Eberhardt from the friendly d roosevelt president ial library and clay bauske of the president truman president ial library talk about the factors that led to the remaking of their museums and the thought that goes into overhauling their exhibits. The two discuss what their job as curators entail. The fdr president ial library hosted the conversation and provided video. The am Herman Eberhardt at franklin was of a president ial library and museum and i want to welcome you to a new series of programs featuring conversations between me and curators at other president ial libraries. In this series we will explore the various jobs and roles of museum curators. Today we will be talking about one of the most important and complicated jobs of a curator, developing new Museum Exhibits. Curators are responsible for providing new changing exhibits on special topics on a regular basis in their museums. They also make periodic alterations to the museums larger permanent exhibits to reflect changing scholarship or incorporate new technologies. But there is one task so complex, so costly and so timeconsuming that it is usually undertaken by president ial libraries only once every 15 years or more. I am talking about the complete rethinking and replacing of the museums entire permanent exhibit. At the roosevelt library, we completed a full redo of our permanent exhibit in 2013. And joining me today to discuss how these projects are done is clay bauske, the supervisory curator at the Harry S Truman president ial using in Missouri Museum in missouri. Clay and his team are in the final stages of redoing their permanent exhibit. Where do things stand right now and what is your projected opening date for the new permanent exhibit . Clay we are probably within two months of having the new exhibits done and ready to open. The big question with all the libraries is when will the libraries actually open to the public. We are not really sure about that, but the work on our new permanent exhibits we are within two months of being done. Herman so the exhibits are being installed as we speak . Clay yes. Essentially all of the general construction in our museum we went in and had contractors literally rip out everything in the museum and start from scratch. That included installing all new walls in the exhibit areas. We constructed a 3500 square foot edition to the building foot addition to the building. That work is all essentially done now. The exhibit fabricators are installing the exhibit panels, the graphics and that kind of thing. We have not really started installing the artifacts in the exhibit. That will be the last thing. That wont happen for another month or so. Herman that sounds like an exciting moment in the project. There are a lot of things i want to discuss about your new exhibit and the process of remaking a permanent exhibition. I thought we could start by talking first about our two museums and what they were like when they were created in the 1940s and 1950s. Museums are not static. ,hey naturally change over time as audiences and technology changes. When fdr created the national and president ial library in hyde park, he included a museum in his plans. When that opened in 1941, it was different from the museum today. Since fdr was the sitting president at that time in 1941, he didnt think the museum had to be about him because he was such a familiar public speaker. Instead he filled the museum with his personal collection. Fdr was a lifelong collector of things ranging from coins, sta mps, art, manuscripts and artifacts related to naval and maritime history. Thee were the things in museum in its early years. It was only after fdrs death as the publics memory of him began to fade a bit that things begin to change. You saw exhibits of his early life and presidency. In the 1970s, exhibits were added about the life and career of Eleanor Roosevelt. Today our museum is different in the kinds of stories it tells. Clay, do you see something similar in the way the Truman Library evolved . Clay there are a lot of similar things, but also some things that are different with the history of the Truman Library. The similar things the main thing is truman liked the idea that Franklin Roosevelt created a museum and his papers were then turned over to the federal government. The main difference was Franklin Roosevelt died in office. Perry truman is the harry president the first after his president ial theres to b years to be at his library. Harry by far spent more years at his library than any other president. He treated it basically as his daily office. He was here five to six days a week. The early days of the library, he was directing what was going on. As vision was not to create museum about harry truman, bubt a museum but a museum that would illustrate the jobs of president s. Inbelieved very much educating people, especially younger audiences about the roles of the president. One of the early exhibits was the six jobs of the president , based on a speech he gave at columbia university. From there, truman spent nine years here, working his office five to six days a week. Ther he passed away, library really didnt change for 40 years. What was here in the library was a series of disjointed exhibits. Some really good exhibits, but they had no connecting theme. There were state gives of various kinds. It wasnt until the late 1990s that a concerted effort was made to create new permanent exhibits that would tell the story of the truman presidency and the presidency as a whole. Thean in both cases, rayed from thet original vision the president d from the original vision the president had for it. That is a necessary thing. As memory of them fades, it is important to tell the stories of their presidencies in these galleries for the public. Clay right. If harry truman were to walk in the door today, im not sure what sort of reaction he would have. Of course he did not want these exhibits to be about harry truman. Especially once he passes away, people want to know what his administration was about. Our exhibits are what we call our permanent exhibits, which as you know well is a misnomer because nothing is permanent. We hope we can change them every 15 to 20 years. But the First Permanent exhibits were created here starting in the late 1990s and into 2001. Now we are doing our second complete redo of the museum, firstng redoing those permanent exhibits to meet new audiences. Herman lets talk about the process of taking a fresh look at a museums entire permanent exhibit and completely remaking it. This has been cloaked in mystery for most of the public who see a new exhibition and wonder how they got from an antique gallery space to this finished exhibit. These things take a long time to create. When we embarked on our project to redo the permanent exhibits of the roosevelt library, the process of doing that was about five years total from the original planning sessions through the design to the final installation and opening of the exhibit. What is the timeframe of the project you are now coming to fruition with later this year . Clay it is about the same amount of time. It will be about five years since we started the planning process once the exhibits are done. In addition to the planning, you have the design work and storyline and all that. A very important component is these exhibits are generally created not as part of the federal government, but by the librarys private support foundation. In our case, it is the Harry S Truman international institute. They had to raise money for the new exhibit. That takes time too. You have to have a coherent statement of the purpose. You have to have people excited to donate. Theur case, the design and fundraising went handinhand. It couldnt have been done in any shorter a period of time. In addition to the design and so forth, you have to make sure the money is in hand to do it. Herman these things have a longer timeframe, both for fundraising and creating them, than people often think. Keynt to talk about the elements that go into this process. One thing right off the bat is understanding your audience. You may have had a similar experience. We recognized our audience was changing. Draw fromim sure, we a local audience and people come from across the country, and we have international visitors, but there was a generational thing where the visitors who were young adults during the fdr era were a shrinking part of our audience. We were getting a bigger percentage every year visitors of history, not something that was their lived experience. That has important implications for the way you tell the story in the museum. I assume that is a similar issue for you at the truman. Clay sure. Years ago, before we did the first round of our renovation in the late 1990s, the exhibits prior were basically all static exhibits. They were objects and texts and photographs. It was sort of like a book on the wall, as they say. By can get by w cant get with that. You have to have more interactivity in the exhibits. You know the subject you are dealing with is interesting to you, but you have to find a way to pull people in and make it as exciting as it is to you already. There are always changing techniques. Think more context is needed. E needed to put a lot more information about what was the Great Depression and what was world war ii for younger audiences to gie th to give them the context to understand why president roosevelt matters, why he was important. In doing that, the museum becomes not just a place where you learn about president aboutelt, you learn a bit the 1930s and 1940s. Clay that is very true. I know you remember because you helped us with the exhibit we 2000s. He 1990s and when we did that round, we had to tell more about the period. Muchxhibit was probably as about what was going on in the country, to set the stage, as it was about truman himself. We are doing that now more so because the people coming in today are farther removed from the time period. So many of them dont know who harry truman was. You have to set that stage and put it in context and tell the story that way so it was not simply a story of he was president from x to y, here is what he did and so forth. You have to make people understand what the world was like at the time. Herman it is important they understand the context. That is key for understanding the world in which these president s operated. The related thing we are always conscious of here, it is very important to layer the experiences in the galleries so you can meet people that have different interest levels. Visitors come with different agendas. Some are intensely interested, some have a marginal interest, some have a brief encounter in the museum. We try to make it accessible to people of different interest levels so we can serve all those audiences. Clay right. The other thing people need to understand about a Museum Exhibit is there is no way a Museum Exhibit can cram in all t he information you cant put all the information in an exhibit. The thing we hope to do is get people interested enough in the subject that they will go home and check out books from the library or do more internet searching and dig down into the part of the story they like the most. I think it is very important to make people understand how the decisions made during our respective presidencies, yours roosevelt and ours truman, how those decisions made by those president s are still affecting everybody today. We go out of our way to make sure the exhibits include a component so people understand harry truman may have made a decision about x or y, but that s not the end of the story. It is still affecting us today. When a visitor comes in, they ask why is this important to me . Well, you are still living in a world where the decisions made back then have an effect on your life. Is vital to make those connections today so people become more engaged with the subject. It is striking a balance. An mentioned the expression, exhibit is not a book on the wall. People experience it standing. They are experiencing history in a different way than when you sit down in a comfortable chair and read a book. We need to always be aware of this. Curators are central to the process of doing exhibits, but the curator is really only part of a larger team of experts and specialists in many different areas. We have been alluding to that in this conversation. Modern exhibits are complicated things in addition to artifacts and documents. There is film, audiovisual experiences, immersive environments. These involve the work of a whole range of people. Exhibit designers, filmmakers, architects, lighting designers, editors, sound specialists. Interestinghas an role in the midst of that. I wonder if you can talk about what it is like to work with a diverse team of specialists. Clay it takes a large team. I would define the role of the curator is the person who needs to define the story. Who what is the story . What is the take away from the museum . From there, you bring in other people and they help flesh out theirory and provide expertise. The audiovisual archivist says i have these six films and so forth that will illustrate that idea. And the archive staff, their thesebution is weve got papers truman signed that illustrate topic y. The curators role is to say here is the story we want to tell, help us tell it in a compelling way. That is where you bring your team together. Anyou mentioned, it is Important Role of archive and av staff, but you need people who are experts in the latest technologies and graphic design, andous parts of fabrication installation. People to help with all sorts of tasks in putting various pieces of the exhibit together. In my mind, the starting point is what is the story . What is the compelling thing we want to tell . Herman i completely agree with your description of the proper role of the curator in all this. It is all about getting the story right and telling the story well. Model of museums, it was collection driven. Now the philosophy is much more, what are the stories you want to tell . Pick objects and documents that help tell that story. It is the story that drives that experience, not trying to get every single artifact into the displays. One of the things we had to grapple with at the outset, and i will tell you how we worked it out, where do you start the story . Our audience is changing and more people are coming in the building that need an introduction to the time period to understand the importance of the president and end what wein the decided to do was start our exhibit at the depths of the Great Depression. To plunge you into the state of the country and the world in 1932 at the low point of the depression when fdr is running for president. We take you through that process of his election and up to his inaugural. It is not until he is inaugurated as president that we step back and tell you the story, who is this man elected to lead the nation in this great moment of crisis . What is the story of his life prior . We look at his early political career back to that same moment of the inaugural. From that point on, we take you through his presidency. This business of frontloading the story and moving back in time because we wanted to make sure the audience coming in knew immediately the nation was facing a tremendous crisis one roosevelt was elected. Once they understood the skill of the crisis, they would be more interested learning who was this guy who grew up in hyde park and eventually is running for president. That was a decision made early in the process that then dictated what we did subsequently. I wonder if you were looking at the big picture in the beginning. Things you are thinking about and how did you come to a decision . Clay ironically we used very much the same approach. Did we want to do a chronological approach, start with Harry Trumans birth and so forth . We realized there is a real thing called museum fatigue. We figured if we started at the beginning and worked chronologically, people would get tired during trumans first year in office. We look for the dramatic moments. The dramatic moment at the depths of the depression. The dramatic moment for harry truman is the date Franklin Roosevelt died. Suddenly truman is thrust into the office of the presidency. Noboody really knows who he is. Franklin roosevelt has been president for the full adult lives of many people at the time. There were a few people who knew who harry truman was. Wee star we start with a dramatic walkin theater presentation with wall to ceiling, floor to ceiling videos that thrust people into the middle of world war ii with battles going on all over the world and so forth. Suddenly there is the news headline that Franklin Roosevelt is dead and harry truman goes into office. You are left with this big question. We use quotes from people at the time, but it is something we hope people will understand, who is president now . Harry truman . Who is this guy . He was only Vice President for 82 days. He was a senator from missouri before he became Vice President. We leave that theater with the question, who is harry truman . Was he up to being president . Background can make you believe he was capable of being president . Many did nothing he could fill roosevelts shoes. They walk out of that theater whereen we take you to harry truman came from, his experience i world war in, the maybe in his life that gave him the leadership abilities he would have to use later as president. Then we bring you back to the presidency and his first four months of presidency, which were certainly one of the most romantic fourmonth periods dramatic fourmonth periods of any president. Ending the war, using the atomic bomb. It is such a dramatic four months of his presidency that it brings you back into the drama of the moment. Herman it sounds like a great way to open too. It crams people by the throat right away. You mentioned the theatrical experience at the beginning. We have a similar thing that deals with the Great Depression. We put people in a small theater where there is a dramatic visual presentation of the crisis going on. That raises a question of audiovisual elements. They play a big role in modern history museums. I think they are very effective, but they need to be used in effective ways. Other times it helps to tell the story in a particularly vivid way. Museumre places in our where we use film effectively. One areas i think it works well for us is when we talk about polio and the impact it had on fdr. He is stricken with polio at age 39. He becomes paralyzed from the waist down and remains paralyzed for the rest of his life. It is a critical subject in his life from that point on. We do have a very poignant display of his braces and some documents that relate to polio. It is the film that accompanies that that gives you a powerful emotional connection to the story. It takes you through the story towhat it took for him rebuild his body to overcome the depression he felt. That was one instance where film had a way of telling the story that added value to the experience for visitors. Was there a place where you found film helped you to tell the story in an effective way . Clay i think so. I could mention a number of places. Ouse ot a theater in h you walk into this room and it is basically the ruins of europe and video projection is done on the walls. It talks about postwar europe and the challenges truman faced. That is kind of a theater experience. Probably the centerpiece of our entire exhibition is just after world war ii has ended. The atomic bomb has been dropped, the war is over. You turn a corner in the exhibit and you see this room with an enormous 14 foot globe. It is a threedimensional globe that is 14 feet tall. The globe has actual cracks in it. The idea is this is the world harry truman faced immediately after world war ii. The idea is there are crises taking place all over the world because the world is devastated from the war. ,e have video projections repeated silent video projections on the surface of this globe that show conditions in various countries over the world. It is a very impressionistic sort of thing. It shows people, okay, world war ii is over, but that was only the beginning of the challenges truman had to face. Here is a world devastated from the war and he has to deal with crises happening all over the world. The globe is in the center of the room and outside we have thebits that deal with programs and policies that truman initiated. For example, the truman doctrine and the Marshall Plan and oteher acts and efforts that were taking place. Audiovisualuse of to create an impression for visitors that, even though the war is over, the challenges around the globe are enormous. The other thing we use our theaters for for example, we have a theater relating to trumans decision to recognize israel in 1948. What we try to emphasize there and other places in the exhibit is president s have to make difficult decisions. Some of them are not cut and dry. Some are decisions you have to buckle down and decide, what are you going to do . Presentation to illustrate the conflict within the Truman Administration about whether or not truman should formally recognize the new state of israel. Herman that sounds great. I can hardly wait to see these new exhibits. The use of immersive environments is really effective in helping to convey messages. On a smaller scale, we do it in a couple places in our museum by recreating period rooms. Have visitors experience how americans in the 1930s and 1940s would hear fdr on the radio, the great mass medium. There was no television at that time. If people were going to have a firsthand experience of the president through the radio, we created a space that recreated the kitchen of a struggling family during the Great Depression. In the room there is a small cathedral style radio seated on the table. You can sit down in this kitchen and by pressing a button you can listen to a portion of one of fdrs fireside chats and get the same experience people would have had in the 1930s of hearing him talk about certain issues. When you are finished hearing that excerpt, you can push another button and hear actors r eading excerpts from letters written to the president by the public in response to that speech. You are hearing their voices as well. We took care to include people that were positive about what fdr was saying, but a fair number who disagreed with the president. I want to turn to a different aspect of what we do our museums. That is how we integrate the story of the first lady into the exhibition. This was another big question for us as we started off our project. Eleanor roosevelt was completely involved in so many aspects of fdrs new deal and things going on during world war ii. She was an active first lady. Ae set a new standard in what first ladys role is. In the older museum, the one we are revising, there was a separate gallery for Eleanor Roosevelt. When we were looking at redoing the permanent exhibits, we decided that did not make much sense having her in a separate place. She was so much involved in fdrs presidency. Instead of having a separate Eleanor Roosevelt gallery, we have her appearing throughout the exhibition in various ways. Woven into thely story, as she was in reality. We were taking a chance. Admirers of the first lady liked we had a separate gallery. We had to convince them we could do it in a way that would enhance her role in the museum. We were pleased when we reopened peopleibit in 2013 that were very happy with how we integrated eleanor into the story. Ndle first lady truman and the exhibits you are going to reopen . Clay that is a great question. We also struggled with this question. Truman . E deal with best bess truman. There could not have been a bigger difference between Eleanor Roosevelt and bess truman in terms of their public persona. Eleanor roosevelt was everywhere. She really defined a new role for the first lady. Bess truman did not want to be that. She was a very private person. She was a very family oriented person. As an aside, for 3. 5 years of the truman presidency, the trumans did not live in the white house because it was being renovated. They lived in the blair house across the street. They did not do a lot of entertaining. Early in the presidency, coming out of world war ii, there also wasnt much entertaining in the white house because that was seen as bad taste early on to be doing a lot of entertaining after the war. Bess truman did not want to do any entertaining. There were occasions when there was an opportunity to do entertaining. Bess was no Eleanor Roosevelt, but what was her role . Her role was her role was as a personal confidant of harry truman. We have a series of more than 1300 handwritten letters harry wrote to bess over their lifetimes. That is the good news. The bad news is we have fewer than 200 letters that she wrote to him. The reason for that is she burned her letters. She did not want the public to know what she was saying to harry. She missed about 200 of them, so we do have just under 200 letters. They would write letters to each other almost every day, sometimes more than one a day. They were very close. We do know she had a really strong behindthescenes influence on harry truman. They would discuss things in the evening and so forth. She was not necessarily a policy person, but she was reading people and she would advise harry about people. This was a very private woman. It just seemed to us it would not make sense to have a separate gallery for her because what we would have to do is do everything bess truman did not want to do. She did not want to be public. She did not like to do a lot of entertaining. She did not like entertaining. But what we did have is this personal correspondence, so we can see her role behind harry truman all the way through his career, so we try to weave that throughout the exhibit. The personal, as harry truman is dealing with issues we showed during his president ial years, we try to also show letters he has written to her so you can see that she was giving him suggestions and advice and being supportive. But it made more sense to weave it throughout the exhibit then it did to make a separate gallery for bess truman. Herman we have been talking a lot about immersive environments and av and things of that sort in the exhibit. There are a lot of documents and artifacts. We certainly have a lot of that in our museum and i am sure you do, too. A question i often get from visitors is, what is your favorite artifact in the museum . Or, what is your favorite document . I do have my favorites, and im sure you do, too. I thought it would be fun to mention a few of those during this program. We are curators. We cover a lot of ground. But we have our favorites as well. In my case, i love the fact that we have the original Oval Office Desk that f. D. R. Used, and the chair, and all the items he used keep on top of the desk. We have harry truman to thank for that because after f. D. R. s death, he gave the desk to Eleanor Roosevelt. That is not a usual thing. You dont usually see white House Furniture leaving the building. Feeleculate truman did not right sitting at the desk knowing it had been used f. D. R. For 12 years. In any case, he gave it to eleanor. She then gave it to the library. We are one of only two president ial libraries, the other being the l. B. J. Library, that has the actual desk used by the president. The other artifact i really love is a very different kind of artifact, much lighter. It is the giant model of space given to f. D. R. In 1939 at the dinner of the White House Press organization. Hims a striking likeness of as the sphinx, including his trademark cigarette holder and it is a wonderful device not just because it is funny but it is also a wonderful way to talk about f. D. R. s decision to run for a third term in 1940 because the whole story of the sphinx culture is connected to the fact he was not letting anyone know his true thoughts about whether he would run for a third term. In terms of documents, and we have many on display in our permanent gallery, i think the ones that stand out most for me are the original drafts of his onegural address in 1933, where he made the famous line, the only thing we have to fear is fear itself. And also, the first draft of his pearl harbor speech where he date that will live in infamy. There are lots of other documents and artifacts in the exhibit, but those are some that stand out for me. I wonder if you could talk about some of the favorite things you will be putting on display in your new exhibits. Clay of course, asking a curator what his favorite object is is sort of like asking a parent which is your favorite child. You cant possibly answer it. I will mention a couple. I think the most poignant artifact we will have on display is at the end of the exhibit dealing with the first four months of trumans presidency. It sort of culminates in this space does devoted to the decision to use the atomic bombs on japan. And we have the safety plug that was removed from the atomic bomb not dropped on nagasaki. And it was removed by the electronics officer after the plane took off. While it was in the air, they replaced the safety plug with an arm and plug so the bomb could be detonated. We have that safety plug on display in a case all by itself. It is in the center of the room. In the same with, exhibit gallery, we have a small paper crane folded by a girl who was in hiroshima when the atomic bomb went off. She was a young girl. She eventually developed leukemia from the radiation. Dying, shehe was folded 1000 paper cranes because that in tradition meant good luck. The library was presented with one of those last april cranes that she folded paper cranes that she folded. We have that in the same gallery to reconcileway the end of the war and where japan and americas relations have gone since. Those are a couple of the most poignant pieces. Of course, one of the most famous artifacts we have is the desk find that says the buck stops here, which truman referred to many times. That will be on display in the exhibit as well. Bessve two of harry and trumans automobiles, both 1941 model chryslers. We have a buggy that came from trumans farm in 1914. And a lot of other things. Herman,ou did this too, but we have set aside some exhibit spaces in our museum for highlights from our collection. Many people dont really understand or know that the president s dont just have in their collection things related to their presidency or lives. People gave them stuff all the time. Some of them are really fascinating pieces. We are going to display some of those in this exhibit area. We have, for example, a 1928 pilots license that belonged to amelia earhart. It is countersigned by the man who was the head of the predecessor of the faa, his name. As Orville Wright we have a lot of other pieces we will be displaying. They are not necessarily in our permanent exhibit, but we want people to understand the librarys collections are very rich. Not just relating to things that happened during the truman presidency but may just be gifts given to truman by people all over the country and the world. Herman i think it is great youre doing that. As you mentioned, we do the same thing. We have an area where people have the ability to look through glass walls into some of our collection rooms and see all of the things not on display in the permanent exhibit or the special exhibits. It is interesting. Most museums you go to, well over 90 of the collections are in storage at any given time. Any opportunity we can give people to see some of the other things i think is interesting for people. In our case, it lets us show you a portion of f. D. R. s ship model collection. You mention automobiles. We have the car f. D. R. Had modified with hand controls so he could drive it without the use of his legs because of his paralysis from polio. You mentioned earlier the atomic bomb. One of the topics i wanted to talk about today is president ial libraries are sometimes accused of being uncritical of the president s and only presenting a positive view of them. At the roosevelt library, we directly address issues where historians are very critical of f. D. R. , along with issues where there is disagreement among historians about aspects of his presidency and legacy. We do this in a number of ways. One of them is we have a series of touchscreen programs located throughout the galleries titled confront the issue, where we give people an opportunity to hear historians talking about topics. You can sample from documents from our own collection that shed light on this. They cover a whole range of subjects from what caused the Great Depression, did the new deal and the Great Depression, f. D. R. s response to the holocaust, his executive order incarcerating japaneseamericans during world war ii, the new deal on African Americans where new deal programs were often marked by racism and segregation. We have a host of these topics where you hear from the critics of f. D. R. , and youre able to explore documents that shed light on the debate or topic from history. Are there ways you are doing similar things in your new exhibits . Clay yeah, sure. We are trying to do the same thing. We learned this a long time ago, that your exhibits gain more credibility if you display the all, so we have tried to do that everywhere we can in our exhibit. You know, the whole idea that truman was not qualified to be president when he became president. Most of his decisions had opponents who were very verbally strong about their opposition. Tried in as many cases as we can to display any documentation of that. You know, letters from irate people. You know, the irate father of a soldier who was killed in korea. And all throughout the exhibit, we try to do that. Harry truman was a flawed , andn, like everybody is he was fairly candid about it himself. In a lot of his writings, he didntlk about he really regret decisions he made. He sort of made that clear. He made a decision and went to sleep afterwards. When the decision was made, it was done. But we do try to bring out his critics. His decision to use the atomic bomb was controversial at the time. It is still very controversial. We have an area where historians and people who lived at the time, quotations from them highly criticizing truman for that. And then, we also have a comment book where people can write their own comments about whether they thought trumans decision was the right one or not. We try to do that as many places in the exhibit as we can. It. An you mentioned andink people respect appreciate when you confront these issues honestly and point out where historians have been critical of the president. It is a great way of having points of engagement with audiences. They come sometimes knowing a bit about these topics. They are looking for it. They are hoping you do address it. I think we have had really great responses to the aspects of our exhibit where we are presenting critical viewpoints of the president. The last thing i want to talk we talked about where you start the exhibit, but how do you end the experience . This is something we had a great deal of discussion on our end about how to do this. These stories have ends with the death of the president. But these president s, and i think especially the ones that we are talking about, frankly roosevelt Franklin Roosevelt and harry truman, these were consequential president s. They are still impacting our lives 70 or 80 years later in so many ways. We struggled for a long time with how to end the story. Death,rly cover f. D. R. s which is the beginning of your story, so that is where our museums intersect for a moment. Actually had two things we ended up doing. I mentioned earlier Eleanor Roosevelt and how she is woven through the exhibit, of course, eleanor continues beyond 1945. She does not die until 1962. She had a very consequential career in the 1940s and 1950s. Sent a delegation to the united nations. She was the principal author of the universal declaration of human rights. She was involved in many issues in the 1950s. Civil rights, democratic politics, womens rights. What we did is after we cover f. D. R. s death and truman taking over as president , we have a final gallery where we look at Eleanor Roosevelts life beyond 1945 and all of the Amazing Things she was involved in. After that, we have a small theater. We struggled with how we wrap up the legacy, not just of f. D. R. But of eleanor. We went back and forth endlessly about how we were going to end the gallery. We knew we wanted to have some sort of sit down theater where you have a final experience, but we did not know how to do it. We finally did find a way. It turns out at the end of the 20th century, famous americans were asked to comment on who they thought was the most influential 100 people of the century. Time magazine did this at the end of the century. Bill clinton, who was the sitting president at the time, wrote an essay for that Magazine Issue in which he made the argument that Franklin Roosevelt deserved to be in that group. We read the essay and realized clinton had done a wonderful job of compressing into a small essay the real, lasting legacies of both franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt. We contacted the Clinton Library and asked if they could check with the president and see if it was ok if we used his essay as the basis for our final theater. And then, we actually asked whether or not he would be willing to narrate it. The answer on both counts was yes. He was willing to use let us use the essay and was happy to narrate it. What we have at the end is a theater where we sit down and bill clinton narrates in his thinks the he legacies of franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt are. [indiscernible] importance today is so huge. How do you treat the endpoint after trumans death . How do you treat the final experience of visitors before they leave . Clay we decided to do what we call our lacey gallery. It is kind of a hallway area as you are leaving the exhibition where we go back and look at a series of issues on sort of a timeline thing. In the center of the timeline are the decisions that truman made on these various issues, and then above and below this timeline are actions that other president s took either just before truman or after truman. Social security which roosevelt is prominent in before truman. Things like medicare, which truman had proposed but was not actually enacted until the johnson administration. You sort of see these things that are decisions truman made, but they are not static. President s before truman had initiated some. Truman had initiated some which are still being dealt with today. We hope to get people thinking about this whole idea that even if a president served 70 years ago, the decisions that president made are still affecting us today. So, they walk through that gallery. We have only one artifact in that whole gallery. That is this little oval table that was in the president ial the hotel in kansas city. Fromtruman came back washington while president , he had his office at the meal box hotel and he had this president ial suite. And he used this little table to sign things on and so forth it was on that table that he signed the act that became known as the truman which provided aid to greece and turkey, but also became the foundations for providing assistance to countries that were resisting communism. But that table was then given to the Truman Library, and we have had it on display a long time. President Lyndon Johnson came here to officially sign the medicare act here at the Truman Library. And he gave the first two medicare cards to harry and bess truman. And he signed that on that table as well. Secretary of000, state Madeleine Albright came here and signed what was called the nato accession. Nato was established during trumans administration. Madeleine albright wanted to recognize truman for that, so she came out here and signed this thing that added the first three new countries to nato. We have got that in display galleryay in our legacy. Museum, theyt our go through a space that deals with the truman funeral. From there, they can access our courtyard where truman had his office here for years and also the gravesites where harry and bess truman are buried. Herman that is great. That object you described is wonderful. Aspects ofates both his domestic and international legacy. You have it all in one object people encounter at the end. I want to thank you for joining me in this conversation about the process of developing new exhibits. I have got to say i am really looking forward to seeing your exciting new permanent exhibit when it opens. So, thanks again for joining me in this conversation. This is American History tv on cspan3, where each weekend, we feature 48 hours of programs exploring our nations past. Nature]of each week, American History tvs reel america brings you archival films that provide context for todays Public Affairs issues. [video clip] come on, now. [clogging sounds] [banjo music] [singing a folk tune] with a banjo on my knee across the ocean i ate to go ache to go has breakedy girl my heart you come and go you come and go you come and go ore i get too old u. S. Senator sam nunberg on the cold war 75 years after it began. In a conversation hosted by the georgia historical society. Here is a review. Met inthe people you your career in the senate, your time traveling abroad, all of the officials you met in terms of the cold war, lets go one cold war personality who most impressed you for good or ill and all the time you were in public service. Spin the question a little bit different. Who did i meet that had the most affecting world events during this time . Gorbachev has to be the systemt because was going to collapse. But humanity was blessed by the fact gorbachev was in leadership, because any of his predecessors, in my view, we would have had a bloodbath. It would not have been a peaceful collapse of an empire, so gorbachev in my view, he did not save the system, but he probably they from worst atrocities in history that could have been. , i certainlyson did not agree with him on many things, but ming changed the world when he changed china. He awakened the sleeping giant. Third, i would put the series of president s we had from truman through h. W. Bush when the cold war ended. Truman made some very gutsy decisions. H. W. Bush at the end made a lot of good decisions in terms of germany, german reunification. Huge number of excess, Dangerous Nuclear weapons. Justd brent scowcroft, who passed away, had a huge effect. He put pressure on the soviet system and all autocratic systems. Not with military power but with his emphasis on values and human rights and integrity and dignity and respect for human beings. That is the ultimate way you put pressure on regimes. And i think harder does not get anything like the credit he deserves. And of course, reagan made tremendous contribution through not only his strong and firm stand against communism but his recognition that gorbachev was a different kind of leader. Most people in both parties did not realize it when reagan realized it. Gorbachev made one of the most profound statements when they said together that nuclear war cannot be won and therefore must not be fought. Watch the full Program Sunday at 2 00 p. M. Eastern, 11 00 a. M. Pacific here on American History tv. Next, on the civil war, the Gettysburg Civil War Institute d. Scottiscussion with hartwig. He discusses how he got started discussing researching the battle of antietam. The Civil War Institute provided the video. We travel to northeastern france with the historian to visit key locations and learn about the juste of saint mihiel inside the western front that the germans had occupied since 1914. At 8 00 eastern on lectures in history, the emory professor teaches a class about president richard nixon, henry kissinger, and some of their key Foreign Policy initiatives. Today, we are going to talk about scotts book. Here we go. Published by johns hopkins. We have this Discount Code unc was able to provide. I have the hardback version, signed i might add. It is in paperback. Is a thoughtful book, a book that leads up to the battle at antietam creek