the white house in front of the portrait of george washington. and thanks to beth taylor, who is the author of the paul jennings book, we were invited to the white house. "the descendants" of paul jennings to actually have a private tour and to take this photograph in front of the portrait. for those who have not read the book yet, paul jennings is credited with saving the original portrait during the war. i think it was 1809. we went there in 2009. the anniversary of him helping to save this portrait of george washington in the white house before it burned. so i want to acknowledge all of my cousins, many of whom i have met recently. some who actually lived here in

washington, where i have lived all my life and had never met. and some from other cities such as california and pennsylvania, et cetera. basically, i'm just going to mention a little bit about growing up here and being exposed to my family and paul jennings. i did not really grow up knowing about paul jennings. i knew that i had relatives or a relative that had worked in the white house probably for a president that was about the extent of it. but what i did have was a wealth of information about that side of my family. i grew up knowing paul jennings grandson. his grandson was my great uncle hugh. and paul jennings, they were franklin and mary jennings. they lived at 2121 k street

northwest. beth showed you a picture actually of franklin standing in front of their home. that home was there until about the late -- and i visited that home many times because my great great grandmother mary lived to be almost 10. she was about 99. she kept the house wonderful with all kinds of artifacts including that portrait of paul jennings that you saw that hung in her house with many antiques, with swords from the spanish-american war, et cetera. so i did grow up actually seeing that and knowing about some of my history. and ironically, this area has been involved with my family for a long time because my mother actually taught at stevens elementary school, which was at

21st and l, and my brother and sister attended stevens in the elementary years. i wound up at 24th and k for high school. and i would get to walk past my great great grandparent's house, you know, a couple times a week. so i continued to be in this area and foggy bottom was, you know, home for me. also during the '80s, i worked down the street here at the va hospital and ate lunch many days in lafayette square not knowing that paul jennings had actually worked across the street, you know. had actually walked the same area that i was sitting out there eating in. and then even more ironic, i don't work down here anymore, when borders was getting ready

to close on l street, you know, i was in borders. i said, i didn't realize it was so old down here in the basement. well, according to beth's research, this was paul jenning's home. this was part of his foundation. so it's amazing how, you know, i'm still crossing paths with my ancestor. he's always been in my life, even though i didn't really know him. he's been there at some point or another. and even more ironic is my brother who is now deceased did his career at the department of interior for 30 years where paul worked at the department of interior. so those are just, you know, a couple tid bits to just kind of let you know how history has not left families sometimes.

that even though we're not here at the same time, some of it continues. and even now part of the family are actually buried in the old mount zion cemetery, somebody mentioned earlier in their presentations over in georgetown. they are buried in the black section, which is not kept up, but it does have the headstones that you can see the family names on. so thank you. and i want to thank beth especially for being interested and curious about paul jennings and who he was and everything to actually document all this history. i can't tell you how thankful i am personally for having that. i mean i couldn't have done it. i don't have those kind of resources. it's just phenomenal to be able

to hear about what one of your ancestors did so many years ago. and thank you for the white house historical association for having this presentation, including paul jennings part of it. [ applause ] >> thank you all for sharing those stories. and as i was listening to you all, one of the things that i found really interesting and also exciting is that, you know, probably the four families that you represent are ones that you think of kind of prominent black families that you, you know, that represent families that we know much about. but through all the work you're doing, there's so much more to know. and so much more to research, which is both interesting and exciting. with that, i want to open it up to the audience to see if anyone has any questions for our

panelists. and there's someone who has a microphone and they will come to you. >> i'm directored towards mr. hammond. have you searched through the slave manifest records in new orleans or attempted to do that looking for your ancestor? >> thank you for the question. i'm actually beginning to do that right now. looking at the national archives and don and i are planning a trip right now to new orleans. so as we gather our list, we're going to go down there and see what we can find. i was told a lot of the manifests would potentially have name there is. >> just as a suggestion, it's something that i have actually initiated. my folks come from norfolk, virginia. what i discovered was, and this is something that's been reemphasized throughout many of the presentations, is that a lot of the traders had private sales. and so where you would normally look in the deed records for evidence of these transactions,

they are not there. one thing about new orleans is that they have these slave manifests. so you may not find them leaving, but you may find them arriving there. i've been to the notorial archives in louisiana. they are phenomenal. the staff is topnotch. they will go out of their way to help you. so i will suggest that you spend about a week or so going through those records. it's just volume after volume after volume. i just wanted to mention that simply because some of the records at the national archives, there's only one side to it. and there's a wealth in new orleans. there's just a whole different culture understanding the french government. one other thing i wanted to say to all of the descendant z, i came here because i was hoping to hear something more about your lineage. i have been fascinated by your

families since i was a kid. i've read about your families. for quite a long time and have been fascinated by the individual accomplishments and the continuity of those accomplishments, the effect, the influence that your ancestors had on our society. one question i wanted to ask each of you, or if you could answer this, when you found out at that juncture what your ancestor did, what kind of influence did it have on your life? >> steve? >> i guess the real big impact for me is when we found nancy si fax at the cater house. this occurred here in d.c. happened to be at an event and they saw her name on the placard in the building that said nancy si fax lived here. and we were just floored because

we have been looking to place nancy as opposed to her brother in arlington. it was exhilaration and it also opened about a thousand more questions. >> does anyone else want to answer a question about what it meant when you first found out about how famous and historical your ancestors were? >> i did. i looked up and said, not that again. because i was a little child. it wasn't until i became a more mature person that i appreciated the significance. but i can remember my great aunt, who is the little infant in the picture there, sitting me and trying to describe the scene and the frosted doors since she had her own horse and carriage. but she didn't spend so much time on that. she spent her time talking about

honor and dignity and the way you carried yourself as being most important. on florida avenue, she lived over one house on 8th and s. i went out with her just a little 6-year-old. and some person who looked like he might not have had a meal in a long time walked by and said hello. and she hid with her umbrella. she said you take your hat off when a lady walks by. i always take off my hat. >> my mother brought home a book called "great negros in american history." she said your great grandfather is in there. i saw his picture there. and that was the first exposure i had to oscar depriest.

and that summer we went to church camp up in northern michigan. and we were playing volleyball and the ball went into the neighbor's yard. and there were three black men sit i sitting in the front yard on folding chairs. i went and got the ball. and he said, boy, what's your name? and i said my name is phillip depriest. and he said, i used to work with your great grandfather back in the '20s and '30s. and of course, i was like, 11 years old, and i didn't appreciate the connection. and i went back to the volleyball game. that was it. it wasn't until much later in my

appreciation for the depriests grew. went to high school and then on to college. i reestablished a relationship with my grandfather in chicago, oscar jr. and that's when the story started to come out. he had remarried back in the '40s. my step grandmother franky was a tremendous source of information. especially considering jesse depriest. we had a lot of trouble finding out information about her. she was very, very quiet and reserved woman who didn't have a whole lot to say. she carried herself with great poise and dignity and class and

was always very concerned about being courteous to other people, no matter who they were. so that's the beginning of finding out more and more. being a plolitical science and history major, i kind of took on a passion of finding out as much as i could about the both of them as years went by. >> do you want to talk about the impact? >> mainly i would say it's really been real interesting for me to find out about the things that he did and overcame all the obstacles of getting out of slavery. but then also realizing that

from him, he really did leave a legacy in our family. he left property in our family that still kind of goes on till today all the way down to the next generation. that is very significant, you know, for african-american families. for any family to last this long. >> are there any other questions? >> in doing your research, what we found looking up our family, property records was the best start we had definitely with slavery. then after slaves became free, the census records got a little shaky when it came to people of color. did you find that in your

research? to finding out your family if your family was in the slavery? was a slave? >> you have to become a student of census records and you have to take everything with a grain of salt. you cross reference and cross reference and cross reference. it's remarkable what you'd read the first time, when you go back and read it the second or third time, you always find something new. you go back and look at whatever records you think you'll know, you'll find something that you missed the first time around. or you'll find some linkage to a piece of information that you can use elsewhere. just last week, i found this story about robert old and being the confederacy and so forth. and i saw that slave certificate that wormly purchased. when it was filed, it had to be supported by the justice of the peace. the justice of the peace was

named old, so my suspicion is that they would have known each other. their fathers would have known each other back in the 1818 and 1820. i've had that in my files for years. just never know. >> this is for mr. depriest. as a congressman, do we know what committee work congressman depriest was influential on or involved in? >> committee work oscar depriest did? >> as far as legislation concerns, his record is somewhat limited. he was successful in getting an amendment to build and establish the civilian konz vaconservatio

corps in 1933, which made any kind of -- you couldn't discriminate for race or religion when people were looking to get a job with the conservation board, which opened up thousands and thousands of jobs for african-americans. so he was very successful in that regard. he did introduce an anti-lynching bill into the hou house, twice, that was defeated. it really kind of blows your mind when you think about the kind of environment that he had to function in when an anti-lynching bill -- it didn't even make lynching a crime. it held accountable the authorities in whatever town or

county who were holding a poor sole in their jail. if a mob came and dragged out this poor soul and lynched him, the authorities, that county sheriff would be held accountable for what happened. so basically what that said is it's okay to lynch black people in america and you won't be held accountable and go to jail for it. it's really a black bar on congress's history when you think about that. >> i think that's a good -- i'm sure you all have many questions we could continue in conversation, but i think that's a good point for us to end. and i think it's poig yant and

pulls out from everything we heard today is to think about these descendants that they represent and what they represe went through throughout their lives and we can use that as inspiration for us, when we're challenged, that we are capable of being up to the task of pursuing what we need to do to bring justice and equity as their descendants did and as they continue to do. so thank you very much. next a look at our recent visit to little rock, arkansas. a look at the city's rich history and literary culture. you're watching "american history tv" all weekend every weekend on c-span3. >> douglas macarthur was arguably one of the most influential in our country's history. we're filming in the birthplace of douglas macarthur here in

little rock, arkansas, which is one of the little-known fact force a lot of people. macarthur's father, captain arthur macarthur, was in the u.s. military following his service in the civil war, and came here serving in the arsenal that existed on the site where our building is located. he brought with him to little rock his wife and two sons. they actually lived in this building that we're in in one of the apartments that was contained in this structure. and in the following january 26, 1880 douglas was born here and spent his first six months in this building. six months after his birth, his father was transferred outside of arkansas and he only came back to arkansas one time in his life, in 1952, when he was 72 years of age. during that return visit in 1952, here on these ground force

the first time publicly, he acknowledged publicly for the first time in a speech to 10,000 people that he was returning to the place of his birth. for us, that's significant part of our site's history, our building's history, and we hist. 1952 was a very pivotal point in macarthur's career. in fact that brings us to this room that we are standing in now. in april of 1951, after a very lengthy military service that spanned three world war conflicts, world war 1, world war ii and korea, macarthur was abruptly relieved of command of the united nations forces in korea by president harry s. truman. it's important for us to consider the korean conflict occurred just five years after the end of world war ii. and that was a conflict that had spanned all over our globe, millions of people had died,

lives had been uprooted and effected by it. and then here we were five years later, you know, getting into another conflict. for americans, it was in a country where most people in america had no idea where it was. the united nations forces were led by general macarthur. and he disagreed with the way that the war was being conducted. and made his disagreement, made his disagreements with the president public. and because of that, president truman decided he needed to relieve him of command and bring him home. >> it's of the deepest person regret that i find myself compelled to take this action. general mac ar hur thur is one of our greatest military commanders, but the cause of world peace is much more important than any individual. >> at the time, macarthur was hailed as hero he returned to this country after a lengthy absence and was received by parades on the west coast and on the east coast.

he addressed the joint session of congress. >> mr. president, mr. speaker, and distinguished members of the congre congress, i stan on this rostrum with a sense of deep humility and great pride. >> and he was, as i said, he was welcomed as a hero truman was wildly scorned. but the issues that have been examined since that time, i think transcend even the korean war. the issue of civilian control, of the military, the issue of the containment of communism and why we were fighting in korea, and i think an overlooked issue, that's the issue of the conduct of a limited war versus the conduct of a total war. which i think really is the crux of what macarthur's dilemma was in fighting the korean conflict. if you look at the way wars have

been fought from world war ii prior to that time, the basic philosophy was simply this, the politicians get us into a war, they send the military figures in to fight the war, the objective is to overwhelm your enemy, destroy the enemy and the politicians negotiate peace and you try to return to normal. that's what happened in most of the wars through the end of world war ii. but the advent of nuclear weaponry totally changed the way that warfare could be conducted. because if you went into a conflict with a goal of totally annihilating your enemy, with the use of nuclear bombs, you would not only destroy them, but you could also destroy yourself and our entire population. and, so, the idea -- the way that wars had traditionally been fought was changing. was evolving. and for someone like macarthur, who in 1950, he was 70 years

old. and you have to understand that macarthur had been trained in the military tactics of west point back in the early 1900s. and the 3tactics that he had ben trained on how to fight a war worked in world war 1, worked in world war ii, but in korea he was having to work under constraints that went against how he was being trained, but the realities of having to conduct a limited war dictated that you could not go against and throw everything you had, your arsenal of weapons against your enemy. you have to credit macarthur for believing in his principles to the point that he was willing to sacrifice his military career for those principles. he had been taught all of his life from his father being military man to his military service that you obeyed your commander in chief. here he was going public with his disagreements with his commander in chief. and many would feel that he did so because he felt like he was -- his point was so right

that was willing to sacrifice his career, which he ultimately did. truman fired him, brought him home, and the war continued on until its conclusion a few years later. now we, today, have the benefit of hindsight. and there are people today who would argue that had macarthur been allowed to pursue the war as aggressively as he wished, to go on and invade china, that we would not be seeing the geopolitical influences that are there today between north and south korea. but you have to remember at time that all this was occurring, you know, five years after the end of world war ii, and was this country -- was the world ready to go into another potentially worldwide conflict over north and south korea? >> since i took the oath on the plain at west point, and the hopes and dreams have long since

vanished, but i still remember the refrain of one of the most popular ballads of that day, which proclaimed most proudly that old soldiers never die they just fade away. and like the old soldier of that ballad, i now close my military career and just fade away. an old soldier who tried to do his duty as god gave him the light to see that duty. good-bye.

find out where c-span's local content vehicles are going next, at c-span.org/localcontent. you're watching american history tv, all weekend every weekend on c-span3. today at noon eastern, on c-span2's book tv, join our live call-in program with distinguished former navy s.e.a.l. and author, chris kyle as he talks about his life from professional rodeo rider to become the most successful sniper. >> at 10:00 p.m. -- >> if you think of yourself as a family and as a team. she said when he gets a raise at work, she said we got a raise. she includes what her husband does and she had a lot of respect for what her husband was doing. >> liza munda on the changing roles of w