T. R.

THEODORE ROOSEVELT -- Henry F. Pringle--Harcourt, Brace & Co. ($5)./-

This robust biography would have pleased its robust subject. It is written to the Roosevelt formula of history: "The exact truth . . . our disasters and shortcomings as well as our triumphs." Without too finicky mental analysis Biographer Pringle has painted the bouncing, bubbling, sometimes bumptious career of "Teddy'' (he loathed that nickname)-- the sickly child who messed around with dead frogs; the dudish State legislator who "rose like a rocket"; the Civil Service Commissioner who warred with Postmaster General John Wanamaker on the spoils system; the New York City Police Commissioner who brought the town down about his ears by shutting off Sunday beer; the Assistant Secretary of the Navy who prearranged Dewey's Manila Bay victory; the New York Governor who rode into office on the laurels of San Juan Hill; the Vice President who presided over the Senate only four days, before stepping into the White House; the President who rattled the sword, yet kept the peace, who flayed "malefactors of great wealth," yet took their campaign contributions for reelection. Biographer Pringle's result is a very real Great American.

New Material.To the familiar outline Mr. Pringle has added much new material of his own. Seventy-five thousand Roosevelt letters (up to 1909) were first opened to him in the Library of Congress. The Roosevelt Memorial Association made available a mass of new facts, largely pertaining to pre-presidential days. Nicholas Murray Butler and Elihu Root released their Roosevelt correspondence. Ralph Pulitzer turned over evidence on Panama which the New York World assembled for its defense when President Roosevelt ordered U. S. Attorney for New York Henry Lewis Stimson (now Secretary of State) to prosecute for criminal libel. From Dr. William H. Wilmer Biographer Pringle learned that the President went blind in his left eye in 1908 and "not more than a half dozen people knew it." Mrs. Robert Bacon helped fill in the blank spots on the first Roosevelt marriage. Here and there are footnoted a few "confidential sources" but none of large historical importance.

Alice Lee. Unmentioned in his own autobiography is Roosevelt's first marriage. As a junior at Harvard he first met pretty, prim Alice Lee of Chestnut Hill, Mass. His courtship like everything else he did was impetuous. He made the poor girl sit in the gymnasium balcony at Cambridge while he, stripped to the waist fought hard but vainly to win the college lightweight boxing championship. Fits of despair sent him moping to the woods whence he was retrieved by worried relatives. Theodore and Alice were married in Brookline four months after his graduation (Oct. 27, 1880). They traveled abroad. He got into politics, went to Albany. On Feb. 12, 1884 was born their first and only child who was someday to become Mrs. Nicholas Longworth. Writes Biographer Pringle: ''Roosevelt came in. ... He found his wife barely able to recognize him, and all that night he sat at the head of the bed and held her in his arms. Just before 3 o'clock in the morning his mother, who had developed typhoid fever, died and Theodore, standing by her bed, echoed the words of his brother: 'There is a curse on this house.' Dawn dragged into the next day. At 2 o'clock on Feb. 14, her body weakened by Bright's disease. Alice died. . . Two hearses moved side by side from the home on 57th Street. . . . A door was closed on the three years during which they lived together, a door that was never opened. . . . Honors came to Roosevelt; age came also. Only Alice Lee remains young and does not fade. She is forever fair, like the figure on the Grecian urn.

"I Took Panama." Most disputed point in any Roosevelt chronicle : Did the President personally incite the revolution of 1903 whereby Panama seceded from Colombia and opened the way for the construction of a U. S. canal? After a re-examination of all available evidence Biographer Pringle concludes that he did not directly plot the uprising but that he was "extremely well informed" as to the conspirators' plan. The Panama Republic was cradled in Room No. 1162 of the old Waldorf Astoria Hotel. Bent on selling the French franchise to the U. S., Philippe Bunau-Varilla and William Nelson Cromwell buzzed often and loudly about the White House. President Roosevelt, primed, recognized the new order with ''indecent and unwise haste." When the Indianapolis News, backed by the New York World suggested that some of the $40,000,000 to be paid to French stockholders had gone elsewhere Roosevelt, white with rage, started his absurd libel suit under an act "to protect the harbor defenses . . . used by the U. S. from malicious injury." Pride in the canal later caused Roosevelt to declare: "I took Panama and let Congress debate." The virulent hatred of Roosevelt for Woodrow Wilson grew out of the fact that the Democratic President, to right a wrong, agreed to a $25,000,000 indemnity to Colombia.

War. Roosevelt had a lust for war. To him most wars were just. Only "flubdubs and mollycoddles" opposed them. He worried himself half sick lest he miss "the fun" in Cuba and when he returned he clamored loudly for a Medal of Honor. Most thoughtful citizens were amazed that his foreign policy from 1901 to 1909 did not embroil the U. S. in hostilities. A thorough jingo, he nevertheless won the Nobel Peace Prize for his Russo-Japanese war settlement (1905).

Liar? Was Theodore Roosevelt a liar? Biographer Pringle admits that he handled the truth roughly but doubts if the President wilfully indulged in falsehoods. A form of self-hypnosis was responsible for his lapses, a kind of fooling-himself-to-believe-things-not-so. He said he was boxing champion at Harvard because he had wished so intensely for that honor. He dodged taxes between New York and Oyster Bay because he was always more or less strapped for money. He tried to bluster out the protests against the Booker T. Washington White House dinner by saying that the Negro leader chanced to be around at lunch time whereas in fact the President had formally invited him for the evening meal. His declaration that all he knew about the Panama revolt was what he read in the papers came close to being pure mendacity. Biographer Pringle's only thesis is that Roosevelt was always an adolescent and, like most overgrown boys, indulged in loud exaggerations, in public indiscretions.

Author. Henry Fowles Pringle, 34, was born in New York City, graduated by Cornell in 1919. Slender, dark, thoughtful, sucking a thin-stemmed pipe, he reported for New York papers (Sun, Globe, World), steeped himself in New York politics, contributed to magazines. In 1929 for a year he was acting managing editor of Outlook, is still an associate editor. His other books: Alfred E. Smith : A Critical Study (1927), Big Frogs (1928), Industrial Explorers (1928). A relentless researcher, he has fleshed out the earlier Roosevelt admirably but his penchant for politics has somewhat blurred the man in the White House and after. There are few scenes and little of the colorful personality that made T. R. so dear to the public. Through Biographer Pringle you hear Roosevelt more often than you see him.

/- Published Nov. 5.

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