Morning from southcentral michigan, made the journey, and is here to talk about his book about russell kirk. One of the first questions for lots of people is who is russell kirk . The man undoubtedly cast a very large shadow over american political and intellectual thought in the latter half of the 20th century. It could be argued he still does. Yet, russell kirk is not a name that is much known these days or much invoked these days. Brad, your book does many things , but it also helps serve as a marvelous bracing introduction or reintroduction to russell kirk. We are avoided talk about many things today, but for starters, please give us a quick overview of this man. Bradley sure. Thank you, john, and thank you, everybody, for coming here. Thanks to cspan tv and booktv. Russell kirk was born in 1918 in michigan into extreme poverty. It was something he experienced the first 35 years of his life , to varying degrees. Yet, he was always very bookish, became interested in all kinds of things. If the stories are to be believed, he had read the collected works of karl marx as well as Thomas Jefferson by the about the time he was about 11. Certainly he had read all of James Fenimore cooper, and no doubt there was a certain genius in this very unusual man in plymouth. He ended up going to michigan state. Afterwards, he served in the military for about five years during world war ii. When he came back from his military experience, he ended up lit, a little higher than a graduate degree, at a scottish university, the university of st. Andrews, earned that in 1952, came back in 1953. Strangely enough, his dissertation became this millioncopy bestseller, this book called the conservative mind, which the timing was just right. It hit the market from a chicago publisher, ended up going through seven editions over its lifetime, and it really did give there were a number of disparate voices that i would just say were not leftist. They might be conservative to some degree, libertarian to another degree, but there were a whole number of voices that i think kirks book allowed some kind of forum for all of these voices to be able to speak right at the end of world war ii, right at the end of the korean war, so he becomes very important. We would never have had a very goldwater Movement Without kirk. We also would not have had a reagan Movement Later on without kirk. He did represent that strain of conservatism. John and he helped coalesce conservative thought. What is interesting, and what most people might not imagine, is that the milieu in which the conservative mind came out was very different than we kind of offer a shorthand for political thought at this point. We think about conservative and liberal, and we think about these things on the opposite extremes. We have pretty entrenched ideas about what those terms mean. Bradley right. John they are convenient shorthand at this point that often lead to stereotypes, but at the time that the conservative mind came out, conservatism really was not a thing in america. Bradley thats right. And part of what kirk had to do was he had to bring together disparate strands, and he had to give it some kind of coherence, so what he decided to do in his this occasion when he wrote the dissertation, he had certainly longed to be a well published author. He never anticipated he would have the kind of success he did. The timing was perfect and he was a good writer a very good writer, and amazing stylist and a good anchor as well, but he certainly did not project this was going to change the world. Even though and i think you are absolutely right that we have kind of forgotten in this , in this day and age, from about 1950 three to about 1964 , and once goldwater fails in that horrific failure and the 1964 president ial election, kirk fails as well. He lives for 30 more years, and it takes him those 30 years to rebuild his reputation that to where it was before the the vocal. But as you say, and it cannot be stressed enough, that kirks conservatism was not political, i think that is fundamental to understanding the original conservative movement. It became political with goldwater movement, but when kirk writes the conservative mind, he is not thinking in terms of a political movement. Things used for reagan, he is not thinking a large defense and free market he is in favor of all that, but his main idea of conservatism is really presenting a kind of western face against the soviets. So it was not just that we were not soviet or we were anticommunist, but he actually wanted to try and figure out a way that we were something that was its own thing, and, yet, he did not want to be ideological, either. So a lot of his conservatism is very poetic, it is very literary. It has to do with art probably more than it has to do with tax subsidies or military policy. John again, to set the stage, pre1953, you think about conservatives not really having a place at the table. Bradley right. John they were not really a firm, cemented part of the spectrum with a definition he behind them. Keep in mind, the country is coming out of the great depression. The country has been experiencing the new deal for quite a while. You have got radical ideologies germinating abroad. You have got a giant war that had taken place abroad. There was probably a general feeling that government control , in ways bigger than ever before, was perhaps a little bit necessary, and that modernism was the inevitable path for mankind. Then along comes kirk, who presents a different path. Bradley yes, and very antimodern. He is very leery of this. One of the things i think we often forget, and, john, your question leads beautifully into this, is that modern conservatism comes out of two impulses number one, the fear it comes out of the fear that there is a collectivization going on not just in government, so theres no doubt that conservatives from the beginning were fearful of big government. What we see radically abroad in the kind of terrorist ideological regimes that we see in russia, germany, italy, portugal, and other places prior to world war ii, and we see them in some ways decline during world war ii, and in others, we see them decrease. Increase. It was not just a fear of that abroad, but that at home through what we call progressivism that , there was a desire to solve all problems through colossal institutions. Gm, which kirk had no love for, huge universities, which kirk was fearful of huge universities, or government. He was fearful of the cult of the colossal around anything that seemed to be antihumane. That was one of the impulses that i think was important for all conservatism and libertarianism at that time in the 1950s, but the other impulse, which, again, we have gotten, and we have even seen modern conservatives i will put them in air quotes, but we have seen modern conservatives lambast this. Nesbitt,ke Robert Russell kirk, they believe very strongly that our true voice was the force of socrates and plato with cicero and augustine, and they saw that long line and believed, and i think probably correctly, that these things were being attacked, and it makes sense. I do not think we have to get ifspiratorial here, but National Governments get involved in funding universities, they are going to want things like science, which science is great, but they will use science for making larger bombs. To kind of round this question out, hopefully, it is tied to both the fear of what is colossal as well as the loss of liberal arts, that we are pursuing power without virtue. And kirk was absolutely horrified. In the book, im not sure how well i explain it, but i try to explain kirks feelings about this he was horrified about the dropping of the atomic bombs on hiroshima and nagasaki. Those two of events, one isnt put together, but the dropping of the bomb first of all, the development of the bomb, that physicists would even consider this thing. I think this was just too much for him. I go into this in detail, and i hope people dont take kirk as crazy, but he saw this as a very old stoics response, but he the kind of response that Marcus Aurelius mightets all ry give, but he wondered as a member of the u. S. Military if it was his duty to commit suicide, not because he was depressed or suicidal, but because our honor as americans have been so tainted by the attack on these cities that maybe it was the duty of a Good American to actually have recompense to pay for this in a kind of purgatorial way. Very interesting. It is obvious he did not commit suicide, but his letters and diaries were just horrified by this. John i want to talk in a little bit more detail about kirks brand of conservatism. When we think about liberals and conservatives these days, we almost cannot help but fall into the trap of stereotypes and caricature. We see almost a cartoonish pop conservatism or liberalism on radio and tv. You write that conservatism for kirk was served as a means, a mood, or attitude to conserve, to preserve, and to pass on to future generations the best of the humane tradition rather than to advocate a particular philosophy, party, and agenda. Very different than our shorthand version of conservatives right now. Bradley absolutely. John could you talk about what his brand was of conservatism and why it set lots of minds on fire . As you said so well, john, there were not any conservative voices there were not many conservative voices. They were not unified by any means. A lot of these people were not coming out of the ivy leagues, which was interesting, too. A lot of these people were people who had been educated in smaller schools. I dont want to take this too far, but there is a bit of animosity towards not only corporate america, but towards east coast elitism and the ideas ivys as well. I dont want to suggest that as a prime motivating factor, but they were kind of proud they could jab the east coast universities as well. The word conservative is first used in the american tradition in the modern sense by a person out at one of the Seven Sisters schools. He uses it in an article in the atlantic, and you would not get from reading this that it is political. He is really talking about t. S. Eliot and remembering the great things in music and opera and so forth. It is not conservative in a political sense. It is not until after world war ii that the term starts getting bantered around. It is really kirk that does give that label some kind of gravitas, some kind of real strength. It is not a rallying cry for a party, because eisenhower, it takes him a while, for example, to call himself that. Robert taft takes it on pretty quickly. Of course he passes away in 1963. 1953. Really, for kirk, that conservatism, he gives us six cannons in the book the conservative mind, and he uses the term intentionally. He is kind of a quasiatheist at this point. He will convert to roman catholicism but not until august 1964. This is a long journey for him. He is 45 when he converts to catholicism. His really kind of an atheist agnostic for most of his life up to that point, and yet, if you read those cannons in 1953, they sound deeply religious. They start by arguing we should believe in a higher power, we should believe in the author of the natural law. We should believe in the dignity of every person. In his second canon, he actually sounds like vatican, too. What he says could have easily been written by someone in rome during 1952 and 1955 during the vatican council. It is all personal and humane in the way he thinks about this, but i stress, and i think it is important to note that he uses the term canon, because that meant a truth that was not easily defined. He is trying to avoid a marxian program or a fascistic conception of the state. He does not want conservatism to be an ideology or a party platform. It is a way of thinking, and that way of thinking is what we might call a stoic, almost agnostic judaism or christianity. It is good enough to have the ethics of socrates, really to have this as a way of moving forward, and window conservatism ofknow, as the history conservatism, of course, from its beginning is very catholic and very jewish. It is not protestant really until you have the revival of the new right in the 1970s, so the Great Movement is kind of it had those religious overtones, but its not blatantly religious in the way we will think of it with Jerry Falwell or oral roberts or Pat Robertson later on. He puts out the conservative mind in 1953. It shows there is not only this other point of view, but that it also has this very proud angloamerican heritage that stretches back a couple of centuries, and he instantly became a spokesman for really what became a movement. What did the book accomplish and , and what was the reaction . It is still obviously in print at this point. It is very heady stuff, not your typical bestseller material, and yet, that is what it became. Bradley that is right. It went through seven additions during his lifetime. The last was published in 1986, just about eight years before he passed away. Even to the beginning, most likely, this would be the last revision. The revisions do matter. This is not just a change of a name here are there. In particular, each edition changes the last chapter, so it kind of looks more at what is happening. The original title, interestingly enough, was called the conservatives route, because kirk thought all conservatism would be a rearguard action. He could not imagine anyone stepping forward and using this as a way to move into the future. It would always be a way of stopping radical progressives, holding them that to a certain degree, but he thought we would lose. That was not a typical. Whittaker chambers, even though he leaves communism, is always convinced communism will win. He is joining the losing side. A publisher here in chicago, which we identify usually with conservatism, he actually had made his money by translating catholic theology in the late 1940s into english, so a lot of german scholars and a lot of french scholars, he had translated those and made his money that way before it became known as conservatism, but when kirk publishes his book, is in the englishspeaking world. The conservative mind is published in every major periodical, every major newspaper. Several newspapers review it twice, because it becomes so big that they feel they have to go back and look at it again and make sure they did not get it wrong. Almost everybody is laudatory. You find a few criticisms. Some people will say kirk is a 19thcentury man thrust into the 20th century. He is a romantic, which he was. There is no question kirk is an idealistic romantic. He would have enjoyed walking tours with wordsworth or coleridge, theres no question about that. He could have easily and he was a very eccentric person. We have not talked about that, just as eccentric as they come, but yet that word, conservatism becomes the word, and it really brings in all of these disparate schools. It does bring together a lot of people, and one person who is absolutely taken with this book, strangely enough, is this pilot from arizona, barry goldwater, and that is a catalyst for him. And the conservative mind pretty much begins with edmund burke and his thoughts. Talk about the importance of edmund burke, and talk about some of the other people in the book, the other litany of conservative saints, if you will. Bradley that is a great way of putting it, because the conservative mind is very much a hagiography, looking at roughly 29 people, looking at their lives and what they contribute. They do not all agree, and that is important for kirk, that in the book, these 29 characters, some we know well, people like edmund burke, known well to at least academics at the time, people like alexis de tocqueville. A lot of these people we do not remember very well. In america, he is laudatory of moore. Abbitt and that i think are great guys but nobody picks up on them. John there are others we know well. Bradley absolutely. He end the book with t. S. Eliot. He and eliot become very good friends and shape each others thought profoundly he and. I dont think we could have had conservatism in america without eliot, who really sanctioned kirk. Certainly, burke is important. Kirk gives his bookends for the conservative mind starting with burke and john adams, the cheat of great conservatives as he sees it. He ends with t. S. Eliot. He has these 26 figures in between. Burke is important and is a great figure, and i have the great privilege of teaching founding of the american republic. I get to teach it every two years, and i absolutely love it, but i always make sure that as the students are reading John Dickinson or Thomas Jefferson, we also do a good deal of burke. Part of that is because i like kirk, and i like burke as well, but a huge part of it is because burke was the leading mind in parliament. He put his life on the line more than once, he was actually treasonous, at defending american life, and he did that his whole career. It was not just a political movement. Burke truly believed that americans had inherited the very long tradition of common law, trial by jury, the right to be innocent until proven guilty, habeas corpus. Burke believed that we were the true englishman. And that was kirks idea as well. Sense that a burkian is important for our modern conservatism, but it is equally important, john, to state burke is not unique. He is one in a very long line of thinkers. Even though kirk starts his book with burke, burke is the inheritor of socrates, plato, and aristotle, and all the greats through the western tradition. Burke represents that. So for that idea to come forward, that is kirks understanding that we as americans and i would even, for the audience especially and those watching cspan, look at ronald reagan. If you go back and look at Ronald Reagans speeches in 1981 and 1982, he will talk about the greatness of america, but what he talks about so importantly is america defending the greatness of the west. And he, like kirk, he draws that in. Later, i think, reagan becomes a little more nationalistic, but in his earlier years, he is concerned with the western tradition and really the best of the western tradition. And that is why kirk picks burke as well. John the conservative mind at the table for kirks career. He was a writer who out his life, helped found the national review, with william buckley, where he was a syndicated columnist, widely read across the country. Several other books, important book on t. S. Eliot, among others. A novelist, just a protean creative figure. If, for nothing else, he would be remembered for that, despite the fact that early on, he did not talk about conservatism as a party, as an agenda, as politics, he did get very much involved with politics, as you alluded to, with very Barry Goldwaters candidacy in 1964. What prompted that shift, and how did things play out . Yeah, that is an awkward subject in a lot of ways simply because kirk really goes , against his own principles. In many ways i will say in many ways, in every way i could find, kirk really was a man of integrity, and im sure he had his faults. I have seen he had a temper and so forth, but he really did try to live what he preached. He did make a lot of money, but he gave it all away. We could talk about that. That is maybe a different story, but he had argued as early as 1953, and he takes this from one of the great writers. He said politics is for the poorly educated. [laughs] bradley it was not the nicest comment to make, but he believed real change came by writing books, dealing with newspaper editors, it came by writing syndicated columns. He was truly a man of letters in that he believed a real intellectual presence, a real change would take at least 25 years. We do not go into congress assuming that if we get one law passed, everything will change tomorrow. He took a long view. He saw how civilization had risen and fallen. He knew the greats of western civilization people, again, i know i have mentioned them already a couple of times, but the three greats of Greek Society socrates, plato, aristotle they came at the itsof greece, not in heyday. They were all nostalgic writing about what they lost. The same thing with cicero and saint augustin. Kirk thought we, too, were at the end of the west, and therefore our job would be like medieval monks, to transcribe and conserve, but then this young senator, who had a lot of charisma, and even though only about 1 3 of the population like him, that third really liked him. And goldwater was, by all acounts and i am not goldwater scholar, but by all accounts, it is hard to dislike him. He met with people and was totally honest. People used to talk about when goldwater and nixon would meet with donors, goldwater would never, ever placate a donor. If it was gm and they wanted a subsidy, goldwater would say to their face, no, i would never do that, and nixon would say i think we could work something out. And again, i am not an expert on but i dont nixon, think any of us would think old goldwater lied. He is just a guy who whatever he thought he spoke. I think kirk was pretty taken from that. Goldwater calling him from washington, d. C. , saying my two favorite authors are you and friedrich hayek. I need to know what to say to make this work. How will i convince people . I think a young kirk was pretty flattered by that. He became very involved. Goldwater called him all the time. They met at times in places like florida. They with William F Buckley strategized, how do we take out the birchers . We we dont want these people on our side. How do we take out the radical right . None of these people should be a part of genuine conservatism. Then the goldwater movement took off in different directions. Kirk did not get involved much past 1964. And he was not good at it. He was good, if you want an honest politician, kirk is fantastic. If you want a winning kirk is not that good. [laughs] john along the way, kirk supported reagan, supported gene mccarthys run in 1976, pat buchanan later on. Bradley he loved norman thomas. I think he was much more concerned with personality and who he thought was honest. John you know, theres obviously a lot of names and influences that kirk enjoyed. It is very enjoyable in your book to go down all of those paths of all of these thinkers who influenced kirks thought. This probably more ideas per page in this book than a years worth of ted talks. It is fascinating intellectual history. By this token, russell kirk, as you alluded to, was an interesting character. He was not just a writer off in a room somewhere. Lots of eccentricities, a little bit of a prickly nature. Talk about the man himself and some of those peculiarities. Bradley yeah, thanks, john. It is a great question, and i dont think you could ever walk away from russell kirk without knowing his personality. He was bizarre. My favorite story and my wifes favorite story as well my favorite story about kirk, he is a bachelor all the way up until 1964. He marries about a month before he turns 46. Marries this beautiful woman. Annette kirk, she had been a model in new york. Extremely intelligent. Incredible person and they were a great team, but a year before he gets married, he always traveled the world, not as a young man, but once he went off and served in the military, became enamored with travel. He was a world traveler, throughout north africa, south traveled throughout south africa, all of asia, all of europe. You would usually live on peanut butter. He did not mind poverty at all. Always whatever he had, that is what he had. Money was only a means to an end. For kirk, that was another story. In 1963, he and a hungarian scholar decide they are going to spend a summer walking across north africa. They walk all across north africa. Everywhere kirk goes, he always carries with him a portable typewriter. That thing is everywhere and his letters im 48. In all my years of research, i have never seen a body of letters like what he left. The guy never stopped writing. He could do 120 words in minute. He had a photographic memory, just amazing. 1963, he walks across the desert with this hungarian scholar and he wears the whole time a iece tweed suit across the moroccan dessert. He carries with him not only his typewriter, but he has this huge cane that has a sword in it. Tsa would not allow this now, obviously. Usually carried a revolver were herever he went. Hes just an absolute eccentric, and of course, bedouin children, they follow him everywhere. Just this bizarre character walking across, ends up in europe after this whole thing, gets to an opera in italy. I think he is in florence. They show up at the opera after this journey. He had a count dracula cape he had won for one of his horror stories. He got the count dracula prize. Ray bradbury was one of his friends. He loved wearing this cape. He shows up at the opera. He is late. The Security Guard will not let him in at all. So these friends as, you do not understand. No way, the door is not opening, so kirks friends, this is the duke of the costa. The Security Guard is like i had no idea he was a duchy. It is like this sixperson village in michigan. They let him in. John the small town in michigan was his home. And he rebuilt his home in a rather grandiose manner. Bradley this is the other story about kirk we dont forget. If any of you end up reading the book and i hope you do, of course, but if you do, i would ask the one thing to take away that i think is so brilliant about kirk no one will believe , it, but kirk did make millions of dollars in his lifetime not just from his books but especially from his fiction. He did very well. He wrote these gothic horror stories. Most people who read his horror novels do not know he was the author of conservatism and most people who read his conservatism do not know he was the author of fiction novels. When he died, he was basically broke. He gave everything away. Drive his wife used to and would find Homeless People and open their house to them. Anybody who wanted to come from cambodia, anyone escaping from communism or fascism, they opened their house to them. They have four daughters. The daughters would wake up every morning. They never knew who would be at breakfast with them. At times, there were 13 ethiopians or 18 cambodians, vietnamese, all of these people. One of my closest friends, an economist, was brought out of the former yugoslavia because of kirk. We dont often remember that about these guys. Kirk truly lived this in every way. One of the persons kirk met was an excon who was on parole from upstate new york who happened to be walking through michigan, and his wife met him. It was a man named Clinton Wallace. Kirk thought this guy was fascinating. They loved him. They invited him in for sunday brunch. They loved him and invited him to stay, and they ended up living with him. He called the Parole Office in new york said, we will take care of this guy. He accidentally leaves the grate to the fireplace open and burns down kirks home. They rebuild after that and it is this beautiful ornate structure. Heres the thing i think is beautiful. In st. Michaels cemetery, they bury Clinton Wallace he died around 1978 his tombstone is right next to Russell Kirks. But it does not say hobo or exfelon, itor or says knight of the road. That was kirk. He loved people. He loved stories of people. He was very forgiving. This guy was interesting, so kirk like him. Kirk was that eccentric, too, just not on the criminal side. John let me ask you something you might imagine kirk would think about whats going on these days. I dont mean to put you in his mind, but who better to ask that somebody who has put together this biography . What would he think about todays political environment . Bradley he would be horrified. In every way, he would be horrified. I think two things would have bothered him immensely. And he spent the last years of his life combating this. Right or wrong, he thought that george bushs Foreign Policy first george bush was just against everything america stood for. He was very worried about the first gulf war. He saw this as our first foray into america empire. He was run out of the conservative movement for his views on this. He made some remarks that were not very judicious. He was very against this. He thought bush had betrayed the entire reagan legacy. Kirk was fine with a large military. He just did not think we should use it. One of those things where you have a military so you dont use it. The idea we have troops stationed in 150 countries out of roughly 196, something very different from what it would have been in 1991, he would have been very upset about it. He would not have recognized any of the people that we call, pejoratively or not, neocons. He would not have predicted their ascendancy. He was very worried about the possibility. He also, and i think this is maybe even more important, and i dont want to necessarily name names, but the idea that you have radio shows dedicated to not as art but entertainment, the fact it would be selling conservativism as a radio show or tv show. His conservatism, what we are taking 35, 40 minutes and actually thinking about an idea, that, for kirk, is what we should be doing. You may have disagreed with llehrer, but that was the proper way of doing news. There were people like ayn rand going right at him, and he very strongly disagreed with her brand of individualism, kind of a social darwinism, his brand was very different, he let her talk and answered very calmly. She was frustrated and he was fine. He actually got along very well with malcolm x. Same kind of thing. A halfhour discussion. I think that was important for him. Soundbites, that was not his john this discussion, exchange of ideas, a good thing. In closing, we want to open up the floor to questions from the audience for professor birzer if there are any about russell kirk, his thought, or this book. Going once. We had answered all the questions. One last question and then we will close. In brief, Russell Kirks legacy. Bradley yes. John im sorry, we do have one question. We will get to that. Two questions. One, what was his reaction to what happened in the 1960s . So much conservatism today seems to come from that. Off the is somewhat subject, but there has been a lot in the news lately about how conservative professors on campus are somewhat afraid to come out of the closet as conservatives. Any comment on that . Thank you for coming today. Bradley thank you for coming and thank you for both those questions. Kirk, like many conservatives, was confused by the 1960s. He did attack some radicalism on wasuses, but he also willing to debate and engage. One of my favorite stories, he was asked to speak at the university of michigan, and he andasked to speak by sts the black panthers. He was asked to debate tom hayden. He got in front of this crowd that was predisposed to tom hayden, pretty radical group, but kirk was without question a gentleman, and no matter who he was talking to, he treated people with respect, and tom hayden came late. Kirk, because the event had to get started and hayden had not shown up, they allowed kirk to give a speech. Waiting for hayden. Hayden came in from the back of the room at least as the story goes hayden came in and immediately started launching into kirk as this defender of corporate capitalism and a person defending the establishment. And the story goes ive not been able to verify all this, but even if its not true, i think it says so much about what we remember about kirk and explains a lot. There was a Young African american man in the front row who was a very convinced black panther. And as soon as hayden launched into kirk, the guy stood up and at haydened yelling and said, you have no right to do this. You did not listen to this man. This man has more respect for us than you are showing now. By all accounts, kirk won the debate because whatever he said, he treated everybody well. It was not a show for him. This was serious conversation. I think it is really important to note that kirk in his life, whatever again modern conservativism has become, kirk was always a defender of people who would have been called minorities in the 1950s. Always. He believed the changes that happen in the 1960s were necessary. From the beginning. Editorial in 1963. This would not go over well with libertarians or hardcore free market rights. He said he thought one of the ugliest things that had developed in American Culture were roadsigns, big billboards. He has an editorial in one of his newspaper columns where he thought all americans should spend their time defacing billboards because they do not do anything for america. He loved architecture inside and out. In his lifetime, he planted thousands upon thousands of trees because he said it was his duty to make up for the sins of his ancestors who had raped the environment. When we hear radio personalities in the media today who are espousing conservativism, not generally what we hear. As to your second question, i cannot really answer that. I know a lot of my friends who are conservative feel very oppressed in the academy. I am teaching at a Small College that is very open. I have never experienced that. Last year, i had the great blessing of teaching at the university of colorado in boulder. I loved it. Im sure people thought i was weird, but i had nothing but good experiences. For what its worth, my anecdotal evidence, i have not seen that, but i certainly know my friends who are conservative or libertarian do not feel the way i do. But maybe i have just gotten lucky. John we have come to the end of our time. I want to remind everybody, the book is russell kirk american conservative. Bradley birzer has been our guest here. Thank you very much for the conversation. [applause] john everybody enjoy the rest of lit fest today. Thank you so much. Thank you for attending todays program. Bradley birzers book will be sold just outside the door and your feedback is important to us. Please visit printersrowlitfest. Org and have a fantastic day. [captions Copyright National cable satellite corp. 2019] [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. Visit ncicap. Org] this weekend, American History tv joins our spectrum Cable Partners to highlight the history of missoula, montana. For more information on other cspan. Org citiest our. We continue now with the history of missoula. Missoula is located in the western part of montana. Claims to be the largest city inside the Rocky Mountains because we have a branch to the east and to the west. We are located in the heart of western montana in a very fertile area. When captain Christopher Higgins established missoula, actually established h