(Theodore Roosevelt at the Union Pacific Railroad Depot on May 2, 1903. Courtesy of Morse Department of Archives and Special Collections, Kansas State University)
In April 1903, President Theodore Roosevelt embarked on a 14,000-mile rail journey from Washington D.C. to the West Coast. The trip dubbed the whistle-stop tour, lasted from April to June 1903, a total of 9 weeks. During the tour, Roosevelt visited over 25 different states. On May 2, 1903, the train rolled into Manhattan, Kansas at the Union Pacific Railroad Depot. Roosevelt was greeted by a boisterous crowd of spectators including students and faculty from the Kansas State Agricultural College; along with residents. Roosevelt spoke for fifteen minutes to the crowd, about various topics including his appreciation for Kansas's rich agricultural history, his visit to Haskell Indian Nations University, and his appreciation for Kansas's military prowess.
Roosevelt's closing remarks addressed the student body:
"I want to say a word especially to the students. It is always a pleasure to be greeted by the student body. You go out into the great world with a peculiar weight of responsibility upon you, because it largely depends upon how you handle yourselves as to the esteem in which education will be held by the community at large. If you make the privilegs you have serve as an excuse for not working hard, not doing as good work, not getting down to the ground and working up, you will not merely discredit yourselves, but you will discredit those who have not had your advantages. If, however, instead you feel that they make it more incumbent upon you to show that you profit from the advantages you have had, then you will reflect credit not merely upon yourself, but upon those who founded and keep up institutions of learning, such as this."
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