William Howard Taft: His Wife's Stroke

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	The Health and Medical History of President
	William Howard Taft: His Wife's Stroke

wife's stroke

May 17, 1909: In the morning, Taft's young son Charlie endured a bloody adenoid operation. Later that day his wife suffered a stroke, rendering her unable to speak. "The President looked like a great stricken animal. I have never seen greater suffering or pain shown on a man's face" [9i]. Presaging the cover-up of President Woodrow Wilson's stroke, word of the event was kept from the public. Taft kept all his appointments [18b] and Mrs. Taft's sisters became White House hostesses [24c].

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There are two good descriptions of Mrs. Taft's stroke. One was written contemporaneously by the President's aide de camp, Major Archie Butt. The other was written by Taft's biographer, Henry Pringle.

Pringle's account of the event is complete. [More]
From Butt's nightly letters over the years, it's possible to construct a first-hand account of Mrs. Taft's progress through late 1911. [More]

By contrast, Mrs. Taft's description of her stroke in her 1914 autobiography, is slim on details [24c]:

In May I suffered a serious attack of illness and was practically out of society through an entire season, having for a much longer time than that to take very excellent care of myself. During this period my sisters... came from time to time to visit us and to represent me as hostess whenever it was necessary for me to be represented.
But even in my temporary retirement, as soon as I was strong enough to do anything at all, I always took a very lively interest in everything that was going on in the house, and from my apartments on the second floor directed arrangements for social activities almost as if I had been well.

Do not, however, get the impression that Mrs. Taft was merely interested in social activities while she was First Lady. She was, by all accounts, intelligent, ambitious, and the President's premier policy advisor until her stroke.

Eventually, she recovered almost completely. She was, however, left with a slight speech impediment, and her written letters lost the fluency of earlier years [18c]. Mrs. Taft died in 1943 at age 81 -- 34 years after her stroke [18d]. Mrs. Taft may have been predisposed to a stroke, as "paralysis had struck her father" [13a] and her mother [24d]. [I am suspicious that the reference to her father is a typographical error.]

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Abbott, Lawrence F. (ed.). The Letters of Archie Butt: Personal Aide to President Roosevelt. Garden City, NY: Doubleday, Page & Company, 1924. [a] p. 165
Anderson, Judith Icke. William Howard Taft: An Intimate History. New York: W. W. Norton, 1981. ISBN 0-393-01462-2 @ Amazon [a] p. ??? [b] p. 28 [c] p. 68
Arnebeck, Bob. White House Workout: William Howard Taft's good fight against the 54-inch waistline. Washington Post Magazine. September 15, 1985: 17, 19.
Barker, Charles E. With President Taft in the White House. Chicago: A. Kroch and Son, 1947. [a] pp. 50-51
Boller, Paul F. Jr. Presidential Anecdotes. New York: Oxford University Press, 1981. ISBN 0-19-502915-1 @ Amazon
Bromley, Michael L. William Howard Taft and the First Motoring Presidency. Jefferson, NC: MacFarland, 2003. ISBN 0-7864-1475-8 @ Amazon [a] p. 76
Bromley, Michael. Personal communication. Email to Dr. Zebra Sept. 15, 2005.
Bromley wrote: "Taft never drove. He always had a driver. His driver in Washington in the Twenties was named Tom Ford." It is not clear, however, when Ford was hired or if he was behind the wheel when this incident occurred.
Bumgarner, John R. The Health of the Presidents: The 41 United States Presidents Through 1993 from a Physician's Point of View. Jefferson, NC: MacFarland & Company, 1994. ISBN 0-89950-956-8 @ Amazon [a] p. 172 [b] p. 167 [c] p. 168
Devotes one chapter to each President, through Clinton. Written for the layperson, well-referenced, with areas of speculation clearly identified, Dr. Zebra depends heavily on this book. Dr. Bumgarner survived the Bataan Death March and has written an unforgettable book casting a physician's eye on that experience.
Butt, Archibald W. Taft and Roosevelt: The Intimate Letters of Archie Butt, Military Aide. Garden City, NY: Doubleday (1930). Volume 1: pages 1-432. Volume 2: pages 433-862. [a] p. 326 [b] p. 760 [c] p. 172 [d] pp. 70,75, 76 [e] p. 70 [f] p. 73 [g] p. 75 [h] p. 76 [i] p. 88 [j] pp. 86-91 [k] pp. 91-93 [l] p. 99 [m] p. 108 [n] pp. 101-102 [o] p. 123 [p] p. 129 [q] p. 173 [r] p. 175 [s] p. 209 [t] p. 179 [u] p. 193 [v] pp. 210-211 [w] p. 247 [x] p. 376 [y] p. 585 [z] p. 615 [a1] p. 620 [b1] p. 642 [c1] p. 650 [d1] pp. 651-652 [e1] p. 653 [f1] pp. 656-657 [g1] p. 787
Butt, an Army officer, was military aide first to President Theodore Roosevelt and then to President William Taft. On April 14, 1912, Butt was at sea aboard the Titanic returning from a European vacation that Taft had insisted he take. President Taft later said: "When I heard that part of the ship's company had gone down, I gave up hope for the rescue of Major Butt, unless by accident. I knew that he would certainly remain on the ship's deck until every duty had been performed and every sacrifice made that properly fell on one charged, as he would feel himself charged, with responsibility for the rescue of others." Taft was correct. Butt did not survive the sinking.
Coletta, Paolo E. The Presidency of William Howard Taft. Lawrence, KS: The University Press of Kansas, 1973. ISBN 7006-0096-5 @ Amazon [a] p. 9
Dole, RJ. Great Presidential Wit. NY: Scribner, 2001. ISBN 0-7432-0392-5 @ Amazon [a] p. 134
Hicks, F. C. William Howard Taft, Yale Professor of Law & New Haven Citizen. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1945. [a] pp. 111-112 [b] pp. 113-114
Manners, William. TR and Will: A Friendship that Split the Republican Party. New York: Harcourt, Brace & World, Inc., 1969. [a] p. 95
Marx, Rudolph. The Health of the Presidents. New York: GP Putnam's Sons, 1960. [a] p. 301 [b] p. 300
Montgomery-Massingberd, Hugh (ed). Burke's Presidential Families of the United States of American. 2nd ed. London: Burke's Peerage Limited, 1981. ISBN 0-85011-033-5 @ Amazon
Enumerates the ancestors and descendants of American presidents up through Ronald Reagan.
Pringle, Henry F. The Life and Times of William Howard Taft: A Biography. New York: Farrar & Rinehart, Inc., 1939. [a] p. 24 [b] p. 3 [c] p. 1072 [d] p. 21 [e] p. 35 [f] p. 287 [g] p. 334 [h] p. 39 [i] p. 375 [j] pp. 208-209 [k] p. 214 [l] p. 215 [m] p. 219 [n] p. 226 [o] p. 235 [p] p. 253 [q] p. 377 [r] pp. 442-444 [s] p. 543 [t] p. 857 [u] p. 884
Braisted, William C.; Bell, William Hemphill; Rixey, Presley Marion. The Life Story of Presley Marion Rixey: Surgeon General, U. S. Navy 1902-1910: Biography and Autobiography. Strasburg, VA: Shenandoah Publishing House, Inc., 1930. [a] p. 265
Rixey was the White House physician for both William McKinley and Theodore Roosevelt.
Ross, Ishbel. An American Family: The Tafts - 1678 to 1964. Cleveland, OH: World Publishing Co., 1964. [a] p. 143 [b] p. 221 [c] pp. 221-222 [d] p. 393
Sargent, Shirley. Yosemite's Famous Guests. Yosemite, CA: Flying Spur Press, 1970.
Smith, Ira R. T.; Morris, Joe Alex. "Dear Mr. President:" The Story of Fifty Years in the White House Mail Room. New York: Julian Messner, 1949. [a] pp. 66-69
Ira Smith was a peppery fellow who ran the White House mail room from 1897 to 1948. He started working during the administration of William McKinley and was the only mail room staffer until the volume of mail made it necessary to hire help during the administration of Franklin Roosevelt.
Sotos, JG. Taft and Pickwick: sleep apnea in the White House. Chest. 2003;124:1133-1142.
Sullivan, Mark. Our Times: 1900-1925 (Six volumes). New York: Charles Scribners' Sons, 1926-1940. [a] p. III-14 [b] p. III-14 quoting Arthur Brisbane [c] pp. III-15-16 quoting Frederick Palmer [d] pp. III-14-15 [e] p. III-15 [f] p. IV-408
Taft, Horace Dutton. Memories and Opinions. New York: Macmillan, 1947. [a] p. 7
Taft, Mrs. William Howard (Helen Herron Taft). Recollections of Full Years. New York: Dodd, Mead & Company, 1914. [a] p. 57 [b] pp. 57-58 [c] p. 365 [d] p. 233
Taft, William Howard. Papers of William Howard Taft. On file in the Library of Congress and selected other research libraries. [a] WHT to Charles P. Taft, August 31, 1908 [b] WHT to Helen Herron Taft, September 24, 1905 [c] WHT to Helen Herron Taft, June 15, 1907 [d] WHT to N. E. Yorke-Davies, Dec. 9, 1905 [e] WHT to Helen Herron Taft, May 7, 1908 [f] WHT to Helen Herron Taft, Sep. 23, 1908
Watson, James. As I Knew Them: Memoirs of James E. Watson. Indianapolis, IN: Bobbs-Merrill, 1936. [a] p. 133
The William Taft web page at the White House.
(1 match when checked in November 2003)

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