Roosevelt Christmas At Sagamore Hill: Sleigh Rides, Hidden Tree, 'Joy'

OYSTER BAY, NY — Stories about the life of Teddy Roosevelt, the 26th U.S. President, are full of larger-than-life myths and tales. To separate fact from fiction, Patch asked an expert at Sagamore Hill, his home in Oyster Bay before and after his presidency, to find out how Roosevelt and his family celebrated Christmas a century ago.

Laura Cinturati is a museum technician at the National Historic Site who has studied the Roosevelts' lives at Sagamore Hill. One of the most well-known stories about Teddy Roosevelt — about him opposing the cutting-down of live trees for Christmas because he was a conservationist — may be apocryphal, she told Patch.

"After the presidency, there are references that the Roosevelts had a large cedar Christmas tree cut down from their own property set up in the North Room," she explained.

Another famous tale is true, however.

Roosevelt's son Archie surprised the family in 1902 by setting up a secret tree in a White House closet. The surprise tree had presents for each member of the family on it, as well as for the family pets: a dog, a kitten and a pony. The Roosevelts continued a tradition of constructing a second, hidden tree in the years after.

On snowy Christmas Eve, the Roosevelts would travel by sleigh to Christ Church in Oyster Bay. When the parishioners sang the hymn "Christmas on the Bay," Roosevelt's favorite, he mistakenly thought it was about Christmas in Oyster Bay, Cinturati said.

A lot of the early 20th century traditions sound similar to what happens in 2022 family Christmases: On Christmas morning the Roosevelt children would "pile into" the parents' bed and open stockings hung on a fireplace mantel. The kids got presents like riding boots, train sets, books, dolls or even small rifles.

The children of the staff got presents too, and the Roosevelts were known to visit neighbors and families in need in Oyster Bay with baskets.

Teddy Roosevelt always visited nearby Cove Neck School with presents for the students. Some accounts say he dressed as Santa Claus on these trips, but Cintaruti said that was doubtful.

The Library of Congress has a video that shows Roosevelt visiting Cove Neck School or Oyster Bay neighbors.

Christmas dinner had dishes like turkey, roast suckling pig, vegetables and desserts like Sagamore Hill Sand Tarts.

“Christmas was an occasion of literally delirious joy," Roosevelt wrote in his autobiography.

"I never knew anyone else have what seemed to me such attractive Christmases, and in the next generation I tried to reproduce them exactly for my own children.”