logoalt Hacker News

Teddy Roosevelt and Abraham Lincoln in the same photo (2010)

141 pointsby bryanrasmussenyesterday at 9:18 AM45 commentsview on HN

Comments

GCA10yesterday at 3:36 PM

The timeline doesn't match up here. We're told that historian Stefan Lorant was doing his research in the 1950s. Then we're told that he checked with Teddy Roosevelt's wife and got her confirmation that one of the children in the window was Teddy Roosevelt.

Roosevelt was married twice, and his first wife, Alice Hathaway Lee, died in 1884, so it's not her. But his second wife, Edith Carow, died in 1948, at age 87. So unless Lorant interviewed her posthumously, via seance, it can't be her, either.

Our best hope of rescuing this anecdote is to assume that Lorant's research happened earlier (1940s?) while Edith Carow Roosevelt was still alive. But she would have been just three years old at the time of Lincoln's funeral, and while her family and the Roosevelt's family socialized together, even her quoted reminiscence is less than definitive about whether that's actually TR.

Possible? Sure. Probable? Maybe. 100% verified? No way.

From what's presented to us, this sounds like a cool legend

show 5 replies
lubujacksonyesterday at 11:03 PM

For some reason, this reminded me of spotting a very young Mick Jagger at the first televised performance of Hey Jude by the Beatles.

Also, a young Bill Clinton shaking JFK's hand. These sort of baton-passing moments are interesting to see from all sides.

show 1 reply
Rebelgeckoyesterday at 3:42 PM

Who is she referring to as "that horrible man"?

show 2 replies
m463yesterday at 8:11 PM

Along not-that-similar lines, I used to have a lincoln kennedy penny.

It came with a card full of abe lincoln vs john f kennedy coincidences.

(I wonder if I still have it somewhere?)

https://duckduckgo.com/?q=lincoln+kennedy+penny+card&iar=ima...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lincoln%E2%80%93Kennedy_coinci...

ramesh31yesterday at 4:01 PM

The past is so much closer than you think. We are only three human lifetimes away from the American Revolution. The last living children of American slaves were around into the 2010s. Back to Teddy, the last living person who could have met him was still around in the 2000s as well, meaning in your lifetime you could have talked to someone who knew someone who saw Abe Lincoln alive.

show 9 replies
xrdyesterday at 3:31 PM

When I hear the name Lincoln now, I can't help but think of the fake Letterboxd review of Melania: "the worst experience I've had at a theatre." By Abraham Lincoln.

show 2 replies
MORPHOICESyesterday at 3:08 PM

[dead]

triceratopsyesterday at 3:06 PM

Tl;dr a picture in which a historian spotted 7-year old Teddy Roosevelt watching Abraham Lincoln's funeral procession from the window of his grandfather's house in New York. Very cool story!

jej_FundAlignyesterday at 5:47 PM

OK, thats enough proof for me that we are in a simulation. LOL

anigbrowlyesterday at 7:05 PM

This image shows a close-up of the second story window (Courtesy the New York Times)

A 'close up' that is smaller and lower resolution than the main photo on the article, which is courtesy of the NY public library. NY Times isn't mentioned in the text at all. Is this entire article an LLM hallucination?

show 2 replies