site, for the archives and by c-span for airing on book the, so, please, be mindful of this as you enjoy the presentations. in addition, please, do not sit on the camera, risers that are located in the back of the pavilion, and please, silence your cell phones. thank you. the author we have with us today is fabulous. his name is justin martin, and he's the author of the widely-held biographies of two iconic figures, alan greenspan and ralph nader, both of whom i think would be really interesting dinner guests. [laughter] at the same dinner. [laughter] and i couldn't think of two different figures than i was asking justin a few minutes ago about that, and he said that after he had written the greenspan book, he didn't want to do anymore economists, and his agent was thinking, hey, you

can carve out a career with economists. so he wanted to go exactly in a different direction, and with ralph nader he did. greenspan be, the man behind money, was a national bestseller and chosen by "the new york times" book review as one of the notable books of 2000. nadering, crusader, spoiler, icon published in 2002, is thes definitive biography of the perennial presidential candidate who sometimes leaves voice messages on my voicemail asking the post to cover one thing or another. and he also plays, certainly, a controversial role in the disputed election of 2000. justin became one of the go-to experts to explain nader, appearing on cnn and other television shows and also the 2006 documentary, "an

unreasonable man." his latest biography is of a less controversial figure, at least by today's twitter standards. "genius of place: the life of frederick law olmstead," is the story of the brilliant landscape architect who with designed central park and about 50 other green spaces around the country. olmsted also was a sailor a scientific farmer, a crusading journalist, a noted abolitionist and civil war hero, a life worthy of the careful, illuminating justin martin treatment. justin is a former staff writer at "fortune" magazine and has written for such publications as "newsweek" and money. he's a graduate of the university of houston, and he seems to have been destined to write his current book on olmsted as he was married in central park. which is olmsted's greatest achievement. he also happens to live in the new york neighborhood designed

by olmsted's son, frederick olmsted jr. and with that i'd say, please, welcome justin martin to the stage. he will be signing books from 4-5 p.m. as well. [applause] justin. >> well, thanks, kevin, for that really nice introduction. it is so nice to be here at the national book festival. i'm actually here as well as being here as an author, i'm here just because i'm fan. i've had a really great day going around seeing different speeches. it's been really fun. and my book is called "genius of place: the life of frederick law olmstead." olmsted was a pretty restless genius, so it makes the most sense to break my speech up into a couple of different parts. first i'm going to describe the

really circuitous path he took to become a landscape architect, and then i'm going to briefly describe some of his greatest achievements in the context of how all the various eddies he traveled and career experience, how those actually informed his most masterful design. and then there'll be time for questions, of course. olmsted was born in hartford, connecticut n1822. he was born into a pretty prosperous family. his father was a dry goods merchant, and as was the habit in that era, olmsted was sent away for his schooling. he entered into a whole series of arrangements with really poor country parsons. these parsons, they were besieged and beset. they had, they had their parsonage duties, many of them were running small farms on the side in order to make extra income, and that left them very little time and very little focus for their third role as educators. olmsted was mischievous as a boy, so he took full advantage

of the situation. he was in the habit of sneaking out of these parsonages, he'd wander around setting trap for quail, wandering around in the woods. he got very little schooling, but he certainly got an appreciation for landscape, particularly the landscape of his native connecticut. now, when olmsted was 14 years old, he had an absolutely terrible case of poison sue mack, and it spread into his eyes. he tried to get a letter from a doctor that indicated he no longer needed to go to school. he was delighted. but this also meant that at a very young age he needed to find a profession. the first thing olmsted lit upon, it kind of made sense, it kind of was illogical. he said he wanted to become a surveyier. it was certainly a profession available for someone with limited schooling, but it also requires eagle-sharp vision, and

he had had this bout with sumac. never mind, he arranged to serve an apprenticeship under a surveyor, and olmsted proceed today completely abuse the situation. while pretending to learn the useful trade of surveying, olmsted wandered around hiking, fishing, paddling in a canoe. he learned very, very little about surveying, but he certainly deepened his appreciation for landscape, particularly the landscape of his native connecticut. at this point his father decided, time for olmsted to buckle down, time for him to to brooklyn, got him an apartment in brooklyn, and he also got him a job in manhattan where he would be working for an importing firm. now, olmsted was deeply lonely in brooklyn. he was deeply lonely there. he also hated the job working for the importing firm. he hated the fact that it was a

desk job, he hated the long hours, he hated the regimentation. there was really only one thing about the job that olmsted liked, and that was that periodically he got to go onboard ships and inventory their wares. and it was while doing this olmsted had a new idea of something that he might like to do with his life. he decided he wanted to become a sailor. now, once again this made immeant sense. sailing was one of the professions available to people in that era that can't have much form -- didn't have much formal schooling. a whole long line of olmsteds if you went back generation after generation had gone to sea. so in april of 1843, olmsted set out onboard a ship headed for china. and on july 4th of 1843 as the ship rounded the cape of good hope right beneath the southern tip of africa, it hit an absolutely ferocious snowstorm. now, it was traveling through

the southern hemisphere, andan it's possible for weatherd conditions to be reversed, so o. july 4th you can have some pretty wicked winter weather. and in this case this was anin incredible storm. olmsted looked around at his fellow sailors, he could sees t panic in their eyes. he realized this ship reallys. might sink. about this time captain fox, ths captain of the ship, gave the order to furl sail. and what this meant was that it had become completely uncontrollable. the wild winds were whipping this way and that, the sails were acting as a detriment. so they rolled up the sails, and olmsted and his fellow crewmen went below dick, and for three days and nights the ship pitched on the sea completely uncontrolled. olmsted thought that at any moment it might crack open, he might be pitched into the icy ocean and to certain death. fortunately, that did not happen. olmsted continued on to china, um, the ronaldson delivered its

american goods.de it picked up a load of chinese tea and started heading back to the united states. along the way olmstede experienced all things ofk deprivation. he didn't get enough food, enough water, enough sleep. w he watched as his fellow sailors were whipped for even the minorrest of infractions, and when the ship docked in april of 1844 and when olmsted disembarked onto dry land, he swore to every, ever go to seatn again. but this only meant that he needed to find a new profession. so now olmsted hit on the idea of becoming a farmer.essi once again, this made imminent sense. farming was a professionar certainly that was available to someone with pretty limited formalab schooling. what's more, farming was the profession in the united states practiced by 70% of the population. so olmsted identified a man whop received a commendation for running a model scientific farm. and then olmsted arranged to

work with the man as sort of an apprenticeship. and at this point olmsted was also having the very first pangs of wanting to be a social reformer. t and so he very much liked the idea of being a scientific farmer. that would be a waryy to accomplish that, and the reasonw why is while olmsted didn't have much formal schooling, he was very, very well read. and so he thought that he could read the latest agricultural journals, learn the latest best practices in farming, and then he could dissemimate this f information to his fellow farmers, many of whom were illiterate, and this way heli could act as a kind of socialsoi reformer. so olmsted completed his a apprenticeship and started off s on a life of his own as a farmer. wor and true to his word, he was very good at growing crops. true to his word, he also wound up being a social reformer. he would read those latest agricultural journals, he would glean the best practices with j the latest cutting-edgehe

practices in farming, and he p disseminated this information to his fellow farmers. but then olmsted learned that his younger brother john was planninged to take a walking too across england, and olmsted became almost pathologically jealous. he could not believe that his little brother was getting readb to take this great adventure while he was stuck on the farm. so olmsted started writing a series of letters to his fathers in which he pleaded to be allowed to leave the farm and join his brother on this trip.ts you might wonder, why would a man now in his mid 20s need toy beg his father's permission?ther his father held the mortgage tor the farm. his father was also a very kind, very generous man particularly by 19th century fatherly standards, and so he agreed to let olmsted go.ar and furthermore, he staked him to some money for the tour that he took across england.mone now, when olmsted returned, he was the beneficiary of a really fortunate coincidence.

one of olmsted's neighbors on staten island where he was farmingrs was a man named george putnam, and george putnam was a weekend hobby farmer. now, olmsted was farming on staten island at this point, and staten island was not yet part of new york city. it. was simply an island off the tip of manhattan. and george putnam is a name tham might have resonance formany of the people in the audience today because he was a publishing magnate, and the publishing company which bears his name is still in existence today, putnams. and putnam was a real innovator. he had lately been working on something called paperbacks which was brand new to the world in this era, and he was publishing all kinds of different paperbacks. he was publishing treatises on philosophy, collections of poetry, collections of short fiction, and he was selling them for 25 cents a pop. putnam approached olmsted, his neighbor, his neighboring farmer on staten island, and asked

olmsted if i he would be interes inside producing an account to be published in paperback of his recent walking tour acrossrece england.r olmsted readily agreed, and he produced a book called "walks and talks of an american farmer in england." sales were very, very slow. [laughter] reviews were incredibly tepid. but olmsted had now made an incredible transition. he had gone from being a surveyor to a clerk to a sailor to a farm tore a -- farmer to a writer. and now comes an absolutely extraordinary coincidence. there was a brand new newspaper -- this was the earlya 1850s, and there was a brand new newspaper called the new york daily times. a few years later it would become "the new york times".er w and this paper was in a fight for its life. this was the era when most big cities had about a dozen

dailies, so henry raymond, the editor, was trying to figure out how to separate it from this large field of competition.fi he came to the conclusion that the best way to do this was by d focusing on veracity. now, this was the era of yellow journalism, so a dozen or so competitors were in the habit of stretching the truth mightily or just making things up whole cloth. so raymond perceived if he devoted this new paper to objective reporting insofar that that was possible, he could distinguish it from its competitors. raymond was also interested in covering some of the biggestf topics of the day, and one of the biggest was again at this point in the early 18 50z -- 1850s, onceet again there weren rising tensions between theited northern and southern states one the issue of slavery. these were tensions that had existed from the very inception of the nation, but they appeared toth be reaching a flash point.

many people thought there might be violence or maybe even civil war. and so olmsted applied for this job. he had a five minute interview, and he was handed an absolutelyh plum assignment. you might think, how did he get this? he was pretty underqualified, but he did have a book to his credit, he'd written "walks and talks of an american farmer in england." maybe more importantly, he was a farmer. and the south in this era was nothing if not an agrarian n society from. the autumn of 1852 after thef harvest was over -- because olmsted was still farmer by s trade -- he set out for the south. and the only way to describe ite is nothing could have preparedld henry raymond, the editor of the times, nothing could have prepared anyone for what an able reporter olmsted proved to be. he went everywhere, he talked to everyone. he talked to plantation owners, he talked to slaves, he talked to poor white farmers, and he

produced a series of spectacular dispatches that literally put a the brand new new york times on the map. now, in 1861 those dispatches were compiled into a book called "the cotton kingdom," and all i can tell you is "the cotton kingdom," here it is 150 years later, 1861, and "the cottons kingdom" is still in might. and if you want a window into the south on the eve of the civil war, you can watch the movie "gone with the wind" whici is fictional but certainly has great facts about the south, or you can read olmsted's absolutely stellar reporting as it's collected in "the cotton kingdom." so olmsted was now a member ofy what he called the literary republic. and next he got another just plum assignment. he became an editor for a magazine called putnams, and putnams c was editor of a brand new magazine called harpers.

and putnams had an amazing stable of writers., while working as an editor at putnams, olmsted copy edited a t couple of short stories by s herman melville. olmsted also decided he wanted to become much more deeply involve inside abolitionism. given the fact that he traveledt through the south on assignment for "the new york times," thisis was a cause that he certainly wanted to become involved in. so inom 1855 a man named james abbott traveled east frommed kansas, and james abbott was the head of a militia. james abbott's militia was devoted to making sure that ifma kansas entered the union as a state, it would enter as a freeu state rather than a slave state, and he was headed east to get money, to raise money to purchase weapons for his militia.s first he went to connecticut and rhode island, and he raisedwent enough money to buy about 100 what were nicknamed beacher's

bibles.ls these were short rifles. then he went down to new york, and the person he wanted to connect with was olmsted.s in olmsted readily agreed, and so olmsted started reaching tout the various people he knew around new york city. one of the people he reached ous to was forest greeley who hadey been the editor of the new york tribune and was the very person who coined the term, bleeding kansas. olmsted raised about $300 through his various contacts, and abbott described olmsted as a prompt and energetic friend of kansas. olmsted then, olmsted kepten abbott apprised of his activities by writing -- olmstei then used the $300 to purchase a howitzer. and he kept abbott apprised of his activities by writing him letters that employed a ridiculously crackable code. for instance, he refer today the

howitzer as an h. now, it wasn't a code that was very difficult for anybody to figure out, but at the same time it certainly reflects that olmsted was so very aware that he and abbott were involved in t very dangerous endeavor here, i and they want today avoid detection with these letters. olmsted also arranged to break the howitzer up into severalp different pieces and to send ite to kansas broken up into component parts. when the cannon arrived in kansas, it was once againsa assembled, reassembled, it was placed in front of the freed, pa state hotel, and it comported itself very admirably, the cannon did or the howitzer did, throughout the ensuing bloody kansas struggles. but now comes an absolutely cat cataclysmic event in u.s. economic history. it's come to be known as the panic of 1857. it was an incredibly rapid downward spiral in economic conditions. putnams, the magazine olmsted had been working for, went belly up. olmsted lost his job.

olmsted was short on coal, he owed money to everybody he knew, he had a hole in his shoe, he didn't have a proper hat. so he decided to take a job that was an incredible comedown for someone who had recently been travel anything such lofty circles. he took a job in which he started clearing a really c scruffy, unatact tractive piece of -- unattractive piece of land. he's knocking down shanties and clearing swamps in a piece of l land that was prosaically named for its position in the middle of new york city. it was called central park.entr olmsted was clearing this piece of land for someone el's design. -- someone else's design. enter vox, an establish-trained architect. he took one look at the existinn plan fored central park, and hed was disgusted. he could not believe what an amateurish design this was. what's more, vox had friends in

high places. he'd recently designed the fifth avenue mansion of one of the board members of the future central park. so he started approaching the board saying, first of all, this is a terrible design for the get park, i suggest you get rid ofse it. and secondly, vox said, in england if you want to get theg, best design, you hold a publicbr competition. the board tabled the existing central park, and they announced that there would be a public competition for a new design. at this point vox sought out olmsted to see if olmsted wanted to be partners. now, for these purposes voxth could not have cared a whit about olmsted's high profile, about the fact that he's been part of the literary republic,bc that he'd been an abolitionist. that meant nothing to vox.nari the reason vox wanted to partner with olmsted was because olmsted had been out on this scruffy piece of land knocking down shanties and draining swamps, and vox perceived that if they

partnered up, they would have a leg up in the competition u because olmsted literally knew t the lay of the land. so olmsted and vox, they partnered up for the competition, and the only way to describe it, it was kind of parallel to his earlier southern reporting. re in this case nothing could have prepared vox, nothing could have prepared anyone for what incredible ideas olmsted brought to this design. and when they turned in the design, it was the clear winner. there were 33 different peopleen who entered the design competition.mpet 33 of them -- 32 of them produced designs that would rat somewhere between a b -and a flat f. olmsted and vox were an a +. they were given permission to proceed with it. one of the design elements that set their plan so very far apart by the other designs turned in

by the other contestants, the board spelled out that all contestants had to follow certain mandatory elements, onet was that there had to be four roads crossing central park. central park is a very unattractive shape for a park, rectangle and very narrow. the other contestants just kind of comply with the that pla mandatory requirement. tha they produced park plans that were crossed in four different h places with roads. that resulted in really cribbed, cramped plans. it wasn't possible to have annot expansive med meadow, any kind of long view or vista. w olmsted and vox came up with this brilliant inknow innovation, they agreed to do the four roads crossing central park, but they'd come up withdea this idea called sunken transverses. what these were were subterranean channels. and in certain places they designed land bridges that would cross the subterranean channelsc and what this did was it opened up their park plan.ng

it made it possible to have an expansive meadow, to have a long view or a vista. what's more, it meant that t traffic wasn't traveling at eye level as you were going through the park. as olmsted put it, your view be would not be interrupted by a clattering dung cart. well, olmsted and vox's design innovation continues to pay dividends to this day. i'm sure many of you have had the experience of walking through central park, and there can be traffic traveling very nearby that's traveling through these subterranean channels so you don't see it, and you don't really hear it either, not that badly at least, because it sounds muffled because the traffic is traveling beneath ground. so ohm ted and vox, they -- olmsted and vox proceed with the their plan for central park, and they had done most of what they wanted to do, and what they hadn't done they had in i preparation ready to go when ini 1861 then civil war broke out. now, olmsted, he most certainly wanted to be involved in the union cause. and so what he did was at this

point he came down here to washington, and he headed up an outfit called the united states sanitary commission. this was a battlefield relief outfit that just provided immeasurable relief to battlefield wounded during the civil war. w after the civil war, through aee whole series of convolutions the united states sanitary commission, the very outfit that olmsted was head of, ultimately morphed into the american red cross. but come the battle of gettysburg, olmsted start today grow restless once again. gettysburg was kind of a turning point in the civil war.ttle the clear after that battle that the north was going to emerge victorious, it was really only a matter of time and terms. from olmsted's standpoint, it became clear that it was only a matter of time before his assignment with the united states sanitary commission ended, and he'd need to find some kind of new job. and the funny thing is olmsted j looked around, and he really didn't consider land scape

architecture, this veryape profession that he and vox hadhe pioneered. olmsted had a masterpiece to his credit with central park, but he just didn't really think thereay were that many cities thatted wanted parks design.he so in instead olmsted headed out to california and became the supervisor of a gold mine. while he was there, he started visiting a place that was about 30 miles away from the gold mine, and it was yosemite valley. olmsted was absolutely enchanted. now, by some account cans olmsted was one of the first 500 nonnative americans to even enter yosemite. that gives you an idea of how remote that valley was in this era and how far away and distant it was from civilization. olmsted loved walking around in yosemite, and pretty soon he started to make a kind of human cry to preserve this place. he recognized that america's a population was going to expand,p

and at some point yosemite was going to be in the some danger of being diminished by having so many people visit it. so olmsted started suggesting that certainly no kind ofo private interests should beinte looked to to preserve this natural wonder. he suggested that a far-seeing government should step in and take care of this beautiful place. this was unbelievably prescient. this was literally, this was decades before the national parks system. but civil war ended, and all of a sudden in the north at least there started to be an economic boom. all of a sudden all these cities were clamoring to have parks designed. so ohm ted and vox, they partnered up again, they teamed up again, they did a whole bunch of different designs. then olmsted and vox, they never got along well, they were always at each other's throats s so they broke apart. olmsted continued on solo, and

he did a whole series of designs.tead and these designs -- part of tho reason people respond to them the way they do today, part of what makes them so singular, soy magnificent, so a set apart isod veryay much because of how he dw on all the various dead ends all that he traveled down and career eddies that he traveled over before finding his way toing landscape architecture. he brought many of those experiences, those varied experiences into play.to what i'm going to do now is describe just three of olmsted's greatest works in the context of how his earlier experiences came into play. the first of these designs is right up that way, the grounds of the u.s. capitol. olmsted was called upon to design the capitol grounds in gr 1874. and the very first thing he did was he became extremely fixated on finding a way, a circulation system, a logical way for peoplp to travel over the capitol grounds.. in this era there were 41 era

different points where a persone could enter the capitol ground, and people were in the habit ofe entering the capitol grounds at any one of those points and just making a beeline for the entrance of the capitol. this produced a harried gridnes work. olmsted sat down, and he came up with this idea of having the best way to describe it is itrie was kind of like tributaries feeding into larger tributaries feeding into a river. olmsted decided that what madeed sense was to have -- didn't matter what one of the 41 points someone entered into, they'd be fed into a tributary that would feed them into a largerth tributary path that would feed them into a very broad, sinuous, curve cg path that would deliver the person right to the entrance of the capitol. now, congress which was the client on the project was completely puzzled. they'd hired olmsted to create striking design for the capitol grounds, and here he was fixated

over a circulation system. but this had everything to do, it was completely rooted in roo olmsted's earlier career as a farmer. when working as a farmer,rmer olmsted had had many times the experience of conducting his goods to market and having a wagon get stuck in a mirey road. that spelled disaster. m it meant the produce he was taking to market was going to gg bad, it meant olmsted wasn't going to get money. so when he became a landscape architect, he came that lesson with him.te so often clients would be incredibly puzzled as congress in this particular case was. they'd wonder, they'd think, you know, we hired you to do an incredible project, and here yoh are with this road fixation. but olmsted would explain, it doesn't matter how beautiful ae design i create f there isn't a. rational way for people to get around on the grounds, it'll bea a disaster.

the second project i wanted to e describe in the context of olmsted easier experiences andi how they came to bear was his absolutely visionary design for the world's fair in chicago in 1893, what was called the t colombian exposition.expo olmsted was the one who actually sited the fair. he picked where the fairgrounds would be, and he decided it would make sense to put the fairgrounds right on the shorept of lake michigan. he thought that was a really r striking backdrop.st but when olmsted came up with this really kind of out there idea. he decided he wanted to cut channels that would travel froma lake michigan through the fairgrounds and so there would be water, there would be waterways traveling over the fairgrounds, and it would become possible for people to go from t attraction to attraction at the world's fair by boat.e now, olmsted had a vivid, almost ha louis that story vision of what he wanted these boats to te be.

he wanted them to be small, to t seat ao maximum of about four o people, hef wanted them to have brightly-colored awnings, and he modeled this idea in his mind on the chinese sam pans that he'd seen during his sea voyage to china 50 year before. now, daniel burnham who was the administrator of the fair, he thought this was a ridiculousir, idea. he thought why would you if you're trying, you know, having people travel through the fair by boat, stroke a genius, a brilliant idea. but having them travel in littlu boats four at a time made absolutely no sense. to burnham. so he went behind olmsted's back and forged a relationship and w signed a contract, ine fact, wib a steamship company.tea now, when olmsted learned about this, he was apoplectic. he wrote burnham a series of memos that are obsessive, demented but devastatingly

logical. he made the argument this these memos that, first of all, that ultimately the world's fair wouldir be consigned to memory. it was going to open in the spring of 1893, it would close in the autumn of 1893, and that would be it.ou so point that olmsted made was what would people rather remember, a big steamship going along, people leaning over the railing waving their hats, a steam whistle going off, or would they rather rememberor little brightly-colored boats gliding along these waterways? olmsted further summoned an argument that this wouldthe prosurprise the great amount of good to the greatst number of people. if you had a handful of boats ti carrying four people at a time, not everybody was going to take a boat trip, but he made the point that everybody would enjoy the ambience of having these lovely, quiet little boatselin traveling over the waterways. now, burnham was a man of indomitable will, but he met his match in olmsted. and when the fair opened in the

spring of 1893, what wasd available were a handful of very small, brightly-colored boats that could seat a maximum ofd four people just as olmsted hadh seen on his trip to china 50 years before. and, of course, the white city as that world fair's come to bes known has an indelible place in american memory and one of the things certainly people remember is the ambience, and one of the things that contribute todayht, that kind of languid ambience were these waterways with these little, small boats traveling th over them. wa the final landscape that its. wanted to describe or landscapes plural is what are known as the park systems. and this is an incredible idea. olmsted and vox were the pioneers of the parks system. they built the very first one io the world in buffalo in 1868, and then once olmsted and vox'se partnership broke up, olmsted continued on, and he kind of perfected the concept. he designed a parks system in milwaukee, wisconsin, heone

designed one in louisville, kentucky.lo he designed one in rochester, new york, and famously he doches signed the emerald necklace a park system in boston. one of the things that made thet park system a really great idea was you were no longer -- what it was, it was a series, you could have two or three or more parks. they were attached or they werey connected by parkways.ways but it meant you were no longer tied to a single piece of landas for a park. and you wouldn't have to haveing something like central park which was until the designed a really unattractive piece ofly land.acti instead you could have several different parcels of land thatsa were, that might have differenta landscape attributes. for instance, one of them might be kind of hilly, ott of them might have -- another of them might have a nice natural lake. but far more important to olmsted than this variety of different landscapes was the fact that it meant within the center of a city you could have a variety of different parks, all of them serving, um, different neighborhoods.hbor

and in those different neighborhoods you'd have all kinds of different people, um, o would be able from all different backgrounds to be able to mix and mingle in the parks. now, this was completely drawn,y so very drawn, the idea of the t park system, on olmsted's earlier travels through the south on the eve of the civil war for "the new york times".th. while making that trip one of olmsted's most enduring observations was that the southt in its time was in the grip of a kind of cultural poverty. and olmsted ascribed this cultural poverty to the fact that people live at such great remove, one from another, that no kind of cultural commerce was possible.on plantation owners lived very fa, apart, and olmsted noticed that they just didn't get together and share ideas and share information.ion, and so the park system, what this was meant to do was to to allow people to come togetherete from all different backgrounds i and all different neighborhoods within a city and mix in a kind of democratic experiment.

and so i wanted to close byatic saying it is, it's wonderful tog be here in washington where anhe example of olmsted's landscape is so very true to how he originally designed it. and the wonderful thing is here in the 31st century -- 21 sociat century where you can findspir olmsted's democratic spirit so very alive. thank you very much. [applause] [inaudible conversations] >> the abolition of slavery affecting olmsted in his persuasion of england frome joining the south in the civil war?

>> >> well, let's see, the basise for olmsted's abolitionism, he was what you might call a gradualist. he was a gradualist. they wanted someone objective oe sort of objective to go down there, and gradualists were people who believed that slavery was wrong, but they thought that, you know, you couldn't impose one region of the countr- couldn't impose its vision on another country, and that also this was a complicated institution that needed time to be unwound. and so for that reason theytuti thought because he wasn't a u rabid abolitionist, they thougha here's a good person to send down the travel through thehe south. well, the fact was as he traveled through the south and as you read his 48 dispatches, you see olmsted make an amazing transformation from being adual gradualist to being someone who really becomes an abolitionistab precisely because of what he witnessed. and one of the most ---- [inaudible] things he witnessed, was he sawa a slave -- one thing peoplerom

jealously guarded from him wase the actual punishment of slaves. that was a very guilty thing for the south.hin so he'd get to travel around plantations, but no one punished them in front of him. ultimately, he saw a slave whipped by his other than.cau he felt complicit because he didn't stop the overseer, but also olmsted was back in a gully, and his force flared its nostrils and rushed up out of the galley, the horse's reaction that this was a deeply morally wrong thing, slavery.at w and so that was one of the real events that caused him to deepen his abolitionist sentiments. >> i'm sorry, thank you so much. [applause] >> that event part of the 2011 national book festival here in

washington d.c. to find out more visit loc.gov/book fest. >> you're watching booktv on c-span2. here's a look at our prime time lineup for tonight beginning at 7 eastern. steven pinker presents his book, "the better angels of our nature." then at 8:30, condoleezza rice details her tenure in the bush administration. at 10 p.m. eastern, "after words," corey robin discusses the reactionary mind with s.e. cupp. that all happening tonight here on booktv. >> i want the start by talking about why i wrote the book and what i hope to accomplish with this book. i wrote the book because our party is certainly at a crossroads, and there's a division. and going forward, i truly believe we have to unite. as a matter of fact, i extended

on one of my fox interviews an invitation for karl rove and i to kiss and make up. [laughter] we can go forward a united party, but i wrote, i do talk a hot about the cronyism of especially the republican party in delaware which those leaders have been ousted. but the reason i bring that up is not to perpetuate it or to fan the flames, but to put it to rest. and to say that, you know, if that, you know, that crony crowd would embrace the principles that the grassroots crowd that our party was founded on -- not just our party, but our country was founded on -- we will be a powerhouse if we can unite. and i detail some of the things that my campaign has incured and -- endured and what i went through as a candidate again to illustrate a point. of what happens when we divide

instead of when we unite. and everybody knows, it's no secret that the 2010 elections, um, the republican party was divided. but i think that there are some examples to look at, and i draw the contrast between kentucky and my own race where in kentucky we had the nrfc, and we had senator mitch mcconnell really campaigning against rand paul, you know? he was the worst thing to happen to politics until he wop the primary. -- he won the primary. the day after he won the primary, you know, mitch mcconnell and rand paul were arm in arm, and they were saying that's the past. we've got to move forward to make sure this guy crosses the finish line. and unfortunately, that didn't happen in delaware. but it's got to happen in order for us to win in 2012. so that's the message that i hope that people can take away with them by reading in the

book. i tried to tell the story of how i got involved in politics and, um, what made me embrace the principles that i did and why i chose to become a republican. and i told it in a way that some political advisers have said was a little too honest. i probably shouldn't have admitted some things. but i did that, again, so that the reader can relate. because it's not about how many mistakes we've made or if we've ever fallen because you simply cannot pretend to be perfect. it's too exhausting and too weary to keep up that facade. we're human. but what it's about is about whether you get back up again, whether you're willing to own up to your mistakes and whether you're willing to correct your mistakes and whether you're willing to forge ahead in spite of the opposition. so that's why i chose to address many of the things that i did in my book and talk about it where i came from and some of the

hardships that i personally endured so that people can be inspired to get involved. >> you can watch this and other programs online at booktv.org. >> on your screen is the tower in the center of the university of texas at austin campus, and booktv has been on location here at the university of texas conducting interviews with some of their professors who are also authors. every sunday during the month of november we'll be bringing you those interviews at 1 p.m. eastern time as part of our university series. >> and now on booktv, anita hill examines housing issues in the united states. ms. hill, a social policy, law and women's studies professor at brandeis university, profiles several african-american women and report on their attempts to secure housing against numerous obstacles including racial and gender discrimat