new addition to True Stories - Theodore Roosevelt

Here at Lamplighter we are always trying to raise the bar. Many of our
covers and spines have been redesigned, our illustrations improved, books
re-edited with added footnotes and appendices, and additional text when it
will make the book unforgettable! We are presently working on updating True
Stories of Great Americans for Young Americans and have added two more great
stories. The first addition is about THEODORE ROOSEVELT. Here is an
except...i just love to read about those who overcame great obstacles:

THEODORE ROOSEVELT was a New York boy. He was born in that great city on
October 27, 1858, and was taught at home to be active and industrious. He
told himself, "My father, all my people, held that no one had a right to
merely cumber the earth; that the most contemptible of created beings is the
man who does nothing. I imbibed the idea that I must work hard, whether at
making money or whatever. The whole family training taught me that I must be
doing, must be working-and at decent work. I made my health what it is. I
determined to be strong and well, and did everything to make myself so. By
the time I entered Harvard College I was able to take my part in whatever
sports I liked. I wrestled and sparred and ran a great deal while in
college, and though I never came in first, I got more good out of the
exercise than those who did, because I immensely enjoyed it and never
injured myself."
When he was a little fellow, Theodore was thin, pale and delicate. No one
thought he would make much of a man-if he lived to be one. He was taught at
home and in private schools, for his parents were afraid to trust him to the
rough play of the public schools. He did not like that. He wanted to be
strong and to do what other boys did, and when he was old enough he began to
do all he could to make himself strong. "I was determined to make a man of
myself," he said.
There was not much he did not try. He learned to swim, he learned to row, he
learned to ride. He climbed, he jumped, he ran, he tramped over the hills.
If any one asked him to ride, he said he would rather walk. If asked to take
a sail, he said he would rather row. That is the way the delicate child grew
to be a hardy boy and a man with muscles like steel. He showed what nearly
any weak boy might do, if he chose to take the trouble.