaded beyond measure to have him know that I had been guilty of a lie, or of cruelty, or of bullying, or of uncleanness or of cowardice. Gradually I grew to have the feeling on my own account, and not merely on his."

While enrolled at Harvard College, Roosevelt began to research the US Navy's involvement in the War of 1812. His sources were based primarily on his two uncles who had served in the Confederate Navy during the Civil War and US Navy records. He used this information to pen The Naval War of 1812, what many historians would later consider the first modern American historical work. Unlike it's predecessors, the book was unbiased and focused on quantifiable facts. The book cemented Roosevelt's reputation as a respected historian. To this day The Naval War of 1812 is still in use as a standard study of the war.

During his tenure in the Civil Service Commission in 1888 and as president of the Board of New York City Police Commissioners starting in 1895, Roosevelt fought the spoils system. As Commissioner he hired over 16,000 new recruits to the New York Police Department, based on their physical and mental prowess and not by their political affiliation. Later, as Governor of New York, he signed an act that replaced the Board of Police Commissioners with a singe Police Commissioner.

In 1897, Roosevelt was appointed Assistant Secretary of the Navy, which, because of Secretary of the Navy John Long's inactivity, gave Roosevelt complete control of the US Navy. Many historians consider his position essential in the Navy's readiness during the Spanish-American War, which started a year later. Upon the war's declaration, Roosevelt resigned from his position to form the First US Volunteer

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