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The Nutty Lives of these American Leaders Were Anything But Ordinary

Khalid Elhassan August 25, 2022 38 min

4. The Frail Child Who Grew Up to Become a Tough POTUS

Theodore “Teddy” Roosevelt (1858 – 1919), America’s 26^th president, was a sickly child whose frequent bouts of ill health made his parents fear that he would never make it to adulthood. The son of a Manhattan socialite and a businessman philanthropist father, young Teddy often suffered severe nighttime asthma attacks that the best doctors could do little about. As he described the bouts in later years, they felt as if somebody had sat on his chest and tried to smother him with pillows.

Teddy Roosevelt could kick tail and take names. Library of Congress

However, TR was a born fighter who did not despair. Instead, he discovered a way to help him keep down the asthma and simultaneously keep up his spirits: vigorous exercise. When he was eleven-years-old, Teddy traveled with his family to Europe. As they hiked in the Alps, the frail child discovered that he could keep pace with his father. It felt pretty good, and from then on, TR adopted a regimen of strenuous exercise and outdoors activities. He also took up boxing in order to learn how to fight, after he got bullied by two older boys on a camping trip.

Written by

Khalid Elhassan

A lifelong history buff, I developed a particular passion for WW2 history as a child, when I spent hours listening to my grandfather, enraptured, as he recounted his wartime experiences in the British East African Campaign and with the British 8th Army in North Africa.

I graduated with a history BA from George Mason University, then went on to get a JD from the University of Virginia School of Law. After lawyering for a decade, I moved to sunny Rio de Janeiro and a less demanding career, opening a tourism agency in Copacabana.

A big chunk of my free time is spent blogging (you can follow me on Quora https://www.quora.com/profile/Khalid-Elhassan ) or freelance writing, mostly about my favorite subject, history.