interviews susan several members of the library of congress. this is just under an hour. carla: i wanted to open this wonderful treasure chest to as many people as possible. the room we are in now has 6 stradivarius violins and original scores from beethoven, hayden, no relation. there are so many things here.

susan: david ferriero, do you remember why you said yes? >> i said yes because of the opportunity to participate in and administers and i was serious about, and thought that the national archives have a role to play in transparency. susan: dr. skorton, why did you say yes to such a different gig? dr. skorton: part of the goes back to my dad, who was a nationalist citizen.

we're a little corny. he said if you can do something for the country, you should do it. i felt like i had some small part in telling the story of america. i knew that libraries and museums are one of the most trusted kinds of institutions in the u.s. at a time when not every institution is trusted. i thought it would be nice to the sector. susan: i wish the camera had been rolling when you all sat down. how often do you all caps together -- do you all get together like this? ms. hayden: we will be doing more of this type of discussion about what we can do together. this is the third time where we

have had a chance tour together. >> it is quite a community. it goes from the large institutions to smaller ones that are still jewels nonetheless. think you are going to see more of this kind of thing. susan: thank you for doing this with the c-span audience today. i would ask each of you if you could give us capsulization of your history. ms. hayden: it started with a small collection of books in the house and capital, the jefferson

building we are in, was a building built and opened in 1897. thomas jefferson famously gave his collection of monumental library for congress. it has grown to one of the largest libraries in the world. susan: point are your responsibilities today? ms. hayden: the library of congress has 162 million items, including the sheet music i mentioned to abraham lincoln's life mask, all types of things. it operates in the u.s. copyright system. a lot of the materials that built the national library part of that process.

it is still the reference arm for congress. susan: the smithsonian came along next. how did it get started? >> a man was an admirer of the early american experience in 1970, and requested he give $200 million of his net worth to the united states. the united states decided to accept that set of something. he wrote that he wanted the institution to be oriented to what he called "the increase and diffusion of knowledge." that is what the smithsonian has become. 19 museums and galleries.

215 museums affiliated around the united states, a traveling exhibition service. our collection is 156 million objects, including 2 million books. items ranging from biological specimens to the ruby slippers, to the hope diamond. i want to just put another plug in for the library of congress. not only were all these things mentioned, but the musical instrument collection is fabulous here. when i first came, carla's predecessor gave me a tour. it was to die for. >> you can play one in an inadequate fashion.

susan: how did the national come about? >> around 1934. i was convinced it was because of roosevelt's personal passion for records. he sent a lot of time selecting the first archivists. creating what would be the process for managing the records of the government. that has been the mission from the beginning. the creation for the schedules for the executive branch agencies, managing records of congress and supreme court, building staff, and creating the management of government

records. which looks easy from this perspective. he had similar problems with agencies being reluctant to give up their records, the president having to lay down the law about this. it is at this point a collection of 13 million pieces of paper, 43 million autographs, miles of film video. the fastest-growing collection is five terabytes of electronic records. susan: is it all saved? >> the federal records asked acts governs the federal branch. every agency has a records manager. they create record schedules to

identify the kind of records and how long they need to be retained for legal purposes. 2%-3% of those that are legal value need to be kept forever get transferred to us. everything that is created in the white house's record. susan: that means that the presidential library system-- >> 13 presidential libraries are part of the national archives also. susan: we have an incoming president who tweets. will you be gathering all of his tweets? will that start january 20? mr. ferriero: it starts after the inaugural ceremony, as soon as he is sworn in, the record-keeping starts. tweets have nothing new. we have been collecting this president's tweets.

susan: very different kinds, though. [laughter] it will be interesting for future generations of researchers. this is another round robin question. your organizations and their structure is interesting. you were appointed by the president and went through the confirmation process. who is your boss and how long is your term? ms. hayden: the congress. it is a 10 year term. the librarian is the only appointee that is a presidential appointment. the other 3200 people that work at the library are government employees, federal employees. there is not an appointment process.

when i mention congress, there are appropriations committees that have oversight, and quite a bit of interaction with congress. susan: is there still a joint committee? mr. ferriero: yes, in both houses. susan: are they active? ms. hayden:. they are active what has been hard in working in congress is the interest of most of the legislators in history. it was striking during my confirmation process, seen how much the legislators knew about history and wanted to cement their place in history. susan: what is your operating budget? how much of that is federally subsidized?

ms. hayden: just about all of it. $632 million. the smithsonian has done a wonderful job of working with patriotic philanthropy. the library has been relatively new to that. the fact that we are in this room was a gift of mrs. coolidge with these stradivarius instruments. susan: first lady coolidge? ms. hayden: no. susan: i don't know how far back the history went. to whom do you report? dr. skorton: the president. we have oversight committees in both the house and senate. our main communication is with the white house. susan: what is your operating

budget? is it all federally funded? dr. skorton: about $450 million. each of the presidential libraries, as well as the flagship national archives have private foundations that supplement that. susan: your government structure is interesting. there is a board of regents. there is a chief justice, vice president, and leaders of congress serve on it. dr. skorton: you are stealing my thunder. it is an interesting governing system. 9 are private citizens. there are eight public service. 6 sitting members of congress. not necessarily leaders, but three from the house and three from the senate. the chancellor of the smithsonian is the chief justice. i report to the board. i am not a political appointee or a federal employee.

the smithsonian is something called a trust instrumentality. 2/3 are federal employees, 1/3 are not. we have 6000 volunteers on-site. you can see them when you come to the library and archives. we have another 6000 or so digital volunteers from the far. it is an interesting governing process, and it works well. each resource center has an advisory board which is delegated certain aspects of functioning. the actual governance is done by this 17 person border regions. susan: are they active? dr. skorton: very active. we have a subset of the board

that meets my telephone every month. they are quite active. susan: talking about funding, how important has private philanthropy been to what you want to get done? ms. hayden: before you answer to make one provision. the donor is staring at me. [laughter] i think even the candles are flickering a little that. i would be remiss if i didn't mention her philanthropy. you do understand. [laughter] dr. skorton: i think that the public-private partnership has

been beneficial. lots of things that the public can afford, and many want to the budget is $1.4 billion. the fluid .2% comes from federal appropriations. the rest comes from a combination of retail and shopping, imax theaters, cafes and other things. we have been fortunate in getting generous philanthropy. we have already passed the $1.5 billion mark. susan: i know that you are

dealing with so many donors, you don't want to single out one. it is unusual in a generation to have a private philanthropist with pockets as deep as his have been. can you talk about his role, and what kind of editorial control does one seek? do you get to keep your independence? mr. ferriero: that is the best thing about david. there is no pressure. he does not control where the resources are used. he is a passionate collector, and he wants his collection in

the public. he wants to place them where people will see and appreciate them. he bought ross perot's copy of the magna carta. just months before i arrived on the scene, he was the first person to welcome me to washington. he graduated from two university. he checked with the president to make sure that i was a credible person. he has been incredibly supportive. but never pressure in terms of how we display or make decisions for us. susan: what has a simple donor like that made to the smithsonian?

mr. ferriero: my colleagues can agree that philanthropic fundraising is a bit of a dance. you need capacity and a passion for something or other. you want to match them up with priorities. one thing about david rubenstein is that he has a broad range of things he is interested in. he is a voracious reader of history. when you see him do an interview, he has no notes and manages to take it from memory. he has been a terrific partner. he wants to do what the institution finds to be a high priority. to give him credit for beyond the three of us sitting here, he

does the same for the american people through monuments and memorials. he is helping with the elevator in the washington monument, doing something for the lincoln memorial. he truly wants to share his passion and wealth these acquisitions with the american people. ms. hayden: he credits enoch pratt library in baltimore for his love of reading. there was a limit of 12 books in the and have to wait for a week. this year at the national book festival, he was there meeting

people from all walks of life. he sponsored literacy awards for nonprofit organizations encouraging young people to learn to read. the power literacy. >> he has a deep sense of responsibility for funding these institutions. it is not his own personal feeling. he hosted a meeting at the giving pledge. three of us the opportunity to present our institutions to these numbers. susan: is private philanthropy a uniquely american concept? mr. ferriero: unique is a word you want to use sparingly.

it may not be unique, but it is much more of the american ethos than anywhere i have visited. there are generous people everywhere. it has been a big part of america. i can say with authority that the smithsonian would not be what it is without the public-private partnership. congress has been generous with us. we have had generous support. without the excellence we can get from philanthropy, we could not do the things that we do. susan: each of you is charged with conserving the nation legacy. do you ever compete for things

he wants to conserve? mr. ferriero: i have enough in my custody now that i would be fighting with two for more. i think there is lots of open territory to be working on preservation. we have had similar materials in terms of formats. we have had a serious preservation needs. we have talented staff working for each of us in preservation units. we have some real opportunities for collaborative work. far from competition, the folks we are so lucky to have as trusted colleagues worked together already in preservation. they form a network in washington and beyond of experts in some complicated areas that involve chemistry and physics, some things that are more can to art than science.

you can't handle these things without the kind of corporation. we gain and learn a lot from working with your colleagues. susan: the task of digitization seems mind-boggling. the library of congress was behind the curb on digitization. how are you approaching it? ms. hayden: my predecessor started a wonderful digitization effort in the early 1990's. unfortunately that technology caught up with the effort. we are looking at combining the preservation and conservation efforts that relate to digitization with whatever

collections might be useful for, k-12 education, as well as actually being's popular. there is a big push to make sure that we are digitizing things that can be useful more rapidly. susan: how about your task? mr. ferriero: this is been an enormous. anyone interested in family history ancestry.com. most of the content comes from the archives. we have done a fair amount of digitization in-house ourselves. it is a massive project. we are in an environment where the records are created electronically. susan: making more things transparent on an expedited

schedule. can you talk about the mission and philosophy behind your charge? mr. ferriero: part of the open government initiative was the creation of a national declassification center. massive amounts of material that are classified and added onto the part of the administration. a presidential executive order outlining criteria by which material could both remain classified.

mandates review about 4 million pages of classified material going back to world war i with a three-year deadline. we have wet, reviewed, and 85% has been released. we will expedite the review of materials so we don't get into huge backlog situations. susan: when you are at the point you want to be, what will be the result to society? >> we have a bold goal to digitize anything the collection so that anyone can have access to this material at their fingertips. the reason the national archives was created so that the american public could hold government accountable for his actions. you can do that from home.

susan: the smithsonian has a robust web presence. how much of that is credited to the museum experience and how are you making that available to people? dr. skorton: we spent time digitizing cardiac images and analyzing them. it was going to be hard to impress me coming into the smithsonian. i have been very impressed with the digitization work. it is a big challenge to know how much to digitize in what order. at any one time with our collection, only a tiny fraction can be on public display. there is a big impetus from

inside the smithsonian and outside to make it more accessible. our visitor numbers are tiny compared with the rest of the world. we feel a strong motivation to make it accessible. we have over 140 million biological special men's related to natural history. i doubt we we will ever digitize those things. in our asian art galleries, we have digitized the entire collection.

even though only a fraction is on display, today you can look at anything in the collection because of the digitization effort. one area is three dimensional digitization. we incorporated inside the apollo 11 capsule, 3d digitization. i take no credit for this. the smithsonian was doing great work. they are leaving the field with some objects nationally. susan: what technologies are you excited about?

ms. hayden: 3d, also tactile experiences. all of those types of things that make the experience, life. >> i am excited about social media and the opportunities we exploited to engage the public. we have 13 billion pieces of paper. a large percentage of them in script and cursive. we have generations of school kids who can't read our records. we have loaded a thousands of documents and have people transcribing for us.

the use of social media excites me. ms. hayden: in the short time i have been here, the response has been tremendous in terms of twitter. i tweet one or two things a day. it has been growing. susan: what technology are you most excited about? >> virtual reality is a computer programmer developing a artificial world. you can walk into a structure. people are beginning to

commercialize it by putting a headset on. that complete experience is made up by the programmer. augmented reality in which there is a real object. let's say this attractive c-span mug. [laughter] the computer programmer could develop a reality around the mug. the day this one was produced -- i know each one is lovingly written by hand -- that would be the way to put it in context. we have a group of high school students who helped us put together. i have been asking them, what do

you think the next technologies will be? they tell me two things. to a person, they want to make sure we preserve the collections. i was surprised to hear them say that. they want us to use augmented reality to put the object in context. susan: we are talking at a time when reports of russian hacking are in the news. how concerned are you about hackers in your collection? >> very concerned. >> very. >> as i said, the shift from paper to electronic record-keeping is underway. we have an all electronic archive in the near future. the security of the content is something that i am very

concerned about. >> not only for the reasons of our mission, but as an employer. about the records of our employees. all of us here have suffered in greater or lesser degree because of the hacking in the office of personnel management. any operation has to expend serious effort thinking about cyber security and auditing those efforts. my personal opinion is that nothing is secure. susan: you have priceless collections. the library of congress has had incidents in the past few years. how concerned are you about theft? >> constant vigilance. >> i have been in this business

long enough to know that the balance between access and protection is real. a large percentage of the problem is insider theft. raising awareness about keeping and eye on each other. susan: is that discouraging? >> very discouraging. we had an incident where a longtime staff member was caught stealing film from the national archives. the damage that it does to the staff is real. ms. hayden: that is one of the reasons i make sure i follow all the security protocol.

when i come in, i open all of my bags. on the way out, i do it. i want that to be the culture, that even the librarian is subject to the security measures. >> i do the same thing with my badge and belts. the balance between security and access is critical. it is about the safety of the millions who enter. we try hard to hit the right balance. i thought it was great coming into the library. there were metal detectors and scanners. people were polite. even on quite a chilly day by washington standards.

in my home state of wisconsin or illinois, they might consider us to be a bit wimpy. ms. hayden: we were close with the u.s. capitol police. they are very cognizant. we had an appreciation day for them. we showed them how much we appreciated them. susan: how many visitors does the library get? ms. hayden: almost 2 million. >> in washington, 1.5 million. susan: is july 4 the big day? >> we own july 4. [laughter] we have a wonderful ceremony reading of the declaration of

independence. susan: how many visitors to the smithsonian get? >> we get over 20 million visitors, but that is because all of our locations. it is discouraging when a panda does something, it is national headlines, but when i do something, nobody listens. [laughter] susan: maybe we need a camera in your office. the purviews of these institutions is mandated. many say, i want to be preserved in the smithsonian. how do you make that decision? >> there are historians & hired to have the professional

knowledge to decide what is of lasting value and what is necessary to make the collection more complete. a lot of people happily offer things from their lives. the national museum of african american history and culture opened to five months ago. 37,000 item collection. many times the person said, this is something we have had in our attic or coffee table.

if you are telling the story of african-americans, maybe will want to have this. it is a dance between something that somebody knows about and what fits into the overall scheme of our collection. it is an art more than a science. susan: single most amazing thing in your collection? ms. hayden: that is tough. >> i will bring up my dad. we moved from milwaukee to los angeles after the dodgers moved to brooklyn. dad thought that was the greatest thing. when i was shown the backroom of the museum of natural history, it brought tears to my eyes to see sandy koufax's mitt. it meant a lot to me to see that.

ms. hayden: it is a wonderful position i have not found yet. the contents of abraham lincoln's pockets. i am still looking for a treasure. the library at the time discovered a safe. the story goes that no one knew the combination, so they extricated someone from prison that was known to the handy. when they opened the safe, it was a small box that had been given to the library of congress by abraham lincoln's granddaughter.

the note is the there would be some spectacles. it resonated with me. there is only one cemetery in springfield. i will find something else i am sure. >> every day a discovery knocks my socks off.

if i had to choose one, i'd choose 3. [laughter] the charter of freedom, constitution, and bill of rights. they are with us today because of that rescue. >> i have a favorite in each of their collections. if my colleagues really cared about me, they would loan me in my office. a beautiful glass root, and the bill of rights. it's a small thing. ms. hayden: in your kitchen.

i visit that regularly. susan: we are talking on bill of rights day. our time is going quickly. i am going to go over a few minutes. telling the american story when it is not always pretty. we have talked about values we preserve. history has not been pretty. i wonder how you wrestle with that aspect. >> the mission has been to provide and take care of the

records of the country without judgment to good or bad stories. we collect everything so that the people can hold government accountable, whether they were good or bad decisions, letting future generations make the decision whether it was right or not. any of our libraries have created decisions in terms, where they allow schoolchildren access to the records of decision made by that administration. members of the cabinet has access to the same documents. susan: with living presidents, is that task more difficult?

>> i am proud that has been implemented at the george bush library. the same kind of info opportunities are available for students. susan: the library of congress. ms. hayden: the veterans history project. you have history of veterans and sometimes that history is not told. iconic figures like the rosa parks collection, and her letters to her mother, where she talks about how she felt so worthless and depressed. she worried that telling the truth about her story, that it would disillusion people if they

knew that she had these feelings. dr. skorton: i have great confidence and faith in the american people. i think they deserve to know the whole story. we also strive to do that in letting history speak for itself. virtually any area in the smithsonian tells stories that are uplifting and stories that are not our proudest moment, and my point of view is that the american people have the right. my confidence is that they will want to know the whole story. i think that is true of our elected leaders as well. they are people who want to know what is going on and want us to hang onto it.

they can come to us with information that they can count on face value. susan: since you have to work on future planning, let's closed by having you tell your audience what are institutions will look like 10 years from now. dr. skorton: the smithsonian will be a combination of a collection to objects, works of art, authentic material, and newer technologies. i think we will do a better job of telling the story of different people in america whose stories have not been told enough. people coming in the days to come will feel more engaged in what they see. susan: he will be finishing your first term. ms. hayden: the institution will be at your fingertips.

it will be a place where you can have the experience of looking at the original documents, as well as having all types of experiences with whatever items we have. you can have access to the library of congress wherever you are. >> massive amounts of digitization will allow us to do a better job of connecting the 3 institutions in terms of user experience. it will be not just one of us, but a suite of information. we will be much more electronic and collaborative. susan: beyond your institutions? all of us will be interconnected. this has been a quick 50 minutes. thank you very much. i would like to invite you to the future again. thank you for the time you have given us today.