August 22, 1902 — President Theodore Roosevelt toured the city of Hartford in a state-of-the-art horseless carriage aka electric car. The vehicle, a Phaeton Mark IV, built by the Columbia Electric Vehicle Company of Hartford, was designed by a member of the Union League Club of New Haven; William Hooker Atwood.
William Hooker Atwood was already an internationally respected carriage maker when he finished work on the Phaeton Mark IV. Ten years prior, Hooker Atwood had been a judge at the 1893 Chicago World’s Fair: perhaps the greatest assemblage of carriage manufacturers in world history.
By the turn of the twentieth century, a growing number of New Haven’s Republican League, established in 1884, were breaking with the Republican Party over contentious issues such as the tariff. As a result, the club went from being a purely political organization to becoming more of a civic and social fraternity. Enrollment was changed to nonpartisan, and the club was renamed the Union League. The club’s membership, no longer restricted by party, boomed.
In 1902, the Union League of New Haven selected William Hooker Atwood to be the Chairman of the Building Committee. The committee navigated zoning / permitting challenges, answered questions / concerns from neighbors / the city, and successfully shepherded construction of a new addition to the front of the Republican League’s old building. The Union League addition, by architect Richard Williams, more than doubled the square footage of the clubhouse.
As Chairman of the Building Committee, the middle stained glass window (the one over the fireplace), at the Union League of New Haven, was presented by William Hooker Atwood.
Meanwhile, the 26th President of the United States, while getting action in the arena as a statesman, soldier, big game hunter, conservationist, naturalist, historian, writer, etc., did not adopt the horseless carriage. Demonstrating his strong preference for horses, President Roosevelt continued using horse and carriage for all official functions of government.
The White House would not garage an automobile, gasoline or electric, until the Taft administration.
