Teddy Roosevelt - 12of22 (HistCh)

Born in New York City, Roosevelt graduated from Harvard in 1880. He emerged as the leader of reform Republicans in the New York State Assembly in the early 1880s. Thereafter, he pushed practical reforms as head of the U.S. Civil Service Commission (1889-1895), president of the New York City police commission (1895-1897), assistant secretary of the navy (1897-1898), and governor of New York (1899-1900). He vigorously advocated war against Spain in 1898 and then performed heroically in Cuba as colonel of a volunteer cavalry unit, the "Rough Riders."