“The trip has been a wonderful experience for me in every way. Think of chatting with the Colonel three times a day at meals,—Mr. Roosevelt personally explaining the significance of every adobe, cactus, pinyon tree, or prairie dog! When we go by a piece of desert, scorching in the white heat of sun-baked alcali, T. R. recalls an experience thirty years ago, when he lost some cattle that had sunk in quicksand in a dry river channel. He has taken us into his absolute confidence. He tells us stories and gives us opinions which if put on the telegraph would convulse the country. We are all convinced that not only is he the greatest American citizen, but also the greatest American humorist. His sense of humor is as marvelous as his physical and mental energy. To show you how thoughtful the Colonel is, ... listen to this:—two of his friends climbed aboard at Prescott early this morning when I was shaving. That made two extra for breakfast, so Cronin and I insisted upon waiting for a second table. As we munched our toast and looked out at the giant cacti swiftly flowing by our window, who should come back to the table but T. R. ‘Are you boys getting enough to eat?’ he asked, sitting down. ‘I am so sorry that this inconvenience occurred. If my visitors had not been old friends who had not breakfasted, I should never have permitted it.’ How can a fellow help admiring a fellow like that, especially when he is an ex-President and one of the most famous characters in the world today?”
October 24, near Albuquerque:
“... It was nearly 100 sitting in the afternoon sun in front of the speaking stand today. My cloth touring hat was too hot for the occasion, but without it I imagine I would have keeled over from prostration or gradually melted away under the press-stand. When the Colonel got through, his face was dripping. He delivered a corking talk. There was no heckling because he had been tipped off to answer at the beginning, the question as to what he would have done in Mexico had he been President. After he got into his proper speech, and he read every word of it, there were no interruptions except cheers of approval. My confidential opinion is, however, that he realizes that while these western crowds are for him personally, and cheer whenever he shows his familiar face, they do not understand,—they are not in down-right serious accord with, the doctrine he preaches. The Republicans are up against a hopeless situation.... The Roosevelt plan for compulsory military service, and preparedness are not practical this year because they have not wide-spread public support. The crowds come to hear Roosevelt.... The crowds in this country are too busy making money and planning how to make that money make some more, to realize the deep-rooted appeal of Theodore Roosevelt to their Americanism. Perhaps, through this hasty review of my impressions in Arizona, you dear folks at home can enter into this opportunity with me. I will have an interesting yarn to spin when I return to vote.”
October 25, leaving Denver for Chicago:
“We are swinging down from the lofty Denver plateau surrounded with white-topped mountain peaks, through the sugar-beet and cattle farms to Nebraska. We shall wake up in Chicago tomorrow morning on the last leg of our tour. Colonel Roosevelt makes two or three speeches in Chicago and then pulls out for New York. Everything was rush-rush-rush in Denver.... We came by Colorado Springs and Pike’s Peak at night but were all up, dressed and shaved when the enthusiastic Denverites descended on the Colonel with bands, bombs, bandannas, and general noise. Here was an old-fashioned, wild demonstration for the ex-President. He had not been in Denver for nearly six years. At one big meeting of 8000 women he showed them the fallacy of Mr. Wilson’s argument, ‘I have kept you out of war.’ He told them why he was for suffrage. He had them with him from the start. All of this stuff was extemporaneous and I had to write 1000 words on it. The night meeting was a near-riot. We had a stiff fight to get the Colonel out of the auditorium which is one of the largest halls in the country. They have an excellent arrangement for getting the speakers in—wide doors open like a circus and the automobile with the Colonel and ourselves was driven close to the speaker’s platform. Such a bedlam of noise I never heard. On the platform were the women speakers from the women’s special train. When they tried to speak, however, the crowd hooted them down with cries of ‘We want Teddy—Give us Teddy and Sit down,’ etc. Then as soon as he began to speak, the Wilson hecklers started shouting, ‘Hurrah for Wilson’—it was all very exciting.... ‘Let me shake hands with the greatest President since Lincoln,’ one old chap bawled, while I kept my fist under his chin as we formed a ring around the Colonel, and half-shoved and half-carried him to his automobile. The Colonel reached his hand around back of his neck and grasped the old man’s finger-tips, whereupon he subsided and fell back to tell his children that this had been the greatest moment in his life.
“There is no antagonism to the Colonel out here. Even the Wilson supporters love Roosevelt. We have to protect him against his friends, however.... There is a chap on the train now, an old friend of the Colonel who has been collecting pictures along the Mexican border. Some of the atrocities, particularly the burning of bodies and the execution of soldiers are the most gruesome sights I have ever seen. The Colonel mentions them when he ridicules the cry that ‘Wilson has kept peace in Mexico.’ He told me today that some day next week he will entertain the four of us fellows at Oyster Bay at luncheon in his home. He wants to show us the trophies room, filled with relics from his African explorations and his early western life. That will be a compliment to us as newspaper men on this trip.”
Friday, October 27, Pullman private car leaving Buffalo.
“We have just turned our watches ahead an hour, making it 10:15, and signifying that we are back in the home zone of eastern time. The trip is almost over. The rush and hustle of the trip, and the speed with which we have had to write and file our stories, make it seem a moving picture hodge-podge, now that it is over. Take yesterday, for instance,—we pulled into Chicago at 2 P. M. and were greeted by one of the wildest street demonstrations I have ever seen. The Colonel never sat down in his seat from the time he left the station until we arrived at the Congress Hotel. He was up waving his wide-brimmed black hat and bowing to the cheering mob. Every minute there was a flash, ‘some miscreant photographer,’ as T. R. calls them, had taken a bang at the Colonel. We had less than an hour to check our baggage in our rooms, wash up, arrange with the Western Union for filing stories, and get ready to accompany the Colonel to the Auditorium Theatre across the street.
“Thanks to the excellent police arrangements, we were able to walk unmolested through a human line of admirers who had been pushed into place by the mounted police. At 8 P. M. we called to interview the Colonel just before he left for the stock-yards. After the Women’s meeting Cronin and I had to run for the Western Union to get a start on our story. We taxicabbed back to the Congress Hotel, omitted dinner, and joined the Roosevelt auto procession to the stock-yards pavilion which is six miles out of Chicago. How those cars did shoot through the wide Chicago streets, preceded by a motor squad police patrol with the mufflers on the machines wide open. It seemed more like going to a fire than riding to a political meeting.
“In the mêlée of getting the Colonel into the hall, I got separated from the party and found myself confronted with six wooden-headed Chicago cops who refused to recognize the official ticket of admission, distributed to members of the Roosevelt party. I got by one of them by telling him that I had been all the way to Arizona with the Colonel. ‘Well, I’ll be damned’ he ejaculated. ‘If you’ve been in Arizona, there is no reason in h—— why you can’t get in here.’ After I got inside, however, there were more difficulties. The cops and ushers refused to let me up on the platform with the Colonel and the other correspondents. While I was fighting, pushing, and kicking around in the crowd, I heard someone shout down from above, ‘We want Mr. Lewis up here right away. Make way for Mr. Lewis.’ I looked up and saw that James R. Garfield, son of President Garfield, himself former Secretary of the Interior, had come to my rescue. Mr. Garfield had been travelling with us for two days, and with his assistance the rest was easy. I was almost carried reverently to the platform and placed on a perfectly good chair where I could see everything.