The Making of Theodore Roosevelt

By Robert Louis DeMayo

Book Overview

The real-life, coming-of-age tale of how two Maine woodsmen taught young Theodore Roosevelt to survive in the beautiful but unforgiving forests of the Northeast.

At twenty, Theodore Roosevelt is a sickly but iron-willed Harvard student when he flees to the remote forests of northern Maine, desperate to prove he can stand on his own feet. In Aroostook County, he meets two rugged woodsmen, William Sewall and Wilmot Dow, who become his guides, his friends, and, in Sewall's case, the father-like figure only six months after his own father's death. Under their watchful eyes, Roosevelt learns to paddle and portage, hunt and camp, and endure storms, cold, and backbreaking labor that his city life never prepared him for.

Over three journeys to Maine, the young Theodore toughens his body and steadies his character, discovering a love for wild places that will echo years later in the Badlands and in the conservation battles of his presidency. Between trips, he returns to Harvard, where we glimpse his life as a scholar and reformer-and his growing romance with Alice Hathaway Lee, the brilliant, warm young woman who would become his first wife and later be nearly written out of his own story.

This richly researched historical novel brings to life the overlooked years when a fragile boy became the man who would one day be president. Readers who enjoy intimate, character-driven stories of real historical figures, wild landscapes, mentorship, and first love will find themselves at Roosevelt's side in the canoe, on the trail, and in the drawing rooms of Boston as he is, piece by piece, "made."

After finishing this novel, be sure to explore Robert Louis DeMayo's other historical fiction based on remarkable real-world wanderers and adventurers.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0983345317
• ISBN13: 9780983345312
• Release Date: February 2011
• Publisher: Wayward Publishing
• Length: 342 Pages
• Weight: 1.10 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.7" x 6.0" x 9.0"
• Age Range: 10 years and up