Life-changing disasters have shaped our modern presidents
Optimism despite painful personal loss is a common presidential trait
Americans often look to presidents during crises, perhaps because the electorate has tended to view them as paternal comforters since George Washington earned the moniker “Father of Our Country.” But how have personal tragedies shaped our chief executives in the modern era?
Starting with Theodore Roosevelt, one of the first 20th-century presidents, occupiers of the White House seem to have endured trials of Biblical proportions on par with Job’s calamities.
Loss of parents, spouses, siblings, children, military comrades, businesses and health have dogged many of the men who eventually moved into the Oval Office. Notably, our most esteemed presidents, ranked “great” or “near great,” have persevered through painful experiences from early childhood to young adulthood.
Franklin Roosevelt’s father was 54 at the birth of his son, suffered from heart disease, and died when FDR was 18. The only child of an adoring mother, Roosevelt gained self-confidence from her and empathy for the ill from his sickly father. Ronald Reagan’s father, an alcoholic, contributed to an unstable homelife, but the future Hollywood actor learned at an early age to play the part of an optimistic hero, and his persona carried him all the way to the White House.
