approximately 25 home stations and 165 swing stations. a riderstation is where would simply change his tired horse anda fresh gallop on to the next swing he would reach a home station where he would spend the evening and the next morning he would catch the mail coming from the opposite direction and he would head back to his other home station. one rider would do this live in the next one would do this loop and so on. that is how mail was delivered in 10 days. the pony express lasted only a little over a year. that was due to economic reasons . it was expensive to operate the pony express. it was a dangerous job. this was an advertisement from a newspaper. the pony express riders wanted.

must be expert riders willing to risk death the daily. wage is $25 a week, which is a large sum of money for the time period. but of course, risking death daily comes with this type of occupation. the telegraph comes across the prairie and often times the is stretchede across the sagebrush because there were very few trees even to this day across much of the expanse of the planes. with the telegraph laid out across the prairie, annals would run through it. native americans learned the talking wireman more white people coming down the prairie. they would use it for ornamented accessories or jewelry, etc..

the story of the trails ends with the continental railroad bringing in mass populations very rapidly through the western united states. it also begins a new chapter with the modern highway that we now have today. i hope visitors take away from the interpretive center here in appreciation of the people that settled the american west. they were not large people. they were tough people with a mindset that there was a better life ahead of them. they set out with a determination. with a strong determination, you can accomplish many things. >> next on our american history tour, the colorado river. there were floods on the river and the development of u.s. arizona. the colorado river is the

life lead of the southwest. it starts off in the mountains in colorado and it drains all of the ice melts throughout the mountains and it is the source of the water for the entire southwest. it travels 1200 miles down through here and ends up at the mexican border. it is basically the source of water for every community in the southwest and for our food stuff all over the country. there are both good and bad things about the colorado river. acres ofthings were lush wetlands that met the ocean. the bad things were the river was totally uncontrollable. it had floods that would reach about three feet above your head right now. feet above your head right

now. a huge river. destroyed a number of times. herendian tribes have been and have lived off the river. what happened was there was a struggle for control of this crossing. bandits came in and took control of it. the us military came in and kick them out. the reaction was that this was their land and their taking it from them. with these narrow droppings here behind us, this was a safe place to cross the river when the river was wild. here ineople crossed

1849 with the golden rush. , it was almost like a city on the mississippi river. there were steamboats. the trains are bringing in immigrants. different people speaking different languages. it was a real urban center. it was a wild and rollicking river town. it was created by teddy roosevelt in 1903 to try to deal with these issues of the flooding of the colorado river. out of that, they have built a phenomenal architecture of dams and canals. project was one of the

first dam projects on the colorado river. the bureau proclamation started a project to create the first dam which was the laguna dam. ended up providing water for about 50,000 acres of farmland. one of the most interesting crossingf the yuma story is when they brought the water down the california side, they had to figure how to get it to arizona. with all the floods going on, they decided to go under the river. they created the yuma siphon. it was about an engineering marvel. they built it over three years. it goes about 80 feet under the river. -- two footot t concrete walls.

it was an amazing engineering accomplishment in this day. the most amazing part of the yuma siphon project was they had to ring in diverse. bring in divers. they were going underneath the .iver building this it was like a subway tunnel. those workersn worked on the subway system in new york. credible impact on yuma. canyonver dam and glen -- glen canyon was built in the 1960's. those are large storage dams that regulate the flow of the entire colorado river. what has really impacted since dams --a number of

think of them like straws into the river. you think the river is unlimited . parker dam gets built in 1941. it is water through an aqueduct. later arizona wants it's part. serveles to phoenix to those people. dam -- the imperial pulled water out into the all-american canal, the largest canal in the world. you could see it from space. imperial water to the valley -- the coachella valley acres.ves 500,000 it irrigates 500,000 acres of crop land in the imperial valley

and coachella valley. see oft amazing thing to the imperial dam are all of these canals pulling water out and what remains of the river. now all of the states are starting to say, who will get what. says the upper basin states which is like wyoming and colorado get 7.5 million acres. the lower basin states which is arizona and california and willa, -- by the way, we give 1.5 million acres. they calculated it based on the

30 wettest years in our history. in other words, we have come to understand without over allocating the river which is the real problem for the future of the colorado river. oneof the challenges was no spoke to the river itself. no one spoke to the environment itself. realization dawning that the health of the river is important for the operation of the river. we are where we are. we have developed an economy and a culture dependent upon this river into its use. we better be pretty humble about its use. we should not assume it is going to be here for us forever. >> tonight look at the people,

events is part of c-span's cities tour. we highlighted the history of the cities we visit here you can see more on our website, c-span.org. click on the series tap and click the link on cities tour. >> photographer lauren irving retraced the 18 43 and 1844 expedition through oregon and nevada using journals and maps from the journey. it mr. irving photograph all of the oregon camps. sites located near bend. code resorte sister

is that sometimes the writing in the journal is a risk -- sometimes the writing in the journal is so precise. i ended up trying to capture that on the film. there are trying to make nice landscape shots and tried to incorporate things in the images that are described in the journal. expedition of 1843, went westward near kansas city. went along what is now known as the oregon trail. it comes up into the organ territory and settles in this part of the country.

john fremont was a young man who grew up in south carolina. he went to school. he also married the daughter of -- benton helped his son-in-law get this job of being on these expeditions. he came through here. he was 30 years old. .t was a sizable expedition he had a lot of responsibility. 25 men, including thomas the primary-- reason of mapping this trail and providing the detail it takes to get out here on a wagon was to

populate oregon and washington so that the population would be such that we would not have a military conflict with the british. they were pretty well encamped cup of me. it was designed by the british to have this territory. congress is very interested in claiming this part of the northwest. in november of eight keynote three -- 1803, he accomplished his work. tomakes the decision not stay there, not to stay there for the winter. he makes the decision to move south.

then the indianhead canyon camp and down to this conjunction. e we are right now is near bend. milespassing for several over the plains, the trail entered a beautiful pine forest in which we traveled for several hours. and that we descended into a valley of another large band. the street was very swift and eat. among the timber here, it is over three feet in diameter. we have the side of the rainbow. sitefremont came upon this

on december 4. they had some cattle they are bringing along. mules.d 104 horses and this time they're using a teepee. two american indian guys. here on thathrough day in the afternoon at least, you would see them putting up the teepee and several fires getting started and taking all of the material and so far out. he was busy writing in his

journal and getting his equipment out to hopefully have the weather be such that he could get a lot of readings at night. when he was successful in reading the latitude, he was using a telescope and timing a particular moon going around jupiter. he was very in likely on his horse and outward he could see this little canyon and do his drawings of the sketches of the map. they would start each day actually moving at about 10:00 and maybe even 11. it has been a long time. during that time, it is very

likely they were out trying to find a good route if they weren't already on a trail of some kind. and saw thisived for the first time, it was on 5, 1843.f december yet.hadn't seen it to an area where there is a huge amount of loss activity geologically -- of lava activity geologically. this going to a place and is right by ryan ranch. it was all pine forest and beautiful weather made our

journey delightful. everything was melting rapidly. principal ofbe the the river. it was sometimes narrow to 50 feet. river.nded along the it's banks occasionally black and with rock. there must've an old camping ground. the name of the stream is similarly characteristic. you could hear the roaring of the false.

this is the first initial falls right here. it talks about it in his terminal. -- journal. you can see what he is talking about, particularly down below a little bit. if it see what he is talking about. i don't really think it has changed any since he was here.

this is a place where fremont was many years ago. this is the main span of the river. it is one of the very few rivers in the united states that flows to the south and the north, but it does that. the cartographer also talks about the number of false along this area that they were in. we are at the upper end of dylan falls.

just about 200 yards, 300 yard there is a nice big meadow called ryan ranch. it was in this clearing that camped thexpedition night of december 5. at some point, fremont discovered a hole in the rock. in this meadow where the water was draining, he said at the time there was almost a small stream. it was raining down into the lava rocks below. that hole is still here.

he made a comment in his journal that the -- that they located or happened to see a set of freshly atp.d poles for have the owners been here -- as they were not, they merely left the old ones in their place. we talked a couple of times of how long it would take. for the native americans that -- the comeback in the find some old ones. then they went south. down to this marsh.

he went down here to summer lake . he went down to water valley and out into nevada. after this trip was made, the information was published in a report. some 10,000 copies were made. almost every major wagon came out to oregon. they also came to california country. carson was an indian agent for the u.s. government. an author spoke with c-span's

connecting history about his biography of kit carson and his role of the conquest of the western united states. kit carson is one of those guys that i think is almost better known for his fictional aspect. this is a guy that was the subject of hundreds of comic lpoks and these original pu novels that were called "blood and thunder" and a bad tv shows and bad movies. what we note about this guy is punitived muddied by a ulative history of fictionalizing. when i decided to write a book about him, i wanted killed back the layers of the fiction and get to the real guy.

we find his characters to even though he was in a sense powerless, he was an illiterate run away from misery. the westernyone on stage. he intersected with all of these historical figures and was intimately involved in the and theion of the west mexican-american war. this intersected with history. in an intimate way. inecided to devote a book about 45 is my life and figure out who this guy was, kit arson. he came out and escape america. he was a runaway. he had heard all of the stories about the wild west and wanted to be one of these mountain men, one of these trappers.

he became an intimate part of their world, which is mean in french-based culture. he learned french and became the went in french and lived with these guys and learned the river systems of the west. basically a hunting beaver pelts. he knew all the rivers. that was a key to understanding the typography and understanding how to get around here. when they explore the west, they needed a guy. they realize that these mountain men knew the west better than anyone. the cap the expedition on track. became -- there was a

best-selling book. carson be kind -- becomes a kind of hero in these stories. no one could seem to find this guy. he was living in new mexico and was never coming back east. he was kind of this mythic character that people wanted to know a little bit more about. kit carson was often the central character in these stories. the authors who wrote these terrible stories, i would dare you to read them actually. they are not good, but in terms of literature -- these authors never really made any attempt to understand who the real kit carson was. they didn't get his consent to use his name. it carson didn't make any money off of these books.

he hated these books. they were gross exaggerations. they would say things like kit carson was the kind of man who would kill two american -- indians before breakfast. in fact he was married to a native american and was a very close friend to many tribes in the west. these are the kinds of things he had to spend most of his life living down. he didn't understand where this was coming from white people that east so desperately seem to need this hero, he would manifest and whenever he went back east people refused to believe he was the real kit carson because the real kit carson was 5'4" and he was awkward around

people. he spent most of his life on a mule. so he had this kind of awkward gait and wasn't this heroic action figure type guy that was portrayed in the "blood and thunder." so there was this disconnect. you're not the kit carson i'm looking for. they were sorely disappointed. so i spent a lot of time in the ok sort of trying to explore the ways in which carson tried to deal with this celebrity. it was very awkward thing for him. with these "blood and thunder" books, carson had another problem which was he couldn't read them. because he was illiterate. so he had to have other people perhaps around the campfire read these books to him. which was a source of embarrassment. and it just -- it just made it all the worse. there was one time in which carson's celebrity from the

"blood and thunder" and sort of intersected with the real kit carson. and that was in the 1840's when he got a -- an assignment to go try to find a woman, a white woman, ann white was her name, who had been kidnapped by apaches. and he followed the trail for five, six, seven, almost -- closer to two weeks before he did find ann white. and the element of surprise was compromised. and various things happened. and she ended up getting killed. and when they -- when carson and his men went down to the campsite to sift through her belongs, what did they find? they found a "blood and thunder" book that she haddestly been reading. and the star of this "blood and thunder" book was kit carson. and the plot line of the book was kit carson was sent out to go rescue a woman who had been kidnapped by indians.

so here she was reading this book perhaps thinking kit carson was near she gets killed and carson in the real story was not able to save this woman. and this just haunted him for rest of his life. and he ordered the book burned. he thought these "blood and thunder" books were terrible. so interesting ways in which kind of like mythology intersects with reality in his story. one of the most famous stories about kit carson that was told during his time that is actually true. now, you got to understand a lot of these stories are not true. the more you dig into them, pretty suspicious. but one of the ones that's actually true is during the mexican war, he was in a battle near san diego called san pasqual. and the american army had come surrounded by a mexican californian army that was wielding lances, almost like

don quixote and remarkably proficient with these lances. and they were just butchering the american army. they were really good at it. and they were -- these -- the american soldiers were getting gored. and just ripped to pieces by these long lances that -- almost like a jousting kind of thing in medieval times. so they were completely surrounded. and it was just a matter of time before they were all going to be killed. and kit carson was given the assignment to try to make it to san diego where there were supposedly some marines on -- out in the bay on a ship. and maybe go get help somehow. so carson at night slips through the -- this ring of mexican soldiers somehow. but in the course of slipping through their -- this line of soldiers, he lost his shoes. d he had to walk 30 miles to

san diego barefoot. across this country that was just -- just unbelievably difficult and thorny. and full of cactus. and so he does do this. he makes it to san diego. he makes it to this ship. they immediately take him to the infirmary. his feet are just completely torn up. and he's just a bloody mess. he can't walk. but he gets there. he alerts the marines of what's happening. the marines come and save the american army. and carson is meanwhile in the hospital for three or four weeks because his feet become infected. and he never told this story and never talked about it. it was something that -- always reluctant to put himself in the center of a story. but in a way he saved the american army in this situation. and there are stories like this throughout his life. whenever something is going on

that the chips are down, carson somehow gets the assignment to fix the situation. and he does. and this certainly is one of the best known. by the end of his life, when he dies, the transcontinental railroad is being built. most of the tribes that he was close to had been rounded up and sent to various reservations. his main impact, though, i think, what he's probably most famous for is for one of the very last things he did in his life which was the round-up of the navajo indians. the large -- what is really depending on how you count numbers, among tribes, and bloodlines and this sort of thing, it's the largest tribe in the united states. he succeeded in rounding up the navajos and moving them to a reservation 500 miles away. and the destruction of the navajo culture and this long walk as they call it is

something that is -- it's almost like it happened yesterday in terms of the navajo and their memory of this. and they hate carson. they think he's a genocidal character. and they think he's -- you know, everyone hates their conqueror. but their hatred of carson is palpable. and so he's very controversial character out here in the southwest. and i was drawn to that. because here's a guy who's the subject of all these juvenile biographies and he's considered an american folk hero. and yet he's also considered a genocidal maniac. and so how do you reconcile these two very different images? i structured the book into three parts. the first part, the new men, is really about the arrival of the americans into the southwest. during the time of both the mountain men era, leading to fremont's expeditions into the

west and then finally the american army's arrival during the mexican war. so it's really just kind of from shifting perspectives it sort of shifts from various native american points of view to mexican points of view. and who is this new arrival? the new men? what are -- what are they about? why are they here? what do they want with this desert country out here? so that's part one. part two is called a broken country. and basically, it looks at the beginning of what you might call occupation. it's like the conquest of the west was remarkably easy. and fairly straightforward. but conquest was one thing. occupation is something different. i think we've as a nation discovered this and learned this very hard lesson in afghanistan and certainly in iraq. it's like it's one thing to cofpker a -- conquer a people. least on paper. it's an entirely another thing

to try to occupy and govern land. especially one as complicated as this. this desert kingdom with all these different languages and religions and, you know, basically for the first 50 years, almost -- you know, certainly first several decades, people back in washington were saying, what have we done here? we've conquered this land but we do not understand it. and we can't govern it. we should just give it all back to mexico. it's too hard to run this place. just a little -- there was so much violence. there was slavery. there was the hostage taking. and it was just unfamiliar country that people in washington didn't know what to do with. so that's part two. part three is really about kit carson's role in the conquest

of the navajo people. and everything he did with that monster slayer it's called. this is the final act of his long career. and it's probably what he's best known for. this sort of scorched earth campaign that he led into navajo country that resulted in their conquest and their removal from their beloved lands. and this great experiment that went on to try to force the navajo to become -- to settle down and become farmers and christians living in this sort of reservation. and on the border with texas. so it's -- it's a big sprawling book that has many parts. and the remarkable thing is that kit carson kind of is the through line that makes it -- that makes it make sense. he just intersected with all these different aspects of history out here. when i read the book, i was really worried about the sort of political correctness aspect

of it. and because the book is constantly shifting its point of view. i'm writing about pueblo indians and then i'm writing about the apaches. then i'm writing about anglo americans and the frefrpbl folks from the mountain men days and the spanish of course. and it's easy to put your foot -- it's a mine field. let's put it that way. and i was worried that i was offending people. left, right and center. because there are so many people out here. so many different cultures. but that didn't really happen. i don't think -- you know, certainly there's some criticism. there's always criticism when you write a book this big. but i was surprised by how many -- how many people have responded favorably to the book. even the navajo who cannot stand kit carson and who have asked me at various times, why would you write a book about this guy?

he's -- he's as evil as hitler something. han or and i gave a talk at shiprock and a nice woman bought the book and stood up to ask me a question. and she was holding the book and said i bought the book and i'm going to take it home and i'm going to try to read it. but most likely i'm going to use it for target practice. so she had a sense of humor about it and was very polite about it. but spoke to the depth of the feeling that's out there against carson in indian country. started out the book believing that carson was one of the great indian killers. that he was this somehow an indian hater. that he had this ferocious dislike of indian culture. because that's what you will certainly hear, for example, out in navajo country. but when you get into his life, you realize it's very complicated. he spoke numerous indian

tongues. his first wife who was araphaho, singing grass, was the love of his life. they had two daughters. his second wife was cheyenne. he was very close with the ute tribe and with the taos pueblo indians. and with the -- many of the plains indian tribes. so it becomes much more complicated when you realize that -- you can't say this is an indian hater. he was someone who allied himself with certain tribes. and was sort of a bitter enemy against other tribes. he didn't really think monolithically about american indians. he thought specific tribes. and sort of last tribe that he affiliated himself with was if you want to call it that was spanish -- the spanish tribe of new mexico. he became spanish almost. his third and final wife was

spanish. they raised their kids here in new mexico. he converted to catholicism and they spoke spanish. and he dreamed in spanish. he thought in spanish. his last words right before his death were in spanish. so the enemy of the spanish and those times here in new mexico, the sort of mortal enemy was the navajo. so i think that's kind of the way he thought in terms of tribal allegiances that ran deep. and so when he got the assignment to go round up the navajo he was willing to do it. it doesn't mean that he hated indians. it meant that he still thought, i think, in this kind of tribal way. and i think that explains a lot better his motivation for doing what he did. >> tonight's look at the people, places and events of westward expansion is part of c-span's city tour where we

aspect t the literary of each city we visit. -- k on the series tab on c on c-span.org and cities tour. c-span's american history tour continues with our look at westward expansion. in 1846 animal trapper miles goodyear established fort buenaventura, the first permanent anglo settlement in the great basin region in what is today nevada, utah, and oregon. e spoke with an historic interpreter from fort uenaventura. >> we are at fort buenaventura in ogden, utah. it is the site of the first permanent settlement, documented settlement in utah. miles goodyear lived here and his wife pamona, their two

children, william and mary, also lived here. others came and went. but miles and pomona built it and lived here for less than two years. miles goodyear traded all over the west. he was an historical figure in utah, idaho, wyoming, and california. so he was all over basically traveling and trading in approximately 44 -- 1844, he decided that he wanted to go back to where the ogden and the weaver river flowed together. and build a trading post. and of course he at that time still believed that trading was going to be lucrative. he came here to this site, fort buenaventura, and built the cabins in 1845. miles built the cabins believing that the fur trade would carry him through which it had ended and so he discovered that horses were going to be an excellent source of income. and as people were traveling from the east to the west, and

there were thousands of people coming into the west by then, he built the cabins here next to a sand hill which is over here. miles climbed the hill and built fires on top of that hill to indicate to all of those people who were coming across the rockies, which is to our east, that there was a settlement here. and he wanted people to come here and trade with him. and he had four cabins. this one has not yet been rebuilt. it was originally a vertical cabin. it had vertical logs. and it was used to house people who traveled through and needed shelter. this cabin here where miles and pomona lived. they had a chimney which is the only cabin with a chimney so they could cook and be warm in the winter. and inside the cabin, they have beds and blankets and the items that would have been normal for miles goodyear to have had, the bed as you can see would have a

little bit too much give in it. and so they would have a tool that they would go down here and twist it, twist it, twist it and retie it. and that is how the saying sleep tight came about. is sleep tight, don't let the bud bugs bite. and why did the bed bugs bite? because the mattresses were made of straw. and there were bed bugs in them. so the bed bugs bit. and the springs weren't always tight. so sleep tight and don't let the bed bugs bite. this cabin is a reproduction of what existed in 1845. the original cabins collapsed. but there was one cabin that survived. it was taken off the premises sometime after 1850. used as a chicken coop and later on donated to the daughters of the utah pioneers. which is now sitting about a mile and a half away from here. under cover.

so it is being protected. and it was one of the original cabins. this cabin here was used bridles, for saddles, everything miles would have needed for his horse herds. the people coming through here traded their lame animals for healthy animals and he would nurse the lame ones back to health. so basically he would trade two lame horses for one helty. miles named it fort buenaventura. and it means "good venture." he was in hopes that it would be the best venture of his life the trading post. and if -- some things i would like to show you. this is a bedding lamp. bedding lamps were used during this period of time as a source of light. the rich people had candles made out of beeswax but a candle burns and is gone. the bedding lamp has a wick.

and inside this little container is fat from food. and you would light this wick. and hang it from your ceiling. so this is what the poor people used for their lighting in their homes. and the other thing that we could probably find some interest in is tea. and tea was of course considered money. and tea was traded. and this is how it comes out of china. the east indy company brought it out of china in the 1500's, 1600's, 1700's into the british port, ships would then trade these tea bricks. and as you can see on the back, it's scored into 16 pieces. so the rich people would run down to the ships, buy a brick of tea. and frame it. to prove their wealth. and then they would buy another brick of tea and they would cut into 16 pieces and sell

1/16th brick to poor people. this is solid tea. and so what you would do is in order to have your tea, you would scrape it with a knife. and boil -- and put it into your boiling water and it is exactly like tea today. so this is how it was transferred out of china. this is what was thrown off the ships at the boston tea party. it was bricks of tea. and they're very heavy. the other thing i want to show you is cards. these are historically correct playing cards as you can see. there are no numbers and no letters on these cards. so people were killed in card games. and frequently. because if i had three kings, and you had three kings, we didn't know who had the kings. and so people killed each other over their hand of cards. nd about the 1870's they

started putting j.'s, k.'s and q.'s and the women were obvious. you could tell the women. you had a difficult time telling who was the king and who was the jack in any given deck. many people were killed. and the cards became numbered and lettered, it became a family game where people could play cards without danger. i opened the store primarily because my interest in the fur trade had blossomed to the point where i wanted to give other people the opportunity to see what it would have been like to shop in 1840. so this would be the wal-mart of the 1840's. in 1845, as i mentioned, miles built the cabins and in 1947, the mormons, the l.d.s. church arrived in salt lake which is about 30 miles to the south. and 30 miles away was an

incredibly close neighbor. in the west, people didn't live that close. and the tradition was that you built your settlement and then you claimed all of the land around you. the mormons came in with 124 people and all lived in a very close proximity. so miles wasn't exactly happy about having that many neighbors and that close. and so he figured that he might be better off going off to california. which he had been on numerous occasions. with horse herds. and he decided that he would buy some land in california. so he contacted the l.d.s. church officials and offered fort buenaventura and everything that you could see from every vantage point from this location for $1,900. the mormons bought it. and he got interested in the gold mines in california. and found that horse trading to the gold miners was very lucrative. and he did that.

but he also did a little bit of gold mining himself. and he discovered goodyear's bar. in california. still named goodyear's bar. and he got quite wealthy off of gold as well. miles died in his early 30's in california. which was considered kind of a normal life span. and he died of what people assume was pneumonia. well, i think he's important because he is our mountain man and the one who lived here and the one who loved the area and built here. and because he developed the first permanent documented residence in what is now utah, he is really our first resident. other states have their mountain men. but miles is ours. >> the crystal gold mine was one of the first mines in coeur dalene, idaho. it was rediscovered more than a century ago. c-span got a tour of the mine

rom its present day owner. >> welcome to crystal gold mine in kellogg, idaho. let's step through the portal and go way back in time. be careful coming through. this is where we like to capture how the old miners back in the day even decided to drill and blast in a mountain. how would you drill and blast in a mountain? south of the coeur dalene river, when this was being done, hardly anybody around, the river just flowing through the valley and could have been panning for gold. the technique for hard rock miners liked going upstream when they were panning and having fun getting gold in their pans and going upstream. the source of gold stopped. going upstream like that where the source of gold stopped and possibility where in a gold could be coming from and use that as a reference to drill and blast in the mountains. re than likely -- gold

originates in quarts rock. this is what they were hoping to find. here's the initial quartz vein. it looks likes they had fun following quartz leads. we got some highlighted spots still visible in the surface in a couple of spots. and the cement was put in for the tour but look what's in it. iron rails for mine -- miners to have iron rails, miners seeking their fortune in the northwest were lucky to have materials to make old rails like this out of wood. you see a lot of the old mine photos and wooden rails were made. the mine car was found refurbished and old hand push carts. imagine hand pushing the cart up and down the tracks. empty mine car uphill. full mine car down hill. back in the old days in the early 1900's bunker hill was one of our main silver mines around the valley. they were known to do exploratory drifts all around here looking for other opportunities. so we figured they equated this possibly being related to that. imagine this being very remote rugged country. anybody who was in a source of

gold odds were they were keeping something like this a secret and want to protect themselves and protect their gold. pretty good mystery behind the mine. it was caved in pretty good and a lot of fun stuff, candles and a lot of impression they were come back. 1991, the owner of the property saw a lot of water coming out of it. hoping to tap into spring water for drinking like a lot of folks like to do, took a backhoe and dug in the hill in 1991. and comes along a retired miner by the name of bill lane. grew up in beaut -- bute, montana. and a nickname we call the contract miners that drill and blast for the mines. the same name for the contract loggers and stuff. they bid on different jobs and traveled. he was able to purchase the property. got -- made a living on and cleaned the mine out and do educational tours for friends and family. and thoroughly cleaned it out the tracks got further exposed and old candles and hand stills and a little bit of quartz with

gold and lived his lifetime dream out. notice how they engineered this old mine. they maintained a vertical red. one-armed sweep pattern off the natural formation all the way through the mine. with hardly any timber required. we like to call this a bald mine. we're walking -- the entrance of the mine from portal to ceiling, usually you don't have an opening at the other end. so the main horizontal entrance like this to a mine is referred to as an at it. i see that in crossword puzzles and allows the water to drain out in the day. a cross cut drift a. known technique to explore out and actually try to find a better source. we're drilling and blasting underground, and when the miners are doing that, that process is called stoping. when they don't pan out a lot of times they're backfilled for miner safety or this slip here that's natural hard rock and they're safe, they're taking advantage of for some kind of room, storage or even a lunch room because it takes too long

to get miners way back outside so-called a stope. this is why bill and judy named it the crystal gold mine for what was found growing in here. and crystals get longer with the extra moisture. people refer to these as bacon crystals and look like strips of bacon as they grow. if you come over here and stand where my light is circling and keep you back in time. and keep your technology away from me. because they didn't have technology like we have it today. they didn't have flashlights. they didn't have electricity for lamps. they didn't have anything. and what's really fun is you wave your hand in front of your face because you can't see it move. we could be in here for hours and you would never adjust to it. imagine trying to find gold in the old days with no technology like we have today. this is called a miner's candlestick holder. the blacksmith made these and different sizes and shapes how they are made and stuck them between rocks and that's what was found in the mine is candles which is quite something. what i mean by that is actually

back in the day, imagine nobody around. no resources or anything close by. a day's travel to get supplies. if you're in these mountains back in the day trapping or prospecting, you're probably using grease lamps or any form of grease to create a grease lamp so having candles is evidence of doing good. i'm packing a spare like they did. not easy to come by. they would want to go to great lengths to conserve it and using a wood match because they didn't have these fun lighters like we have today. imagine working in the old days with no technology and a grease lamp or a candle to find gold. we do adjust after a while. again, they would want to conserve them as much as possible. not easy to come by. bill is in here with his friends and family cleaning it out and discovering things like these candles and evidence of dynamite instead of black powder. could you imagine lighting the dynamite fuse trying to keep the candle lit while you're running out of here? they were known to have some tricks. the more i learn about it, one of them an option they would get everything ready to go and light the dynamite and grab the

mine car and follow the car down the tracks. a lot of us believe they were going in and out of these old mines in the dark as much as possible to conserve their candles and how they were able to discover and actually follow quartz leads without using the candles. they used hand drills and keep them sharp and that blacksmith was an important job and a lot of old camps had a blacksmith. they can't see very well. they probably blasted the last time they were here. when they're drifting back in, they were doing a technique called scaling. they would want to hear that nice solid sharp sound as they're coming in and tapping on rocks all around them. if it sounds like a dull thud or hollow sound that's loose material and can't see that very well but it sounds funny. that's when they get their picks and tools and start scaling all that loose rock off. working hard. scaling that you will loose rock back down that nice solid rock before they start all over drilling and blasting. so starting to believe they would like to hold their hands

still like this and the proper way for safety. a lot of them didn't and our natural instincts to hold them like this. but they had tricks. they like to use their thumbnail to glare off the candlelight and give them a target to swing at as you start drilling. imagine, old days, hardly anybody around. that type of injury might put you out of business so the safe way was to hold them like this. they would hit it. and a quarter of a turn and turn it and hit it and that's how they drill that hole in candlelight. that quarter of a turn like that is really important to maintain the round hole because these hang up easy if you don't do it that way. this is called the starter drill. they start them with the short ones. hand stills longer and some his torns -- had i storns believe they blew out their light source to conserve them. and finish the hole in the dark. this is called a miner stone. and they usually go in the hole. clean out all the drill cuttings and make room for the

explosives. and they didn't have no geeologist on their team. they were known to have tricks. they would like to clean them out and save all their drill cuttings and pans or any containers. that way when they're going outside in the daylight they could see what kind of rocks they're drilling in and that's how they natch gated into the mountains looking for gold back in the day. on the left-hand side of the rim the mineral iron coming through so fun to capture the minerals in this mountain. that's what iron looks like when it rufts. that orange iron coming through. on the right-hand side this gets a lot of photos. we got some purple over the cal site like that. and in this old mine, named after james smithson, the founder of the smithsonian institute. he was quite a mineralologist and chemist back in the day. we keep this covered up and really fragile. and actually quite rare to see. this really captures how we became one of the world's largest producers of silver and recognizes the silver valley in idaho.

notice this one right here. got little wires coming out of that. that's wire silver. what's exciting about wire silver is it's almost pure silver. very high grade ore body of silver in the mountains to have that and represents our industry and history. if you were here prior to the 1884 in these mountains prospecting, that was banner waste and nothing they could do with silver. no place to process it. they would have had to go to great lengths to get the concentrate way east down in san francisco, so all they were after was the gold back in the day. prior to 1884 in the valley. we got a couple of spots here. please don't pick at them. they're good for education and we like to let you rub on them for fun. kind of soft yellow stuff. that's embedded in the quartz stain here. nice smooth soft yellow stuff. probably got a little silver in it. not as yellow as you'd like to see it and nice and smooth and i'm rubbing on it. you go a little further up here. here's another big chunk that we rub on. this one has cubicle structure.

that cubicle shape and structure identifies brittle material. that brittle stuff will get you. that you will glitters is usually not gold. quite the interesting quartz vein that's still in here that nobody came back to whoever they were for some reason. what's funny, though, is they scaled up to a beautiful slip. perfect spot. and nice slip they followed and followed this quartz main down 60 feet this time. and there's a ladder they built out of trees down in there preserved from the cold water. a little old ladder built out of trees. they put next to it timber and figures it goes down 60 feet and nobody has been to the bottom of it. the hoist bucket that was found. it used to be a bucket anyway. so the -- holding those sides in, that used to be the bottom and the sides. and then they had to deal with water and wasn't full like this

but they had to contend with the water while they were mining in here and why they liked going downhill like this. this one caused a lot of discussion with had i storns we've been involved with. old wood plug on this hand pump. and imagine coming in here having somebody pump that and let it drain. the neat thing about this hand pump is it was very expensive and hard to come by. even if it was related to an exploratory drift or the old days, it shouldn't have been left in here. one of the theories is they blast the hillside in and go back to get family hoping to come back to idaho territory and homestead with a possible beautiful future to raise your family. and didn't make it for health reasons. they didn't know, we've learned from them over the years the average life span for a miner doing mining like this back in the day was known to be five to eight years once you started. especially the old widow maker drills which compressed air and no water flow. and no evidence it looks like -- matt hatter, using mercury to separate the gold out of the material. so they could have had health

proshes. so a true mystery behind who did this, what the mine does for us today and continues to do that is since 1997, it's been educating folks on the true old ways of how things got tarted around these parts. >> tonight's look at the people, places and events of westward expansion. is part of c-span's cities tour. where we travel across the country highlighting the literary life and history of each city we visit. you can see more from c-span cities tour on our website. c-span.org. click on the series tab. then click the link for c-span cities tour. the tour closes tonight with the story of the black oakies. african-americans who migrated to rural california during the dust bowl of the 1930's.

>> a decade ago if you drive down highway 99 and that zipper of the road that goes down the heart of central california and you look to the side of the road, you would see this shaq standing. and i remember the first time i saw it, that's something that had been lifted out of the mississippi delta in 1930's. who lived there? as i was driving you looked a little closer and see puffs of smoke coming out of the roof. and it wasn't someone who lived there. somebody was living here in 2002 and 2003. so one day myself and matt blackhawk a. photographer who is kind of the modern day dorothea lang or walker evans we pulled off the side of the road and came up over the railroad tracks. and we pulled up to this shack and a little better shape and basically a tarpaper shack. and as we walked up we could see that there were rabbit furs

that had been -- that were -- ammered onto the wall. i knocked once, twice, this place was on stilts and the door creeked open and there stood this black man who looked like he had been lifted out of the mississippi delta, 1930's. he had a stutter. and later he told us that he came west with a stutter. one state at time. his name is james dixon. 95 and living here and had lived here since the 1940's. he was part of this migration of blacks who did something that no blacks in america -- went against the grain of the great migration. that great migration went from south to the northern industrial cities. and if it came west, it came to oakland and san francisco and l.a. but there was a tribe of blacks, black oakies, from the south and southwest. who wanted to retain the rural lifestyle. it was very important for them

to feel the wind at night, to be out in places where no one bothered them, to be close to the land. and about 25,000, 30,000 of them didn't go to the industrial cities and went from rural to rural. they followed the cotton trail west. and james dixon was one of them. he was from louisiana. he worked in the railroads for a while. as a porter. when i met him, he was -- he had a little water pump here. and a little pecken tree. -- pecan tree. and he was cutting down the pecan tree to burn fire to keep himself warm. he was 5'5". sleeping on a little iron crate. the iron crate was too small for him. so he had a wooden bekeeper's box for his head. there were -- i remember looking inside, and there were vienna sausage cans, empty ones, that he was -- they'd put

in the crevices to keep the place from falling. i mean, literally, he was -- chickens have a better roost than he did. and this is where he was living. he had come and we found him a half a century later. and he was nervous. he thought we were government workers here to maybe inspect the house, shut it down, whatever. i told him no, we were here to tell his story. we're standing in the old tulary lake basin. it was the biggest body of fresh water west of the mississippi. 800 square miles of lake right here in the middle of california. and these cotton growers from the south, they were chased out y the bo weekly came west. they claimed this lake land. rivers, and the dammed them and shunted that

flow to where they wanted to grow cotton. and at some point they had to go back and find labor. and a number of folks came to the tulare lake basin and their narratives played out here. white oakies, latinos, and then black oakies, that no one had ever written about black oakies. they came in the 1940's when the cotton picker was just starting in the fields. it was clunky and big. and it couldn't -- it could take the middle swath of the fields in the 1940's and 1950's. but it could not pick the edge of the rows. and so the black oakies were literally in fields working alongside the machine that would eventually idle them. picking the edges of the cotton. and in 10 years' time they were idled. the women ended up becoming maids and house keepers for wealthy white farmers. much like the south. and the men, where they could,

found work. but many of them were idled and the children left this place. so when we came upon it, it was mostly old folks. when i wrote my last book, "west of the west," i came back to find them because i wanted to open up that book with the black oakies. and every place that i had gone to, a decade earlier, it was empty. they had died. and in some cases the places were still standing like this place. there's that yellow house just two fields away. is is where we found minny patterson. she had come in 1945 and 1946 and she was dying and set up a room for her in the front where she could see this grapevine that her husband had planted when they arrived here in california. she said she had come to this patch of brown surrounded bay sea of white cotton in the fall of 1945. she decided that first night she wouldn't be staying. what kind of land have you

brought me to, she asked her husband? driving three miles to fetch water, reading scripture by kerosene lamp and you might as well kept me hitched to the plantations of east texas. she wanted a home. nothing fancy. in the civilized city and a tract house up the road in bakersfield would do. but willie patterson her husband kept pounding nails in boards on to that crooked hut in the middle of horn toad country and the black people kept trickling in from oklahoma and arkansas and texas and louisiana. they come looking for a place where the cotton grew a little taller. and the white folks had been raised up a little nicer. they found the taller cotton, i'm not sure they found the white folks any nicer. the black oakies thought coming west that they would leave behind the racism. the sun did shine a little bit

more benignly on them here. but i remember a number of them telling me that it was even a more cruel kind of racism. a smile on the face. but a dagger behind the back is how they described california. they were not allowed to live in any of the cities. not even the small towns. they were locked out. and so the only land that was available for them were these land and it kaline -- so salty it looked as if it snowed there. this is a land that was available to them. and they built their little wooden shacks here. no water. they had to go into town to fetch the water. no city sewers. they had out houses. no police roamed this area. it was a no man's land. basically these glorified kind of squatters village. this is a place that got bypassed by the civil rights movement and by the war on

poverty. none of it ever came here. and so it was -- a tough life. one of the things dixon told us before he died he was stuffing actually cardboard boxes into the plywood of that house to keep it insulated. and he looked up, i remember, and he said, i worked all my days in the cotton field and on the railroad. i wasn't lazy. what happened to my life? we're standing in some of the poorest places in america right now. you would have to go to the borderlands of texas or appalachia to find poverty that we have here. and that really is a function of the kind of agriculture we have. we have big industrial agriculture that concentrates wealth in a few hands. and that depends on a constant supply of cheap labor.

and for most of the century, that cheap labor has come from south of the border. and farmers here are reaching deeper and deeper into the rural peasant heart of mexico to bring out the labor. but there have been problems with that flow now and again. and that's why the farmers have reached to other people. sikhs came here to pick. armenians came here to pick. chinese. japanese. hmong. although the hmong are more small farmers and the black oakies. at some point. and the white oakies were brought from the south and southwest to come here and pick the crops. some of them moved up the economic ladder. and became tractor drivers, truck drivers, business owners. that's happened with the white oakies. it happened with latinos, some of them. the black oakies, though, had to leave this place to find economic prosperity.

and the original family members ho came here, the old folks, remain. stayed behind. they never -- they never acquired much. i think theirs is the saddest story of all those groups. and they stayed behind here. simply because they love the rural lifestyle. we went by martha williams' house today. it's no longer there. but she was an 86-year-old widow of an arkansas share cropper. and she was living with her son in a sagging house. don't feel sorry for me, williams said. this is a shack but it's my shack. god gave it to me. i ain't got nobody coming to me saying you owe me rent. i sleep as long as i want to. and get up when i'm ready. and when the beautiful wind gets to blowing, i can flap my wings when i want to flap them. i sleep easy at night.

right here in my little run down shack by the highway. it may not be your dream. but it's mine. now you can just turn around nd leave us alone. >> tonight's look at the people, places and events of westward expansion is part of c-span's cities tour. where we travel across the country highlighting the literary life and history of each city we visit. you can see more from c-span cities tour at our website. c-span.org. click on the series tab. then click the link or c-span cities tour. >> on the next "washington journal" washington times chief economic correspondent patrice hill will discuss the latest jobs numbers for august. "washington post" staff writer reed wilson looks at some of the ballot initiatives and referenda in this year's mid-term elections. and james lewis from the center

for strategic and international studies examines the security of information stored in computers and servers on the cloud. and as always, we'll take your calls and you can join the conversation on facebook and twitter. "washington journal" live at 7:00 a.m. eastern on c-span. >> with congress returning monday, here's a message to congress from one of this year's c-span student cam competition winners. >> throughout the years we have encountered a handful of friends with mental illnesses and throughout those years we have seen how a lack of support for treatment can result in devastating events. as well as emotional distress for those individuals and their families. >> my name is felix schmidt. sclizo s diagnosed with bipolar disorder and wound up in the hospital after an episode like an attack sent me there. went straight to being an

in-patient and they diagnosed me there. after five minutes or so of talking to me as bipolar. and treated me for two weeks. i got out of the hospital. and went from doctor to doctor. looking for someone who would actually listen. it took me over a year to find a doctor who actually did listen. strongly encourage congress to continue to provide funding for those who struggle with mental illness and continue to allocate resources and develop new programs for those in need. >> join us next wednesday, during "washington journal" for the theme of the 2015 c-span student cam documentary competition. next, president obama's news conference following the wrapup of the nato summit in wales. followed by remarks from the summit's host, british prime minister david cameron. after that, the nebraska supreme court hears oral argument concerning the

keystone x.l. pipeline. president obama said there's unanimous agreement among nato members that there must be immediate action to address the threat posed by isis. speaking to reporters at the conclusion of the nato summit in wales, the president said the goal is to degrade and ultimately defeat the militant islamic group. this is about 25 minutes. >> good afternoon. let me begin by thanking my great friend mr. cameron and his entire team for hosting this nato summit and making it such a success. and i want to thank the people of newport and car difficult and the -- and cardiff and the people of wales for welcoming me and my delegation so warmly. it's a great honor to be the first sitting u.s. president to visit wales. we've met at a time of

transition. and a time of testing. after more than a decade, nato's combat mission in afghanistan is coming to an end. russia's aggression against ukraine threatens our vision of a europe that is whole, free, and at peace. in the middle east, the terror threats from isil poses a growing danger. at this summit our alliance to summon the will, the resources, and the capabilities to meet all of these challenges. first and foremost, we have reaffirmed the central mission of the alliance. article five enshrines our solemn duty to each other. an armed attack against one shall be considered an attack against them all. this is a binding treaty obligation. it is not nonnegotiable. and in wales we left absolutely no doubt we will defend every ally. second, we agreed to be resolute in reassuring our

allies in eastern europe. increased nato air patrols over the baltics will continue. rotations of additional forces throughout eastern europe for training and exercises will continue. newcastle patrols in the black patrols in naval the city will continue. for as long as necessary. third, to ensure that nato remains prepared for any contingency, we agreed to a new readiness action plan. the alliance will update its defense planning. we will create a new highly ready rapid response force that can be deployed on a very short notice. we'll increase nato's presence in central and eastern europe. with additional equipment. training, exercises and troop rotations. and the $1 billion initiative that i announced in warsaw will be a strong and ongoing u.s. contribution to this plan.

fourth, all 28 nato nations have pledged to increase their investments in defense and to move toward investing 2% of their g.d.p. in our collective security. these resources will help nato invest in critical capabilities including intelligence, surveillance, reconnaissance, and missile defense. and this commitment makes clear that nato will not be complacent. our alliance will reverse the decline in defense spending and rise to meet the challenges that we face in the 21st century. fifth, our alliance is fully united in support of ukraine's sovereignty, independence, and territorial integrity and its right to defend itself. to back up this commitment, all 28 nato allies will now provide security assistance to ukraine. this includes nonlethal support to the ukrainian military like body armor, fuel and medical care for wounded ukrainian

troops as well as assistance to help modernize ukrainian forces including low gistics and command and control. here in wales we also send a strong message to russia that actions have consequences. today, the united states and europe are finalizing measures to deepen and broaden our sanctions across russia's financial, energy and defense sectors. at the same time, we strongly support president pour chen co-'s efforts to -- poroshenko's efforts to pursue a peaceful resolution to the conflict in his country. the cease-fire announced today can advance that goal but only if there's follow-through on the ground. pro-russian separatists must keep their commitments and russia must stop its violations of ukraine's sovereignty and territorial integrity. beyond europe, we pay tribute to all those from our mission including more than 2,200 americans who have given their lives for our security in afghanistan. nato's combat mission ends in

three months. and we are prepared to transition to a new mission, focused on training, advising, and assisting afghan security forces. both presidential candidates have pledged to sign the bilateral security agreement that would be the foundation of our continued cooperation. but as we all know, the outcome of the recent election must be resolved. and so we continue to urge the two presidential candidates to make the compromises that are necessary so afghans can move forward together and form a sovereign united and democratic nation. finally, we reaffirm that the door to nato membership remains open to nations that can meet our high standards. we agree to expand the partnership that makes nato the hub of global security. we're launching a new effort with our closest partners, including many that have served with us in afghanistan to make sure our forces continue to operate together. and we'll create a new initiative to help countries

build their defense capabilities. starting with georgia, moldova, jordan, and libya. i also leave here confident that nato allies and partners are prepared to join in a broad international effort to combat the threat posed by isil. already allies have joined us in iraq. where we have stopped isil's advances. we've equipped our iraqi partners and helped them go on offense. nato has agreed to play a role in providing security and humanitarian assistance to those who are on the front lines. key nato allies, stand ready to confront this terror threat, through military intelligence and law enforcement as well as diplomatic efforts. and secretary kerry will now travel to the region to continue building the broad-based coalition that will enable us to degrade and ultimately destroy isil. so taken together, i think the progress we've achieved in wales makes it clear that our

alliance will continue to do whatever is necessary to ensure our collective defense and to protect our citizens. so with that, let me take a few questions. i'll start with julie tase of the associated press. >> thank you, mr. president. i want to go back into the situation in ukraine. if this cease-fire takes effect and appears to be holding, would you and your european counterparts back away from these sanctions that you say you've prepared or do you feel that it's an important to levy these sanctions regardless of the cease-fire agreement? and if i could go back to the rapid response force, can you say specifically what u.s. contributions will be in terms of troop numbers and equipment? is it beyond the agreement that you announced -- the proposal you announced in warsaw? >> with respect to the cease-fire agreement, obviously we are hopeful, but based on past experience, also skeptical. that in fact the separatists will follow through and the russians will stop violating ukraine's sovereignty.

and territorial integrity. so it has to be tested. and i note that the europeans are discussing at this point the final shape of their sanctions measures. it's my view that if you look at president poroshenko's plan, it is going to take some time to implement. and as a consequence, for us to move forward based on what is currently happening on the ound with sanctions, while acknowledging that if in fact the elements of the plan that has been -- are implemented, then those sanctions could be lifted, is a more likely way for us to ensure that there's follow-through. but that's something that obviously we'll consult closely with our european partners to determine. i do want to point out, though, that the only reason that we're seeing this cease-fire at this

moment is because of both the sanctions that have already and the threat of further sanctions, which are having a real impact on the russian economy and have isolated russia in a way we have not seen in a very long time. the path for russia to rejoin the community of nations that respects international law is still there, and we encourage president putin to take it. but the unity and the firmness we have seen in the transatlantic alliance in supporting ukraine and applying sanctions has been a testimony to how seriously people take the basic principle that big countries cannot just stomp on little countries or force them to change their policies and give up their sovereignty. so i am very pleased with the kind of work that has been done

throughout this crisis in ukraine. and i think u.s. leadership has been critical throughout that process. with respect to the rapid response forces and the action plan we have put forward, in warsaw i announced $1 billion in our initiative. a sizable portion of that will be devoted to implementing various aspects of this readiness action plan. we have already increased rotations of personnel in the baltic states, for example. we have the air police activities taking place in the baltic and the black sea. this allows us to supplement it.

it allows us to integrat it and coordinate it further with contributions from other partners. what it signifies his nato's recognition that in light of region -- recent russian actions, we want to make it crystal clear. we mean what we say when we are talking about article five commitments and an increased presence serves as the most effective deterrent to any additional russian aggression we might see. king, bloomberg. >> thank you, mr. president. what are your specific expectations for what regional actors like saudi arabia, yemen, and georgia can legitimately provide to a coalition against islamic state? is there a role for iran? secretary kerry said he expects the allied countries to coalesce around a specific plan by the end of september.

do you agree with the time when he set out? and what concrete commitments are you leaving the summit with from other nations that are here? >> let me start with the general point. unanimity over the last two days that isil poses a significant threat to nato was as, and there recognition that we have to take action. i did not get any resistance or push back to the basic notion that we have a critical role to play in rolling back this savage organization that is causing so much chaos in the region and is harming so many people and poses a long-term threat to the safety and security of nato members.

conviction a great that we have to act to degrade and ultimately destroy isil. that was extremely encouraging. beyond that, we have already seen is significant support from a variety of member states for specific actions we have taken in iraq. we have already taken 100 strikes in iraq that have had a significant impact on degrading their capabilities. and making sure we are protecting u.s. citizens, critical infrastructure, providing space for the iraqi government to form. our hope is that the iraq government is actually formed and finalized next week. that allows us to work with them on a broader strategy. some of the assistance has

been in the form of airlifts, humanitarian assistance. much of it has been providing additional arms to the peshmerga and iraqi security forces. there has been logistical support, intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance support. so a variety of folks with different capabilities have already made a contribution. i am confident that we are going to be able to build on that strong foundation and the clear ofmitment, and have the kind coalition that will be required for sustained effort that we need to push isil back. now, john kerry will be traveling to the region to have further consultations with the regional actors and players. and i think it is critical that we have arab states and, specifically, sunni majority states that are rejecting the

kind of extremist nihilism we are seeing out of isil, that say, that is not what islam is about, and are prepared to join us actively in the fight. and my expectation is we will see friends and allies and partners of ours in the region, prepared to take action as well, as part of a coalition. one of our tasks will also be to build capability. yes,we learned in iraq is, isil has significant capabilities and a combined terrorist tactics with traditional military tactics to significant effect. thatart of the problem is we have not seen as effective of a fighting force on the part of the iraqis security forces as we

need. to we are going to have focus on the capable units that are already there, bolster them, bolster the work the peshmergas have done, and support them from the air. but ultimately we need a strong ground game, and we also need ribes in many of these areas to recognize that their future is not with the kind of fanaticism that isil they start so taking the fight to isil as well. require the regional partnerships we are talking about. in terms of timetable, we are working deliberately. if you look at what we have done over the last several months, we have taken it in stages. first, make sure we encourage the iraq the government formation. second stage was making sure that building on the

intelligence assessments we had done, that we were in a position to conduct limited airstrikes to protect our personnel and critical infrastructure and engage in humanitarian activities. the third phase will allow us to take the fight to isil, broaden the effort, and our goal is to act with urgency buty also make sure we are doing it right, that we have the right targets, that there is support on the ground if we take an airstrike, that we have a strong political coalition, diplomatic effort, matching it. a strong strategic communications efforts are we are discouraging people from thinking somehow that isil rep resents a state, much less a caliphate. all those things have to be

combined. --will not happen over light overnight, but we are steadily moving in the direction and we will achieve our goal. we are going to degrade and ultimately defeat isil, the same way we have gone after al qaeda, the same way we have gone after the al qaeda affiliate in somalia, where we released today that we have in fact killed the leader of al shabaab in somalia and have worked to degrade their operations. we have been very systematic and methodical in going after these kinds of organizations that may threaten u.s. personnel and the homeland. and that deliberation allows us to do it right. continue,bt, we will and i will continue to do what is necessary to protect the american people. isil poses a real threat.

and i'm encouraged by the fact our friends and allies recognize the same threat. julie davis. >> thank you. i want to follow up on what you were saying about isil and ask if you think that the objective is to destroy and degrade them. are those the same things in your mind? is the goal to ultimately, secretary kerry said there is no containing them. is the goal to annihilate them? also, you talked about the importance of expertise on the ground and building capacity on the ground. since airstrikes will not do it here, is action -- if action is needed in syria, can you realistically expect the free syrian army do what is needed to destroy, not just put back -- push back isil? >> you cannot contain an organization that is running roughshod through that much

territory, causing that much havoc, displacing that many people. killing that many innocents, enslaving that many women. the goal has to be to dismantle them. if you look at what happened with al qaeda where the primary base was, you initially push them back, you systematically degrade their capabilities, you narrow the scope of action, you slowly shrink that space, the territory that they may control, you take out their leadership, and over time they are not able to conduct the same kinds of terrorist attacks as they once code. as i said in my last press

conference, given the nature of these organizations, are there potentially remnants of an organization still running around and hiding and potentially plotting? absolutely. and we will continue to hunt them down the same way we are qaedawith remnants of al or elements of al shabaab. or terrorists who operate anywhere around the world. but what we can accomplish is to dismantle this network, this force that has claimed to control this much territory so that they cannot do us harm. and that is going to be our objective. and as i said before, i am pleased to see there is unanimity among our friends and allies that think that is a worthy goal and they are

prepared to work with us to come pushed that goal. -- two accomplish that./ with respect to the situation on the ground in syria, we will not be placing u.s. ground troops to try to control the areas that are part of the conflict inside of syria. i do not think that is necessary for us to come pushed our goal. -- accomplish our goal. we're going to have to find effective partners on the ground to push act against isil, and the moderate coalition there is one we can work with, we have experience working with many of them, they have been to some degree outgunned and outmanned, and that is why it is important for us to work with our friends and allies to support them more effectively. but keep in mind when you have

u.s. forces, other advanced nations going after isil and putting them on the defensive and putting them on the run, it is pretty remarkable what then ground forces can do, even if initially they were on the defensive against isil. so that is a developing strategy that we are going to be consulting with friends, our allies, our regional partners. but the bottom line is we will do what is necessary in order to make sure that isil does not threaten the united states or our friends and partners. ok? one last question. colleen nelson. >> some senate democrats facing tough races in november have had -- asked you to delay action on immigration. have the concerns of democrats influenced your thinking, and you see any down .2 -- downside

to delaying any action until after the election? >> i have to tell you this week i have been pretty busy, focused on ukraine and focused on isil and focused on making sure that nato is boosting its commitments and in following through on what is necessary to meet 21st century challenges. jeh johnson and eric holder have begun to provide me their proposals and recommendations. i will be reviewing them, and my expectation is that fairly soon i will be considering what the next steps are. what i am unequivocal about is that we need immigration reform, that my overriding preference is to see congress act. we had bipartisan action in the senate. the house republicans have sat on it for over a year. that has damaged the economy. it has held america back. it is a mistake.

and in the absence of congressional action, i intend to take action to make sure that we are putting more resources on the border, that we are upgrading how we process these cases, and that we find a way to encourage legal immigration and give people some path so they can start paying taxes and pay a fine and learn english and be able to not look over their shoulder, but be legal since they have been living here for quite some time. so, you know, i suspect on my flight back this would be part of my reading, taking a look at some of the specifics that we have looked at, and i will be making an announcement soon. i want to be very clear, my intention is in the absence of

action by congress, i am going to do what i can do within the legal constraints of my office, because it is the right thing to do for the country. all right? thank you very much, people of wales. i had a wonderful time. >> british prime minister david cameron says the cease-fire agreement in ukraine is good news, but adds that there needs to be a commitment to a real peace plan. he suggests that sanctions continue, but could be lifted if a cease-fire and peace plan are put in place. prime minister cameron took questions from reporters following the conclusion of the nato summit in wales. this is about 25 minutes. >> good afternoon. this summit has shown a real sense of purpose, resolution, and unity. everyone can see what nato stands for and why it matters. -- about here at home our

national security and the security of every family in britain. this is an alliance that is strong and united, that nose what the major challenges are, and is determined to overcome them. first, there has been a clear message sent out from this conference to russia that what president putin is doing is indefensible and wrong. while we meet here in newport, a package of sanctions is being finalized in brussels that will further increase the economic cost to russia for its behavior. we stand firmly behind ukraine's right to make its own decisions, not to have them dictated by russian tanks rolling over the border. and we will continue our efforts to support ukraine, including by providing financial assistance to improve their command, control, and indication activities. nato members across europe, particularly in central and eastern europe, have been

reassured that this is an alliance that will meet its treaty obligations to any member under threat. no one will leave here in any doubt that our collective security in nato is as strong as it has ever been. committedce is firmly to providing ongoing reassurance to our eastern allies. the united kingdom will contribute 3500 personnel to exercises in eastern europe between now and the end of 2015 as part of nato efforts to ensure a consistent presence on our eastern flank. nato's agreed to step up ability to respond quickly to any threats with a multinational spearhead force deployable anywhere in the world within two to five days. the u.k. will provide a battle group and a brigade headquarters , and other nations will set out plans, backing words with concrete actions. second, nato needs to be even longer. written is one of only four countries that spends 2% of gdp

on defense. but others will now do more. with today's pledge, every nato member not spending 2% will stop any decline in defense spending and will aim to increase it in real terms as gdp gross and to move toward 2% within one decade. it is not just the amount of money that matters. it's also about spending on equipment you can actually deploy. so we have agreed that 1/5 of defense budgets should be dedicated to major new equipment. here in britain, we have the second largest defense budget in nato. we have the biggest and the whole european union. we have taken long-term, often difficult decisions to put our defense budget on a sustainable footing. and the fruits of this are now coming through. we are equipping all three of our services with the best and most modern military hardware that money can buy. on wednesday, i announced a 3.5 billion pound contract for the

scout armored vehicles for the army, the largest such order in over three decades. the royal air force is getting new fleets of joint strike fighters and voyager refueling aircraft as well as 22 new transport aircraft, the first of which has just arrived. the royal navy is receiving new submarines, destroyers including the hms duncan here in cardiff bay. also 25 forget. -- frigates. these have been made possible by taking a difficult long-term approach i spoke of. carrier, the aircraft the hms queen elizabeth, which has left right dock and is being fitted with combat systems. shipill be the mightiest the royal navy ever put to sea, able to protect and project interests across the globe for decades to come. today i can announce that the

second carrier, hms prince of wales, will be brought into service, ensuring that we always have one character available 100% of the time. they are an investment in british security, reddish prosperity, and our place in the world, transforming our ability power independently or with our allies. we were clear about the new threat we place -- face, visibly islamist extremism. everyone remembers divisions around the world over the iraq war 10 years ago. there were no real divisions here. the nato alliance is clear about the threat we face, the scale o f the threat and the fact we must use all instruments at our disposal. we agreed to offer a nato training mission for iraq as soon as the new iraqi government is in place. the fight against isil must be

themselves, but we encourage countries in the region to support the effort and will work with top partners on the ground to take all necessary this barbaricze terrorist organization out of existence. this will take time and it will take resolve. we will see carefully and methodically to implement a conference of plan. as our troops return home from will do all we can to support them and our families. we are the first british government to write a military covenant that deals between britain and her military into the law of the land. we introduced free higher and further education scholarships for bereaved service children, invested 200 million in helping service personnel buy homes, inned up every local council

support of the military, and gave.unprecedented support to military charities today we have taken the covenant international, with every nato members signing up to a declaration to honor those whose work and sacrifices have delivered peace and security over the last 65 years. there's a commitment for all of us to work together to ask what more we can do in future years to honor, revere, and look after those who serve us and our families. so we leave today united in purpose, with a stronger nato able to keep people safe. i would like to thank everyone who helped make this on the possible. i would like to thank the people of wales, who have welcomed the world and done our united kingdom and nato crowd. thank you. i am very happy to take some questions. prime minister, do you take

the cease-fire in ukraine seriously, the offer from putin and the reaction to it? essence accepting the defective situation in that country? >> first of all, we are not accepting a partition of the ukraine. we should respect ukraine's territorial integrity. that is why we have taken sanctions and put on pressure, and that is why you see such unity in nato today. the announcement is good news. at need to loo carefully whether it is a cease-fire or it also includes a commitment, as i understand it might, to create real progress on a proper peace plan. we need to look at the detail of that to be sure that happens. we should be clear that sanctions we agreed on last saturday in brussels will go ahead and be put in place, that

of course if a cease-fire and a proper peace plan is put in place, then it would be right to look to see how sanctions could potentially be removed. doubt, theo cease-fire is good news. eight peace -- a peace would be better news, but sanctions go ahead. >> you said that ukraine should not be dictated to by russian tanks. isn't that precisely what has happened? ukraine has summoned a cease-fire, putin has won because the ukrainians realized the west did too little, too late. >> i don't accept that. remember how this all came about. the people of ukraine has made -- have made the democratic choice to have an agreement with the european union. food and -- putin's actions

have been totally unjustified, and what we have so far is a cease-fire and some form of peace process. we should be clear we should not accept the partition of ukraine. it is one country. orderone country whose should be respected, and that is what needs to happen now. i'm confident that is what president poroshenko will seek to achieve. i would challenge the view that the eu, the west, america have somehow been weak in response to what happened. it is important to focus on the pressure that we can realistically and effectively bring to their. that is, economic sanctions pressure. day russiaof the needs europe and america more than america and europe need russia. that's why the sanctions we introduced, the russian economy was growing. it is now shrinking. the ruble has fallen.

the stock market is falling. banks have problems raising money. i believe russia can see that the eu and u.s. have moved together in these things, most recently in the latest round of sanctions. if they go on to stabilize the country, partitioning the country, they will face more pressure. we are taking the right approach. these things are never solved easily, but there is genuine resolve between america and the countries of the european union to keep up the pressure if there is not a fair outcome. minister, in dealing with islamic state, isn't part of what you need to do going to involve dealing with the situation on the ground in syria? could you tell me what your thinking is on the? are you tempted to come to a new deal with president assad, or is that off the table? assad's deal with the

question first. my view is president assad is part of the cause of the problem because it has been the brutality with which he has attacked his own people that has led some of them, some of the sunni population, to seek solace in the extremist movement because they have been brutalized by assad. i find it hard to see him being part of the solution. it is important we act in a way that preserves our moral authority and we don't start is my friend. -- doing deals on the basis that my enemy's enemy is my friend. i don't think that is the right approach. if we are going to deal with the problem of isil, isis, we have to deal with it across the board. as i argued that starts at home , with stopping fighters going to fight. making sure we are secure. it involves a new iraqi government.

it also involves the same thing in syria that we need in iraq. just as we need in iraq a pluralistic government that can represent all the people of that country, so in syria we need a transition to a government that can represent all of the people in that country and stop brutalizing them. >> part of my argument is you need that mixture of intelligent politics, diplomatic pressure, long term engagement and a comprehensive plan, as well as the potential for military or other more aggressive action. you need all those things to solve this problem. that will be the case with syria as with iraq. let's have the gentlemen here. >> you have been asking other countries to pledge to go back to defense spending. the think tanks say britain's defense spending has dipped to something like [indiscernible] next year.