One thing I often talk about in my talks at Governors Island is the way Americans used to name their offspring. It comes up when we’re standing in front of the Commanding Officers House and discussing Winfield Scott Hancock. Hancock was of course named after Old Fuss and Feathers himself, Winfield Scott. Hancock’s own father was Benjamin Franklin Hancock. I wouldn’t put too fine a point on it, but naming one’s children after famous Americans was a way for people to identify with the fledgling nation in the early years of the Republic. Horror writer H.P. Lovecraft’s father was Winfield Scott Lovecraft. Then there is Benjamin Franklin Butler, John Quincy Adams Ward. There is no shortage of examples.

This was a phenomenon that lasted into the twentieth century but seems to have fizzled out around the time of the Great War. I have no way of knowing for sure, but it doesn’t seem anyone was naming their kids after John Pershing or other military figures from that conflict. I suppose by 1918 people were too jaded and the culture just moved on. There was a bit of an uptick during the Depression and WW2 when many named their kids after Franklin Delano Roosevelt.

The reason I bring this up is because of this image I stumbled upon the other day. The caption explains it all. With a little digging I learned that a William H. Signet in Pennsylvania named his twentieth child Theodore Roosevelt Signet. In appreciation the president sent Mr. Signet a letter of thanks in 1903. The image above was taken on November 10, 1923, just three weeks after Roosevelt House opened. What I find striking is the width of the age gap within the group. The Theodore Roosevelts you see here ranged from ten months to twenty-five years old.

I was at the NYPL Central Library going through old issues of the Roosevelt House Bulletin this afternoon. They are fascinating glimpses into a New York City and an America that no longer exist. There are also tidbits large and small that shed light on the Birthplace. Often I take what I learn in my digging and work it into posts for the Park Service’s social media platforms. Those linked to the TRB Facebook page will see something in the coming weeks about Gene Tunney visiting the Birthplace in 1940. Just remember that you heard about it here first.

My favorite era in the history of the house is the 1920s. For one thing Anna (Bamie) and Corinne were both still alive and leaving their mark on the historic site. It was quite a scramble to raise the funds and to build the house and museum. I am increasingly aware of just how tough the task was. I came across a touching blurb today from one of the 1919 issues of the Roosevelt House Bulletin. (As you can see in the image above, it was later renamed The Roosevelt Quarterly.) The RMA received a contribution of $1 from a private in the 31st Infantry, American Expeditionary Force. What was so incredible is that the 31st was stationed in Siberia at the time. The Siberian Intervention lasted from 1918-22 after the collapse of the Czarist Empire, the Russian surrender at Brest-Litovsk, and the onset of the Russian Civil War. The Americans and other Allies were there to protect the stores of weapons given to the czar and to prevent those weapons from getting into the hands of the participants in the internal struggle now taking place within Russia. From halfway around the world this young doughboy’s dollar made it all the way to New York City and to the headquarters of the Roosevelt Memorial Association.

The dapper James J. Walker defeated Warren S. Fisher and other candidates in the 1925 NYC mayoral election. Walker’s fashion sense is part of the iconography of Jazz Age New York.

I have been thinking more and more about the United American War Veterans since posting the bit the other day about the plaque they placed at the U.S. Custom House on Memorial Day 1921. It seems remarkable to me that a prominent group like that could just come and go so quickly. I intend to do more with this in the near future, but a cursory search reveals that the story is as fascinating as it is obscure.

The head of the the U.A.W.V. turns out to have been a New Yorker named Warren Shaw Fisher. He was a veteran of both the Spanish-American and Great Wars, and his father had fought in the American Civil War. It turns out Fisher was a bigwig in New York State Progressive politics. On 26 October 1919 he stood in for Leonard Wood at a veterans function at Carnegie Hall. The timing was not accidental, Theodore Roosevelt had died that January and his birthday was the next day. Everyone in the audience would have known that.

Just two weeks earlier Wood had spoken at Carnegie Hall himself, at a fundraiser of the Women’s Roosevelt Memorial Association. Corinne Roosevelt Robinson, Theodore’s sister and a published poet, read a poem she had written about Quentin Roosevelt’s air service buddies and the role  they played at Theodore’s funeral that January. This Carnegie Hall fundraiser served the dual function of promoting Wood’s 1920 presidential prospects. It must have been an extraordinary moment.

The 1920 campaign was where Corinne Robinson gained fame as the first woman ever to speak for a major party candidate when she spoke on Wood’s behalf. Fisher threw his influence behind the general’s presidential run and was active in the Leonard Wood League.

On the 4th of July 1921, just five weeks after the dedication of that plaque on Bowling Green, Shaw was the grand marshall in a 100,000 strong march against Prohibition. The 69th Regiment Band played behind him with a sign declaring that “The Volstead Act Must Go.” In case anyone failed to get the message, the parade included wounded vets driven in automobiles.

In 1922 Fisher supported Al Smith in his successful bid to retake the Albany governor’s mansion. Like Smith, Shaw was a Tammany Democrat. There must be a great story here because in the 1924 presidential election Shaw abandoned Smith and backed Robert La Follette. Shaw ran for New York City mayor in 1925 on the Progressive Political League ticket. The Progressives were strong in New York because of Theodore Roosevelt’s roots here, but the election went to Jimmy Walker.

Fisher died just three years later at the tender age of forty-nine. This may explain why he and the veterans group he led are all but forgotten today.

(image/Library of Congress)