Teddy Roosevelt is One Tough Cookie
Besides being Ike's birthday, yesterday (October 14th) was also the day that Teddy Roosevelt survived an assassination attempt. The year was 1912 and Teddy had been out of office as president for four years. He was unhappy with William Howard Taft, his hand-picked successor. At first he challenged Taft for the Republican nomination, but Taft's political machine was able to stave off that challenge. So Teddy ran as an independent candidate under the banner of the Bull-Moose Party.
While TR was campaigning in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, on October 14, 1912, a saloonkeeper named John Schrank fired a shot at him, striking the ex-president. The bullet lodged in his chest, but only after penetrating both his steel eyeglass case and passing through a 50 page single-folded copy of the speech he was carrying in his jacket. Roosevelt, as an experienced hunter and anatomist, correctly concluded that since he wasn't coughing blood, the bullet had not completely penetrated the chest wall to his lung, and so declined suggestions he go to the hospital immediately. Instead, tough old bird that he was, he delivered his scheduled speech with blood seeping into his shirt.
TR spoke for 90 minutes. His opening comments to the gathered crowd were, "Ladies and gentlemen, I don't know whether you fully understand that I have just been shot; but it takes more than that to kill a Bull Moose." Afterwards, probes and x-ray showed that the bullet had traversed three inches (76 mm) of tissue and lodged in Roosevelt's chest muscle but did not penetrate the pleura, and it would be more dangerous to attempt to remove the bullet than to leave it in place. Roosevelt carried it with him for the rest of his life.
Due to the bullet wound, Roosevelt was taken off the campaign trail in the final weeks of the race (which ended election day, November 5). Though the other two campaigners stopped their own campaigns in the week Roosevelt was in the hospital, they resumed it once he was released.
Roosevelt received 4.1 million votes (27%), compared to Taft's 3.5 million (23%). However, Woodrow Wilson received 6.3 million votes (42%), enough to garner 435 electoral votes. Roosevelt had 88 electoral votes to Taft's 8 electoral votes. Taft became the only incumbent President in history to come in third place in an attempt to be re-elected. This was the most successful campaign of any third party candidate, and the legend of Theodore Roosevelt grew.
While TR was campaigning in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, on October 14, 1912, a saloonkeeper named John Schrank fired a shot at him, striking the ex-president. The bullet lodged in his chest, but only after penetrating both his steel eyeglass case and passing through a 50 page single-folded copy of the speech he was carrying in his jacket. Roosevelt, as an experienced hunter and anatomist, correctly concluded that since he wasn't coughing blood, the bullet had not completely penetrated the chest wall to his lung, and so declined suggestions he go to the hospital immediately. Instead, tough old bird that he was, he delivered his scheduled speech with blood seeping into his shirt.
TR spoke for 90 minutes. His opening comments to the gathered crowd were, "Ladies and gentlemen, I don't know whether you fully understand that I have just been shot; but it takes more than that to kill a Bull Moose." Afterwards, probes and x-ray showed that the bullet had traversed three inches (76 mm) of tissue and lodged in Roosevelt's chest muscle but did not penetrate the pleura, and it would be more dangerous to attempt to remove the bullet than to leave it in place. Roosevelt carried it with him for the rest of his life.
Due to the bullet wound, Roosevelt was taken off the campaign trail in the final weeks of the race (which ended election day, November 5). Though the other two campaigners stopped their own campaigns in the week Roosevelt was in the hospital, they resumed it once he was released.
Roosevelt received 4.1 million votes (27%), compared to Taft's 3.5 million (23%). However, Woodrow Wilson received 6.3 million votes (42%), enough to garner 435 electoral votes. Roosevelt had 88 electoral votes to Taft's 8 electoral votes. Taft became the only incumbent President in history to come in third place in an attempt to be re-elected. This was the most successful campaign of any third party candidate, and the legend of Theodore Roosevelt grew.