Sreenivasan Many Americans are headed to the mall tonight after finishing thanksgiving dinner. We examine how black friday has morphed into gray thursday. Jeffrey brown has another thanksgiving day story about a turn of the century photographer who documented the lives of native americans. He ended up being the largest traffic odyssey in american history. He ended up doing 2,200 pages of text telling life stories, diets habits, sex lives. Its documentaries of lives and nations and people and one man did it all. Sreenivasan and we close with an encore look at a story about chinas moves to satisfy a growing demand for meat. Thats all ahead on tonights newshour. Major funding for the pbs newshour has been provided by and with the ongoing support of these institutions and foundations. And. This program was made possible by the corporation for public broadcasting. And by contributions to your pbs station from viewers like you. Thank you. Sreenivasan it was a day of calm in the middle east, after eight days of punishing israeli air strikes and hamas rocket fire. Each side claimed the ceasefire was a victory, but neither was certain the truce would last. We begin with a report from alex thomson of independent Television News in gaza. Reporter party on, a show of joy, relief and unity. The flags of hamas, islamci jihad and fatah. All factions are friends today, at least in public the kalashnikovs are celebratory for now but hamas was pledging to break the ceaseifre even on day one if the blockade of gaza isnt lifted. If the palestinian will stay and the occupation in the west bank and here under israeli, gaza under siege, i dont think there is going to be a long ceasefire. One day or in a few days, a few weeks, a few months, theyre gonna break this ceasefire. By occupation he means this, areas, just one militarized crossing from gaza to israel. And israel decides what crosses goods, people. It is a complete commercial strangehold on a place desperate to be a country. Policemen able to show themselves on the streets without being targets for the first time in nine days. Fighters, too, and so many people in gaza claim their ability to fire rockets into tel aviv and jerusalem has changed everything. We went north this morning, as did so many gazans, to areas they fled in recent days. Up here in north gaza, close to the frontier with israel, people are used to the airstrikes that come, the craters that pockmark the countryside and that destroy their buildings. Lets face, its happened now every few years. So when you come here, youll find a sense of relief and immediate happiness, of course, but people are pretty skeptical about whether the peace will last. translated god willing i hope it holds but im 50 50. Theyve been breaking their promises since the prophets day. Reporter mobility scooter meets hamas flag. Ahmed atah lost both legs in the last israeli invasion. So, will a ceasefire become a peace . It could, he said, but first we need to give thanks to president morsi of egypt. Across gaza, hes something of a new hero, and theyre even impressed in israel. The egyptian president right now the best hope for peacekeeping here. Egypt was able to regain its regional role as a regional player, mediating between the israelis and the palestinians in convincing both of them to reach a ceasefire agreement. In the city, the flags, the rallies, talking up victory. In the countryside, the hamas song is, were going to bomb tel aviv. But away from politics, what about people, lives disrupted by all this . Yesterday we filmed awad and his mum sabbah taking shelter in a school in gaza city. Frightened, disorientated, a severely disabled boy caught up in all this. Today, diplomacy had delivered. Sabbah was at home with the family in atatrah. Its good that were okay. Im very happy i cant believe it, im shivering. That face, sabbah said, means hes feeling happy and safe, and with an arms round from brother mahmoud, and no sound of an explosion. Sreenivasan in israel, reserve troops began moving away from the border with gaza. Many israelis were grateful a ground operation had been averted. And a day after a bomb ripped through a bus during the tel aviv rush hour, injuring 27, israel announced it had arrested a suspect, an arab israeli man with ties to hamas. I spoke with stephanie freid, a freelance journalist in tel aviv, a short time ago. Stephanie, youre just back from southern israel, the region that was most affected by those rocket attacks. How are people now at 24 hours after the ceasefire . Well, people are venturing out for the first time. I mean, i talked to people who lad been in house for eight days. People who had stayed close to their bomb shelters inside of their homes. So that was one significant change, because ive been down in the south throughout the entire week. People were out, they were shopping. It wasnt the ghost town that the areas down south werent the ghost towns. I was in one specific town today it wasnt a ghost town that they had been all week. People are not as shaken. A lot of these people have been through this for years. I mean, theyve been experiencing this for a number of years. So theyre kind of hardened. Not even kind of. They are hardened. Theyre shellshocked, certainly. They were grateful, relieved, glad to be out getting their hair cut, doing their shopping, going about business, stocking up on some goods. At the same time, they were angry. They seemed very angry about the idea of a truce and the fact that a ceasefire was drawn up. So the mood was its not that people were celebrating, they werent happy, they were sort of hardened, theyre resigned to this and they were angry. Sreenivasan have there been measurements of Public Opinion on how this was all handled . There have been and some of the figures that came out tonight is the that 46 of israelis feel that in this conflict nobody won at all. 38 feel that Benjamin Netanyahu the Prime Minister, did a good job. 40 feel that the defense minister did a good job as well and a full 79 feel that the chief of staff they were pleased with his job in this campaign. The those seemed to be rather positive, of course, when people are looking at those numbers, looking ahead to next weeks primaries. Sreenivasan so we saw a huge massive buildup of troops along the gaza border. Whats happened to the Israeli Military now . Are they withdrawing some . They are withdrawing some. At the same time the chief of staff has put out a statement that some will remain. Were in a cautious period right now. So while troops, yes, we were seeing them leave, we were seeing the tractors pull up and pull up the tanks and the tanks were withdrawing and so were the troops, were getting ready to get out. Some will be left behind. Again, were in this period right now of waitandsee, measuring the situation. Schools are not going back to operating tomorrow. Those kids will still be staying home from school until the south. So the army is also at the same time keeping a presence down there. We dont get numbers. They wont give us numbers but we do know that while some are leaving some will be staying behind. Sreenivasan all right, for most people that dont necessarily get that this is just a cooling off period or a 72hour period where the shelling the stopped then theyre supposed to resume negotiations. Give us an idea of where those negotiations are supposed to start. Well, thats a good guess on anyones part. I spoke a political analyst this evening and he said there wont be longterm negotiations. That was his basic take on this entire situation is that four years ago there was an agreement put into place then. He said there were dozens of clauses. He said not one was adhered to. He said there wont be any longterm negotiations in terms of realtime or anything significant in moving forward. Theres not a timeline officially on that. However, the sense is that even if there would be negotiations on a longterm agreement that theres not much stock put into it, not much meaning, that this campaign was about buying time for right now and that there wont be any longterm implementation of these agreements. Sreenivasan stephanie, youve been talking to people all along the region. How much of that campaign that you mention and that election the next couple of weeks is playing into these events . Do people on the ground see this some level of this as political posturing . Well, absolutely. There were many, many people during the campaign who felt that perhaps and certainly on the flip side, on the other side palestinians and in fact palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas accused israel of creating this campaign or Going Forward with the campaign to try and sabotage the u. N. Bid the palestinian u. N. Bid and also as a ploy for election for garnering votes for upcoming elections. For the incumbent government. The fact of the matter is, when i spoke with people on the ground today in the south, these are the constituents that would primarily vote for Prime Minister netanyahu and right now theyre not very happy with him and many, many people said theyre withdrawing their vote in the coming election, that they will not be voting for his likud party. Theyre unhappy with the fact that there was a pullback from a fullscale invasion. People living in the south who, again, have been through this situation and scenario for years and years wanted to see a ground invasion. They wanted they said they wanted to see some people said they wanted to see gaza flattened. They said they wanted to seeed things taken to the end. They werent certain what that meant. When pushed to the wall, what does that mean, taking this situation to the end . They werent really certain really what that meant. But, again, this could be something that politically may not work in the Prime Ministers favor coming into this election. Sreenivasan all right, stephanie fried from tel aviv, thanks so much for joining us. Thank you. Online weve updated our slideshow of images from the middle east. Still to come on the newshour the economic troubles in greece; the shopping frenzy in the u. S. A day early; the lives of native americans and the demand for meat in china. But first, the other news of the day. In syria, rebel fighters gained more momentum in the east today. They seized a key army base at mayadeen and took control of its artillery stockpiles. To the north, Syrian Government warplanes flattened a building next to a hospital in aleppo overnight. At least 15 people were killed. The airstrikes damaged one of the last remaining sources of medical aid for civilians there. A taliban suicide bomber killed 23 people in a procession of Shiite Muslims in pakistan. The attack happened near midnight when the bomber tried to join a religious gathering in rawalpindi. At least 62 people were wounded, including six policemen. This is the latest in a string of bombings targeting shiites during their holiest month of the year. The u. S. Ambassador to the u. N. Defended her first account of the attack on the consulate in benghazi, libya. Susan rice has come under fire by critics who say she gave misleading information about the nature of the attack and the motive behind it. But at the u. N. In new york last night she said that was not the case. When discussing the attacks against our facilities in benghazi i relied solely and squarely on the information provided to me by the intelligence community. I made clear that the information was preliminary and that our investigations would give us the definitive answers. Sreenivasan the benghazi attack killed u. S. Ambassador Chris Stevens and three other americans. Britain announced today it is rethinking aid distribution to rwanda after a report from the u. N. Shows the african nation is backing a brutal Rebel Movement in neighboring congo. We have a report narrated by Lindsey Hilsum of independent Television News. Reporter as refugees rush out, the rebels rush in. M23 fighters hurtled into sarko today to fight congolese Government Forces which had taken back control of the town. People flee as they fled so many times before. 25 different rebel groups operate in the area, all of them and the regular army abuse civilians. Terror is never far away. Its become a way of life. Congo is a place where you kind of negotiate how much you want to be abused. What people fear mostly is when control keeps on shifting. That is why this year is such a dramatic low in the protection of civilians, cause theres a constant shift of armed groups in control by the army, so reporter in uganda yesterday, three regional leaders met to discuss the crisis, including president paul kagame of rwanda. A u. N. Report details evidence of rwandan backing for the m23, something hes denied, his words somewhat delphic. Aid agencies say 120,000 people are now on the run. Under pressure, the British Government has changed policy towards one of its closest allies and biggest aid recipients in africa. Today they said the u. N. Evidence of rwandan involvement with the rebels was credible and compelling. And would be a key factor in future aid decisions to the government of rwanda. Today the m23 rebels were on patrol in the regional capital goma. The people watched and waited. The rebels have been gathering weapons there by fleeing government soldiers. Rwanda has security concerns and economic interests in this part of congo. By taking goma, their proxies have ensured that the rwandans will negotiate for a position of strength. The withdrawal of british support, a price they may feel worth paying. Sreenivasan the u. N. Childrens agency says the violence in eastern congo has already forced 100,000 people to flee, more than half of whom are children. Americans at home and abroad celebrated the thanksgiving holiday today. President obama in a weekly address urged the country to put aside partisan differences and unite. In new york, the annual macys thanksgiving day parade wound its way through the streets of manhattan, as the area still copes from the aftermath of hurricane sandy. Elsewhere, volunteers served thanksgiving meals to needy families at homeless shelters across the country, like this one in washington, d. C. Turkey and all the trimmings were also served to u. S. Troops overseas at bases in afghanistan and kuwait. The British Broadcasting Corporation appointed a new directorgeneral in the wake of its worst crisis in years. Tony hall a former bbc news executive and currently the head of the Royal Opera House will replace george entwistle. Entwistle resigned from the post earlier this month, amid a controversy stemming from the bbcs coverage of child sex abuse. Sreenivasan next, reducing greeces big debt. The troubled country appears to be on track to get some much needed aid next week. But European Union leaders meeting at a summit this week are still unable to agree on how to cut greeces debt to a more sustainable level. Newshour economics correspondent paul solman has a behind the scenes look at the efforts to do so. Its part of his ongoing reporting on making sense of financial news. Reporter is the eurocrisis resolved . The message from europes Financial Markets over the past few months has been mostly positive. And this month greece passed a tough austerity bill, despite widespread street protests. The credit for europe moving ahead has gone to European Central bank head mario draghi, who pledged in july that his e. C. B. Would buy the debt of distressed borrowing countries to keep their Interest Rates down, keep them solvent. Investors worldwide now call him super mario, after the nintendo video game superhero. Reporter but in fact, as both knowledgeable outsiders and insiders attest, the tugofwar between europes borrowers and lenders continues and probably will, for years. Just look at the images of outsiders like foreign cartoonists, for example. Their picture of super marios newfound powers is a lot more down to earth. Thats because draghi faces steep opposition to his vow to impose supertough terms for his bond buying plan more austerity in the form of tax hikes, government pay and pension cuts and the like to be overseen by his bank and the International Monetary fund. For all the public reassurances, new austerity conditions have sparked bitter protests. In spain. In greece, twice bailed out already and yet again pleading for more slack. This protest was prompted by an october visit from german Prime Minister angela merkel, who many greeks blame for the painful cuts theyve already endured. But, back at home, merkel must contend with an antibailout public in germany a germany which must ultimately approve any europewide debt relief program, since it funds about a quarter of the European Central bank. But germany has no choice. It has to keep playing the game. Or at least thats the conviction of a key insider, new york lawyer lee buchheit. As the french say for want of better, and for fear of worse. Reporter buchheit is mr. Insider greeces chief debt negotiator. Hes managed the countrys bargaining strategy these past pinched years and is the goto guy for many a nation being muscled by its lenders. No one likes to lose money. Any creditor approached by a sovereign with a request for debt relief would accede to it only if they thought that by not giving the debt relief they stand to lose more. Reporter and your job is to convince the creditors that the borrowers cant afford to pay more. Yes. Reporter so when youre advising a country, what are you telling officials who are negotiating with their creditors . To convince its creditors first that it needs a restructuring, and second that the terms of the restructuring are what they need, not necessarily what they want. Reporter lets pause for a moment to explain, with a little help from our friends the cartoonists restructuring is just a way of saying, reduce the amount a squeezed country owes, forcing lenders, generally bondholders, to take whats euphemistically known as a haircut a reduction in the amount thats due them. For professional investors, though, the visit to the barber can be rather more drastic. But how else can a debtdrowning country stay afloat, buchheit asks. You try to return the debt stock to the point that a neutral observer in the market would say ruritania is now creditworthy again. Reporter ruritania being your. Mythical country. Reporter attorney buchheit is nothing if not careful. But for all his elusive talk of ruritania, his real client is greece. In the past year, greece has not just been weighed down by fat cat lenders, but by pannational parties like the European Union and its central bank. Theyve given money to greece to maintain the Interest Payments on its private debt, becoming not just the lender of last resort, but of life support. Any time in a corporate or sovereign context that you have a new party coming in saying im financing the debtor, or im prepared to put in the new money, they have the whip hand. And we nor the creditors can ignore their views. Reporter those views were that greece should never restructure its loans. As they saw it, sovereign debt restructuring was a unique affliction of emerging markets. You could not have the restructuring of a european sovereign without declaring yourself to be an emerging market. Reporter and that would be a real stigma. That would be as they saw it, an indelible stain. And therefore their insistence was, avoid a debt restructuring at all costs, even if it means that in effect european taxpayers must lend the debtor country the money to repay all of its debt in full. Reporter the problem with this approach the longer greece put off paying the debts incurred by its supposedly olympian lifestyle, the greater the pressure on all its creditors. What happened in greece was in may of 2010, they started with a Bailout Program that gave greece all of the money it needed to repay all of its existing creditors. I understood the psychology of it but at some point the psychology must give way to arithmetic. The liability didnt go away, it simply migrated out of the hands of commercial creditors and into the hands of the official creditors, when the axe falls, it will fall on the taxpayers neck. Reporter something the cartoonists, this one from fiscally conservative holland, will never let the lenders forget. 18 months later, they realized what they were doing, and at that point they careened from saying you must repay all of your creditors in full and on time, to saying you must impose at least a 50 nominal haircut on your creditors. Reporter and so in march buchheit helped negotiate a deal that lopped off about a third of greeces total debt to keep greece in the game. Private lenders were forced to take a 75 loss on the face value of their bonds. In general its, the country wants to pay the least it can, and you want them to pay the most they can. Reporter one of greeces private creditors is investor hans humes of greylock capital. Hes sat across the table from lee buchheit in many negotiations over the years. I guess a very nice way to put it is hes a formidable opponent. Lee had a speech where he made reference to creditors blood running in the street. And you get a sense with him at some level hes getting a visceral thrill out of it it is a bitter process. My role is simply to take the debtors side in that dynamic. I dont expect everyone will like it reporter the major gripe against buchheit is that he got greece to actually change its laws so private creditors could no longer sue to collect if enough other creditors, like the e. C. B. , also owned greek debt. Could that serve as model for other countries . Well, once you start changing laws, says hans humes, the skys the limit. Right now, were teetering on something thats far worse than what we saw in latin america. Reporter in the 1980s or 90s you mean. Yeah, i mean i lived in latin america, i saw it and i was part of the workout. This is worse. Reporter does lee buchheit then. Have a lot of work . laughter reporter yeah, im sure he has a lot of work, but does he bear a lot of the blame . No, no. I mean hes just reacting to the situation thats evolving. But i think theres a lot of concern that, if you have this legal coaching on how to really gut creditor rights, that you may actually end up in a situation where nobody wants to lend to countries. Reporter but if thats already a clear and present danger, we wondered why not just stiff the creditors . After all the history of sovereign debt is default, default, default, default over centuries and then those same countries come back into the market sometimes in just a few years and can start borrowing again. Excessively brutal behavior by the sovereign debtor will be remembered and subsequent administrations will pay a penalty. They will pay a higher interest rate. The other aspect though is the pain you inflict on creditors will be a matter of concern to your geopolitical partners, to the i. M. F. And to others who have a stake in seeing the financing of sovereigns worldwide continue to go on. And so outrageous behavior as they would see it, is something that will incur their displeasure and you the sovereign debtor, are likely to hear about it. Reporter and so, the dance goes on. The cartoonists vision is a disastrous ending. But the europowersthatbe are in the business of buying time, in the belief that most debt crises end d t in a b bg, but aa whimper. Sreenivasan and you can find much more of pauls reporting on greece and the eurozone crisis on our website. Sreenivasan now, the emergence of a new thanksgiving day tradition once reserved for the day after shopping. Retailers used to wait until the wee hours of black friday to open their doors. But Big Box Stores and National Chains are increasingly opening their doors on thanksgiving. Tonight, walmart will open its doors to customers at 8 00 pm. That has sparked protests and online petitions. But the retailing giant is not alone. Target, toys r us, sears and the gap among others are all following suit and opening tonight. For more on these moves and the bigger picture, we turn to Barney Jopson. Hes the u. S. Retail correspondent for the financial times. His ebook, the amazon economy, is out next week. Thanks for being with us. Good to be here. Sreenivasan so help us understand, why are these retailers doing this . Why is it so important . This Holiday Season were going to see consumers who are still pretty cautious and as a result of that retailers are just a little bit desperate. These early openings are all about trying to grab the attention of consumers as soon as they can and grab a few of those dollars because overall the Holiday Season it may be that the shopping pie doesnt grow that much. So these retailers want to grab their own slice as soon as they possibly can. Sreenivasan so walmart was one of the big stores to do so. They were already opening at midnight. Why push it into thanksgiving day itself . The Competition Among the retailers and i think theyre inspiring each other to move it earlier and earlier because as people are going to be queuing up perhaps they want to be outside the store thats going to open first. So this cream phenomena is has set in as retailers are trying to outdo each other. Sreenivasan what is the creep phenomena likely to stop at . Can we get earlier and earlier, to labor day or the fourth of july to start our thanksgiving shopping . I think the answer will depend on the bash lash weve seen against some of these moves. There have been labor organizations that have complained that by opening early these retailers are ruining the thanksgiving of some of their employees. And i think some consumers themselves have some sympathy with that idea. Its worth remembering that according to some surveys only about 13 of shoppers are going to be out before midnight on thanks giving so there are a lot of others who will be at home relaxing on the sofa digesting their turkey and they may feel its only fair to let retail employees do the same. Sreenivasan i know there are some protests scheduled for tomorrow. What are they hoping to accomplish if its such a small crowd or i should say a small section of the retail audience that theyre going to reach . I think theyre just trying to draw attention to the impact of the early openings on some of the employees and perhaps draw attention to other issues that they have with labor and pay some of these retail organizations. Sreenivasan it should be said that some of this online frenzy began not just today or tomorrow morning but really early on in this week. Its kind of making cyber monday obsolete. Well, absolutely. One of the great movers is amazon. Amazon is a very powerful online player. Its known as the great disruptor. It disrupts and up turned most of the industries it works in. Thats the subject of the book weve done and weve seen it this week. Some people are complaining about walmart opening a few hours early. Amazon has started its own black friday deals on monday so it started days ahead of everyone else and that is something thats going to disrupt the dynamic of the week. A lot of shoppers are increasingly preferring to buy online. Its more convenient, its easier. Amazon has started its own deals on monday so one crucial thing to watch this year is how much it is taking market share away from some of these traditional players. Sreenivasan what are these traditional players doing to push back . What are big box retailers doing besides moving the start date up to tonight . One of the things theyre doing is trying to match amazons prices. For the first time this year best buy and target have said on certain products they will match the lowest prices amazon can offer and thats an attempt to combat a phenomena called show rooming. This is what happens when people walk into a bricks and mortar store, they find the product they like, they see the price, pull out their smart phone, find it more cheaply online and buy it online right there and then. That drives these bricks and Mortar Stores crazy so best buy and targeting are saying this year well match those prices. Thats a risky decision, its a bit of a gamble, it could reduce their own profit so well have to see just how eager consumers are to play these retailers off against each other. Sreenivasan lets put that profit into perspective. Part of the reason this is called black friday is this is when retailers make the turn. How crucial is this portion of the year for them . Well, by some estimates, the sales that they make on the black friday weekend can be about 15 or 20 of all their sales in november and november and december combined can be up to a quarter, maybe even more of the entire sales for the whole year. So this is why its so crucial. This is why, as i say, some retailers are just a little bit desperate and why i think competition this year is going to be more intense than ever. Sreenivasan retailers can be a pretty good barometer of Consumer Spending and all of the stores that youve spoken to and your reporting, are they expecting a big year . I think expectations are slightly more measured than they were last year. Last year was a big year. Sales grew by almost 6 from the previous year. This year people are expecting to see growth but not quite that level. And thats interesting because the housing market, the stock market, the labor market are all looking slightly better than they did a few months ago. But all this talk about the fiscal cliff, the automatic tax riders and spending cuts are unnerving people a little bit. And also we dont know how much people have been biging into their savings earlier in the year. So in spite of positive economic news, people are still going to be cautious and thats going to mean a little bit of growth but not a huge amount. Sreenivasan Barney Jopson of the financial times, thanks for your time. Thank you. Sreenivasan thanksgiving is a time to remember native American Life and culture. And that was the lifes work of Edward Curtis, a turn of the century photographer. His story is told in a new biography, short nights of the shadow catcher by journalist and author timothy egan, a previous winner of both the Pulitzer Prize and National Book award. Jeffrey brown has our book conversation. Brown in 1896 Edward Curtis took this photograph of a woman known as princess angeline, the last surviving child of the nativeamerican chief for whom the city of seattle was named. It was the first in what would become a decadeslong project. One of the most ambitious in american book and documentary history of capturing a vanishing nativeAmerican Life and some of its most important figures, including chief joseph of the nez perce and the apache warrior geronimo. Author timothy egan joins me now. Welcome to you. Thank you, great to be here. Brown i think a lot of people will know some of the famous paragraphs, but not the scope of the project. Give us a sense of how big this was, what he was after. I think a lot of people know something about curtis. But he ended up being the largest traffic odyssey in american history, more than matthew brady, the civil war photographer. He started out wanting to do native American Life that was still somewhat intact. He thought it might take him five years. It took him more than 30. He took 40,000 photographs and took them on glass plate negatives, 14 x 17 inch plates that he carried around in his pack and on horse back. He reported more than 10,000 native songs. He ended up doing 2,200 pages of text telling life stories, mythologies, diets, habits, sex lives. Its documentaries of lives and nations and people and one man did it all. Brown he had this sense that it is of a vanishing history, right . Where did that come from, though . Where did the passion come from . The vanishing point was the census just counted 235,000 native freedom a high of perhaps 20 million at the time of european contact. So theyre gone by more than 990 and the conventional wisdom of the scholars and indian experts is theyll be gone within a lifetime. He starts out as this prominent photographer. He has a great life. Teddy roosevelt hires him to shoot his daughters wedding. Brown a portrait photographer. He could have been annie liebovitz, which is what he was. And he sees it initially as a commodity, theyre disappearing, he can make money off them. But as time goes on and the project engulfs him, consumes him, becomes his whole passion, he sees something more and becomes outraged. For example, its against the law for them to practice many of their religious rituals hes trying to photograph. He is sort of an accomplice to the a crime. The indian crimes code act is passed making many ceremonies illegal. Brown you describe extraordinary adventures he went through because, of course, for good reason the native americans didnt want outsiders they didnt trust outsiders, right . So its not as though he could just walk in and take photographs. He never did that. They threw dirt at his camera. They charged him with horses. He initially was not accepted at all. But he always had native people on the payroll and he would spend months and even years setting up a single portrait, winning trust, confidence, trying to understand context. Why do you wear your hair this way . Why is that bead like that . Brown im thinking of some that you described were the apaches where he went for months and months. Tried to understand them internally. Brown this is such a big project, it required a lot of money, required a lot of resources. Right. Brown he went to prominent folks, he went to president roosevelt, he went to j. P. Morgan. Roosevelt was his mentor because when roosevelt saw the scope of the project, hes setting aside land for National Parks but not setting aside this vision for the people. Roosevelt writes the introduction to it. But he has as many as 30 people working for him at one time. Translators, technicians, advanced folks, a lot of native people on his staff. It cost a ton of money, hes pleading funds. Its killing him. His portrait business is not keeping up so he does end up in j. P. Morgans wall street office, the richest banker in the united states, trying to convince them to fund the project. Brown pick one iconic one. Of course theres chief joseph. You describe him coming to seattle and theres a Football Game, of all things, involved. They bring one of the most famous indians in america, n 1903, chief joseph of the nez perce whos known worldwide as the indian of napoleon to witness the university of washington Football Game and they asked him later what he thought and he said he said through a translator, he says i saw a lot of white people almost fight each other today. I do not think that is good. But joseph was a prisoner of war at the time. He could not leave the reservation. Same with geronimo, without president roosevelts permission. This is 25 years after the war. Curtis understood that what joseph wanted was his homeland back so at the end of that weekend where theyre parading this indian around at the Football Game, look at the indian at the Football Game, look at the clash of cultures, they take him up the street with a car, curtis shoots one of his most famous portraits and it does what he wanted to do, which is make these people live forever. Brown speaking of what he wanted to do because this is another interesting dimension is the sort of i dont know, it could be an accusation that hes more of a myth maker than a documentarian, at least the way we think of them. Correct. And theres a raging argument over that, there still is. Brown he was posing people in garb they might not be i disagree. He never said he didnt pose people. He always said in interviews if you read the New York Times going accounts, hed come to washington, the Washington Post would say famous indian photographer in town to meet with president and members of the senate. He always said he posed people. He paid people for posing. He asked them what they wanted to wear in their portrait. I think accusation about the posing came later on from people who didnt understand what he was doing. Yes, he was a documentarian. Its no different than you or i going to scotland and saying do you have the kilt your grandfather wore . And asking the Third Generation person to wear the kilt. What he was doing was breaking the stereotypes. Indians were one dimensional. They were even either noble savages or dimestore indians. He saw them as human beings and thats what native people today see in his pictures. Brown you talk about him coming to washington or new york a nationally famous figure and yet died penniless, relatively unknown, almost alone. He had lost his copyright to the house of morgan because the deeper they got into him the more he gave up. So when he finishes his masterpiece, the greatest traffic odyssey in american history, arguably the greatest masterpiece, hes lost it all. Doesnt make a dime off of it. Today those individual sets will go for up to 2 million in auction. The other thing is, no one appreciate what is hes done. He gets a 77word obituary in the New York Times that doesnt mention his. Brown this is 1952. At the age of 84. Hes living alone in a tiny apartment in beverly hills. He hates it. Brown its about 20 years later in the 70s where the boom begins again. There are people rediscovering what hes done. Its an amazing epilogue because morgan buys owns everything. They sell it to a boston book seller for a thousand bucks. It sits in the basement, treasures of this boston store for almost 40 years. They rediscover hit in the 70s and start to be distributed widely. Thats why you see curtis pictures everywhere now. Even the New York Times sells curtis pictures right now. laughs brown all right. The book is short nights of thed that doe catcher, the epic life and immortal photographs of Edward Curtis. Timothy egan, thanks so much. Thanks for having me, jeff. Sreenivasan you can see more of Edward Curtiss photographs online. Weve linked to a collection at Northwestern University that includes the entire 20volumes called north american indian. Sreenivasan and finally tonight, on this day when americans gather to break bread together. We take a second look at a food story far from the u. S. Chinas growing appetite for meat and Dairy Products is driving big changes there in everything from farming to food safety. Our story is part of our food for 9 billion series, a newshour partnership with the center for investigative reporting, homelands productions and American Public medias marketplace. Its reported by mary kay magstad, china correspondent for p. R. I. s the world. Reporter chinas people are on the move. From the countryside to the city, hundreds of millions are coming in search of a better life, in the biggest migration in human history. More than half of chinas 1. 3 billion people now live in cities. In 20 years, it may be two thirds. As chinas economy has grown, it has transformed lives and diets. And thats especially true, when it comes to meat. This is ms. Xiong, a beijing meat seller. She grew up in a village in one of chinas poorest provinces. When i was young, my family could only afford to have pork once or twice a year. We were poor, and our clothes were covered with patches. Reporter she says things got better when the family started raising pigs, instead of just working in the fields. Over the past 30 years, Meat Consumption per capita has quadrupled, and citydwellers eat twice as much meat, on average as those back in the countryside. Pork reigns supreme. China both produces and consumes about half the worlds pork. And that increase isnt just about appetite, its about aspiration, says Cornell Universitys mindi schneider. Now that many people who have the income to do so can buy meat everyday if they want to, theres this idea that theyre eating meat in revenge and its revenge against a past of sort of poverty and scarcity and what felt like struggle, and it symbolizes progression. Reporter but this is creating a huge challenge for the Chinese Government. China has almost a fifth of the worlds population. But it has just 9 of the earths arable land, and a chronic shortage of water. Both are needed to raise and feed livestock. So, how to provide so much meat and dairy to so many people . One answer modernize. These cows, at china modern dairy, get music piped in while they get milked on carousels. This year, as many as 100,000 cows will be shipped to china from australia, new zealand and uruguay and packed into facilities like this. And these pigs live snout by jowl in enclosed buildings, where visitors are only permitted to view them remotely to prevent the spreading of disease. They belong to the chuying company, a major player in chinas industrialized farming boom. Chuyings Vice President is wu yide. translated this large scale way of raising livestock is becoming the world standard. In order for china to raise our standards and meet demand, our entire system needs to be upgraded. Its inevitable. Reporter and one of the governments Top Priorities is ensuring it can meet that demand, says jim harkness, head of the institute of agriculture and trade policy in minneapolis. In america, we have our Strategic Petroleum reserve. China actually has a strategic pork reserve. I was there once when they sort of calls out release the pigs they released a tremendous amount of pork onto the market because the government was concerned about prices going up. Reporter drought, disease and rising feed prices have periodically sent pork prices in china soaring. Rising prices can drive inflation, and inflation can lead to discontent. But keeping those pigs fed can come at a steep environmental cost. Sun jings family has farmed here on the northern china plain for generations. In his own lifetime, he says, hes seen the water table plummet. The water level is getting lower and lower. 300 meters . You wont find water we have to dig deeper and deeper, up to 500 meters. Reporter five hundred meters deep, thats more than 1600 feet. Because of its widespread shortage of water, china now imports 70 of its soybeans and increasing amounts of its corn, from the united states, brazil and argentina. Intensified farming is also causing other water problems. Agriculture is the number one water polluter in china and part of that is from fertilizer and pesticide runoff from crop fields but the number one source of Water Pollution in china today is manure. And thats coming from all of these industrial livestock production systems. Reporter manure releases nitrogen and phosphorus into waterways and causes toxic blue green algae blooms. Blooms like this one on anhui provinces chao lake, chinas fifth largest. Fisherman miao lingshen says his profits, and the number of fish in an average catch, have dropped by half since the algae started to appear on the lake each summer. translated if it gets any worse, well need to ask the government to give us money, because we wont be able to make enough money to live. Reporter miao says he might have to sell his boat, and become a migrant worker, something he doesnt want to do. translated of course not my home is here; my family is here. Why would i want to leave . Reporter perhaps to get safe drinking water. Miao says every fishing boat here has a kit to treat the water, so fishermen can drink it. Even then, it stinks. translated and if the water touches your skin, it burns you. Im not joking here. You immediately get a rash, and an infection. Reporter across china, people are feeling the effects of the rapid ramping up of food production. A wave of food Safety Scandals drove shanghai resident wu heng to start a food safety blog early this year, when he was still a graduate student. Within months, his blog was getting five million hits a day. translated i created a map that shows the intensity and number of scandals by color. Those places with a higher number of food scandals are marked with red, and those with a lower number are marked in blue. Reporter over here we have a butcher. So what would you worry about when buying meat here . translated if you want to buy pork here, you have to make sure they havent put an additive in the feed called clenbuterol. Clenbuterol makes the pork leaner, and lean pork can be sold for higher prices. Reporter clenbuterol can cause heart attacks in humans, and has been at the center of one major food scandal here. Another was when middlemen watered down milk, and added a toxic chemical called melamine, to help pass protein tests. That made 300,000 people sick, and killed infants. Wu heng says his government can and must do better to protect consumers and he acknowledges, the government now seems to be trying, and is open to learning from the u. S. Experience. The u. S. Food and Drug Administration now has an office in beijing, and has done training for hundreds of chinese companies, government inspectors and officials. Blogs and other social media have helped push food safety issues front and center, says fda representative chris hickey. I think the blogosphere is one of the freest forms of speech in china. Having public attention paid to this issue is vitally important, i think, for any country, if it wants to have a truly world class system for food safety. Reporter the Chinese Government now has 11 overlapping and overstretched agencies, monitoring hundreds of thousands of food companies. The f. D. A. Says the government is relying too heavily on inspections, and needs to focus more on prevention. Chinese fed up with waiting for that to happen have started to find other ways to access safer food like, buy imported, processed food, opening the market for Companies Like hormel or buy organic. Organic produce, even organic pigs. Pig farmer wan xi qing says his pigs get room to roam and special feed. He says it costs more to raise organic pigs, but its worth it, because their pork goes at a premium. And who buys that pork . translated very rich people in beijing. Like members of private clubs, retired professors, military and government officials. Mainly people with high disposable incomes. Reporter so there are boutique organic pigs for the elites. Industrially raised pigs for the masses and a lingering question, of whats the best way forward to feed chinas changing appetite, safely and sustainably. Jim harkness has some ideas. Youve had an Overall Economic model that has focused on keeping workers wages down and keeping farmers incomes down. I think if you had better wages for workers, allowing them then to pay for better quality food, youd see the investments that are needed starting to flow into agriculture so that you could grow food thats grown in ways that are more sustainable environmentally. Reporter the yellow river lies at the heart of chinas most fertile region. Time and again, it has seen chinas farmers rise to the challenge of feeding ever more people. But never before have so many Chinese People eaten so well, and been so vocal in demanding both safe, affordable food, and an environment worth living in. Chinas leaders will need to show creativity, and balance to meet those demands. The Chinese People are watching to see that they do. Sreenivasan and theres more online. Correspondent mary kay magstad writes about exploding watermelons and other food safety challenges for chinese consumers in a blog post. Thats on the food for 9 billion website. We also have a slideshow of images from chinas burgeoning meat industry. You can find links to both on our website. Sreenivasan again, the major developments of the day a ceasefire between israel and the militant group hamas appeared to hold, after more than a week of fierce fighting in gaza and israel. Meanwhile, israeli officials flew to cairo to begin talks on easing a blockade in gaza. And in syria, rebel fighters gained more momentum in the east, seizing a key army base need some conversation starters for the thanksgiving dinner table . Mark shields and david brooks have you covered. Find some of our analysts best political turkey day talking points on the rundown. Paul solman takes us back to another hard economic time in our history the winter of 1623. How did the colonists pull out of a nearcollapse . Plus, look ahead with judy woodruff, who highlights whats in store for congress in the lame duck session after the holiday. All that and more is on our web site newshour. Pbs. Org. And thats the newshour for tonight. Im hari sreenivasan. Well see you online and again here tomorrow evening with mark shields and david brooks among others. Thank you and good night. Major funding for the pbs newshour has been provided by computing surrounds us. Sometimes its obvious and sometimes its very surprising in where you find it. Soon, computing intelligence in unexpected places will change our lives in truly profound ways. Technology can provide customized experiences tailored to individual consumer preferences, igniting a world of possibilities from the inside out. Sponsoring tomorrow, starts today. And by the alfred p. Sloan foundation. Supporting science, technology, and improved Economic Performance and Financial Literacy in the 21st century. 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