Sports and the American Presidency / edited by Adam Burns and Rivers Gambrell.

Format:

Book

Contributor:

Burns, Adam D., editor.

Gambrell, Rivers, editor.

Series:

New perspectives on the American presidency.

New Perspectives on the American Presidency Series

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Sports and state--United States--History--20th century.

Sports and state.

Sports and state--United States--History--21st century.

Presidents--Sports--United States--History--20th century.

Presidents.

Presidents--Sports--United States--History--21st century.

United States.

Genre:

History.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (xii, 324 pages) : digital, PDF file(s).

Edition:

First edition.

Place of Publication:

Edinburgh : Edinburgh University Press Ltd, [2023]

Language Note:

In English.

Summary:

Donald Trump's love of golf adds him to a long line of presidents who have a close association with sports. Indeed, golf might just be the leading presidential pastime, ever since William Howard Taft was photographed strutting the links against the advice of his predecessor Theodore Roosevelt. And it was Roosevelt, more than any president, who set the standard for linking the nation's top job to its favourite physical pastimes. Starting with Roosevelt's significant role in linking the presidency with fandom, advocacy of, and active participation in sports, this volume traces how occupants of the White House continued to develop these connections in various guises across the following century. Though historians have certainly not ignored such associations, the variety of case studies represented here provides a wider and more multidisciplinary selection of standpoints from which to assess the interactions between sports and the presidency than ever before.

Contents:

Frontmatter

Contents

Contributors

Introduction: The Sporting Presidency

Part One. Presidents and Their Sports

1 Theodore Roosevelt: Father of a Sporting Nation

2 Profile in Vigor: John F. Kennedy and the Quest for Athletic Excellence

3 “My Second Vocation”: How Richard Nixon Talked Football

4 “He’d Like to be Savior of the National Pastime”: Bill Clinton and the 1994–1995 Baseball Strike

Part Two. Sports and Their Presidents

5 Fit to Govern? The Presidency, Running, and Perceptions of Strength

6 The Presidential Golf Paradox

7 From Wilson to Dubya: The Curious Case of Presidents and Rugby

8 The Sport of Presidents? Horse Racing, Politics, and Perception

9 Emissaries of Toughness: How Coaches Teamed with U.S. Presidents to Politicize College Football during the Cold War

Part Three. Athletes and the Presidency

10 Brown Derby Bambino: Babe Ruth’s Celebrity Endorsement and the 1928 Presidential Campaign

11 Jackie Robinson and His Presidents: Political Endorsements and Civil Rights Advocacy

12 Sport, Merit, and Respectability Politics in the Election of Barack Obama

13 Donald Trump versus ‘Woke’ Athletes: Presidential Sport in the Age of Twitter

Afterword: The State of Presidential Sport

Index

Notes:

Title from publisher's bibliographic system (viewed on 20 Oct 2023).

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Description based on print version record.

ISBN:

1-3995-0797-4

1-3995-0796-6

OCLC:

1368054616