On October 14, 1912, just before delivering a campaign speech in Milwaukee, an attempt was made on Roosevelt’s life. Far more, perhaps, than his accomplishments as a Rough Rider, a big-game hunter, a former president, or the builder of the Panama Canal, the incident illuminated the Roosevelt legend. With a bullet lodged in his chest, the indomitable candidate began his speech:
Friends, I shall ask you to be as quiet as possible. I don’t know whether you fully understand that I have just been shot; but it takes more than that to kill a bull moose… The bullet is in me now, so that I cannot make a very long speech, but I will try my best…
I have altogether too [sic] important things to think of to feel any concern over my own death… I am telling you the literal truth when I say that my concern is for many other things. It is not in the least for my own life. I want you to understand that I am ahead of the game, anyway. No man has had a happier life than I have led; a happier life in every way. I have been able to do certain things that I greatly wished to do, and I am interested in doing other things.
Roosevelt continued the address until he had finished most of what he had come to say. It seemed that he was, indeed, unstoppable. His wounds were not serious: newspapers printed pictures of the tattered manuscript of his speech, which had slowed down the bullet, and his doctors marveled at his massive chest and superb physical condition, which also helped mitigate the damage.
Source:
Hunt, John Gabriel. “Introduction.” The Essential Theodore Roosevelt. Gramercy Books, 1994. xvi-xvii. Print.
Further Reading:
Posting an extra submission today because you guys have been so damn nice.