the street in the soviet union yearns for peace. the government is communist. and those who run it are communists. and that means we and they view such issues as freedom and human rights. very differently. we must keep up our guard. but we must also continue to work together to lessen and eliminate tension and mistrust. my view is that president gorbachev is different from previous soviet leaders. i think he knows some of the things wrong with his society and is trying to fix them. we wish him well. and we'll continue to work to make sure that the soviet union that eventually emerges from this process. is a less threatening. but it all boils down to is this. i want the new closeness to continue. and it will as long as we make it clear that we will continue to act in a certain way as long as they continue to act in a helpful manner.

even when they don't that first pull your punches. if they persist. pull the plug. still trust but verify still play but cut the cards. still watch closely and don't be afraid to see what you see. follow us at c-span history for more history in the news. follow american history tv on twitter facebook and youtube for schedule updates to learn about what happened this day in history watch videos and learn more about the people and events that have shaped the american story find us at cspanhistory. during a recent discussion on his new book history disrupted historian. jason steinhauer talked about how the internet has contributed to our historical knowledge as well as to historical misinformation. here's some of what he had to say. this book is set up in a way so

that it introduces an idea and that idea is a history and we'll talk about what that is. just like there's e-commerce and e-trade. i suggest that there's something called ehistory. and it talks about sort of these value structures that are in opposition the values that sort of underpin the traditional practice of history and the values that underpin the web and how those two sets of values clash and why that necessitates this thing called a history. and then the book then takes you through a series of case studies wikipedia twitter facebook instagram, which shows how these classes of values play out and why certain he history that conforms to a set of values and conditions becomes visible in your feeds and why other forms of your history that don't conform to those values you will never see and at the end the last chapter is actually called does history have a future and the question is will this kind of ehistory eventually lead to

the end of history as we know it you can watch the full program at c-span.org/history. just search jason steinhauer or the title of his book history disrupted. since c-span was founded in 1979 historian and author douglas. brinkley has participated in many of the networks programs forums collins and special projects as well as on book tv and american history tv. c-span sat down with him for nearly six hours to get his insights on american history popular culture good books and more. up next part two of that conversation which focuses on his teaching career the late historian steven ambrose and professor. brinkley's book the magic bus. from time to time and not very often, but you'll see a story where they say doug brinkley has a team of writers that does all of his work for him. you want to deal with that one

and never have a team. i i it's myself and my wife and one person assisting me the team thing might be when i ran the eisenhower center. in new orleans in new orleans. i was running a center and so people and this is when steve ambrose was getting big. and also getting into trouble with plagiarism steve did and i was there too being very prolific and so there's a feeling like this there's this team at the eisenhower son and the same with steve ambrose steve would just do everything himself and his son you ambrose would would help him some but i think just people when you're productive people are wondering how can you be so productive? i don't hear that anymore. i think at a certain age people get to that's what you do. i mean you're i'm doing a book every couple years if anything now, i haven't had a book out a couple years. i'm getting the opposite like what's going on, you know, let's

see what's happened to you. you know, what's their advantages and disadvantages of being prolific the advantages are here. i'm always i've never take a break from one book to the next. and to me the questions i can never answer like how long does it take like i'm writing right now at book called silent spring revolution on john kennedy rachel carson in the 60s environmental movement. well that book began when i long ago did my book the wilderness warrior on theodore roosevelt? and because i'm learning how then national park service worked. i'm learning how the us forest service works. i'm learning. what the bureau of biola you know, the biological survey is i'm learning about the audubon society. wilderness society or you know the garden club of america on and on i was learning about all of that doing tr and then i did

fdr rightful heritage on the same theme and a book on alaska. so i'm doing all the research so even though now my books dealing with the 1960s. i'm doing all my research for the 1970s 80s and 90s because if you're going to go to a bancroft library at university of california berkeley you might as well add a couple days in why you're there plugged in and research what you might be using down the line. and so, you know, i have boxes and boxes of conservation documents. i actually am a collector of things dealing with conservation in the united states. and so it's i'm ready for the next one when i'm done with this one. go back to georgetown for a minute masters in a phd big takeaway for you best teacher besides a couple of you other teachers that you had there impressions that were made on you because at georgetown and being in washington there was name thomas dodd who was his

brother was christopher dodd at the senator of connecticut tom dodd became ambassador to costa rica and he was a central american specialist and i loved taking classes with him because he was a great storyteller and he had been an ambassador down there. and so i gravitated to him a lot. we became we had a friendship that developed and i loved taking central american classes with him. there was a great teacher i had named walter laker. who would you know write about? i remember doing a paper for him, which i'm still don't have the answer to which was whether john brown is a hero or a terrorist. put your instinct god it's just sort of you know, it's which way you will you look at it. it's a you know, he was a very

changed man john brown and blood on his hands murderous and then you see the harpers ferry and in his bravery and how it helped trigger the civil war and and then you see people that are i admire emerson and thoreau in particular backing john brown, which makes you want to back john brown too in and yet i we're looking at where we're terrorism and modern terrorism. and yes, he he was a terrorist so the curry used to force an issue like that that had no easy answers on what it you know on world history and it was intense. you taught it hofstra. tulane new orleans university and he ended up at rice. he also taught the naval academy. what did you learn as you through high school through georgetown through ohio state about what a good teacher is.

i never had to i just believe in the term storytelling. i want people to lean forward and say that's a you know when i do a lecture never to be bored. i if there was one thing that would does ruffle me or would hurt me is if i i was born. and i in it works for me because i i'm not going to be able to educate students on everything. i'm still learning things every day, but i can maybe get them to want to read books and get excited. i'm trying to get excited like you're taking a class with me at any of these schools on presidential history. i want you to feel you know, washington or james monroe a little bit or william mckinley, or at least one of follow the presidency in your life reading. bad pieces maybe an occasional biography. i know presidents aren't going to be the students' lives, but i feel i make inroads that they

get into it and it's fun for them and that's exciting for me. and because i come from my you know, my mom being a teacher the teaching parts been easy for me in the sense of coming in and doing the lectures. it's the writing part some so much harder, but i learned over time brian that through publishers good editors, you know when you get feedback on this is but you know, my problem is tangential material. i turn in too long a manuscript and then an editor, you know a guy trent duffy right now, but they've you know, i've had different ones a woman's shelby saddler used to help me do this. like in acts like are you kidding me? you're you're subject is. john f. kennedy you're going into the life story of ted sorensen, and then you're going the life story and it be you start losing the narrative.

so editors have helped me kind of keep it focused. even with that said a lot of my books are probably too long that i reject cutting things out because i'm i always feel if i don't put those tangential characters and they might get lost for history. i'm not so i it's sort of i'm doing it out of actually what i think a noble cause but i might be self-defeating myself by bringing so many characters into a given narrative that the reader might lose track of them. first met you in this facility. were sitting in right now and interviewed you about this book the magic bus. which made a interestingly enough didn't know at the time is 1993 that it was going to have a big impact on this network. we just shut the buses down after 27 years and so the magic bus made a big difference on this network. it went all over the united states all 50 states. we had the two for a while.

they were yellow buses as you well known and you've appeared on them, but i want to go back to the person and my memory as there was a russian american in one of your classes that gave you the idea of going around the united states. well, the magic bus is one of the best things i've ever done. it's um, it's it's the thing. i may be in the end of the most proud of wish i was still doing it. we would take family vacations growing up you meant we mentioned me visiting historic sites in ohio, but we had a pontiac station wagon. 24-foot coachman trailer and we had our dog hector and my sister and i and a trailer full of cold cuts and we would go around the country camping and some of them in parks and some at the old koa type of places. so i really saw the lower 48 as by the time i went to college

and fell in love with the country. i still love i mean if i had written on my tombstone i wanted just to say i love america. i just love the diversity of our country and the places we i would travel and see and the other hand that musics are talking about ken. keezy wrote one flew over the cuckoo's nest. novelist had a bus on aim further and and then there was like, holy idea of rock and roll tours on a bus and and all of that and i was at teaching at that point at hofstra, but it was more about coming. and i went to georgetown and then now i'm in new york. there was a provincialism. they they were provincial in this sort of prep school world and they didn't really under i felt they there was a misunderstanding of montana or nebraska or alabama that they were or texas like everybody texas wears cowboy hats or says,

you know as and has an oil derek in their backyard, you know, it's just that and it happens everywhere provincialism. so i thought and then i had gone to europe once on a let's go you're a past where you get a rail pass and you can go to all the countries on the trains. well, we don't have a train system like that in our country. so the only way to do it is bus and i just started figuring out. let's do a class called american odyssey a woman named linda longmire at hofstra and i went for summer with kids to middleburg the netherlands and i did a bus tour. through the netherlands doing dutch history, which was found. i had a really learn a lot and it was great, but i thought let's go grab america by the scruff of the neck and it's only because brian i had done the atchison book. and i did driven patriot on forrestal and that book did it's

you know, exceedingly well with for canov, but they both got reviewed in amazing ways. and those are pretty establishment figures that when i went to the president of hofstra and said i want to take students on a bus traveling the country all over for semester earning credits that they didn't throw me out of the room. you were 31 at the time. yeah, and i they know i knew what i was doing. my classes were popular. my books were good. and i said, that's what i this way to do it and to their credit they they went with that they you know, they asked all the right questions about insurance, but the question was what bus and so the nassau. see him and where they had a recreational vehicles show. that's our county long island. yes in long island and there i met a guy named frank perucci who had a bus that he called a highway hotel and he looked like buffalo bill. i mean he almost like i think

purposely try to dress like buffalo bill and a wonderful guy and we talked and i looked at i was just what i was looking for one fancy, but there was enough room a bathroom, you know speakers system air conditioning, you know basic stuff and that's sorts a little brooms like with bunk beds. yeah, and and so we i went with it and i presented it back to the president and back to the provost and so on the eve of this trip in 1992 to my surprise. we were loading on the bus a new york times reporter showed up that stroke had notified about this trip and they did a story in the times of the sort while other kids go to fort lauderdale to party. these kids are learning american history really nice solid article and that started getting male to me people calling. how can i do this trip it became

a thing and in fact that new york times articles why that book was written because lee haber who now is the key person that does hope for winfrey's life works for oprah. all these years does oh magazine, but more than that really is like this with oprah. she called i talked to her on a phone booth in, kansas. where she said i want you to do a book. i read that new york times story. are you taking notes of your trip? i really think you should write this and and i've subsequently did and i've stayed in touch with lee. i talked with her a couple weeks ago. there's a quote from that. work by alexander. is it citron? russian jewish immigrant who said to you one of your students. why can't we learn american history across america rather than here on long island? yeah. yes. he never see him anymore. i stay in touch they get these people's write me letters, you know, most of the magic bus students.

i did it year after year most of them stay in touch with me. i mean they i'm every week i am talking to at least one and usually two people that were on the magic bus, but do you remember this guy? oh my god. i adored him and he was a very funny kind of long-haired a russian kid with a great sense of humor who really did i mean he came here suddenly. he's on long island, and he really wanted to you know, see the united states he wasn't kidding and yeah, i was very you know drinking. i think have changed. i was really loose talking with students. like let's go do that let the other you know, my office would be like a beehive of students coming around and you know and and ideas and this one what just took fire. i mean there was a hunger for american odyssey course, i would

assign the books. we mix it we had so much fun because we would go to a ranch and do branding or we would visit a factory or we would meet a top poet or we would you know, go to visit martin luther king's auburn avenue or you know, john steinbeck's salinas and it brought everything to life and i had fun and no interpersonal problems. so go back to the here's a student wants to get on this bus. what did it cost them less than if they stayed at hofstra. and costs we were living on the bus. they didn't have to pay a dorm fee. and we do group cooking meals like, you know hamburger at the fireside at a park and i was able to get some hotel chains like marriott to say in hilton to put us up occasionally for free and allow us to eat their salad bars at you know their

places once in a while just because i wrote a letter to the public relation said we're traveling america a lot of those chains were very friendly. they just said look if we have oh if we're booked, no, but if we have a lot of vacancy so it's just some room frank perugie drove this bus. yeah, and he left hofstra for how many weeks. well 92:1, i think we did. again, that's the first one that we did. we were the course was eight weeks. it was eight weekday on the road free. yes, and how did they have? to read well, that would be the one complaint some people. well, i had a rule on the bus saying in the front that came from henry l stimson that atchison used to like which is complaints are bore in a nuisance to all and undermine the serenity essential for endurance complaints are born a

nuisance for all and undermine the serenity essential for endurance. the one rule i had is i don't want to hear your problems. i not do i'm going to enjoy this trip. i want to learn but everybody's gonna have bad days every i know whining basically and and that was it. i mean, i was really hard on that no interpersonal issues. i mean people would ask mobile. how do you get along it would never happen on any of these trips because people were just so it felt privileged like my god. how old were the escape 21 i guess average age and how often did they have to read though? oh. read all the time because i gave them an advance the reading list so they had in order to get in it. it evolved brian the first year it was novel, but once you're getting new york times pressing all it became a big deal, but every year i would make people, you know, read books some in advance. so when we first meet we would already be taking a test, you

know on books before we even got on the bus so meaning if we reading will a cather novel i would require it before the class started. so when we go to nebraska to willow cathers homestead they'd already read the novel but then we would read live on the road meeting writers. we would pull in and saw arthur miller and had the students read death of a salesman and they would sit in arthur miller's house and talk with them about why he wrote that novel we meet with tony morrison. we we meet with lawrence ferling getty who who just passed we had i got involved waylon jennings on the bus i had kinky friedman towns fans aunt beau diddley did a seminar and i thought i'd have. doers people come and do a seminar. i was waylon jennings like oh whelan's hosted us all to a party in california, and then we went to his concert and i i a

guy named myron crockett an african-american student. thought it was hilarious that that there was just being so that duke's of hazards, which the whalen had done a theme song for and he had said, i'm gonna see what wayland he's got to do the dukes of hazard song and it wasn't normally i think in wayland's thing but waylon said, oh if you want to hear that, i'll play that for you tonight, and he did it. he was a really nice man a man. i got connected to wayland through a friend who you know, but what beyond seeing wayland jennings and concert i went in and to talk about buddy holly and the crickets and early rock and roll and you know, and so he would do a seminar on that. it's a me lecturing on you know, bill holy in the comments brought in rock and roll and you know or or something here was waylon jennings. telling his stories much like you do on c-span talking to

people. i want to read a quote from you in the book. and i want you to think of it in terms of other phds professors in the classroom hearing this. and also people who run universities. you say i promise you. that in six weeks these students will learn more about american history. our writers our culture our music our president than they would in four years of a normal university. yeah, but see that just that basically says why go to college when i can do this well if you have it's there's some truth to that. they you know, i had painted on one of the later buses and emerson quote. no, they're not truth, but in transit. you know you got to supplement it with reading though if you're going to try to cheat on it. it doesn't work meaning it's if you're gonna read on gettysburg, it really helps to this at the

gettysburg battlefield and one of the things i took advantage was is that local? we have great historians in our country and they're working all these sites. and they're a storehouse of knowledge. so if you're going to get a park ranger take you around gettysburg, you can ask that person any question and they'll answer it. i mean anything you want about it, but you got to come in a little prepared of what you know, when was gettysburg and why did it matter and all in order to ask the right questions, but i love local historians all across the country that are running museums and state parks and houses. always accommodating and i think it's an one of the most undersung spots parts of our country. and if i i kind of am doing it with conservation i want to preserve historic sites and forts and you know, it's a nonprofit kind of passion of mine. but so in many ways, i'm just the shepherd leading the flock

to here is the expert. i mean, we we have no idea the interesting different people we would you know meet on you know everywhere and that's what makes it. so amazing because now the students want to learn more about that thing they want to learn more about the civil war because of you are buses when all of the united states and captured the same thing you're talking about with local historians. all of that is available free of charge on our website for people who are interested in hearing this and interested in history. how many specific bus trips did you take total? oh, probably, i believe it was five years in a row we would do them. so from hofstra then we start doing them in new orleans the university of new orleans, and then i started taking kids on civil rights tours where we

would just do and you guys at c-span covered some of that where we would go on a civil rights to or the big year after this book came out, but in 1993, i had a natural gas. i had the buses run on natural gas one thing that occurred in that book brian that you read the magic bus is what we were in northern california driving the avenue of the giants with the great redwood trees and frank's matt bus was just churning out the diesel you can see the black clouds coming, you know, and i just question i say to god be a way to take a bus. on that's not run on that kind of diesel going into pristine areas like that. and so i started by honestly a dial the department of energy who put me to this person to this person or this person suddenly. i was talking to someone in colorado and said you can't do it on hydrogen fuel cell and all the easiest thing what you're

looking to do is natural gas. you could run the bus on that a natural gas bus and then i got connected to ohio about my home state in columbus where the i was able to get a buses that were natural gas buses and now i use two buses. not one. and to tell you i don't know if you even knew this but that year writing with me on the magic bus was a young writer who lived on the bus with how much students named elizabeth gilbert who went on to write eat love right eat love pray, which is sold a zillion copies. student she was interested in my approach to teaching because of the book and said i want to ride a board if somebody wrote me like that. i'd say come on board if you want to and she ended up writing a a long essay about the magic bus for spin magazine, which was then like an alternative to rolling stone. so did you just five different

trips or five different years years different trips and why i know i've heard you talk about a young person that's now already starting to try to do this. there are a number of them. yeah. hey in and how do they do it? they do it any differently. well, i'm dealing right now with the young woman professor at down at stephen austin in texas, and she now had trouble finding the type of bus i did but she's found these super duper vans, which aren't good for obviously sleeping. they're it's like a stretch van. so we're going to help her. i told her, you know, i don't always try to help when i get these letters, but i wanted to help her and i've told her that the key that she's missing is trying to get these hotel chains to give her some rooms like she's thinking she's gonna camp,

you know, big bad national park and then but you we need showers people need to get a rest people need so if a hilton would do it and they they're much more friendly if they show you know, so i'm gonna help her trying to get some rooms for her trip, but she was doing it leaving in august for a whole semester and doing exactly what i did and i just unfortunately had to give her their heart call because she's always asking my honest advice. i told her to postpone it semester do to covid. i just don't know what the falls gonna be like yet. i said what can't you do it the next semester and then she talk her president of her school and he agreed and they gave her 10,000 bucks extra money. they felt bad. she had to switch it. but anyway, i have about four people like this right now that i'm helping that were inspired by the magic bus that i helped how many credits um, they're doing like 20 credits, you know, so my nap after hofstra so many

students wrote like say to me from all over i had george bush's goddaughter on my bus. i had two native americans students from haskell a emerald thomas a naval emerald. i believe he was the second black admiral american history ran davenport college at yale. i had i think three yale students living on my magic bus. i had students from university of virginia. did you sleep on the bus? yeah, we all did we tried to his camp? i mean when you say sleep on the bus people would be while we're driving. on their sleeping bags writing journaling, but then we would get off and go to you know, we've had it figured out every night either campsite a place to park so you didn't drive overnight. mmm, no because the driver couldn't keep driving that much. i mean legally, he probably overran what he's supposed to but for insurance purposes and

all he can only do you know, i think he was supposed to only drive eight hours or something. he probably do 10, but then we would try to make our designated camp site like at a state park or what went wrong the engine broke. we had we had one magic most triple and all the way up to alaska up to fairbanks the alaska highway to get yeah, and and we touched the pipe because we were debating whether they trans, you know, i'll ask a pipes a good idea bad idea, but we were and and then it broke pretty seriously and we got a little bit marooned. that was really the worst thing. i mean, but sometimes it would break and you have aaa and they fix it real quick. it's something small, but this one had to get a re-haul and we once because one of the two buses had a problem i had to get a third bus in. see, but i started partnering brian with the columbia gas people natural gas in ohio so i

could call them and say they were i was a guinea pig for natural gas, which did fulfill what i wanted to do. you could put your face behind a natural gas engine and not have the black diesel. that's all i did. i just wanted to have a conscience where i wasn't sure doing diesel. natural gas has its pros and cons to but it was a cleaner energy. and so i called it. you know, i wanted to experiment with that. did you have one of those situations where you had a student that? i don't know what to say bugged. everybody was unusual caused trouble and you had to ask leave the bus. no. you know, you know why because i never had. they never they were good young people. i mean we would scout them. i mean you're it's like getting applicants. i mean there were some issues but usually be involved with you know, no drugs allowed.

including marijuana period i i beat my career be over because i had to make it really serious guys. yeah, do you have anybody with you helping you? um yes, a guy named kevin. willey came along helped. he's now in sharif port. you know, we yeah that we had you know, i'd have somebody come a woman named beth neville from hot went from the hofstra year, you know, she came and helped so people would i always have a co-person helping with things. it was beth was great because you know, she was great at booking. things the key is just where we spend in the next night. and what are we doing? it just keep it moving. let me ask you about the places you taught and just a very brief reaction. tell me what you remember about hofstra on long island. that the president james stewart

and a dean there that i became very fond of that. they just embraced me fully. and that meant a lot meaning the love of the administration this was this was risky for any administration unleash a guy like me what could go wrong right a bunch of kids on a bus traveling country with the university and they went with it and and then later they came and gave me an honorary doctorate from hofstra for the magic bus because you know, it became a big success tulane. um, tulane you know, it's a just maryland's i wanted to the city is so spectacular and so fun but at the university itself, you know it was it's good students. it's good. i had a better time though at you when i first came to the university of new orleans. there was that first before he

went to yeah, because i had a that's where ambrose had been and he was retiring and i took over the ice and howard center and that we were collecting the oral histories of world war two vets. now the magic bus doesn't have much to do with the collecting of world war two vets, but i was able to fold this program into the eisenhower center because steve thought it was a great idea steve ambrose wrote the book on the lewis and clark trail and he traveled the entire lewis and clark trail. i went with them on a big hunk of the trail and it was great. how'd you go we went by and we went over lolo pass. we did hiking, you know, steve got very i later went the whole, mississippi river with steve. he was a real believer in this that you take people that goes you got to get the young people excited about history. how'd you meeting and i met steve liked my books on you at

heart ambrose was a cold war historian famously wrote a two volume biography of eisenhower three volume on nixon and i met him in american university here. i had delivered a paper on the berlin wall crisis. i met steve at that meeting and then we stayed in touch and i was teaching at hofstra and hofstra. he asked what i remember about it. we do these great presidential conferences still done. yeah, and i did was in charge of the one on theodore roosevelt, which was a really good one because tr lived at sagamore hill just road, and it had a lot of local interest and but i think ambrose i believe it was the nixon one. i believe they may have been a different president, but he he was up there and we talked and he said i want to can you have dinner while i'm up here? and he said i'll stay an extra

night because i told him i had to run this conference and doing this and then he sounds gonna hang an extra night sweet dinner and garden city new york, and he said you're working on a book on jimmy carter and that's he's in the south and i'm retiring and i want you to take over the eisenhower center. what was the eisenhower was steve's idea to collect d-day battle of normandy oral history. and really expanded it into battle the bulge on and on but collecting the european theater at first oral histories of world war two vets which steve correctly is to say i wish we had a tape recorder at silo or you know chancellorville or something in taped what occur we did have the opportunity to do to communication to get the real stories of all these vets. you would think somebody would have been doing that but nobody

was ambrose was like the one that started interviewing an interviewing all the world war two vets. it was it was a great project that he initiated and it led to the birth of the national world war two museum. how did he end up in new orleans? and why the eisenhower center at the university? well, that's steve was a colorful character. he came up during that. i mean see there's an eccentricity to him. he did his he played football. he's from wisconsin played football linebacker for the badgers. and was good starting, you know linebacker. then went on into history and worked with the famous. tea harry williams the biographer of ue long he worked with at louisiana state and one thing led to another but steve then worked with milton ice and

howard johnson hopkins the brother of dwight and steve wrote some books. he wrote the history of west point still the best history of west point eisenhower wrote the preface to steve spoke on the history of west point, but he then moved out to kansas and he got thrown out of the faculty at at kansas because he was part of a group that heckled nixon coming to campus over the vietnam war. he didn't like nixon. he did not like the war and it became a very famous incident because he was really with the what? he was a military historian. with the eisenhower brand look like he was made to be a hollywood. you know, he spielberg used to say that steve looks like he's you know, john wayne or something in and he was part of a faculty group.

that was boo boo and got noticed and they gave him a reprimand and all of this the administration officials. why would they do that? i disrupted the president's speech. did he have tenure? no. and he got left there and it wasn't a very good thing to have on your resume that you've got, you know trying to get a job and you they weren't going to recommend you because she did that your last place of employment but the university of new orleans hired him and so he was very grateful and then he he built this incredible career up for himself. eisenario and nixon who he actually ended up liking except for the war as he matured and girl older, but he caught he was caught up in that. fervor of that era, you know and and so in new orleans they let you be what you are and steve would was eccentric in the sense when he would often wear like when he wrote on mary weather

lewis he tried to wear an outfit the way lewis would wear an outfit. or he would wear, you know, he would like really do immersion history like fall into well, you know, you know and sometimes the thought he you know, he could talk like nixon and eisenhower he had them he when he lectured about him. he had their voices perfectly and he would bring a dog to class and the dog would sit there and go retrieve students papers and the dog would go when you put the paper down the dog would put it in stephen the kid walking up. that's what i mean by eccentric. you know students love that about him, but he never fit in steve was his own guy. he was early died of cancer. he would smoke died in a 60s. one after the other the cigarettes like and light him

up, but he was giving up the he was quitting but in back to the garden city dinner, he said i said well, i'm in new york at this point. i was living in new york city in manhattan and in he said look, i'll double your salary whatever your salary you're getting on hofster of double it all that got my attention. i started making justifying it, you know how our president see carters in the south, you know more orleans and money talk. yeah money talks. so it was he said look, but if you don't like it, i'm gonna hang out for a year. come down. i'm going to run the eisenhower center for one year while you're there show you what's going on and fair enough if you don't want the job. leave give you a one one. what year was this? um, this was 93. what year did he die? i can't remember right now, but to say 2000 and two something

like that. you took over the in our center would be maybe here maybe three. okay, it's okay. i took it over right after he stepped down and the 90s and i was i ran it and i ran in a little more also doing american studies aspects to it. we would hold a lot of conferences. i for example had kurt vonnegut who wrote slaughterhouse and joseph heller who wrote catch-22 come down to talk about their world war two experiences and you know, i was doing some other things steve with me while involved with building this world war two museum, and then i was on the board of the world war two museum, so i got to see how a museum gets built from the scratch up by the way died 2002 year, right? he was 66. so what's that? what's there if you went to new

orleans went to the eisenhower center went to the world war two museum. what are you gonna see? it's spectacular. i mean we built in new orleans one of the great museums in the world nick mueller. who was a good buddy of steve ambrose really was the ceo energizer oven all but they put together a top flight board. i was just the young interloper. these were like heavy weights from the corporate world. they got congressional funding. it was ted stevens of alaska who really in a way of hawaii that really pushed to get some of the federal funding matching funds, but we made the great sin, it was going to be built on lake pontchartrain and the idea was we can rebuild the higgins boats that landed at normandy and people could crowd on 36 and go on one of those boats see what it was like the little boats that landed on the beach. yeah, and that's why it's in new orleans andrew jackson higgins

was from new orleans and higgins industry built. these the boats the landing craft boats, that would have like, let's just say 35 soldiers in it, and they're very we built to them, but they're very they were built kind not flimsily, but they were built for a purpose. they're not a lot of them around there. they've all deteriorated, but they would just come right in the open and then you'd storm the beach and and it's iconic and those boats were built and designed in new orleans and that gave steve to justification to build first a d-day museum. and then it was so popular. to the national world war two museum and it now is a major american tour straw. i mean they two of the best museums for people in the country are the world war one museum in kansas city in the world war two museum in new orleans. it's has you know five theaters

you it's week. it collects work footage letters memorabilia ideal still at least monthly with them because people write me i have all these letters of my grandfather. you know that what can i do and i always say deposit in them there. it's the best place to have soldier memorabilia letters things to go in the archive it but the money came in tom hanks and steven spielberg became impress. sarios fort fun now, it's they do it fundraises. i mean they have a lot of corporate support. its peak you it's a museum that just grows grows and grows because of the corporate support. there's not a company that doesn't want to support honoring our world war two. that's so you taught at two line you taught at the university knowledge would you teach i'm always the same american history

brian, but i break it up. i've taught over the years my main stay i guess is cold war history, but i do history the presidents. i've done civil rights history environmental history. those are really the core one military history and i break them up right now. i mean my core courses. i'm the last few years. i'm doing one class on the 1960s and 70s and then a class on presidential history before we leave the the bus trips and all that. as you look back. what was the most? successful one stop as far as you could see the reaction of the students well, we there many but one that came to mind so we went to plains, georgia to build a habitat house. with jimmy carter and he would make catfish for us and he would tell us to eat the catfish. you know, you hold the catfish and pull it and and something

about all the students thought. he was a good man humanitarian, so they were all on best behavior around jimmy carter. you mean everybody was like with dress better and and we built a house and the students got out there with the hammer and the sun and you know, we would you know carter's both of them were helping and miller fuller who was crater of habitat, and it was pretty special and they like one night. we were all eating in carters like i have to take a call from cuba and he had a call with castro so he came back from told this my students about us call and to cuba at that point where they're like, oh my god, you know, it was a secret. was surround while we're building the house type of thing right in planes it was done in americus right next to planes. yeah. okay. what's another stop? well one that ended up having long-term ramifications in my life as we would stop in witty creek, colorado and see the

gonzo rider hunter s thompson and hunter would not autograph his book. he would shoot them. and so they read fear and loathing in las vegas, and he would put it up against a tree and go and half the students thought what an idiot he's doing this is what a stupid stunt but then about half of the students like, oh my god. it's so cool hunter thompson shot my book and out of that. i realized hunter had a alcohol issue alcoholic and in had a great archive of material but didn't know what to do with it. so i was he asked me if i would come back. time and help him organize it and ended up doing two volumes of letters of his one called a proud highway one called fair and loathing in america, but that introduction to hunter grew out of the magic bus. i want to come back to 100 thompson later, but there was an incident in a holiday and i

believe or somebody a couple gave you a copy was a fair and loathing in las vegas. which one did yes, that's that story. and how did that what was your reaction to that? i'm not sure. i remember tell me what it was. well you just all i remember is that somebody gave you a copy of the hunter thompson book that got you interested in him in the first place? oh, well, i don't know. you know, that was more. that's what's jack. kerouac's on the road. okay on the road. i got a mixed up. yeah, but yeah, this is what idea the idea of somebody the blue saying here can't you understand that hand into at work? some at a holiday inn in perrysburg, ohio as a banquet porter setting up tables and they how are you i got in as soon as i could i wanted to work i 17, i guess whatever. the law was i got in working. i'd work as many hours as

humanly possible rain snow sleet. i just couldn't believe i could get cash like okay making money and and so we would put up the tables and but somebody that handed me that book on the road by jack kerouac i had mentioned somehow of about liking bob dylan and they had had the book and and just gave it to me as gifted it to me. and it was special. so i've done that occasionally to people and out and respect to that if i finish a book and if i'm on an airplane, i got a book in my bag up talking to some younger person or so. here's a good book. i just read and just give it to i had so many give me a book of french writer selene on a train and and europe wants, you know, you're reading you're talking. well, you haven't read this person, you know here and read it but that fit in on the road a little bit to the magic bus too. it's the idea that an america

the roads has a romantic appeal to go travel and see america by the road and you know, i'm i even now i'm i'm getting this agent life would love to write the history of route 66 and tell the story of that road, you know, so i'm interested in these things. i'm interested in ice and hours interstate highway system. i mean, i'm interested that the longest highway in the world is i 90 that connects some, you know seattle to you know to boston and and we don't think that it's the longest in the world, but that one strip is and and i miss the back roads the blue. ways to the william leased heat moon. you know that find the road not taken undo that too but the interstates make travel convenient go back down to the university of new orleans from there. there. you went to rice. i went to tulane and i ran a

theodore roosevelt center at tulane and i met my wife anne i had written a book. on rosa parks um, and that's in interesting story in itself because on these magic bus trips. we would i would take kids to students to montgomery and there was one road sign that said jefferson davis boulevard and win meat rose of parks avenue kind of thing and you take a photo of that but there was no memorials for rosa parks and i couldn't believe it and then i would look and they were honestly about entered books on martin luther king jr. and there wasn't one serious adult book to read on rosa parks. she wrote a book with jim haskins called about her life. she wrote her own on a biography but no scholar had ever looked at it. so out of that we i then had the

temerity to bring these students and bang on a door of the housing project really where she lived during the montgomery bus boycott and a couple answered and they were very nice and i said can my students see and it's so tiny rosen raymond parks were living in just like a shoe box in montgomery. i mean in that brought you home to hell and she know funding she was you know, kids going out. yeah, they learn they were living in there and they let us see it all you know, we i did that by myself not too many years back when i was in chicago to the birthplace of walt disney where he was born and i guy, i had a car take me and i just randomly knocked on the door and there were opening and there was like mickey mouse memorabilia, but this family just lives there and they said oh you want to see it and they said about every two weeks somebody usually from europe comes in banks on their door, but i went and i saw the

bedroom where he was actually born disney in the place. i do things like that. it's but we we've been started realize i wanted to write a book on rosa parks. let me come back to her later, but go back to lane and then to write yeah tulane and then from tulane to rice you've been at rise of a calculator right 14 years. yeah. you're in the baker institute. yeah part of it and the history department and the history department, but you have said i've seen him many interviews say that you are center left politically. yeah, what are you doing in the james a baker? the third institute oh, you know. have a lot of well first off james baker's an incredible. person to talk to i was telling you about dean acheson and paul knits. i mean, i think as as secretaries of state george schultz. and james baker the third or

outstanding secretaries of state. they were just outstanding and and baker and i got along well got along medium. how did you get into? um, i went let me see. so the it really was more about the rice university recruiting me the president david lebron and wanted me in the history department, but in order to get the proper position, they wanted me to double, you know be a history and in their public policy center, which was is named after secretary baker bush 41 was living there by rice in houston. and so the public policy center bake around he would bring in world leaders all the time. i mean, it's astounding these young people get to just meet everybody. i know i'm talking across the board current world leaders. he would have you know, if somebody prime minister of japan

comes to washington, they might end up giving a talk for james baker on campus and students get to interact. it's pretty special. and yeah baker's written me letters of recommendation for things in life in the like in they call him bake the if you're going to do the right biography of them. i always with title at the velvet hammer. because that's really what he is. he's very genial and kind and warm but if you get into a business thing with them look out, he's a tough cup customer you live in austin and this is in houston. do you do that? well in between the big event when i was at tulane was hurricane katrina. and you know, we felt the deprivations of that and you know in any endless ways and at that time i was getting an

offers from universities quite a bit like almost poaching me out of tulane people saying well all for this and this i was debating between a few schools, but rice my big thing was i wanted to do three classes every fall. and then zero because i really wanted to do writing and research and if you can't do it with two one, so tulane told me you could keep doing we will do two one. and i said no, i'm not bluffing i'm leaving if it's not three zero and rice. baker and lebron offered me the the zero and at that point i loved rice, but for one thing brian i have i have asthma. and i it was in remission for most of my life, but i went in to help house clean and debris from katrina and it got into my

lungs some of the debris and i had to go to the jewish memorial hospital in denver for respiratory. and i just don't want to breathe bad air cause of that and used in with the refineries plus the humidity, you know, i i just thought if i have a choice it keep dawn to me. could i live in austin, which is more amenable with my interest, which is hiking kayaking outdoor living and in could i do that as a commute and i could if it was 3-0 meaning if it was only had a commute in one semester. see if i had to do it the other way i'd have would have moved to houston. move to rice we had three children and i just decided kind of a maverick fashion. i want to raise my kids in austin. i picked a city where i wanted to raise them. from all of my travels and then i love houston. it's a great cosmopolitan center. obviously. i just wrote a book on nasa and

going to the moon and you know, i'm engaged in it. so i feel i'm blessed to have both cities in my life, which is is exciting. and of course, i just drive i leave austin at about nine at night and i'm in two and a half hours listen to the radio. i used to call my mom all the time on the commute because she likes to talk about an hour and it's and that would eat up that some of the clock and it now i enjoy it particularly the drive from austin east and coming home. you know, i'm less interested because you're gay start hitting some traffic getting out of houston. and that was the second part of our six-hour conversation with historian and author douglas, brinkley. the rest of this conversation will air at the same time each week. you can watch this in upcoming segments in the series once they've aired online at cspan.org/history.

interview program afterwards daily beast journalist, kelly weil reports on the rise of the flat earth movement and other conspiracies disseminated through online platforms. find a full schedule of everything airing today on your program guide or visit booktv.org. and beginning now former editor and chief of the standard and the south china morning post mark clifford argues that china's control over hong kong foreshadows with the superpower has planned for the world. welcome everyone to the opc's book night with mark clifford to discuss his new book today hong kong tomorrow the world. what china's crackdown reveals