I Rose Like a Rocket; The Political Education of Theodore Roosevelt

New York: Free Press, 2004. First Printing [Stated]. Hardcover. Very good/Very good. ix, [3], 448, [4] pages. Notes. Selected Bibliography and Sources. Index. Paul Grondahl is an award-winning journalist and author. Grondahl has been a staff writer at the Albany Times Union since 1984, where his assignments have taken him from the Arctic to Antarctica; from Northern Ireland to Africa; from New Orleans immediately after Hurricane Katrina and Haiti after its catastrophic earthquake in 2010; and across New York State, from Ground Zero on 9/ 11 to the Adirondack wilderness. His in-depth newspaper projects on domestic violence, death and dying, mental illness in state prisons and the problems facing sub-Saharan Africa have won a number of local, state and national journalism awards. Grondahl's writing prizes include the Society of Professional Journalists' Sigma Delta Chi Award for Feature Reporting; Scripps Howard National Journalism Award; New York Newspaper Publishers Association; two first place national feature writing prizes from The Society for Features Journalists; more than a dozen New York State Associated Press writing contest awards; and the Hearst Eagle Award, the highest recognition for a reporter in the Hearst Corp. The author of four books, Grondahl was named Albany Author of the Year in 1997 by the Albany Public Library and Notable Author of the Year by the Guilderland Public Library and East Greenbush Public Library, in 2004. He has been featured on C-SPAN's "About Books" and "Book TV." Grondahl also has been selected several times in recent years as Best Local Journalist and Best Local Author in Metroland and Times Union readers' polls. Teddy Roosevelt (1858-1919), the favorite political role model of Bill Clinton and both George Bushes, is legendary for his political acumen and for bending the world to his will. Where, however, did America's twenty-sixth president learn how to master the rough-and-tumble of politics? Not by weightlifting and boxing, or by heading out West to try cattle ranching, or even as a Rough Rider in Cuba. He was far more than simply a self-made man or a crusading outsider who reinvented politics wholesale. The story of his political education has never been fully told and is every bit as entertaining as his more famous nonpolitical exploits. Roosevelt's rise to the presidency is one of the most captivating, instructive, and inspiring of any American president. Derived from a Kirkus review: A good take on Teddy Roosevelt's coming of age as a political leader. TR lived by a chivalric code much of which was of his own making, which set him apart from other politicians of the time. One plank in his platform was not to back down before bullying, and so, Grondahl writes, when TR first entered the New York legislature he sought out the local Tammany enforcer, a notorious hector, and threatened, "I'll kick you, I'll bite you, I'll kick you in the balls. I'll do anything to you-you'd better leave me alone." He meant it, too. Most of Roosevelt's experiences in Albany, Grondahl holds, constituted a political education that would serve TR well in the White House, especially when he sought to break the power of the great financial and commercial trusts. As a legislator and governor, TR had already scrapped with the likes of Jay Gould and Tammany, but he had to unlearn some of his tactics on battling for higher office: "In the run-up to the Republican National Convention, Roosevelt reversed his take-no-prisoners approach and tried to play it safe and reserve political capital." That did not suit his nature, however, and Roosevelt reverted once in the White House to that hunter on the plains, glad to draw blood.