captioning sponsored by newshour productions, llc >> woodruff: good evening. i'm judy woodruff. on the newshour tonight: getting the vaccine. the biden administration teams up with key global allies to challenge china's vaccine diplomacy dominance. then, work shift. black americans and women still face discrimination in skilled trades, despite an increasingly diverse workforce. >> it's hard to get a point of entry. historically, women and minorities have been systematically kept out of these higher-paying skilled jobs. and when you do get in, there's no place for advancement. >> woodruff: and, it's friday. david brooks a jonathan capehart consider the historic covid relief law, the immigration crisis, and a year

of life in the pandemic. all that and more, on tonight's pbs newshour. >> major funding for the pbs newshour has been provided by: ♪ ♪ ♪ moving our economy for 160 years. bnsf, the engine that connects us. >> fidelity wealth management. >> consumer cellular.

>> johnson & johnson. >> the john s. and james l. knight foundation. fostering informed and engaged communities. more at kf.org. >> and with the ongoing support of these institutions: and friends of the newshour. >> this program was made possible by the corporation for public broadcasting. and by contributions to your pbs station from viewers like you. thank you. >> woodruff: the white house is defending president biden's decision to hold covid-19 vaccines in the united states, and not ship doses overseas. last night, he announced that all americans should be eligible

for shots by may 1. today, aides confirmed that he has declined to donate part of the u.s. supply. >> his view is that his obligation-- first obligation-- is to-- addressing what is still a crisis in our country. right? yes, he outlined last night there is a light at end of tunnel, but 1,400 americans are dying every single day, and he wants to have, as the leader of this country, maximum flexibility. >> woodruff: mr. biden has agreed to contribute financially, to help needy nations buy vaccine. and today, he met virtually with others in the so-called "quad," leaders of japan, india and australia. they unveiled a plan to boost vaccine production in asia. we will look at all of this, after the news summary. new york governor andrew cuomo defied growing political pressure today and refused again to resign over allegations of sexual misconduct. a majority of new york's congressional delegation,

including late today, both u.s. senators chuck schumer and kirsten gillibrand, are calling for him to step down. but, in a conference call earlier, cuomo accused his detractors of joining so-called "cancel culture." >> there is still a question of the truth. i did not do what has been alleged. politicians who don't know a single fact but yet form a conclusion and an opinion, are, in my opinion, reckless and dangerous. >> woodruff: the governor also questioned the motives of his accusers. but today, a seventh woman, another former aide, charged that cuomo harassed her as well. federal health officials are hoping more families will claim unaccompanied migrant children,

coming into the u.s. without fear of being deported. they announced today that they are ending a trump-era policy of sharing information on sponsors with immigration authorities. numbers of children crossing the southern border alone are surging, with more than 3,000 in detention facilities now. the city of minneapolis agreed today to pay $27 million to settle a civil lawsuit with the family of george floyd. he died in police custody last may. the family's attorney, ben crump, hailed the agreement as historic. >> makes a statement that george floyd deserved better than what we witnessed on may 25, 2020. that george floyd's life matters, and by extension, black lives matter. >> woodruff: the settlement came amid jury selection for derek chauvin, the white former police officer charged with floyd's murder.

in rochester, new york, an investigation into the death of daniel prude accuses the mayor and the former police chief of withholding information, and outright lying. prude suffocated last march after police restrained him. today's report was commissioned by the city council. a grand jury has declined to indict any of the police officers involved. mainland china today rejected u.s. criticism of its tightening grip on hong kong. the u.s. state department had called it "an assault on democracy." but, beijing accus washington of hypocrisy. >> ( translated ): when hong kong was rocked by disturbances, the u.s. praised it as "a beautiful sight." but when demonstrators stormed the capitol on january 6, the u.s. branded it domestic terrorism. what moral high ground does the u.s. have to tell china about what it should do? >> woodruff: china has now imposed measures that let it select more of hong kong's lawmakers.

e vatican says it has nearly used up reserves from past donations to cover budget deficits. church officials today forecast red ink of nearly $60 million this year. they blamed reduced donations amid the pandemic. the holy see also faces an ongoing corrtion probe. and on wall street, the dow jones industrial average gained 293 points to finish at 32,778. the nasdaq fell 78 points, and the s&p 500 added four. still to come on the newshour: the biden administration takes steps to challenge china's vaccine diplomacy dominance. black americans and women continue to face discrimination in skilled trades. david brooks and jonathan capehart offer their takes on the politics of covid relief. plus, much more.

>> woodruff: president biden moved up the timeline last night for vaccine allocation, saying he will order all states, tribes and territories to offer a vaccine to all adults by may 1. that, he said, could allow for smaller gatherings by the fourth of july. but it means that vaccine distribution will have to ramp up even further. mr. biden also vowed this morning to expand vaccine supply globally during an unprecedented meeting of world leaders. william brangham and nick schifrin are here now to break it down. so hello to both of you and william, i'm going to begin with you. give us a sense of where we are with vaccine distribution now in the united states, a sense of the progress that's been made. >> brangham: judy we're at

about 81, 82 million shots that have been administered so far. and if you remember the president promised 100 million shots within his first 100 days. it looks like he's certainly going to hit that deadline. you remember last night we all heard eligibility for all adults should be opened up by may 1st. and this comes from the administration's confidence that we are sudden going to have a large supply of vaccines in our hands. and then the issue of course as we have seen thus far is how do we get those out of vials and into people's arms. the pace is getting better but we're still struggling with the issues of getting people appointments and vaccine registrations and still gum in the works but the pace is definitely picking up. >> woodruff: tell us, what is the administration trying to do to speed things up? >> brangham: there is a lot

of money in the covid bill ju signed into law. today the coached administration task force announced that vaccines will be going to clse to 700 more community centers, vaccines will be made available at another 20,000 farmingzs. -- pharmacies. the administration said they would double the number of vaccine distribution centers, from stadiums to vaccine clinics to mobile around the country. the pool of vaccinators, the people that are able to administer the shots and the president promised a new website last night too to help coordinate this confusing byzantine process that people have been navigating. the question now comes of course if we stay at our current pace when does the country reach herd immunity? when do people have enough vaccines that we feel confident

this pangd is getting behind us? at the current pace of about 2 million doses being administered every day, there are a lot of caveats to this, but we could be close to 75, 80% of the population being vaccinated by mid to late summer. lots of caveats. there are things that could interrupt that process but mid to late summer we've could achieve something close to herd immunity. the hope is that when we get to that point, many other nations around the world would hope that the u.s. would share its supply of surplus vaccine for them. today, jen sa key said, until americans have been fully vaccinated they have not been sharing something so far. >> holman: tell us what the world leaders announced today. >> schifrin: president biden

presidents from j.p. australia on big screens. vaccines will be manufactured in india, which is already a leading manufacturer and they will use australian logistics to distribute those vaccines. and that will help what every expert says, that is the pandemic will not be over until everyone, everywhere is vaccinated. >> we are all interdependent and no country can simply vaccinate its way out of this pandemic. we cannot end the pandemic anywhere unless we end it everywhere. >> schifrin: another step to accomplish that goal judy william mentioned the white house finally admitted today it had blocked requests to export vaccines. u.s. officials tell me they will begin to export vaccines this summer after the entire united

states is vaccinated not only because the administration has purchased more vaccines but the trump administration warp speed increased vaks if nation production in the united states. he said this kind of high income country investment in vaccine distribution and development is the only way this pandemic will end. but he said he was disappointed. that the biden team had declined these export requests, and he said the u.s. could have and should have done more. i talked to other humanitarian officials who urged biden to go further. to push companies to give up intellectual property rights and also to focus not only on asia but on africa. >> woodruff: do we know where these vaccines announced by distributors are going to be sent? >> schifrin: according to senior u.s. and quad officials

is the indo pacific. the hub of production will be india which is already exporting millions of vaccines. as india's ambassador told me earlier today. >> india has already opened its door. pharmacy of the world. and we believe in sharing our you are aware that india's private sector last been stepping in and expanding capacity. >> schifrin: independent experts point out that the cex for this is southeast asia is where beijing has focused its vaccine efforts and a billion vaccines is enough to achieve herd immunity for the entire region. and the biden administration, trying to send a message to beijing not only today, but also

these trips coming up, secretary of defense, secretary of state not only going to southeast asia. >> woodruff: william brangham and nick schifrin, thank you both. >> woodruff: the winter storms that devastated texas last month led to a major water crisis. but, for weeks afterward, there weren't enough plumbers to help customers with the damage. all of this underscores the need for more of these skilled workers. and yet, for women and workers of color, there can be even greater obstacles. paul solman has the story, for our series "work shift." and a warning: this story includes sensitive subject matter. >> i was in a porta-john one time. they picked me up with a crane. >> reporter: "they" were adrienne bennett's fellow workers during her five-year union plumbing apprenticeship

in the early 1980s. >> and you're bouncing around in there, and you-- and you got that sewage is splashing all over you. you're afraid. you don't know what's going to happen. >> reporter: the point was rather obvious. >> like the women before me, they wanted me to leave. >> reporter: those women before her, all white, had quit. but bennett survived, got high- level training while not taking on college debt, was actually getting paid. in 1987, she became the first-- and still only-- black female“ master plumber” in north america. now running her own firm in detroit, bennett says it isn't just the stigma of dirty work or the emphasis on college that keeps people like her from getting a hands-on education for high-paying jobs in the understaffed trades. >> this is a piece of artwork right here. >> reporter: unsurprisingly perhaps, it's discrimination. because you're a woman, because you're black? >> i never, even to this day, i still can't answer that question. in those days, there was no

place for me to go and complain. there was nobody i could go talk to. >> reporter: women obviously make up half or more of the population; african americans, another 14%. but according to the bureau of labor statistics, only 8% of plumbers are black. as for women, take bennett's own union local. >> it's over 1,500 members, and 13 women. >> reporter: but just listen to what she endured from her fellow apprentices. >> dead rats in my lunch box. and they were used to groping me. >> reporter: one of them, savagely. >> he grabs me by my buttocks. and he lifts me up off the floor and by him doing that, he's ripped my skin. it hurt. and i looked and there was blood. by this time i was so tired of them putting their hands on me, i grabbed a pipe wrench out of my tool belt. and before i realized it, i came

down on the top of his hardhat. and i said, stops today. you pass the word. the next ( bleep ) that puts their hands on me will die, and i will go to prison happily. >> reporter: the hazing stopped. but the prejudice wasn't just against women. even in heavily african american detroit... >> when i got into the trade, there were no black men. they had left the union, because they themselves were being called the n-word, being called a boy. you know, they were being treated like they were in the deep south. >> reporter: tonya hicks is from the deep south. >> meridian, mississippi. >> reporter: and she's another rarity in the trades. >> only 3% of all the electricians in the united states are women, and i'm one of the 3%. >> reporter: and blacks comprise less than 7% of the electrical trade. no wonder hicks became mississippi's first black female journeyman back in 1999. she now runs her own firm in atlanta.

how tough was it for her? >> i had a foreman to tell me that all black women do is get fat, have a bunch of kids and collect welfare. >> reporter: growing up in meridian, mississippi, were you expecting to be treated as badly as you were treated? >> yes. >> reporter: why? >> i grew up in an environment where discrimination and racism was a daily thing, so i didn't know anything different. my grandfather was stabbed 62 times, and they slit his throat. >> reporter: why? what did he do? >> he was black. so when you learn if people hate and what hate does and what hate looks like and feels like, you don't know anything different. so, no, i expected it. but i was brave enough to go and hungry enough to stay. >> reporter: and tough enough to endure. but haven't things changed?

how come more black people, more women don't try to become electricians? >> it's hard to get a point of entry. historically, women and minorities have been systematically kept out of these higher-paying skilled jobs. the unions have a history of it, incling my own union. and when you do get in, there's no place for advancement. >> reporter: in addition, says hicks... >> it's based on who you know. and that's how most people hire. they hire who they like and who they are comfortable with. so, if you don't have black people in management, you don't have women in management, it won't change. >> bring it up and bring it all the way over. >> reporter: as adrienne bennett learned recently, when she was interviewing african american plumber candidates. >> one guy said that he couldn't get into the union, because he didn't have any connections. he should have been able to go to that union hall, knock on the door and say, i want an application to get in. "who do you know?"

"i don't know nobody." they shut the door. >> reporter: but bennett does think things are changing. >> the u.a., which is united association, which is for the piping trades, a national level, the president at the conference this year, he made a mandate that harassing, hazing, is going to stop, and the workplace is not a place for that. so now, it is better, but it's a mindset that is generational. they still feel that they can say and do what they want. >> reporter: for the pbs newshour, paul solman. >> woodruff: so much going on. and now to the analysis of brooks and capehart. that's "new york times" columnist david brooks, and jonathan capehart, columnist for the "washington post."

let's begin with president biden's first prime time address to the why nation. what do you think of t tone he said? >> brooks: he said i need you. i haven't heard that from the white house in a while. there was a stone of empathy but i like the way he spun it positively. at this moment, the government has had a faults of being too negative, they are still imposing warnings, dot do this, don't do this. but i think people want something to look forward to. we can hang in if we are given the hope that good times are ahead. july 4th, you can picnic with grand jury family. this is a really hard part of the pandemic, we are exhausted

of doing the same thing every day for a year. >> woodruff: jonathan how did you read, hear what president biden said? >> capehart: the thing that jumped out at me the same as david actually when the president leaned forward into the camera and said, i need you. the other thing that was in that speech for me aside from the words, was the fact that yes, we have an empathetic president, one who overflows with it. and after four years of a president who didn't have any empathy, for years of a president who made every utterance, speech rally about himself, to have a president stand before the nation and say we, instead of i, to give that, say that there's a light at the end of the tunnel, was something that, you know, i noticed on my twitter feed when i sent out a message saying thank god we have a president who is overflowing

with empathy, the number of responses from people who were saying they were crying in that moment, listening to this president who's not only giving them hope but really giving words to the pain and frustration that millions of americans have felt for the last year. >> woodruff: when you look at the substance of what is in this legislation, this massive piece of legislation, david, the republicans are saying it's the worst thing they've ever seen. mitch mcconnell saying, terrible -- the worse law he has ever seen pass the congress, while democrats are saying this is going to make a huge difference in the lives of americans. who's going to turn out to be right? >> brooks: i don't know. you know you take a bet. the republicans are right about one thing. when you throw nearly $2 trillion onto a hot economy of borrowed money you certainly run the risk of inflation. and that's very hard to defeat. you really have to shut down the economy the way we did in 1981, 82 to solve that problem.

you certainly run the risk of having a big debt problem. so i completely understand the concerns. i think would i bet the way biden bet on this case because for the last 20 years it's become increasingly clear the economy is not working for people the way it used to. it not working for young adults, it's not working for people throughout the country and one way to fix that is to create a white-hot labor market by pumping money in the economy. another way to fix it is with the child tax credit to make pareparenthood affordable. when i look at this bill i look at it as as a big epical shift. it is an equivalent transformation to me of when ronald reagan came into office and 1981 addressed the stagflation of the 1970s. now we have gigantic policies but in response to the real problem of the moment. >> woodruff: and jonathan, do you see any risk or risk of any

size, magnitude, on -- in what the democrats are doing, party line vote, no republicans voted for it? >> capehart: no republicans voted for the bill, judy but when you look at the public opinion polling about the american rescue plan 60% of republicans favored it. so i think what we're going to see going forward is a growing disconnect, a growing chasm, between republicans who are elected to come here to washington to legislate and the people who sent them here. and i'm not sure how the republican party is going to deal with that. because all we have seen from republicans on the hill is, doctor seuss and everything that they are against. i defy anyone to tell me what republicans are actually for. with the exception of senator mitt romney, senator tom cotton, on minimum wage and the child tax credit. but that's just two republicans.

more needs to come out of the republican party for them to be a credible policy challenger to democrats. >> woodruff: and david, if the two parties weren't going to come together on this what do you think the prospects are for anything coming down the pipe any time soon? >> brooks: i think there is some prospect. the democrats really wanted to go big on this. they got more than they thought they would. without scaring away the moderates that was not automatic so they wanted to on big and they opened huge. there is the posibility of infrastructure, this is the perennial thing of which there should be bipartisan agreement, everyone mouths we should agree on this. some republicans have come up to 11, so it's possible the question to me is democrats do they really want to? they hold the power here. do they really want to or do they regard the recurrent republican party as so

illegitimate it's not worth compromising? i think that sentiment is really the guiding force within the democratic party now. >> woodruff: jonathan what do you think the chances are they work together on something jghtd they'll work together on something. maybe it's -- >> capehart: they'll work together on something. maybe it's infrastructure. they might be able to do it one more time with some aspects of an -- i'm sorry not immigration, infrastructure package. but i do think what we're going to see on a bunch of other priorities, immigration, voting reform, other things, where the bills are going to come to the floor in the senate and there won't be 60 votes to end the ffilibuster. but there will be more than 50 votes that will send a signal to the american people that this could pass, were it not for the filibuster. and i think that will engender grass roots pressure on

democrats to do away with it. but also put pressure on the republicans to explain to the american people, wait, if a majority of you are for this, why can't it pass? >> woodruff: right. different subject. governor andrew cuomo of new york, david there are now seven women who have come forward accusing him of sexual misconduct and now we have both new york state, u.s. senators, chuck schumer and kirsten gillibrand calling on him to standpoint down. can he survive this? >> brooks: i don't possibly say how he can. this is reminisce ebt of when barry gold water and a number of republicans told richard nixon he had to leave. this is all relevant democrats with a few exceptions telling him he has got to leave. there are many women who made these accusations. news story today interviewing

dozens of women in the administration, who described a toxic atmosphere, not all of them did, some of them were describing an atmosphere where they were required to wear high heels and dress in a certain way. i don't see how he could last in office. >> woodruff: and jonathan as we reported earlier governor cuomo earlier today said these people calling for him to step down are part of cancel culture, that they don't know the facts. >> capehart: yeah, he'll say what he needs to say to defend himself. but when you have both sitting united states senators, more than half the legislative -- legislators in albany calling for your resignation, that is sending a signal. the one person i am watching judy is congressman hakeem jeffreys was a house impeachment

manager very, very close to governor cuomo. if he loses hakeem he jeffreys you know he is gone. >> woodruff: we will watch that. and in the little bit of time we have left, this is the week for both of you. we have spent a year now in this pandemic. it started march, march the 10th or 11th of 2020. our lives have been turne upside down. david, i want to ask each one of you what it's meant? how have you -- do you think you've changed? what's different for you after this? >> brooks: well historians noted that the asian countries succeed and the western countries failed. we're a less united country, we could be united about this and personally 538,000 families have lost a family member. the rest of us have endured stress and anxiety. the number of people i know who

are on anxiety pills now is kind of high, suicide, depression, and i wondering where i left these things and stress and boredom and loneliness affects the mind. i feel my mind has been drained by this i'm ready to sit out there in the studio with you and jonathan. >> capehart: that's a great slip. >> woodruff: and we're ready to get back in the studio when it's safe to do that for sure. jonathan, what about you? how do you feel things have changed? what's different now? >> well, i agree with david on everything that he said in terms of the nation and the world and the impact that it's had on all of us. it didn't help that we had a very stressful presidential administration and election that added to that anxiety. i think for me personally what's been interesting is i'm an introvert at heart. i love being at home.

staying home was not a hardship for me. >> woodruff: we don't believe that but go ahead. >> capehart: but it's true! here's the thing. i feel like i'm in between generations. old enough to be from that generation that you wake up, you go into the office, monday through friday you must go into the office to do work. but i'm also young enough to now, as a result of the pandemic, understand, you know what actually you can work from home. it's okay. you're not cheating in any way. so that's one sort of glimmer of hope that i've taken from the pandemic. but i do think that what it has done to us as a people, as americans, as a country, pitting us against each other over whether you're wearing a mask or not, governors whether they're republican or democrat deciding whether they're going to open up their state, public health being politicized, that's the thing that's most distressing to me.

>> woodruff: well, we each have stories to tell about this year. and it's amidst so much suffering that we've seen. we thank both of you, and we hope you have a good weekend, both of you, jonathan capehart,.david brooks. >> thanks judy, same to you. >> brooks: good weekend. >> woodruff: christie's, the auction house, sold a work of art yesterday for a record- breaking $69.3 million, for a piece that exists only digitally. it is a sale seen by many as history-making, in the development of both digital art and crypto-currency markets. jeffrey brown takes a look for our arts and culture series, "canvas." >> brown: he goes by the monik“" beeple.”

real name, mike winkelmann. he creates digital images and videos-- humorous, grotesque, social commentary. and part of a series he's been working on called “everydays”-- one drawing a day for 13 years and running-- just sold for nearly $70 million. >> oh my god! >> brown: heady stuff for a man who has a hard time even calling himself an artist. >> i just feel like the term "artist" is super pretentious. and so, i would never be like, "i'm an artist." i can't say it. >> brown: we spoke to winkelmann, 39, before the outcome of the auction. he cls himself a "designer." a computer science grad, he'd built a successful commercial career, known for elaborate video backdrops used at concerts and events, even the super bowl. but he's also made his own work, including the "everydays." >> the things that are happening in the news and different pop culture things-- so there's sort

of a range of themes, but there's also a lot of just weird stuff. it's definitely not for everybody, i will say that. >> brown: you will admit to that you have a select audience. but until recently, he faced a major challenge. >> i wouldn't necessarily say that i didn't know how to sell it. i would say there was no real way to sell it. i think there was-- you could sort of print out my work and you could kind of collect it that way, but that's not really native to, like, the medium that i make this on. i make this on a computer. it's meant to be viewed on a screen. >> brown: a problem for digital art: it can be reproduced with a simple click, and it often lives freely online. so, why would anyone spend money on it? and how, after all, can someone "own" it? an answer comes in what's called an n.f.t., or non-fungible token. put simply, an n.f.t. is a digital “proof of ownership” for a digital work like beeple's art.

d that's what people are buying. noah davis handled the sale for christie's. >> one way to wrap your head around this is if you're looking at our website and you see the illustration on the last page, that's a metaphor for the artwork. it's a symbol of the artwork, but it is not the artwork itself. the artworitself is a long code. >> brown: what makes an n.f.t. special is that it's one-of-a- kind and impossible to copy. it relies on "block-chain technology," sometimes described as a kind of "digital-record keeping." it's a secure way to track when digital ems change hands online. and since only one person can own an n.f.t., the digital art associated with it suddenly becomes collectible. and that opens a whole new market for all kinds of things. >> the idea that you can have a collectible commodity that is extraordinarily valuable and also intangible will change the way that people think about

investing, the way that people think about exhibition, the way i mean, it's going to affect the technology, or every pce of technology potentially that's involved in the contemporary art market apparatus right now. >> brown: no one knows yet who made the winning bid on beeple, but the n.f.t. market generally has been growing fast, with plenty of high-flying entrepreneurs jumping in. >> folks like elon musk and mark cuban are weighing in and starting to buy and collect these things now. and they're all, sort of collectively, seen a visionaries-- not just famous people, but visionaries who made gambles early and did well. >> brown: jason bailey, who writes about art and tech on the site art-nome, says the boom in cryptocurrencies also means a new generation of investors. >> there's thousands of young people who are tech-savvy enough to get into crypto and are now looking to build a culture. so, those are real buyers. i think a combination of bitcoin and ethereum's extreme growth in 2020 means that a lot of these people are crypto-millionaires.

>> brown: and it's easy. anybody, even non-millionaires, can go to sites like “super rare” and place bids. >> i see huge potential for decentralization of the art market. which means simply that a larger amount of people has access and perhaps even at a lower price. >> brown: christiane paul is curator of new media arts at new york's whitney museum. she says both artists and collectors stand to benefit. but, she also wants us to see beyond this week's craze. >> i think we have to make sure that we don't mistake what we're currently seeing sold through n.f.t. as representative of digital art. because it's a much, much broader field and there are still aesthetic distinctions to make. >> brown: there are also environmental concerns. n.f.t.s and cryptocurrencies require significant energy to power massive networks of computers. no one knows where all this is headed, whether its a

speculative bubble or something real. but for mike winkelman, a.k.a. beeple, the benefits to him and others are plenty real for now. >> there's a bunch of digital artists who are suddenly able to make a living through selling n.f.t.s. so this is very much a movement. and i just kind happened to be sort of one of the more popular people in the space who kind of is the sort of bridge right now between the traditional world and this new digitaworld. but i think these worl are converging very quickly. >> brown: so when are you going to call yourself an artist? >> well, we'll see after this christie's auction, maybe after that, maybe i'll change my name badge to "artist." >> brown: for the pbs newshour, i'm jeffrey brown. >> woodruff: we are now into the second year of this global pandemic, and since it began,

more than 530,000 americans have died from covid-19. as we do every week, we pause to share with you the lives of five extraordinary people lost to this virus. jose antonio martinez would do anything for his wife, maria josefa martinez, their daughter told us. they were both born in camaguey, central cuba, and both went by nicknames-- pepe and josie. they married in 1961 and started their family while in cuba. but before long, pepe had to work in a forced labor camp. so in 1971, the family fled the castro regime and went to the u.s. on a “freedom flight.” they started from scratch in new orleans, taking night classes to learn english. josie worked as a cleaner, and then a teacher, and prepared

children for holy communion on sundays. pepe ran an auto parts store, and loved baseball and elvis. they liked to listen to jazz and dance together. their daughter said they were never happier than when they were feeding family and friends at their home. after 58 years of marriage, they died, 16 days apart. josie was 78, and pepe was 79. tom church had a thirst for knowledge as deep as the oceans he studied, his brother said. his work as an oceanographer took him around the world, but he always made time to soak up the local culture. he lived on a farm in delaware with his family. as a young boy, tom had polio, and had to learn to walk again, his brother told us. during his recovery, he developed what would be a lifelong love of music-- playing both the piano and trumpet. tom was 78.

antoine hodge's friends and colleagues described him as a gentle giant with a nurturing spirit. ♪ ♪ ♪ his bass baritone voice filled churches and opera houses alike, and he would sing whenever and wherever he had the chance. he was a prolific performer, from king balthazar in “amahl and the night visitors” in fort collins, colorado, to his recent chorus role in “porgy and bess” at new york's metropolitan opera. friends said hgave the best hugs and encouraged them to dream big. antoine was 38. music and laughter echoed through every home constance gaylord rial matthews ever lived in, her daughter told us. she spent her early years in western new york, and studied music, theater and sociology.

she married just after world war ii and had four children. she loved traveling the rld and visited every continent except antarctica. but chicago became her home, where volunteering, opera, and art were her passions. constance remarried late in life, and before her passing at 97, loved nothing more than to be surrounded by her new, extended family. for sharing these stories with us. our hearts go out to you as they do to everyone who's lost a loved one in this pandemic. we ask you to stay with us to discover long lost masterpieces but

>> woodruff: imagine discovering that a painting on your wall is a long-lost masterpiece? in two recent cases, the story centers on jacob lawrence, a

lydia gordon of the peabody essex museum in salem, massachusetts is our guide, part of our arts and culture series, "canvas." >> so, i have never experienced lightning striking twice, but this very much feels like that experience. so, jacob lawrence was the most famous black artist of the 20th century. the "struggle" series for me really solidifies lawrence's visionary artistic impact. we're working at the dawn of the modern civil rights movement when american art is really entrenched in abstraction and he has his own synthesis, his artistic ingenuity and individuality, to tell the stories that are really underrepresented in the history books. finding missing works of art is incredibly rare. so, panel 16 was discovered because of a visitor to the exhibition's installation at the

metropolitan museum of art in new york, was standing in the gallery seeing this narrative series and looking at the holes on the wall where-- where the missing panels would have been. and she thought to herself that, gee, i think my neighbor has one of these panels. and it happened to be panel 16, which is incredible because we didn't actually know what it looked like. there's incredible golds and-- and greens that lawrence uses for the citizen's army and then the cool blue he uses for the american revolutionaries. but across the panel, all the faces of the soldiers are in complete despair. so we work with the owners of panel 16 to get their painting on the wall at the metropolitan, and about two weeks later, the owner of panel 28 is reading her community bulletin, and saw the name jacob lawrence and recognized it, went over to a painting in her home and of

course, saw jacob lawrence's signature at the bottom of this painting that had been hanging in her home and her family for decades. she marched over to the metropolitan and a very new york fashion and asked to speak to somebody who worked on the exhibition and helped make the connection that she had another missg painting. panel 28 is really interesting because we did have a black and white image of it, a very poor quality one. so when we were able to see the painting in its full color, things were revealed to us that we couldn't see before. so the figure in the middle is holding what we thought was a prayer book, but it's actually a rose, a potted rose. the figure on the right is holding a baby. lawrence included not only founding fathers in this story, but he included the stories and the contributions of women, of native americans, of enslaved

people, black people, europeans. to have not just one but two paintings surface that across the exhibitions tour is incredibly hopeful and optimistic. and i'm-- i'm certain that we will be able to reunite all 30 panels. >> woodruff: three paintings of jacob lawrence's "struggle" series remain missing. "struggle" is currently on display at the seattle art museum through may 23. and that is the newshour for tonight. i'm judy woodruff. join us online, and again here on monday evening. for all of us at the pbs newshour, have a great weekend. thank you, and good night. >> major funding for the pbs newshour has been provided by: >> fidelity wealth management. >> consumer cellular. >> johnson & johnson. >> bnsf railway. >> the william and flora hewlett foundation.

for more than 50 years, advancing ideas and supporting institutions to promote a better world. at www.hewlett.org. >> supporting social entrepreneurs and their solutions to the world's most pressing problems-- skollfoundation.org. >> and with the ongoing support of these institutions and friends of the newshour. captioning sponsored by newshour productions, llc captioned by media access group at wgbh access.wgbh.org

>> tonight on kqed newsroom. it has been one year since the pandemic began speaking across the golden street . uc health experts discuss where we have been and where we have going. >> -- joins us to discuss women in business and hurt efforts to improve water energy to the state and nation. welcome to kqed i am priya david clements. when years ago our lives were turned upside down. children place orders went into effect shutting down businesses