While researching different kinds of pets, I came across the Presidential Pet Museum website. I couldn’t stop laughing when I read the museum’s blog about Alice Roosevelt and her pet garter snake. Alice, the oldest child of President Theodore Roosevelt, liked to carry her pet garter snake in her purse and pull it out at unexpected times to startle people. She named her snake Emily Spinach. Why? Because the snake was green like spinach and thin like her Aunt Emily.

Evidently, Alice was not the only one of Roosevelt’s children who liked snakes. Her younger brother Quentin bought four snakes at a pet shop in Washington, D.C. Instead of waiting to share them with his father when he wasn’t busy, he busted into a cabinet meeting. He sat the four snakes on his father’s desk and the cabinet members ran for cover. President Roosevelt was not amused. After the snakes were recovered they were returned to the pet shop.

Roosevelt’s children had many pets. So, many they almost had a zoo. They also had funny names.

 

* Jonathan Edwards – a small bear
* Bill -a lizard
* Eli Yale -a blue macaw
* Baron Spreckle – a hen
* Josiah – a badger
* Rollo – a Saint Bernard
* Peter – a rabbit
* Admiral Dewey,  Fighting Bob Evans, and Father O’Grady – guinea pigs.
* Sailor Boy – a Chesapeake Bay dog
* Tom Quartz – a cat
* Skip – a black-and-tan Rat Terrier

 

 

For more fun reading about White House Pets, check out Presidential Pet Museum website.

(Photographs from the Library of Congress)

 

Tags: Alice Roosevelt, Jr., Presidential Pet Museum., Quentin Roosevelt, Theordore Roosevelt