The Everything Theodore Roosevelt Book (42 page)

The press was only too happy to keep the argument going. Noted publications of the time such as
Harper’s Monthly, Science
, and the
New York Times
ran articles and essays in which supporters of both viewpoints exchanged insults, charges of carelessness in documenting their facts, and challenges to provide scientific evidence of their observations.

He believed that animals existed solely to satisfy human needs, especially in the name of progress, so it didn’t matter what prompted them to act. Eventually, he had enough of the debate and jumped into it, ostensibly to protect his friend John Burroughs.

TR Joins the Fray

TR had never been shy about engaging in a healthy debate, especially when it involved a topic of which he knew a thing or two. Natural history was one of them.

Ever since TR had acquired the seal’s skull and shot his first buffalo, he had retained his fascination with natural history. In fact—and identifying facts as opposed to fiction was the gist of the “Nature Fakers” controversy—it was their mutual interest in natural history that began TR’s friendship with Burroughs, which started when they explored Yellowstone Park together in 1903. It was only natural that Roosevelt would try to defend him.

The catalyst that finally drew TR into the debate was a book by writer, naturalist, and Congregational minister William Joseph Long, titled
Northern Trails
. In it, Long described how one of his subjects, a wolf named Wayeeses, killed a caribou by impaling its heart with his teeth.

As a hunter, TR knew that it was a physical impossibility for a wolf to do that. So even though he was a religious man and the author was a minister, TR took a stance. He never let religion stand in the way of a good argument, so the president wrote a letter to the publisher with a copy to Burroughs in which he pointed out that Long’s description was inane. TR’s personal involvement in the “Nature Fakers” controversy had begun.

Even a wolf can’t do the impossible. William Joseph Long described in
Northern Trails
how a wolf killed a caribou. “A terrific rush, a quick snap under the stag’s chest just behind the fore legs, where the heart lay; then the big wolf leaped aside and sat down quietly again to watch.” An exciting account—but an implausible feat according to TR.

In an October 3, 1905, letter to Burroughs, which also appeared as a dedication in his book published that same year,
Outdoor Pastimes of an American Hunter
, TR made plain his feelings about writers like Long:

From the days of Aesop … to the present time, there has been a distinct and attractive place in literature for those who write avowed fiction in which the heroes are animals with human or semi-human attributes. This fiction serves a useful purpose in many ways, even in the way of encouraging people to take the right view of outdoor life and outdoor creatures; but it is unpardonable for any observer of nature to write fiction and then publish it as truth, and he who exposes and wars against such action is entitled to respect and support
.

The book opened the floodgates. TR became a crusader against nature fiction writers such as Long, Jack London, the Canadian poet Charles G. D. Roberts, and Ernest Thompson Seton. He charged them with writing “unnatural history.”

The Writers Fight Back

In an effort to tone down the debate, or at least his part of it, TR changed direction. He said that perhaps the nature writers were not to blame for what they wrote. Instead, it was the publishers who provided them space and the school boards that used the stories who were at fault.

London labeled TR in a
Collier’s
magazine article as “homocentric” and “amateur.” Long suggested that the president had no room to talk when it came to understanding nature. He wrote, “I find after carefully reading two of his big books that every time he gets near the heart of a wild thing he invariably puts a bullet through it.”

Eventually, TR stopped blaming anybody for anything they wrote about nature and withdrew from the debate. Once he did that, some of the other people involved lost interest as well. TR returned to his presidential duties.

About the only significant outcome of the debate was TR’s contribution to the lexicon of the day; he coined the term “nature fakers.” He took the name from an article in the June 1907 issue of
Everybody’s Magazine
by journalist Edward B. Clark, which was based on his interview with the president.

Clark entitled the article “Roosevelt on the Nature Fakirs.” TR changed the spelling of fakirs in an essay he wrote, in which he charged that “nature fakers” completely “deceive many good people who are wholly ignorant of wild life.” The term caught on, and TR got the credit for it.

American Historical Association

TR was not only a student of history, but a practicing historian as well. While he was president of the United States, he pushed for the preservation of historical records, which made him an ideal candidate for the leadership of the AHA. He became the association’s twenty-seventh president in 1912. One of his primary duties as president was the same as that of his predecessors and successors: give an address at the annual meeting.

The AHA, founded in 1884, is composed of U.S. historians and professors of history. It exists to promote historical studies, the teaching of history, and the preservation of and access to historical materials. AHA publishes
The American Historical Review
five times a year, presenting scholarly articles and book reviews. Congress granted AHA a charter in 1889. TR was not always happy with the organization—or the way history was presented. He believed that historians in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century were too scientific in presenting their topics. But his membership did provide him with the “bully pulpit” to espouse his views on the importance of history and its role in the education process.

The Importance of Imagination

TR told members in a December 27, 1912, “State of the Union” address in Boston that historians had to have imagination if they were going to be storytellers and entice the general public into developing an interest in what created their world. He declared, “The imaginative power demanded for a great historian is different from that demanded for a great poet; but it is no less marked. Such imaginative power is in no sense incompatible with minute accuracy.”

As he explained, “On the contrary, very accurate, very real and vivid, presentation of the past can come only from one in whom the imaginative gift is strong.”

Should history be considered literature or a science?
TR addressed that question in his December 27, 1912, speech in Boston: “There has been much discussion as to whether history should … be treated as a branch of science rather than of literature … There is, however, a real basis for conflict in so far as science claims exclusive possession of the field.” TR was clearly on the side of history as literature.

He urged professors and historians to lighten up and become a bit more romantic in order to foster a love of history among nonprofessionals, rather than analyzing it scientifically in esoteric journals such as
The American Historical Review
, which few people other than themselves read or understood. There was a certain irony in his suggestion. TR was less than enthralled with the “nature fakers” who used that romantic approach in their natural history storytelling. Nevertheless, he averred that historians apply a bit of it in their writing.

In TR’s opinion, historians’ purposes were to be great moralists and to “thrill the souls of men with stories of strength and craft and daring.” He said that he hoped when the history of his era was written, “It will show the forces working for good in our national life outweigh [those] working for evil.” That summed up his personal philosophy about government and history. TR worked for good throughout his lifetime, in every capacity in which he served.

The National Institute of Arts and Letters

TR was a great “joiner.” If there was a prestigious club he could join, he would. If such a club invited him, e.g., the British Royal Society, all the better. His eclecticism qualified him for a variety of associations. Among them were The National Institute of Arts and Letters and the American Academy of Arts and Letters

The American Academy of Arts and Letters, created in 1898, was called the National Institute of Arts, Science and Letters. By 1900, the “Science” part was dropped, and eventually the organization morphed into the American Academy of Arts and Letters. Name changes notwithstanding, TR was one of the first fifteen members.

The NIAL held its first meeting in February 1899 in New York City. It had a maximum membership of 150. The primary qualification for membership was the completion of notable achievements in art, music, or literature. TR qualified through his accomplishments in literature. Thus, he became an original member. In 1904, he was among the first fifteen NIAL members elected to the organization’s AAAL offshoot.

According to the original organizational structure, the first 150 members of the institute were to elect thirty of their group to the academy, an elite subset. The numbers were increased in 1904 to 200 regular and fifty elite members. As the numbers grew, so did the organization’s prestige. By 1907, the numbers had risen to 250 regular and fifty elite members (where they remain today).

Eventually, TR used some of his influence to try to get the group a federal charter. That created a bit of controversy. He relished the chance to get the institute and the academy more recognition. It was a bit of a surprise that his last controversy as president would arise from such an innocuous attempt to gain recognition for a literary organization.

The “Immortals”

In January 1909, as TR was leaving office, his friend, Senator Henry Cabot Lodge of Massachusetts, an historian in his own right, introduced a bill to incorporate the National Academy of Arts and Letters and the National Institute of Arts and Letters. The list of incorporators included Lodge, TR, and what the
New York Times
called in a January 18, 1909, article, “A Slur on the Immortals,” “a galaxy of leading writers, scientists, sculptors and artists.” The newspaper did not take the organizations as seriously as they took themselves.