On this day in 1918, former Vice President Charles W. Fairbanks died. He served as vice president under Theodore Roosevelt from 1905-1909. He also ran as Charles Evans Hughes’s running mate in the 1916 election (they were defeated by Woodrow Wilson and another Hoosier running mate, Thomas Marshall).

Born in Ohio in 1852, he settled in Indianapolis with his wife in 1874. It was in Indiana that he used his considerable wealth from practicing law and his political acumen to lead the Republican party to victories in numerous elections. In the 1896 election, he served as a key campaign adviser for William McKinley’s presidential run, helping lead it to victory. His success as party leader also ensured a Republican-majority in the Indiana General Assembly, which in turn elected him to the US Senate (State legislatures chose U.S. Senators before the ratification of the 17th Amendment in 1913), a position he held until he was sworn in as vice president on March 3, 1905. Due to personal and ideological differences, Fairbanks found himself isolated in Roosevelt’s administration.

While a serious contender for the Republican presidential nomination in 1908, his prospects ended when the party chose Roosevelt’s hand-picked successor, then Secretary of War William Howard Taft. In 1909, he retired to Indiana and again pursued his law practice, only throwing his hat in the ring one last time in the aforementioned 1916 election.

Known for his stoic and intense persona, Fairbanks’s political peers dubbed him the “Indiana Icicle.” An article in Collier’s magazine echoed this description, describing Fairbanks as “calm, cool, deliberate, [an] educated statesman, wise in counsel, efficient in action.”

He died on June 4, 1918 from a stroke, a likely side-effect of a chronic kidney ailment. A colleague said of Fairbanks in a June 5, 1918 tribute in the Indianapolis News:

His love of his native state was noteworthy. When he left the office of Vice-President his first thought was of doing something that would be of permanent value to Indiana, and at the same time would be an example for the nation. His active and greatly beneficial efforts for forestry development was the result.

He was a real man of high and noble Ideals. His statecraft made him a country-wide figure In public affairs, and his distinguished presence, hie fine courtesy and his safe counsel will be missed by his friends, his party and his country.

To learn more about Fairbanks, visit these biographies by the Miller Center and the US Senate.

To read the Collier’s article, click here.