>> eisenhower did send money over there. he sends him arms and he probably helped prop up the regime. but whether he would've gone much further i don't know. i can't imagine. i can't imagine 550,000 american soldiers fighting a war under anyone. >> at that point, yes. 1961 would have played out quite

differently had richard nixon been the president. >> fortunately -- >> we have the history that we have. do you think the kennedy assassination come and major turning point for richard nixon? >> i do. i think the kennedy assassination was the worst thing that ever happened to richard nixon. he had a really traumatic loss in 1960. nixon had long detailed memo setting forth the pros and cons, the call and really won the argument. you can see the temptation, okay, rockefeller as governor of the biggest state. rockefeller was his chief rival. he lost a big way. but in many ways people say it wasn't that big of a deal for him. he didn't really care. he didn't want the job.

he didn't really care about the water supply in los angeles. this is one of his things. he wanted to think about big real world issues. to his credit taken on the john birch society here. and the primer he defeated a bircher, who was a hero. so nixon's kids were being teased in school by the children. they were glad to get out of here. they moved to new york and in the spring of 63 he had a good job offer. perfect job offer. he didn't have to practice much all. he could give speeches and he could be a named partner bringing in business. wall street firm, became -- all the names council. they were happy. they were going to musicals. eating at the best restaurants.

nixon was having lunch with tom dewey and all these also-rans. they were walking along fifth avenue. tricia and julie were going to school. in february of 64 -- spent nixon in new york your i can see. >> and "new york times" reporter really liked nixon. he said nixon was a happy new yorker. so february 64, jack paar's daughter, randy, got tickets for julie and tricia to see the beatles on the ed sullivan show. and suddenly kennedy is killed. that was the end. he was already meeting with republican national committee chairman i think the weekend after kennedy was shot. he could feel it coming. he had told -- there's a big columnist, i'm not going to run again in 1964. i won't run in 68 or 72.

he meant it. pat nixon was thrilled to be in your. he would've been bored, he would've and rustlers. he would've and elder statesman, but he would have had a normal, prosperous elder statesman life. and then. >> he was in dallas spent he was. >> i'm not suggesting that. no, no. just because i'm wearing black doesn't mean i'm going to go into that wormhole. but he gives a press conference in dallas before the assassination, of course to andy criticizes kennedy's leadership. that's strange for someone who's enjoyed walking his dog in new york. >> he was going to be a big spokesman for the party. he spoke in washington, and he was happy to criticize kennedy for the bay of pigs invasion.

but it wasn't as if he was running for something. he was a good republican speaking out against the opposition. and he was happy doing that. eisenhower had contempt for kennedy as a young whippersnapper spent what effect do you think the '60s had on nixon? >> by the '60s human -- >> let's mark the start of the 60s with the assassination of john f. kennedy. what do you think effective vietnam, our mounting involvement, then the antiwar demonstrators in what effect the thing that has on his understanding of what it was to be a leader? >> that was the other thing that really affected him. he felt, from the moment he was not ready he felt under siege. his inauguration, it never happened before.

people were throwing tomatoes and smoke bombs at the car and so on. then when he was president, the pentagon papers came out. even though the pentagon papers, secret history of the wars, was about the war that lyndon johnson got, nixon felt threatened by. nixon felt there was a breach of security and so when. and certainly this counterculture, he had, he just didn't get it. it was alien to them so i don't think it in some ways it didn't affect them. i think the 1960 democratic convention, i think he saw as a great political opportunity. he really didn't have much contact with the counterculture. his children didn't either. julie and tricia -- david had friends at amherst were sort of part of it. they made fun of him. and julie had friends but it was not part of their lives.

it hit him like a stun gun you could almost say when he was president. >> he did a good job on laughing though. >> he was coached by a guy that nixon met when he is on the jack paar program. and he was sort of an outlet in the world of comedy. he was a real republican. you can see the outtakes, nixon said socket to me. and, finally, said sock it to me. it might've helped him win the election. >> now, one of the things again, you this period, domestic turmoil and foreign turmoil, and it would be natural for a leader to feel beseiged, as you said. i'm wondering how much of that was brought with him? and at the knee back into to the story you lay out so beautifully. he doesn't seem to have a lot of

friends. >> his friends work of his california friends, the drowns, and i think bob and carol finch were very good friends, even the finch was sort of pushed, when finch can to work with them he was sort of pushed out, but he, he was, he was sort of a famous lonely man in many ways. particularly as president but i think the key to them, the key to his failure as president, sort of accommodation having great power comes enormous by which he never had before, and you could see him beginning to exercise after he was elected. you would see these loony memos he would send out address to mrs. nixon from the president. >> loving. >> he suggested that -- the most maligned politician in american michigan or the great comeback. where is this coming from?

and you could see this site, the combination of great power and great integrity. that's a deadly combination, a really deadly combination and i think that's what finally brought them down. >> one of the things we did at the library was we started an oral history program, because the library had been run privately and the federal government had kept all of president nixon's papers in washington, one of the outcomes of watergate, and my job was to bring it together and have a federally funded and administered library in california with the papers. so we started this oral history project 30 years late. and after all, it's much better when you get people when they're just out of the administration. and another since talking years later the time to, and may be more candid. the really, really older gentleman of the entity for the library had been with richard nixon in the '60s. you just mentioned something about him pushing him out. without exception, the men who

had been with them in the '50s, he pushed away when he got to the white house. and he brought close to him younger people. he enjoyed having of the people around, but younger people he could mold and shape. and a lot of the trouble that arose was that these younger people were willing to do what he wanted them to do. whereas the older people and the numbers we interviewed wanted, kept saying no, don't do this. now, what i'm wondering is why would he push away the people from the eisenhower period, the might've been a very healthy amateur influence on him, when he becomes president speak as he would push away people from the early nixon period. that was the saddest thing. i talked to a man, air force general, wonderful man who had been nixon's military aid. but we talked about it and he

resigned before the watergate scandal broke loose. and he said, you know, things are changing. there were these orders coming down to why is there no catch up on the boat? why is the state overdone? come from the deputy. but clearly it was from nixon. he felt this horrible atmosphere and all cleared out. the only one who sort state find at the end was rosemary would, of the old nixon hand. so people who really knew nixon and had been with them for years. judges have been with him from the early years of the vice president. rosemary was when he was in congress and so on. herb klein had been is press secretary, and they were pushed away. nixon was free to let loose his worst site. ray price who was the editorial of the "herald" tribune, he wrote come he was would've nixon's good speechwriter, sort

of the good side or the genocide, and pat buchanan who came in, who had been, worked as a conservative editorial writer was sort of the other side. that begin with the speech, most notorious speech, the one that led to the invasion of cambodia, the helpless giant speech. julie and david were not able to attend their own graduation after that. and ray price was the other said. he said he had this dark side in his lifetime. he said the darkside album with one out, but at the end of the presidency the darkside was clearly ascended spent without having a we will open the floor to questions. >> the are two of us going around with microphones. the race your hand if you the question. please their first and last and before you question the also we are recording this not only for our website that will be available tomorrow morning but

also c-span is here so you will see yourselves on national television. probably next month. anyone with a question? first question all the way in the back. >> hi. [inaudible]. i'm zac. what was taken away from that date, the part that was erased? and other things in the ether that maybe watergate there were some things about the kennedy assassination and people, that's why i'm a part of what he wanted to break into watergate. >> timothy has heard many more dates than i have. >> well, we don't know what's on the eight and administered, the national archives -- first of all, try to figure out what was

on that piece of tape, long piece of the. and analyzed it. they analyzed it and they determined that it had been, it was a deliberate erasure, and there were six to eight examples of anti-razor. so when it started raising it and stopped and started and stopped and started and stopped. the national archives i think, 10 years ago before my time there, but it analyzed the tape and used forensics, audio forensics, to try to find the bits of sound on the edges. because when you erase something on this all takes you can get everything. well, sadly there was nothing on the edges. and then just recently there was another attempt to look at it. and to evaluate but nothing came of the effect it was also an attempt to make sense out of bob

holden. bob holden was the president's chief of staff. when he met with the president, he would have a yellow legal pad and he would note decisions, action items, things you have to do. he did not write transcript of the conversation. and he did note the nature of the conversation that day. so we know from his notes that they talked about watergate. we know that the period, that what's gone from the tape is almost exactly covering the period when they were discussing watergate. soifer was accidental, it was brilliant accidental. but from the haldeman notes, and haldeman notes were never designed to be transcript, he had just a sense of nixon discussing how to fight back, have to go after them.

that's basically defend with a good offense. that's all we have. so the tape itself provided no new clues. haldeman's notes are rather limited, and the national archives get a spectral analysis to see if they could see whether there had been another page that had been ripped out and thrown away from and they're looking for indentations. your smiley. people actually tried to figure out if there was a conspiracy, really. and nothing. spent you don't think it was anything simply dennis should be -- sinister beyond what we know? >> i'll tell you my, i'll tell you what struck me as really interesting about that tape was how it had been handled. was my job as a national archives, i wrote the library and looked into this. i had an interesting take that i run a project, and it turned out

that the states had gone to this particular tape, from if i'm not mistaken june 20, 1972, the first time that haldeman and knicks are talking to each other in the white house, after watergate. they have talk to each other before but they were in florida but this is the first time next to a taping system. anyway, that tape went to camp david where it was worked on by the president, secretary rose mary woods, it also went to others. so there's number of people who could have erased it. not since richard nixon. and, frankly, my sense is that the person who might have done it is the one really deniable person in the nixon entourage. because it went to florida. what was it doing in florida? but there's no evidence, no secret evidence but i never saw any cut of whatever evidence i saw i made sure, i nature is

available and there's nothing more but i wish there were more on the eight minute gap so i just give me a speculation at this point. >> my name is brian. i'm not going to ask you about any conspiracies. probably safe to say that american collective faith in the america is a lot lower than that was 50 years ago. a lot of things have happened in that period, the vietnam war, the iraq war, 9/11, katrina, et cetera. how much of that loss in faith of government can you describe the watergate? >> and vietnam. spent and the assassination spent i think, first of all, you've got a credibility gap, the whole concept is a product not of the nixon administration but johnson. that sort of comes and. we have a man named robert mcnamara to thank for that, and that's because what you had, you had these white house briefings are actually pentagon briefings about the situation in the war. and then you have people

journalists find out on the ground that no, the war was not going away. so the public on imus in the public was naïve but the public was used to a certain level of honesty. they were seeing the convergence and that was the gap. that's really johnson. of course, the loss of both kennedys and martin luther king was shot people about the nature of our political system. but i think, i know it's part of it but i think it's vietnam and its watergate. look, president nixon in 1973 makes a statement where he denies lots of things. a year later, evidence comes out, some of which he provides, which contradicts almost completely what he wrote in 1973. so it didn't even take a year. as a citizen you have to wonder, i was lied to about vietnam by

johnson and act america, and now i'm like you about our electoral op-ed and our government's commitment of privacy by president nixon. so both democrats and a republican has lied to me, why should i believe anybody? >> david bloom. i was at an event here in africa with carl bernstein and by satellite link bob woodward, every doctor think bernstein was particularly exercised about the lifelong, after he left the white house, nixon to eradicate a list of things that he did. i was just curious about your perspectives on how good a job as historians, mr. frank and right, how good a job he did in making us forget the things he did? >> at his funeral, bill clinton sort of said let's not judge, they will come a time when we don't judge his entire presidency by his one mistake. he was in public life or 50 years. i think they're taking a broader

view of nixon now. the warp was johnson's war. he had told people the u.s. can't fool. he was a cold warrior. this was a great tragedy. 58,000 americans died in network, and 18,000 of them died while nixon was president. they didn't have to. but i don't think -- i think people will never forget what he did. so don't take it medicaid is the right word but i think we'll begin to see him for all his personal quirks, the farther the way -- away we get from them, the wider perspective that we are interesting view will have on them, i hope spent i disagree slightly with it. i think there was an effort made to alter public perceptions.

i think richard nixon had a lot to offer as president on foreign policy. one of the things i have to say that richard nixon is he believed in the big play, or you call it a hail mary pass. he was willing to take huge risks. not all presidents are will do that. detente with th the soviet union with 20. so get a lot to offer presidents. but i do believe, i know this for a fact, there was an effort to make it difficult was it takes to become available. richard nixon, richard nixon by the way was totally in his right to assume that the tapes belonged to him. because every president until richard nixon owned their papers. the national archives didn't know that there were kennedy tapes until, until the nixon tape were released and the

kennedy family dental the nation archives, you know that safe in the warehouse which we only have teased? there are tapes there. the national archives didn't know. and so president kennedy, president johnson and president nixon assumed that the tapes they were making would belong to them. well, when president nixon cut a deal, with the overseer of the national archives to try to get back to tapes, congress intervened and passed a special law at the nixon library's the only library governed by one law, presidential recordings of 1974. that will stick to that first of all that we, members of the public, had the right to get any information about the use of government power. but also protected. president nixon, former now, president nixon and sued, it was a long struggle, it took years. and, in fact, only now are the tapes coming out. when i was there we released

about 630 hours. there's another big dump of import material coming out i hope this year. it's taken years for the staff to come up, and that's because of richard nixon and his estate. so they did not want these tapes to come out. the same with the papers. nixon sued the national archives, and it dragged down. in fact, when i was there there were 35,000 pages that are found in the fault that i got out that had been put in there because the national archives is afraid of what richard nixon and others reaction would be. didn't change the world. there's of other really good mentor figure out now on the web or freed a table. but the fact of the matter is that richard nixon put enormous pressure both legal and political on the national archives, and that track of this process but and i will say one thing. if you care about access to government information, then

support -- i don't work for them anymore. support the national archives. it has very little public support. or very little political support. so that's really important, because richard nixon is not the only president to put pressure on the national archives to make things difficult spent i totally agree but i wasn't talking about -- i'm talking about the campaign to make them look better in the public eye but as far as china, i do want to say we should really give nixon, yeah, people say kissinger, henry kissinger was an old european guy. nixon was from the west coast. he traveled to asia when he was, first took office. this was nixon, this was all nixon. >> my name is lawrence reid. i'm going to read my question i want to get it correct.

you mentioned nixon's relationship with moral. perhaps more relevant to nixon's -- his relationship with the other two african-americans who served in congress during his term. which william dawson and adam fell. he championed nixon and the black union as tenure as vice president command according to an autobiography, powell was snubbed when opportunities arose for a black delegate to travel with nixon's administration. how do you feel -- that was a consistent pattern and it was very selective. although all three of those congressmen were democrats and, obviously, would've not been the first choice just for that reason on its own. it was a very selective policy figure something of a period of time of the racial politics, for it to have been limited in a circumstance like that to be able to say we will select one of these three congressmen and

the other two will be decisively turned away. how do you feel like something like that affects the legacy of a man who already has kind of come he has a very divided depend on how you can judge his relationship with martin luther king, and some of the other things he did spend this was the eisenhower administration. eisenhower had no sympathy for the brown v. board of education decision. when it was a crisis like little rock crisis, eisenhower did follow the law. he followed the constitution. he did what a five star general did. the hated this whole thing. anti-particularly didn't like adam clayton powell. he thought he was a demagogue. so i'm not sure what nixon's role in this, nixon was, you, nixon was very friendly with them because they kind of like each other. [inaudible]

>> the issue was that he was actually influenced by advisers to him he won't be able to make a decisive decision not to include. so what i'm saying is that you feel as though nixon's personal politics towards african-americans during his administration were negatively affected by his advisors that surrounded him during that administration? >> i don't think the. you're talking presidents nixon, not vice president nixon spent but i'm talking about an event that happened during his vice presidential speeches are not aware of one or the other, i'm sorry. >> i think that richard nixon attitude towards african-americans were shaped by some assumptions we have about genetics and race. which he speaks of on the tape. so i think, i think that its refusal someone who wants to

understand richard nixon's view of the world to look at how he thinks about race and how he applies his own kind of genetics. i found it an unpleasant approach. >> sorry, i think nixon's private attitudes were not were not, were unpleasant, but i think he tried, i think in this case i think he was supported the aspiration of african-americans as much as he could. he wanted african-americans to succeed in society. >> but i think he assumed a feeling. >> but if he did, i think h it'd but i think the tapes show the. in never, never expressed a publicly spent i think it may have shaped his welfare policy. i think, i came to the conclusion listening to the tapes and seeing some this correspondence with daniel

patrick moynihan pic and i think that may have shaped -- i think what we're looking at it that way. >> thank you. i'm wondering what you discovered about the relationship between richard nixon and ronald reagan during those years? >> there wasn't much. i mean, nixon didn't have much respect for reagan. he didn't think he was all that bright. i don't think he did much -- i think is putting more involved and other ministry should i had a personal experience with nixon when i lived in "washington post." i was in the outlook section, and this is when the first george bush was president, and we were saying, they're saying maybe he's not quite getting the arrival of yeltsin. i said why do we get richard nixon to write a piece for us. they said he will never utter the "washington post." and by gosh, he wrote of these.

it was a pretty good one. i came in and i said we need to work up we called his office the next morning. i can't believe i spoke to. he was up all night working on it, and so we ran it. apparently, i was told it had some influence that brent scowcroft like the peace and gave it to president bush and it was a part of his policy. >> another question over here. >> thank you very much. my name is terry stevenson to either question about during the time of the watergate hearings and so the information came out as far as nixon burglarizing the office in so many other things i'd do if it makes you indeed impeachment or not, when we go into the future, patriot act, subsequent legislation, how much of what nixon got in trouble for now would be legal? >> well, not, burglary --

[laughter] >> i'll tell you what we know about president nixon and the ellsberg burglary which have a not very far from here. what we know is that the president was told by his chief domestic adviser, but also who was the head of something called the plumbers, a group that was supposed to staunch leaks, plumbers, that there had been an operation in los angeles, and that it was part of, part of what the plumbers were doing. and it had aborted. the president was told, and the timing of this call correlates exactly what the operation here. now, the president himself was

not sure whether he had ever authorized it because he asked bud crowe who was the action officer, whether he had authorized it. later he said that whether or not he had authorized it is so thought it was right for national security because he thought that there was a conspiracy leaking information. the patriot act does not allow the us government to break into a place without a warrant. the area where the patriot act and some of what richard nixon did overlaps is a question of wordless wiretapping, and there, this is a period when it was legal to wiretap for national security purposes without a warrant. but it had to be for national security purposes. and the debate over richard nixon's wiretapping was did he do this for national security

reasons or for political reasons, because the people he was wiretapping were journalists and also people who used to be on his staff. but the warrant was wiretapping of the patriot air -- there is a reminder that era when not just richard nixon but other presidents would wiretap without work and by the way, as result of the nixon's wiretaps, some call them kissinger white house but anyway the national security wiretaps in the nixon era, congress and president ford and president carter signed bills which gave us more privacy. and it's the patriot act that undermines some of the privacy that was a post-watergate phenomenon. so for a lot of people it look like we were going back to that period that we really didn't really like, when presidents could do this willy-nilly. >> one of the things i was trying to do in this book was not to focus on watergate. because that territory is owned

by so many reporters and so on. i thought nixon was in public life or '50s in this country and i thought there were so many other interesting things to look at. >> and you proved that. >> i just think, there was no point taking him around on that 11 more time. >> the one thing that's interesting is this the same man. that's the question. >> it's a very interesting question. >> and here's the problem, which is that we have, we have almost everything this man did and he was in the white house, from 1971, february 71 until july of 73. imagine your life under that type of microscope. there's nothing like that for him as vice president. the only bits and pieces of his diary that we have are those which appeared in his memoirs.

so the indexing of the '50s is not accessible in the materials that we have. >> a lot of it is available if you sort of go into the yellow pads and find the notes he took -- >> you mean those of the median? >> there was a particularly interesting section of this period when eisenhower was trying to get him off the ticket in 1956. he said why don't you take a post such as sector a defense. this went on for months. nixon thought this was much harder than the whole fund crisis and nixon was writing notes to himself, how he would announce his going to voluntarily get off the ticket. just agonizing, i'll do it for the good of the country, terribly -- not knowing what lay before him. so you can find all these sort of notes in these meetings and the way he presented himself.

he gave a talk to the cia wants, or discussing the top of a vice president. he clearly you could see the way he saw himself as from his own self as a man who was -- he was ever. he was in the legislative branch and is in the executive branch. so in a way his job was -- is very interesting. keep looking but it's in the. there's a lot of files but how many billions of papers? >> they said 42 million pages but didn't count spent i didn't get through all of them. >> we have time for one last question. happy hour is about to stop in the lobby. you can ask our guests more questions you may have. they will both be the. also our favorite bookstore, skylight books is here thumbing copies of jeffrey frank's "ike and dick: portrait of a strange political marriage," so please join us, please pick up a copy. and now our last question. >> i think this is really fascinating, especially i've always thought it's interesting mix and relationship and how he

applied the lessons but i'm curious, in my expensive going to nixon's papers come it seems that first year he was already applying for permanent campaign model in which he was letting politics and foreign policy. and i'm curious how you see his relationship with the eisenhower years in terms of domestic policy and have that informed eisenhower's politics. did you see any of the lessons learned from those eisenhower years being applied to nixon as president? >> i'm not quite sure, yes, he was doubtful in full campaign mode when he was president, no question about it. he had learned lessons -- we hadn't mentioned murray tonight. he was a man who coached him when he first ran for congress in 1946, really coached him in 1950 when he ran and sort of,

sort of stood by his side. murray would give a course in election politics if he was sort of the karl rove of his air. he suggested the flight your upload. nixon learned that lesson the in a way that would -- a dark figursector that part of nixon s the early. the attacks i'd of him wasn't just doing eisenhower's bidding but it was something he had learned from murray chotiner. but i'm not sure i guess what you meant from the. >> from the very first month of nixon's presidency, you've already applying these lessons of domestic policy, to determine his political future. i was just curious if you saw him learning lessons from the eisenhower reacted to things like little rock and things, how to get out ahead spent eisenhower, i said, i don't think eisenhower -- eisenhower really -- little rock, eisenhower did what he knew what he had to do.

>> there's one foreign policy lesson i think he learned. richard nixon, and i'm not, in your book he suggested he may have felt that way at the time, but clear, letter, richard nixon came to think of dwight eisenhower handled the suez crisis badly. long story short, the israelis, the french and the british -- now this is a conspiracy. spent genuine conspiracy. >> gets rid of the president of egypt. the united states decides not to back great britain and france but, in fact, puts real pressure on the british to get out of this. richard nixon and ledgers thought it was a mistake. that united states -- >> but he didn't say anything. >> however we look at it, he certainly thought, very, very

open. he started talking about it. so he saw this as a mistake that eisenhower had made. and so i think that the were negative lessons. spent he also said a eisenhower changed his mind. i found no evidence eisenhower ever change his mind onto his. eisenhower sought he was taking a colonialist stand there and i saw no evidence eisenhower regretted what he had done. >> you will see in jeff's book that richard nixon was very interested in african leaders as he was in the '50s. by the chinese president, he doesn't think any action says africa is going nowhere. is not the interest. one last thing. i want you to does, because i think it's those interesting part of the nixon story, do you foresee in the '50s of the decision to change american

politics in china, 20 years later? is that something else he had to learn? >> i think what he always had was a fascination with that part of the world. and that was in the '50s. as i said earlier, i think growing up on the west coast as a california kid, the easement a lot to him so i think there was something in him always, and i think, no, nothing. he never -- i wasn't until he wrote this piece for foreign affairs which was just published it 67, but that was the first time he went public with. this was a year before he ran for the presidency. i don't know. i think it was something, just because it is fascination with asia and east specs that he was evolving, too. >> not always in a good way but he was always evolving. [laughter] >> and with that i believe, thank you very much. thank you. [applause]

>> for more information visit the author's website, jeffreyfrank.com. >> michael lee pope, author of "shotgun justice: one prosecutor's crusade against crime and corruption in alexandria and arlington" is next on booktv. mr. poe sat down with us and alexandria, virginia, during a recent visit. spent we're staying in the conference room of the arlington county sheriff. this guy behind me is the shotgun, then the shotgun was used by a prosecutor in the early 20th century to a guy by the name of crandal mackey, elected in 1903 as a commonwealth attorney for alexandria county, and he conducted a series of raids where he shut down brothels and saloons and all kinds of dangers places. and he used to shotgun when he

conducted those rates. crandal mackey was in south carolina. his father was a very prominent judge and author in south carolina. he moved appeared to be a lawyer, and then he got involved in politics of fear in northern virginia area. and what's significant about this time period is that he was part of a progressive wing of the democratic party at that time. which was split kind between a more conservative faction and a more progressive faction but this was a time when there really was a republican part to speak of in virginia. only real politics have to do with which faction of the democratic party was sort of in charge. and so the conservative wing of the party was run by political machine that was operated by a state senator at the name of thomas staples morton. known as the martin sheen. so when crandal mackey first became interested in politics and the early 1900s he got involved in this group of progressives that were trying to

essentially take over the state government. one of his first major campaigns was the caboodle election of 1902. he went down to the convention to support the progressive candidate at the time it was andrew jackson montague. montague was successful, and so that sort of launched crandal mackey's political career. when crandal mackey first elected he wanted to go after these gambling houses and the saloons and the sunday porsche anyone to shut them down but he had lots of resistance from the sheriff who wanted nothing to do with any of his because he was aligned with the political machines. so crandal mackey as a prosecutor had to put together his own poss policy of support d conduct his own rates without much help from the sheriff. so he sent out letters to all af his political supporters saying what he was about to do, what raid is about to conduct and try to get people interested to find out if they want to be part of the raiding party. he got a good response, and so the elected prosecutor took the

shot in a sort of his totem to all these places. so the shotgun is a really interesting piece of history because it's associated with crandal mackey, but it's been passed on over the years through various hands. it's actually the property of the arlington historical society. but then at some point it was displayed here in the arlington county sheriff's office. now, the back story on that is the arlington historical society had on the same and you can go to him about the history of arlington, but they were concerned about his gun because it is an actual weapon and they thought it might be a liability to have a weapon in amusing. so they gave it, they loaded technically to the sheriff here in arlington county. and it's been in possession of the arlington county sheriff ever since. the prosecutor, the modern-day prosecutor. who waited for the book was a little upset about this because the shotgun is associated with a prosecutor, and it's not in the prosecutor's office. it's in the sheriff's office. more to the point, crandal

mackey, one of his chief enemies during his time in office was the sheriff who was aligned with the corrupt political machine. so the modern-day prosecutor who is retiring at the time, he felt like the shotgun should be in the possession of the prosecutor, not the sheriff. thought also interview the sheriff here in arlington, asked her about that and she said the shotgun is ours and we're giving it. today, crandal mackey's name has been largely forgotten. there's a couple places where you can learn about crandal mackey. one of them is here in the conference room where we look at the shotgun that crandal mackey used. also in roslyn there is crandal mackey park but we are not far from it now, that the area that crandal mackey park is in it for all of these saloons and brothels and sunday bars used to be. crandal mackey was deaf like to be remembered as someone who played a critical role in creating the modern northern virginia. if you get on the metro system today and get out the roslyn

stuff, there's a huge as good and you go into a metropolitan area, a big building, lots of people. it's not like the ram shackles, sort of muddy streets where you can get shot in an alley and people were afraid to go. so today you can walk around the streets of rosalind, and it's a nice, prosperous place but you will not fear for your life but i think crandal mackey would find that his great legacy. >> during a recent visit to alexandria, virginia, booktv took a tour of several occasions that have strong but not necessarily well-known historical value with the help of comcast, our local cable partner. michael lee pope describes each location and discusses the importance of alexandria's history, next on booktv. >> this is hidden history of alexandria d.c. the last part of the title is very important because it's not about alexandria, virginia.

it's about appearance and issued and the district of columbia included parts of what's now virginia. what i wanted to do was look at this 50 year time period and get a sense of why alexandria became part of the district of columbia. what went wrong and why it left. one of the things i wanted to do with the book is give people a sense of what life was like in this time period. firefighting for example, were very differently in this time period. crying worked very differently. slavery played a crucial role in the business world of this time period. politics were very different. lots of research on the politics of this area. this was a big 10 in what was essentially a democratic city. so i thought those kind of interesting because today in the modern world is a democratic town and what is essentially a republican state. so from that sense there's sort of a line you can look back to this time period and see thos te

was a political decision than that still exist today. when i was doing research i found three places that we like to take you to get a sense of what it's like to live in alexandria d.c. one of them is jones point part because we'll find the original boundary marker for the southernmost tip of the district of columbia. the other is the booming ground were very famous duel took place between sector estate henry clay and virginia senator john randolph. the other place i was interested in taking you is the infamous slave park which is where we're headed next. we are standing in one of the hidden gems of old town alexandria. this is the infamous slave pen at the franklin at armfield slave do. were located right now in the basement of the northern virginia urban league. this was at one time the most prosperous slave business in america. franklin and trying to would round up slaves -- armfield

would round up slaves of all point, virginia, maryland, even delaware. they would bring him here, process them and then they had camps. there was a men's camp on one side of the campus and a woman's camp on the other side of the cabinet. they were not allowed to go mingle with each other, and the catcher until they could be sold in large quantities down south. and so then they would be transported either the shipper sometimes marched on foot down to mississippi and louisiana. when the union army invaded alexandria, one of the first places they came was to do this slave pen because it was this infamous spot in slavery, have been featured in all of the abolitionist newspapers at the time period. so when the union soldiers came here, they came in here to the basement where we are now standing and found slaves actually shackled to the wall. slavery played a very important role in the history of the early history of the district of columbia, it also played a very important role in why alexandria wanted to leave the district of columbia.

if you're to take a look at this 50 year time period, alexandria was part of the district of columbia, you would see that the business of slavery was the predominant basis in alexandria. it's where all the money was at. so the slave trading operations that were standing in right now was the most, one of the most successful businesses in alexandria. and he was so successful as a matter of fact, that the threat posed by the potential ou outlag of slavery and the district of columbia was enough to push this movement forward for what they call retro session, which was alexandria leaving the district of columbia. so slavery played a very important role as the predominant business during this 50 year time to get it also played a key role in why alexandria wanted to leave the district of columbia. >> we are standing up at the dueling grounds in north arlington. this is a famous spot because this is where the duel happen between sector estate henry clay

and virginia senator john randall. this is a little-known duel. i actually had never heard of this bill into started researching the history for the book, but these are two titans of american politics to the modern-day equivalent of this would be sector estate john kerry versus virginia senator mark warner. so they're right here on the day of the duel. after randolph had given a speech on the senate floor, calling click a blacklist which is a simply a corrupt gambler. i did not like this. they ended up having a duel together. they arrived here. on the morning of the duel they were handed weapons. they shot at each other. both sides miss. they were headed new weapons. a shot at each other, and missed again. and so they came together, and so rendell said to click, you owe me a new coat, mr. clay, because the bullet had pierced his code. so clay said to randolph, well, i'm glad the dead is not greater. >> right now we are at jones point. were standing on top of the southernmost tip of the district

of columbia. this is the boundary marker that was late in 1791, when the federal government was creating that district of columbia. we look at the map of the map of district of columbia, it looks diamond shaped. but if you look at a modern map of d.c., it looks like moths have eaten the southern half of it. that's because the virginia part of the original district was wrecked as he did back to virginia. this point is a significant because it was the original boundary marker. to a number of boundary markers that were laid all around this area to point out the diamond shaped. the actual boundaries of the district, but this was the first, and it was also, there was a lot of ceremony that was involved in the placement of the stone in 1791. this is when it was placed here. so the significance action has come a long story that dates back to 1784. the end of the american revolution. the congress was debating how they should have a capital city

and whether or not they should create a district. a guy by the name of eldridge gerry, who we know from gerrymandering, suggested that a district be created, a federal district. he suggested two possibilities. one was in new jersey and the other was georgetown, maryland. so the congress debated it and eventually chose been. then they approved funding for georgetown and threatened. the idea would move at different times of the year. virginians were really willing to go to great lengths to make sure that the capital was placed here on the potomac. one of the people that played a key role in this as a guy whose name has been kind of lost in history, but a man by the name of david stewart. this was a friend of washington's. he was actually related to washington, a business part of

washington. he laid the cornerstone here in that 1791 masonic ritual. the infamous compromise of 79 is what finally seal the deal. it have to do with the assumption of debt. at the revolution were from the whole lot of debt that had been taken on by the various states. and the politics of this, the southern state that largely paid off their debt by the northern states had not. so i always nation alexandria hamilton, one of the people who assumed these debts, james madison was against that. but madison and the virginians wanted the capital of the potomac river. so there was a famous dinner that was held at monticello, thomas jefferson south, where thomas jefferson invited james madison and alexander hamilton, and then over dinner at mama jo and perhaps over a few glasses of your they struck the compromise of 1790.

in exchange for the capital being placed right here on the potomac river. so the compromise was the key deciding factor in creating the district of columbia. they came there to the spot we are standing on now, and had a masonic ritual. the masons have their aprons and their trials and corn oil. they give some speeches right here on the spot and did the ceremonial lighting of the southernmost boundary marker, which is what we are standing over now. and that was how the district was created. >> for more information on booktv's recent visit to alexandria, virginia, and many other cities visited by our local content vehicles, go to c-span.org/localcontent. >> at the end of the working day, about 2 a.m., the prime minister churchill would say soup, out loud very loudly. staff heard that that was the

signal the working day was over. the secretaries could leave can begin typing of today's mammals. and he would have his cold jelly consommé which he always ate before going to bed. churchill loved all game, especially to the anti-raised geese on his farm. at one dinner as the goose was laid upon him at the table he said quote, you carve your this goose was a friend of mine. in all my research into churchill's life i never found a mention of a vegetable. and he made fun of vegetarians who he called matt depeters. at a meeting he -- not eat us. gentlemen, if you're finished going, we will get on with more important matters. and another, all the nut eaters and food fabrics i've ever known died early, after long periods

of senile decay. another churchill favorite food was irish stew, with plenty of onions, and surprise lake sometimes pineapple. this is the mail the churchill served to general eisenhower when they planned the invasion of europe. and, of course, caviar. churchill loved caviar. he was thrilled when he received lots of caviar as a gift from the soviet union. churchill eight small portion. churchill loved picnics. whenever the place or the weather, even in wartime, there's a wonderful photo in the book shall churchill in a three-piece suit enjoying a picnic sitting on a rock by the side of the road. a picnic with roosevelt at hyde park.

a picnic on the banks of the rhine with his generals. and the north african desert with friends. he established his own picnic rituals, enthusiastically singing old indian army coats and calling for versus i could only be recited at picnics. much has been said and written about churchill and alcohol, some of it true, most not, some exaggerated. i go into detail in the book about churchill's drinking habits. churchill had been told -- brazil, so, was told that churchill had been a drunk. a charge one or two of his critics repeated. churchill did consume more alcohol and we're used to today, but not a great deal by the standards of his contemporaries. and drink did not affect him for his work. >> you can watch this and other programs online at booktv.org. >> you have been washing