60. Theodore Roosevelt

Our friend Phoebe helps us add Theodore Roosevelt to the List of Every Damn Thing.
Phil and Jake are joined by friend and fellow Ted-head Phoebe Assenza for a deep-dive discussion and ranking of Theodore Roosevelt on the List of Every Damn Thing.

If you have something to add to the list, email it to list@everydamnthing.net (or get at us on Twitter, Instagram and Facebook).

Make sure to check out Phoebe’s Substack.

SHOW NOTES:
  • Phil claims his sister (and recent EDT guest) Alexa Green said dry-cleaning is a mutually-agreed upon lie that holds society together. Phil takes it a step further and claims that laundry detergent might not be real either. He knows for a fact that dryer sheets aren't real. Phoebe disagrees as a laundry-doer in humid and smelly New York. 
  • Phil also says that peanuts should be marketed as the most crunchy form of peanut butter; peanuts become peanut butter once you chew them so they should be sold as a less messy form of peanut butter.
  • Here’s the History Vs. Theodore Roosevelt podcast that Jake listened to for show prep.
  • The Strenuous Life is a speech in which T.R. said that “danger, hardship, and bitter toil… win the splendid triumph.” As a sickly kid, Roosevelt’s father pushed him to challenge himself physically and it became the cornerstone of Teddy’s persona — walking into danger like the Battle of San Juan Hill, choosing a rugged life in the Badlands rather than seeking comfort in New York after the death of his mother and wife on the same night. 
  • William McKinley was assassinated by an anarchist. The guy who tried to assassinate Teddy Roosevelt said McKinley visited him in a dream and told him to do it.  
  • The "Man in the Arena" speech is actually called “Citizenship in a Republic”.
  • Roosevelt was a backer of the Simplified Spelling Board, who pushed to simplify spelling.
  • Grave-robbing was a big deal before someone thought up donating your body to science.
  • The Panama Canal was completed in 1914 (the Suez Canal was completed forty-five years earlier in 1869).
  • Turns out it was actually TR’s dad (TR senior) who was one of the founders of the American Museum of Natural History, not TR. 
  • Lamarckian evolution, as we discussed, is a discredited idea of evolution where acquired characteristics are inherited. The classic example is a giraffe. Lamarck explained that a giraffe's neck is long because its ancestors stretched their necks to get leaves and passed the longer necks along to their descendants.

ALSO DISCUSSED IN THIS EPISODE:
Mount Rushmore * eugenics * William H. Taft * the Rough Riders * The Spanish-American War * the Teddy Bear * bear hunting * Boss Tweed * Boss Nass * Gangs of New York * Leonardo DiCaprio * the U.S. National Parks Service * the Philippine-American War * Jenny McCarthy * Mark Twain * imperialism * Manifest Destiny * white supremacists * white privilege * Hank Williams Jr. * Hank Williams * Shakira * Native American allotment policies * Ice Cube * Barry Bonds * Steve Jobs * Monopoly * Tommy Bahama shirts * Grocery Outlet


Below are the Top Ten and Bottom Top items on List of Every Damn Thing as of this episode (for the complete up-to-date list, go here):


TOP TEN:
  1. Dolly Parton - person
  2. interspecies animal friends - idea
  3. sex - idea
  4. Clement Street in San Francisco - location
  5. Prince - person
  6. It’s-It - food
  7. Cher - person
  8. Pee-Wee Herman - fictional character
  9. Donald Duck - fictional character
  10. Hank Williams - person


BOTTOM TEN:

186. Jenny McCarthy - person
187. Jon Voight - person
188. Hank Williams, Jr - person
189. British Royal Family - institution
190. Steven Seagal - person
191. McRib - food
192. war - idea
193. cigarettes - drug
194. QAnon - idea
195. transphobia - idea


Theme song by Jade Puget. Graphic design by Jason Mann. This episode was produced & edited by Jake MacLachlan, with audio help from Luke Janela. Show notes by Jake MacLachlan, Phil Green & Phoebe Assenza.

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Email us at list@everydamnthing.net.