He was a sickly child. But through sheer will, muscular effort—and a lot of time in the great outdoors-he became a powerful, passionate adult. The young theodore roosevelt did not strike most people as promising enough to be- come one of the nation's greatest Presidents. His august Knickerbocker family had grown rich from generations of shrewd investments in real estate, banking, glass importing and even hardware. But in his youth—and for that matter in his adulthood—T.R. showed very little interest in adding to the family fortune. When Roosevelt was a toddler, his asthma began to overshadow everything he did.
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