Sagamore Hill's Great Untold Stories
Perhaps the most important event to take place at Sagamore Hill is one of history's best kept secrets. In the 1896 election Roosevelt was backing Speaker of the House, Thomas Bracket Reed over William McKinley. Earlier TR and Henry Cabot Lodge had helped Reed defeat McKinley for Speaker.
When it became obvious McKinley had out smarted Reed and was poised to win the nomination TR wrote Lodge that Reed's loss and all the problems he was having as President of the NYPD Commission was going to make it where he couldn’t even get elected as a delegate to the convention.
Roosevelt was aware his political career was in a death spiral. To help dig himself out he was able to get McKinley’s money man Mark Hannah to come to his senses and meet with Thomas Collier Platt rather than ignore the party’s NYC political King Maker in New York State. The push was to change the Republican platform from tariffs to the question of Gold, or Silver Currency.
That helped, but TR knew he needed more than that. He needed a guru, an inside man. He makes his move early in August 1895 when he invited McKinley’s close friends, Bellamy and Maria Longworth Nichols Storer to Oyster Bay.
He got to know them in Washington as a Civil Service Commissioner. Belamy was a congressman and became Archie’s Godfather. Maria was the aunt of Nicholas Longworth who married Alice Roosevelt. During the Panic of 1893 the Storer’s helped McKinley out of a financial jam when they gave him the money he needed to cover notes that had been called.
TR believed Maria was smarter and carried more influence. They walked from the house to the beach where TR rowed Maria around Cold Spring Harbor. He told her he wanted McKinley to appoint him Assistant Secretary of the Navy, but knew it would never happen without their help. He asked if Maria and Bellamy could help convince McKinley he was the right person for the job.
Even with Maria’s influence, it would be an uphill battle. McKinley was not a fan of Roosevelt and neither was Mark Hannah.
Early in 1896 TR heads to North Dakota to do some hunting and on the way stops by the Republican National Headquarters in Chicago where he pledges his support. No one seemed interested. He was practically being ignored.
On his way back he tries his luck again. This time McKinley’s headquarters asked if TR was available to speak to a traveling salesman’s organization in NYC. Roosevelt jumps at the chance and speaks to the issue of Gold and Silver Currency. It was a complicated issue, but during his time in the Bad Lands TR learned how to talk to America in terms everyone could understand. Instead of sounding like a University Professor TR sounded more like your next door neighbor. “If our currency isn't based on the Gold Standard of Europe nobody is going to do business with us.” Voters understood that message.
Its Roosevelt’s plain speaking delivery that makes him so effective and McKinley is beginning to take notice. More of what Roosevelt was saying was beginning to appear in McKinley’s speeches. Two weeks later Lodge and Roosevelt were sent on a speaking tour of western NY.
TR called McKinley’s opponent William Jennings Bryan a demigod, an anarchist who would destroy the country. He told audiences if Bryan won it would be worse than if the Confederacy won the Civil War.
Roosevelt was invited to Ohio to meet McKinley and pledge his committed support after having endorsed Reed and to sit down for a planning session. Bellamy Storer was at the meeting.
In mid-October Roosevelt was asked to speak to an audience of 18,000. He warned if Bryan was elected he’d destroy the republic. He repeats the same message in speeches through Illinois and Michigan. On election night McKinley captures 51% of the popular vote.
When it came to appointing Roosevelt Assistant Secretary of the Navy McKinley began calling TR Marie Storer’s Man, but he still considered him too head strong and insubordinate. When Marie told Roosevelt of McKinley’s impression of him he was convinced he wouldn’t be appointed.
What appeared to be the situation in March changed and by early April 1897 it was official. Theodore Roosevelt would be named Assistant Secretary under John Long.
If Roosevelt had never invited Bellamy and Maria Storer to Sagamore Hill history may have taken a completely different turn.
Footnote: The Fedor Encke portrait of Roosevelt in his Rough Rider Uniform that hangs in the North Room was a gift from Bellamy and Maria Storer.
