The

The Theodore Roosevelt is often described by historians as America's first modern president.

And by that, they mean that he represented a clear demarcation between the quaint notions of the

presidency as designed by the founders and the more complex presidency that we see today in which the

president is involved in more aspects of American life and is now the leader of a major global power, in many ways,

the global power. And that's the notion of the presidency that continues today that we see

every day. Our guest today, Dr. Michael Patrick Cullinane, will help us understand Roosevelt's role

in that shift in building the modern presidency.

He's the Loman Walton Chair of Theodore Roosevelt Studies at Dickinson State University.

And he's also the public historian for the Theodore Roosevelt Association.

He's also involved in the building of the Theodore Roosevelt Presidential Library, which is due to open in

26, which is very exciting. I love presidential libraries. I'm very excited to have our guests

so he could tell us about that whole process. So, Professor, thank you for being on our show.

Thanks for having me. So just looking at your resume, you are one of the nation's top authorities on Theodore Roosevelt.

So how did your journey, your personal journey with TR start?

Well, that's interesting because it started out not as a love affair, but quite differently.

So the first book that I wrote, which was my PhD dissertation,

was about the anti-imperialist movement at the end of the 19th century, which was a movement

basically aligned against American foreign policy and particularly the expansion and colonization

of places like the Philippines, Guam, and Puerto Rico. The anti-imperialist movement's greatest enemy in many ways was Theodore Roosevelt,

who had a policy that was inherited in part from William McKinley,

but was imperial in nature in the sense that he believed in American internationalism.

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