Vice President Theodore Roosevelt had a quiet, somber inaugural.
The Sad Circumstances
Vice President Theodore Roosevelt was taking a rare family vacation at a resort in New York’s Adirondack Mountains when news came that President William McKinley had been shot by an assassin at the Pan-American exposition in Buffalo on September 7, 1901. Naturally he hurried to Buffalo where he was told that the President was recovering nicely, and Roosevelt was urged to return to his family. But President McKinley was 58, portly and of a sedentary nature. The attending doctors, failing to utilize a newfangled x-ray machine readily available at the exposition, also failed to locate the bullet that had lodged in his belly. Within a few days, an infection had spread rapidly. “Recovering nicely” was quickly becoming “urgent.”
Once again Roosevelt raced to Buffalo, and advised that the President had died only hours before. The Cabinet had already assembled, along with a small group of Senators and Congressmen. It was essential for the new President to take the oath of office immediately.
The Queen is Dead, Long Live the King
Theodore Roosevelt’s near-decade in the White House coincided with the reign of Britain’s King Edward VII. His mother, the British queen for 63 years, died in January, 1901, making the 58-year-old Prince of Wales the new King. But while he became King immediately, it would be more than a year until his formal coronation and parade.
Old Queen Victoria was past eighty, and had been failing for some time. Plans had been in the works for nearly a year to prepare a magnificent coronation ceremony for her successor. England was a the height of its empire, the most powerful – and civilized – country in the world. They wanted to show off their prestige, especially following the pomp and ceremonies of the late queen’s Golden and Diamond Jubilees.
Long lists of notable invitees were prepared. After all, the new King was closely related to most of the royal families in Europe. Other countries were duly expected to send high-ranking representatives as well. All came with entourages. And egos. All required housing and feeding and appropriate entertaining. Protocol mavens labored over their precedence and status.
The plans were so complex that the actual coronation ceremony was postponed until September, 1902.
The Buffalo Inauguration
Today, even in Buffalo, few people know that a president was inaugurated in their city. And not just any president. Theodore Roosevelt was the new president, destined to be one of the most famous world leaders of his time, and perhaps of any time. His was not the sedate personality of Buffalo’s Millard Fillmore, another VP turned POTUS a half-century earlier. Nor was it like the gruff business-minded Grover Cleveland, who grew up in Buffalo and had been its mayor thirty years earlier.
No, Theodore Roosevelt was the perfect head-of-state for America’s new century.
It had been suggested that the brief ceremony take place in the home of John Milburn, president of the Pan-American Exposition, but that was quickly overruled. It would be unseemly. President and Mrs. McKinley were Milburn’s guests, and following the assassination, he was taken to his home, and lingered and died in his guest room. His body was still being prepared for the funeral services. Frail Mrs. McKinley was in seclusion there.
Ansley Wilcox, a local judge and old friend of TR, met the now-President at the train station. Only three months earlier, he had hosted Vice President TR when he came to open the Pan-American Exposition. Now he brought President TR back to his stately Victorian home, where he could freshen up, change to appropriate “borrowed” clothes, and greet his new cabinet. It was also decided that the Wilcox parlor would be an appropriate place for the private inauguration.
Taking the oath of office was a somber ceremony, with only cabinet members and a handful of other notables. Limited newspaper coverage was permitted, but photographers were expressly forbidden. Later sketches of the scene were from memory. The new POTUS offered brief remarks. There was absolutely no hoopla, and everything was over in a half hour.
Later…
After paying his respects to Mrs. Ida McKinley, TR took immediate control.
Following the funeral ceremonies the following day, TR left for Washington, to stay with his sister Anna Roosevelt Cowles, whose townhouse had been his occasional pied a terre for more than a decade. This way, the McKinley family could make their needed arrangements in private.
Later-Later… A Lost Gem of a Story!
Newspaper coverage of Roosevelt’s inaugural was quickly surpassed by the coverage of McKinley’s death and funeral, his temporary burial in Canton, Ohio, and the trial and execution of his assassin. In due time, all of that was eclipsed by the whirlwind of TR-ness.
But, a year later, after the grand spectacle of the coronation of King Edward VII hopped the pond and splattered in US headlines, comparisons were made to TR’s inauguration. An old article from a Buffalo newspaper was found – containing a doozy of a typographical error!!
The typesetter had inadvertently substituted the letter “b” for the “o” in oath, and the article read… “For sheer democratic dignity, nothing could exceed…surrounded by the cabinet and a few distinguished citizens, Mr. Roosevelt took his simple bath, as President of the United States.” Then it was lost.
The oath-bath story appeared in Vanity Fair Magazine, and later was reprinted in a collection of VF clippings circa 1960. And lost again.
But as Ansley Wilcox said in an essay he wrote shortly after the inauguration in 1901: “It takes less in the way of ceremony to make a President in this country, than it does to make a King in England or any other monarchy, but the significance of the event is no less great.”
Sources:
Corry, John A. – A Rough Ride to Albany – John Corry Publishing, 2000
Shenkman, Richard and Reiner, Kurt – One-Night Stands with American History – Quill/William Morrow, 1982
https://www.britannica.com/summary/Edward-VII
https://millercenter.org/president/roosevelt/life-before-the-presidency
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