Transcripts For CSPAN2 C-SPAN Cities Tour Visits Rapid City SD 20240713

Coming up in the next hour and 15 minutes we will hear from authors about this gateway city to the black hills. Located in the western part of the state. We will take it to the State Game Lodge. He spent his Summer Vacation in 1927. Then, in about 15 minutes the story of life inside an Indian Mission boarding school. As he talks about his first book children left behind. We visit downtown rapid city for a look at the correction of lifesize statues. We begin our special feature with the story of Calvin Coolidge in the black hills. We are here in south dakotas black hills. And we are at the State Game Lodge. It was constructed several years before Calvin Coolidge made his summer lake house in 1927. With the first lady stayed here for nearly three months from june through september 1927 while they were on vacation. They took office in 1923 when he was Vice President with warren harvey. They served out the last little bit of the term. And he was elected to his own term in 1924. He came to south dakota in 1927 when a lot of people were speculating what he or what he not run for another term. And it was widely expected that he would. He came here in 1927 because he was looking for a place to escape the impressive summer in washington dc. They had vetoed a farm bill and there was a depression going on. South dakota was the epicenter for that. They have reduced by about 62 percent. The block in congress have a farm release though. It was to buy up the commodities. They vetoed that. He hated government intrusion in the marketplace. A lot of seats were considered with wisconsin they had have a tradition of setting up the summer white houses and they have almost always been on the eastern seaboard or close to there. It was unusual for a president like that to come this far west. In 1926 south dakota made a failed attempt to attract him to set up his summer white house in the black hills. And at that time he said he didnt even think he would be able to transact business out here. In 1927 as i mentioned he vetoed the bill and all 70. They have a legendary former governor and then u. S. Senator named peter nor back. He was a big fan of the farm relief bill. We have the mountain called rushmore that was an attempt to carve it. No carving have taken place. Fundraising was happening. They were trying to raise money and attention. If they could get the president now here i would really boost the prospects for that as well. This is a time when automobile tourism was just beginning if they could get the president out here rapid city in the black hills would have datelines and papers all over the country. So he really made it his personal mission to recruit and he did so and he was really instrumental in getting him to select this as a Summer Vacation spot. He got out here in june of 1927 the days were really scheduled. He stayed here at the state lodge every morning. A driver would load him up in the car. It was a little bit advanced. And drive him over 32 miles they have a huge set up he would spend his mornings in his office in rapid city and he have twice weekly press conferences there. And then they would be driven back here to the State Game Lodge at about 1 00 every afternoon and he and Grace Coolidge would have lunch here. And then in the afternoon they would go sightseeing and fishing. And it really traveled all over the black hills and saw just about everything there was to see. He was nicknamed the silent cal. The reporters who covered him there. It was so fun. It came out to the black hills. He was given a 10gallon hat by people from the rodeo who is trained to recruit him. He became part of him. He was given a full cowboy outfit and a horse. He dressed up at one point. And really kind of handed up for the cameras which was really out of character for him. The agent called it a second childhood that he experienced here like he have woken up in a dimestore novel and he really seem to have a lot of fun it was a bizarre summer. With the present here for three months just becoming part of the area. My opinion was probably like a lot of people. Canavan unknown silent character. Unknowable in a lot of ways. I think maybe the most interesting. And lead the led the book with the story. It was august of 1927 he woke up there in the State Game Lodge. He was driven to rapid city. And he went to his office there. And he have the press conference. It happened to be the fourth anniversary of his decision to the presidency. They ask him to sum up his first four years in office and he did. He ended the press conference by saying he wanted the reporters to come back a little bit later that morning. And he may have an announcement to make. He came back at the appointed time. He had written up a note and he had have his stenographer make a few dozen copies of that note and he cut them up into little slips of paper. And he brought all of the reporters back into his office and he told them all to come up and grab a slip of paper out of his hand. They opened it up and they saw the simple statement that said i do not choose to run for president in 1928. And thats how he let the world know he was neck and a run for president. More of an explanation and he refused. One of the staffers at the back of the room opened up the door and they all burst out of there. And they reported the news to the country. And he just walked out calmly from the announcement and was driven back here in the State Game Lodge. And that was it. Very understated. Thats how he surrendered the presidency in the black hills by making that terse announcement. It set up all kinds of expectation. What i mean do i mean by do not choose. He enjoyed watching people scurry around a lot of people said he came out here to the west. People were surprised and confused if he have come out here to meant political fences why was he then not running for the presidency again. I think in a lot of ways he came out here to repair any damage that he have done to the Republican Party with his veto of the farm release build. The reason he did not want to run again. He have served a little bit of that term after he died and then he have served his own fouryear term if he have won another term they sort of took away the joy of the presidency for him. He had been thinking about it and perhaps that decision had been solidified why he was out here in the black hills. For whatever reason he just chose that bay and made the decision and nobody except maybe one or two people knew that it was coming here they have a really underappreciated role with Mount Rushmore. I was hashed they had raised some money they had recruited them. He left that project unfinished. No carving have been started. They really havent been able to get the project started. So he comes out here made an attempt to recruit the president to get their dedication to the ceremony. He eventually agreed to go to a consecration ceremony because it have already have the dedication. He was driven to keystone which was a little mining camp essentially at the base of Mount Rushmore up to rushmore. He rode a horse the rest of the way up. They have directed a wooden plank there. During the speech he said that his effort that was undertaken basically entitled the people who were doing the support of the federal government. They question everything down to the amount of pencils is that the government was buying. The federal government should give money to a project was really something and set the product on the nuclear directory. During the ceremony they actually scaled the side of the mountain and hung over the side of the mountain they went back to washington dc with the last couple of weeks in office. I gave out rushmore the first 250,000 in funding. And it ended up taking a long time Mount Rushmore wasnt finished until the 40s. Coolidge really got it started. Coolidge had a lot of visitors that came on the interactive with a lot of people Herbert Hoover who was a commerce secretary at the time came out here and visited coolidge in his office. He came out and visited coolidge here. Leonard wood. Charles lindbergh did apply over here they have flown across the atlantic and he was on a barnstorming kind of two or across the country. With the attention and celebrity. He also met with a lot of everyday people. He did make several visits with the native americans in the rapid city area. He also took a journey to the pine ridge indian reservation which is 40 or 50 miles east of here. For people in the tribe. Some are excited about the visit. Others were not. He went to a ceremony in deadwood. They adopted him to the sioux tribe they gave him a native american name. Welcomed by some others who really resented that. They never came back to the black hills there was an effort to get him back here. It was a oneshot thing. Eisenhower did come to the state game. Not nearly as long but there was another president ial visit. Back then it was just a large house that they have inhabited. If you go inside a husband extended. It has not looked like a whole lot it was really funny doing research for this book because we live in an era now where if a president goes golfing a few times its almost a scandal. President coolidge he spent weekday mornings working my he was here. He was on vacation every afternoon for three months. I was kind of understood that a president needed time to get away in time to relax. Totally different world than it was now. Im just going to disappear into the wild i probably wont be accepted like it was back then. In such an eight chapter of history that maybe they dont know. They arent one of the most prominent. A president did come live in south dakota for three months and didnt had as much fun as he did. All the experiences that they have here. And knowing when you come here to the game lodge. The history is really powerful. Unique chapter in history that we will never see repeated. I guess what we like people to see. When they read the book. Really brought him out of his shell. A different kind of person than people were used to. I loved how been here in the black hills and seen the Natural Beauty here being away from washington prop a different side kind of a second childhood as i mentioned. It is such a unique chapter of history. That we will never see repeated. I dont know of any other president that will sit in the black hills for three months. Its deftly a fun time of history that have never happened before and well never happen again. Its sort of an out of body experience. Its for him to come here and be a different person. Im really open up to the people of the west and the black hills. Our look at rapid city continues as we hear from author and newspaper publisher. The first boarding school was built on the Catholic Boarding School 1888. It was built on land that was deeded to the catholic church. Right now he have a strong feeling that we have to become educated it was the primary motive for donating land. I dont think he ever saw the longterm consequences of what it was in a do. I started school at the boarding school. I was left there at the mission. Back then it was run by the jesuit priest. It was a whole new world to us coming from the small community. I think one of the best things they did was the catholic priests and nuns they have a good day of educating. I stay there until i was in the 11th grade. I ran away one sunday morning. While church was going on. I just kept going round and round. Why did you run away. I couldnt stand the discipline and the outrageous way they tried to destroy everything that they knew culturally. They took away our language and tradition. The guys are educating us. And acclimating us when i was 17 years old. I was on a trip. I have a spiral notebook and i guess that will still feeling the trauma of having just come out of that. My memories were still very vivid of the years i spent there. I havent wrote them all back for minimum marries memories. I sent the transcript to a gentleman named it will come to me pretty soon. They have a foundation in San Francisco and it was called the Historical Society and he printed books. He wrote the book of poetry. And he called me and said ive got to put these into a book. You are bringing back a lot of terrible memories for me. It was the chief recommendation. I wrote about how we had even to pay for that in that if we have more than ten demerits it would line us up on sunday night just before the movie started and if you have more than ten demerits he would read your name i worked at the movie selling popcorn. They said its too quiet in here before the movie starts. We need to get someone to to entertain someone entertain someone thats coming in earlier. Where the projection room was. They love stress. We put the music on and i knew that it wasnt quite right. I looked back at the audience with the lights on. They have them sitting there with the eyes close. That is a scene that has never left my mind. Why was that important. For people that were troubled. This is back at just after the depression. And things are really hard on the reservation. And yet they found their way in every sunday night. After i started the newspaper and a lot of the kids have gone to school. We would like to have you come and talk to us. They were all drinking. Eight or nine ladies then. Each one have told us the experience. Not only by a nun but sexually abused by priests. I put some of that in the book. The reason i did is because my little sister shirley was one of the girls i was raped when she was there. She was only about nine years old. It was really hard for me to write that. I brought some of that stuff up. I have never stopped writing columns about the boarding school. The kids are going through the same ptsd it struck a chord with me. I said you know what i remember those days. I saw that. I just wrote about that today. Is he still there today. If he is how has he changed. When i was 17 years old i never really have a chance to be a teenager. I went straight to age 17 i saw some horrific things. That was probably part of it i think my childhood experiences made me fearless about life itself. By having to see opportunities to me that than i ever thought i could have. I have something i would have never had if i wouldve stayed on her reservation. Not just native american to get the fellowship to harvard. Those things i think happened because i grew and changed. I think my writing matured over all of the years. I was able to sit in with my classmates at harvard and educate them. They wanted to know a lot of the things that were happening. We have students from ghana and ecuador. They were also interested they have no idea what an indian reservation was. Those were the experiences i think helped me to reach that point in my life. Im still writing. What i contributed to native american journalism. During our time in rapid city south dakota. It visited various Historic Sites in the area. Next we will take you to deadwood south dakota where we will hear the story of seth bullock. Walk out welcome to deadwood. Deadwood in many ways is the most vibrant part of the black Hills Community and the black Hills Community is made up of many talents we had deadwood here lead just up the road. Pretty much on the central edge to the east. They need a sense of place. They can all identify. We all identify with the black hills. You all know about what goes on in the black hills. It is a great place that we all share this shared sense of community. Each town was a little bit different. It was an exciting town to begin with. This is where gold was discovered in the late 1875. This was a great gold rush. While bill was dead six weeks later. And brought up your just buried down held there. While bill is right behind us. They left and came back in 1903. The people of deadwood never wanting to miss a commercial opportunity went up there and grabbed a body. They would always say that they were lovers perhaps more than friends nevertheless buried together right on the hill behind us. Deadwood is a big tourist town today. Its really on this cemetery. Deadwood from the start of the gold rush. The first chair was seth bullock. In part because they knew the first chair. He was only sheriffs or nine and half months when south dakota or dakota territory took control of the black hills. When congress remarked removed the reservation the gold rush was illegal. It was an invasion. Bullock came in august 1876. By february 1857. They removed the black hills. For nine and half months he is sheriff and he is the first guy trying to impose law and order. One violent dent per month. And what did he deal with. He have to deal with the first stagecoach robbery. That set the run for a lot of stagecoach robberies. He dealt with saloon violence. Not a lot. While bill was killed before bullock arrived. They dealt with plane jumpers. More people that claims to be claimed. We always, reactive share. I dont think much violence might be a share. A first guy that would try to establish law and order. He was in a business. He ran a Hardware Store. Have lots of other ambitions. They opened a ranch. Out north of the black hills. Called an smb ranch. He also got into the mining business eventually. He got on board with it. They produce silver bars. This big silver find. Luckily im mistaken there. There wasnt much silver there. In the mine went broke. Even though he tried. He cannot get more silver. Eventually what happened. Downtown deadwood. Thats were his Hardware Store was. It was still with his hotel. The spanishamerican war came along. As we know from the experience with the three calvary units. Peter roosevelt and leonard wood organized company a. The first unit. The attorney general of south dakota was authorized to coordinate the third unit. He recruited a thousand men. They recruit men for the unit here in the black hills and surrounding reasons. He loved being captain. I was cut out to do this. And the soninlaw wrote in his diary, im sure bullock did not pass the physical. That is another story. He recruits his men. And they go training. Then they get shipped to georgia. There they trained and stayed. Theodore Peter Roosevelt was capturing san juan. They stayed in georgia. The war ended. And they were disappointed. In dismayed and they sauntered back to the black hills. After the war roosevelt loved to get to redder does mike get together with his rough riders. He goes into the republican convention. To establish they establish a closer relationship we have people that ran ranches and mines. He is a new york electrician. This kind of the man that keeps roosevelt around it in this symptom that he has for the western speak spirit. In 1900 when mckinley and roosevelt are running for the office roosevelt takes a train right across south dakota and bullock joins him on the train for a week. Roosevelt like to have the rough riders with him to sound the charge and all of it. He was quiet and respectful and later said that he thought his whole skills had to have that mesmerized. If anybody raised a foul word against roosevelt. He would shoot them. They would keep them quiet. Everybody says that stories true but why not. The raise the mckinley point. And this is the black Hills National forest. When bullock became supervisor he became it as an independent force. In bullock was a man that roosevelt wanted and he wrote him a letter and a man have a character that had to run the force. And he applied his western ways. As he said immediately i dont want a lot of eastern dudes out here trying to be my rangers. , he went back east and lobby. That can camp under the open stars. And he got that authority. He head about 12 of those under. He is very much in mind. He came to admire him. He believed it was a balance out here. He needed it to keep the water viable. Very important figure at the time. When they were present. He points to the u. S. Marshall. He did however go to washington a lot. They wanted to make sure that they were there. And the story goes that it was to uncover the cougar and say words to roosevelt but it became so emotional he couldnt think of anything. He just pushed the flowers aside. He said later. Im always a bad hand at saying goodbye. They have that kind of friendship where bullock was classified as my ideal typical american and that is what he thought of that man. When roosevelt died in the 1919 Kermit Roosevelt wrote it was a terrible blow. The great hero was his father. So when roosevelt passed away bullock negotiated with the black hills pioneers and they bought land on the top of the mountain. They renamed the roosevelt mountain. They built it out on this mountain. Does bullock wanted it to look out of the planes of the north. And then just months later we are here in deadwood in september 2019 seth bullock dies. Dies just dumb help from moran. In his home on van buren street he is hauled up the hill where we are. It doesnt stop. Outside the cemetery there is a place up there and he arranged for the black hills pioneers to defy and hes buried up there. At that location you can look over and see roosevelt tower. So he could look at the tower and in essence they could look back at him. The place of honor on the hell and he can look at the domain. What did it mean to the black hills. He got out the wild west if you well. There was a guy who is a sheriff before and you can say so the wild west. That he became the entrepreneur. And then when he couldnt do that any longer he stepped back and became part of the federal control of the became the black hills. He became the transitional. He became in the early black hills frontier. And he may have helped transform it. And then did good for the entire black hills. Its probably neck and a do the great transformational figure that other people can claim title ii in deadwood. Join us in the first and third weekend of each month as we take book tv on the road. Go to cspan. Org. The cities to her is exploring the american story. Follow us on twitter. We now continue our feature as we take you downtown. Whats a life size statues. We are physically inside the president ial center. This building was bought by the founder we are surrounded by this. Downtown there are fullsize statues and we chose to have the statures depict something about the president. Its actually shows us something something about the president s life. You can see them in various poachers. To go further they are hung. He asked me if i would do personal biographies for all of the president to be displayed in the center. As i began to research the president. We cannot do anything. I realize the importance of the depth of all of the president s. With the approval i started writing about their as i began to do it what they dont really know about the president and that is how the book was resolved. They were just going to be cold. It is amazing how there is common threads. That run through the president s past. The important part of the work ethic. That is how it actually came to be. More than 20 years ago i was the director of marketing at Historical Hotel in rapid city outside the hotel. They are a local businessman. He chose to use south dakota artist. It wasnt really popular and so when we started talking about this, and i began to study the Human Interest stories when we knew the evolution of the statute. The idea was that we began with that too must contemporary president s and the two most historic. And then we have robert ragan and George Herbert walker bush. Until we get to the center when they were all there. I knew what they were going to do i just meant met a had and began the research on them. Then, when we got closer to the end i would interview with the artist to get the concept. I needed to know what that statute meant because it was part of the book. Thats kind of how it dissolved. They took it upon themselves in the process was they could can pick what the president wanted to do. A sketch in just a drawing. If the board accepted that concept they would then go to the area. The list was approved than they could go to the full bronzes. Sometimes there were small changes made. When they went to the bronze stage. When unveilings every year. I have to say when they did the president obama president obama unveiling we have to do it at a full theater. It was standing room only. The city has really taken to this. They are very proud of what we have. The important thing about the statute is e you have to walk around behind temp because it traditionally traditionally president taft was the one who started throwing out the first baseball during the National Baseball season. They still do that to the day. He have to have a go along and pick up because he just couldnt do it. A gentleman he was when he was writing on a streetcar. They give their seat to three other women. Some of them are quite humorous. Some of them are kinda poignant. You and i discussed this. His favorite president was Calvin Coolidge. As we know he was known as silent cal. He was a dining at the lodge one evening and approached him. See my friend over there. They looked at right in the eye and said no self respecting person is in aware them with their pants tucked inside their boots. It is a south dakota who has been broadcasted. He got the outfit on. Any south dakota hood ever claimed is way off base. President tyler in his early days he was quite an accomplished writer. And he really wanted to pursue his career in music. He said you will never make any money as a musician. Have to make an choice between law and music. I will not support you if you continue with your musical background. He chose to go into politics. When the artist researched his life he realized that tyler would like to have been a violinist. And when you see the statue we depicted him playing the violin and we contacted his family and they said that wouldve meant so much to them. Thats whats out there. Because of the Strong Military background he decided to depict the military uniform. You will see that there is a ground map you see him standing between these two territories. Am i say all veterans come down and they recognize him for that. My story about eisenhower is that we remember him as us quiet military when he went there as a cadet. He got in a lot of trouble. Dancing wildly. One time he was attending an event and he did something and an upper classroom upperclassman caught him. I want you to report to my quarters in one hour in full dress code. Time goes by, theres a knock at the door. The upperclassman go and then there is the dance cadet eisenhower. And nothing else. When the artist wanted to depict john f. Kennedy they realized that when he was happier when he was with his children. Between his Health Issues in the state of the country at that time so much weight upon him. They decided they wanted to do one. They truly have a favorite color. The statute shows president kennedy bending over and handing this little toy airplane to his son john. As history involves how pathetic that really was. The politicians control that. They were told what they could and couldnt do. He here is an example of fdr. He became so disabled he have to be in a wheelchair. They have an agreement with the press. Never take a picture of president roosevelt when he is being assisted in either way. They wanted to keep that from the people the statute here they just warmed up to the podium. This is the date he gave the speech. And he have to show his strength for the country. He was wheeled up to the dance. You can see his cane. Does the artist was so subtle in showing the leg braces. If you dont look for them you dont see them. Don kept saying they are not Strong Enough until we got it just right. But getting back to this in these days the press was given information that they could share and it was not is not like it was today its just an entirely different different mindset in those days and pretty done discreetly and in the school the teachers American History with incoming immigrants and very often they use this book now to teach American History to not american and as they had their frailties and tragedies and there were a lot of parts of their life where we just did not understand a lot of the holism and oppression, Abraham Lincoln saw his own funeral. As he slept he saw his own funeral with the train in the tragedy that happened with him. I think that people begin to understand our leaders as fallible, human beings. Spirit cspan cities to her concludes his work at rapid city, south dakota with the work to the river branch. We will hear from biologist dan obrien about the importance of creating a Natural Environment raising free roaming grass fed buffalo. We are about 85 miles south but mostly east of radford city, south dakota and right on the edge of the badlands and up against the Pineridge Reservation and thats the lakota people. You can see the Cheyenne River in the distance and that is the boundary between us and the Buffalo Gap National grasslands which we have a permit out there to run our buffalo and ive been writing for a long time and you end up writing what you know and that book, wild idea, reflects the years that i spent basically getting this place in order to run a ranch out here and it has to do with mostly the land or outdoors but also a bit of the social part living out here with a very red state and this is the first family which is the thing or the glue that holds these urges together. My first book about buffalo, and ive written three now, i swear to god i will not run more but its called [inaudible] with a broken heart. It was the story of getting the first dozen buffalo and what we were thinking. Then we grew that heard up to maybe 50 and then we moved or rented another piece of ground and run a few more buffalo and then we moved to this place and have been building up this hard to about a thousand buffalo for the last 20 years. That is maxed out. Thats how big this herd in this land will be. It started with a very small 27 acres thing and did not take long to figure out what was missing and there were a lot of things missing, species missing but the big thing it was missing was buffalo because the land was shaped by buffalo and everything coevolved together when you take a big herbivore out of the land of grass you will have all kinds of imbalances and that looked pretty and i did everything i could to move up to a ranch that was on a scale that the buffalo could survive and we could have a sweep of species particularly plants and birds and you cant do it on 20 acres because these birds use tens of thousands of acres. The buffalo use tens of thousands of acres. Slowly, very slowly, i worked up to the larger ranch and settled here. This land by me is the Buffalo Gap National grasslands which is a redheaded stepchild of the forest service, they inherited the trees so to speak of out there and they got it anyway and this ranch came with a permit to run cattle of that 20000 acres or so and so we went through the steps and had to go to Environmental Planning to put buffalo out there which seemed odd to me but thats what we have to do and we did get that permit switch to buffalo. This ranch with the deeded land in the beast land and all that, gated stuff that you do to put a ranch together is about 35000 acres and thats about enough for 1000 buffalo and now i think when you get to that level you are at a level where you can work with species in a big country like this. New jersey or something maybe eight woodlot would do for a particular species but out here everything travels in most things travel great distances and thats how it evolved and the best is the big species here and we tried to let our buffal buffalo we want them in a place where they can walk in a Straight Line for 3 miles and thats why of course we started thinking about food and how do you pay for that because its a big bill at the bank and we said lets try selling buffalo meat to support the comeback in the buffalo got to pay their way back and we started Wild Idea Buffalo Company and that has got to be the big thing and takes up a lot of my time and i did not know what the spreadsheet was until we ordered that business but i learned i had a great family that helped out in the whole family is involved to employ the 24 people now so theres balls in the air out here. We do the biology and the ranching and the business and i write books. What is it that the buffalo do . I think first of all, you have to believe in evolution. To even understand the explanation coming. Buffalo grass, birds all those species out here coevolved and so they depend on each other. The buffalo will come in and graze down a certain area because thats the right height and grass they need to nest in et cetera. We have from the antelope and the deer in. Dogs and we have a suite of i dont know, maybe 75 birds that we will live on this place and they have all evolved to depend on each other. When you take one out, even a little sect out, it makes a big dent in the ecosystem. We are trying to do the impossible to bring back that ecosystem to completely functioning system. To do that we need to put as many of the native species back out here as we can and to keep the Invasive Species out. Humans are an Invasive Species so thats why there are People Living on this 35000 acres. Thats about right. Buffalo have been out here for 300,000 years. They been getting along just fine without people, without people to feed them or find them water et cetera et cetera. Our underlying approach is to leave them alone and to let them do buffalo and we never had a veterinarian on the place. Screw with them. We dont put them in shoes and bring them around. At times you have to but its not like cattle where they are constantly being harassed and beat up and put in trucks and what we do when i was first in this business i went to the lots were almost all the buffalo would end up as meat to feedlots. Of course the lot basically was putting them into confinement and give them corn and other products what they dont eat and never saw until humans got here and until that europeans got here and i thought their standing in their own waste and they look sad and if i have to do this then i will raise buffalo so we went about trying to figure out what we call harvest them not slaughter them but its in a way that respects them as a species on a level with us which is native american idea. Were not the first ones to think of that. We will not harass them or put them in a pan and run them up an alley or put them on the truck and send them to old omaha to be slaughtered. So then what will we do . You go to the bank every year and put money in there so we developed two trucks and one truck is a semi, 53foot trailer and we turn that into a cooled processing plant. The other truck is a pickup truck that can pick a buffalo up, dead buffalo up we tried out into the herd which is very easy to do. They get used to you and they are not afraid of you and we have a couple guys were you dont want them shooting at you because theyre pretty good and we have an inspector who rides with us and we shoot a buffalo, back up to it, pick them up, take them to a normal processing plants. Weve done studies on this, the stress hormones and all that weve had buffalo that we sent on purpose to a plant in buffalo we harvested our way and the cortisone levels are off the chart in the meat like the ones sent to the plant. Its just flat and the ones that have lived and died right there on the spot but the other animals dont seem to even mine. Its amazing. That was a big breakthrough. This is a way to respect these animals and it fits with what we are doing. For this ecosystem and we want to respect it in every way. I am not a big believer in the kind of capitalism that is going on particularly in agriculture and i dont think it has any respect for land or animals and we will not fall in with those guys, thats all there is to it. We had this whole system and we raised the animals and slaughtered the animals and processed the animals and ship them out and sell them to people all across the country. Its a good response. That is where the revenue comes in. Now, it costs more to do it this way but we feel its worth it and our customers pay more for that, not supporting industrial agriculture. We pay a little for that and people understand that they almost always say yeah, what the heck, of course. People know with industrial agriculture meat is killing us. I mean that literally. Of course, we get big enough now that those industrial agriculture people are starting to take shots at us which is a good thing because we are taking a stand for the environment or for this landscape. How do you know what youre doing here is working . I dont know what im doing. This is all were just trying. For what we are doing were raising buffalo which is completely different than the way everyone raised buffalo before and a business that supported by that we are running on autopilot and theres no template for this. We make mistakes. It gets tough but we think its worth doing and were trying and maybe we can find a few things that will help other people. In the wintertime out here is i read and i write. I end up writing about what im talking about and living. Im working on it. Those books, if i had to one theme, there are some about falconry in some about birds and some about buffalo and people novels about people and im not consciously trying to do this but in the bulk of my work is really about understanding and ecosystem and that ecosystem is the northern great plains and to help people understand that everybody has an ecosystem and we are all a part of it, whether we know it or not, and we certainly have to admit it and embrace it and thats what we try to do here. Twice a month cspans city stores takes a book to be an american industry tv on the road to explore the literary life and history of a selected city. Working with our Cable Partners we visit various literary and Historic Sites of the interview local store historians, others and civic leaders. You can watch all of our past interviews on mine by going to tv. Org and selecting cspan cities to her from the series dropdown at the top of the page or by visiting cspan. Org cities tour. You can follow the cspan cities to her on twitter for behindthescenes images and videos from our visit. The handle is, at cspan cities. Heres a look at the event booktv will be coming this week. On monday look for a Bradley University in peoria, illinois where frank and sean will discuss the congressional tenure of a late republican congressm congressman, robert michael, of illinois. On thursday we will be in washington dc or steve bogles recount of the cold war Clandestine Mission operation gold where u. S. And British Forces sought to dig a tunnel into east berlin in order to capture kgb intelligence. That same night in york paul thoreau will talk about his journeys along the usmexico border but most events are open to the public and if youre in attendance take a picture in titus at the tv on twitter, facebook or instagram. Booktv continues now on cspan2. Television for various readers. We want to introduce you to other joe validated heres the book hes written. You dont write whats for living but youve written several, is that correct . I have written 12 but mainly farmed for living smack what have your books but about . Both how to beef production, chicken production, you can farm and then broader cultural things like everything you want to do is illegal and folks say our modernday in the spotlight and the historic normalcy we are in a pretty avid time here so theres broad cultural things. One of my favorite so books is the one i read the sheer ecstasy of being a lunatic farmer and that one describes the difference in our farming. Tell us about your farmers. We are in virginia Shenandoah Valley and pastured livestock, think about tyson chicken houses in smithfield hog factories while our animals are out on pasture and they move every day or every couple of days. Do they go where they want . There controlled with hightech electric fencing but we can be thing but we have hightech electric fencing today so we can mimic the migration of choreography of ancient times with modern technology and steer them around the landscape to get the synergistic benefit that nature offers for a long time before domestic livestock was the norm. What other synergistic benefits . In america the big herds of bison built the deep soils of the prairie in the bush where we live and in virginia and the world kept them moving and native americans had buyers to attract them in to open up grazing areas and so there was a bird plant in biosis that was quite wellmanaged and intricately managed a meeting and this is not a wilderness area but a very carefully managed state by both predation, climate and people. And so by looking at that template and trying to duplicate it on the commercial domestic model we were able to bring back the abundance that was here prior to today. People dont realize that 500 years ago north america grew more food than we do today. Thats a pretty astounding fact but its true. Our desire is how can we bring back that abundance. Rather than a dead zone the size of rhode island and the erosion soil so besides cows to do any other farming . We have cows and pigs, chickens, turkeys, rabbits, ducks and sheep and we have a forest so we do a lot of forestry as well. Thats a big operation. It keeps us busy. We own about 650 acres and then we lease about another 12 or 1300 managing about 2000 acres servicing 50 restaurants about 5000 families in several institutions direct marketing everything and we dont sell through walmart or in the supermarkets but we own the customer and we like it that w way. More of a boot to farm or farm to table type operation. Yes, absolutely. Why do not sell to the major chains . A small farm is hardpressed to get enough to live on with the margins being so small. By us wearing those notorious middleman hats the farmers say the middleman makes money well if that is where the money is i want to be one, sign me up. Weve become the process of the distributor in the market or and artist and person that answers the phone and by doing that we can increase our margin for every dozen eggs or a pound of chicken or whatever or for a small farm then we can earn a nice living on a small farm because we own all that chain of that chain between the farm and the consumer. What kind of regulations do you have to adhere to from a federal state level . There are lots of them and they are not always about food. Often they are esoteric things like zoning so we are in an agricultural zone. What that means is it still legal for us, for example, we have 500 acres of hardwood forest with oaks and walnuts and beautiful appalachian hardwood but its illegal for us to go to the words, cut a tree and we have a sawmill so we valid on our sawmill but thats all legal till we make a chair and sell it because chair making is manufacturing and its illegal in an agricultural zone. A lot of restrictions are around Food Processing or food value adding and for example, its illegal for us to smoke our own fork on a farm because smoking is a manufacturing process as well. Those are zoning issues. Technically its illegal for me to write a book from my home office because writing is not agriculture. These are interesting private property stipulations that have come in but food is, of course, a big one as well. We have customers that we would love to get for example a Chicken Pot Pie but its illegal for us to make that without a freestanding inspected kitchen with attached bathroom and a plethora of compliance regulation. One of the problems with these regulations is that they are not sized scalable and they are size discriminatory. If youre small to difficult and if your big their easier. Do you find the usda and ally . Oh, no. If i were president i would abolish i call it the u. S. Dollar. I would abolish that tomorrow. No federal agency has ever been more efficient at eliminating its constituency. House so . Mo agencies grow their constituency, housing, education but the usda has almost eliminated it constituency, farmers that were the original constituency where theyve almost there are so few farmers now we have twice as many people incarcerated in prison in the u. S. As we have farmers. How is that the compost in your view . In my view, its not all the governments fault. The population is complicit in this and that the population likes cheaper food and would rather spend more money on other things than food and so the government has been complicit in creating food safety requirements that eliminate neighbor to neighbor commerce among consenting adults. Because the government defines what is safe and what is allowable in the marketplace, for example, its fine for me to give my child four glasses of mountain dew every day but one glass of roth milk is considered equivalent to cocaine. The government defines what is safe and unsafe then therefore what is marketable and what is not marketable that immediately puts marketability into the hands of a bureaucracy which typically will work at the behest of a mindset that is primarily status quo driven and the marketplace the big players dont like competition. If they colluding with the government regulators can keep innovation out of the marketplace then, of course, that helps. Youve written two books you can farm in your successful arm business but what you just told us does not sound like its an easy gig. No, its not an easy gig. But there are workarounds. Lots of workarounds. So, yes. Do we live in a straitjacket whatever tyranny in many ways . Yes but we still have plenty of opportunities in so rather than dwelling on the problems these books are about dwelling on the opportunities and the opportunities are that we can either find ways around whether its to build a little commercial kitchen or collaborate with someone who already has one or work with the processor already licensed and those are the things that weve done but beyond that we can elect to just not comply in there are now more and more people around the country who are creating direct farmer to consumer transactional bottles that are not in commerce and that the legal word. I can give you a glass of roth milk and that is great but i cant sell it to you. I can give you a backyard process for chop or pepperoni but i cant sell it to you. If we can figure out a workaround to keep it out of in commerce we are okay. Theres a lady in oracle and it started a 5o1c3 food church. If you join the church then you can participate in transactions. Its an outfit in kentucky that started a country club of a boot club where you join a country club but instead of playing golf you get homemade cheese and raw milk and all sorts of cool stuff. There are some really cool workarounds in effect we will host a first i dont know if will be the first and last but introductory rogue food conference january 252 showcase these clever workarounds to compliance. We often read or hear about bailouts or payments to farmers in do you accept those . Do you take those . I dont know where the usda offices but we dont play those games. We dont take grants. In order to give you a grant it had to be stolen from somebody before so its not the governments money and the government got it from someone else. We dont participate in any of those programs at all but by direct marketing and establishing a brand and doing compost instead of chemical fertilizer and doing perennials instead of annuals and mobile infrastructure instead of knowing what infrastructure theres a whole lot of things a lot of latitude within the regulations so that is what we are working on is where are our business the call unfair advantages where our unfair advantages within the system but leverage those and see where we can exploit those cracks in the structure. What is your take on dmo in organics . Dmo im against genetically modified organisms but however i deeply appreciate the need to research and science and try new things so my take on dmos is unlike many of my organic farming friends who want to outlaw them categorically i say let the research proceed but if one of your patent and beings invades my farm and gives me foreign beings that i dont want that should be considered trespass, property trespass just as if your bowl came over and trumped up bright rosebushes. We are so convoluted injustice in America Today that not only if your dmo comes over and has a, you know, these are inherently promiscuous beings so if they come over and have a promiscuous orgy on my farm giving me being that i dont want not only can i not go down and get the magistrate to kick you for trespass but our courts have ruled i have to pay you a loyalty for the privilege of your beings coming over and affecting might beings. Its an extremely convoluted type of justice that we have today and so if your property were truly protected that way like it is from bowls and cars if it were protected that would put a break, if you will a historical and maybe maybe we could even say inorganic break, if you will on dmo development and expansion and maybe we would have it maybe we wouldnt but at least we would be protected from them invading my space from that built hitting my nose. Who is this book written for . That is written for all of the people who have ever dreamed of having a pleasant life in the country or being a farmer but have been told by family, friends, Business Associates coworkers that you are crazy and you cant make but there aint no money in farming and its a hard drudgery bad life, bob loblaw so its ultimately a book about how do we take our current situation, our context in modern times and how do we go from scratch and build a profitable enjoyable farm that is emotionally satisfying, economically satisfying and environmentally satisfying within the context of today. Heres the book, called your successful farm business, joel is the author. Thank you. You are watching the tv on cspan2 with top nonfiction books and authors every weekend booktv television for serious readers. Here are the current bestselling nonfiction books according to the Washington Post. Topping the list is talking to strangers new yorker staff writer welcome gladwells examination of how many misreads as rangers words and actions. Then in we are the weather jonathan argues that solving Climate Change starts with what we eat. Janet matus and bing west without general matus military career and his views on leadership in callsign chaos. In permanent record former National Security agent contractor Edward Snowden reflected on his life and decision to expose the master Surveillance Program of the United States. Wrapping up our look at some of the best nonfiction selling books according to the Washington Post is david platts recount of his journey to the himalayas and what it taught him about faith in human suffering in something needs to change. Most of these offers have appeared on the tv and you can watch them online on booktv. Org. Saturday night on book tv 11 00 p. M. Eastern. If we dont tell our own stories others will tell them for us and they wont have the same care and concern that we do. This is an important thing for all of us. Im a privacy advocate and it was very hard and it was harder to tell this story and to tell my story then it was to come forward to risk my freedom potentially my life to tell the world about everything going on. Former national 30 advisor, Edward Snowden, talks about unveiling exposing the United States Surveillance Program. This was the hottest summer on record and we have never had so little arctic sea ice. We are losing huge swath of the amazon and we have lost much of the Great Barrier reef. These are the major features of our planet. The arctic. The amazon. The Great Barrier reef. As my friend said, we are breaking them. Miss klein talks about her books which include on fire. No logo. The shop doctrine. Joining the conversation live with your phone calls, tweets and facebook messages. At 9 00 p. M. Eastern on after words in his latest book deceiving the sky Washington Times National Security, bill gertz talks about chinas effort to become a Global Military and economic superpower is interviewed by paula to bring ski, former undersecretary of state for global affairs. Everyone is looking at the chinese economic threat. The white house was very successful in highlighting the threat he issued a report with the stunning title called chinas economic aggression and there was a huge policy fight with the bureaucrats saying we cant say economic aggression but when you read the report you understand why spirit watch book tv every weekend on cspan2. [inaudible conversations] good evening. Im the coowner of politics and prose and this is my wife who is down there the behalf of everyone and those folks here welcome and thank you very much for coming. We at politics and prose always enjoy joining forces