Transcripts For CSPAN3 Hoover Presidential Library And Museums American Presidents Exhibit 20170807

Brought to the Hoover Library by cspan in partnership with mediacom. The curator shows us the additional artifacts that accompany each of the portraits. Today we are at the Herbert Hoover president ial library in west branch, iowa. We are in the museum portion of the building. This is our temporary exhibit, which is cspans american president s life portraits. The idea for this came about from thinking about bringing the temporary exhibit from cspan. And then adding something personal from each man to show Something Different about them. We think of them as about the president s, but we want to show them as human beings as well. And that is an interesting aspect. Some of these guys were very interesting. To borrow the objects, it was an extensive process trying to find sites associated with the different people and getting them to agree to loan us items. We did with other president ial libraries and the archives, and then everything from the National Park service to individual historical societies, state historical societies, and even a few individuals. One of the things about the temporary exhibits we do here at the hoover president ial library is that our temporary exhibits are generally here only. While the base and core of this show is the cspan american president s piece, the added objects are only going to be seen here in this configuration. If anybody else is putting Something Like this together, they are on their own. This is what we put together. And we are pretty proud of it. Here we are with George Washington. George washington, first president of the United States, one of our founding fathers. What we have for George Washington is a copy from his library of a book called essay on Human Understanding by john locke. That book was one used by the founding fathers. From this go into the declaration of independence. George washingtons copy is from 1775. And inside of both front covers of it is his personal bookplate. Then on the title page of each one, he actually signed his name into it, which is apparently not common for him to have both of his bookplate and his signature. But what also makes these books unique is that these were owned by Herbert Hoover. Herbert hoover purchased these at a bookstore in new york city im not exactly sure what year, we have not been able to figure that out, but about two blocks from where he lived in the waldorf towers is where the bookstore was located. The books were part of washingtons private library. They were sold by his family in for 20. 1800s and Herbert Hoover spent about 2700 to buy these books. And now, who knows what they are worth. Here we are at john adams. John adams was our second president. And one of our founding fathers. What we have for john adams is the seal he used to authenticate his signature on the treaty in in 1789 that ended the American Revolutionary war. He was sent to negotiate with the british. The treaty was signed in paris. This seal, while the adams did not have their own family crest, the crest to used is the family crest of his motherinlaw. Then, moving on to thomas jefferson, our third president , also a founding father, we have a glass inkwell and a pen nib holder. We think about the quill pen a lot. Feathers were not used as much as we seem to think. It would have been just a wooden holder that held a special tip which would be used to write. Is fromholder monticello, who we borrowed this from. 1775 21825,from when he died. It might be something he used when he was writing the declaration of independence. We dont know. Here we are with james madison, our fourth president and one of our founding fathers. And what we have borrowed for 1812is a document from called the warship document. This is from the montpelier foundation. This document is interesting because it is a document for a ship. The ship is an american cargo ship, signed by president madison and secretary of war james monroe, who becomes the next president. This document is to show the ship is a neutral ship. At the time, the french and british are taking american ships and sailors and pressing them into their navies to fight for them or sale for them, claiming they are defectors from the british navy. This document was designed to claim the ship was neutral. Later on at the beginning of the war of 1812, it was captured by the british. Moving on to james monroe, what we have on loan from the James Monroe Museum is a snuffbox. James monroe was known to partake of snuff, finely powdered tobacco leaves snorted or snuffed up. It was a Common Social practice at this time. You would pass the snuffbox around, people would take a pinch, and snort it. Known toroe was enjoyed a variety of different types of tobacco products. The interesting side note is Dolley Madison was known to like snuff tobacco as well. John quincy adams, son of john adams, and what we have on loan from the Adams National historic cufflinks. Et of to johnes them unique quincy adams, but they are also tied to john adams, is that is inside each of the cufflinks, there is hair from both his mother, abigail adams, and john adams. The other cufflinks that has the here of john adams, which he did not have a lot of, and his wife. It seems kind of weird and some people think it is even creepy that we have family members hair in our jewelry, but it was a common practice, a way of remembering relatives who passed away. Just keeping a piece of them close to us all of the time. They are pretty neat. They have on them in latin, it says remember, consider the relatives. You can think about the past when you are wearing the cufflinks. For Andrew Jackson, we have a turkish pike on loan to us from the hermitage in tennessee. Not a lot is known about this pipe. Were apes but pipes common way of smoking tobacco at the time. And his wife also enjoyed smoking pipes as well. Here we are with Martin Van Buren and he was the chosen successor to Andrew Jackson. Andrew jackson eight him what he called a presentation cane. It is made out of hickory wood from Andrew Jackson hermitage. What is interesting about the cane is it has Little Silver medallions going down the shaft. Each of those little medallions from the top to the bottom, there is a letter punched into spellsedallions and it Andrew Jackson all the way down. That is on loan to us from the Martin Van Buren Historic Site. Here we are with William Henry harrison, one of our shortest lived president s. And what we have from him is an inaugural cane presented to him. We are not sure who it was presented high, but the idea of presenting a cane to somebody or a Walking Stick is probably be more appropriate term was a shell or expect them a show of respect or esteem. The top of the chain is engraved with his inauguration date of march 4, 1841. Canes were a very common accessory for out walking around. Now we think of them as something older people use to get around. They were very fashionable in the day. John tyler was the Vice President for William Henry harrison. After harrisons death, he became president. What we have on loan through the Virginia Historical society and through his greatgranddaughter is a card and gaming table. It was beautiful inlaid wood, probably made in the netherlands. It opens up into a smooth playing surface. It also has a second hinge which opens into a felted tabletop for playing cards, little places for keeping coins or tokens. Popular card games at the time might have been hearts were even poker. And here we are with james k. Polk, the 11th president of the United States. What we have for james polk is is thee mesh letter seal. His wife would travel with him and bring along her secretary travel desk. Equalo of them had a very relationship together with all the letters he wrote. The seal is made from ivory and brass and is online to us from the Historical Society. Here we are with Zachary Taylor and this item we have here is a letter on loan to us from the filson Historical Society. The letter was written by Zachary Taylor when he was president to a friend of his named colonel webb. He was writing him about Millard Fillmore and he is interested in their stance on slavery. Owner but he slave was not for slavery continuing. Fillmore thought slavery was evil but he also believed the government should have no involvement in ending it. That is what makes the letter and interesting letter. The handwriting of taylor is pretty hard to read which is sort of interesting because i think of these guys as having a more likable legible handwriting that a lot of people today. Here we are with Millard Fillmore. As Vice President , millard a friendwas appointing of his to a clerkship. The letter we have is to his who got him started in law. What i find interesting about this piece is im dealing with only one object of Millard Fillmores but as i do my own research it becomes less clear who he is actually writing this letter to. His mentor would have taught him law. A job in a clerk in a law office for a few hundred dollars a year seems like it might be a step backwards for mr. Wood. But this a letter written in his hand on loan to us from the aurora Historical Society in aurora, new york. Here we are with franklin pierce. We have a letter frequent pierce wrote to Abraham Lincoln which is on loan to us from the library of congress. What is interesting about this letter is this was a letter of sympathy written from pierce upon the death of Abraham Lincolns son. He was 11 years old. Part of what makes this letter really heartfelt is pierces on son died at the age of 11, shortly before he became president in 1853. He died in a train accident all three of them were in while franklin and his wife both survived an injured unin jured. They did see the crushed body of their son which was tragic for them and they both became depressed as a result of that and im sure it affected his presidency. Really interesting letter he writes in sympathy to Abraham Lincoln. Moving on to James Buchanan, we have on loan from the Lancaster Historical association a tobacco smoking pipe. T is made in london James Buchanan was known to smoke a little bit. There is not much known about James Buchanan other than that. This is one of the harder president s to try to get things for. Here we are with Abraham Lincoln. Abraham lincoln liked to go to the old soldiers home and he would take his items, papers, in this portfolio with we have on loan to us from the Abraham Lincoln library and museum in illinois. He carried some of the documents he worked on like the emancipation proclamation in the portfolio. In addition, we also have this seal that he used, the seal of the United States. It can be dated to about 1864 by the number of stars on it. It has 36 stars which would indicate when nevada had become a state. With that, we have the storage box made that came with the seal. Box ofn interesting holding this item of Abraham Lincolns. Johnson,ng onto Andrew Andrew johnson was apprenticed at the age of 10 to a tailor and working for who he awaypprenticed to and ran and went off to be a tailor in a different town. He moved around a little bit. He ended up settling in greenville, tennessee, where he started his own tailoring business. What we have on loan for him is some of his shears and a large iron that weighs about 10 pounds. He was a pretty successful andnessman at doing that made a pretty good living at it or you here we are with ulysses s. Grant. The item we have is a letter he had written to his sisterinlaw after the civil war was over in august of 1865. He is talking about sending her a check for 500. He is talking about family plans. One of the things that is interesting in the letter is he is talking about how he does not want to have a big party. He would rather go fishing. One of the things that is interesting about the letter is grants signature is cut out of it. If somebody would write to the family and say they would like your signature, they would cut out his signature and keep the rest of the letter for themselves. A lot of people were collecting signatures at this time at a later time. Not an uncommon thing to see. You will see that in a lot of different places where famous peoples signatures have been somebody. And given to hayes on to rutherford b. , we have a parish issues on loan to us from the rutherford b. Hayes museum. They are pretty common shoes. Most shoes at this time were handmade. They are considered to be massproduced, made in factories. Shoes madetill have for you which would be a more comfortable fit. This is a very common type of shoe. They dont appear to be left or right footed. That is becoming less common at this time as well. Here we are with james garfield, 20th president of the United States. The object we have for him which is on loan to us from the western reserve Historical Society in cleveland, ohio, is a dressing down the left dressing gown. It was not a bathrobe. It is a less formal jacket you would have around the house and you take Something Like this and put it on. It allowed men to have more color in their wardrobes. Most Mens Clothing was pretty drab at this time. These things can be pretty intricate and interesting. Very comfortable for around the house. Here we are with chester arthur. What we are two letters on loan to us from the new york state archives. The letters are dealing with getting supplies at the beginning of the civil war. Chester arthur was working and with the quartermaster general for the state of new york and trying to supply the new troops coming into the army in new york was a bit of a challenge. They never had this many troops before. Trying to get all the supplies, weapons, uniforms, shoes for all of the people. It shows the confusion at the beginning of the war of getting it done. This is from may and the second one is from the beginning of you june. Can see how things have gotten more efficient. Arthur was known to be pretty efficient at it. And he eventually gets promoted to be the quartermaster general. For the state of new york. Never comes close to combat. But he is serving his country in the best way that he was able to. Here we are with Grover Cleveland. The 22nd and 24th president of the United States. He is the only president to serve nonconsecutive terms. And most people dont realize he was an avid outdoorsman. He liked to go hunting and fishing. What we have are some of his fishing bobbles he used when he would go fishing. These are on loan to us from the Grover Cleveland birthplace Historic Site in new jersey. Known for being very serious about his fishing. A couple of different times, he said if you want to catch a fish, attended strictly to business. That is something he said to one of his friends when they were out fishing and his friend was messing around. He also said that fishing was good for the soul and good for the country. One of the funnier things he said is that the fishermans e ,oving on to Benjamin Harrison Benjamin Harrison, what we have postpresidency, he continued to be an attorney. One of the things he did was he represented the country of venezuela against british guyana. While he was in paris for the trial for that, this is a hat he were at that time. A little bit different style than you sometimes see. It is not a straight stovepipe hat. It has a concave around it. He wore this hat around paris. While he was in paris, he spent 25 hours in the courtroom, filed an 800page brief. While he lost the case, he he did get International Acclaim for the legal arguments he used. Here we are with William Mckinley. The optic we have for William Mckinley is from the William Mckinley home in canton, ohio. Wayne mckenney liked to ice skate. As a boy, he was not very interested in sports. However, he did enjoy ice, playing marbles, and shooting the bow and arrow. For William Mckinley are hard to come by. His collection was dispersed. He had no dependents. Most of his things are around and hard to come by. Is a prettyce skate neat thing to have, and we are glad to have it. Moving on to Teddy Roosevelt, the 26th president , we have one of his saddles from when he was a rancher in the dakotas. One of the interesting things about his time in the dakotas is he went out to the dakotas after his first child was born. Two days later, Teddy Roosevelt mother died and then his wife died leaving him with a newborn child. Atwas stricken with grief losing both of those people at the same time. He went out to the dakotas and purchased a ranch out there named the maltese cross. He learned to ride and rope and do all the things a cowboy does out there. He did that for three or four years before going back to new york. In this saddle is on loan to us from the sagamore hills Historic Site with the park service. Here we are with William Howard president toy after the presidency go on to become a Supreme Court justice. He was the chief Supreme Court justice until shortly before he died. After being defeated for reelection, he went on to teach at yale law school. While he was there, we have two of the exams he gave to his law students. We also have a document from at the summer white house in beverly, massachusetts. From beverly, massachusetts, we have in itinerary of things he did. Going for a drive, going to church, those are things he did there. Moving on to Woodrow Wilson, the 20th president of the United States, the item we have for Woodrow Wilson is a picnic set. What is interesting about this is this is one of the picnic sets he used when he was courting his second wife. His first wife had died during his first term. He was introduced to this woman less than a year after his wife had died. And they fell in love and would go on drives. They would take a picnic set like this and go out and picnic in a park in the washington, d. C. , area or drive. He also had a second set for tea. They could do whatever they wanted to do that way. This continued into the presidency has well. Here we are with warren g. Harding. Warren g. Harding, what we have for hill is a set of golf clubs and a golf ball. An avid. Harding was golfer and was introduced to golfing at the age of the p1 when he was in the senate. He had a 22 handicap and considered golfing under 100 to be a personal victory. He spent a lot of time golfing. The last time he golfed was two weeks before he died. Like the social aspects of it but he also liked the game of it. He would always have a side wager going on. He would pay back the debt lost. He was followed by a terrier and the two of them could be seen together quite often on the golf course. Here we are with calvin coolidge, the 30th president. Calvin coolidge was a lifelong fisherman but mostly a bait fisherman. He learned flyfishing. We have some of his flies and one of israels his reels. In 1926 when his secret service chief took him out to a stream that was freshly stocked and ready to bite, Herbert Hoover referred to him is not a very good fly fisherman at the beginning but by the end of his term he was passable. Here we are with Herbert Hoover, the 31st president of the United States. And the president that i worked for. What we have for Herbert Hoover is some home movies taken of him which show him in a different light. That is the idea of this exhibit, adding objects to show a personal side to the president. Included with the films we are ,hown here are two color films the earliest color films from the white house. These were taken by his wife, lou henry hoover, in a format klled coated color odacolor. When run through a special filter, they become color. The filters didnt exist and this was recently digitized and colorized. We got a grant to do that. They were distributed to the public in february of this year. Now we are with Franklin Delano roosevelt, the 32nd president. Roosevelt said i owe my life to stamp collecting. What we have on loan from the Franklin Roosevelt president ial library and museum is some of his stamps and one of his magnifying glasses he would use to explore stamps. As a child, he would collect stamps. They taught him about geography and the world. Polio,dult when he had they would take his mind away from that and that allowed him to recover quicker. President , his son has commented how he had never seen him more relaxed than when he had time off to look at his stamps. That is what he loved to do. Here we are with harry s. Truman. Harry truman would spend some of his winters in key west at the little white house. While at the little white house, he started wearing these button up shirts, like a hawaiian shirt. They became very fashionable very quickly. They were more comfortable in the heat. It affected mens fashion and a lot of men around the country started wearing these shirts. For the Mens Clothing Companies Across the country. He really liked the shirts a lot. Here we are with Dwight Eisenhower. What we have from Dwight Eisenhower is one of his paintings. After golf, his second favorite passion was painting. He painted over 260 paintings in the 20 years after he was president. He got started after watching a portrait being painted of his wife, and that got him interested in painting. When his stuff was on exhibit at a new york art gallery in 1967, he said they would have burned this a long time ago if i were not president of the United States. Here we are with john f. Kennedy. For john f. Kennedy we have on loan from the john f. Kennedy president ial library and museum a model of his book from world war ii. It was important to him because it was the boat he commanded in the pacific which was sunk by the japanese. And he and 10 of the crew survived and able to swim to an island and able to get rescued that way. As a result, kennedy received the navy and marine medal as well as the purple heart. Here we are with lyndon johnson. For lyndon johnson, we have we have the telephone from his desk at the white house. It is a mass of buttons for different lines. Theres even an extra side panel for more buttons added on the side to contact more people. Lyndon johnson was always on the telephone. He had a telephone installed in his bathroom and he would talk with people. He would bring people in there and talk to them in the bathroom which could be disconcerting. He also recorded telephone conversations he had. Those were supposed to be not open to the public until 50 years after he had died. However that changed in 1993 with related to john f. Kennedys assassination as a result of the commission looking into that. They started transcribing or releasing Public Recordings of those. You can find them on the internet. I dont know why they are so interested in what the votes are up here. If i get along with the senate, it looks like yall could. If i can endure his program and control a hearing, it looks like yall could. Alyall have to run washington. Yall run austin. You can download them and listen to them on your computer. They are very interesting to hear, the way he talks to people, the way he coerces people, and how he goes about his business. Here we are with Richard Nixon. For Richard Nixon, we have a loan from the Richard Nixon president ial library and museum a pair of his reading glasses. Richard nixon did not like to be his glasses so there are very few photographs of him wearing his glasses. What is kind of fun about these glasses is you can see where they have been chewed on. Here we are with gerald ford. We have is one of his ski outfits he wore when he was president. This is on loan to us from the gerald ford president ial museum in grand rapids, michigan. What is fun about the ski jacket and outfit is he was an avid skier. He loved to go skiing. Ford is probably the most athletic of all the president s. He was a gifted athlete. He learned initially have to ski in the 1930s when his then girlfriend who was also a model had taught him how to ski. In look appeared magazine and cosmopolitan magazine. There is a photo spread of them skiing. It is kind of a fun thing. As president , he was such a good skier that the secret service was unable to keep up with him. They had to hire people whenever he would go on vacations skiing in colorado so they could keep up with him and protect him. Here we are with jimmy carter. We have a number of arrowheads that he collected at his farm in plains, georgia. He loved collecting arrowheads. He had a large collection of them which are at the jimmy carter president ial library and museum. These are on loan to us from there. As a result of his love of picking up artifacts and arrowheads he found on his farm the 1979he soil, archaeological resource protection act included a jimmy carter clause. It was not illegal to pick up and collect arrowheads found on the surface. , forg on to Ronald Reagan Ronald Reagan we on loan from the Ronald Reagan president to library and museum in california, we have a pair of his work gloves. When he would go out to his ranch in California North of los angeles on the coast in the mountains, he would spend time relaxing. He thought it was as close to heaven as you could get without being in heaven. It was a place he loved to go and enjoyed reading there. The gloves are interesting. Ooll look like sheep will lined. The buttons are horse heads. Here we are with george h. W. Bush. These are from the george h. W. Bush library and museum, a pair of cowboy boots given to him by the secret service in 2000. What is unique about them is they have golf cleats on the bottom of them. What most people may not realize is his father and grandfather were both heads of the United States golf association, so golf has been a big thing in his life for a lot of his life. The mixing of the golf cleats and cowboy boots is a very texas thing. Moving on to bill clinton, for bill clinton we have a pair of his Running Shoes made by nike, size 13. And they have the president ial logo. These are on loan to us from the William Jefferson Clinton Library in little rock, arkansas. Bill clinton was known for running eightminute miles, a pretty good pace. He would run at least three miles a day. Additionally when he was out running around washington with his entourage, secret service guards, if other people were jogging, he would holler over to them to come join us. The secret service was not excited about that because you are bringing unknown people into the area of the president. But he seemed to enjoy it and got along just fine. Here we are with george w. Bush. Haveeorge bush, we baseball cards he collected as a boy. Im guessing like 10, 11, 12, 13. What he did with these baseball cards as he would tape them to a selfaddressed card and put it in an envelope and mail it to the baseball player with a handwritten note saying please sign the card and return. These cards are the ones he got back. It shows an early love for whoball for the president at one time had owned a baseball team, the texas rangers. Now, barack obama. Burrowed from the barack obama president ial library is a chess set he got as a gift from the king of jordan. Barack obama is known to play chess. He enjoys playing chess. Occasionally, he and his wife play chess with each other. I dont know who wins more often. But he is known to have played with this chess set. And here we are with donald trump. Ist we have for donald trump one of the red baseball caps he wore during the campaign. The current president this early into an administration is hard to get objects for that were theirs. The National Archives at the time we were putting this together did not have any objects yet. The White House Gift unit had not received anything when we were working on this. We were able to acquire a red hat which we think represents, definitely representative of donald trump on the campaign and what he is trying to do as president