Transcripts For CSPAN3 Newly Discovered Black History Photographs 20180120

To tonights program. To our members, it is your support that makes nice like this possible. To the many of you joining us for the first time, a warm welcome. Before we begin, now is the perfect time to turn off your cell phone or anything else that might make noise during the program. Of newuary, 2016, a team york times staffers discovered dozens of photographs in the New York Times archives. The monthlong series explore the history behind the photos, garnering 1. 7 million views and thousands of comments. We are thrilled to welcome tonight two of the authors who were involved in creating the unpublished black history from the New York Times archives. Is a contributing photo editor at the New York Times and the creator and editor of a times blog. Rachel swarns is an author who writes about race and race relations. She is the author of american tapestry, the story of the black, white, and multiracial ancestors of michelle obama. Moderating the conversation this evening is the curator of film and photography at the museum of African American history and culture. She also serves as the head of the africanamerican media arts center. Welcomingn me in Darcy Eveleigh and rachel swarns. [applause] i would like to echo lawrence wonderful comments. I think we are in for a delightful conversation. I am so thrilled to be here with both of these two dynamic women. I would like to start off by asking you to give us the context and situate how you were findto uncover and somebody photographs that have not been published before. Kennedy,author, dana had come to me can you hear . Is that better . Ok. How are we doing . Ok. Everyone can hear me now . Sorry. If there was something we could do from the New York Times Photo Archives that would be of interest to young africanamerican readers. Immediately, i thought of an idea. A couple years prior to that the former New York Times picture editor came to visit the time, and i had the opportunity to sit with him for an hour. I asked him, is there anything in the archives i should be going back to look for . John became a little agitated and said go back and reedit everything. He said, they did not let us run the right pictures. We had to edit for space constraints, for the style of the times of the day, which was a stiffer picture, someone clearly looking at the camera. John knew what was left behind. When dana approached, i said, oh yes, there is something in there. Rachel and dana and our other coauthor started with a list of names. Who could we name that the times might have covered . We started with Martin Luther king and rosa parks and all the expected names. What happened was the discovery beyond that, the accidental finds, the ordinary people, that was what drew us in. Eventually, the book started to take shape because we wanted to include those unknown people. How long did this process take . How many photographs are we talking about . Archive, they know they have 10 million print photographs in the archives. Of that, about a third of them are from Staff Photographers, about one third are from wire agencies, and another third are handouts from theaters or corporations. Publicity type images. In addition to that, they have negatives from those events. Made, there got are potentially 36 frames left over or more in some cases. Wentof the photographers out and shot hundreds of rolls of film. We are talking early 20th century through present . I think we hired the first Staff Photographers in the 1920s. I believe it was the 1920s. , thereatives collection was a period of culling in the early years. With this call to do something for black History Month or related, you have this thought in mind from your conversation, and then a team of colleagues came together and went through 3 million photographs . I get asked how many i went through. I dont quite really know. A lot. I spent months curled up on the floor with stacks of negatives in a loop. When we started, the idea was we would look at, we would have an image or series of images every day for the month of february. That was our idea. Without there would be amazing images we thought there would be images that have never seen the light of day before. It was an opportunity for us to look at the New York Times as an institution and how we covered and did not cover africanamericans. It was kind of a scramble in the first month or so. Darcy started in november. We were sitting around the table in january, and we were going through images. The initial intention for it was forive online and in print interactivity. We learned soon after that this could be more than that. There was such an incredible response to these images. People saw themselves in some of these images. Some of the parade photos, we asked people to engage with the images. Right away, people said, how can we get them . We were realizing we have to make these available. How did you go about then crafting and conceptualizing . Such a vaste amount, and the initial thought youunpublished work, can talk us through how you had to triangulate that it was unpublished, and you mentioned it was like one a day, but beyond that for the book . What was interesting for the process was the images we could not find, the people who werent there, and perhaps why they were not there. Most of our photographers were based in new york. We had some in washington, too. We are talking about a period of time where we have most of these images from the 1940s on, and richardyet to find wright, the bbb to voice w. E. B. Dubois. , one of the first things we went to look for was Martin Luther king. Low hanging fruit. We know we shot him. I started with the most popular photo i knew of him, which was a portrait the times ran hundreds of times. I went back to reality that film reedit that film expecting to see a portrait series, but that is not what i found. He was at an event, a roundtable. He left that event and was attacked, egged. The next day, there was no photograph. There was a portrait of him. Pictures,ned up the it was not a series of portraits. It was some distant shots of this roundtable of that. At the end of the event, they walk time, and the attacks took place, and they werent there. They had gone home already. I got my shot. I am leaving. T the penalizes what itomizes what happens when the press isnt there. This wasnt a newsworthy picture, they probably rushed that out. It became to go to for 50 years. Years. Goto for 50 you were able to find surprises even in what we consider low hanging fruit. Part of what we wanted to look at was to think about how the choices were made. After all, these were amazing photos that had remained unpublished. Why . Have photos of prominent people, and then we cocked about willidnt this and we show you some of these. That was part of the exercise. Why . There were many reasons why. We were a newspaper dominated by text. We are not the kind of newspaper with our now. They were limited sometimes. Sometimes it was practical. You only have so much space. Sometimes it was issues of getting film somewhere. Editor. A photo why wasnt that person there . Looking at the photo that was published in the one that did not get published, saying, hmm. We were a big institution at a time when american institutions were marginalizing people of color. There were some of that, too. As you were speaking, i was wondering, did your research allow you to look as you are theorizing why some images are in and some werent, did you look at other publications and see if they ran a different image of the same story . I did some research both with the daily news imagery and the amsterdam news imagery. They had wonderful photographers. The daily news was the picture paper. I did not go through the washington times. We covered the local stores. It was quite a difference between the coverage of the times and these other organizations. The gray lady. Their stories were 400 word stories, and hours were 1500 word stories. The advertising was taking up space on the page. Fascinating. If we canve to see go through some of the images. There may be some stories. I would ask each of you, is there an image in this cooperative experience where you are all working together as a team to get selections for the book, is there one each of you would love to have seen in there but did not make the cut . I know you talked about music. It is not a single image. It is a category for me. Forad amazing coverage music and jazz at the New York Times. They spent a lot of Energy Sending photographers to these events. At the end of this book, we realized we had so much music that i had left some behind. I didnt want this to be strictly a book about that genre , but the collection of music photography is spectacular. Notow did you all go about be conceptual, ordering and organizing and the process of figuring out . We didnt want a book that was going to be politics, music, sports. We didnt want that. Experience that was wonderful for us as journalists was the discovery. We were looking, and sometimes we found stuff, and sometimes we didnt. Sometimes we didnt think we had it, and darcy realized we did. We wanted readers and viewers to have that sense of surprise. Each page, you wanted something different. Not chronologically. We worried a little it would be a little too heavy 1960s if we did it chronologically. Really about i found this today, i found nothing today, and i want the reader to experience that and be surprised. Tell us what you found, some of the things you found. This is the opening of the book. Organization an that was based out of new york called the growth. Negro. I am sorry, i forget the acronym. Economic, organization, growth. Opportunity. They were angry with the new not times that they were covering the progress they were making in the community. They accused the New York Times of only writing stories about the negative, crime, violence, to some extent politics, but leaving out the positive contributions that black new yorkers are making, so this big protest gathered at the New York Times building. On,he day went unfortunately things turned rather violent. They set trucks on fire. The police came. There were dozens of arrests. The next day in the paper, there was a two column, at the time the times was a broadsheet, there was a two column story, and no photograph, and yet every single one of the Staff Photographers had gone out there that day. This blew my mind. There must have been 40 or 50 rolls of film from this event, and not a single image made the paper. It was so unbelievably violent. This, a dialogue happened between the times and this organization. There were promises to be better at reporting. Change was promised at that point, but it was fascinating that something so violent happened, and the public never got to see it. The story that was written was very detailed about the events of the day. I will give them that, but why not the picture . Would you suspect that did they not want to reinscribe some sort of idea around urban decay and violence . You could have run that first picture if you wanted. Sometimes Media Outlets were sensitive about perception, optics. There was an interesting debate. Dana and i did talk about this. You will see protests in front of any news organization. Today run out there and cover it because they dont like what the times was saying about israel . No. The turn of events was so remarkable. Today, if they lift trucks on fire, we would cover it. Who was the photographer . I believe this is already brower. Artie we are looking at lena horne in her apartment. For those of us who are writers, this was an interesting project to work on. Normally in a newspaper, the photos come after. We go out. We report. We say we need this person photographed, or this cover, this image. Sometimes it is a working collaboration with the reporter and photographer at the same time. Oftentimes, the photographer comes afterwards. This, the photographer was the main event. This was the point of departure. We had these images and had to look at them and say, what story is there here . This was an article that ran about lena horne and her new variety show that was coming up. Out. So it was interview with her, and the photo that ran was a little headshot photo of the number one. Her face looking straight on. There is this wonderful photo, what is the story to tell here . In the interview she was talking about decorating for christmas, and she was talking about how hard it was to find an apartment. I am thinking, it was hard for lena horne to find an apartment . I want to report on that. It was the 1950s, 1960s, and lena horne, one of the most celebrated actresses and singers in the country, was a black woman who struggled to find an apartment in new york city. How she found it was a great story. It started with harry belafonte, who also could not find an apartment, even though he was the first black artist to break one million albums. He got so fed up he sent his white publicist to sign the paperwork, and when he arrived, the building manager was really mad. Told him you have got to leave. Harry got really mad and he bought the building. He invited his friends and, and lena ended up with the apartment. [laughter] rachel that is what a lot of these stories were like. It was kind of the image, but the history told us something. Rhea rachel, was your inclination to do a deeper dive . Rachel we tried. We tried to tell the story behind the photo. We were trying to tell the story of the moment in the photo. This is such a remarkable photograph in the sense that she just looks at ease. She does not look like she is performing in any way. She looks at home, and running this photo with the print, you think it would have been the natural choice. One column headshot. They did not have a. Darcy this is a contact sheet that i found, we ran frame number 19, the third one down, they ran it as the headshot. When i found this object, i saw it not as a singular photograph, i saw it almost as a movie. She brought this to us. Immediately the idea was, we are going to depict this whole thing. If you look, it is just amazing. You can imagine the photographer, click, click. It is like a mini motion picture. It is beautiful. Rachel it shows his animated personality, passion throughout this contact sheet. Darcy i wanted to give readers of the series the opportunity to see the photos the way the photo editor saw them. Why did they choose frame 19 . For me, i wouldve gone for the one down in the bottom, where he has the cigarette in his mouth. It is so expressive. 19 . Hich one is frame the one smiling. They went with the one smiling, the second column, that is the one they ran. Rachel no, it is the third one, first row. [laughter] darcy right, first row. Yes. There he is. Are shut. He is smoking a cigarette, no way. To me, it said the photographer had three minutes with him and was determined to capture him. I think he captured him better in this contact sheet more than any singular frame. In doing the research about which story to tell, i started reading. His face captured me, and i started doing research. He had grown up with this complicated relationship with his own face. He grew up being told he was ugly. He really internalized that and struggled with it for a lot of his life. It is so hard for me, when you see James Baldwin that is the last thing you think of. It also spoke to me about africanamericans and how we internalize some of these ideas about how we look. Standards of beauty, which he wrote about in many of his essays and grappled with. Here you see all of the beautiful expressions in his face and life. Darcy the next series i wanted to show you was by our first africanamerican Staff Photographer hired by the New York Times. In 1964, he came on staff. He was a harlem resident. These images, don was sent on assignment over a weekend to cover harlem life in 1966. Harlem was a pretty rough part of town at that time. The times wanted to show a different side of it. By monday morning, six photographs were on the cover of the metro section. That mustve been the biggest photo essay to hit the pages. Don shot more than 100 rolls of film that weekend in his community. 3600, 3700 frames. Six made the paper. There were many more that were left behind. He certainly captured it. We could do a book just on this weekend in harlem. I love this. The kids are just going for it anyways. A dominoes game on the street. And this was a view from one of the local buildings. This is what you saw when you looked out from the cathedral. Rachel there was this for my understanding, real or perceived, that harlem was this rough area. We are seeing quite the contrary in these images. Darcy the pictures that ran were very true to what he shot. Here we go. One of my favorite. Just beautiful. When there is only six images to run, it still took up one third of the page. The pictures werent running six calm photographs the way the times does these days. They were three or four inches. So editors were going for tighter photographs. If you go back to this, that would look like mud in the paper at the time. It is understandable why they left it, but it is so beautiful now for a book. Rhea these works remind me of something i read in the book, a reclamation. Thats what this feels like in terms of reclaiming. Throughout the book, as you mentioned, darcy, is the ordinary. How you are already looking at photos of those that we know, but also goes that are less familiar. It seems like it is a reclamation of these stories, as well as the people behind the stories, that is so poignant to the project and maybe this book. Darcy it was very important for me as the photo editor to put the voice of photographers in this. I really wanted to see what i would edit to be their best work. I want that to be the edit of the day. We edit very differently now. We edit not for space, not so much to match visuals to text perfectly. We now edit to tell a secondary story that can run parallel to the words the writers are writing. Rhea is this going to be the same for something that is running online and only lives online . Darcy we often do edit very differently. There was an example that the times did last week. I am no longer a staff picture editor there. They had a cover of harvey weinstein. It was one image. Online, they ran a different image. It is because of how the images would be perceived. They come out very differently. Yes, we do edit to that extent today. The slideshow. Who is seeing it . How are they looking at it . On a mobile device . Rhea still these questions are being made around choice. Who is in it, who was not in it. Thats what these images bring. It is not just a historical question, it is a question that we grapple with, who are we showing, what are we showing, what are we not showing. When you look at some of these images and you think about the choices that were made, harlem from Don Hogan Charles lens is a very different place from the forbidding harlem that we described in the 1960s. If we are true to ourselves, we have to think about, how are we doing it now . Where are those blank spots now . Rhea i am also struck by the series in the three or four photos that you showed us, he took so many photos over the course of the weekend, and what he is capturing, just from this ordinary daily life, a photographer who was not from the community or neighborhood might have overlooked some of these moments. Darcy and probably, just as important, might have not been able to approach. That goes without saying to me. Darcy he got into the community center, a bowling alley. He knew the people. A lot of these people probably knew him. He probably had been photographed, it was not a surprise to see him walking down the street with his camera. It just so happened these might make the New York Times this weekend. He was an incredible talent. Rachel next in the series, this was one of my favorite in terms of the subject. Rhea it seems so timely. [laughter] rachel this is the same time month that the big battle over the Confederate Flag was going on in south carolina. This is reverend kendall smith, who was annoyed that the Confederate Flag was still being flown in parts of new york city. It was either part of a display part of a series of flags in city hall. So he went down to city hall with the Confederate Flag, waved it around, got mad about it, then he took the flag outside to City Hall Park across the street and lit it on fire. Looking at this picture, this is City Hall Park, not too many people standing around. This was three or four weeks after the big protest in central park, the antivietnam war protest where there were hundreds of thousands of White College students burning the american flag. Kendall smith was arrested for inciting riot. Not much of a riot going on here. What is even more fascinating, and i dont have any arrest records from the previous event, but i cant recall reading the paper and seeing hundreds of white students being arrested for burning the american flag. He was arrested, thrown in the clink. The next day, the times had a big article about it. But no photos. Not a single photo. They continue to write stories about his legal case, never ever publishing photos that show there was never a riot. Was a smalling it crowd of reporters and a photographer or two. I think the writer got funny, writing about there being pigeons there. [laughter] did the headline say riot . It was pretty straightforward. They used to write very straightforward, somewhat dry, informative headlines. The text was clear in describing the scene well, but there were no pictures. He eventually got off on a technicality that others were arrested for the same thing. It was not actually illegal to burn a flag. He was acquitted. He took a sheet from a nearby hotel, i dont know if hes to it, but her paid for made it into a kkk costume and was arrested for inciting a riot. It is a performance in a way. Arrested for inciting a riot. Yes. The pictures were so clear. The photographer had moved the camera around, and i think at one point there is a picture of the bench behind the photographer three people behind him. I wonder if the times had put this image in the paper the next day, would it have gone away that afternoon . Hard to say. Rhea and your theory around editorial choices of size and space, how does that sort of fit in . Darcy it is a mystery. They had a few columns. It was not as if they had no space. Was filled with ads on the other side. Why would they not put anything . To go along with this. It does not make any sense. Rhea no, it doesnt. Maybe it wasnt a big enough deal. It could have been that some sort of bar needed to be reached to have a picture there. Rhea maybe they needed a riot. [laughter] i am thinking now, what i do recall is how many pictures the times had about the central park issue. On one hand, there are these benign thoughts that this was just the factual not enough space and edits, not enough photo space. S that make uslope beg the question about what subtext is taking place . What is happening whereby we can write two pages about this situation and fan the flames of this being a horrible what is it, antiamerican . It is not even an american flag. Some argue in the south. There is that. Ok. So, i want to pause. The way in which we are seeing these wonderful images in this range of stories, is that the same that we will expect from the book . Rachel yes. A little bit all over the place. Rhea but there is a throughline as well. When you are dealing with so many years, how did you determine whether or not these have been published . How did you figure out that process . Darcy with each image we found, there were three ways we could search the New York Times archive. Theres something called the times machine where you can look at old physical copies of the paper as they were published. There were two other ways internally to look through the times past, which is an internal Search Engine. An internal Search Engine and proquest to search. Eventually, i did a Google Search on the names, you can google the name and New York Times and see where they appear together. Finally, maybe six weeks before i handed content over to the publisher, i started with the earliest picture in the book, the 1940s, i clicked on every single image in the New York Times. I panicked and said i had to look at every single page of the New York Times. It is important to know, and there is a section of the book that does it justice. Proquest, all of the copies in library, it is only the very last edition. There is a very remote possibility that an image could have appeared in a First Edition paper, but there is no electronic record of it. So we addressed that challenge in the book and figured we would continue anyway, because there would be no way for anyone in this audience to see it. It is not fair to not show it then. We had one other way of checking it. If the name was famous. If the name is mr. Evers, we can go into the files in her clipping library and see images that were not famous. We would not have clipped generic parade. So i searched for famous names in clipping to make sure. The hardest part was the vetting of content, not the finding of content. Rachel a photograph can tell you as much on the front as it can on the back. I think in the blog you used the back of the image as well. How much of that was critical in terms of doing research or useful in determining a selection . Rachel this photo, which we believe is the only photograph that the New York Times took up edgar evers came from the lens of a reporter. A civil rights correspondent who spent a lot of time with medgar evers and others. His notes are a lot of what i relied on to tell the stories. He was writing notes on the back of these images. They were really conversations in a way with his editor, telling him, i saw this guy and here is where i was and this is what this person was. He did have photos that appeared in the New York Times. He was a writer, but he talked too about issues about light and shadow and, oh, i wish there had been better light. It was really remarkable to see his notes. And it gives you some insight into what was going on in the field. Did his note recommends they actually run this . I did not see anything in the series where he said, run this. Darcy he apologized to his editors, saying, the light is bad and the skin tone is too dark, i dont know if you will you. Will work for he used these photographs as reporting notes. He was out in the field and he would use his camera, get the film developed, and write stories from the contact sheet. And described in great detail what the scene looked like, what people wore. An example of image as text. In some instances, some of these photos you can see where the story was connected. But he was writing about white the story we could actually find. Again, i believe so much of that was because he wanted to have a record of it and describing in detail later in other elements. We are also talking about snail mail and some of these things may not have made it to the photo editor and said the new york desk in time for the image, if you will, in times of the company a story accompanying story. This is an example. The New York Times had a staff wasographer and george primarily shooting for the magazine at that time. He did [no audio] the way many photographers are now. George had freedom to roam, and there is another photo in the book that shows the crowd. He could walk that room. The next time, the times when a beautiful photograph from the associated press. It was a big image that showed the funeral procession and it was a lovely picture, a famous picture, but why would they have when theyap photo were stuck in the back . It is unknown. Was it because it was for a future that never ran . Was it because it was for a future that never ran . Was it the film never got back to new york in time and they had to process the film, send it, fedex it not fedex but fax it back to new york, why did it not get there in time . Why was it not in the paper . So this is your opportunity as photo editor to readd as photo editor to readd it. They did not run it then, but i am running it now. I feel so much for the photographers. Really has sois few of these amazing images shown, not just in this category, but across the board. This truly is a tribute to the great work of this. I do think this idea now in terms of image and text, that is another way of reading into it and diving deeper into the way in which we understand things. It seems like text was king. It was about text versus this between thetionship way in which someone can understand a story and the complexities of the story. Fascinating. Wonderful stuff. I love this picture. Was at a local school. He was working with the Mary Williams Jeb Foundation at that point in the school is a recipient of some funding. He came up to jam with the kids. The next day, the New York Times had a lovely article and a photograph of a small one inch or two inch picture of dizzy holding his horn, staring at the camera. Horn, staring at the camera. [laughter] i bet i saw this picture and i was so mad as a photo editor, how could you not run this gorgeous picture . I understand it are you he has his eyes closed. They never would have done that. You would not show a picture with someone and their eyes closed, right question mark it was too big. You could not run this photograph. Even the detail . The version they ran was somewhat cropped moment of this that was just typed hide in in on him, and the photographer got him straight on and i think it is a shame. Again, it was face restraint. This great series of photos in the book, a photographer went to detroit about a week or so after the 57 right 1957 riots, and there was a roll of of stack ofk negatives that was marked destroyed and that is the one i went for. [laughter] i pulled it out and saw this whole world was double exposed. I was roll was double exposed. I was so excited. One of these has to work. I found this one. This is an incredible story when you see what is happening and even better that it was meant to be throughout. The family in this photograph homeless by the riots. The mom had a common name in the not find her, but she and her children were left after their home was burnt down. In the background, you see the bamboo board, which in the 1950s, was the hottest nightclub in detroit for the jazz age, so john cole train ltrane there, contran played there, and all these big names. You see that it is destined and this broke my heart. I also think it is my most favorite photo, the most dutiful in the book, and in the car, too, having the symbol of detroit, so much is happening in the picture. To me, it is a work of art and something that would put on my wall. Someone wanting to throw it out. And you have the children there, the promise of tomorrow, the ways in which what the uprisings whereabouts, who, what it embodied, there is so much that this photograph i hope that this book i hope one of these children or even a mom comes forward and identifies who they are because us the story today. Have you had any stories like that . [laughter] we have. One of the things we wanted to do when this project was launched was for it to be an interactive experience. We really did not want to just show photographs. We wanted people to connect to them and tell us their stories, too. This image is not one where we thought, initially, this would happen. This is an image of a school in new jersey that had been recently integrated. We presented the photo, and readers said, ok, nice photo, what happened to the kids . We were like, well, we dont know. [laughter] so we asked Readers Online and on social media did anyone know who these children are, and where they are now . Well, several accounts came forward and there was a story to tell. Someone had been posting about these photos and shared them these are folks who had gone to the school and shared it on facebook and someone said, evelyn, isnt that you . She was like, oh, my gosh. [laughter] this is me. Do you remember that day . She remembered that experience of being so excited. She talked about being growing which wasof instead, a people that she said would have described as the ghetto, but she said it was a golden ghetto, a place where teachers all kinds of working people and she said it was just such a wonderful it was a porch community, so it was a wonderful place to grow up. Going ered [no audio] soto photo. What a fantastic story. It was. We were so excited. If anybody recognizes the stories this was the first africanamerican men to win a pulitzer. With him is his son greg. He happened to be touring colleges. This, i found a stack of negatives. It talked about diversity on College Campuses. I did not see anything in there of interest, but i came across a john to the photo editor dugan at the time and it said, hey, you will never believe, i ran into this man and he says hi. This was three weeks or four weeks before he was given his blitzer dashes pulitzer. Pulitzer. We could not find him in the times archives because everything was either hand out from ebony magazine, an ap photo, we could find nothing unique. When i found this i wanted to include it because this is an example of the enormity of the collection at the time. I mentioned that they think they have somewhere between 400 million, 500 million negatives and they do not know. There is no count they have been able to do because the connection is so enormous. That ifranged in a way it can contain 36 frames or 3600 frames or more, so it is impossible to get a count at this point. They think hundreds of millions of photographs. What i also love about this , as you mentioned, he is with his son on a college tour. Of touch points and flashpoints around africanamerican history are told, there are these kind of stock of stories, either it is going to be harlem and the forbidden city, riots, istruction, the bomb that kinds of but these everyday moments, robert, son, walking across the College Campus [no audio] it was in the opportunity, just let home. It was such a great image, and an opportunity to think of, how did this guy, who pioneered research on the harmful effects of segregation, live out his life . It was interesting and obligated. That in agree and echo the thought of, this is a photographer who knew him. That and that access you were saying, even with the photograph, there was this sort of ability to take these pictures and capture these moments and sorted that unfettered access that sometimes now as you get there are so many layers that photographers have to go through to get pictures of that atrium. That is true. I know we are short of time. I want to get to the last one and we will speak quickly. Another point to talk about access. This is the interior of complexs home after it was quite malcolm xs home after was firebombed. He got into the house because he was friends with the family. The times the next day ran the press photo, a wonderful andure, a stunning picture the times never ran the picture the next day. I have never seen other pictures from inside the home. Why did they not run this . I come back to may be bit inability maybe the inability to make a photograph clear in newsprint since it was a 65 line screen and the quality was not particularly good. This is a very dark image and hard to see, was that the reason they were left behind . But another reading of that would have the, if you could have shown two, but this is what he is responding to. This is so powerful. That is the table, that is your family, and everyone in america and all of that the world can relate to that. Someone might have in their own imagination and understanding of what they felt or who malcolm x. , but thebeliefs interior shot of the living room bombed out would resonate, i would think, with anybody. It is an interesting there was another. Why wouldnt they run that . Maybe it was the back of the head . The standards to what a picture should look like had to be met with the times. It is a wonderful picture. Finally, i wanted to get to this because this is one of the most hysterical stories we did in this whole book. This is radio cummings. He claimed to have been the second africanamerican men to ever run for president. We did not put that in the book tickets cannot confirm it. Here was something funny, was too young to run for president. However officially. But he put his name in the hat and got rejected. Regardless, he was an interesting fellow. He ran a newspaper, and he was astten about many times being this upandcoming politician who was supposed to be this dynamo. Articlesmaybe 10 or 15 articles down the line, i come across this picture and i come across this tragic obituary. He dies from a heart attack at the age of 35 for 36 years old, tragically. And the story ends. Name pops upr, the in an article. Im going, this is weird. O he wrote a story we ended the story with his death because his obituary was in the New York Times, a beautiful, two column obituary. We are trying to come up with words and we do not have enough information. We decided, lets research this guy. Turns out we discovered that mr. Oak cummings fake his death. Said his death in the New York Times. He hoodwinked the company into running his obituary. Because he was in trouble at the black panthers. There were some Death Threats going on. He took his family and escape to canada for couple of months. Reappeared and he reappeared ae press, he invited to New York Times in the amsterdam news, they showed up and covered it. They said he faked it, it was a hoax. The New York Times did not show up and cover it. It turns out after this book closed, and this is something i can only tell people in person. After it closed, we had run a quick article about this in the times. An 80a call from somethingyearold former times men, so retired, living in london. Who remembered. Who remembered, and i havent in the story is i want i have it in the story. He called up and got the executive editor on the phone and said it was fake. I faked the whole thing. Who remembered, and i havent in the story is i want ihe an to the newsroom to the then politics editor at the time and said, i got this call from a guy named ohcummings and he said he faked the whole thing and he said he called to fake it and he was very much alive. Named ohcummings and he said he arthur said, concentrating on the story, again, concentrating on the story, he replied, do not believe a word he says. He cannot be trusted. [laughter] thathe times left it at and never ran the correction. Until this, we ran this short piece on it in february, and we corrected it how many years later . [laughter] 48 years after the fact, and when damien and i discovered this whole thing, we were running into the standards [noor because we had the audio] but he did call up for his death certificate. So, it was a fascinating discovery. I did speak to the obituary editor, and he said it is only the second known faked obituary. [laughter] wow. Well, i think we have some time for thank you, ladies. This is fantastic. Wanted to leave room for a few questions if anyone has some questions, yes . This is a fascinating program. All those rolls of film. Ago,had seen those years if someone had went and did those and went through them in one weekend, i am thinking [indiscernible] all the advertisers. I do not know. It is very different, but i would imagine that there was plenty of money. They would not pay what you pay for a roll of film, but yes, there was a big stash. The photographers having to turn in all of this, are you all come across and a new, these are work higher kind of things, but did they ever had any of their own or when some photographs or have you come across any where it was published in any other mod above mode from the photographer . Not really, but there was a time when the company was pulling out of this, and the photographers were really worried about that. However, over the course of many years, there was work like this on the blog, and there is preservation of the photos, and they have given them back. They have reached out, and now i have about 800 rolls of film here that belongs to you guys, do you want them . The good thing is they preserve them. There was a time when this stuff was in a way when it was on the loading docks and a lot of things would get lifted. Marilyn monroe is in the, hey, that is great, i will take that. I have so many questions, but i want to hear from the audience. There was someone else i thought i saw with their hands up. [indiscernible] i am always concerned about [indiscernible] what condition . It is in great condition. It was in the basement, which never changes temperature. Ands not climate controlled the negatives are stored in two different actually, three different spaces because of the more modern collection on a different floor, but it is locked behind a room, and it is well taken care of by curators. It is not in any sort of white sleeved container, but what is is packedg is it in is packed in so tight and really touched that it helps preserve it. About a year ago, there was a leak in the building, and there happened to be so many boxes stacked on top that when the water came down, it went around and it was packed in so tight that almost nothing got damaged. And thed up the boxes paper, excuse me, it just washed to dry and stuck it back in again. Was the paper, to dry and stt back in again. And roles of older films [indiscernible] everything that is left is none of the flammable film left. I think that all deteriorated long ago. Yes . Thank you very much. [indiscernible] perception ofthe or inou are confined other words, in turn eyes in fashion internalizing or altering did it internalize or alternate your perception . No doubt. I had no idea what to expect. I did not expect such a broad history. I saw it i only knew what i knew. I knew of rosa parks, and i did not know me until we went out i did not know, and i did not know why. That is a fascinating part. You look at these pictures and you understand why people did what they did and that was the biggest discovery. I would give the same question to you. What is interesting to me, is to think about how we as journalists did this, i think that was interesting to me. For me, as well as in terms of doing the research and finding out more about what i knew, but i think what is interesting to me is just think institution and the role that we play in making people visible or not. I think that is the thing that really stuck with me. Beyond your self reflection on the timess responsibility, like there are two dimensions. One is that the photos of the funeral, there was a huge like there are two dimensions. Interest of wanting to explore then you have been able to capture in one book. Historiansxpect would absorb the visual imagery that has been hidden. Different in the way you have been able to do it, so the question is, do people say, we went to gain access to the archives a little bit more quickly . And the other question is, how many unseen histories of topics, thatother were just waiting to be brought upon . What is your thought . What is interesting is this project was such a huge success. Immediately, it spawned other projects and darcy can tell you about some of the work she did and it is still being done. Really, i think newspapers around the country, fortunately, a lot of regional newspapers in their archives, in terms of going back into communities, it is such an important resource. Aam curious, i have done bunch outside of this, but i dont even know. Corporate archives are not necessarily open to the public, so i do not know what the response would be if they came knocking. They did come knocking. There is in office there, and he responded to a call from an individual about one person. That isthing i think important with this project and the one that followed was that for a long time, organizations have come into the New York Times and said, we will give you x amounts of money for it and we will digitize it for you. Senseully, they had the to never collect them because that never worked for any organization. Senseand they held onto it, ani think that they are understanding its value and its use. It is by creating books like this and using it to their own future stories and i think they. Ee that it now pays off it is enormous, and it costs money, keep it. It is not free to keep it in the basement. For thes not free employees to work with it. I think utilization of this collection is one of the best things that could happen to it. Any other questions . I thought i saw a question of ir from the in lady question up there from the in lady. Many people figured out that he was dead . [laughter] good question. For those of you who have not guessed, this is my daughter sydney. Good question. My daughter has been a very big help in this book, as your children have, too. And broach what they call a press release and he sent it to the writers at the time and convinced them basically. [laughter] early take news. Fake news, and the writers believed it. [laughter] why . [laughter] that is exactly how that happened, so good question. Thank you. That you will have to a remarkable job here and there went to give you another round of applause. [applause] everyone thatnd it is a phenomenal book that is just a fraction of the archives discovery. It sounds like there are multiple opportunities or more. It sounds to be uncovered, so thank you so much. Thank you. [applause] eet onset cspan, this is about an issue that resounds today, and this question is about how many people were bothered by u. S. Gis and how are they treated 25 years after the u. S. Departure . Duringcould be featured our flight program, join the conversation on facebook at facebook. Com cspanhistory and on twitter