So, i am going to ask all of our panelists, why do we care so much about what the first lady wears . What is the impact . What is the legacy . What is the message . A symbolicshe is figure. Little bit at her a like the queen of america. People want to emulate her from how sheance is conducting herself and with theg herself world. I want to remind everyone, we are going to have a question and answer session at the end of this, so if you have questions and you think you might forget, write them down. We have Dolly Madison, who presided over the first ball. Ral what do we think about Dolly Madison and the impact that she had . Its taking us back, way back. People criticized her. They thought she was too fancy and not aristocratic enough. When you think that Dolly Madison grew up as a quaker when she married James Madison she broke from this quaker background. A woman who was demurely dressed rake out inty to amazing close. A nod to the quaker cap. Wonder if this is what she longed to look
Before cspan started covering the sessions, this was where the major hearings were televised going back to news reels covering it in the 1920s and 30s. Television came after long in the 1940s. This is where viewers would have seen the crime investigation, army mcarthur hearings, water gate hear agos. This was the most famous televised room until the chamber was open to television. I bring people in here from time to time. You can hear the echoes. You can hear the gavel of the chairma chairman. The story of congress is the story of the nation. Thats a story of growth. The capital started as a very small sand stone square box. It sort of grew as states entered the union and more senators and representatives came. In the 1850s so many entered they had to put on two wings for Current Senate and house chambers. By the 70s they were crowded and couldnt find space for senators to work. Initially senators offices were their desk in the chamber. They were constantly besieged there. So eventuall
Capitol and saw these pages and thought, wow, what a great opportunity this would be and saw they were all boys and was told, well, we just dont feel like this is the place for girls to operate. And i at that age between sixth and seventh grade said, well thats just not fair. He said, well, maybe we can do something about that. So when i went back to school in the fall, i wrote letters to mr. Albert. And wrote letters to mr. Albert and wrote letters to mr. Al berd for many years, and finally one day when i was just about to graduate from high school, i got a call from charlie ward, who was mr. Alberts administrative assistant, and he asked me how i would feel about being the first woman page. Well, needless to say, i was finally ecstatic about this. I said, well ill have to ask my parents first. He said, well, mr. Albert has already spoken the to your parents and its okay with them. And i said absolutely. So thats how it began. And by the latter 1970s. Its about half and half females,
Elliott use kyra artifacts and facts to trace the house beginning in 1917 and ending with the story Margaret Shea smith here today at 6 00 p. M. Eastern here on cspan 3. Each week, American History artifacts takes ou to museums and historic places. Were in the Senate Caucus room in the Russell Senate building before cspan started covering the senate in was the most famous room in the capitol and in the capitol complex because this is hearings have been televised going back to the ews reels covered it in the 1920s and 1930s, but television came along in the 1940s, so 1941, a senator from missouri named harry truman said were war. Ing ready to go to were spending millions of dollars in defense. We need to look into the way the contracts are being allocated. We need to make sure that money spent wisely and not being gypped by unskrup louls developers. In fact, truman was a great scholar of history and read a ot about the american civil war. And knew that a lot of shoddy equipment had been
News anchor on his more than 50 years of reporting on world events. Thats this Christmas Day on the cspan networks. For the complete schedule, go to cspan. Org. Each week American History tvs american artifacts takes you to museums and historic places. Im don richard, the senate historian, and were in the Senate Caucus room which is in the Russell Senate office building. Before cspan started covering the senate in late 1986, this was the most famous room in the capitol, and in the capitol complex, because this is where the major hearings had been televised going back to the well, newsreels covered it back in the 1920s and 30s, but television came along in the 1940s. In 1941 a senator from missouri named harry truman says that were getting ready to go to war. Were spending millions of dollars on defense. We need to look into the way the defense contracts are being allocated. We need to make sure that money is being spent wisely and were not being gypp eped by unscrupus developers. And i