Bettye kearse is a pushcart prize winning essayist. The other madisons the lost history of a president s black family is her first book and follows a 30 year quest to confirm her lineage. It was called roots for a new generation. Thank you for being part of this program. Most of us grew up thinking of James Madison, the first draft of the u. S. Constitution, what did you think . What were you told . I was told. With this important figure in American History. I was also told he was my greatgreatgrandfather through his relationship with one of those enslaved cooks. He was my ancestor. Host always remember you are a madison. You come from african slaves and president s. What does that mean for you as a child. To me it sets some clear expectations. It was intended to be an installation. In my family history, also i had slaves in my family to be admired as well. Theres a lot to live up to. A lot was expected of me. She carried the stories of her lineage, both had been enslaved, eight generations going back to the africanamerican woman who was brought to the united states. This is the tradition, tell us about that tradition and its role in your family. Guest the tradition goes back thousands of years probably before the birth of christ. They maintained entire cultures, the history of cultures with this value. I am sure it is going on today but it is a tradition of oral history. Host so this carries throughout your family and your mother told the story to others, there was a slide presentation, historical and genealogical, the black madison lecture circuit. In effect handed this role to you when she gave you the books. What was in the box . Guest all kinds of things, death certificates, marriage licenses, amazing hand stitching, a very fancy, some areas, slave senses, newspaper articles, anything that could be put together. There was experience for it. Host what does it mean to appeal this box . Guest a big responsibility, my mother hadnt warned me this was going to be my responsibility to take care of this box and its contents and to be more responsible for making sure the stories didnt die or generations, sort of overwhelmed and not sure how i should handle it. It contributes to my concern and my mother is the one who creates it. Before that time, my grandfather, my greatgrandfather had the documents and the family bible. Moving from one small texas town. To make sure that didnt happen again, or should tell the stories with many people who were interested. I decided on the latter, the important things that were so important. They werent just the story of enslaved people and they represented other africanamericans and just a message of strength and persistence and love that i thought was important to share. Host i want to hear a little more about you. You spoke about the sense of ambivalence that set you on the path of discovery, many miles covered, many obstacles and a lot of emotional freight. Your mother had a reverence for the madison family, pride and meaning in strength and a really hard life. I would love to hear your feelings about that, you have more ambivalence about being connected to the family. Host i am a product of the 60s. During the civil rights, the black movement, very important. And so i felt licensed to take on the more uncomfortable side and not try to hide head on which is very different from where we looked at it, in some way be assured, somewhat comforted by having Something Special in her family background that set her apart from those who were experiencing the really difficult parts of being black in america. Host she grew up during jim crow. Just to reiterate, they have questions they can ask in the q and a, type them into the q and a section at the bottom of the screen and we will try to get to them. Something you were alluding to, this began with mandates, this woman kidnapped from africa as a teenager purchased by James Madison senior, sexually assaulted her. She bore his child and james junior, the man who became president raped korean who bore his child. There is incest in there too. To call it riggs, courageous, and talk about that conversation. I remember this pretty well, a bunch of papers around me. I was thinking did she really recognize what this was. Did you know president madison, what they were. Her term. How do you frame it like that. Or to listen it wasnt is not being able to find historical records. That we were battling a sacred cow. Not just my mother, my grandfather actually passed our stories, use the term visiting. And my mother would go to someone else like my and laura, they were very uncomfortable talking about what happened in a straightforward way, angry approach with those kinds of questions. Host you were going to get at the unvarnished truth, parts of the saga that was unchallenged. The most famous hostess Dolly Madison was a widow and had a son, you destroy your family details parts of their life and the life of james and karens son jim who was sold off as a teenager at dollys urging. It is a life we are talking about but a sense of what you heard about this life. Guest about jims life . Host jim was the one i mentioned. Guest jim was madison of things and the time he was born, they came to live with them. They signed kareem to be his wet nurse. And jim in one breath and the baby whose name was victoria, over the years we became very good friends and they were in their teens, they fell in love with each other and found out about it and promptly sold jim from tennessee and never saw his mother or father or victoria again. Host a heartbreaking story, one of many. You were going to try to find these unnamed what happened to jim. Made the first of many trips to montpelier, the madison Family Plantation that is now a historic site, to africa to several states but so many people descended from slaves whose lives werent considered important enough. There were some real breakthrough moments. Would you care to share any of those . Guest in terms of finding jim . Host in terms of what you discovered along the way. There are little gems wandering through this maze to find out more about your family. Guest it was certainly difficult. Often names were not recorded, families were separated, sold apart for what happened to jim. Very difficult to find out who had purchased him, where exactly it was. The trail picks up with his son emmanuel. There is documentation of him, we know who he was because of who owned him. He was owned, famous in tennessee. We had hoped to trace back from emmanuel to jim. One of my cousins passed, more than unfortunately passed but my citizen cousin, sean harley, came across 1830 slave senses because the man he found is not a slave. His name was chadrack, we believe he could have been jim. What we are trying to do is somehow verify the chadrack, in virginia around the same time and lived in the same place, originally owned by the same family. They have this unusual first name, chadrack and when they were freed they chose the name madison. Guest which speaks to always remember you are a madison. Host thank you for writing the support books. What are your thoughts of those trying to rewrite the narrative around slavery, tend to portray slavery as indentured servitude are excluded from history books entirely. Guest they are deniers. Just a bit in some ways not unlike laura who didnt want to talk about the painful parts. It is a painful part of American History. It happened, a very important part because this country wouldnt have been what it is without the millions of slaves. Host it comes across so clearly, im not just in an institution but an emotional support. You went to research the origins of the slave trade and twisted moral code that was adopted to rationalize, to ghana, why take on physical and emotional experiences . What did they add to your sense of the family story. Guest for me, they understand who i am. Very protected environment. Didnt have any idea what my enslaved ancestors have gone through and i felt like i was missing part of myself so i would look for them. I looked for mandy and all the places you named. I looked for kareem, to montpelier and walked in the same steps, just a profound experience. In so doing i got just ending going of what my ancestors had gone through, and learned a lot about the incredible strength, their inner strength. The talent and values they have, down to all of them. This is true for every sway of family. Host if you have questions for Bettye Kearse, you can write them on the q and a section and happy to get to as many as possible. All the way turn down your stand that depravity in the us, also to confirm the family lineage and those you heard through Historic Records and dna and enlisted the help of doctor bruce jackson. You approach National Society of madison family descendents about often authenticating your familys dna, where would that lead you . Guest looked like it would be very promising not to jackson, be careful with the generalities. If you compare your dna, who told you . They are related. The National Society did identify one man, appropriate genealogy and initially was going to compare the study, what happened was shortly after that, a big article in the Washington Post and he just didnt want to get involved so he backed off and since then really pursued that. I have been feeling more and more that the dna and the proof that other nonafricanamericans, that is not what is important. That was fascinating. Youve been asked many times would it matter to you if you did get proof that you were descended by James Madison or that you were not, i would love to hear a little more about that. Guest if i did have proof it would be in my book. It is more about marketing. It is really about understanding who you are and what your values are and honoring and respecting the slaves and knowing you inherited a lot of their strength and have an opportunity to contribute just as much as they did to this country. It is about knowing who you are. Host another question. Any sense of the role of faith or religion, played in the life of your slave ancestors who mustve been strong people inside and out. How if at all has this informed your own life . Guest my enslaved ancestors were strong christians and most were. It is an important component to our values. Including myself. An important part of my daily life. Host thank you for sharing your family story. Have you been in contact with others . Famously this valley, tell me more about that. Guest two occasion, one was at the university of virginia, i cant remember exactly. There is a symposium of slavery in the university. With james monroe and Thomas Jefferson and slaves who worked at university some of whom were owned by the university. I was at montpelier, the sins of monroe, jefferson and washington. Your favorite contact. Host you built so many relationships in this journey, several for people who work at montpelier but many others. In addition the most elite of elite americans, the father of the constitution, student of the enlightenment, the sacred fire of liberty. The very foundation of americas this is the man who came up with political compromise to count enslaved africans as 3 fifths human. You do so much to flesh out the people who are in your slave the sentence line. How do you make sense of these contradictions in James Madison or my other question is does it even matter who he was . Those that matter who he was, that is a good question and a tough one. It does matter. Hard to balance his faults with his strength. He didnt free a single place. Host after that. Guest yes. George washington freed those slaves who were in fact his own. Thomas jefferson freed slaves who were his direct descendents but James Madison didnt create a single slave. To go to philadelphia, whose contract madison sold to a northerner assuming that eventually he was free. Jefferson and all, they live this strange dichotomy of lofty ideals, but not truly being able to live up to them. They probably that is the way we do things here. Didnt really want to do that. As far as acting on it. Host what positive or negative reactions have you received from your book . Guest so far, i have only had positive reactions. Host i am guessing there will be controversy, people disputing of the account at the Sally Hemmings family. Building relationships at montpelier you mentioned speaking at workshops and symposium reexamining historical narratives and how they are formed, who is included, there is a real History Movement that wants contextualize how we remember whether it is integrating the story of Sally Hemmings at monticello or in georgia the atlanta history center, contextualizing lost cause civil war monuments. How would you like your family story to be reflected at montpelier . Guest the first time i went to montpelier in 1992, this was six years before dna proof that the hemmings family they were ahead of the game already because the day that i arrived the first time i was able to see an excavation site, the south kitchen and they were looking for the truth. They were trying to learn who the slaves were, how they played a role in James Madisons life in montpelier and what their contributions were to the country they were already doing that and they have continued to do that. They are my friends. They have always been supportive and interested in my story, they want the whole story and one name is up on the wall where other slaves are listed. I was involved in the permanent exhibit called a mere distinction of color which is ultra James Madison and that exhibit is something i feel allamericans should see because it puts the role of slaves in perspective and talks about their role at montpelier and how they dealt with them, the constitution, the fact that they were people and not just commodities. I like to say that there were millions of slaves, but millions of individuals. A visit to montpelier encourages you to see that. Host what does it mean to have that folder more inclusive picture of American History . Guest it is the whole story, the real story, the voices that werent heard. African slaves werent able to speak for themselves but they left their mark everywhere, from new york city, they build a wall all over the country, every where i lived, the mark of the slaves there. Host question from jen, the message of what it is like to be black in america. What would you like people and women in particular to take with your story . Guest women in particular . Host what would you like people and women in particular to take away from your story . Guest i couldnt imagine reading this book, and they were slow on, the same quality to tell their own children about this, that is the chapter about rape. One specific message i wanted to convey, could happen in any setting and one setting was within marriage. I did want to portray that to all women, marriage is not necessarily awful, i hate it from the possibilities of being sexually abused. Host theres a lot for readers to dig into about the sexualization of africanamerican women. Guest little girls growing up, there is a likelihood they could be raped and there was nothing in the pallet. Host a question from the charlotte. When i think of what persists, when they were part of the hearing, with sex partner should be celebrated but i wonder if the denial of common humanity that is shockingly present among us should be subverted by descendents coming together as a family. Your thoughts . Guest that was a long question. Host really good question. The interconnectedness is the healing instead of dividing of the way they think of history. I hope i am not putting words in. Guest within families . Host it came back up. The moderator came back up. Inc. Of the divide. Sometimes wonder if the interconnectedness of families can be part of the healing. I dont suggest the abusive taking Vulnerable Women and sex partner should be celebrated but wonder if the denial of common humanity that is even now shockingly present among us can be subverted by descendents coming together, terrific question. Guest it will take work and outreach. A great person, descendent of one of them. And she has shared with me, the history the same way, should all come together and look at the whole truth of the family backgrounds. Recognize the healing that come together. Host how do you feel about president madison now than before your research . Guest allowing myself to be angry with them. It is different when i have a priority on that because he knew it was wrong and yet he used one of his slave women. What he didnt do was didnt prevent dolly from selling jim so i lost that connected to a ancestor that i want to know. I allowed myself to be disappointed as well. Host there are so many stories people can look forward to. One of the slaves poisoning his master, the grit and fortitude, newly emancipated slaves established themselves, your greatgrandfather, max rowland, armed riot in the cedar peak in 1889 over the right to vote and so much more about the journey that you go on to find all those things out. I am wondering before you close, there are so many names left out of the official record of your share with us all the people guest the first name i put out is mandy. The first african and sister. We talked about jim. Mentioned emmanuel. And lives with it, they were a portion, those who are able to stay together. In that family and that generation and greatgrandfather mack and shelby and young and james, and name all eight of them, and the rest of us. A wonderful family. Host so appreciate you sharing that part of the story. A lovely note from connie graft who you mentioned. Guest it is not. Host this is a real story and im proud to be Bettye Kearses cousin. I would love to see her and other madison descendents and i, causes of another medicine descendents to come together at montpelier and talk about our histories. I will never be mad at you. So all is resolved. Thank you so much. A real pleasure. Guest thank you for having me. Host thank you for tuning in tonight. We will be airing an edited version of this talk with Bettye Kearse on Second Thought on may 15th. In the virtual author series, Mary Beth Keane about her new novel ask again, yes, that is tuesday may 12th and Stephanie Vander on may 21st to talk about her new memoir called stray. You can see a full video and watch video of that virtual author event at atlantahistorycenter. Com. Thank you, Bettye Kearse. Really a pleasure. The president s from Public Affairs available now in paperback and ebook. For biographies of every president organized by their ranking by noted historians from best to worst and features perspectives into the lives a nations chief executive that leadership style. Visit our website, cspan. Org thepresident s to learn more about each president and historian featured and order your copy today wherever books and ebooks are sold. This memorial day weekend on booktv. Today at 3 2 05 pm eastern bestselling author James Patterson talks about his efforts to assist bookstores impacted by the coronavirus plus his latest book the house of kennedy and on sunday at 4 00 pm Eastern Foundation for liberty and american Greatness Foundation adams on his book trump and churchill, defenders of western civilization. National Political Correspondent molly ball talks about her latest book pelosi which looks at the career of speaker of the house of representatives nancy pelosi. At 9 00 pm afterwords facebook cofounder chris hughes talks about his book fair shot about his plan to reduce poverty and strengthen the middle class. On monday at 8 30 p. M. Eastern bestselling thriller writer David Baldaci talked about his books on in depth. Watch booktv this memorial day weekend on cspan2. Hello, everyone. Good afternoon. Welcome to our live lunch. I am heidi lewis, director of Corporate Events and sales for politics and prose bookstore in washington d