Sweet serendipity... Sweet for Amy Verone, curator of the Sagamore Hill collection who spoke at the second 20/20 lecture sponsored by the Oyster Bay Historical Society and the Friends of Raynham Hall on March 25.

Serendipity because the winter 1998 issue of the Freeholder, the publication of the OBHS, contains an article "The Search for Noah Seaman: TR's Superintendent and Friend" by Franklin R. McElwain. Ms. Verone's theme was TR and his home, Sagamore Hill, which was, while he lived there, operated as a working farm, run by TR's superintendent and friend Noah Seaman.

Sweet serendipity...when the two come together as Ms. Verone would like to see the national historic site restored to the way it was when Theodore Roosevelt, his wife Ethel and their six children were living there and that farm was cared for by Mr. Seaman.

Adding to the coincidence - when Mr. Seaman's cottage behind Sagamore Hill burned down, Elizabeth Roosevelt, attending the lecture, said she missed seeing the fire. The rest of her siblings saw the blaze, but she was very young and was asleep. For the rest of the family, in then rural America, it was a big event.

The barn building was visible in a slide of Sagamore Hill, shown by Ms. Verone. Ms. Roosevelt said the land the house was on was planted with flowers by Bertha Rose, an early curator of Sagamore Hill.

The Sagamore Hill Collection

Ms. Verone's study of the Sagamore Hill collection has given her an appealing view of the Roosevelts to share with listeners. Theodore Roosevelt was always fond of dressing up, she said, and she showed slides to prove that. When he went to Montana in 1884, after his first wife, Alice, died, he had a cowboy outfit made for himself that included a pearl-handled pistol.

A slide showed TR in an embroidered buckskin shirt that cost $50, "Two months salary for a Dakota cowboy," she said. He looked like a young Richard Dreyfus in the picture.

After being clued into his love of dressing, you could see it in the slides of him as a Rough Rider; in a long frock coat making a speech; in a safari jacket in Africa.

The trip to Africa, said Ms. Verone, was a real expedition for the American Museum of Natural History. TR and his son Kermit brought back 600 large mammals for the museum scientists to study. The entomologists and ornithologists on the trip brought back 8,000 items, she said.

Ms. Verone showed how TR and his home, Sagamore Hill, changed over the years. It, like many a Long Island house, began on a bare hill, without the trees that surround it today. Ms. Verone would like to see the lawn cut in the old style, with tall grasses and a daisy field around the house. Getting it done with today's power tools and volunteer workers is a challenge.

The house changed over the years, she said. The front foyer was originally used as a living room where children and parents gathered around the fireplace and read poetry. The children were challenged to recite pieces they had memorized.

That room became a real foyer, more formal looking, sometime after the North Room was created. The North Room was the result of Edith Roosevelt getting tired of being thrown out of her parlor when Mr. Roosevelt had guests and wanted to talk politics, said Ms. Verone.

Edith Roosevelt told TR, if he was going to have guests - build a room for them. He created the North Room, which cost almost as much as the whole house to build - $16,975, according to Franklin R. McElwain's article. He filled the room with souvenirs brought back from trips and gifts people gave him. Ms. Verone said they have 95 percent of the things that were originally in the house.

Ethel Roosevelt Derby's wedding reception was held in the North Room - and outside it. "They rolled up the rug and danced," she said.

In the most recent restoration of Sagamore Hill, TR's bathroom, added to the house in 1905, was added to the tour. It was made out of a linen closet at the same time the North Room was being built. Before that there was one bathroom for six children, five servants, two parents and guests. Edith added two more, she said, for a total of four.

"People in the '90s are obsessed about bathrooms," she said. Today's visitors ask about bathrooms.

There is a new "chic" to restoring rooms historically. "The boss wants it 'company ready,'" said Ms. Verone. "I want it to look as if the maid slept late - or was grumpy from having the flu." Ms. Verone would like the rooms to look as if a family with six children were in residence at the house, and had just left the room you were entering.

She related that most of the Roosevelt's furniture was inherited pieces. "If she needed to buy something, Edith went to Sears." Fashion did not rule in Edith and Theodore's life. His mother, however, did purchase stylish pieces.

Recently the hill received a set of china donated by Alice Roosevelt Longworth's daughter. They are a set of luncheon and dinner plates used by the family in the White House. There are no cups and saucers and no cake plates. Ms. Verone speculated that another family member received a dessert service. "We'll have to look for it," she said.

Ms. Verone's hope for Sagamore Hill is that it will once again be a working farm. In The Search for Noah Seaman, Mr. McElwain stated that TR wrote to his sister Bamie that "It would be lovely to have a farm..." When he bought the property it had only one 40-year-old red oak growing on the hill, near the house. They raised pigs, turkeys, chickens and had horses and cows.

Still, Ms. Verone has a vision. "In five or 10 years, you'll come to the farm where the Roosevelts lived."

She said they might contract with a farmer to do the work for a trade agreement of sorts. "It's a huge step for us," she said. "It depends on the budget."

The next 20/20 lecture features James Foote, TR impersonator, at the Masonic Lodge next to Raynham Hall at 8 p.m. Mr. Foote talks about "T.R. - His Life and Times." The final presentation, is on May 20 at Jakobson Shipyard and features Charles Hatton, chair of the Christeen Oyster Sloop Preservation Corporation as he demonstrates work being done on the Christeen. Free. Refreshments. For information call 922-5032.