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The Theodore Roosevelt Collection @
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The Pigskin Library at Harvard By John Gable
On Monday, September 22, 2003, a reception was held
at the Theodore Roosevelt Gallery in the Pusey Library at Harvard to mark the
donation, by the family of the late Sarah Alden Derby Gannett, of Theodore
Roosevelt's famous "Pigskin Library" to the Theodore Roosevelt Collection at
Harvard. On hand for the occasion were former Vermont State Senator Robert T.
Gannett, his three children, Alden Gannett Taylor, Robert T. Gannett, Jr. with
his daughter Katherine, and William B. Gannett and his wife Anna , as well as
many members of the Theodore Roosevelt Association (TRA), including President
Norman Parsons and Executive Director John A. Gable. The host for the
reception was Wallace Finley Dailey, Curator of the TR Collection. Also
present was Tweed Roosevelt, Honorary Curator of the TR Collection.
The
"Pigskin Library" was the collection of books
that Theodore Roosevelt took with him, or had sent out to him, on his African
safari, 1909-1910, for his personal reading. The name derived from the fact
that most of the books were bound or rebound in pigskin. TR wrote: "They were
for use, not ornament. I almost always had some volume with me, either in my
saddle-bag or in the cartridge- bag.... Often my reading would be done while
resting under a tree at noon, perhaps beside the carcass of a beast I had
killed, or else while waiting for camp to be pitched; and in either case it
might be impossible to get water for washing. In consequence the books were
stained with blood, sweat, gun oil, dust, and ashes; ordinary bindings either
vanished or became loathsome, whereas pigskin merely grew to look as a
well-used saddle bag looks."
The "library" was a gift to TR from his sister
Corinne Roosevelt Robinson, and was carried in a light and shiny aluminum
case. The books and the case were given by TR, on his return from Africa and
Europe, to his daughter Ethel Roosevelt Derby, who left them to her daughter
Sarah Alden Derby (Mrs. Robert T.) Gannett.
When TR wrote of the Pigskin Library and published a
list of the books, there was much public interest, in part because President
C. W. Eliot of Harvard, with whom TR was frequently at odds, had just released
his list of the (in Eliot's opinion) best books, and inevitably the two lists
were compared. TR said no list could be definitive, and that his list merely
showed the books he personally wanted to read at that point in his life. TR's
list of about 60 books included novels by Mark Twain, Sir Walter Scott, James
Fennimore Cooper, Thackeray, and Dickens; the collected poetry of Poe,
Browning, Emerson, Longfellow, Tennyson, and Shelley; Dante's Inferno and
Bunyon's Pilgrim's Progress;
The Federalist Papers and the Bible with
Apocrypha; Alice in Wonderland and short stories by Bret Harte; the
works of Shakespeare, Milton, and Lord Macaulay; as well as many others.
What is known today as the
Theodore Roosevelt
Collection at Harvard began as a collection assembled at Theodore Roosevelt
Birthplace by what is now the Roosevelt Memorial Association, now called the
Theodore Roosevelt Association. The books and manuscripts, mounted
photographs, bound magazine articles, and other materials in time outgrew the
space at TR Birthplace. The research collection was donated to Harvard, TR's
alma mater, in 1943, and now consists of thousands of books and articles; over
10,000 photographs, over 5,000 cartoons, and many manuscripts, letters, and
papers. Parts of the collection are housed in the Houghton, Widener, and Pusey
libraries. The TR collection is maintained by Curator Wallace Dailey.
The Pigskin Library is currently on display in the TR
Gallery in the Pusey Library at Harvard. Senator Gannett has two degrees from
Harvard, his son Bob graduated from Harvard, and his son Bill is a graduate of
Harvard Law.
To consider the Pigskin Library is not an exercise in
trivial pursuit, or merely antiquarian or bibliographic interest. Rather it is
to see some of the sources or streams that flowed into Theodore Roosevelt's
mind, as well as to note some of the books that a well-educated and cultivated
man of that era would read. Most of these title were old favorites of TR's. He
liked to reread books. Those familiar with Roosevelt's writings and his
speeches will recognize some sources listed in the Pigskin Library, such as
Bunyon's Pilgrim's Progress, which is where TR found his famous man
with the muck rake, the muckrakers. Some titles, such as the five books by
George Borrow (Mrs. Roosevelt adored Borrow), will be completely unfamiliar
even to a well-read person in the twenty-first century. All the titles reveal
something about TR and about the intellectual history of his period.
The Houghton Library is the principal rare-book and manuscript library of the Harvard College Library. Opened in 1942, Houghton is an international resource of exceptional depth and diversity that supports research and instruction throughout Harvard and the global academic community. The richness of Houghton's collections offers scholars direct access to a wealth of primary source material managed by an expert staff and augmented by exhibitions, lectures, seminars, publications, and courses. |
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