monday to continue the confirmation process for district court judges and executive positions in the trump administration. follow the house live on c-span, the senate live on c-span2. this is a special edition of american history tv, a sample of the compelling history programs that air every weekend on american history tv, like lectures in history, american artifacts, real america, the civil war, oral histories, the presidency, and special event coverage about our nation's history. enjoy american history tv now and every weekend on c-span3. now a look at the presidential retreat in maryland known as camp david. frankly roosevelt was the first u.s. president to use camp david and set a precedent for hosting dignitaries there when he invited british prime minister winston churchill to be his

guest. held at the bush presidential center in dallas, this runs an hour. >> ladies and gentlemen, please welcome the chief executive officer of the george w. bush presidential center, ken hersh. [ applause ] >> thank you and welcome to the engage series presented by highland capital. i'm ken hersh, the introducer in chief. our goal here is to provide content that you can't get anywhere else, and we're honored today with this session to launch a wonderful insider's look at presidential retreats and a glimpse of what life looks like for a president outside of the white house. it's a fascination that so many people have, and we're delighted to take a deep dive into camp david, crawford, kennebunkport, and the lbj ranch. and tonight we have a series of guests who can also give us that

special insight. and to kick us off, i'd like to introduce the 43rd president of the united states. [ applause ] >> thank you all. thank you very much. so this is a special moment for laura and me because we've got such fond memories of the presidential retreats. one of the things about the presidency that is kind of hard to explain, what it feels like to be in a bubble, and you're kind of in a bubble, particularly in washington, d.c. so the presidential retreats, for any president, are very important in the life of the presidency. and so i want to thank ken and holly and the team here for opening up the presidential retreats and a lot of the

stories of presidential retreats for the people here in dallas. we had three presidential retreats, which is kind of unusual, one of which was kennebunkport, maine. it was really my dad's presidential retreat. but laura and i would go up there on occasion, and when we went, it was all family, which was incredibly important part of our presidency. i don't remember -- i think we entertained sarkozy there and putin. i'll never forget dad said to putin, do you want to go on a boat ride? [ laughter ] he had this boat with three 300-horsepower engines. yeah, he was kind of a macho dude at this point. he said, yeah, i'd like to go. he said it in russian of course. but he had this interpreter who was kind of a strange little

guy, who was nervous. anyway, dad gets out in the ocean and opens that thing up, and putin, of course, was just in heaven. and the interpreter thought he was going to die [ laughter ] so walker's point was an important part of getting out of the bubble, but not nearly as important as crawford and camp david. crawford is a place laura and i love. it's a place that we went to in august, which made it kind of uncomfortable for a lot of the people on our staff from the east coast. i loved it. i mean i would get outside, and this is before we owned a bulldozer, would chop down cedar. it was like unbelievably therapeutic. i would ride bikes.

but mainly i rested. now, here's the thing about these retreats, though. you never escape the presidency. and so the definition of getting outside the bubble, at crawford meant there were probably 150 staffers of some sort or another down there, which made it fun because it meant there was a lot of other cedar choppers available to help. [ laughter ] laura and i entertained a lot of world leaders there, and we've got a lot of fond memories of conducting personal diplomacy on the ranch. it became kind of a way for us to give some of these leaders a special look, and it really did open up the dialogue in a much easier way than had we been discussing things in the white house. i remember koizumi and i sitting out by the pool there talking about japanese history. lord, i took a great walk across

the prairie with angela merkel and her husband. putin came, and we had a press conference, and rather than have it on the ranch, i decided that a cool thing to do would be to go to crawford high school. now, crawford's a town of like 600 people. there's 31 people in the senior class, and three were allowed to ask questions. then of course we had to answer questions from the press. but we had a lot of world leaders there. israeli prime minister, crown prince of saudi arabia. one of the interesting stories from the crown prince of saudi arabia was when he came, and he was angry because sharon had occupied ramallah, and he was madder than heck about it. and one of the first things he said to me was, tell the pig to get out of ramallah. now, that is about as great an insult as you could possibly issue in the middle east. and, you know, frankly, i wasn't about to allow a foreign leader

to dictate our foreign policy. and i said, now, look, just give me some time. that wasn't the answer he wanted, and our interpreter, who is a friend of mine and colin powell's and condi's, came into where we were sitting because he wanted to be alone for a while with his people, and said, he's going to leave, which would have been a disaster for a young presidency to have a major ally bolt the scene, and it would have been something we would have been dealing with for a long period of time. so i said, colin powell, go in there and fix it. he came back and said, i can't. he said only you. i said, okay. so i walk in there. i don't know what i'm going to tell the guy. he's in there smoking butts like mad in our living room, and so i said, i hear you're going to leave. he kind of grunts yes. i said, before you do, i want to

talk about two things, religion, and i said let me talk to you about my faith. i said, i quit drinking because of religion, and described the relationship of i had with billy graham and all that, and i said, i'm curious about your religion. nothing. the guy wasn't interested. smoked his cigarette. so that didn't work. so i played the ranch card. i said, i hear you have a farm outside riyadh and you love it there. yes. i said i love this place. i'd like to give you a tour before you leave. can i give you a tour? he reluctantly said yes. so there we are in the ford 150. i'm driving, which is unusual, and abdullah and the interpreter leaning over the back seat, we're driving along. these are live oaks. couldn't careless. these are cedar elms. not interested. these grasses, restoring our prairie to native grasses.

could care less. he didn't say anything. i'm saying this thing is going to be a disaster. we're at the very far end of the ranch, and there's a turkey standing in the middle of the road, a lone hen. he said, what is that? i said, well, that's a turkey, your royal highness. at one point it was going to be the bird of the united states. that's what benjamin franklin, one of our leaders, suggested. but instead we went with the bald eagle. and the turkey is standing there, didn't move. and he leans over and says, it's a sign from allah, my brother. and i'm saying to myself, that's damn good advance work. [ laughter ] and we got back to the house, and i said, you want to eat? he said, yes. i said, we're going to have lunch, and the relief on the foreign minister's face and the ambassador's face was palpable. dallas' bob jordan was there by the way.

the reason i tell you that is the ranch was a great place to get to know leaders and to establish a bond with them, as was camp david. now, camp david was initially called shangri-la, which means heavenly place, which it is. it's tucked in the mountains. thankfully it's only a 25-minute helicopter ride from the south lawn, which means it's extremely accessible, and so laura and i accessed it a lot. we went there as often as we possibly could. you're going to hear from one of the base commanders from camp david. the whole deal is it's a military base, and they've got a lot of other military functions and duties. but when the president's there, it's to like pamper the guy, and they do a really good job of it. dwight eisenhower changed the name to camp david, and my brother, marvin, lobbied for a while to get me to change it to

camp marvin. [ laughter ] thankfully i didn't. we've got a lot of fond memories of camp david, a lot. and, you know, again, it's a place where laura and i invited a lot of world leaders. tony blair's first visit to the united states, we took him to camp david. laura decided to have a movie there. they've got a nice movie theater, and it's called "meet the family" -- oh, "meet the parents." i was asleep. [ laughter ] if you like to exercise, it's a fabulous place to get outdoors and exercise. we had mountain bike trails, a wonderful gym. i think the thing that i remember most about camp david was christmases. it's big enough for our big family each to have their own cabin, and so mother and dad would come. jeb and his family, neal and his

family, camp marvin and his family, and doro, and it was spectacular. a spectacular time. and the reason i emphasize the family aspect is because during the presidency, you know, sometimes it's kind of hard to count on certain people, but you can always count on your family to bring you comfort and love. so that's what we're going to hear about tonight is a true shangri-la. holly kuzmich is going to interview admiral michael george ione who was the base commander when we first got to camp david. she's going to interview stewart mclaren who is the president of the white house historical association. and finally my chief of staff, josh bolten, one of the coolest guys i know, will be onstage as well. but beforehand, one of the real treats for laura and me was to have a beautiful little chapel there called evergreen chapel.

and a preacher there had a huge influence on us, and his name is stan fornea. and thankfully stan fornea has agreed along with his wife belinda, has agreed to join us tonight. so please welcome the right reverend navy -- something -- captain. >> chaplain. >> i know chaplain. [ lesson ] navy captain stan fornea. [ applause ] >> thank you very much, mr. president. what a privilege it is for me to be here this evening. ty for the invitation. on january 22nd, 1963, news reached camp david of the assassination of president kennedy, who had just been a

recent visitor to camp david. there was a contractor working at camp at that time by the name of kenneth plummer. and mr. plummer noticed that in that experience, there was nowhere for people to gather to pray, to think, to be quiet. there was no sacred space whatsoever. so mr. plummer began the process of saying he wanted to see a chapel built at camp david. it took him some time, but through his persistence, he was able to form a nonprofit. he raised the money to build the chapel, and ground was broken by president reagan, who was the first contributor. and then the chapel was dedicated during the presidency of president bush 41. it was also during that time that president bush decided that he wanted a chaplain there, and

so i have had the privilege of following in the legacy of having navy chaplains at camp david ever since that time. if there is any one thing that i would want you to know about camp david, it is that there is a very unique climate of community there. it is a small group of people. a lot of people do not realize it is a military installation. and those who are there were chosen because of their desire to serve their nation by serving their commander in chief. and this unique climate of community and even maybe so far as a climate of family that exists there to a great extent is made possible by the presidents and how they use and serve. and i'm a little bridged because of my time with president bush, but i would suggest to you that

there's no one who has contributed more to a climate of community and family at camp david more than president and mrs. bush. and that is evident by many different things that they did. president bush was always connecting with people there, and that connection with people helped create this unique climate of community that existed. you may know that president bush enjoyed mountain bike riding when he was at camp david, and my first day there, i had one of the lean and mean marines tell me if president bush asked you to ride bikes with him, tell him no way. [ laughter ] and i said, why? and he said, because nobody can keep up with president bush on these trails and on those bikes.

and so he said, i know it's hard to say no to the president, but you've got to say no if he asks you. and one sunday after chapel, we had lunch with the president, and he was beginning to set me up, and i knew it. so he said, chaplain, do you ride bikes? and i said, no, sir. no, sir, i never had really the chance to ride bikes very much. and he dropped it, and i got out of that experience. but he connected with the young marines and the others there in doing that. there is no way the president connected more with people and the staff at camp david than through evergreen chapel. i had the privilege to conduct over 100 worship services for the president and mrs. bush and the family and the staff of camp david. and it was always the most

marvelous experience. the president would always be faithful. in my almost four years there, the president never missed a worship service even if we had week-long services during christmas or easter or holy week. they were always there, and the camp community gathered with the president and mrs. bush when we worshipped together. mrs. bush, i remember, would every christmas and easter bring gifts for all the children of camp david. and during our christmas pageants and other things we would do, she would distribute those gifts to our children. and she did that faithfully event after event and year after year. it was just the most marvelous climate of community that existed there. president bush also did something very unique for us, and that is he asked me one time, let's gather all the camp

community together, their spouses, their children, and let's invite them all to a town hall meeting in the chapel, at which time the president spent almost two hours standing before us, talking about the presidency, his leadership skills, and opened the floor for people to ask questions. and it was so successful and because everyone could not get in at one time, the president said, let's do it again. and we had all the camp staff come once again, and the president gave two hours of just standing before us and talking about what it means to be the president of the united states. so the president and mrs. bush did a great deal to create this wonderful climate of community at camp david. i think maybe he may have learned some of that from his father. it was christmas one week, and president bush was there and

president bush 41 and the extended family. we had had a service in the chapel that sunday, and we were distributing t-shirts that had something like evergreen chapel christmas on it. and at the end of the service, everyone left. i was left in the chapel by myself, and the phone rang, and it was president bush 41. and he said to me, he said, chaplain, is there any chance that barb and i could get a couple of those t-shirts? and i said, of course, mr. president. so i got in the golf cart and took them some t-shirts over at their cabin. always gracious, he invited me in, and i had a cup of coffee, and when i got ready to leave, president bush said, do you know why we wanted these t shirts? and i said, no, sir. and he said, well, he says, we've stayed here a little longer than we anticipated this year, and we're running a little

short of clean underclothes to wear. [ laughter ] at which time, i said, well, you know, mr. president, there's somebody here that can take care of that wlalaundry need if you e it. and yet he looked at me and he said, chaplain, this is christmas week. i wouldn't dare ask someone to do that for me during christmas week. and then he looked and said to me, don't forget it's their christmas too. and i always thought that spoke so much about the way the bushes felt about the staff at camp david and how much appreciation they had for the climate of community that existed there. but, you know, sometimes even in a close-knit community there can be some challenges, and i'll close with this story. but i was sitting in the chapel one weekend. the president was there along with prime minister abe of

japan. and it was a saturday. i had sent my chaplain assistant home because nothing was scheduled, and i was sitting in the chapel by myself that saturday, and i heard the door open, and in walked president bush and the prime minister. and i thought that was nice that the president was showing the prime minister around, and the president looked at me, and he said, can you do one of the history briefs that you do for the prime minister? now, that involved a screen and projection equipment, none of which was set up. i had never set it up in my life, and i said, of course, mr. president. we can do that. i said, it will take a moment to set it up. so he sat down on the front pew, and i went back in the back and pulled the screen out and set it up, and then ran up in the balcony to turn on the projection equipment. and this may come as a surprise to you, but i noticed the president looking at his watch

every now and then. and so i eventually got it done. i was sweating. i was proud of myself for getting it set up so quickly. and i finally said, mr. president, we're ready to go with this. and he said, just a minute. and he looked at the prime minister and said, he's good at doing worship services, but he's not very good at handling technology. [ laughter ] i was proud of myself. i thought i had done very, very well. and i'm not saying that the president's greatest virtue is not patience, but he is prompt, which reminds me i need to stop talking and move on. but i do want to tell you in all sincerity that the four years that i spent at camp david was the absolute highlight of my entire 35 years of ordained ministry. nothing else has ever come close

to it, and i don't know if there will ever be anything that can top the fact that i had the privilege of serving our nation in the military and especially the privilege that i had for four years of serving president bush, mrs. bush, and their family, especially during a time of great turmoil and war, in the chapel at camp david. and for those experiences, mr. president, i thank you very much. [ applause ] and now you know. you've already heard, but would you join me in welcoming our guest, stewart mclaurin, the president of the white house historical situation, joshua bolten, who as chief of staff had to endure a lot of those worship services as camp david as well, rear admiral michael

george yoen, a former commanding officer at camp david, and then holly kuzmich, who is the moderator tonight and you know as the executive director of the bush institute. so join me in welcoming them, would you please. [ applause ] >> well, thank you all for being here. and our job tonight is to demystify a place that most people will never get to visit, and you all obviously have some great background and stories to share with this crowd about camp david and to try and bring that to this audience. so let's start there. stewart, president bush mentioned the name shangri-la. that was its original name at camp david. tell us how it came to be, how the site was selected, where that name came from. what was its origin?

>> well, president and mrs. bush, it's wonderful to be here at this extraordinary presidential library with all your guests tonight. president hoover had a wonderful fishing camp out in the shenandoah and when fdr became president, he tried it out, but he had asthma. and it was damp climate out there, so he didn't like it. his doctor said get a place that's a little higher elevation. so he asked the national park service to select three different sites, his options. one was back in the shenandoah. it was 30,000 feet out toward the blue ridge. two others were in maryland, and one was the site that was eventually selected to be shangri-la. so he took a small motorcade up there of three unmarked vehicles and decided he liked it. it had been built in the 1930s, about ten years prior by the works progress administration, so it had some rudimentary government buildings on this site that were functional. so he decided this would work. so they decided this would be shangri-la. the name shangri-la, there had

been a very popular british novelist named james hilton who had written a book called "lost horizon," and shangri-la was the himalayan paradise that was talked about in that book. so that name was adopted, and they moved in, and on july the 5th was the first day that they started shangri-la as a presidential retreat. and things went along really well for a couple of years until the secret service got nervous about the safety of shangri-la, that it might be vulnerable to air attack from the enemy. so roosevelt started looking for an alternative to this place, a place a little more secure, a little more safe from air attack. so there was a place that was a little more tropical, a little more remote, and just think what would have been had president roosevelt followed through and moved the presidential retreat from shangri-la to guantanamo. [ laughter ]

>> so, mike, you were the commanding officer at the end of president clinton's term and the start of president bush's term. you got to run the place. tell us a little bit about what that entailed and tell us about the place itself. what's there? what is camp david like? >> thank you, holly. president bush, mrs. bush, great to see you again. thank you for this honor. 200 acres of mountain park. it is a rustic retreat, simple, single-story cabins, oak plank siding, cedar shake shingle roofs. just enough amenities. enough security of course, but very pleasant, simple place to go where many presidents have found that respite they're looking for. >> talk a little bit about your role and the staff. >> it is navy command. it's run by the navy. it's been that way since the roosevelt years. he took the sailors from the yacht that stewart talked about and the marines to guard it. so it's a navy command that

operates and maintains the principal facility for the president. but on the weekends, it takes on that whole aura of being the place where the president and his family and guests can get away whether for their own personal use or for diplomatic purpose. >> and so presidents use this partly as a recreational retreat to get away. they also use it to entertain and host world leaders. tell us a little bit about what goes into a world leader visit. >> big pucker factor, first, for getting ready, and a lot of work with the state department. but a fascinating time to stand on the sidelines and watch our president work with world leaders. and i talk about in the book about it's one thing that we all talk about building relationships before you need them. but when you stand on the sidelines and you watch presidents actually do that, as i saw president and mrs. bush do that with the blairs, and you see how important it is as humans, of course, to get to know someone on that level, it's very impressionable and it really affected me and many of the crew that saw it as well.

>> how many staff are there? >> about 200 sailors and marines that work there full-time. >> so, josh, you were there in a variety of roles. you went first as deputy chief of staff working for president bush, then you were omb director. >> i never got invited when i was budget director. [ laughter ] nobody wants the budget director. >> so when you were chief of staff, part of your role was really helping towas really hel to host and entertain delegations when they would come tell us about that role and what that would entail.>> thanks to president bush for the privilege of being here and the special privilege to be here just listening to his voice a few minutes ago brought the same kind of comfort that i

think the reverend brought to all of us on a regular basis with his sunday sermons and it's not even my face and i always look forward to going to chapel to hear him speak. it is not just about the president and not just about the visiting prime minister there is typically a whole delegation that comes with and as important as the opportunity that camp david provided for building a warm personal relationship between the leaders, also important was the opportunity it provided for an opportunity for those serving just below the two leaders to

get to know each other and establish the kind of relationship that becomes critical especially in a crisis. especially when i was chief of staff i had the privilege of basically hosting my counterpart or counterparts for a wide variety of world leaders and the relationships that were established there many cases turned out to be extremely important in the months and years to follow. >> we have more informal moments about the delegation in the bowling alley how is this very imposed photo?>> my score? well the person on the far

right is the presidents military aid the to others the top two advisors to our crown prince of the united emirates whose relationship with president bush i think was very important to the united states relationship overall in the gulf region. while president bush and the crown prince were off having a walk or something like that maybe they had already gone to bed so i said who wants to bowl and to this day the guy to my

right is now the ambassador to the united states and the guy to my left runs the abu dhabi front but to this day when i see them they bring up the time we went bowling at camp david and it creates a special bond even for something so pedestrian as bowling. >> do you remember who were the teams?>> i'm sure i one. i got to visit camp a lot and i will tell you my average was good. >> one of the most consequential things that happened was the camp david accords, tell us about that, how those meetings came to be and what that entails.>> this

was of course during the carter presidency and earlier that year they had hosted this, at camp david and that was a warm and friendly meeting, several months in advance when they were contemplating bringing both sides together for summit a very contentious time, multiple wars fought over decades between egypt and israel, the time came to plan this summit and there were conversations between president carter and the national security advisor, they looked at spain and portugal, carter wanted a confined space away from the eyes where they could be driven to talk to one another. they set aside initially three days for this summit with protecting for additional days should they need them they ended up spending 13 days there

and there were similar scenarios to the resident bush story when they had to be pulled back and finally it resulted in the accord of which camp david might be most famous for which is that famous picture on the south lawn of the white house but it was a very tedious time, camp david provided the perfect cramped, comfortable but uncomfortable setting to drive that dialogue this successful completion.>> president bush mentions that tony blair was his first visitor there as a foreign leader you got to see that and experience and understand the role of camp david and his casual retreat and foreign diplomacy. let's hear more about that and what you saw in terms of why

that setting sort of lent itself to those. >> it certainly made sense to me and the first time they were meeting instead of a white house dinner formality that come to camp david so the military core trust is appropriate but the couples dressed casually it said so much to us about you have to set the tone. to get to know each other, great allies, talk about history and the relationship but the two couples spend a weekend together hold a conference off camp it is so impressionable to us and resonates why it's in camp david. >> when gordon brown visited

the contrast in the photo between gordon brown and tony blair.>> you can see that she is striking up a relationship as great leaders do they figure out a way to connect with leaders and their own personalities. >> so he showed up in a suit and tie.>> it happened with president obama very formal and she made a joke about it to relax everyone and some people don't understand the purpose of camp david and once they let their guard down this provides the right setting.>> did you all know he was going to show up in a suit and tie?>> did not know that. >> so what did you have to do? >> we address appropriate all the time anyway but you just react. there was a strangle to find neckties. in the military they always

look good.>> so josh you have an interesting experience when you were there i want you to tell the story about a world leader meeting that only partially put the place at camp david because of where you flew president bush to have another side of the meeting. >> one of the most complicated and delicate things that i did as chief of staff and my predecessor did was figure out how to get the president out of the united states and over to iraq with anybody knowing it. at any given moment there are literally hundreds of people that know where the president is, protecting him, watching every movement and so on and president bush several times during his presidency made the

courageous decision to go basically into a combat zone and either visit the troops or in the case of the one that i organized in 2006 to meet the new prime minister of iraq, president bush thought that once the prime minister had finally pulled together a cabinet that represented all of the various factions and ethnicities in iraq it was important for the president personally to show up and meet face-to-face in their offices on their territory and making that happen logistically is really hard to do and for the trip to iraq and afghanistan in

2006 by the way you cannot let anybody know that the president is coming because the bad guys will be there with rpg is or whatever to knock down air force one as its landing. so when we started the planning for this trip i believe i came up with the idea, now it could have been joe hagan who served almost the entire eight years in that role in the bush white house, i'm pretty sure it was me but you know.>> you're the only one here so. >> you might want to credit joe but the idea we came up with was let's get the president out of washington from camp david

because as these gentlemen know camp david is one of the only places the president can go where there is no press watching, there's a perimeter there and it is a relatively secure place, the presidents ranch being really one of the only other places where you can spirit him out without a lot of people knowing it so we started with that frame and then we thought how do we get the whole iraq you cabinet assembled to meet him and so the brilliant idea was that we would organize a cabinets to cabinet meeting so the iraq he cabinet was in baghdad and the relevant

counterparts would assemble at camp david with president bush and we would have a joint cabinet meeting by city conference so that's what we advertised to the iraqis, what we advertised to the entire world was that president bush and his cabinet would be at camp david and all of the iraqis would be in baghdad and they would have a meeting by videoconference. we invited the cabinet members i think there were six or eight of them who were relevant to come up to camp david and the chairman of the joint chiefs, a couple other people and there was a big dinner and the

convening place that has a dining room there was a big dinner for all of the cabinet members there with the president and vice president cheney and our plan was president bush and his national security advisor and i would slip out before dessert and we would leave dick cheney to make small talk. by the way this is where the plan almost failed. because we needed to keep everybody there at dinner while the rest of us went out on golf carts and went to the helipad and got onto helicopters that had no lights and took off from camp david. as i was leaving i vaguely

remember the vice president saying anybody read any good books? so i was worried that somebody was going to because we had not told the cabinet about it word spreads pretty fast anyway we flew from camp david by darkened helicopter to andrews air force base where that start helicopter drove into a hanger in which air force one was being kept so it wasn't outside where anybody could see it, we boarded the plane and then air force one took off from andrews late at night without any lights and we flew eight or 10 hours to baghdad and we landed there and just before we looked

just as we were landing the iraq he prime minister was informed that there's going to be a videoconference and president bush is going to be here in baghdad. this photo here is a photo of the president i always got the end seat i don't know why i'm the guy at the end there and what you see up on the screen is all the members of the u.s. cabinet being videoconference to and from camp david. it was a hugely successful meeting and in a way in which the protected and confidential nature of camp david contributed to a very successful operation that could not have been done but for the

kind of place that camp david is.>> we talked about the camp david accords talk about some of the other consequential historical events that happened, meetings that happened at camp david throughout history.>> the first international visitor that went to camp david of course i think it was part of that incentive much they enjoyed fishing there and talking as they talked about the invasion of sicily and normandy pretty consequential conversations, eisenhower was the first american president to make use of helicopters for presidential travel so he spontaneously, i asked him directly in person can i give you a tour around washington and he said i can get on, they did a tour around

washington and later went on to camp david and enjoyed a great time up there. interestingly they lights that american-made helicopter so much that he talked eisenhower into letting him buy 2 that she took back with him to the soviet union. another soviet story was with nixon. interestingly they claimed in his memoir that he did not know much about this camp david place he was almost suspicious of it but he went anyway, the party guy richard nixon had the typical navy blue blazer when he got there was the presidential seal and he also had the keys to this brand-new navy blue lincoln continental car so he told nixon to get in the passenger seat i'm sure the service was having a great time

with this and he was used to driving these curvy roads, so here nixon is in the passenger side, brezhnev behind the wheel they go behind the hill around the curve brezhnev hits 50 miles per hour in the lincoln continental and you can see nixon as the story goes sitting over there like slow down, slow down and brezhnev slams on the brakes around the curve, they come to a. with richard nixon and says where you find that automobile it holds around really well so i think the short-lived tradition of american presidents getting automobiles ended with that in camp david but that's a wonderful story of brezhnev and the continental. >> tell us about your first visit there president bush did not just use this for diplomatic visits he used it

for weekend visits and more recreational getting away from the white house.>> i was a regular visitor during the last three years in the administration when i was chief of staff as my predecessor and his wife were but it was not common for people other than the chief of staff and national security advisor and so on but the president and mrs. bush took the trouble to work their way through most of the senior staff of the west wing and give them an opportunity to come to camp david with their spouse because what they always spread was service and government and

in the administration is a family affair and everybody is serving. so it was a really important not just a perk but a way of building the community he was talking about earlier building that kind of community around the white house and the rest of the administration. there was two assistants to the president at the time i think who were unmarried so we did not actually make the list very early but then finally we both got invited on the same weekend but no spouse so we concluded this must be jewish singles weekend. so i was disappointed to find in fact it was just me and her.

but it was a really important way to establish more of a personal relationship and we did not need camp to feel that way but i think it contributed a lot to the family atmosphere through the entirety of his term.>> you live with your wife and two daughters that had to be a fascinating experience to raise children at camp david, what was that experience like?>> we are the only family that lived inside the camp so think about everyday families and transform yourself to children living inside the cabinet called cedar. it's quite an extraordinary

place, a modest house with a graveyard we used to say and your neighbors happen to be the president and all the others but you're still family and two young daughters, it's a different dynamic, lots of highs a few lows, great memories. >> you are not allowed to have pets there? >> no pets at the time. my wife wrote the rules but for good reason. the presidents find this comical but again a military organization protecting the camp and the president and his guess but currently there is a no pets rule which we honored but one day michelle and the girls were coming back sitting in the backseat of our car with little baggies of goldfish coming through the gate and

very duty-bound marines and he says ma'am you can't bring pets into the show he was flabbergasted by this and the girls are catching on and the tears are starting to roll down the eyes and michelle is looking at them and she goes well, they are for dinner. i think the marine essentially said yes ma'am carry-on.>> you have another a story about when the palestinians were there talking to your wife and daughter. >> we were always there to honor the president, we briefed

the girls about how to dress it was july so hot and rainy, don't expose body parts and don't wear your bikini top and all that type of thing. michelle kept the blinds shut in cedar and one morning she went out to water her plants and across the way was rosebud with a bunch of mail palestinians in their bathrobes and that was it, outfront and she thought that's just kind of strange but she runs back in and says girls let's go play in the backyard, it was just the kind of thing you learn how to react to things like that and keep it low-key. common thing right?>> the president is not the only one who is marked the first lady

generally is. >> what i like is where the white house and first lady will leave their mark, their legacy in a way to remember this white house we had wonderful projects with mrs. bush and in the green room and library, camp david the same is often true the first lady will make some changes, maybe eisenhower came into this military government issue and this would not do so the camp quickly became colored and eisenhower green, yellow and pink industry brought in a navy reserve decorator it's transformed to place that's actually where they got their names after the trees. that's how the aspen lodge came about mrs. nixon like in the white house who was really unheralded and her

extraordinary work with transforming some of the french influence to great american influence, did quite a bit at camp david as well and they grew the facility, she did the swimming pool other amenities have an added, eisenhower did the golf course there so other recreational things. mrs. nixon did quite a bit, mrs. bush i love some of the things she did bringing the directors of the presidential libraries to camp david all of their bosses spend times at this place but none of them have seen it, spent a day there having lunch and understanding the place was very important and another with wonderful touch i love is she had pictures collected of all the world leaders as well as leaders going back to fdr and

put those in places all around david and a nice special legacy piece she had an artist from the arboretum go around with her and select certain plants, shrubs and flowers and memorialize those entities extraordinaire drawings and the originals are still at camp david and there are reproductions here available so you can take a piece of camp david with you home tonight.>> we heard about how they spent the holidays, between the two presidencies there were 12 bush family christmas is at camp david, what was it like to be there and serve during the holidays?>> again you see the typical american family come together as family and it's just wonderful to watch. that calm serenity, that peaceful meal the right decorations and just provide the atmosphere, serve the

presidents guests so when they leave on a sunday and the visit is over they are happy and restored. to watch them do christmas for 12 years is a phenomenal thing to witness. >> all right what we are close to being out of time as you all know you won't get to see a special sneak preview of our exhibit across the way and not only does it cover camp david but the ranch and walker's point and the lbj ranch so you are among the first to get to see it please make sure you take time to walk across the courtyard and visit that tonight, we have mike's book inside camp david for sale as well as the historical association, please make sure to visit. we have some great things in the exhibit we have the original camp david sign we have correspondence between fdr and churchill, we have a

chainsaw from president bush hopefully you have a few more down at the ranch i'm hoping it's not your only one. please join me in thanking our great panelists tonight. [ applause ]