AIAC PREMIERES ‘THE MAN WHO DARED AND WON,’ A MUSICAL TRIBUTE TO THEODORE ROOSEVELT

AIAC Chair L. M. Levie issued the following statement:

"One hundred and twenty-five years ago, Theodore Roosevelt became the youngest American president when William McKinley fell to an assassin's bullet in Buffalo. He was forty-two years old. He had been a sickly child and a grieving widower; he had found renewal on a Badlands ranch and led the Rough Riders at San Juan. Now the nation turned to him, and he answered not with caution, but with the conviction that had carried him that far: that life is not to be spectated, but lived; not endured, but dared.

Theodore Roosevelt asked the nation to honor not the critic, but the one in the arena - the one who strives, who errs, who comes short again and again, and who, at the worst, fails while daring greatly. He lived that creed at San Juan, in the White House, in the uncharted jungles of the Amazon, and on a Milwaukee street, where he spoke for ninety minutes with a bullet lodged in his chest. His was not a gospel of comfort, but of courage; not of ease, but of duty.

Among the most cherished historic artifacts of The Explorers Club is Theodore Roosevelt's application for membership, dated March 26, 1915. In it, he listed his expeditions, the books he authored, and his various positions in government service: noting as a final afterthought, 'President of the United States.' It tells us how he measured a life: not by the offices he held, but by the frontiers he crossed.

His example speaks across borders and generations. The forests and canyons he set aside remain a gift to all who walk among them. The Square Deal he championed rested on the conviction that a strong society is built by people who work hard and deal fairly. The peace he brokered at Portsmouth showed what patient statesmanship can achieve between nations. And his life reminds us that history is written not by those who watch from the stands, but by those who choose, always, to act.

Let it be ours, then, to prove worthy of that example: to meet adversity not with retreat but with resolve; to cherish the land and the legacy he left in our keeping; and to pass on to those who follow the same summons he heard and answered - to enter the arena, and to dare."

About Theodore Roosevelt

Few American presidents are claimed so readily across the political spectrum as Theodore Roosevelt. Those who prize self-reliance, national strength, and the strenuous life find in him a champion; so do those who prize conservation, fair dealing, and the public good. He was a Republican president who later ran on the Progressive ticket, a reformer who believed in enterprise, and a man of action who wrote more than thirty books. That breadth is precisely why his legacy has belonged to no single party or era, but to the whole American story.

Born in New York City on October 27, 1858, Roosevelt was a sickly child afflicted with severe asthma, who built his strength through boxing, rowing, and hiking. On February 14, 1884, his wife Alice and his mother Martha died in the same house on the same day. Grief-stricken, he went west to the Dakota Badlands, where he ranched for several years. "I never would have been President if it had not been for my experiences in North Dakota," he later said.

In 1898 he resigned as Assistant Secretary of the Navy to help raise the 1st U.S. Volunteer Cavalry, the "Rough Riders." Popular memory recalls a charge up San Juan Hill; in fact, Roosevelt led his men up neighboring Kettle Hill before joining the assault on the San Juan Heights. The legend made him a national hero, and he went on to become Governor of New York and Vice President. On September 14, 1901, following the assassination of President William McKinley, he became, at 42, the youngest president in the nation's history.

As president, Roosevelt pursued a "Square Deal" for working Americans, challenged powerful trusts, and signed the Pure Food and Drug Act and the Meat Inspection Act. He protected roughly 230 million acres of public land, establishing national forests, bird reservations, national parks, and national monuments, including the Grand Canyon. He launched construction of the Panama Canal and sent the Great White Fleet around the world. For mediating the Treaty of Portsmouth, which ended the Russo-Japanese War, he became the first American awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, in 1906.

In a 1910 address in Paris, he declared that "it is not the critic who counts" but "the man who is actually in the arena." On October 14, 1912, while campaigning for the Progressive "Bull Moose" Party, he was shot in Milwaukee; the bullet was slowed by his folded speech and steel eyeglass case, and he spoke for roughly 90 minutes before accepting medical care. His youngest son, Quentin, was killed in aerial combat over France in July 1918. Roosevelt died in his sleep at Sagamore Hill on January 6, 1919.

Today his likeness stands on Mount Rushmore, and the lands he protected remain open to every American. His greatness lies in this: he asked as much of himself as he did of his country, and he called each generation to meet hardship with courage and to leave the nation stronger than it found it.

For further information, please see:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theodore_Roosevelt

https://www.nps.gov/thro

About the Theodore Roosevelt Association

The Theodore Roosevelt Association (TRA) is a historical and cultural organization dedicated to honoring the life and work of Theodore Roosevelt. It was founded in 1919, the year of Roosevelt's death, by his friends and supporters, and was chartered by the U.S. Congress in 1920 as the Roosevelt Memorial Association. In 1956 it merged with the Women's Theodore Roosevelt Association and took its present name. The TRA is headquartered in Oyster Bay, New York.

The TRA donated Theodore Roosevelt Island in Washington, D.C., to the federal government in 1932, and in 1963 gave Sagamore Hill, Roosevelt's home in Oyster Bay, and the Theodore Roosevelt Birthplace in New York City to the National Park Service, together with an endowment for their care. Today it carries Roosevelt's legacy forward through its quarterly journal, the Theodore Roosevelt Police Awards, public speaking contests for high school students, programs for young people, and an annual meeting held near Roosevelt's October 27 birthday.

For further information, please see:

https://www.theodoreroosevelt.org

About the Theodore Roosevelt Presidential Library

The Theodore Roosevelt Presidential Library opened on July 4, 2026, the nation's 250th birthday, in Medora, North Dakota, at the edge of the Badlands where Roosevelt ranched in the 1880s and near Theodore Roosevelt National Park. The 96,000-square-foot facility stands on a 93-acre site acquired by the Theodore Roosevelt Presidential Library Foundation from the U.S. Forest Service, and it is open year-round.

Through immersive, interactive exhibits for visitors of all ages, the Library presents Roosevelt's life and ideals of citizenship, leadership, conservation, and the strenuous life, in the landscape he said made him president. In October 2026, it hosted the Theodore Roosevelt Association's 107th Annual Meeting.

For further information, please see:

https://www.trlibrary.com

About American Industrial Acquisition Corporation

American Industrial Acquisition Corporation (AIAC) is a diversified industrial group with manufacturing and distribution sites in 24 countries in North America, Europe, Africa, Asia, and Australia-New Zealand. AIAC has acquired and grown non-core subsidiaries and divisions of Boeing, Siemens, Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman, Raytheon, Johnson Controls, Merck, Pfizer, Astellas, Visteon, Carlyle, Ahlstrom, Tolko, Groupe Suez, Groupe Rexel, and many other leading multinational corporations.

AIAC companies serve companies and governmental entities worldwide in all major sectors, including aviation, space, defense, automotive, truck, rail, marine, petrochemical, solar, nuclear, food, confectionary, beverage, civil engineering and infrastructure, commercial construction, mining, dredging, disaster relief, education, medical devices, and pharmaceuticals. AIAC companies are also exclusive, authorized distributors of leading branded industrial and consumer products and serve as critical suppliers for the construction of major airports, schools, hospitals, performing arts and sports centers, offices, and hotels throughout Southeast Asia, Australia, and New Zealand. AIAC is a leading manufacturer of building, street, and highway signage in Europe, signage and illumination structures in North America, and a distributor of electrical products throughout France.

Of note, AIAC purchased Boeing Canada in 2005 and has produced over 10,000 unique components for every Boeing jet plane ever since, reliably serving Boeing from manufacturing facilities in North America. A leader in ultra-high precision jet engine component manufacturing, AIAC companies produce 2,200 fan blades for each jet engine produced by GE, Pratt & Whitney, Rolls Royce, and Honeywell.

AIAC companies actively support exploration into outer space, manufacturing critical components for launching and propelling spacecraft and satellites. AIAC customers in this sector include NASA, the European Space Agency, SpaceX, Blue Origin, and Boeing. AIAC companies also lead in the design and manufacture of undersea umbilical cables for worldwide oceanographic research.

AIAC companies produce the critical automotive wire and cable for Tesla, GM, Ford, Chrysler-Fiat, Toyota, and Nissan. In connection with its kraft paper manufacturing interests in Canada and the US, AIAC controls and sustainably manages 22 million acres of Manitoba, Canada forestland, an area equivalent in size to the nation of Hungary. AIAC affiliate Metallwarenfabrik Gemmingen GmbH, located in Germany, designs, manufactures, and distributes high performance, emergency portable power generators utilized in global conflict zones and during natural disasters.

For further information, please see: www.aiac.com.

About AIAC Philanthropies

AIAC and the AIAC Foundation support a wide range of nonprofit, nonsectarian, bipartisan organizations which promote international conflict resolution, disaster relief, economic development, environmental sustainability, exploration, and the performing arts. The exploration-focused nonprofit organizations they actively support include The Explorers Club, the National Geographic Society, the Royal Geographical Society, the Royal Canadian Geographical Society, Mission Blue, the Jane Goodall Institute, the American Museum of Natural History and the Hayden Planetarium, the Royal Observatory Greenwich, the Victoria & Albert Museum, the National Air and Space Museum, the National Space Society, and the United States Space Foundation.

AIAC and its affiliates Bradford Space, Canadian Kraft Paper Industries, SuperAlloy Manufacturing Solutions, and Champlain Cable are Partners of The Explorers Club and of Climate Week, and Sponsors of Oceans Week.

AIAC Chairman L. M. Levie is a Member of the Board of Trustees of The Explorers Club, its Poet Laureate, and a Member of its Annual Dinner Committee. L. M. Levie also serves as Trustee of the Theodore Roosevelt Association, and a Fellow of the Royal Geographical Society, Royal Society of Arts, Manufactures and Commerce, Zoological Society of London, and the Asia Society.

For further information, see: www.aiac.com | aiac.com/our-values

About The Explorers Club

The Explorers Club is an American-based, international, multidisciplinary professional society with the mission of promoting and supporting scientific exploration and field study on land, sea, and in outer space. The club was founded in New York City in 1904 and has served as a meeting point for explorers and scientists worldwide. Members of the club have been the first to explore the North Pole, the South Pole, Mount Everest, and the Mariana Trench, and to walk on the Moon. The club's notable current members and honorees include Buzz Aldrin, Jeff Bezos, Elon Musk, Prince Albert II of Monaco, Princess Reema Bandar Al-Saud of Saudi Arabia, Grand Duke Guillaume V of Luxembourg, Sir Richard Branson, Ken Griffin, James Cameron, Ray Dalio, and Wendy Schmidt.

In years past, prominent members have included Sir Ernest Shackleton, President Theodore Roosevelt, Sir Edmund Hillary, Amelia Earhart, Neil Armstrong, John Glenn, Jim Lovell, Thor Heyerdahl, Walter Cronkite, Prince Philip - Duke of Edinburgh, and Jane Goodall. The Explorers Club's historic clubhouse, at 46 East 70th Street in New York City, is a museum and monument to the "Famous Firsts," the greatest explorers and expeditions of all time.

For further information, see:

www.explorers.org

https://www.flickr.com/photos/jurvetson/52439078337

Media Contact

Isabel Carro-Toro, Vice President
American Industrial Acquisition Corporation
+34 689 295 827 (Spain)
+1 787 244 3175 (USA)

[email protected]

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