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renters past. help me and giving me special thank you to our sponsors. [applause] before we begin, we ask that you silence your cell phone and turn off camera flashes if you take photos. at the end of the presentation, who will be taking questions and there is a mike here because c-span is recording. please come to the mic so it can be heard on the m recording. let's begin. please welcome marcia chaplin, author of franchise, the golden arches in black america. she's in conversation elizabeth. thank you. [applause] >> thank you all for coming today. can you hear me? it's such a pleasure, it's a beautiful day outside but it's

going to be much more interesting in this room as we dig into this important part of history. i am thrilled to be here. professor of history, georgetown university. i just want to say pulitzer prize winner 2021 from a history. [applause] citation read this right and one reason i'm going to read out loud isre that there is not a bg luncheon or anything because of covid so i don't know if you've had a stranger read this to you ever so i'm going to do it. this amazing book, franchise,

golden arches and black america. the citation read this way. for a nuanced account of the complicated role fast food industry place in african-american communities, corporate rates and capitalism that masterfully illustrates how the fight for civil rights has been intertwined with the state of black businesses. so it's a smart book and work of history way beyond what you know about the golden arches and the calorie count and a happy meal. this important story how this purveyor of food shaped

political culture, shaped the economy and so many cities around the country. it's really importantnt history and a lens i don't think people have thought about like you have so i am thrilled to be here. embedded into the american subconscious. i'm sure a stones throw from here. it's a paradox because simultaneously history of opportunity but also an opportunity, and national story so let's begin in chicago.

marcia, your first book was southside girls growing up in the great migration. here we are in chicago where you grew up so what was your first mcdonald's experience? >> i want to say thank you for everyone joining us and thank you for thiss invitation to talk about my book. i got up early this morning and took a walk around downtown and it was so emotional having grown up here and having so many afterschool programs in this neighborhood, i could count the number of places i got a paycheck around the city and i want to return to that because mcdonald's for me was at the center i think of my budding social life as a young adult so we ate mcdonald's a lot as a kid is in the 80s, that's what you did. there was no -- just social shaming about eating mcdonald's,

did but as ihat we got older, mcdonald's became the site of our social lives. a number of people i went to high school with and people of the same age and that was our social media. we didn't have cell phones but we can all meet at a mcdonald's so in manyy ways i really saw it as an ever present part of my social world and also the place where i think i could articulate my independence. growing up in chicago with mcdonald's, mcdonald's had two distinct places. one ended underwriting in the black cultural life of chicago which is how i started thinking about this book if you think about the parade, if you think about the activities happening at the museum emerging and my own participation in wgn broadcast, know your heritage. all of these things are under black mcdonald's owners and in

addition growing up in the 80s an early 90s, a lot of first corporate job opportunities for students of color mcdonald's was up there with abbott labs and xerox and those corporations providing thatla entry for a lot of black college students so in many ways, i think being in chicago, mcdonald's needs a little differentin than in other cities. >> so we know mcdonald's launched by ray croc and the franchisera started. it is a story of the franchise industry and capitalism. so how does that work for mcdonald's? >> mcdonald's grows out of socal and one of the things i talk about in the book is when we

think about how people often talk and write about mcdonald's, they frame it as this incredible innovation, which it is, getting so many people food so quickly is a really big deal for the food industry in the 1940s and 50s but for my purposes, i like to think about it in terms of what does it say about america's racial history? what does it say about businesses that grew up around the highway system, the source of so much terror and anxiety for black travelers? what we think about the suburbanization of black food in communities that had all sorts h of legal means excludingdi african-americans? when we get to the moment where franchising because growth opportunity for business, it's exciting because it's a moment in which you don't have to have a lot of business experience or have had owned a family business to make it back. this is so american, right? you can own something but you don't really own it.

i own my house but bank of america really owns my house. you can be really successful without a formal education which is one of the promises of american industry. o people were in love with the idea of franchising because someone has done all the hard work that the asterix, assume risk and liability and an incredible amount of work to make it work so thinking about chicago, can you talk about the first black franchise owner? >> mcdonald's horse found in 46 so the original mcdonald was in the 40s, it moved to chicago and 55. he's incredibly ambitious and he says we could have a mcdonald's in every bedroom community for

african-americans don't really get an entry into franchising until 68. it's immediately after king's assassination. i think for us having grown up in a world which martin luther king jr. is a hero, it's very easy to not know or misunderstand king in his moment was not the good guy of history so after his assassination -- it work over the past three decades martin luther king is a hero but in 1968 after the uprising in reaction to his death, after all of us about the direction of the civil rights movement, there is an incredible encouragement for black-owned businesses under the umbrella of black capitalism so herman patty of the first african-american franchise of mcdonald's, he's kind of in that moment where there's pressure to open up business opportunities

african-americans and mcdonald's get involved knowing there will be a a number of white franchise owners who do not want to do business in black communities anymore. they are incredibly chilled by the events after king's assassination and mcdonald's starts recruiting black franchise owners to preserve predominantly black communities. what theycd discover soon afters that it's very profitable for a number of reasons. >> very profitable for some of them, right? >> is prospective franchising so but they soon discover is called black stars at the time. black stores yield very good profits because they are often located in communities where there's not a lotot of competing businesses. market research shows african-american customers go to mcdonald's more often than their whitean counterparts but the franchise owner doesn't

necessarily f see all of the profits. so very early on, mcdonald's intervened to try to create a baseline program so black franchise owners can keep their stores. some people do lose their stores in the early years but by 75, 76, there is a real sense this is something that can work. if you put black franchise owners in black communities, not only do you take advantage of the change in landscape of inner-city business but you have a really loyal customer base because people feel they are patronizing black-owned business and it's incredibly important for the politics of the time but then it becomes trade-off. do we want mcdonald's or communitymc center? can you explain how that was interwoven together? >> one of the things that happened as mcdonald's is becoming more present in cities

like chicago and cleveland, los angeles, philadelphia, portland, oregon, community groups are trying to decide they like mcdonald's or not and they think this was something i really wanted to talk about in the book, a world in whicho mcdonald's wasn't a presupposition so i do this often, has anyone in this audience never been to a mcdonald's? or doesn't know what is? only twice has this happened. two people in the dozens of events i've done, said they have never eaten mcdonald's and they were both raised by beacon nutritionists. [laughter] but everyone knew what it was but there's aot period of time where this was not a fixture in every community so as mcdonald's is growing in terms of its presence in black communities, community groups are starting to question whether or not they will o contribute to the health and wellness of the people

around it so there are different protests where people say mcdonald's is going to be here, it has to f be black franchise. if mcdonald's is going to be here, they have to contribute to the free breakfast program run by the black panther program. if mcdonald's is going to be here, they're going to helpdo us pay for part of it. this was before corporate responsibility had its playbook mcdonald's is trying to decide if they arena going to do these things or not. some ofho these actions are so mind blowing from the perspective of 2021 for the whole office of people telling you how to not sound racist or say something but and 78, 79, even the 1980s, everything is still on the table and i think that's the part of the history i find most fascinating, how to reset the standards template for how corporations interact with communities? >> so interesting.

so how do you think -- in a way, the government really supports the expansion of mcdonald's by highways and drivers can find them easily. how has society been complicit in this expansion of mcdonald's? >> one of the things we see during this time. , very strange in 20202 here some of the rhetoric from 68 being recycled. one of the reasons there's so much unrest in the 1960s, it's not because people want more businesses necessarily, they want the fundamental things you need for a good quality of life. equal housing, schools for your

children, access to healthcare, jobs that clt pay more than starvation wages, the issues are very clear and it seems the federal government says we are not going to deliver on the promises of civil rights and were on property but of people have their own businesses may be pay will be pompous. this is my cynical be stuff but there's something about this i find so appalling that i understand why it's seductive in 1968. there has been large-scale failure of federal government to live up to anyge of the promises of the legislative reforms that have happened relative to black rights. people are saying we are not going to be protected in these ways, maybe we have a business and become self-sustaining but small businesses particularly but. few businesses have the power and we have yet to have one to undo civil rights abuses. no company can innovate

respecting someone's right to vote for anything police brutality so we know during this period of time people are thinking maybe it's true but in 2020 we have nohi excuse for thinking the appropriate response foror the torchlight summer is by from flax businesses, none of it makes sense but this is what we are possibly presented as a potential solution to the problem. >> editor solution that continues to this day. in a way what you are talking about, it perfectly expressed on the cover of your book. i don't know people can see because in paperback but can you talk about the cover of the book flex it captures a moment, a really important moment. >> i'm glad you asked. i love the picture so much. it's a picture of a gentleman giving the oath of voting to a

woman in the parking lot of the mcdonald's and the picture is from the neighborhood in rutland, one of the things i appreciated in the research process was i was able to write about black history in the pacific northwest but she's getting her right to vote at a mcdonald's the title franchise, use you are my editor get there, she come up with the title. i wasn't that great but what does it mean for mcdonald's, the space in which black rights are being pursued and realized? this is so depressing but i think it's a cautionary tale to all of us to think this is where this needs to happen. i think what i am most concerned with is saying we do have the tools to address racial injustice but if we keep on

suggesting market space solutions or market activity going to do this then we are going to continue to see these cycles of history. i want to quickly ask about advertising. advertising was so accessible on the campaign. can you talk about barreiro and the company? >> communications in chicago was so important for this moment because what's happening in terms of the marketplace is 1968 is the culmination in many ways, many years of racial unrest. it adds to where the country is and other political issues. corporations are feeling indicted thinking how are we going to reach out?

so they start investing in black advertising agents, agencies and black creative marketing and black market research companies. it takes mcdonald's on and creates serious supposed to speak to the black consumer and there is this anecdote how they try to sell african-american consumers on you deserve a break today and it doesn't work because what break? look around. [laughter] all of this is to say that is something i came to appreciate during the research of this book because there are not a lot of african-americans on television during this time. it's a big deal and even when i was a kid growing up in the 80s, it was a big deal to see commercials, to see not only black actors and actresses and

singers but black creative talent have a place to start because producing commercials, being backup singers, a dancer in a commercial, this was the platform before the internet if you spend as much time on youtube as i do watching old mcdonald's commercials, there are some big stars to get started in these commercials. i wanted to make sure this book although there's a lot of policy history and a lot of civil rights history acknowledges the creative work able to shift the representation into the 80s and 90s. >> can you talk about archival work? this is not a corporate history of mcdonald's. didn't open up their archives.

>> no, they didn't. [laughter] the blessing that goes around and interesting step, what did you find? >> i can't believe i did this, i really can't. my aunt of time i got on an airplane and stayed for days at a library to get three pieces of paper, the excitement, this is a life of a historian. i tell students, you knowf when you are on twitter and their something that's gone viral and is a joke and you spend maybe 40 minutes trying to find its origins and you feel proud of yourself? that's my job, my whole professional life. [laughter] mcdonald's has its own archive not open enter corporation, how to retell a story about mcdonald's? this is about shifting the lens.

when i tell a story about black america and 68, mcdonald's is everywhere. when i look at the papers of people like julian bond, mcdonald's is everywhere. when i looker at the archives of the southern christian leadership conference or the naacp, mcdonald's is everywhere. i think we often think about certain relationships with power. people would say was own ten bot mcdonald's and black america but i think it's a cautionary tale about who we center and turn important makers of history. this is why i'm so excited about the possibility of agr graduate student reading this book and think this is the work worst

book i've ever read, and want to go back to the same archives and write a better version of this because these things are possible but is political. there has to be programs in which you can study african-american history, there has to be faculty to advise you to do that. this isn't magic, it'so about changing who and what we think about in the places that train scholars to do that kind of work. >> toys interesting to me have you as a journalist or i, i met you, a summer intern. >> your desk was like category from my. >> your phd in american civilization? i think it's a more expansive way to look at history.

it makes me think maybe that's one of the reasons you are so smart about archives. >> being in interdisciplinary peace, your program pushes you to think about the places where knowledge can be produced so it's not just the papers put in a newspaper archive or a collection historical society, it's something you see on youtube or television, conversations people have you have access to but one of the things being back home and being reflective about this trajectory, a lot of what is possible inside the book in my career, it is because i grew up in a moment in which there were opportunity programs. this period of time, i am a generation from 68 but i benefited from the affirmative action program, minority scholarship programs, the idea

that maybe we should try to change things a little bit. i think the biggest difference between my dunes and i, they are living in a world where fewer of those opportunity and this is what i finds most irritating about the cycle of history, in some ways i can chart the programs, some are federally funded and some are part of the public but i can chart programs that got me here. when i think about the number of resources my students might have with technology, those programs and possibilities aren't there and i think it's something we have to be so careful about suggesting there's never a moment where the work is done. we are alwayslw dealing with the unfinished business the question is, how do we return to a place where we still want to expand opportunity so aggressively? >> certainly you grapple with

this because in many ways your book is indictment of capitalism and capitalism can't beat that socially responsible. i read your book. >> you read it correctly. [laughter] >> wanted it to be sensitive and not so arrogant to suggest that i am smarter than the entire mechanism of capitalism that makes me want things are makes me excited when the new iceland comes out. that's not the entire thing but it is to say if we are going to be serious about inequalities born out of racism and we can't constrain choices to wear a new mcdonald's becomes the presence in the lives of people and then have the expectation that people will be well fed and happy and

have time for the families have living wages and access to healthcare. these are compatible when it comes to curing black rights, this is the place we turn to, the idea the marketplace can put something together well but deep inequalities people are constantly reacting to it having to make choices from. >> it seems people are eager, contemporary life condemn mcdonald's and bagged food and dangers that last eager to contend with social implications of the businessca itself. >> it's so easy to go on people's food choices.

it is a long practice especiallp throughout the 20th century when you havee ideas of diets ad good and bad food. i want people to live healthy lives but i never want us to suggest what a person is consuming is more important thing the condition created the set of choices. for health practitioners and public policy people, there's a default position that african-american choices should be the first place to go as if all of the choices are equally constructed among all people. >> what are the blocks to a new system emerging up franchises that would do vegan food? >> is a vegan festival going on right now.

people have always embraced different food movements, that's neither here nor there, i just don't want the impossible burger to determine whether the community of healthcare. mcdonald's can make all the brothers they want but i want them to operate in a civil and social context where their workers don't have those wages. let's talk about the franchised, let's talk about the disenfranchised and the people who work there which are in your book. i look to your footnotes, those are great kriebel finds. >> there is this moment where people are thinking okay, fast food jobs are first jobs.

there entry into the marketplace and then people will have the other tools necessary for social mobility but we will put no money into those tools, we will not create regulatory structures on the quality of those jobs and when the nation is in financial crisis, there were not be an extension of benefits for people in these jobs and people arefi wondering why can't you advance from these jobs? when mcdonald's starts to get into black communities, there are two things that are interesting, one is a lot of the black franchise owners are praised for bringing black women into working at mcdonald's. early mcdonald's brothers fired the young woman who worked at their restaurants because they said they flirted, sexism's evergreen so slowly but surely you have young black women working at mcdonald's and some being able to become managers and seeing it as a great

opportunity.bl mcdonald's sells itself to black consumers byy suggesting the person working the counter would one day become a franchise owner into the stream if you just stay long enough, you know how much capitol you need to franchise mcdonald's? mark zuckerberg in an article a couple of days ago set his dad told him you could either have a mcdonald's franchise or send you to harvard -- isn't that a great story, so just to wrap our heads around it, that ms. of possibility in the franchisedd system so powerful but all of this is to say that the economy shifted rapidly so these jobs were not possible in terms of creating stable working families. the fight for 15 has effectively raised that consciousness among a lot of people but the $15 an

hour which is not enough. i used to live in oklahoma city, i taught at the university of oklahoma and i remember when companies were common and people would say these are great jobs and we don't have to pay a lot because oklahoma city is expensive as if this is the kind of barometer for economic growth so this is how the fast food practices really mushroomed. low wages, inconsistent scheduling, sexual harassment, no paid sick leave, workers are expendable, this is the moment we are contending with. >> for any questions, please come up to the microphone if you have a question. i have one last question. high. >> i was going over in my mind

-- >> hi, daniel, how areow you? >> i'm glad you got to the last part because i was born to talk about wage theft and i grew up inin the south and mcdonald's ws my first jobob in my nephews and my brothers first job. when i moved to los angeles, i was supporting with our family with a job from mcdonald's. the fight for 15 would have been have done in to 2011 but now it's incredible insult, almost all around the country. i'm wondering if you've seen any connection between the mutation of what mcdonald's was in for civil rightsio movement and the power memo and basic strategy corporate america to push down everything that happened about

the u.s. government but is there -- i want to say synergy or a complement right, there. >> one thing talking about archives, what blew my mind when i was looking at mcdonald's in the 60s, i found a number of instances in which groups like the committee naacp were involved in protests against segregation at i mcdonald's, why is that not within the frame of our history segregation. we've seen all of these iconic images and they are qualified before there was segregation and there wasn't and these are the places in which it happened but the arkansas movement and 62, 63, people are beaten by the police trying to do mcdonald's

was part of north carolina durham and tempest, all these places people are acting against mcdonald's and it's not within the frame. sometimes i wonder because they grafted themselves onto the narrative of after king's death, we did theid socially responsibe thing by recruiting black franchise owners, it was out of our history and they just kept on doing these things. ... >> segregation has disappeared at a time is so strange. the whitewashing of history.

it is terrible, are there any other questions. [inaudible]. >> imagine how a lot of these creature comforts are universal healthcare necessary and are kind of like you said indictment. why don't we see a lot of small business owners pushing for universal healthcare and things in the nature. and why did they really like i think it is as someone who is open a business, healthcare is the hardest thing to try to understand and purchase it and i never understood why there is ni like ideas like the push in terms of that.

why is that something. >> one of the two issues that come up is that franchise owners absorb a lot of the risk of the business and so they are very much the whole into the corporate structure the run a franchise in there and this issue with the nationally relations board in determining who do your work for, if you work at mcdonald's, you areon pretty corporate and franchise owner and they have gone back and forth on this issue when the challenges about harassment had about wage theft and taking care of the workers. and i think narrative of the small business america has been that regulation will kill your business and that your employees are people to be distrustful and invested it in all of the same time and so we can create an incredible movement of smallll business owners that if we are the fuel of america, every politician left and right excess kind of claim that these are

things that we demand from the public in order to have our small businesses and this is why i always say danger and always talking about black-owned businesses in the majority black-owned businesses do not employ anyone. the majority of black businesses will never have the ability to rebuild the south side of south chicago, they just do not have the capacity but if they have the floor, perhaps they can say, if you really love the black economically impairments, then this requires universal health care precut under precollege and childcare in things alone, could transform the possibility of small businesses that can appoint maybe one or two people and can maybe expand the ones i think that we suggest that the public good undermines business, then we lose that possibility. >> i know that we have to go and have a quick question and people

should rush out and buy this book and we can only distribute it or give you a taste of that so in a five -month-old baby at home. to think you be able to go to mcdonald's for what we do their printed. >> so here's the thing and this is what i have learned in my many months of parenting, i can determine what my child eats after certain point because i want him to be in a town at a time and this the world but this is what i do know. i will try my hardest to raise lvery sensitive child who imagines that his choices make a difference in whether it's what he eats or how he treats others, and there will be a lot of real talk about mcdonald's but i think that there will also be a lot of real talk about every choice that we have is complicated in that regardless of the choices you make, he is still my baby boy who i love so

much printed the lesson that i will say is that this is been an incredible year and i adopted a child and won a pulitzer prize and in that order and i just wanted to say that this is not about me necessarily but that a black woman in her 40s could be recognized with a pulitzer prize and this is like the point. and someone on every scholarship in every kind of program was able to do this and i feel like this is really meaningful and it does not necessarily mean the work is over. >> that is so inspiring and kudos to you, you've done so much good work and thank you. [applause] >> with us and at a session, join us all as we per book tv, today it is from recent book festivals, who will hear from author on a book franchise,

entered pretty and former tennessee governor on his release "faithful presence", fmr. gov. bill haslam rated and then a whole country fighting is the drug companies delivered the opioid epidemic in that all-stars and avium eastern on "c-span2" and you can also acces online at booktv.org. ♪ ♪♪ ♪ ♪♪ american history tv, saturdays on "c-span2", exporting the people and events until the american story and 2:00 p.m. eastern the presidency, historians revisit george washington 7096 farewell address is warnings against the threats confronting donations and then at 10:00 p.m. eastern, 100th anniversary of arlington national cemetery to him of the unknown soldiers, samuel holliday u.s. capitol historical

society shares a story from the gym including the overseas adjournment journey from the fighting feels of world war i printed the americas most revered church oil ground pretty much work in history tv, saturday and "c-span2" and find a full schedule of your program guide or watch a line anytime c-span .org/history. >> hello, my name is nathan on behalf of the humanities - i would like to welcome you to the southern festival of books here in nashville, tennessee. while you're watching is a minor joining us today and c-span, the great session for you today we are glad you're with us. so we start i would like to think if you are the key sponsors for their ongoing support rated the metro national park commission, ingram content group, the tennessee park commission, vanderbilt university, and we are grateful for your support and thank you