Well we all know that politics is awful but it made for an interesting menu on the California delegation’s train to the 1948 Democratic national convention (to nominate Harry Truman). Among the passengers, California Governor Gavin Newsom’s grandfather William Newsom, former Gov. Jerry Brown’s father Edmund G. Brown, who defeated Nixon in 1962 (and lost to Ronald Reagan in 1966), and Helen G. Douglas, who Nixon defeated for senator in 1948.
I looked at the list of delegates and saw a familiar name, James Roosevelt.
As Captain James Roosevelt USMC during WW2 he had to pull strings to GET into combat! He was a member of a Marine Raider battalion and was set to go on the Makin Island raid, but the higher-ups in the Corps didn’t want to take the risk of the president’s son being killed and pulled him from the mission.
Jimmy got on the phone to Dad, who got on the phone to General Holcomb, the Marine Commandant, and said “If it’s too dangerous for my son to go then it’s too dangerous for anyone’s son to go!”
Jimmy went!
That menu looks great! And no vegan stuff, those were REAL Democrats back then!
Another President Roosevelt son, Theodore (son of Teddy Roosevelt) was in the army, and, as a brigadier general, commanded troops in the invasion of Normandy. He died, of a heart attack, in the same month of the incvasion. His father wold have been proud of him.
BrigGen Roosevelt had had a heart attack earlier in the year and wasn’t supposed to go on the invasion, but he went anyway.
Maybe not from an enemy bullet, but he died at the head of his troops.
George Patton, who was one of the general officers attending at Teddy Jr.'s funeral, called him “The bravest man I ever knew.” High praise indeed.
Here’s some raw Signal Corps footage of General Roosevelt’s funeral, look closely and in addition to Patton Generals Omar Bradley and Courtney Hodges are there, plus others I can’t identify.
True, a self-inflicted gunshot to the head. Will Jr. had been in poor health, suffering several strokes, heart issues, and two hip replacements. I suppose he’d had enough. Poor man.