On paper, Alice Roosevelt’s life reads like a typical young society woman: Debut at 17, travel, friends, parties, marriage to a wealthy and important man, and eventually, motherhood. But Alice’s life was far from typical. For starters, her travel was for official United States goodwill missions, her friends were some of the wealthiest in the world, and the parties were expensive balls where “Be Naughty” seemed to be her rule of the day. She smoked, she bet on horses, she flirted and rode around in cars with men…and America, and soon the world, LOVED her!
When it came to marriage, Alice chose Representative Nicholas Longworth from Ohio, a wealthy respected, and charming man who loved his drink and women–including ones that were not his wife. They did have a very public, Power Couple life hobbing and nobbing with influential politicians, and Alice- with her quick wit and intelligence became so important to the government- without ever holding an office- that she earned the nickname, Washington’s Other Monument.
In this episode, we continue with the story not only of the life of Alice, or Mrs. L as she came to be called, but also continue to take a good look at the most influential man in her life, her father, President Theodore Roosevelt. It’s really a two-fer!
Alice Roosevelt Longsworth died after a very long, very influential, and very unconventional life at her home in Washington, DC on February 20, 1980. She is buried with her daughter, Paulina Sturm, at Rock Creek Cemetary in Washington, D.C.
Time Travel With The History Chicks
Books!
Web!
If you find yourself near Long Island, NY, head on over to the Roosevelt summer estate, Sagamore Hill (the one that should have been named Leeholm until Alice’s mother died.) Tours are limited and by reservation, so plan ahead.
Read all about it! Alice Roosevelt at the 1904 St Louis World’s Fair! St. Louis Post-Dispatch
White House History post with a lot of lovely photos from her wedding to Nick Longworth as part of an online exhibit about White House Weddings and also Memoirs from Edith Roosevelt’s social secretary, Isabella Hagner, is also at White House History, and the Reagan Library has a series on White House kids, here’s Alice’s!
Read her “voice” in this interview from the Washington Post in 1974Wondering who the real source of a quote is?
The Quote Investigator may have hunted it down already!
High Tech!
The two podcasts that Susan mentioned were: The conversational show about Philippine history, What’s AP: Araling Panlipunan Rebooted and the scripted comedy, Edith! about Edith Wilson.
The scripted, historical drama, Crowded Hours, is an Amazon Original starring Emma Roberts as Alice! Does HBO Max still have the television series based on Alice’s life in production? We don’t know, but we are hoping really hard that it’s true!
Join us on our Field Trip to Paris in October of 2024! For information and to register, visit Like Minds Travel. We hope to see you there!
