two best-selling authors will show their perspectives on c-span's new book "the president." they ranked the best and worst executives. tonight at 8:00 eastern on c-span. c-span cities tour visited palo alto, california. we continue our look with a hoover institution to tour the hoover tower. in the hoover tower on stanford's campus, which was dedicated by herbert hoover himself in 1941. hoover himself was in front of the tower there, giving his speech, and that was actually the 50th anniversary of the founding of stanford itself. he was an alum of stanford. he was part of the first class. got a degree in geology and as ae immensely successful

mining engineer in many parts of the world, became a millionaire, and in 1914 was in london where he and his wife had their headquarters. at that point, people contacted americansp get stranded on the continent and in england act to the united states. as he was doing this, he realized this was a catastrophic war with people starving in belgium and northern france. so he stepped in immediately, and hoover and his wife were instrumental. saved millions of people during the war, and millions more after the war in about 20 countries or so. here.s a lovely quote "this structure is dedicated to the use and preservation of the

collection of books and manuscripts of war, revolution, and peace." peace was very important, of course, to herbert hoover. he also came from a quaker was tound, and his motto study war in order to avoid war. to promote peace, you have to understand the consequences and the origins of war. there is another wonderful another -- there is wonderful quote from his speech in 1941 there. over the elevator that goes to the top of the tower. "the purpose of this institution is to promote peace. it's record stands as a challenge to those who promote war. they should attract those who search for peace. i therefore dedicate this building to these purposes." so we are now about to enter

herbert hoover's office, in which he spent quite a lot of time. we actually have a photo here of herbert hoover at his desk, which would have been right about here at an angle with this great view of the campus. died in 1964, and his wife sadly died 20 years earlier. so he spent a lot of time here in his office on campus, splitting his time between california and new york, where he lived. and he was incredibly involved with the operations of his library and archives. and as you can see here, on top of everything else that he did,

these are all the books that he either wrote or cowrote. i don't know when herbert hoover slept, because he was so prolific. translationnderful that he and his wife did of a treaties that was written in latin in 1556. they together worked on this project. work.tely fantastic she, i understand, did most of the translation, and he worked on the plates. but it was an incredibly scholarly collaboration that they did so much together. they were quite a pair, and this is a beautiful example of that. you can see from the photo here, the campus is right behind here. i think his desk was right here.

it is really exciting to be in the same spot where he was. and to think that he was the first alumn here, part of the first class on campus. the university gave so much to him, and he gave so much back. now, this room was refurbished in 1990, so the furniture here is new. that he hadthe desk as secretary of commerce. we have two chairs here. one was his chair as secretary of commerce, and the other is his cabinet chair. the meetings the cabinet had would have had a chair for each secretary, and he would have had his as secretary of commerce. in fact, one of the chairs still has a plaque here. secretary of commerce, march 1925 to august 1928 . office.the foyer to his

this is a very interesting historic artifact. herbert hoover was incredibly well known and admired after world war i. it was universal, really, because he had saved millions of people through relief operations. both parties wanted him. he was called a master of efficiency. he was incredible in so many ways that it is very understandable that people wanted him to join their party. joined -- he threw his hat in with the republican party. joined -- he threw his hat in this is the fabulous view that we have from the top of the tower. it is the center of the campus.

it looks very much like it was when it was originally built in 1891. and the story is related to this. at the new york world fair, you had this carillon in the pavilion. this was the time when the tower was being built, eventually dedicated in 1941. originally, herbert hoover meant for the reading room to be here at the top of the tower. but with the beginning of world there in europe, 1939, was no way that carillon could be sent back to belgium. so herbert hoover and many others raise funds and acquired this carillon. he sent a letter saying, change

of plans. the reading room is going to stay downstairs, and we are going to have this wonderful carillon at the top. the architect did not bat an eye, just changed the plans. in 1989 when we had yet another earthquake, there was a little bit of damage, and it was in need of refurbishing. so the bells were sent back to europe, and came back. on top of that, when they were reinstated, they built this enclosure so that a professor of music here on the campus, when he played, he is not deafened by the sound. he can just play in this enclosure. in order to study history, you have to have records. you have to have the original documents, the primary sources. they have to be collected and preserved and made available to

the public. the public at large and the historians, journalists, researchers. we need to understand what happens in order to plan for the future, and herbert hoover saw that. that was his vision. we have not stopped collecting sense. we are so proud of being able to preserve this history of the 21st century. staffcer: our cities tour recently traveled to palo alto, california, to learn about its rich history. to watch more video from aloe alto and other stops on our tour, visit c-span.org/citiestour. you are watching american history to be on c-span3. bus iser: that c-span stopping at middle and high schools across the country to meet an award the winners of our

studentcam video competition. we were recently in providence, rhode island, and met with second prizewinners raymond menez. and jovan ji >> it is very exciting, because this was our first time entering. we put in a lot of hours editing, a lot of contacting, and it was a long journey. we were very excited and happy, and we look forward to participating next year. >> it was something we could not believe. next year, we are coming for the win for sure. >> to think our first year entering something. we just entered jessie how far we could go. and think that we got second place on our first try just blows my mind. announcer: to watch all the winning entries on this year's studentcam contest, go to studentcam.org. announcer: once, tv was simply three giant networks and a network called pbs.

a small network with an unusual name rolled out a big idea. let viewers decide on their own what was important to them. c-span opened the doors to washington policymaking for all to see, bringing you unfiltered content from congress and beyond. and at the age of power to the people, this was true people power. in the 40 years since, the landscape has clearly changed. there is no monolithic media, broadcasting has given way, youtube stars are a thing. but c-span's big idea is more relevant now than ever. no government money supports it. it is a public service provided by your cable or satellite provider, on television and online. c-span is your unfiltered view of government so you can make up your own mind. >> author richard carwardine abraham lincoln

symposium about lincoln's sense of humor. the abraham lincoln institute and ford peter society hosted this symposium and washington, d.c. to highlight the 16th presidents of life, career, and legacy. this is 50 minutes. >> good morning, ladies and gentlemen. i a board member of the institute. executive director of the abraham lincoln's bicentennial commission. thank you for joining us today. unlike winston churchill, tended lincoln's humor to go toward self-deprecation. during one of the debates in illinois, the spectator shouted that lincoln was being two-faced.