President Theodore (Teddy) Roosevelt

Theodore Roosevelt visited Madison seven times during his lifetime.

Roosevelt journeyed to the city twice in the 1890s to do research at the State Historical Society of Wisconsin for his four-volume work, "The Winning of the West." He dined at the Wilson Street home of Robert and Belle La Follette and corresponded with University of Wisconsin historian Frederick Jackson Turner. Roosevelt's other Madison visits included a 1903 trip while he was president and a 1912 appearance as the candidate of the Progressive Party. The 1912 appearance was part of the same campaign trip that took Roosevelt to Milwaukee, where he was shot. John N. Schrank, a saloon keeper, tried to assassinate Roosevelt just before he gave a speech.

On May 28, 1918, he hoisted the flag at the opening of the Madison Club. He also gave a speech at the Stock Pavilion on the University campus in front of 6,000 spectators. The "two-fisted, square-shouldered" speech called for a single language in the country, the language of the Declaration of Independence. "This is a nation," Roosevelt shouted, "and not a polyglot boarding-house."