It ’s 2 a.m. on acool and rainynight in June 1895 . Two men in dark coats are loitering on Second Avenue in New York City , observing a police officer across the street . The officer is sitting on an upturned butter bathtub , departed — and snore so loudly that the two men can hear him clearly above the rain .
Finally , one of the men step off the curb , traverse the street , and rouses the officer , who tells the alien to get suffer .
Bad move . He just gave lip to Theodore Roosevelt , the headspring of the metropolis ’s four - humans police commission — and his boss — who is in disguise , cheat on the street on what he calls a “ midnight ramble . ” He wants to make certain that his officers are actually working .
He finds , however , that they are not . rendering of this same shot would take place , in thewordsof photojournalist Jacob Riis , TR ’s friend and companion that night , “ for three time of day along 1st and 2nd and 3rd avenue , from 42nd Street to Bellevue . ” Police would be standing on street niche outside bar , visit or sleep or otherwise not doing their Job . All of them would sass Roosevelt , and all would later repent it .
A local newspaperreportsthat Roosevelt cave in the overdue officers “ a raking down which they will not soon forget . ” afterward , hecrowsto his sister , Bamie , “ These midnight rambles are expectant fun . ”
He set out go on the rambles nearly every Thursday night , sometimes with Riis , sometimes with reporters . Once , he busts an on - responsibility officer as he ’s slurping oysters in a eating house . The policeman — who clear does n’t know who he ’s speaking to — tells Roosevelt to kick rocks . TR demote him the next day . It ’s just one more chapter in his quest to reform the police section .
As his friend Jacob Riis wouldsay , “ There is very little relief where Theodore Roosevelt contribute . ” From the bars of the Bowery to the halls of great power in Washington , TR made a career out of take on degeneracy — and we ’re about to find out how .
From Mental Floss and iHeartRadio , this isHistory Vs . ,a podcast about how your best-loved historical figure faced off against their sterling foes . I ’m your legion , Erin McCarthy , and today , we ’re oppose TR against profiteering politicians , perfidious trusts , and deceitful food for thought . This instalment is TR Vs . subversion .
Nineteenth - century American political sympathies were delineate by the spoils scheme . Party bosses maintained power by turn over out favour , like problem or authorities contracts , to supporters . In New York City , Tammany Hall was the big electrical distributor of spoils , but the scheme extended to Washington , too .
Theodore Roosevelthatedit . He save : “ No democracy can permanently endure when its politics are tainted and base ; and the spoils system , the practical app in political life of the degrading philosophical system that to the winner belong the spoils , produces corruption and abjection . ”
An incident take his father may have been the ground behind TR ’s feeling .
In 1877 , when TR was 19 , President Rutherford B. Hayes nominate Theodore Senior , or Thee , as Collector of Customs in New York . Thee acquire it was a wages for his philanthropic work . But Hayes actually intended Thee ’s nomination to obstruct his rival , Senator Roscoe Conkling , genus Bos of the corrupt New York State Republican political machine , who backed his own nominee .
The Senate confirmation cognitive operation dragged on and on , with Thee at the politicians ’ mercy . After more than a month of tortured wait , his nomination was rejected .
That ’s Clay Jenkinson , beginner of the Theodore Roosevelt Center at Dickinson State University in North Dakota .
in short after being rejected for the customs post , Thee die out from stomach cancer . TR was then at Harvard studying natural story , but his father ’s expiry help alter the direction of his life . He now feel that a career in public service would be the good way to honor his father ’s memory , and in 1881 , was elected as the youngest extremity of the New York State Assembly .
fit in to historian Edmund Morris , in Roosevelt ’s first 48 hours on the Committee on Cities , he premise four reform government note . Only one cash in one’s chips , but he had made an feeling — and a few enemy .
When Roosevelt decide to push a reform bill through the committee he was chairing , several corrupt penis team up up to block it . TR realized he might need to use a warm weapon than persuasive palaver . He hid a confused chair leg behind his desk , then announced he would unilaterally sanction the billhook while accusing its opponent of blackmail — which nearly caused a riot from his colleagues .
Roosevelt write later , “ The riot did not fare off ; partly , I call up , because the opportune production of the chairman - leg had a sedative effect . ”
Another time , Roosevelt ’s enemies tried to smear him by lure him into a compromising spatial relation with a woman who was n’t his wife . Roosevelt balked , then had a tec succeed her and discovered that he ’d avert a trap .
But his nascent career in Albany was marred by the tragical decease of his married woman and his mother on February 14 , 1884 . TR also feel pressure from the Mugwumps — a cabal of the Republican Party — to tolerate the popular presidential nominee , Grover Cleveland , over James G. Blaine , the controversial Republican presidential nominee . Roosevelt reluctantly stuck with Blaine .
After Cleveland ’s triumph , TR smell out his time in politics was up . He pull up stakes his infant daughter , Alice , with his sister Bamie and acquire off for his spread in the Dakotas . In the West , Roosevelt felt he could reinvent himself , free from Eastern rules . He dove into frontier life on his ranch and lived as a local , pen books , gallop across the champaign on his horse , and wangle a ruck of farm animal .
But he was still drawn to New York … and to politics . For geezerhood , he traveled back and forward . He attended political consequence and began on the Q.T. court Edith Kermit Carow , whom he would get hitched with in 1886 . That winter , austere conditions killed his kine , and he had sound through much of his heritage . His ability to make a living off of his ranches was seeming less likely by the twenty-four hour period . And so he release to politics again , although a calling there also seemed unsealed .
According to Kathleen Dalton , writer ofTheodore Roosevelt : A Strenuous Life , the West failed to fulfil TR . Shewrites , “ He recognized that he had not yet lived up to his father’s — and now his own — expectation that he would make something of himself , but he did not know what to do next . ”
Still , TR threw himself into campaigning for Benjamin Harrison in the 1888 presidential election .
The Civil Service Commission handle the regime ’s civilian employees . Immediately , Roosevelt plain that Harrison ’s hand - pick postmaster oecumenical , section - storehouse magnate John Wanamaker , was replace all of the Democratic postmasters with Republicans and squeeze money from them . Harrison largely ignored him , lead Roosevelt to fume , “ Wanamaker has been as outrageously disagreeable as he could possibly be … We have done our best to get on smoothly with him ; but he is an ill - conditioned creature . ”
Undeterred , Roosevelt launched a successful political campaign to rootle out tainted postal officials . As historiographer Leonard White writes [ PDF ] , TR “ struck brat into the nerve of contumacious postmasters and aggregator of impost . ”
After five years as commissioner , TR was itch for a fresh challenge . One revealed itself in his base city of New York : a commission of Republican functionary test to draft him as their candidate for city manager . TR ’s wife Edith argued against that programme : It would cost too much money , specially if he ended up losing . TR conceded , but immediately regretted it .
A reform - given Republican , William L. Strong , eventually won . He bid Roosevelt , who had been take the field for a job , an intriguing spear : New York City Police Commissioner , one of four Isle of Man to hold the role . TR was elected the instrument panel ’s chairwoman .
At that time , corruptness was as much a part of the police department as badges and billy . It supported a seedy underworld where prostitution , alcohol , gambling , and graft thrive . As one example , a captain named Joseph Eakins was accuse of allow brothels in his precinct to operate on while he look the other way .
On Roosevelt ’s first twenty-four hours at police headquarters , a chief told him that his efforts at reform would be useless . “ It will pause you . You will yield . You are but human , ” Chief Thomas Byrnes enunciate .
TR never take on a threat lying down .
Roosevelt enlisted Jacob Riis to show him the real face of the city after wickedness — and the photojournalist knew what to show him . pothouse where whisky flowed on Sundays . Brothels operating under law aegis . Two immigrant families engage a single room in a tenement . Children sleeping in the filth - slicked streets .
The sights deeply affected Roosevelt . A year after he became police commissioner , a deadly heat wave come across New York City . TR saw children sleeping on roofs and fire escapes to beat the heating system . Sometimes they fall off during the dark .
When the city fail to respond to the crisis , Roosevelthadhis police officersgive out complimentary iceto poor resident — grant to Edward Kohn , author ofHot Time in the Old Town , TR personally supervised the distribution of ice — and travel to their homes to ensure they were all right .
Roosevelt and the three other police force commissioner systematically remove the police memorial tablet — including Eakins and Byrnes — who had allowed graft to thrive . He appoint Peter Conlin as the unexampled chief of police force . Next , Roosevelt took on enforcement of the Bachelor of Arts in Nursing on public house sell spirits on Sundays .
The Sunday excise tax law , as it was officially call , had been around in some form since 1857 , but there were loophole allowing hotel eating place to trade inebriant to their guests . It also did n’t address individual nine , which sold drinks to their dues - yield member . That meant the law of nature largely affect workings - social class bars patronise by immigrant .
But to TR , it seemed like a win - win . Richard Zacks , author ofIsland of Vice : Theodore Roosevelt ’s Quest to Clean Up Sin - Loving New York , writesthat TR had two master reason for enforcement .
One , he wanted to demonstrate the newfound incorruptibility of his police force . Zachs write that Roosevelt “ essay to frame up it not as a crusade against liquor , but rather against blackmail and selective enforcement of the law . ”
Two , Roosevelt knew that “ saloons acted as unofficial clubhouses for Tammany Hall , ” Zacks continues . By close them on Sunday , he could strip the Democratic automobile of its favour meeting places .
TR told theNew York Evening Sun , “ I do not deal with public opinion . I administer with the jurisprudence . ”
But his actions caused enormous argument .
On Sunday , June 23 , 1895 , Roosevelt deployed more than 2000 officers to supervise about 8000 saloons across New York . saloon owner signaled their compliance by evoke their windowpane shades to reveal empty barrooms . The campaign deprive one thousand of New Yorkers of a restful beer on their only daytime off from employment , but some found a means around the Excise Law . Drinkers travel all the way to Coney Island in Brooklyn , which was a freestanding metropolis until 1898 , and outside TR ’s jurisdiction . Others tried to inscribe saloons through the side door , but many were turned aside .
The next Saturday , Mayor Strong and Roosevelt gave a printing press group discussion on the steps of City Hall . A large bunch of German - American resident — who traditionally drank beer at family gatherings on Sundays — denounced TR ’s enforcement as too broad .
It was unfair , they read , for vice - ridden saloons and wholesome family pushover to be caught in the same mesh . Moreover , German immigrants as a whole confirm Mayor Strong , and felt betrayed .
harmonize to Zacks , Otto Kempner , a leader in the German - American biotic community , outcry , “ Only bigots could enforce such law of nature . It is an mindless practice of authority . ” TR roared back : “ You multitude desire me to enforce the law of nature only a little bit , a footling teeny bit … I do not eff how to do such a thing , and I shall not begin to learn now ! ”
The dissonance look like it would do to a head in September 1895 . About 30,000 German - Americans turned out for a huge parade up Lexington Avenue to keep liberty and beer .
One of the personal digital assistant trolled Police Commissioner Roosevelt with a formal invitation to the festivities , “ more as a taunting or a trick , ” according to Zacks . But they evidently did n’t know TR very well .
For those of you who do n’t talk German , that ’s , “ Where is Roosevelt ? ”
Which translates to , “ Here I am , here I am . ”
Roosevelt also fought the city ’s rampant harlotry . Unlike his peer , he believe the male customers were as much a part of the problem as the female actor . In his autobiography , hewrote , “ public opinion and the jurisprudence should compound to run down the ‘ flagrant military personnel swine ’ who himself hunts down misfortunate or lightheaded or unprotected girls … Our duty to achieve the same moral level for the two sexes must be performed by raising the level for the man , not by lowering it for the woman . ”
As with the saloons , corruption in the law department allowed illegal brothels to remain assailable for business . Roosevelt give the sack at least one policeman for negligence in enforcing police force against prostitution , but some paper editorial impeach Roosevelt of priggish labored - handedness . TheNew York Mercurycalled the officer ’s firing “ as flagrant an routine of unfairness as was ever find at a Massachusetts witch burning ” and suppose Roosevelt was a “ gloomy - full-blooded Knickerbocker Puritan proceed to seed . ”
A venial scandal ensued when an military officer catch a unseasoned woman , who was merely lose and ask a man for directions , on suspicion of being a working girl . Newspapers protested the besmirching of an devoid lady friend ’s honor by an fanatic police force . She was acquitted of the charges , and Roosevelt suffer an embarrassing frustration . An attempt to find the moral eminent earth by raiding the metropolis ’s most elegant brothel also backlash .
Roosevelt would not be deter . If the law was on the Good Book , he would enforce it . But his black - and - blank worldview was not universally popular or practical . TR squabbled with the other commissioner despite their common motives . Citizens evaded the saloon closures and allurement police force . Some officials felt that TR ’s outsize personality got in the agency . And in 1898 , the integration of all five borough into the City of Greater New York mean that the city ’s police military commission would be replaced with a new leadership body structure . escort the end of his usefulness in New York , Roosevelt campaigned for a higher - visibility position in the McKinley administration — and he come it .
We ’ll be right back .
In 1897 , Roosevelt start to go forth as a national political figure . fresh elected president William McKinley appointed him supporter secretary of the Navy . Against the wish of his party boss , Secretary of the Navy John Davis Long , Roosevelt promote to build up the nation ’s fleet of battleship while keeping a close-fitting eye on matters in Asia and the Caribbean .
After a suspicious explosion demolish the U.S.S.Mainein Havana Harbor , Cuba , the U.S. adjudge war on Spain . TR quit his C. W. Post and formed the First U.S. Volunteer Cavalry Regiment .
He and his troops , the Rough Riders , file up Kettle Hill and help oneself win a critical conflict on San Juan Hill that chop-chop led to a U.S. victory in the Spanish - American War .
Back in New York , the Republican Party carry TR to run for governor on the strength of his state of war record . He won by a narrow-minded margin , but soon moved up in the world — partly because the Republican motorcar wanted the reform - tending Rough Rider out of their haircloth . He became McKinley ’s running Ilex paraguariensis , and on November 6 , 1900 , he was elected vice president of the United States when McKinley won a second term .
Less than a twelvemonth afterwards , McKinley was assassinated , and TR was sworn in as prexy . And if anyone thought he would ease up on his effort against corruption as president , well … that was wishful thinking .
As master executive , Roosevelt bear on his war on spoilation . He took on the trusts — mega - corporations that control multiple companies at once , which were increasingly prevalent in the Gilded Age . cartel could be used to make monopoly , which might one-sidedly prescribe cost for goods and service . Monopolies were great for business leader , who argue that they eliminated inefficiency among the companies they owned , but they were bad for consumers , who had to pay whatever terms the monopolies charged .
Congress had attempted to order trusts to keep the creation of monopolies with the Sherman Anti - Trust Act in 1890 . The legislating prohibit “ every contract , combination … or conspiracy in constraint of craft , ” as well as any seek to take shape a monopoly tounreasonablyimpede fair trade . alas , the law failed to fix term like “ trustingness , ” “ monopoly , ” and “ conspiracy , ” and the loose diction made the practice of law hard to enforce . In 1895 , the Supreme Court decided in an anti - trust casing that the suspect , a sugar party that controlled 98 percent of all U.S. sugar refining , had not violated the Sherman Act . That ruling basically ended the government ’s attempts to reign in confidence .
In 1901 , railroad magnates James J. Hill and E.H. Harriman , along with banker J.P. Morgan , formed the Northern Securities Company , merging three of the big railroads in the Upper Midwest . outright , Northern Securities became the second - large fellowship in the world , behind U.S. Steel , and had a upper-case letter broth of $ 400 million .
critic feared that Northern Securities ’s monopoly would appropriate it to dictate merchant marine prices from Chicago to Seattle — in other words , impede fair trade .
Enter President Roosevelt .
Roosevelt suggest to Congress that he was planning to challenge the Northern Securities Company when he suppose in his yearly content , “ the government should have the right to inspect and try out the working of the great corporations engaged in interstate business . ”
The following February , ignoring advice from GOP leaders , Roosevelt instructed his lawyer full general Philander Knox to sue the monopoly on the earth that it violated the Sherman Act . grant to Larry Haeg , writer ofHarriman vs. Hill : Wall Street ’s Great Railroad War , it was the only matter TR , being TR , could do : The law was on the Scripture , and he had to enforce it .
Haegwrites , “ Legally , of course , it was Roosevelt ’s duty , just as he think it his duty to enforce the Sunday booze laws when he was police commissioner . He had solemnly depose to preserve , protect , and fight the Constitution . ”
It was the first time a president had confront the biggest corporations in America , Dalton writes , and Knox ’s courtship succeeded in break up the company .
That did not go over well with J.P. Morgan , who attempted to reason with TR and Knox at a meeting at the White House . Morgan intimate casually , “ if we have done anything awry , institutionalise your world to my man and they can get it up . ” Roosevelt huff , accordingto Edmund Morris’sTheodore Rex , that that could not be done .
The Northern Securities Company sued to overturn the decision , and the appeal went all the way up to the U.S. Supreme Court .
The motor inn denote its determination on March 14 , 1904 . In a 5 - to-4 opinion , the justices sided against the Northern Securities Company . Justice John Marshall Harlan write in the majority legal opinion that “ no scheme or gimmick could more sure as shooting amount within the password of the [ Sherman ] Act … or could more effectively and sure stamp down innocent competition . ”
Roosevelt had won . He had shown that anti - trust legislation , part of his broader attack on corruption in authorities , stand firm juridical examination . From then on , TR ’s reputation as a trustingness - dude was cement , and his triumph at the Supreme Court facilitate Roosevelt ’s election campaign that year .
In November , TR was elect to his first full terminal figure as president . Having broken up the second - biggest company in the earthly concern , he set his sights on rearing subversion in the food and drug industry — the kind of corruption that threatened multitude ’s life .
According toDeborah Blum , author ofThe Poison Squad : One Chemist ’s Single - Minded cause for Food Safety at the Turn of the Twentieth Century , food for thought had to travel far and for long period of time to reach metropolis dwellers . manufacturer increasingly used preservatives to guarantee that food did n’t rot in transit . The problem was , most preservative were toxic — and unregulated . Formaldehyde was add up to milk to keep it fresh , while boracic Zen was used to preserve meat . Eating these substances in three meal a sidereal day could make people extremely ill . Not to mention that what was listed on the recording label might be totally different from what was in the can .
debased solid food and drugs were a huge public wellness problem , and there were few Union laws for protecting consumers . journalist had tried to expose the insecure conditions in the slaughterhouse and the motive for federal inspections , but their efforts were frustrate by the so - call Beef Trust . Five major meatpacking company had joined together to struggle governing oversight of their Chicago - based industry .
That ’s the 1906 novel that uncover corruption and unhealthful practices in Chicago ’s meat packing plants .
Roosevelt himself had had experience with America ’s lax nutrient Pentateuch . As a Rough Rider during the Spanish - American War , he experienced putrid kernel supply by the Army . News reports claimed that meatpackers provision the military with tons of rotten tinned boeuf preserved with boric dose to mask the stench . Many soldiers who eat it fell sick , and some died .
Rooseveltwroteto the Army ’s command general to complain , thus stirring the scandal : “ The so - called tinned roast beef that was issued to us for travel ration … and which we occasionally make even at the front , was practically worthless . Unless very athirst the man would not touch it … There was also a provision of beef … speculate to be fitted by some cognitive operation to withstand tropic heat . It at once became putrid and reek so that we had to dispose of it for fear of its create disease . I opine we threw it overboard . ”
Meanwhile , Roosevelt commissioned a secret undercover probe into meatpacking diligence praxis , which issued its determination in the damning Neill - Reynolds report .
When Roosevelt delivered the Neill - Reynolds report to Congress , he wrote [ PDF ] in an accompanying letter , “ the report shows that the stock thousand and packing houses are not keep even passably clean , and that the method acting of handling and train food Cartesian product is uncleanly and grave to health … the precondition demonstrate by even this inadequate inspection to subsist in the Chicago neckcloth yards are revolting . It is imperatively necessary in the involvement of wellness and of decency that they should be radically change . ”
Congress did pass the Meat Inspection Act , and Roosevelt signed it into law on June 30 , 1906 . It cast out the sale of adulterated or mislabeled meat products as food , and required that livestock be mow down in a healthful environment . It also mandate Union inspections of solid food brute before and after slaughter .
On the same day , Roosevelt sign another notice with a similar purpose . The Pure Food and Drug Act interdict the sale of adulterated or misbranded food for thought or drugs . In grocery stores and pharmacies , consumers would no longer detect bad meat freshened with borax , children ’s candies tinted with lead , whiskey consisting of prune juice and cheap inebriant , or yield colored with coal - tar dyestuff . They could be sure that the drug they purchased for common colds were actually the music they arrogate to be .
Two weeks after the Pure Food and Drug Act came into military unit , The New York Timesreported , “ Already the force of it are amazing . The masquerade of alcohol , opium , cocaine , and other injurious drugs as nerve tonics or remedy for stomach and lung disease is at an end … The trade in nostrums and letters patent medicines is utterly pervert . ”
Roosevelt ’s reputation as a trustbuster and enemy of degeneracy was solid before the public . He had go after more than 40 trusts . But when a national crisis demanded it , TR was willing to negociate .
In 1907 , an economic panic was brewing . People who had deposited their nest egg in America ’s banks and trust companies — a case of financial institution that competed with banks — had no insurance against loss when the company made bad investment with their money . As Dalton publish , “ inadequate regulation leave alone depositors unprotected , and as long as trust companies could mull over in stocks and make unreliable loan to customer who bought stock on tolerance , no one could secure that any worldwide downturn would not provoke an American affright and impression . ”
And that ’s what was begin to happen . Wild surmisal had led to the loser of several company , and worried customers lead off to pull their money out of the one that stay . Some feel that Roosevelt ’s anti - trust activities also made companies nervous and liable to make fewer investments .
J.P. Morgan call a meeting with New York ’s other run banker and U.S. Treasury obligations officials . They excogitate a design to land up the failing companies by pool the banker ’ funds and $ 25 million from the U.S. Treasury . It was n’t enough . Then Morgan suggested that U.S. Steel bribe the failing Tennessee Coal , Iron , and Railroad Company to fend off the prostration of its investor . Morgan was concerned , however , that Roosevelt ’s trust - bust position could get in the way of the deal .
Roosevelt and Morgan made a gentleman ’s agreement : Morgan ’s deal would stave off double-dyed collapse of the blood grocery store and hold open American chore , and Roosevelt would not prosecute U.S. Steel under anti - trust law .
U.S. Steel had other motive , though . Its executive wanted to extinguish its competition and acquire the Tennessee companionship ’s asset — fact they save from Roosevelt .
The agreement became a wedge between TR and his Republican heir in the White House , William Howard Taft . While TR had a reputation as a major confidence - dude , Taft in reality went after more trusts in his single term , and his Justice Department charge U.S. Steel of spoil the Sherman Anti - Trust Act with its acquisition of the Tennessee Coal , Iron and Railroad Company . Taft ’s armorial bearing blew up Roosevelt ’s deal with Morgan and take a swing at his unity . And if that was n’t awkward enough , Taft did n’t warn Roosevelt ahead of the news disclose on October 27 , 1911 — TR ’s 53rd birthday .
The character — and the rift between Taft and Roosevelt over control of the party ’s ideology — direct Roosevelt to challenge Taft in the 1912 presidential election . Roosevelt ran as the nominee of his own pro - labor , anti - corruption Progressive Party , seek to uphold his trajectory of reform that began 30 years earlier . With his “ New Nationalism ” platform , Roosevelt recommend a judiciary that turn better for the mass , women ’s suffrage , labor rights let in proletarian ’s recompense , a national health service , and other demands . The promises were so radical that the buttoned-down Taft and his followers broke from Roosevelt completely , along with some of Roosevelt ’s former ally .
When the vote were shake off , TR did n’t win — and neither did Taft . Roosevelt ’s third - party candidacy separate the Republican vote and handed the presidency to Democrat Woodrow Wilson .
In his 1913 autobiography , Roosevelt reflected on his bequest of taking on subversion : “ Where there is no opportunity of statistical or numerical mensuration , it is very hard to state just the degree to which condition change from one period to another . This is oddly hard to do when we share with such a topic as depravity . Personally , I am inclined to think that in public life we are on the whole a little good and not a little worse than we were 30 year ago , when I was serving in the New York general assembly . I think the experimental condition are a little good in interior , in United States Department of State , and in municipal politics . Doubtless there are points in which they are worse , and there is an tremendous amount that needs reformation . But it does seem to me as if , on the whole , things had slimly improved . ”
CREDITS
History Vs.is hosted by me , Erin McCarthy . This episode was write by Kat Long , with research by me , Kat Long , and Michael Salgarolo . Fact checking by Austin Thompson . Joe Weigand voiced TR in this installment .
The executive producers are Erin McCarthy , Julie Douglas , and Tyler Klang . The supervising manufacturer is Dylan Fagan . The show is edited by Dylan Fagan and Lowell Brillante .
Special thanks to Clay Jenkinson .
To con more about this episode , and Theodore Roosevelt , visit MentalFloss.com/HistoryVs .
account Vs.is a yield of iHeartRadio and Mental Floss .
