Transcripts For CSPAN2 BookTV Visits Saratoga Springs NY 20171217

He once was dying of cancer and his family was facing serious financial problems. At this point in his life he was a man trying to take care of his family and we get to tell his story here that most people dont know about. Welcome to Saratoga Springs on the tv. Located about four hours north of new york city it has a population of about 27000. Names for the numerous springs in the area early settlers walked here to experience the therapeutic effects of the natural mineral or water. Today Saratoga Springs is a popular Tourist Destination with its spots. Revolutionary war history and. With the help of our spectrum Cable Partners for the next 90 minutes will learn about the citys history and feature its local Literary Community including Andrew Mckenna on his battle with opioid addiction. Growing up i thought the person who is addicted to heroin lived under a bridge somewhere and was pushing a shopping cart around or Something Like that you know, that is not the case. One of the most abused drugs right now on wall street among traders and these are elite professionals are opioids. We begin our special feature with author on the history of Saratoga Springs. We are standing at the spring and it has recreated the portico discovered in 1792. It was found to be beneficial for certain diseases. Id like to say that Congress Park is a city park developed because of constipation. Because that is the disease most likely it was used to treat. It helped to spur a Great Development of hotels, boarding houses and businesses, generally, here in surgical springs. There was nothing here until the first spring was discovered. In fact, we think that the mohawk and muskegon indians came here only for the mineral springs. It was not a place where they cant particularly perhaps they hunted here so perhaps the european americans came here in 1771 and probably finding the spring or dividing land that had been very inappropriately taken from the mohawks. So what happened in the very beginning and 71 and 72 was that the first people to come here build log cabins and anyone who heard of the water made there were here paid a small sum of money to stay in one of these very rough log cabins and they bathed in the spring where they drank it and the this is very dangerous territory so everything stopped for about seven years. Even when it started up it started out slowly. It wasnt until 1802 that [inaudible] came here from connecticut and built the first hotel. Originally called putnam tavern and later it was called william hall and became the grand hotel. The big boost was 1832 when the railroad was built. It came from albany by way of schenectady and immediately a number of people coming here. The next big boom was because all the fortunes made in the war with what is called cloth for the ironing and petroleum which is just beginning to be exploited. Those loved it here and they came in great numbers and thats when the union hall has expanded into the grand union hotel and the United States had burned in 1864 and was rebuilt a decade later in those two hotels for each over 800 and they were immense. They were six or seven stories high right on the sidewalk. In the 1860s and 1870s the very, very wealthy did not build summer homes and they did that later but at first they rented rooms in the two big hotels and sometimes the other larger hotels. At the same time the was taking place racism was getting going. It started in 1847 the state fair but it was primarily [inaudible] for the first three years. In 1863 John Morrissey, prizefighter and gambler, began the racetrack and this was thoroughbred racing and things really took off. They took off quite successfully and the track was set in stone in 1902 when William Collins acquired it with his associates. From 1863 to today the racetrack has been served as the bread and butter because in fact by that time the use of mineral waters was declining. The crowd that came here to stay often for four weeks at a time at the great hotel no longer wanted to do that. They wanted variety and fights and they had automobiles so that started with the very rich and trickledown first of the middle class and ultimately to let say the late 40s. It was progressive but the hotels do not have private baths and in world war ii called a halt to racism because it was impossible to get versus year with the travel restrictions. So they raced in new york city instead of here where they normally would have. The United States hotel was turned down in 1943, 1944 in the middle of the war but the hotel went along 1853 and then it was gone. That was gone and the Largest Hotel in town probably had the roads so it was really a change and then in the early 60s saratoga hands came together and in a grassroots effort pulled together to turn things around in a number of things contributed to it. For one thing the interstate highway was built in albany from 1963 ultimately on the way to montreal. That made traveling here a lot easier. When i came here in 1978 people of my generation had moved in, had bought rundown houses, rundown commercial buildings and everything is happening at once. It was an exciting time here. That was almost 40 years ago in today saratoga is a most remarkably diverse city, economically it is a college town, a resort town, a Light Industrial town and summer of albany and it was really broad. That is part of the success. Its a complete place and we love it here. This is a 4000acre estate located in Saratoga Springs established as a haven for writers and artists. It houses over 200 artists a year which have included 74 Pulitzer Prize winners and a nobel prize winner. With the help of our spectrum Cable Partners we continue to explore the Literary History of Saratoga Springs the memoirs of former president ulysses s grant. When grants arrived at the overlook and here he is. Ill only a few days left before he passes away and seeing this great beauty this valley that one saw conflict and warfare and where our nation was born was now a Peaceful Valley were farmers were working and he must have taken some satisfaction in that he was a part of the Great American story. We are on Mount Mcgregor in upstate new york only a few miles north Saratoga Springs and the significance of this Historic Site is this was the final home of civil war general and president ulysses s grant. This is the place where Ulysses Grant penned his memoirs in 1885. He was dying of cancer and his family was facing serious financial problems and at this point in his life he was a man trying to take care of his family. We get to tell the story here that most people dont know about. After his second term as president Ulysses Grant and his wife julia went on a world tour for two years. From 1879 and he met many World Leaders and was well respected around the world. When they arrived back in the states in 1879 they were looking for a place to settle because they had come out of the white house two years earlier and were granted it was always an easy decision even though they owned multiple properties in the United States the decision for grants because he was always the devoted family man was to be close to family and he chose the location in new york city so the grants moved into a home in the Upper East Side of manhattan and their children lived nearby and they enjoyed a few years you could say out of the limelight and the winners in york city in their new jersey cottage and grants when he arrived back from his world tour was in need of some income which is i had scheduled for most people because he was a president and people wonder why he didnt have a pension of any kind and it turns out he had given up his military pension to take the presidency and at the end of his presidency there was no pension at the time so he was making his own way in the world and spent a lot of money on the world tour in his son ulysses junior, they called him but, born in ohio, the Buckeye State had gone involved in wall Street Investment so he got his father involved in the formed a firm and they named grant and ward. The investments went well for a while. The early 1880s were comfortable times and money was coming into the firm but everything really started to collapse in the final year of grahams life. He ended up having a slip and fall on the icy sidewalk in new york city that put him in bed ridden for a couple weeks and then early in 1884 in the spring of 1884 he arrived at the office of grants awarded and found out that there was a major financial crisis. He had to get a loan from his friend William Vanderbilt for 150,000 to try to keep the firm afloat. He brought this money to his Business Partner Ferdinand Ward had been doing the books the entire time for the firm and thought that maybe this would help the firm survive and in fact, he found out soon after that ward was actually a crook and he had been running essentially a ponzi scheme the entire time and the grants hit the grant family like a bombshell. They were financially devastated because they had invested heavily in the sperm and the whole family had and now they had to find a way to make money. Grant felt personally responsible. It really encouraged his family and others to invest in sperm and even though he was and he felt personally responsible and wanted to pay back his debt. The grants were not built situation because of the financial scandal and they packed up and moved out to the new jersey cottage for the summer of 1884 to essentially figure out what they were going to do with the future rebuild their lives financially. Grant was approached by sentry magazine at this time, a big magazine company, to write some articles. Grant had been pestered to be an author for many years and had always resisted but other people had written about him and he didnt think youd be much of an author and he was very modest man but most of all he didnt need the money either. They knew they had them in a corner because he didnt need the money and they offered him 500 in article, enough to keep the family afloat to pay the basic bills. So grant started writing articles about the civil war in the summer of 1884 at the new jersey cottage. That is when his writing career began and that is when he brought in some money but there would still have to be a larger work of literature out of the debt they were in. I wish grant started his writing for shaky. It was seen as more of a drive military report. The editor even went so far as to remark that essentially it may be the second disaster of shiloh because it was on the battle of shiloh and this may be the second disaster of shiloh so it was a very poorly written article but interestingly enough this editor came down to visit grant at the new jersey cottage and talked with him freely and said to grants would you tell me about the civil war and so grants are talking anecdotes about the civil war and he told grant that is material that people want to read. Grant really came into his own as an author in summer of 1884 by the end of summer he started to have an idea that maybe this writing career can produce money for his family so right around the same time the magazine was ready to make a push to get him to write a larger book that could be sold. The sentry magazine told they would publish it and he ended up starting to work on it as they went back to the new york city home for the winter of 188485. As grant was working on writing the article during the summer of 1884 he ended up starting to have propane. It started with a very bad staying in the back of his throat that he felt as he was eating a peach. He kind of shrugged it off as may be being a wasp or something on the fruit when he ate it but it kind of persisted and kept coming back and he ignored it because his regular doctor was away in europe and he really wanted to see his regular doctor so he ignored it and said he would see his doctor in the fall essentially. They didnt think much of it at the time because he had been a smoker since the civil war of cigars and they called it smoker stroke at the time. He continued on working with his writing career because when they move back to new york city he finally went to the doctor and he ended up going to his regular doctor knew there was a serious problem as soon as he looked at his throat and he sent him to a specialist, doctor john douglas. He went in to doctor Douglas Office and doctor douglas took a look at his throat and grant looked at douglas face and said is a cancer and unfortunately the doctor had to tell him essentially it was. Grant worked on these memoirs throughout the winter of 188485 and towards the spring of 1885 it was really touch and go pick it a couple of neardeath experiences and his doctors believed the only way he would survive long enough to finish his book was to get him out of the city which was human, dusty, hot to a mountaintop environment. They did a lot with ailing people in that time. And they were looking for opportunities and a friend of the family, joseph drexel, approached the doctors and the grant family to offer them the use of cottage that he just purchased on the top of Mount Mcgregor, just above Saratoga Springs. The cottage that mr. Drexel offered to the grants was fairly modest in size but did have six rooms upstairs in a few rooms downstairs and it had been originally a small in built by the first owner of the mountain, duncan mcgregor. It was moved to accommodate the expansion of the resort in the early 1880s and the resort was expanded to the point where there was 100 room hotel called the bell moral just above the cottage and property was turned into a big victorian wilderness resort you could call it out in top wilderness resort with wonderful overlooks pathways and obviously wonderful air and there was one advertisement for the hotel that said if you dont cure your hayfever its free so mountain air was seen as curative at the time. When grant and his party left new york city on the morning of june 16, 1985 grant was in Poor Condition in the day he arrived it was incredibly hot on the strip appear and difficult. Although once he got off the train and came up to the cottage he immediately got changed, came back out on the porch and in the mountain air and the clear of the mountain seem to revive him seem to have good effect on him right away. Most importantly, he was able to be with his entire family at the cottage. He will head into grants bedroom and this is where grant wouldve come in from the outside and one thing youll notice that is missing here is a bed. Normally there is a bed in the bedroom but unfortunately because of grants condition his throat condition he ended up having to sleep sitting up so he would have his feet in one side and sitting up in the other and this is where he worked on the memoirs when the bugs chased him and or the heat and this is where his nurses or his doctors which he had three doctors on call into nurses who would administer any medicine or try to give him nourishment it was very hard for him to eat with his throat condition so most of these items you see our original but they were provided for the grant family by mr. Drexel. These two chairs however came up from new york city with the grants and grants wrote in these up from new york city on the train. Now because mr. Drexel left these to become a memorial grants son actually left his fathers personal belongings here and we have some very personal items here. And that show that grant was here and that he was at home here and that he went through some very tough times here as well because we have his food bowl in his spittoon and hair brushes, toothbrushes, dockings, his clothing here and we also have food equipment that he was trying to get nourishment and its very difficult but what is really interesting item we have in this room is grants original original medicine the original liquid and substance and most people guess that what they were using for medication is Something Like morphine or some heavy sedative like that the only problem was that grant couldnt take medicine like that because it was too powerful and he wouldnt be able to concentrate on working on his book so the doctors settled on a fairly new substance of the time, a little controversial, it was cocaine. What you see in the bottle is cocaine and they would stir that up and they would apply it on his throat topically to give him pain relief so he could keep concentrated on the work of finishing his book for the sake of his family. When grant arrived you can imagine that he was internationally famous so the train car behind his family string hard was the press corps. When they found out that grant was dying in march of 1885 they kept up a 24 hour vigil. They followed him up to the mountain here and camped out across the cottage intends and they would run up to the hotel and send telegraph wires down to new york city. They also opened the Hotel Balmoral and normally it didnt open until july 1st but they opened it when the grants arrived june 16 so there was a lot of activity appear people new grants here. He was in the papers every day. He was expected to say. For secret service the only person that volunteered was a Civil War Veteran about the same ages grant sam willett, local Civil War Veteran and he volunteered and they pretense up for him on the cottage then he ended up being grants bodyguard. He stood at the bottom of the stairs and he would tell people to move along and guarantee grants privacy. Grant made sams job difficult because grants, even in his condition, with such a friendly man that these folks passing nearby the cottage he would always tip his hat in ways and was very friendly. That is one thing about grants. He was an unassuming man in the next to him and not know he was famous. The matter how much money he had pain and never changed him and he was a simple man very approachable at all times. But sam got frustrated because he told grants oldest son that could you tell your father to be less friendly because hes making my job difficult. Sam went to fred and fred went to his father and told him the situation and i think what grants the next really shows his true character. He said i dont want to be exclusive, let them come. In the fall of 1884, there was a buzz in the Literary Community about grants writing a book and one of the people interested in publishing the book other than a century magazine that had already made an offer was samuel clemens, better known as his pen name marked. He just started his own Publishing Firm and had self published Huckleberry Finn that year 1884. So he shows up at the grant household and have been a casual friend of general grant since the civil war and showed up at the household in new york city in the fall of 1884 just as grant was starting his memoir and he asked the general could take a look at your contract and we looked at the contract and he said later on he said i didnt know whether to laugh or cry becauses first contract ive ever seen. It was only offering 10 of the profits and he said thats totally inappropriate for a man of your stature and he said ive got a Publishing Firm and i can offer you 70 of the profits. An incredibly generous offer especially for a man that was notably ill and they didnt know he was dying with a new 11 time. Grant was reluctant at first, honorable man and he said century magazine came to the first and thats when wayne pulled the ace out of his pocket and said well, general, if you remember a conversation two years ago i asked you to write your memoirs then. So grant eventually did go with and offer and it was impossible to use. Martin had his nephew in law running his Publishing Firm called Charles Webster, that was the name of his nephew. Him and Charles Webster came up with a plan to sell the memoirs door to door instead of selling them in bookstores so they would arrive and take preorders date hundred doortodoor. One of the things mark twain wanted to do was provide an opportunity for Civil War Veterans to salesman so he would request Civil War Veterans to even donned their uniforms and to go doortodoor. Grant himself was a focus of his time and having him write the book was good for sales but honestly having a Civil War Veteran come up to the door as well helped to sell them as well so it was door to door sales and there was many, many thousands of salesmen engaged in this all across the country. It give them a way to make money for themselves and also to support their old commander in his final hours. Twain came to the cottage of few weeks before grant passed away and it was important meeting. Pain was checking on the progress of the book but the grant will support things was to find out how well it was selling. He knew time was short and wanted to find out if the book could be a success and that was when the train was able to tell them probably i have already presold 100,000 copies and i havent even canvassed two thirds of the country. Grant knew at least going to his grave that he had taken care of his family and that he had succeeded in by the time he reached the cottage mark twain believed that the second volume of his book of memoirs was completed but grant was a perfectionist and he still had writing in him and as long as he was alive he would keep writing. He did. He wrote at least another chapter to his book and it was a struggle right to the very end but he kept on it and he wanted the book to be as good as possible and no matter his physical condition he always try to work on the memoirs. Some days he couldnt get out of bed physically. Other days he worked on it and wrote 3040 pages of one single day. To give you an idea of the scope of the memoirs they would eventually beat pages and almost 300,000 words. This was a major project for someone who wouldve been good condition, maybe an expert writer but have someone that is struggling with cancer this was an incredibly heroic effort for the sake of the link. Now, grant worked up to the last few days till he passed away and he finish his book and he asked to be taken down to the overlook for one last view of the valley. By the time they arrived back at the cottage here grant was in very Poor Condition and they knew he didnt have long to live so his son fred said to his father, would you like to lie down . Youve been sleeping in tears, so they brought a bed down to the nearby hotel and placed it here in the corner. They came down just before eight and surrounded him as he passed away peacefully on this bed on july 30, 1885 100 years ago. He walked over to the mantel clock and stopped it at 8 08 in the morning to mark a time when his father passed and it hasnt been touched since. Its a symbol of the time capsule that this place has been kept all these years. Other than leaving a legacy for the country , the history of his life and the civil war that he left , he also left his family and amazing legacy financially. The memoirs went on to sell over 300,000 copies and bring in almost 450,000 for the grant family and in todays money that would be somewhere between 10 and 11 million. It was enough for them to get out of debt andlive comfortably the rest of their lives so he did succeed in his final battle at the cottage , his final devotion for his family. Almost immediately after grants passing, the owner of the college decided that this place would be left as a memorial. So things were left just the way they were when the grant family left and its been kept that way for the last hundred 32 years and thats why i think this cottage is so important to keep the way it is and to maintain it because its just such a compelling story and it gives you that wonderful insight into a relatively misunderstoodfigure in American History, ulysses s grant. Cspan is in Saratoga Springs new york. Next, the life of solomon dorsett, a Saratoga Springs resident who was lord into slavery and whose memoir inspired an oscarwinning movie. Where in secaucus springs and across the street there is a historical marker. He was lord into slavery just about a block or two from here and he ended up in louisiana as a slave so he can finally become a free year man again. It was unknown to scholars who were starting again but when the film came out, that changed because it got all kinds of different awards including postures and it just really helped to increase awareness of solomon northops story. Solomon came to saratoga from Washington County about 1834. He had been doing farming over there but he and his wife decided to make a change. She was an accomplished crook so she was able to get work as a cook at the Different Hotels over the years. He would do various odd jobs, sometimes he would play his violin for parties or dances and so forth. He also would do some labor when some of the railroads were coming to town, he worked on those and during the summers there was work driving people around to the hotels and so forth. In 1830 there were 85 africanamericans in saratoga. Saratoga at the time was just a village. By 1840 it had doubled to 190 so it had doubled. The population over all of Saratoga Springs was a couple thousand people so basically close to 10 percent were black at that time. Not too much before the solomon northop here, they gone through a process of emancipation so a lot of people who had been slaves were freed and they wanted to try Something Different and they would come to a place like Saratoga Springs and maybe this would be a wayor they would do other service jobs in the industry. Just to help establish their identity now that they were free persons. Northops father, he had been a slave to a ships captain by the name of captain henny northup in rhode island. He was a lawyer still during the revolution and afterwards decided to come to eastern new york state. Eventually he freed his slaves, he freed his provisions to get his freedom around 1798. So northups father was a slave but solomon was born in the early 1800s so by that time his father was free so solomon northop was not born a slave, he was always a free person. At the end of winter, some men approached him on the street and said that they had some things for them if they he was willing to go with them and connect up with a service they were involved in. They heard he was a musician and hurriedly played the violin so solomon at that point was in need of money because Saratoga Springs was very much a summer place so there was a lot of money during the summer but the winters were a little bit harder he thought it was a good chance to go and earn quick money and the home relatively quickly. Instead, he ended up being taken to washington dc and they turned them over to a slave trader there who put him eventually on a ship toward new orleans and there he was sold in the slave market and was a slave there for close to 12 years before he finally was able to get word back to people in the north who were able to go and locate him and bring him back to new york state. There was a law in new york state at the time because there were other kidnappings that had taken place and the law provided if a person notified the governor that a citizen had been kidnapped and sold into slavery, they could apply and the state of new york would take care of the expenses for that person to go ordinarily to the south, obviously to locate the person and bring them back so they would be free again. Another man named henry northop who was a captain who had owned solomon northops father, he was a friend of solomon northop so he got approval to go to louisiana and look for solomon northop. A common thing when people were kidnapped was they would be given a different name which would make it hard for their friends and family to trace them after they were enslaved. So in solomon northops case, he was given the name saxon one of the men who kristin him went by the fake name of hamilton so on the slave manifest from the orleans that took solomon northop and a number of other people of color to new orleans, there is a hamilton residence as well as the names of a lot of other people solomon northop mentions in his book and throughout his time as a slave, northop was known as flat rather than solomon northop and that caused a problem because when Henry B Northup went to rescue solomon, he could ask around for solomon northop night and day and nobody would know who he was, his name was platt but luckily he came across somebody who knew who he was talking about. It was a slave for under 10 years and northop, his family had relocated to Granite Falls which was is one county north of here so when he came back, he didnt come back to saratoga to join his family up there and work on his book over four or five months. The book came up amazingly less than six months after he came back to new york state so it was pretty quick work. After solomon northops book came out in 1863 there was a man in Fulton County west of here who read the book and he realized that from northops description of the man who had kidnapped him, that he was sure he knew who they were. He had been on the same trip to washington dc with them and noticed that on the way back to washington dc a did have this black man with them but they were flush with money, had fancy jewelry to purchase so he came forward and they went over and he paid these two men and arrested them and put them on trial in the county seat for Saratoga County two miles from Saratoga Springs. Solomon northop was brought by the magistrate in connection with that and undoubtedly attended some sessions of the trial but the attorneys in the various parties argued a lot about different aspects of the case so it really never came to fruition other than the two men were confined in the county jail for a period of time but they never officially got convicted and sentenced. We dont know what ultimately happened to solomon northop. There are some articles that imply that he fell on hard times and in the 1850s and maybe into the 1870s but we dont know for sure. He could have just become ill, become old andpassed away quietly. But that went up, it was right in front of the Visitor Center in Saratoga Springs. The market first of all ties this in with an interesting historical story that now people are more aware of because of the film but it also , they realized there was a big black population in Saratoga Springs. A lot of people come for the racing and are not aware of some of the history and especially the black history of this particular city. We are at Congress Park in Saratoga Springs new york where cspan is learning more about the areas literary scene. Up next week to Andrew Mckenna on his book sure madness how drug career took him to a career as an inmate in federal prison. Andrew mckenna, can you describe the first time you tried heroine . I can. I hurt my back when i was in the marine corps and i treated it just how it should have been treated with motrin , heating pads, ice packs. I didnt seek out opioids at all but when i left the marine corps and join the Justice Department as a prosecutor i went to a civilian doctor in washington dc where i lived and worked and he prescribed me percocet. And pretty much would give me as many percocets as i wanted and looking back over time as a child , i never really developed coping skills and i was theyoungest of four, fairly normal family in upstate new york. But i learned at an early age at 12 or 13 if i smoke pot or if i drank, my feelings of insecurity would go away. I carried that into my 20s and 30s so it was almost like this perfect storm. I was performing at a high level, as a prosecutor. As a parent, as a brother, as a son but i was selfmedicating with percocet. My back didnt hurt that bad there i needed that level of medication. Eventually i left the Justice Department and moved to upstate new york, got ajob outlaw for. Good firm, good job. Holding the family together but i couldnt find a new york doctor to prescribe opioids the way my washington dcdoctor would. And i eventually turned to a friend and asked him if he could get something for the pain and its an old friend ive known for years and years and he said i can get oxycontin which is heroin in a pill. Theres no two ways about it. Theres an offense if term, they used to call it hillbilly heroin when they first brought it on the market. And thats weird because in appalachia, for were taking the pills, crushing them and injectingthem and overdosing and dying. I knew about it as a prosecutor. We had dealt with it and it had just come on the market. They put a lot of money into saying it wasnt addictive and they told doctors that and they use the footnote out of a new journal of medicine article. That completely was fraudulent. As soon as i tried oxycontin, it was a different animal. Completely different from percocet. Percocet, when you run out of those you feel like you have a cold for a day or two but its manageable. When i ran out of the oxycontin, i started going to massive withdrawals. I remember sitting in my law office in albany and im probably taking last oxycontin. A day and a half earlier. And my stomach started flipping in my body and my bodystarted to cramp up. Nausea, i remembered the waste paper paper basket right next to me. I had a client in the waiting room, secretary saying are you going to see this client and im about to throw up. I didnt know what was happening because ive never been through withdrawal before. Id say whats happening to me and he said youre withdrawing from oxycontin. I said, it was literally coming on fast and i was panicking and i didnt want to lose my job. Theres no way i could have sat in front of the client and given legal advice. Throughout this time i was trying cases in federal court and i was going to state for it and seeing clients and so long as i was on the oxycontin, it was okay. It was a great. We know opioid addiction in general is a house of cards but this was a different animal. So when i call this guy, he said there is something that can replace oxycontin. And i kind of in the back of my mind new what he wasabout to say. And but we didnt talk about it. He said come on over. And he was reluctant. He was reluctant to introduce me to any of this stuff. But he was in the throes of his own addiction. I didnt know it at the time. I shouldve known it because we were using oxycontin and he introduced me to heroin. And also you what, as soon as i did that tiny bit of heroin. All those side effects, all those withdrawal symptoms went away. The sweating stopped, everything. It was like a miracle and i was able to go back to work that day, ill never forget. I was able to see a client. Under the influence, i was able to prepare for trials. I was able to go home and be a parent. And you know, a husband at the time. When you started, in the beginning, how often were you using heroin and then at your peak, how often were you using it . Right from the beginning, heres the thing with oxycontin and heroin. And percocet and hydrocodone, oxycodone, theyre just as bad but oxycontin as i said is a different animal, it really is heroin in a pill. I started using every day and it took me once i started using oxycontin about two or three days and my body physically needed it after that point. For the first few days, this is great. What a great hi. Im no productive and the life is beautiful but its a lie. And its unsustainable. So now after three days if you dont have it, your body starts to as i said, your stomach starts slipping, flew times 50. Once i started using heroin was off to the races. At that point, the house of cards had come down. I lost my job, lost custody of my children. I lost the trust of friends and family. And i started using a lot of heroin. Like you know. 50 to 60 bags a day. You can imagine that. Though one was 10 bags of heroin and back then it was 130. Nowits cheap and its 140 bucks. Its hard to get my mind around from a Law Enforcement perspective is how did the price go so far down but i know First Responders are doing all they can to prevent it but to answer your question, a lot and every day to the point where if i didnt do it, i become violently ill. So then, and addiction is a disease. Its not a moral failing. And im starting to see a sea change a bit in the criminal justice system, theyre starting to understand this but this isnt a moral failing, that there are viable alternatives to incarceration. But it drives you places you can never imagine. It caused me to act in a manner completely inconsistent with who i was and my value system. So were you becoming, well, i dont want to put words in your mouth but how was your addiction manifesting itself through your family and to your job . What had started to happen was my work performance went way down. I was late to go to work. My quality of work wasnt what it should be or use to be. And family was just borrowing money. There were times where i stole. And i write about it in sheer madness and its not pleasant to recall. But thats how it manifested itself. And it was completely destroyed everything that i stood for. Everything that i believed in. Everything i admired about peers of mine, and thats also a crushing blow because when youre going through that, your selfesteem is absolutely down the drain. Because you know this isnt you. You know you just can take 100 from somebody no expectation that you will ever repay them and then just see the look in there i and people, this is what people in addiction deal with. They see the look in other peoples lot live and its almost like a mirror into their own soul. Not to be dramatic but its a terrible feeling. And but theres hope. There is a way through it. There is no way around addiction. You have to go through it and you have to put work into it but the wheels came off the bus rather quickly. What was your lowest point during your time of addiction . My lowestpoint was following my arrest. Before you get into that story or, can you tell us how did the idea for robbing banks even come into your head . Its also a great question. Clearly im not proud of what i did and what i wrote about wasnt bank robberies. One day i was driving to family court where i knew id lose again. I wouldnt be able to see my kids and the Family Court Judge called me a junkie. My previous appearance. And your illegal star but now youre a junkie and nobody believes a junkie so especially if you have that put together, i think i had three months clean time at that point so i was really trying. I couldnt fight the depression issue. And the anxiety and the addiction. It overcame me so instead of going to family court in saratoga here, where i had family court i went north to let george andi robbed the bank. Its not a rational, its not rational behavior clearly. Im not a bank robber. Im not a social path. But i was so angry at everybody that i just, i got a case of forget it. I remember driving north and i was all, i remember it right now, its almost like i was in a fog and not clinically insane butclearly disturbed. And all they can run through my mind was i cant see my kids. And so i just drove. I got off the exit, i walked in, i went to a desk where you can write in a receipt for a deposit slip and i used one of their deposit slips and i wrote a demand note. I got in line and i walked up to the teller and ill never forget the tellers face out of my mind. Im sorry. I handed her the note and she gave me the money. Thereafter i used and that was the beginning of the end. I ended up robbing several more banks. I finally got caught. This was my disguise, what im wearing today with the baseball cap so it was my most irrational behavior. My father was a College Professor for 50 years and passed away but i remember him coming to the jail and saying we saw the footage on the evening news, couldnt you have worked in a disguise . He never did anything wrong in his life but you know, really, that was the beginning of the end and once i got arrested, my girlfriend at the time came to see me in jail. She saw me on the morning news because there was a helicopter and all this footage and all this other stuff and she didnt know what i was doing. She didnt know what was going on. When youre in active addiction, it can keep the people who are closest to you at a distance. And its troubling. I remember the lowest point was when she came to jail. She never had to visit anybody in jail before and it was terrible, i looked for a horrible and i withdrew on the floor of the jail for 28 days throwing up. Going to the bathroom, on myself. Going in and out of consciousness. They dont give you comfort beds in jail and there is no ativan to get you through the shakes. And no methadone, no suboxone, so those seven days knowing she was out there having to deal with all my stuff, all of her stuff, it just, it was devastating. But that, there is a turning point in that for me that when you hit your bottomlike that , you decide, you make a decision that i cant live like this anymore. Are there misconceptions in the stereotypes surrounding in particular heroin because i think in the beginning they called it the hillbilly. Oxycontin was yeah, the hillbilly heroin. Yes, i think so. Paul granda was a journalist, hes the director of the new York State Writers Institute and he was a journalist long term for a great newspaper. He reviewed my book and he had this great line and i use it all the time he said heroin doesnt read resumes and thats the thought because growing up, i thought the person who was addicted to heroin lived under a bridge somewhere and was pushing a shopping cart around or Something Like that. But thats not the case. One of the most abused drugs right now on wall street among traders and these are elite professionals are opioids. Again, it goes back to that no field, no deal. You go 100 miles perhour a day and you made 20 million on trade and you want to shut that down , thats the drug. But it doesnt work. It only works for a little while and ultimately it spirals out of control. When you hear the discussion out there with the president talking about the viewing crisis we are having in this country and how they are planning on tackling it, what goes through your mind . A couple different things. I think trump has gotten a lot of bad press which i think a lot of it is partisan stuff. But he did appoint Chris Christie to the commission to lead the commission on Opioid Task Force and we have to put more money into the problem that i think the money has to be spent wisely. I think the money should probably be allotted to the states to control because each state is a little bit different. Ohios got their own issue. Everything works a little bit different. New hampshire, the first primary state. Has a massive opioid problem but the challenges each state faces weather, it could be an urban setting, suburban setting, those all those different challenges so i think its smart that we push the money to the state with incentives, give the state incentives. Have evidencebased treatment. We have to put back into place. Back when i got clean, the main thing that i dont myself was a 12 step program which is effective for people but we know statistically that evidencebased programs, Treatment Programs where they use dialectical behavior therapy by changing the my point, bringing mindfulness to the person, cognitive behavioral therapy, analyzing your thoughts, figuring out what triggers this person and tackling those things, thats where the focus has to be where the money has to be. 66,000 opioid dependent veterans right now and i think that numbers low. They cant get into programs in the va. I think you guys have covered this. If i remember right and so why dont we open that up to the private sector a little bit . You dont need a 50,000, 40,000 Treatment Program necessarily but open it up, monitor it for fraud carefully but get these folks into treatment. These guys are overseas fighting and ridiculous wars in my view largely. Not to be political but lets take care of them. So i think trumps probably doing, his administration is taking some smart choices. I dont think theyre putting enough financing into it, im concerned about cuts to medicaid and medicare with regard to treatment. But ultimately, its not a republican or democrat issue. We are all in this together. And its interesting because ill talk to super fiscal conservatives and they say no, they made bad choices, put them in jail, put them in prison, we dont want to put them in the street. We know economically that doesnt make sense either. Your recidivism rate is at 65 percent in the federal system, 45 in most after three years of beingout. Lets put some money into this front end and i wrote about this for a piece i did for the herald. But train these guys, and when theyre in prison, lets teach them a trade. Theres nothing in federal prison. We had 1100 person waiting list to get into the Masonry Program so i remember walking in and this young guy from North Carolina or South Carolina had a few months to the door, we used to call it. He was getting out in a few months and we said what are you going to do . He said what can i do . I got my ged when i was in here. I didnt have money to go to college and obama brought back pell grants for inmates which was a huge thing to do. But can we teach welding . Can we send them back to the communities with the skillset where they can make money . Pay taxes, be productive members of society and live a life free . That has to be our goal. In your opinion is it easy to pinpoint the heart of the issue . Is it accessibility, is it pharmacy prescribing these drugs to easily or is it also people not being able or getting counseling for depression, anxiety and things like that. I think its a combination of things. I think doctors to readily prescribed opioids and theres a chart that put out by the dea i think and it shows theres one line going up the chart that shows additions, the rate of prescribing opioids and then it shows the use of heroin and the lines all go up in sync. So i think thats an issue, but the fact is, doctors have to be able toprescribed opioids for pain. Its one of the tools in their set that they have to use. Now my position, he knows not to prescribe me. He knows my story because of my book so he knows not to prescribed opioids and i know not to see them so thats one issue. The other issue is, we have to dig in and find out what are they trying to escape by using this stuff 10 years ago it wasnt like this. This epidemic has been alive now six or seven years but now we are in full force. What is everybody trying to run from . Opioids, any clinician will tell you this, its a no field, no deal drug so i think thats an issue. A lot of that in terms of getting people to treatment, we talk about coauthoring Mental Health issues and almost always, id say 90 percent are seeingdepression , anxiety, spectrum disorders. All these things that have gone untreated. Its hard to say where the changes in the chemical balance of your brain, you stop reducing your own means and its hard to feel happy so if youre not really happy, you can always spend three dollars and get happy. People who read your book. , what do you want them to be sure to take away from it . First of all, its not a book about the crimes, theres nothing sexy about bank robbery. I think when i wrote it and started as a journal entry, im a psychologist. He said you start journaling, all your thoughts, you have so much in your mind, get it down on paper and its a freeing experience so i recommend that the families and clients that i get into treatment. So the take away that ive gotten from families is now i understand. Now i understand why my son is doing what im doing, why hes doing what hes doing or my wife. Now i have a different perspective on addiction and i realize it takes People Places that they never thought they go. Clearly it did for me. Tv is an Saratoga Springs to learn more about its history. We visit the Saratoga Springs public library. We are standing in the saratoga room. This room has been dedicated to collecting materials about the city of Saratoga Springs, the people for about 40 years now. One of the most important collections we have to is doctor walton calling collection. Doctor mcclellan was the first medical director the saratoga bob reservation. When the founders of the spa of the reservation took the land over by eminent domain, they wanted to turn it into a worldclass spot. They knew the waters were therapeutic and available so they hired doctor mcclellan to come in and build this spot in the late 1920s early 1930s. It was a wpa project. They sent him to europe for two years to go through the grand spas of europe to learn about the bath, the waters so when he came back he was knowledgeable. He sent a lot of photographs and drawings that they modeled the spa after. So when you came here, it was not just for broadway, you came for and you got an actual medical interaction. And what they would do is they would do a survey. Just like you would go to the doctor now. He fills out everything that you have. Wrote down what all your issues were and based on what your issues were you were given a prescription for how they would treat you and those prescriptions, this is an example of one right here, this person is going to get a bath at 93 degrees for 20 minutes. Its going to be full emerging and then theyre going into a gas cabinet which was one of the contractions they had out there. And for 20 minutes, 20 percent gaps, infusion i guess, then you need to rest for a half hour afterwards. And anyone who came into the spa for treatment went through this exact ritual, i guess. What they found was what doctor mcclellan ultimately found was the result of the treatment, these are some of the things with arthritis, the water is very effective and these various types of arthritis folks came in with issues with you can see what they found was there was in a number of patients they surveyed, almost everyone seemed to be relieves, have their symptoms relieved from the waters,from the bath. And they gave in, they drank it. I dont have an example here but often times it would take a glass of cold lisa in the morning, take a good walk. It was very holistic medicine and wellness, it was about not only society but the mind aswell. They encouraged cultural activities. See a show, read a book. Take a nap which is always lovely and these are all part of the treatment. They were treated whole person. The waters of saratoga, the springs are all very different and that has to do with the bedrock the water comes up through. Originally, there were over 200 springs that have been found. The vast majority had been capped and it was only 22 i believe that are Still Available for people to use but theyre all naturally carbonated. Carbonic acid. And the minerals that they grab onto as they come up through the bedrock, each one is different as they are in different locations so each one has different qualities based on the minerals that they pass through. Most people think, they come in and taste the water and they say silver and theres no sulfur. There are only two Sulfur Springs and both of them have been capped for years. The taste is alkaline. So they are all better for the skin and this is what doctor mcclellan was using in his medical approach for the use of the waters. The use of the back, thats because each of the springs were different, you would be given based on, given the waters based on what your medical condition was , they wouldnt necessarily use something from the old red spring because thats more foreskin if your problem was digestion, youd want that type of water and these are two examples. The medical facilities ran from the 30sand was open until 1935 until the mid50s. At that point , sort of western cultural medicine, take two and call me in the morning. That was very different from take a half hour bath and a half hour nap. So it really made its heyday in the 30s and 40s as a medical facility and during the war it was a military medical facility and veterans were able to come and use the facility for free. To help them get through what they had experienced. Today, its still there. You can go and you can try the waters. Theres about 20or so springs that are stillviable. That you can take , they are all different. Book tv is an Saratoga Springs new york to learn more about its history. Up next week with alan carter about the history of worse racing in the city. This is horse racing and its important because of the oldest sport in the country. n , it makes the most money and gives the biggest horses. In 1863, John Morrissey who owned a bunch of casinos in town wanted something for his patients to do during the daytime and they could take baths other than that they didnt have much going on and he thought maybe they like to see some horse racing. So august 2, he had a four day meat and it was hell that was called the old sarasota tried and tractor built in 1849 and one of the problems with the track itself it was really not a good facility at all but it was so popular they charge a dollar a person to come in and of course for the horses, he still made money off it after four days. Considering the fact that there was a bad horse shortage because of the civil war, of course the horses are important to be more movement. They needed them in the north and south but somehow he got these forces together and he knew he couldnt use his track anymore so he got people together including William Travers, cornelius vanderbilt, don hunter and they got the money together to build a new track across the street which is where the present track is and it opened on august 2, 1864. The first race of that day was travers race, in honor of William Travers who was the president of the association and i have to say one thing about morrissey, he was a very smart guy and he knew from his background being a strong man and living with his fists that if he was at the head of the Saratoga Springs association, he would lose favor. Travers was probably the most prevalent person in new york city, he was very wealthy but he was just a figurehead. Morrissey actually pulled the strings. They opened up a six length lead with one furlong to run. They left the field really behind. What a commanding performance. It was trevor by 12. The fastest drivers ever and a new track record. And it just got better as the years went on. And saratoga was full. They dont hotel to take care of these people. That was about the only real track in the eastern United States. I decide who are the heroes of Saratoga Springs, a copy of the 50 between william c whitney. He took over the track and one and he hired a professional landscaper to put a strong and the trees and it was a lot of pain. He brought back all the old races. Between the travers and including alabama and everybody came back to saratoga. And from then on, it was a great success. Then there was metalwork, one of the great resources of alltime. Manofwar was synonymous with saratoga. The race here seven times and the 16 and lost one. He will off the sanford memorial when he was a twoyearold. He was a 2 to 5 favorite but they didnt have many starting dates so he had to be good to keep the horses in line and get an equal start. And Martins Castle called in sick so they had to have a placing jug by the name of Charles Pettengill to start the course and he was terrible at it. He couldnt get them off at all and when he started them off, manofwar was either backwards or sideways. We dont have the some of it but it was just eyewitnesses but he was not ready for the race. He ended up running dead last and he only lost by about half the length. It was the only loss of his career. And saratoga saw just about rape every resource that ever lived, most of them this type of racing was in world war ii. And 1942, they had any racing upstate. And so saratoga was shut down from 1943, 44 and 45 and didnt open until 1946. After the war they realized that saratoga was no longer as popular as jamaica, belmont. Upstate was 15,000 happening and you got 1 Million People down state and he was born in 1955 and what they did, they brought the tracks that were in existence at the time, the aqueduct, belmont and saratoga and they sold it but they did it in an aqueduct and will not and in 1957, 456, there was a movement to have the current race in august. They would have racing at saratoga and racing at belmont for whatever track which wouldve killed saratoga. They couldnt do that. Luckily, April Herndon was the governor of new york. And the city forefathers got together to not only convince herman but somehow the legislature to give us 24 days of exclusive racing which they passed in 1957. Chance meeting, saratoga, 1978, a mile and a quarter. In 1978 al darmans firm ran travers and it was a huge event, probably the greatest rivalry in horse racing history. 55,000 people came and im guessing of the 55,000, 30,000 had never been to saratoga before. Then i saw what it is and said wait a minute, were missing something and they started coming back. Synonymous with that the city fathers realized that downtown saratoga was a disaster which it was. You could roll a bowling ball down broadway and it wouldnt hit anybody and what they did, they tax themselves and it worked. All of a sudden people are coming in, restaurants arepopping up. The heyday is right after 1980. Right now were in the sale of lack the dog. We are recording belmont which was never the case before and they saw just about every resource that ever lived. There off in the travers. And american sparrow race here in 2015, it was a triple crown winner and he was going to go to the travers but they had a public forum and they announced anybody who would come in, 50,000 people showed up and they changed it and it lasted for about five minutes. Next saratoga, we love our horses. Were going to drive up here out to historic travers park and take a right onto broadway. The park is by far one of the jewels of saratoga not only because of its location but its just deep in the great history of saratoga. We were the number one Tourist Destination in the United States in the 1800s so anybody that was anybody came to Saratoga Springs. While in Saratoga Springs we took a driving tour of the city with Saratoga Tours owner charliecancel. It was all because of one main thing. It was all about the water. That telling location of the city of Saratoga Springs, thats called iraq springs. That was visited for hundreds of thousands of years by the native americans indigenous to this area for the mohawk and they came, they drank the waters. Thats where the name saratoga, that means place of the great salt springs. The springs in Saratoga Springs, you can still drink from them, still get water from them. Do people do that out here . Especially the locals. If youve been here the majority of your life, there are some who like Saratoga Springs and as a result theres a fair amount of bottling where people will bring containers of bottles and fill those on a daily basis. They are different cases. Theres a lot tohow you accept, its not like a bottled water. Its not like something you would get out of your. The mineral waters of Saratoga Springs have so many trace elements. Molybdenum, you name it. There is a time of them. And as a result, these trace elements get along with a few other inherence just a very pungent taste. Where to next . Were going to loop around a little bit. Take you and give you a look at what they thought of as camps in the 1800s, okay, lets take a look. This is broadway. Is beautiful. These are the houses built in the 1800s as summer cottages. They refer to this, they were coming to saratoga to go camping. Without question almost any element of victorian architecture can be found up here and we have new homes here along with a mix of the 1800s but this became the destination for people in the 1800s to come to saratoga after the american civil war. The waters they drank and how they took baths, etc. Eventually as good americans they became bored with their surroundings and then we added the gambling and horse racing. Right now we are going down broadway. What is this area now, theres a lot of shops and restaurants . Its a vibrant downtown. We cater to a lot of Convention Groups in saratoga along with the daily weekly and seasonal travelers for the track and Saratoga Performing Arts Center so thats our heart blood right there. The center of the city is what makes everything happen. Take a right and we will head ourselves over to the racetrack. We are here at the race track. This is our home and training track. There are no competitive races held here. This is strictly a facility in which to train. We opened probably in midapril, roughly and close the first week of november. So come into Saratoga Springs, one of the common things to enjoy in the morning is you come over here at first light up until about 10 00 in the morning, look across and see the horses out on the track. This training track is an economic boon in the offseason. How did the racing industry become so popular in saratoga . Believe it or not, they came for the waters and then they became bored with just this and they needed some kind of outlet and in 1863, a group of men led by John Morrissey who was also responsible for building a casino today, he brings the idea ofthoroughbred racing to saratoga. Just a couple days in august in 1860, starting in 1864 the construction of the present day track took place. Were going to drive down the backside of the track and give you an idea as we look across to the water eventually, just out of our thoroughbred track. It is a very beautiful track. And the facilities there are great. We have historic track in the sense that it hasnt been modernized to the point where you can put 170,000 people there but you can put 50,000 and a beautiful setting and look at it the way it was operating in 1870s, 1880s, early 1900s. Where the races here . The travers race is our big race of the season and theres our track right there. Its a mile and an eight dirt track and we got to taurus inside. Whats the travers nose work . Its got a lot of great history. Unfortunately saratoga has gotten the nickname the graveyard of champions meaning many of the greatest horses of all time have come here only to meet with defeat. In 1973 the secretary came back here after winning the triple crown and secretary at lost a horse here. I was there that day and i couldnt believe my eyes. What are we seeingthis looks like in her business. This is not the thoroughbred racingwe talked about earlier at our main track. The Harness Racing is a different variety of racing because we are not restricted by the weight of the jockey and not the jockey riding on the back of the horse being pulled in a car behind. And this is a different type of racing. Generally doesnt get quite as much attention as the thoroughbred racing, but we have a nice facility here. This was built in 1941 and became one of the fastest halfmile ovals in the country and today is back up with 2300 slot machines, electronic gambling machines in the back. What would you like to see happen for your city next . I think good things are in the works. Weve got some hardworking local people that are constantly looking for ways to enhance the experience for people to come here and people that live here. Thats i think the problem of development of any city. You dont want to get out of control. You want to grow, but you want to controlgrowth. Our schools are good. The city is beautiful. We have a True Community feeling in saratoga and theres so many people that worked so hard without any real accept the satisfaction theyare doing a good job in the city. And it makes life better for all of us and the people for generations to come. Thank you so much for showing us around today. My pleasure. Heres a look at the best books of the year according to Publishers Weekly. In answer among elephants, to john giblin describes her Family History and upbringing in india. Peter manzo, curator of religion atthe Smithsonians National museum of American History recall the life of william mugler, a photographer in postcivil war america known for his. Photography in the apparition list. City university of new york professor Ashley Dawson explores how cities can be affected by Climate Change in extreme cities. In fear city, new york new universitys kim phillips spine call the fiscal collapse of new york city in 1975 and how the cities brush with bankruptcy we shake ideas about government and wrapping up our look at Publishers Weekly books of 2017 is the color of law, Richard Rothsteins report on how local, state and federal legislation isresponsible for americas segregated cities. Today, those homes sell for 300, 400,000. Africanamerican families were prohibited from moving into those homes and frankly apartments in the city did not gain 200, 300,000 in equity over the next two generations. Whitefamilies gained equity from , and today those homes are unaffordable for workingclass people. 100,000 in 1940 in our terms to 1947 was twice the National Median income. Workingclass families could afford to buy homes with an fha mortgage so today those homes sell for seven times the national income. Workingclass families, middleclass families cant afford to move to these suburbs that were created as segregated enclaves in the 1940s and 50s so nationwide when you have a ratio in income, africanamerican income on average is 60 percent of white income. Africanamerican wealth is 5 to 7 percent of white wealth. Most families gain their wealth through housing equity. This enormous difference between 60 percent income ratio and five percent wealth ratio is almost entirely attributable to unconstitutional federal housing policies that was practiced in the 1930s, 40s and 50s so the wealth gap i think is attributable to this creation. Some of these authors have more will be appearing on tv. Watch them on our website, booktv. Org. Up next on after words, goldstar