It is 480,000 people spread across those 318 square miles for a density of about 1,460 per mile, which is pretty sparse when you get right down to it. Were roughly, 29, 30 African American. About 11 latino, 5 various mixes of immigrants and various cultures there. The rest caucasian. Kansas city has variety of neighborhoods. It has an extremely sophisticated purpose and culture. Things that people might not expect. We have tremendous sports teams. We have great art. Its a place of variety and a place of music and barbecue. One thing i can tell you as a mayor is that all cities have similar problems. We have issues that we have to deal with crime. Just like everybody else, too many guns on the street, too much gun violence, too many homicides. We have to deal with that. By educating kids. Because one thing we know is that seldom do you have ph. Ds shooting each other on street corners. You have people who are undereducated and therefore have fewer options who feel hopeless. And when you feel hopeless, you feel angry. And when you feel angry, you lash out. And if you happen to have easy access to guns, oftentimes thats with a gun. The things that i remember and the things that hold me close to kansas city are the times that i was in high school growing up in the 1960s. Graduated in 69. And we had all of the things that other cities had, the panthers, the civil rights movement, the sexual revolution, the drug culture, the ant antivietnam phase. Everything was here all at one time. One thing i learned about kansas at this point in time is we tended to be softer on all of those issues than others. Our riots were not as vast. And we came together to put those out. And we moved forward. We learned how to get along with each other, although we still remain unfortunately in mind and opinion too segregated. We have to do more to bring our people together across color barriers. And were working on that seriously. But the things that i remember or the things that i grew up with, growing up in a time, in a city where there was a lot of conflict and watching how this city dealt with that conflict in a way that kept it together without it falling apart and moving forward. Were at the negro leagues baseball museum, historic 18th and vine in kansas city, missouri. Here we document the story of black baseball in america in general and the professional negro leagues specifically. Essentially, you just walked into an old ballpark. The only difference in this old ballpark is that youre going to meet some new baseball heroes. And of course when you walk into the ballpark, the first thing that you see is the field. Here it is the field of legends. And the field of legends as you can see is a mock baseball diamond that houses 10 of 12 lifesides bronze sculptures of negro leagues great. Theyre cast in position as if they were playing a game is that they represent ten of the first group of Negro League Players to be inducted into the Baseball Hall of fame at cooperstown. So that is how our all star team is chosen. On the outside looking in is the late great john buckle neil. The only one of our collection of statues that is not in the national Baseball Hall of fame. Certainly international he should be in the hall of fame. Neil buck, who is also the cofounder of the Negro Baseball Museum is managing this allstar team that we assembled. Really our guests come in. They peer through this old chicken wire. They see this incredible display. And we hope it invokes the desire that oh, man, i cant wait to get out there and walk amongst the stat use. But at the negro leagues baseball museum, we segregate you from the field. We wanted our viewers to experience what segregation was like. Knowing full well that they were good enough to play in the major leagues, so close to it yet so far from it. So for most vantage points in the museum, you can see the field, but you cant get to it. The only way that youre allowed to take the field at the negro leagues baseball museum, you have to earn that right. And you do so by learning their story. And by the time youve beared witness to everything that they endured just to play baseball in this country, then the very last thing that happens here is now you can take the field. Let me introduce you to rup foster, the genius. It would be rup fosser who would establish the negro leagues here in kansas city at the old ymca. The building still stands. As a matter of fact, it is right around the corner from where the museum currently operates. That is where the contingent of Baseball Team owners met in 1920 to form the Negro National league, the first organized National Black baseball league. They would go on to operate for 40 years, from 1920 until 1960. Jackie robinson breaks baseballs color barrier in 1947. But 13 years after jackie breaks the color barrier, the negro leagues are still operating and operating with a relatively good deal of success. Because it took Major League Baseball 12 years before every Major League Team had at least one major black baseball player. But it was the legend, without question the greatest baseball mind this sport has ever seen and virtually no one knows anything about him, even though he is rightfully in the national Baseball Hall of fame. Sometimes lost in the romantic nature of these heroic athletes and courageous athletes who overcame tremendous social adversity to go on to play this game that they loved is the fact that negro leagues baseball was thriving black business enterprise, Third Largest black on the other hand business in this country. But the impact that it had in spawning other businesses probably was greater than any other business during that time in the African American community. Welcome to the street hotel, the prime example. The street hotel was black on the other hand hotel right here on the corner of 18th and paseo here in the historic 18th and vine jazz district. But let me tell you, it wasnt a travesty to have to stay at the hotel. Because youre f youre black and visited kansas city, this is one of the few places that a black person could have to stay at a hotel. And it was by far the most majestic of the black on the other hand hotels or motels that were here in kansas city. This depicts the sitting room of the old street hotel. You could walk in the sitting room of the street on any given day, and man, you might see sitting in one of these chairs former heavyweight boxing champion joe lewis. Or at this time the fastest man in the world, jessie owens. Here is the legendary orchestra leader lionel hampton. Hampton loved the kansas city monarchs. So much so that my dear friend, the late great john buck oneal who was managing the monarchs at the time would put hampton in a monarch uniform, and he would sit on the bench and serve as an honorary coach there is the beautiful lena horn throwing out the first pitch at an allstar game. The legendary jazz musician cab calloway had his own semi grow perot black Baseball Team. So did wanted to be all the Baseball Players wanted Baseball Players. To be jazz musicians. So it was only fitting that they would come here to 18th and vine where you had the best of both worlds, jazz and baseball. Yeah. And so kansas city in 18th and vine was jumping. A jazz musician could get a gig in kansas city when he couldnt get a gig anywhere else in the world because you had all the nightclubs had music. The clubs galore here at 18th and 12th and vine. So this place was wide open. And baseball and jazz kind of intersected. Yeah, that intrinsic mixture of jazz and baseball which radiated from 18th and vine and made it one of the most recognized street Cross Sections anywhere in the world. Changing time looks at world war ii. Here we had the irony of young black soldiers dying fighting the same racism in another country that were being asked to accept here in the states. That led to the movement of integrating americas socalled national pastime. The sentiment was this. If they could die fighting for their country, they ought to be able to play baseball in this country. That led to Jackie Robinson being handpicked from the great kansas city monarchs. Again, jackie place here in 1945. At the end of the 45 season, signed his contract to play in the dodgers organization. He would spend the 46th season in montreal in the dodgers farm system. And then in 1947 make that monumental walk on the field as the member of the brooklyn dodgers, forever changing the game of baseball. But more importantly, forever changing this country. There is no question that jackies breaking of the color barrier is one of the most significant events in American History. As a matter of fact, the museum makes the bold assertion that robinsons breaking of the color barrier wasnt just a part of the civil rights movement, it was the beginning of the civil rights movement. 1947. This is well before those more noted civil rights occurrences. This is before brown versus the board of education. This is before rosa parks remuse forecast toll move r refusal to move to the back of the death. Dr. Martin luther king jr. Was a sophomore at morehouse when robinson signed that contract. President truman would not integrate the military until a year after jackie. So for all intents and purposes, this is what started the ball of social progress rolling in our country. Well, the integration of our sport is bittersweet. It is bitter because im not sure the African American community was aware of what it was losing when we lost the negro leagues. The negro leagues had been so greatly impactful in spawning black businesses and helping create the dynamics of a thriving black culture. When we lost the negro leagues, we lost a lot of that. Yeah. Segregation mandated ownership. And so with integration we did lose that. And so the degree of ownership that was so prevalent during that era of segregation in the African American community, i dont know if we will see that level of ownership again. I certainly hope that we will. But we lost a lot. Yeah, and so it was good for the soul of our country, integration was. And ultimately the integration of our sport which triggered integration in our society in a much broader fashion. It was good for the soul of our country. It moved us in ways socially that i dont ever think fathomed was possible. But it was devastating economically. We finally make our way to the field where we are greeted by this uniform display. And of course these incredible lifesized bronze sculptures of negro league greats anchored on the mound by the legendary leroy satchel page. There are few, if any whoever did it better than the legendary leroy satchel page. What the negro leagues teaches us is very simple. In this great country of ours, if you dare to dream and you believe in yourself, you can do or be anything you want to be. You see, these athletes dare to dream to play baseball. They had no idea that they were making history. Quite frankly, they didnt care about making history. They just wanted to play ball. But the passion, the perseverance, the determination, the courage that these men demonstrated in the face of adversity would not only change our sport, it changed our country for the better. Tom pendpendergast was a political boss in the city dur about the 20s and 30s. How his influence both good and bad helped shape the city and politics. Tom pendergast was the political machine boss of kansas city from really in control from 1925 to 1939. The political machine got its start from toms older brother, Jim Pendergast, who came to kansas city in the 1880s and got started establishing this machine in the first ward of kansas city, which was in the industrial west bottoms down by the river. There were many there was an irish community, African American communities. It was very diverse. A lot of working class people. And Jim Pendergast had sal loans, aloan salons. And he went precinct to precinct building this machine that was based on favors. Basically helping people get jobs in exchange for votes, helping people through giving them loans that you didnt have to get a formal bank loan. And jim would loan the money, settle gambling debts, skimming money off of the top of illegal activities such as gambling and prostitution and so on and so forth. And when Jim Pendergast, he was getting older. His health was failing, and his younger brother Tom Pendergast got started in the machine around the 1900s. Machine around the 1900s he was elected city alderman. In charge of streets for a few years in the early 1900s. Tom pendergast was in a position to take over the machine. By the time jim died in 1911. The legacy of pendergast family has been beat up and twisted and turned. So many times over the years todays kansas citien doesnt understand who he was and what he did. Both good and bad. The pendergast family came here in the 1870s. What a lot of people dont realize is that they were Tom Pendergast and his brother jim and the seven siblings were sons and daughters of immigrants. And came here as working class young men looking for jobs in kansas city. And when big Jim Pendergast just through sheer popularity won the seat as alderman for the first ward. A real influential ward with the immigrants and African Americans. And immigrants. They grew up in a sort of a poverty themselves. They empathized with the working people. Tom follow ld his brother into politics. Became a deputy constable. For the city court and became took on other positions within is the city. And took over in 1910 as a city counsel man. An alderman like his brother had been. And i think when you follow the trajectory of kansas city and the economy and its growth with the immigrant groups coming in. People looking for work. Tom built his kingdom if you will his political kingdom on serving those under served people. In other words he knew that unlike today when politic ts make intangible promises theyre going to save the world and make the country prosper for everyone. Tom threw the years delivered tangible things for people who needed them. Whether it was medicine, whether it was coal. Whether it was food. More importantly it was jobs. He learned early on the way to a persons heart is through his dignity. And with the job comes dignity. Especially when he got into the depression era where so many people were out of work trying to raise families he knew the best thing he could do for anyone for a lifetime of favors returned is to get that person a job. A political machine its basically a started to describe it with the act of doing favors in exchange for votes. When you boil it down to its base element. Thats what it amounted to. Its being tied in to organized crime and other elicit activities taking bribes and kick backs. And using influence to make sure that your preferred candidates are elected. And then once you control the City Government, by 1925 the pendergast machine had full control of over the city. They had five out of Nine City Council members were hand picked by tom. Through the city council they appointed henry. Who city manager. And city manager position was really more powerful than any other position in kansas city at the time. When ever they did City Construction projects, he would make sure the contracts went to companies that were owned by Tom Pendergast. And pendergast he owned mostly construction companies. There was basically everything from quarries to cement. To there was a mix company. He had insurance companies. He had liquor companies. Of course. Which at least officially they changed to Beverage Companies during prohibition at the time. And so all of those city contracts went through mcroy to pendergast and had gets this money. Theres a circle op money. And pendergast is always getting his cut. And people affiliated get their cut. In exchange he gets votes. Im not trying to justify the pendergast legacy of vote fraud. And government control. But i do want to balance it with the fact that kansas city wouldnt the city it is today in the many good ways if it hasnt been for Tom Pendergast. He helped funnel money this during the depression from the new deal. With a ten year plan. Which they used tax dollars to put people to work. Building a lot of these major structures city hall. The courthouse. The auditorium. All those became public works projec projects which he helped control to garner the money to put people to work. He split jobs during the depression so one guy would work half a day and another guy work half a day. Two jobs instead of one. He guided us through the depression. They say he had City Government in county government in one pocket. And the under world in the other pocket. And he used those influences to do a will the of good. And of course lined his pockets at the same time. 1932 the power actually went statewide. When he got guy park elected. And they had inflounce for the state of missouri. Representation at the Democratic National convention. In the 1930s, the pendergast eventually selected truman to be senator for missouri. And he was elected in a statewide vote. And but at this point through pendergast i believe the number was he could produce about 70,000 fraudulent or ghost votes. In any given election at this time. With that the sheer number of votes that he could produce out of kansas city that would be tallied and they were official. Whether they were real or not. He had that the power to to do this. At a time of extreme project in the 1920s and 30s. For instance the ku clux clan was in kansas city for a convention. 10,000 clans men. Did a parade down main street. Or grand avenue. While in the con vejs one of the chants was goodbye tom goodbye joe your crooked gang has got to go. They were referring to tom up and down guest and joe shan shon. His sometimes ally and sometimes competitor on the political scene. Locally. One of the reasons that the kkk targeted Tom Pendergast was he was later described as man of equal opportunity. He treated African Americans as voters first and foremost. He helped any group that needed it as long as they were registered to vote. But i think thats another side of the pendergast machine that wasnt copied or replicated in other cities. He reached out and woshlged with all the different communities. Black, white, when it came to election day. Everybodys vote was the same. Eventually in the late 30s, 1937. He got involved in an insurance kick back scheme. And actually the scheme its not clear whether he broke the law with the scheme itself. Im not a lawyer. So i cant explain that. Where he ran into trouble is he didnt report the income to the irs. For income tax. On this tax return. So just like al ka poen it was the irs. That finally caught up with Tom Pendergast. And he was indicted in 1939. And went to jail in eleven worth. The federal penitentiary. He was nothing by this point by 1945. And pendergast died. Natural causes. Truman came to his funeral. Truman who just became Vice President came to the funeral of Tom Pendergast. During wartime. On a military plane. Its a big controversy. And weeks later, roosevelt died. And truman was president of the United States. So truman could never completely distance himself from the background with the machine. And he owned it. He said that pendergast always kept his word. And he wasnt going to abandon his friend. So. So what were trying to do is complicate that history. And ive done a little bit of that in this interview. But we are building a web site that will include currently we have about 9,500 scans of original documents. We have photographs, letters that people have written to one another back then. I mention the court cases that unvail voter fraud and crime. And its an interactive web site. That will combine this original documents with new scholarship. So we have reached out and 2015 to 18 different professors. Who were or Museum Professionals or historians. Who have produced full length articles that they would go on the book. Theres some new ideas in there. Or new topics that just havent been explored in any kind of depth before this. Were taking web site versions of those. A little bit shorter geared to the public audience. And those will go on the web site. Everything will be linked together. So when youre reading the essay you can click and see the documents that support the research. You can go read the court case that put pendergast in jail. And its not as dry as a Typical Court case might sound. When you think about everything going on at the time. The scope is focusing on pendergast and the machine, and then exploring all of the implications of machine rule. In kansas city. Especially in the 1920s and 30s when they were at their peak. Did he manipulate votes . Yes probably. Did he employ maybe heavy handed guys to convince you to vote the right way at the poll . Yes he did. Did he vote dead people. He did. At the same time it was like a father figure almost i think considered himself a robin hood figure. Who used the cash he made from much of the cash he made from bribes and kick backs to put people to work and provide services. I one time interviewed a guy who remembered growing up in the 30s. And he had a younger sibling that died at maybe age three. And he said we were poor, dad was out of work. He goes and we had the funeral and the casket and all this. We buried our brother. And went to the morgue to pay for it. And pendergast had already taken care of it. It was those things that earned peoples lifelong loyalty. Because in days when times are tough and people are poor, its they dont care about the politics so much. They dont care who the office holder. They care how am i going eat today. How will i feed my family. How can i find a job. And they did that through pendergast. Now we return to cspan tour of kansas city, missouri. Author explores wealth inequality in the u. S. Including fees charged for housing, work, transportation and school. Payment for a service rendered. Or a good provided. Thats basically what in effect a fee is. For much of recent sort of history 20th century we thought of fees covering an administrative cost. So you go to dmv and its a price for what you have to pay for the them providing you a drivers license. Its cover that cost with nominal revenue or profit. For the government its revenue. Increaseingly fees has been used as a form of profit strain. Thats the material difference i would say in the recent development. No longer just simply to cover revenue cost or expenses. But its a form of revenue or profit for the government. Profit for the private sector. We see they take off in a 1970s 1980s. You may hear about fees here or there in terms of hotel fees and airline fees. My research looks different. Looks at fees in the Consumer Financial industry. The rise of fees particularly in three areas. Which are mobility in america. Housing, education, employment, what gets us from home to school to work. In transportation. And so these four areas are a mobility and post war america. We also see an incredible rise of fees in related financial expenses. In those areas. The Student Loans. For instance. Again im talking about fees but fees are part of a larger expense. For the student loan. Theres a Registration Fee and fees that attach to that. The delinquency fee. Its student loan itself is designed to pay tuition. And i think that in the uk they call it tuition fees. Thats what it is. A tuition fee of the student loan to offset that cost. For the average student low borrower which come out of graduate they come out 28, 30,000 in debt. All right. The argument is put forth it beats not going to college. But that ignores and misleading because it ignores the hang over effect that a student loan has. By being a hang over effect or the cascading effect. Youre a college student. Youre 30,000 in debt. You come out of college and you have the worst debt to income ratio. You pay you have more points on your Mortgage Loan. O mortgage interest and insurance as well. It means that for the next 30 or 40 years of the Mortgage Loan too. Youre constantly behind the person who didnt take out a loan. You pay more for your home. You pay for more your car note. And that means that you have less money to save less equity to build. At the same time you have a kid you have a child. The child is born you want to put money into the 529. College account. You have less investment capitol. Your child the household has a effect on generational wealth mobility. The cascading hang over effect of Student Loans is ignored so much. By people who want to talk about the advantages of a student loan compared to those who dont have it. Homeowner ship, higher education. Look at issues employment. Transportation. In every one of these fears the key drivers often the Financial Services lobby. This lobbyist who actually write the st. Germane act. And so in the act is basically written in actually chicago tribune. It says its in their headline. This isnt bill its not for the consumer. So lobbyist or crafting these bills. Freddy st. Germane enters ento congress in the late 1960s as a son of a factory foreman. Leaves a multimillionaire. Youre not supposed to become a multimillionaire as a public servant. Why hes chair of the Financial Services committee. And things take off. So lobbyists are driving much of these creative Financial Products. These fees. Same thing with Student Lending. Cost benefit analysis. Someone like a lindsey. Economic advisor for reagan. Republican. Talks about how guarantee Student Loans are less efficient than the direct student loan. Cost taxpayer more money. A bad Financial Products. Basically. And others talk about it. And both democrat and Republican Administration cost benefit analysis say a direct loan is a better Financial Product for the student borrower. It gets money more quickly and directly. Financial aid officers say wow this a streamline system. Welk get the money in the hand of the students faeser for less cost. Which means it cost the student less. Less to go into default. The taxpayer isless likely to pick up the tab. Nonthe less the direct lending is forestalled and held off. And drowned in the bathtub. By the guarantee Student Lending lobby. All these things are driven by the Financial Services lobby. Same thing payday lending. Cant get a federal law because of Financial Services lobby. Same thing with the autoinsurance. Which is so critical. Which is unlawful to drive without it. So all with the autoinsurance its the insurance lobbyists. In which the 1980s which put more money into a campaign in california to forestall a proposition. Than spending in the president ial election that year. Yes. Its the Financial Services lobby. Whether its Insurance Industry or student loan industry. Or banking industry. Which allows pr perpetuation of the products so abusive to consumers. Which drives wealth and inequality in america. You can talk about women as the Fastest Growing consumers in the society. And so this demographic population is also have been the ones who increaseingly been the ones marketed and targeted by the Consumer Financial products the most over leveraged. Student loans, mortgage. Payday lending. Autoinsurance. And the ways which autoinsurance is predicated not on merit but on factors not related to the quality of the driver. All these factors have a impact upon the fast e growing in society. Example autoinsurance. For instance. Something which is a boring who wants to talk about insurance . What can be more boring. In nowhere to you find the private sector more protected than having a good or service which required by law to purchase. But delivered by the private sector. Health insurance doesnt fit that category. Theres medicare. Medicaid. Only autoinsurance has this protected in the society. And so in insurance autoinsurance is in large part termed not by how you drive, but by where you live. Territory rating system. Pc profiling. Its no longer to profile people by gender or race. You cant charge this woman more. Because shes a woman or latin. Even though they try to do that in texas. Years back. But you can charge more based upon where they live the zip code. The postal code. Politically correct profiling. A latin o who lives in a neighborhood that is mixed latin. Is more likely to pay more autoinsurance. Having the same exact driving record. Driving record i mean number of years driving, both seven or eight years. She has perfect driving record. She has no tickets. Not been in accidents. She drives the same amount of distance. As a white male who lives in 90210. Opposed to a latin in a latin section of california. Is still more likely to pay more in autoinsurance. Even though she has the exact same driving profile. Its not predicated on individual merlt merit. Its social factors. You pay autoinsurance one year and extrapolate this over 40, 50 year window. Maybe five or 600 more in insurance in a year. By 40 years life of a driver. You can see the amount that this this cost the Fastest Growing population in the society. The future holds is basically that as right about these fees and related costs have a dramatic impact on middle class america. Both erecting barriers to the middle class. As well as eroding the middle class as well. But i think looking ahead. As detrimental as costly the hidden cost of the fees and related expenses have had upon the middle class. Has had even more damaging and effect upon the Fastest Growing segment of american society. People of color. Are far more likely to have a sub prime loan than the average american. Women im more likely to take out a student loan. Than men. Also be deeper in debt. In the Fastest Growing segment of american society, latin o, women. African american. Asians as well. Immigrant population. All of these things i have laid out have had a acute impact upon the Fastest Growing segment of the society. And so what might impact might this actually have that the Fastest Growing of society is actually the most arguably the most over leveraged. What might that have on things like public financing. Infrastructure. Or retirement. Medicare. For the state of democracy itself. And so this is im a historian i write about the past. But looking ahead looking for we have to understand that if were moving toward a minority, majority minority society. And that these things that have laid out have a desperate impact upon the Fastest Growing segment of population the future is quite concerning. Now a conversation on the slavery that existed along the Missouri River. And the slave and owner relationships that grew out of it. The fact is that a little under half of enslaved people lived on small scale Slave Holdings and the vast major it of white people who were engaged in slavery were small scale slave holders. That has led to the idea that somehow slavery was a milder institution in the place like missouri. Some people have argued that somehow it was a more domestic institution. Because people were living in working closely with one another. Sometimes enslaved people lived inside the household. And that somehow that might have made it better. And there hasnt been a lot of research into trying to figure out if in fact that was the case. We are in the john house. Which is in kansas city, missouri. And john was very influential early kansas citien. And he was a farmer and a banker. But he also was a slave holder. It was a substantial institution. Out here in western missouri. Many of the counties along the Missouri River all the way out to the border and sort of stretching up the border in the years before the civil war. The enslaved population was from 25 to 35 of the population. Most people think about slavery they think about plantation slavery. This large Slave Holdings with perhaps hundreds or 200 enslaved people on the property. They think about cotton. And sugar plantations. They dont think about farm. And in fact the vast majority of slave holders in the United States throughout the era were engaged in small kale slavery. In missouri that was the case. The vast majority of individuals who owned slaves owned fewer than ten. In fact many owned just a few. And so the question is did that make a difference . Did that make slavely operate in a different way than it did in other parts of the south. Thats what i set out to do. To look at whether slavery was different, if according to to where it was located. Or the size of slave holding. So the immigration streams to missouri were mostly from the upper south. People came from virginia, and kentucky, to a lesser extent from tennessee. And from north carolina. And there was all this wonderfully fertile land. The land was cheap. They came out here and they engaged in diversified agriculture. They also grew cash crops. They grew corn, raised hogs. Hemp and to bobacco. Those are labor intensive crops. White men didnt want to engage in thatly boar. They forced African American men mostly to to do that work. Working in all sorts of capacities. Most typically on the farms the way it would work is that enslaved women would engage in tremendous amount of domestic work. Wb within the household. In the kitchen like this. This was not easy work. Most people out here didnt have stoves. Oftentimes they were cooking on open flames. They had to tend the entire day long. So cooking certainly washing clothes. Cleaning. Men typically worked as general farm hands. Every task from clearing fields in the winter time. To get them ready for the spring planting. To tending to the crop ts over the course of the year. To tending to livestock. Whole host of other kind of work that they were engaged nd. To keep these farms going. I will admittedly say that enslaved people they didnt want to be sold down the river. It was literally down the river. To new orleans. To the slave market down there. Where they would end up in the cotton fields of mississippi. Or the sugar plantations of louisiana. Which were just brutal. Working conditions. So as far as working conditions, they were better here. Than there. One other way that it was really different in this i think is probably one of the most significant things that i found. Is that small scale slavery had a dramatic impact on enslaved peoples families. And communities. So if you think about it demographically. There are a few people on any of these farms. Typically just a dpults. Those adults maybe related to one another. They maybe brother or sister. Parents kp children. And so that did not allow for the opportunity for people to marry people that lived on their own farms. When i say marry i dont mean legal marriage. They did didnt allow legal marriage. It was clear through the records that i read that people were married to one another. In their own eyes and their communities eyes and even in their slave holders eyes. They were married. There were engaged in what were called abroad marriages. What that meant was often time ts the father and husband was on one property. And the mother and children were on the other. Typically the man could only go to visit his family once a week. He would leave on saturday after work was done. Sunday typically was the day off. From work. Most white people recognized that and gave people a day off from work for them. That didnt mean they werent working for themselves. But it meant they werent in the fields. They would visit their family on sunday. And come back late sunday night or maybe in the wee hours of the morning monday morning. What i argue is that it really kind of kept the whole system working. Because ultimately theyre interested in the enslaved population growing. Through a natural reproduction. The only way that will happen is these relationships they allow the establishment of the relationships. They believed that it made people maybe not more content. In their enslavement. But perhaps they i think they thought they were more controllable. They would have something to hold over their heads. You cant go visit your wife or ill sell you away or whatever it was. So i think they used it as a control factor. Then it was the sort of resip row kal thing. Among the white people within the community. They were allowing relationships to go in all the different directions. And that kind of kept the whole system running. It is more intimate than would have been the experience for the typical person who was working on a plantation. Or large property in a place like mississippi or louisiana. Because what it meant was there was constant interaction. With white people. And with the Slave Holding Family members. And you can imagine that sometimes that could end up in more positive situations. If that white person was inclined to some kind of kindness. But it oftentimes could end up in with really, really horrifying results. So for an enslaved individual they were walking this tight rope all the time. Trying to figure out how to navigate through this situation that they were they had been placed in. And they it was really important that they very carefully study the person who claimed them. To try to understand the whether or not they could push them in different ways or what would rung them into trouble. With that person. So one example i have spent a lot of time with the diary of a woman. She was living in the household of her motherinlaw. Her motherinlaw they didnt like each other very much. There became a power struggle. Merged within the household over who was in control. Its a one womans property. But her daughterinlaw is living there shes married to the man whos running the farm. He doesnt own it. That was sort of a problem. It was a classic sort of motherinlaw daughter relationship. Where they dont get along. What was intriguing about it is that the enslaved women understood this. Fully well. And they tried to manipulate it in in way they could. They would tell stories about one woman to the other woman. And go to one woman trying to ask for things and go to the other woman if they couldnt get them. This went on for years. So thats an example i think that a good example of how enslaved people tried to work with within the very bad hand they had been dealt. Basically. And tried to influence the circumstances in ways that might not have been altered their life dramatically but they felt like at least they were able to alter it just resisting is powerful. In itself. This happened everywhere. But i would argue that all this was much more charged because these people both black and white people on these Slave Holdings were living and working so closely with one another. And white people thought they imagined somehow that enslaved people cared about them. And they had a positive relationship with them. The reality is they didnt. Why would they have. It was a brutal exploited labor system. White people like to talk about how slavery was domestic here. I think that or milder here. And i think there was a lot of incentive to do that. Especially as the political situation heated up. Over across the state line. Into kansas. And they were trying to turn kansas into a proslavery state. They would talk about themselves in that way. Certainly i think theres a lot of evidence to show people in the deep south was suspicion at people in the upper south feeling like they werent right with slavery. It wasnt a mixed labor system. If you go to st. Louis, theres a large and grand population there and not all the folks are from the south. By the time you purchase a couple decades leading the civil war. Its a huge german population. Who were not all abolitionist. But most were antislavery. Quite a few irish immigrants. People coming from northern states. And so the population was becoming more mixed. Thats one of the reasons why the state is bitterly divided during the civil war. Does not i mean votes not to su seed. So its a divided place. Its essential that we understand this story of slavery. In america. This is really the foundation of our modern race relations. And if we dont try to understand this story from you know the perspective of the people who experience slavery. But also understand the way that slavery operated. In this country. And how essential it really was to to the growth of the nation. How slavery was used economically. Socially and political. The institution itself. But then trying to get in there and understand the experiences of the people who were actually, you know, the experiences of the people who actually had to experience the horrors of this institution. And the ways in which they were used and in order to create wealth. And political power. For white people. Its a really important story. You can find this and more from our trip to kansas city, missouri online at cspan. Org. Thursday night our look back at the 2017 cspan city tour continues. Into washington. We hear about the 1940 collapse of the narrows bridge. And its impact on Civil Engineering today. In concord, massachusetts well take you to Minuteman National park. Where some of the first shots of the revolutionary war was fired. And california. A special tour of the 9066. Exhibit chronicling the japanese American Experience in the 1940s. This weekend cspan city tour takes dwrou to springfield, missouri. While in springfield were working with media come to explore the literary scene and history of the birthplace of route 66. In southwest missouri. Saturday at noon eastern, on book tv. Author talks about the conflict occurring along the kansas missouri border. In the struggle over slavery. In his book, the border between them. John brown having left kansas comes back to the territory. He begins a series of raids into western missouri. During which his men will liberate enslaved people from missouri. And help them escape to free tom. In the course of this theyll kill a number of slave holders. And so the legend or the notoriety of john brown grows. Part of the struggle that people locally understand is really the beginning of the civil war. Sunday at 2 00 p. M. On American History tv. We visit the nra National Sporting arms museum. Roosevelt was probably our shootingest president. A very avid hunter. Fers they think he did when he left office was organize and go on a very large hunting safari to africa. This particular rifle was prepared specifically for roosevelt. It has the president ial seal. On the breech. And of course roosevelt was famous for the bull moose party. And there is a bull moose engraved on the side plate of this gun. Watch cspan city tour of springfield missouri. Saturday at noon eastern. On cspan 2 book tv. And sunday at 2 00 p. M. On American History tv. On cspan 3. Working with our cable affiliates as we explore america. Now to hide park