2026年6月21日 / 美国东部时间上午9:28 / 哥伦比亚广播公司新闻
西奥多·罗斯福始终位列美国最受欢迎总统前五名。在即将到来的7月4日国庆日——也就是他逝世107周年之际，罗斯福终于拥有了属于自己的总统图书馆，但地点却可能出乎你的意料。这座图书馆将拔地而起于北达科他州荒地的草原之上，总面积达9.6万平方英尺，是为纪念美国第26任总统打造的献礼之作。
这座建筑如同拉什莫尔山上的罗斯福雕像一样宏伟，却又低调得多，建筑师克雷格·戴克斯表示，这正是设计初衷。“这里的大自然具有改造之力，”他说，“它曾改变了西奥多·罗斯福，也将在此感化前来参观图书馆的游客。”
![北达科他州荒地中在建的西奥多·罗斯福总统图书馆。哥伦比亚广播公司新闻]
其缓坡屋顶模仿了周边的孤丘造型，表面覆盖着本土草皮，屋顶上还设有步行道——没错，就在屋顶上修建了步行道。设计初衷是让游客登上屋顶，俯瞰隔壁的西奥多·罗斯福国家公园的全景。
“我们希望建筑能给人一种原始自然的感觉，”戴克斯说，“因此这种从大地中生长出来的造型，仿佛是天然形成的一般。”戴克斯还介绍，馆内的一系列天窗将提供几乎全部的自然采光，所有支撑结构都由纯夯土墙构成。
![西奥多·罗斯福总统图书馆的天窗与夯土墙内部设计。哥伦比亚广播公司新闻]
今年3月我们有幸提前参观时，处处都难以分辨自然景观与建筑的边界。这座造价4.5亿美元的图书馆，是北达科他州梅多拉小镇有史以来遭遇的最大手笔项目。
如果你好奇为何罗斯福的图书馆不建在他的故乡纽约，那是因为罗斯福曾坦言，如果没有这段西部经历，他永远不可能成为总统。
![西蒙与舒斯特出版社]
图书馆首席执行官、新书《西奥多·罗斯福的挚爱：成就一位总统的女人们》（西蒙与舒斯特出版社出版）的作者爱德华·奥基夫说：“西奥多·罗斯福童年体弱多病，患有哮喘，一生都在书本和想象中度过。24岁时，他来到北达科他州的草原与荒地，过上了只在书中读过的生活。”
但奥基夫指出，他来到荒地定居的缘由并非美事：“他当时身心俱疲，身处破败之地，是大自然治愈了他。”
一个令人心碎的转折是，泰迪·罗斯福的母亲米蒂和年轻的妻子爱丽丝在同一天——1884年情人节——死于同一栋房子里。“我的生命之光已然熄灭，”罗斯福在日记中写道，日期旁画了一个醒目的叉号。
“在他妻子和母亲的葬礼上——那是一场双重葬礼——他极度悲痛抑郁，以至于大家都担心他的人身安全，”奥基夫说。
处理完后事（其中包括请妹妹抚养他刚出生的女儿爱丽丝）后，他独自一人前往西部。一年前他曾来过达科他领地狩猎两头野牛——这两头野牛至今仍挂在罗斯福位于长岛的家中。
![1980年代，西奥多·罗斯福在第一任妻子去世后访问达科他州荒地时的留影。T.W.英格索尔摄/MPI/盖蒂图片社]
他扎根于此，开启了许多达科他州牛仔认为他无法胜任的生活。他们错了。
奥基夫说：“我认为他怀有‘人生愿望’。他意识到，无论你多么富有、多么享有特权，都无法预知下一秒会发生什么。如果你想在这个世界上有所作为，如果你想爱人，如果你想成就一番事业，你必须亲身去行动。”
而图书馆希望游客不仅能旁观、理解，更能亲身感受这段坚韧、质朴且真实的心路历程。“‘图书馆’和‘博物馆’这两个词，根本不足以描述TR图书馆的本质，”奥基夫说，“它是一场冒险的召唤。”
这座甚至在五年前都无法建成的场馆，如今大量融入了人工智能技术。例如，你不必再想象穿上罗斯福的牛仔装会是什么样子，你可以亲眼所见。
![西奥多·罗斯福总统图书馆的一处展览利用AI技术，让游客体验身着罗斯福牛仔装的样子。哥伦比亚广播公司新闻]
奥基夫表示：“我们打造了世界上首个人工智能总统档案馆。游客可以来到TR图书馆，与罗斯福的虚拟化身进行面对面交谈。你不能毫无准备就和西奥多·罗斯福对话——他可不会迁就你。”
这里将是唯一一处设有拴马桩的总统图书馆。游客可以沿着一英里长的草原步道漫步，围坐在营火旁听关于西部牧场的传奇故事，还可以走进埃尔克霍恩牧场的小屋。
但场馆不止有轻松趣味，也兼具严肃的思考维度。罗斯福身处他的时代，而那个时代并非总能经得起审视。
“我无意为西奥多·罗斯福打造一个歌功颂德的项目，”罗斯福的曾曾孙西奥多·罗斯福五世说，“以他命名的地标、雕像已经够多了。但只是一味地站在伟人的光环下，说‘这是一位伟人，大家都来瞻仰他’，并没有太大意义。通常来说，总统图书馆的核心目的，是让总统为自己的执政生涯开篇定调。但这一次，我们有了一百多年的时间回溯他的遗产，真正理解这份遗产究竟是什么，留下了哪些持久的影响。我们可以直面这些问题。”
其中就包括罗斯福对原住民的种族主义观点，他常将原住民称为“野蛮人”。
“我们和五个原住民部落一起在此举行了土地祈福仪式，”罗斯福说，“以此祝福这片土地，并真正让他们参与到项目中来，我们与他们携手合作，确保他们的声音被听见，我们能恰当地呈现历史。”
图书馆已接收了2022年从纽约美国自然历史博物馆外移除的罗斯福雕像。批评者认为，这座白人雕像凌驾于原住民和非洲象征之上，象征着种族优越。
“我们在此保护西奥多·罗斯福的生平与遗产，”奥基夫说，“我认为最终我们需要为这座雕像设置恰当的背景说明，但不会在开馆时就这么做。”
如果说西奥多·罗斯福总统图书馆传递了什么信息，那便是勇气与力量往往源于个人悲剧、失策、犯错与误解。正如他那句名言所言：真正重要的是身处竞技场之中。而这一点，或许正是这座图书馆凭借事后之明所能带给人们的最珍贵的启示。
“他不喜欢批评者，”奥基夫说，“不喜欢那些站在 sidelines 指手画脚的人，说强者如何跌倒，或者实干者本可以做得更好。他欣赏那些敢于尝试并遭遇失败的人。这在今天仍是一堂意义深远的课。我尤其希望孩子们能来这里明白，如果你想改变这个世界，你必须成为改变的源头。”
Theodore Roosevelt Presidential Library opening in North Dakota Badlands
June 21, 2026 / 9:28 AM EDT / CBS News
Theodore Roosevelt consistently ranks among the nation’s top five most popular presidents. On this upcoming July 4 holiday, 107 years after his death, T.R. is finally getting his own presidential library – but it’s not where you might think. That library is rising out of the prairie grass in the North Dakota Badlands – a 96,000-square-foot tribute to our 26th president.
It’s as grand as his likeness on Mt. Rushmore, except a lot more subtle, and that’s by design, says architect Craig Dykers. “Nature is transformative here,” he said. “It transformed Theodore Roosevelt, and it will transform new visitors to this library.”
The Theodore Roosevelt Presidential Library under construction in the Badlands of North Dakota. CBS News
Its gently sloping roof mimics the surrounding buttes, covered in native grasses and walking paths – yes, walking paths on the roof. The hope is they’ll get visitors up and out for a commanding view of Theodore Roosevelt National Park right next door.
“We wanted something that just felt primitive,” said Dykers. “And so, this form emerging from the Earth, it felt like it just arrived from the Earth.”‘ Dykers said.
Inside, a string of skylights will provide almost all the natural illumination the library would ever need, held up by walls made solely of compressed earth.
The interior design of the skylights and earthen walls of the Theodore Roosevelt Presidential Library. CBS News
Everywhere we looked during our privileged sneak-peek back in March, it was hard to tell where nature ended and the library began. Its $450 million price tag is the biggest thing the small town of Medora, North Dakota, has ever experienced.
If you’re wondering why T.R.’s library is way out here instead of his native New York, it’s because were it not for his experiences way out here, Roosevelt said, he never would have been president.
Simon & Schuster
Edward O’Keefe, CEO of the library, and author of the recent book “The Loves of Theodore Roosevelt: The Women Who Created a President” (Simon & Schuster), said, “Theodore Roosevelt grew up as a sickly, asthmatic child who lived his life through books and imagination. So here he is, 24 years old, on the plains and Badlands of North Dakota, and he’s living the life he only read about in books.”
But the reason he took up residence in the Badlands is hardly a happy one, said O’Keefe: “He was a broken man, in a broken land, and nature was his healer.”
In a tragic twist, Teddy Roosevelt’s mother, Mittie, and his young wife, Alice, both died in the same house, on the same day: Valentine’s Day 1884. “The light has gone out of my life,” Roosevelt wrote in his diary – the date marked by a bold X.
“At the funeral of his wife and mother – it was a double funeral – he was so desolate and so depressed, that they were concerned for his own safety,” said O’Keefe.
After settling his affairs (which included asking his sister to raise his newborn daughter, Alice), he headed West, alone. He’d been to the Dakota Territory just a year prior to hunt a pair of bison – the two that still hang in Roosevelt’s Long Island home to this day.
Theodore Roosevelt during a visit to the Badlands of Dakota in the 1880s, after the death of his first wife. Photo by T.W. Ingersoll/MPI/Getty Images
He dug in, and began living a kind of life many Dakota cowboys thought he wasn’t prepared to live. They were wrong.
O’Keefe said, “I think he had a ‘life wish.’ He realized that no matter how rich you are, no matter how privileged you are, that you don’t know what’s going to happen next. If you want to get something done in this world, if you want to love somebody, if you want to accomplish something, you gotta go.”
And it’s that kind of rugged, raw, and real intellectual journey that the library wants visitors not just to look at and to grasp, but experience. “Library and museum are the two worst descriptions of what the TR Library actually is,” said O’Keefe. “It’s a call to adventure.”
It’s the kind of place that couldn’t have been built even five years ago, because artificial intelligence is such a large part of it. For example, you don’t have to imagine what it’s like to be in T.R.’s boots; you can actually see it.
An exhibit at the Theodore Roosevelt Presidential Library used AI to illustrate how visitors might look in TR’s cowboy garb. CBS News
O’Keefe said, “We have created the world’s first presidential archive in AI. Participants can come here to the TR Library, and have an in-person conversation with an avatar of T.R. You do not come unprepared for a conversation with Theodore Roosevelt; he will have none of it.”
It will be the only presidential library that will have hitching posts for your horse. You can take a nature walk on a mile-long path through the prairie. You can sit by a campfire and hear tall tales of life on the range, and step into his cabin at the Elkhorn Ranch.
But for all the fun, there’s a serious bent, too. He was a man of his times, and his times weren’t always flattering.
“I wasn’t interested in doing a legacy project for Theodore Roosevelt,” said T.R.’s great-great-grandson, Theodore Roosevelt V. “There’s plenty of things named after him, plenty of statues. But the idea of just sort of basking in the glow of somebody and saying ‘This is a great man, let’s all look at him,’ isn’t particularly compelling. Normally, presidential libraries – it’s the principal [reason], the president trying to cement the first chapter of his legacy. In this case, we’ve got a hundred years-plus to be able to look back at his legacy, to really understand what that legacy is, what the lasting impacts were. We get to face those issues head-on.”
Including Roosevelt’s racist views of indigenous peoples, whom he often referred to as savages.
“We had a land blessing out here with the five tribes,” said Roosevelt, “to bless the land and really bring them into the project, so that we were working with them and making sure that their voices were heard, and that we were representing things appropriately.”
The library has taken possession of a statue of Roosevelt that was removed in 2022 from outside the American Museum of Natural History in New York. Critics argued that the message of a White man elevated above both a Native American and an African symbolized racial superiority.
“We are here to preserve the life and legacy of Theodore Roosevelt,” said O’Keefe. “I think it’s important that we eventually do something that contextualizes it appropriately, but not at the opening.”
If the Theodore Roosevelt Presidential Library has any message, it’s that courage and strength often come from personal tragedy, mis-steps, mistakes, and misunderstandings. As he famously said, it’s being in the arena that counts. And that, more than anything, may be the hindsight the library has to offer.
“He does not like the critic,” said O’Keefe. “He does not like the person on the sidelines pointing out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. He likes the person who tries and fails. That’s a powerful lesson for today. I want kids in particular to come in and understand that if you want to change something in this world, you have got to be the source of that change.”
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