On cspan. In partnership with the library of congress, cspan brings you books that shaped america. Our series explores key works of literature that ive had a profound impact on the country. In this program the journals of lewis and clark, from their tour of discovery published in 1814. In 1803 the size of the United States nearly doubled with the Louisiana Purchase, the vast tract of land was largely unknown. President Thomas Jefferson commissioned Meriwether Lewis and William Clark to explore and map the newly acquired territory. There crew of explores juried up the Missouri River, cross the Rocky Mountain and the Pacific Coast. Lewis and clarks twoyear tour of discovery ended in september 1806 and they returned with maps, sketches and it journals. Detailing the regions path, animal life, geography and indigenous people. In 1814 Many Americans were able to learn for the first time about the western land, upon the publishing of the book titled history of the expedition under the command of lewis and clark. Host welcome to books that shaped america, our cspan series that looks at how throughout our history books have influenced who we are today. In partnership with the library of congress, this 10 week series looks at different eras, topics and viewpoints. We are glad you are joining us for this walkthrough history. In the first two weeks of our series we look at Americas Foundation through the eyes of Thomas Paynes common sense and the federalist papers. Tonight, it is a look at americas expansion and the 1804 to 1806 expedition to the west made by Meriwether Lewis and William Clark. When they returned in 1814 1806 presented their journals to president Thomas Jefferson. Those journals were published in 1814. To help us see how lewis and clarks travels and subsequent book helped to shape america our guest this evening iStephanie Ambroses. She is the author of the lewis and clarke companion and she is a member of the lewis and clark trust. This series is called books that shaped america. How did lewis and clarks expedition and the subsequent publishing of the journal shape who we are today . Guest the question is, it shaped us today because it gave us the data we needed to expand. In other words everybody was anxious to know what was out there. What was in the Louisiana Purchase, especially Thomas Jefferson. In order for us to expand that is what most of the people wanted to hear too. So the journals are extremely important and filling in that canvas at jefferson would say of what was in the Louisiana Purchase and beyond to the pacific ocean. Host where did your interest in lewis and clark come from to the point that she wrote a book about it . Guest when i was 16 my father was working on undaunted courage. It was o research trip. He took us as a family out to hike and paddle in the missouri and basically camp our way along the trail. That was such an adventure. I really learned to love the west, i ended up going to school out west. But what really fascinated me i think was the congo we sacagawea. The fact that there was a young woman on the trip and that she was just as strong. A person of fortitude as any of the men. Host and of course your father is the late historian stephen ambrose, in his 1996 book undaunted courage was about lewis and clark. A must seller. And youre broke book the companion. What is that about . Guest the lewis and clark companion came out when the bicentennial was gearing up, the commemoration of the lewis and Clark Expedition. A friend of mine clay jenkins and i were talking about it. No one had done an encyclopedia encyclopedic listing of what was involved in the journals. It is a look at people laces and things associated with the expedition. Host what is the lewis and clark trust . Guest it is a Nonprofit Group that we work in partnership with the National Parks service who administers the trail and we help them with education programming and signage and things that they see local communities needing. Including expanding the trail to places that lewis visited before and after the expedition. Host how well is the trail marked today . Guest it is marked very well and because people have the internet and cell phones there are auto tours. There are a lot of local communities and agencies, state parks, that want to have that story as prominent as they can. If you go online and look up the trail of lewis and clark there are all kinds of things that will tell you the way to go. Host we want to show a map. This is the map of the United States in 1804. You can see in the eastern part that is the United States. 1803 Thomas Jefferson purchased the louisiana territory a there is the spanish territory out west. You casee the Missouri River and the trail, the lewis and clark trail there. Beginning near st. Charles, st. Louis missouri. How much did we know . Here is a map that lewis and clark brought with them. We are going to show that as well. How much of this uncharted territory here in the middle that is unmarked, how much did we know about it . Guest not a lot. There was a french i think is how you say his name who had gone to the dakotas. There were some explorations that had come in from the west on the Columbia River that we do not know a whole heck of a lot about that part of the country that we had just purchased. Host what was the goal of this expedition . Guest the goal was to see if there was a Northwest Passage in jefferson wanted them when they were looking for this route , to basically survey everything. People, places, minerals, plants, animals, birds, soil. Everything about the land to fill in those questions. What is out there. Host what is it was it a controversial undertaking . Guest it might have been except that the purchase happened. There was this secret address that jefferson gave, it really did not need to be secret once the purchase was made. Host Stephanie Ambrose tubs, when this book came out in 1814, history of the expedition under the commands of command of captains lewis and clark. It did it have an impact in 1814 . Guest it took about 80 years for the journals to grab a hold of the publics imagination. The reason it took so long was because of louiss death for one thing, and then clark struggled to find someone who would put the journals into book form. So there was a gap in that gap, people just were not fascinated with it as much as they probably would have been if it had come out right after they went west. Host i want to read from the lewis and clark journals, this is from Meriwether Lewis april 7 1805 in north dakota. We are now about to penetrate a country, at least 2000 mil width onch the foot of civilized man has never trod in. The good or evil it had sre for us was for experiment yeto determine, in these little vessels contained every article by which we were to expect to subsist or defend ourselves. Im going to start with the use of the word civilized. What was he referring to . Guest he was referring to euroamericans, white men. The fact that they knew there were indians out there but they just did not know what tribes and how large their encampments or villages were. I dont think they understood the differences in the geography that they would go through. They kind of had to see it to believe that it was that different from where they came from. Host including the Rocky Mountains. Guest yes. Host did they spend most of their time onhe Missouri River . Guest eshey did people like to say that sacagawea was a guide but they really do not need a guide because they were on a river. Once they started getting up into the bitter roots she would not have been able to guide because she did not really know beyond were her people were. What was the first part of the question . Host it was about the civilized part. Guest it meant euroamericans had never gone there in one of the things that our Montana Historical society had an exhibit up called neither empty nor unknown. Because there were people out there and they knew their lands, they knew the river. They knew all the rivers actually. So it was not empty and it was not unknown. Host and we will get into sacagawea shortly but i also want to ask, he used the word the little vessels. What were they traveling in . Guest they were in canoes or parogues they called them, right up until they got into port the had a barge. I think were going to see some of that. Host and they are going against the current . Guest yes they are going against the current that is something people dont realize. Had to pull and pull and basically just how those boats. Of river. Host from the journals what did they experience, what do we learn they were experiencing as they went north and west . Guest everything. Grizzly bears, Indian Tribes, people they were amazed by because certain tribes would use a board to flatten babies heads and they had never seen anything like that. I think the variety, the sheer variety of the land. The people, the animals. Everything was brandnew. Host was there expedition being followed contemporaneously back in 1804 through 1806 . Guest a lot of people thought when they did not come back after two years because it took them two years four months in 10 days, they assume they were dead. And they had also sent back some things from fort mandan to jefferson, so they knew they made it that far. But once they got back, the newspaper accounts started host firing up people like they are back. Almost like robin caruso characters. Host we want to show you some video of some handwritten journal entries from the lewis and Clark Expedition. This comes to us from the American Philosophical Society in philadelphia and you can see the date on the entry. It is sunday march 16, 1806 and it is written by Meriwether Lewis. What is the American Philosophical Society and how did they get these original journals . Guest the American Philosophical Society was a group of very learned men who learned that they needed a place to study, a place to be together and talk about their studies and to encourage exploration. When lewis went to philadelphia, jefferson sent them there to learn from various experts. The American Philosophical Society was kind of the nucleus of all the experts. Host as i mentioned, our partner in this endeavor in this 10 week series books that shaped america is the library of congress. And we have utilized a lot of their resources, their original list came out about 10 years ago. It was called books that shaped america, there were 100 books on the list. That is available on our website cspan. Org, books that shaped america. You can see all 100 books that they have on there. This is not meant to be a complete list, it is not best sellers. It is books that were chosen as having an impact on our society on public policy. And who we are today. Cspan shows 10 books from that series and the lewis and Clark Expedition, there journals was one of them. And up at the library of congress they have a First Edition of the lewis and clark journals from 1814. How were lewis and clark and the Others Holding on to their writings because they were not putting this in the computer or email at the time . Guest they had 10 boxes they kept the journals and to keep them dry. Another thing they did was, at four so other journalists beside the captains would actually make copies. They would make their own entries of their journals and they would also copy some information from the captain so they would not lose the information. So it was a military expedition and part of their assignment was to keep those journals, keep them dry and record what you see. Host we have learned there were about 5000 pages in the journals. Who did most of the writing . Meriwether lewis, William Clark . Guest actually sergeant ordway was the only one who kept a daily, every day journal religiously. Lewis there are some major gaps, and clark was pretty good about writing every day. Even when he missed, he went out hunting in north dakota and he missed about 10 days because it was way below zero so he had other things on his mind. But when he came back into fort mandan he recorded all of those and brought it up to date. Host who publish the book in 1814 . Guest the book i believe, it went through paul allen. That was the guy who ended up with his name on that addition. Because it was turned over to alan and he said i got as far as i can go with that you take it over and get it to the publisher. And he paid him 500. And his name, paul allen appears on this version and doodles is kind of not around. Host who is paul allen and middle . Guest bittle was a philadelphia lawyer and a child genius and was approached by jefferson to get those journals out and published. Host our partner is the library of congress and heres president jeffersons letter to Congress Asking for 2500 for this expedition in 18. This was kind of a secret letter is that correct . Guest like i mentioned he would have had to make it even more secret if the purchase had not been made. But he did not want to alarm foreign governments that there was going to be this expedition going on so that i think is the reason he kept it under wraps. Host and jeffersons instructions to Meriwether Lewis, the library also has and here is what it looks like. Here is a quote from that letter. Your mission is to explore the Missouri River by its course and communication withater of the pacific ocean. May offer the most direct r across this continent for the purposes of commerce. This was about commerce. Guest indeed it was. In fact they did not find Northwest Passage but they certainly found a lot of opportunity for commerce. Host 2000 341 miles from the headwaters near three forks montana to the mississippi are virtuous north of st. Louis, did they traverse all 2340 1 miles of that river . Guest of the missouri . Yes they did. It the headwaters. Actually it is a little not correct to say headwaters but lewis and his men that got there assumed this rivulet as they called it was the headwaters of the missouri and they were so happy to get there that one of them stood with his feet astride that mighty river, they had come all the way up to that point so they were pretty proud of themselves at that point. Host so Stephanie Ambrose tubs how did they traverse the 700 miles they had left to get to the oregon coast . Guest they went downriver, once they got up over the Rocky Mountains they were able to get onto some tributaries that were of the columbia and go through on the Columbia River and get to the coast. Host missouri, kansas, nebraska, iowa, north, south dakota. Montana, all of the states are impacted by the Missouri River. The longest river in the United States. At the library of congress is a curator talking about in original lewis and clark map they brought with them. We are here in the library of congress in the geography and map division and vault my name is amelia and i am a reference librarian in the geography and map division. This map here was prepared in 18 for the lewis and Clark Expedition, and they had gathered as much information as they could about the area west of the mississippi where the expedition would be traveling. A number of different sources were pulled together for this map, and a lot of information from french fur traders and british heads of state company and other companies. In the mississippian great lakes area. You had spanish exploration on the Pacific Coast and british exploration as well and what is now british colombia. And then this whole area in the middle, just dass marks conjectural. The Missouri River which is one of the pieces of information that the lewis and Clark Expedition was trying to find, trying to map out, this represented with the dotted line. They did not know exactly where it went. This map was created by a War Department photographer and this map was sent with the lewis and Clark Expedition at least as far as the mandan villages. And while they were traveling Meriwether Lewis added notations, these notations in brown inc. Is Meriwether Lewiss hand. You can see he was drawing in rivers, either that they had seen or were gathering information about. He is noting trading posts and even drawing in mountains. At some point during the expedition they shipped it back to washington and that is eventually how it ended up in the library of congress. T