Transcripts For CSPAN2 Craig 20240704 : comparemela.com

Craig nelson, the author of v is for victory. Franklin roosevelt American Revolution and the triumph of World War Two and the New York Times bestseller. The rocket men. The epic story. The first men on, the moon as well as several previous books, including pearl harbor, the age of radiance, the first hero, heroes, thomas paine. And lets get lost. His writing appeared in vanity fair, the wall street journal salon, soldier of fortune, national, Popular Science Readers Digest and a host of other publications. And he resides new york, and he is here to with us today. Welcome craig nelson. So unlike many of you ive been visiting the Hudson River Valley for 45 years. And one of the last things, roosevelts before he died was that he wanted to go home to the river. And all of us here what he meant. So i want to thank you also for your warm welcome. Im of living a once in a lifetime experience where ive never had a book that sparks the reaction and this one does. The people are passionate in love with it, and i find it a little bit destabilizing. And i really used why this book took seven years to research and write and publish. And some of that was the worst years of my life. I got sick. I was really shut in an invalid for a year and a half. So when that finally came out for people to really love it, its sort of like when a woman goes through a pregnancy and labor and then everyone goes, look at your beautiful. And she goes, mom. So thats sort of where i am right now . So youll have to forgive me. But before i get into talk, i want to talk about an incredible thing that happened. So a ago, the head of history for the of defense invited me to give talk at the pentagon. And i penned before i love the pentagon and i love the military and i love our military history who unusual for historians what they write is really a matter of life and death. So and and it was just great. We saw two dozen books. The q a was, fantastic. But that is it. The story story is that the woman i stayed with when i go to washington is having surgery. So the department of defense arrange for us to get from the entry to the auditorium, which is a mile away inside building on scooters. And these scooters are like a cross, a riding mower and a vespa. And they had a little dog to go for it and it pushed to go back at a speed. And there i have to do these down the halls at the pentagon by scooter. Its just one of the great moments of my life. I just cant i will never forget. Okay. So this is the story about how america at its absolute worst moment rose out of bitterness a near civil war when we were at others throats. Depression, despair, hopelessness rose out of that came together to defeat the greatest evil in human history. And exactly how that happened became the real focus this work. And it just sort of really drew me further and further into the story, which is why i went to apologize to all of you when pick up this book and say, oh, im getting a world word to history, and you go to the first page, those 1933. So anyway, i promise you that the reason why we go back to that moment, because the day that roosevelt enters the white house in march 33 is really the worst moment of our lives. The stock market has fallen 85 . The there is over 25 unemployment. The people who jobs are frequently working part time. And now when we think of the Great Depression, we frequently think like men in snappy hamburgers in line to get bread, those beautiful black and white pictures. But it was a really time and one of my stories that i felt really heart rending is that theres a little 12 Year Old Girl and shes in school and she says, oh, i just cant even think about school. Im just so hungry. And she starts sobbing and sobbing and the teacher says, its okay honey, ill let you go home and you can have something to eat. And the little girl, i cant. Its my sisters turn to eat. So this is how two people were tearing out ornamental woodwork in their home to have. And they really felt completely bereft and alone. And the banks were at an incredible rate. People were becoming terrified that their lives, savings was vanishing and theyre pulling all their money out of the banks and roosevelt took office. 10,000 banks had failed. And this was the first thing he had to take care of. So he did his very first fireside chat coming on to the radio and listening as Something Like 90 Million People descended, he said, you know, it isnt the banks. What going on . Its your fault when you put your money in a bank, they invest it. They dont just have in a vault and its much better to have it in a bank than under your mattress. And this all just a problem because youre afraid. And for 72 hours, the Treasury Department monitored how all that still banks were doing where they could send a bunch of newly printed dollars, save the ones that were about to fail, but they never had to that one speech fixed the banking crisis. More people put money in the banks and took out and that was over and that was the profound impact he on the american public. But as far as and so his first day in office i dont know if this story is true but its so good im going to tell you anyway in his first day in office. Its the end of the day. And roosevelt pushes a button and four secretaries come running and he goes, is that it . Is that all there is. And he they go, just zorba. And he goes, this job is a cinch cinch. So heres a so in the first hundred days, he puts to such a pile of legislation that it becomes known as just like the first chapter of genesis to one congressman and part of that is a huge influx in infrastructure which american to be able to get ready for taking hitler as it turned out. But it also included things like s. S. , which was the civilian kinds invasion corps and the he many people couldnt understand. It worked because they took urban people and put them in the woods where they would build structures, grade roads and read blueprint. And it was run by the army and it was in fact run by general George Marshall, who was a captain at the time. So George Marshall gets the experience from doing this and all of these people are basically getting what half of what they would get if they were in basic training for the war plus it paid them 30 a month, but they had to send 25 of it back home. So it was a tremendous boost to the economy as it was fixing all these things. And i say roosevelt had one set of benny sheaves policy. He was always looking for one thing that would solve many problems at once, not only directly helping people with their but taking care of things politically. So in 1938, three years before pearl harbor, france and england get pieces of czechoslovakia over to hitler to keep him from continuing to wage war in europe. And this is called appeasement and just like when we gave crimea to putin, it did not work. And that it was a terrible idea and he figured he had to do something. So he launched a giant expansion of american warplane production. The planes would he would sell to germany and england and then would i mean to the that and then it would boost our own Defense Operations and it would make money and americans did not want to do anything that would help any people who might be at war at this time. Theyre very burnt out from what happened after world war one. Their theyd struck by the spanish flu, which killed tens of millions of people around the world and they were in the depression. So they didnt want to do anything. But when roosevelt explained it this idea would make money and help with unemployment it sailed right through and that little idea became arsenal of democracy, which was the secret weapon to winning that war. So on february 20th, 1939, 20,000 americans dressed in nazi uniforms held a nazi in new york city, in Madison Square garden. They Franklin Roosevelt, franklin rosenbaum and announce that they were starting the goebbels show, which is going to be a radio show featuring the head of propaganda for the nazis. And they passed out a brochure george washington, the first nazi, now barely caused notice in papers because they were worried about other things at the time. But one who did notice was roosevelt, who had read mein kampf hitlers memoirs and the original german and was at how much of the terrible stuff had been left out of the english translation, such as the idea that on the top of every telephone player in the 500 miles from berlin to the north sea. They should sit there head of it. You. So he decided that he really needed to do something and he didnt quite how to do it. But then he had a lucky and that lucky break was named lindbergh. So Charles Lindbergh was at the time the most well probably equally famous as the most famous american in the world, with the roosevelt. He was a hero in the twenties when america really needed a hero. He did this incredible thing where he had been an airmail who didnt really know much about celestial navigation, whod cross the atlantic from new york to paris. But this fame drove him crazy and it ended up with his baby being kidnaped, murdered, and this sort of drove lindbergh around the bed and he exiled himself and his family into. Europe, where they met sort of the hard right wing british who believe that hitler was going to win. And there was no use inviting him. And then lindbergh was given a tour of, the luftwaffe, where they did the same thing that the soviets would do during the war with the circle, the same planes over and over and over again and make you think they had a lot more planes than they really did. And they showed him engines that promised a lot more than they really did. And he then around the world telling people the germans are going to win. Theres no use fighting. And he came back to america to specifically make these points. So eventually lindbergh admitted that the only way we can defeat roosevelt is to decimate franchised black people and not let them vote, and to make the realize that they think things are bad in germany. Wait till they see what might happen here. So he came out with how horrible really was, but what happened in the meantime was that roosevelt make a speech on the radio and then lindbergh would make a speech on the radio and. Every american citizen could sit home and listen to these opposing beliefs and make up their own mind. And it was really how before the fall of france and pearl harbor, American Foreign policy was from being completely isolationist to lendlease, helping britain and the ussr instead of sending American Allies into battle, wed send american machines. And this was called the great debate, this lindbergh roosevelt conversation. And it really got americans to agree in unison what a nation should be, who we are, what kind of people we were and what we wanted future to be like. So it really was the american system in action and it really worked. So by the spring of 1940, hitler concluded, that if the United States entered the war, a victory for the reich would be nearly impossible after saying that america is simply a joke, what is it . But beauty queens, millionaires records in hollywood . He told mceleney the recurring undertone of threats in mr. Roosevelts telegrams, notes and inquiries is ample reason for seeing to it that the is brought to an end as soon as possible, meaning before the United States joined the fight. This is what triggered blitzkrieg across all of europe from the lowlands and france. They took the netherlands in five days. Belgium in 18 they took ten days to cross all of france. After five weeks, german troops were in paris and five days after that the city surrendered in its onslaught. Final hours, the parisians had been forced to eat street cats. No. If britain fell, it would be the United States would need to defend itself against a war waged by the whole of europe under nazi rule secretary interior harold ickes called it the most critical situation we face since the independence. And George Marshall now the army of staff, told roosevelt, if you dont do something and do it right away, i dont know whats going to happen to this country. After years of isolationist talk from the American Military that their only job was to defend the western hemisphere, they now had to admit that there enough of an American Military to set to defend the western hemisphere. The American Military in the 1930s was 14th in size between portugal, bulgaria. We had 300 planes to defend the entire in the United States. And they were obsolete. We had 135,000 men in uniform and from 1919 15 to 1933, the country had produced 33 tanks. So if you wanted to train in a tank, you pretend you marched. Your four other people who are going to be in tank in the shape of a tank down the road. And then if you were really lucky, you got to practice being in a tank using using least good humor. Ice cream trucks. Meanwhile the people who are being trained in bombers were dropping off bags of flour instead of actual ordinates out of the bomb. And these were so common, they became known as Betty Crocker bombs. So so this is this is the group thats going to defeat hitler . Okay. So at the same time, the situation for england had become so dire that commonwealth governments of australia and canada wrote to Buckingham Palace said, please let your kids, who are 14 year old elizabeth and ten year old Margaret Rose evacuated for safe haven. The crown can continue. And in one of the great moments of World War Two, the queen of england said the children go without me. I wont go without the king and the king will never leave. So in may of 1940, roosevelt, the great sage of wall street, bernard, who are the three top Industrial Production in the United States right now . And baruch said, number one, bill knutson, number two, bill knutson. Number three, bill knutson and the sort of wizard of building jesse. Jones said that knutson to carry in his head a picture of the whole Manufacturing Business in the United States, knowing what factories would need to be greatly enlarged with only a little retooling, which were ready to go, to go work, and how to get in touch with anyone who could get things done. Five days later, the phone rang and newtons office with roosevelt asked him to come to washington and agreed. So bill newton has one of the Great American stories in the world. He arrives as a nine year old in new york harbor with 30 in his pocket from creating copenhagen gardens. First bicycle built for two. He gets a job working on the docks of the bronx, where he becomes a champion for the docks boxing competition. He then goes to night school, switches to horseless carriages and develops an alloy with a partner, and this ally would be used by olds for oldsmobiles and henry ford. For ford and henry ford still fall in love with newton and his partner, that he would buy the whole company and ship off to Highland Park in michigan. Newton then rose up through the division, he created a he turned for into a global giant with offices in factories all over the world. But then when he wanted make cars in different styles, in different colors, henry put his foot down and newton then went to gm where he rose to being president after savings chevy, from being destroyed by introducing colors and new styles. So at this moment, detroit was just like silicon valley. It was the epicenter of a manufacturing and high tech that created a new system combined that the ideas of samuel colts armory, a Sears Roebuck distribution center, time in motion studies, which was a big thing at that moment, and the meatpacking district of hooks to carry carcasses over your head to turn Assembly Lines into a factory that was a machine. And above itself as they got more and more refined using mass production methods, the price of cars fell and fell, fell and their profits rows and rows and rows until henry ford was able to announce that he was dramatic improving the pay of all of his so that they could all afford inform cuts to buy fords and the head of the New York Times, adolph says, is he crazy . I think hes. Dont you think hes crazy . And this is sort of the reaction of many people in the business community. But he won and it was a brilliant idea. His employees did buy fords. He continued his own market by, paying his people decently. But henry ford went nuts. And we cant figure out why he went nuts or what happened. But he bought the dearborn independent, turned it into something called the ford, and had his dealers force people to buy subscriptions of it if they wanted buy ford. The most popular car in the world. And this thing was filled with antacid garbage such as jazz, jewish music takes over the country and just terrible things and so many people complained about that. Henry ford backed off, but he couldnt get over what had happened to him for some reason. And he hated roosevelt until he refused to take in the art of democracy for many years, even though his german was making things for the nazis and his British Company was making things for the britons, and his French Company was making things for the french until finally, son edsel said, you know, Eleanor Roosevelt on the radio said, if there is a national emergency, Franklin Roosevelt could take over ford motor company. And then henry saw the and started cooperating. So knutson arrives in the American Revolution<\/a> and the triumph of World War Two<\/a> and the New York Times<\/a> bestseller. The rocket men. The epic story. The first men on, the moon as well as several previous books, including pearl harbor, the age of radiance, the first hero, heroes, thomas paine. And lets get lost. His writing appeared in vanity fair, the wall street journal salon, soldier of fortune, national, Popular Science<\/a> Readers Digest<\/a> and a host of other publications. And he resides new york, and he is here to with us today. Welcome craig nelson. So unlike many of you ive been visiting the Hudson River Valley<\/a> for 45 years. And one of the last things, roosevelts before he died was that he wanted to go home to the river. And all of us here what he meant. So i want to thank you also for your warm welcome. Im of living a once in a lifetime experience where ive never had a book that sparks the reaction and this one does. The people are passionate in love with it, and i find it a little bit destabilizing. And i really used why this book took seven years to research and write and publish. And some of that was the worst years of my life. I got sick. I was really shut in an invalid for a year and a half. So when that finally came out for people to really love it, its sort of like when a woman goes through a pregnancy and labor and then everyone goes, look at your beautiful. And she goes, mom. So thats sort of where i am right now . So youll have to forgive me. But before i get into talk, i want to talk about an incredible thing that happened. So a ago, the head of history for the of defense invited me to give talk at the pentagon. And i penned before i love the pentagon and i love the military and i love our military history who unusual for historians what they write is really a matter of life and death. So and and it was just great. We saw two dozen books. The q a was, fantastic. But that is it. The story story is that the woman i stayed with when i go to washington is having surgery. So the department of defense arrange for us to get from the entry to the auditorium, which is a mile away inside building on scooters. And these scooters are like a cross, a riding mower and a vespa. And they had a little dog to go for it and it pushed to go back at a speed. And there i have to do these down the halls at the pentagon by scooter. Its just one of the great moments of my life. I just cant i will never forget. Okay. So this is the story about how america at its absolute worst moment rose out of bitterness a near civil war when we were at others throats. Depression, despair, hopelessness rose out of that came together to defeat the greatest evil in human history. And exactly how that happened became the real focus this work. And it just sort of really drew me further and further into the story, which is why i went to apologize to all of you when pick up this book and say, oh, im getting a world word to history, and you go to the first page, those 1933. So anyway, i promise you that the reason why we go back to that moment, because the day that roosevelt enters the white house in march 33 is really the worst moment of our lives. The stock market has fallen 85 . The there is over 25 unemployment. The people who jobs are frequently working part time. And now when we think of the Great Depression<\/a>, we frequently think like men in snappy hamburgers in line to get bread, those beautiful black and white pictures. But it was a really time and one of my stories that i felt really heart rending is that theres a little 12 Year Old Girl<\/a> and shes in school and she says, oh, i just cant even think about school. Im just so hungry. And she starts sobbing and sobbing and the teacher says, its okay honey, ill let you go home and you can have something to eat. And the little girl, i cant. Its my sisters turn to eat. So this is how two people were tearing out ornamental woodwork in their home to have. And they really felt completely bereft and alone. And the banks were at an incredible rate. People were becoming terrified that their lives, savings was vanishing and theyre pulling all their money out of the banks and roosevelt took office. 10,000 banks had failed. And this was the first thing he had to take care of. So he did his very first fireside chat coming on to the radio and listening as Something Like<\/a> 90 Million People<\/a> descended, he said, you know, it isnt the banks. What going on . Its your fault when you put your money in a bank, they invest it. They dont just have in a vault and its much better to have it in a bank than under your mattress. And this all just a problem because youre afraid. And for 72 hours, the Treasury Department<\/a> monitored how all that still banks were doing where they could send a bunch of newly printed dollars, save the ones that were about to fail, but they never had to that one speech fixed the banking crisis. More people put money in the banks and took out and that was over and that was the profound impact he on the american public. But as far as and so his first day in office i dont know if this story is true but its so good im going to tell you anyway in his first day in office. Its the end of the day. And roosevelt pushes a button and four secretaries come running and he goes, is that it . Is that all there is. And he they go, just zorba. And he goes, this job is a cinch cinch. So heres a so in the first hundred days, he puts to such a pile of legislation that it becomes known as just like the first chapter of genesis to one congressman and part of that is a huge influx in infrastructure which american to be able to get ready for taking hitler as it turned out. But it also included things like s. S. , which was the civilian kinds invasion corps and the he many people couldnt understand. It worked because they took urban people and put them in the woods where they would build structures, grade roads and read blueprint. And it was run by the army and it was in fact run by general George Marshall<\/a>, who was a captain at the time. So George Marshall<\/a> gets the experience from doing this and all of these people are basically getting what half of what they would get if they were in basic training for the war plus it paid them 30 a month, but they had to send 25 of it back home. So it was a tremendous boost to the economy as it was fixing all these things. And i say roosevelt had one set of benny sheaves policy. He was always looking for one thing that would solve many problems at once, not only directly helping people with their but taking care of things politically. So in 1938, three years before pearl harbor, france and england get pieces of czechoslovakia over to hitler to keep him from continuing to wage war in europe. And this is called appeasement and just like when we gave crimea to putin, it did not work. And that it was a terrible idea and he figured he had to do something. So he launched a giant expansion of american warplane production. The planes would he would sell to germany and england and then would i mean to the that and then it would boost our own Defense Operations<\/a> and it would make money and americans did not want to do anything that would help any people who might be at war at this time. Theyre very burnt out from what happened after world war one. Their theyd struck by the spanish flu, which killed tens of millions of people around the world and they were in the depression. So they didnt want to do anything. But when roosevelt explained it this idea would make money and help with unemployment it sailed right through and that little idea became arsenal of democracy, which was the secret weapon to winning that war. So on february 20th, 1939, 20,000 americans dressed in nazi uniforms held a nazi in new york city, in Madison Square<\/a> garden. They Franklin Roosevelt<\/a>, franklin rosenbaum and announce that they were starting the goebbels show, which is going to be a radio show featuring the head of propaganda for the nazis. And they passed out a brochure george washington, the first nazi, now barely caused notice in papers because they were worried about other things at the time. But one who did notice was roosevelt, who had read mein kampf hitlers memoirs and the original german and was at how much of the terrible stuff had been left out of the english translation, such as the idea that on the top of every telephone player in the 500 miles from berlin to the north sea. They should sit there head of it. You. So he decided that he really needed to do something and he didnt quite how to do it. But then he had a lucky and that lucky break was named lindbergh. So Charles Lindbergh<\/a> was at the time the most well probably equally famous as the most famous american in the world, with the roosevelt. He was a hero in the twenties when america really needed a hero. He did this incredible thing where he had been an airmail who didnt really know much about celestial navigation, whod cross the atlantic from new york to paris. But this fame drove him crazy and it ended up with his baby being kidnaped, murdered, and this sort of drove lindbergh around the bed and he exiled himself and his family into. Europe, where they met sort of the hard right wing british who believe that hitler was going to win. And there was no use inviting him. And then lindbergh was given a tour of, the luftwaffe, where they did the same thing that the soviets would do during the war with the circle, the same planes over and over and over again and make you think they had a lot more planes than they really did. And they showed him engines that promised a lot more than they really did. And he then around the world telling people the germans are going to win. Theres no use fighting. And he came back to america to specifically make these points. So eventually lindbergh admitted that the only way we can defeat roosevelt is to decimate franchised black people and not let them vote, and to make the realize that they think things are bad in germany. Wait till they see what might happen here. So he came out with how horrible really was, but what happened in the meantime was that roosevelt make a speech on the radio and then lindbergh would make a speech on the radio and. Every american citizen could sit home and listen to these opposing beliefs and make up their own mind. And it was really how before the fall of france and pearl harbor, American Foreign<\/a> policy was from being completely isolationist to lendlease, helping britain and the ussr instead of sending American Allies<\/a> into battle, wed send american machines. And this was called the great debate, this lindbergh roosevelt conversation. And it really got americans to agree in unison what a nation should be, who we are, what kind of people we were and what we wanted future to be like. So it really was the american system in action and it really worked. So by the spring of 1940, hitler concluded, that if the United States<\/a> entered the war, a victory for the reich would be nearly impossible after saying that america is simply a joke, what is it . But beauty queens, millionaires records in hollywood . He told mceleney the recurring undertone of threats in mr. Roosevelts telegrams, notes and inquiries is ample reason for seeing to it that the is brought to an end as soon as possible, meaning before the United States<\/a> joined the fight. This is what triggered blitzkrieg across all of europe from the lowlands and france. They took the netherlands in five days. Belgium in 18 they took ten days to cross all of france. After five weeks, german troops were in paris and five days after that the city surrendered in its onslaught. Final hours, the parisians had been forced to eat street cats. No. If britain fell, it would be the United States<\/a> would need to defend itself against a war waged by the whole of europe under nazi rule secretary interior harold ickes called it the most critical situation we face since the independence. And George Marshall<\/a> now the army of staff, told roosevelt, if you dont do something and do it right away, i dont know whats going to happen to this country. After years of isolationist talk from the American Military<\/a> that their only job was to defend the western hemisphere, they now had to admit that there enough of an American Military<\/a> to set to defend the western hemisphere. The American Military<\/a> in the 1930s was 14th in size between portugal, bulgaria. We had 300 planes to defend the entire in the United States<\/a>. And they were obsolete. We had 135,000 men in uniform and from 1919 15 to 1933, the country had produced 33 tanks. So if you wanted to train in a tank, you pretend you marched. Your four other people who are going to be in tank in the shape of a tank down the road. And then if you were really lucky, you got to practice being in a tank using using least good humor. Ice cream trucks. Meanwhile the people who are being trained in bombers were dropping off bags of flour instead of actual ordinates out of the bomb. And these were so common, they became known as Betty Crocker<\/a> bombs. So so this is this is the group thats going to defeat hitler . Okay. So at the same time, the situation for england had become so dire that commonwealth governments of australia and canada wrote to Buckingham Palace<\/a> said, please let your kids, who are 14 year old elizabeth and ten year old Margaret Rose<\/a> evacuated for safe haven. The crown can continue. And in one of the great moments of World War Two<\/a>, the queen of england said the children go without me. I wont go without the king and the king will never leave. So in may of 1940, roosevelt, the great sage of wall street, bernard, who are the three top Industrial Production<\/a> in the United States<\/a> right now . And baruch said, number one, bill knutson, number two, bill knutson. Number three, bill knutson and the sort of wizard of building jesse. Jones said that knutson to carry in his head a picture of the whole Manufacturing Business<\/a> in the United States<\/a>, knowing what factories would need to be greatly enlarged with only a little retooling, which were ready to go, to go work, and how to get in touch with anyone who could get things done. Five days later, the phone rang and newtons office with roosevelt asked him to come to washington and agreed. So bill newton has one of the Great American<\/a> stories in the world. He arrives as a nine year old in new york harbor with 30 in his pocket from creating copenhagen gardens. First bicycle built for two. He gets a job working on the docks of the bronx, where he becomes a champion for the docks boxing competition. He then goes to night school, switches to horseless carriages and develops an alloy with a partner, and this ally would be used by olds for oldsmobiles and henry ford. For ford and henry ford still fall in love with newton and his partner, that he would buy the whole company and ship off to Highland Park<\/a> in michigan. Newton then rose up through the division, he created a he turned for into a global giant with offices in factories all over the world. But then when he wanted make cars in different styles, in different colors, henry put his foot down and newton then went to gm where he rose to being president after savings chevy, from being destroyed by introducing colors and new styles. So at this moment, detroit was just like silicon valley. It was the epicenter of a manufacturing and high tech that created a new system combined that the ideas of samuel colts armory, a Sears Roebuck<\/a> distribution center, time in motion studies, which was a big thing at that moment, and the meatpacking district of hooks to carry carcasses over your head to turn Assembly Lines<\/a> into a factory that was a machine. And above itself as they got more and more refined using mass production methods, the price of cars fell and fell, fell and their profits rows and rows and rows until henry ford was able to announce that he was dramatic improving the pay of all of his so that they could all afford inform cuts to buy fords and the head of the New York Times<\/a>, adolph says, is he crazy . I think hes. Dont you think hes crazy . And this is sort of the reaction of many people in the business community. But he won and it was a brilliant idea. His employees did buy fords. He continued his own market by, paying his people decently. But henry ford went nuts. And we cant figure out why he went nuts or what happened. But he bought the dearborn independent, turned it into something called the ford, and had his dealers force people to buy subscriptions of it if they wanted buy ford. The most popular car in the world. And this thing was filled with antacid garbage such as jazz, jewish music takes over the country and just terrible things and so many people complained about that. Henry ford backed off, but he couldnt get over what had happened to him for some reason. And he hated roosevelt until he refused to take in the art of democracy for many years, even though his german was making things for the nazis and his British Company<\/a> was making things for the britons, and his French Company<\/a> was making things for the french until finally, son edsel said, you know, Eleanor Roosevelt<\/a> on the radio said, if there is a national emergency, Franklin Roosevelt<\/a> could take over ford motor company. And then henry saw the and started cooperating. So knutson arrives in the United States<\/a>, arrives in washington and and the great thing he had done was doing what ticktalk is doing to your and facebook is doing to your parents right now which was to track user and purchaser ideas and, use it to make sell more cars. And this was his big breakthrough and he dramatically rose sales at general motors, but he ran into a problem when you want to retool a factory from making cars to making bombers, you have to bring in a whole new bunch of things called Machine Tools<\/a>, which are my favorite things in the world. Now, if youve ever seen that incredible Award Winning<\/a> program, how its you get to see Machine Tools<\/a> action as it grinds this piece of metal and shapes this piece of metal and does all this stuff to make all the elements making guns, yo, everything in the world just made it essentially the same way. And because you have to redo a factory with Machine Tools<\/a> first before you can actually start production, that delay caused nuts and doom and everyone to saying, oh, hes not doing anything oh, whats going on here . Oh, francis. Well, they go, what the hell is happening. So everyone is very upset with him. And so roosevelt does, he always does, which is he doesnt actually fire you. He just brings in another to do your job and. Then the two of you can battle it out in a darwinian struggle, and well see who wins. And the guy roosevelt brought in was a guy named donald nelson, who was the head of purchasing Sears Roebuck<\/a>. And he liked to say, ill tell journalists, you know i oversee a much bigger publication than you because i oversee the Sears Catalog<\/a> and and nelson both of these men were very and used to the vicious politicking of dc and nelson will almost be taken down by it but he figures a brilliant thing which is that theyre trying to figure out how to force domestic manufacturers to start working on behalf of the war effort. But because the war is up and going domestic manufacturer make a lot of money and they dont want to do it. So theyre to figure out how to coordinate the economy between domestic war, between the military, between the consumer and the military is a problem because they dont understand that the people who make all their things also need things to live on. So they dont want to divide it up at all. So youre actually seeing this struggle between these three forces, but. Nelson comes up with a brilliant solution. He realizes is that practically everything in america on aluminum, copper, carbon, steel and, stainless steel and that if you controlled the distribution of these four things, you can redo the whole economy of the United States<\/a> and this solves that problem and this is what creates the ocean which produces. 2. 5 million trucks, 500,000 jeeps, 268,000 war warplanes, 86,000 tanks, 14,400 naval and merchant vessels, 41 billion rounds of ammunition and 2. 6 million machine guns. Two thirds of the allied material for World War Two<\/a> without america as Assembly Line<\/a> stalin said, we would the war. And in fact there a war going on domestically because well there were about a million dead and injured in combat. There are almost 8 million injured and dead from working the eyes of democracy party. My favorite story in the middle. All this has to do with tanks because you know, the tank figures. 1919 to 1935, 33 tanks. And in 1940, 85, 88,000 tanks. So how did this happen . Well, knutson finally realizes that he really needs to do something about the tanks because. Britain, by itself, wants a thousand hacks a month, so he starts casting around and a pr comes in and says, im here, help you. And newton says, do you know how to make . And the guy goes, no. And he goes well, i wont be seeing much of you. It kicks it out of the office. He then calls the head of chrysler, katie keller. He goes, katie, i want you to make tanks. And katie says, oh, i sure will, bill. What our. So he actually has to go to the arsenal and see how theyre made. But he ends up creating an arsenal, detroit, that produces more tanks than the nazis produced for the entire war. And this is sort of the power of this operation. So when chryslers went on tour of the u. S. Armys raqqa in arsenal, they were shocked. Learn that the army more or less made their tanks hand to translate process into the language of detroit. They disassembled a vehicle and its parts into a \u00a3186 of blueprints, which they then redid for accounts to. Make it cost estimate, and they say 4 5 of the machining time by using welding process as well as a 480 ton metal press to bend key pieces into shape, followed by 30 ton jigs that carried the tanks upside down. The Assembly Line<\/a>. So after repeatedly being told by his father that wouldnt do anything for the arsenal after brought up this idea for l. A. , that frankly could take ford motor, henry finally acceded to xcels demand, and his demand was that he wanted to make bombers an entire bomber from scratch. And he would he promised the white house that he would produce a bomber an hour. And this factory that he created to do this was called willow run. But henry made sure that willow run was in an angle so that it would stay inside of the republican county instead of having part of it be inside the democratic next door. But and willow run had such a hard birth that they sometimes it will it run, but in fact, it ended up working out just fine and they did produce bomber power and edsel needs to be remembered for something more just an ugly car design as he today and i hope you will remember him. So one of my favorite things about researching story was learning about working women in World War Two<\/a> who had risen and fallen up and down, being restricted unrestricted. One of the fun things in research was actually to use a rivet gun to see rosie the riveter is all about, well rivet. Gun is pretty much just like an automatic machine gun that shoots bolts. So the idea of a delicate woman handling this thing is mythological but i tracked down all the roses i could find, and i found. So the first rosie was a woman named rosalyn p walter, and she became very wealthy and shes from long island. And she gave all her money to pbs. So the next time we were watching Great American<\/a> experience, american masters nature youll see courtesy of the russ p walter foundation. Thats the first rosie the riveter. But my favorite working woman story, actually is about an 18 year old married woman who worked in a drone plant before i did this. But i didnt even know there were jones in World War Two<\/a>. But ronald was the head of of sort of domestic propaganda for American Military<\/a> hired roosevelt and he was a big roosevelt fan at the time. And he sent a photographer out to take pictures of beautiful women on the Assembly Lines<\/a>, which is an entire thing in World War Two<\/a>. I so this guy finds this 18 year old married woman at a job that and he just falls for her and takes all these people he takes two weeks off to help recruit a modeling portfolio and she puts together these pictures and she gets on the cover of 33 magazines. And her husband says, i dont want my wife working. So she rid of him. And she goes to 20th century fox and changes name to Marilyn Monroe<\/a>. So thank you are sort democracy for Marilyn Monroe<\/a> and meeting has to end if we get there. One of the really odd things is that i have a completely new idea about the roosevelts doing this book about franklin. I have people from both the new deal and the World War Two<\/a> saying that they could they do that. His entire persona was created, but they could never see the real guy. And they kept to find him, but they couldnt. Heres just is it this great had this fantastic persona he was always happy to see you. He loved every idea you had it was it was lets go have a beer. Everyone knew this. The people who worked him knew there was somebody else there, but they could never see it. And my favorite thing i learned about eleanor was that her boyfriend, the time, taught her to shoot and she didnt need Service Protection<\/a> because she always had a gun in. Her purse. So on december 29th, 1945, two weeks before the attack on pearl harbor, roosevelt once again took his place. A bank of microphones carried by over 500 american radio stations. And in nine languages around the world. The biggest audience in broadcast listen to the birth of the secret that would win World War Two<\/a> and put it into the Great Depression<\/a>. This is not a fireside chat on war, he started. Its a talk on National Security<\/a> because nub of the whole purpose of your president is keep you now and your children out of a last ditch war for the preservation of american independence. I tried to convey to great mass of American People<\/a> what the banking crisis meant to them in their daily lives. Tonight i want to do the same in the same people in this new crisis which faces we met the issues. 1933 with courage and realism. We this new crisis, this new threat, the security of our nation with same courage and realism. American industrial genius through the world is the of production problems has called upon to bring its resources and talents. Action manufacturers of watches of farm instruments, linotype cartridges, automobiles, sewing machines, lawnmowers and locomotives are now making fuzes bomb crates, telescope mount shelves pistols and techs. But all our present efforts are not enough. We have more ships, more guns, more planes, more of everything. We must be. The great arsenal of democracy. So my book is really the story of how all this happened, how it all came to this point, how it all turned out and to do this, the Roosevelt Administration<\/a> turned upside. It created a wholly new that would become the leader of, the west, the global force that would ensure there was no world war three. Why transfer me what americans thought of themselves and what they achieve . This policy ended the depression, defeated the fascists of germany, italy and japan, birthed americas middle class affluence and consumer society, the jet engines, computer radar, the military industrial complex, big science and Nuclear Weapons<\/a> triggered Global Economic<\/a> boom and turned the u. S. Military into a worldwide titan with the United States<\/a> as the undisputed leader of World Affairs<\/a> at that time, one of americas most popular magazines, colliers announced, we have had our revolution and we like it. Thank you so much. How is that. So ready . Questions mom to the please has lots of questions that questions you can ask anything you want, i promise. May not answer it, but you can ask it. Oh, come on. Thank you. Its a great quote. Could you talk about the role your parents played in the writing, the book . Oh, sure. Thats a its a very sweet story. So my parents were from a horrible part of wisconsin that is the source of a book called wisconsin death trap about how if want to live in rural poverty, its a nightmare. One of my aunts had rickets and so the World War Two<\/a> got them out of there. My mother ended up in atlanta as a air Traffic Controller<\/a> and my father ended up in new guinea. He had wanted to be a pilot, but he couldnt because he was colorblind. And then after the move to houston, texas, she became an administrator in the School District<\/a> here, became a Business Manager<\/a> psychologist. They had two sons. They had grandkid, a very nice life lady. Now said they were going to be interred a Veterans Administration<\/a> cemetery really far away. And convenient for anyone to visit. I thought, this is really strange. My mother said, were doing it because its free. But. But then realized after many years later that they were with their generation because World War Two<\/a> was the greatest thing that ever happened to them. And that was why they chose to be buried there there. What kind of tax burden did the building, the arsenal of democracy put on the american right . So they had a terrible problem with inflation in the postwar world of world war one. So were very, very careful about all of this. And they did this interesting where they got people to take if you couldnt be a combat soldier, there are many other ways you could help. War effort. Have you considered bonds. So they did the secretary treasury was a guy named Henry Morgenthau<\/a> jr who is a real character and one of the victims of history. No one remembers him at all anymore, but he did this brilliant series of bond where you, babe ruth, came out retirement to hit homers while being crosby saying White Christmas<\/a> and the picture mount and you could have your baseball autographed if you bought bonds and set it up so that ordinary americans buy bonds. Children could buy bonds. And he sold tens of billions of dollars with the bonds. And thats primarily how was done, but also the economy people who are making 0. 40 an hour in the Great Depression<\/a> were now making 2. 40 an hour. And so income tax, which used to be paid by for people, was now being paid by a lot of people, but they were making so much money, didnt care. They would story. I didnt have room for, you know, it was really incredible. So okay in the late thirties joins the army and he signs up for two terms and when he leaves to sign up his his family which has Four Brothers<\/a> and sisters and two parents live in a two room house. Right. He comes out of the service after three years and says, im coming home. I cant wait to see you. And they said you needed to give us more notice we have to coordinate our now everybody came home and everyone had their own house they were all working there. Media their parents were working 24 hours. They would have to 12 hours shift. It had the babies of back and forth in their cars. So their entire lives had been so change. It was a he couldnt understand it. He didnt realize you need his help. So they actually paid very well for the war. It was it the deficit spending of, the new deal and the early years ended up being paid off pretty much by the end of the war. Thank you for your presentation. Thank you for coming. I have a question. The arsenal, the tanks, the cars, the boom in manufacturing. What place did africanamericans have in that . Did they . So this is an incredible story because roosevelt was cut saying something that he didnt say and he got really mad. So i installed a taping system in the white house. And one of the great moments in that taping system is when he calls to convene the head of the sleeping porter association, who is randolph and the head of the naacp, whos white with the head of the army. And its integrating the army and the army not be integrated. And roosevelt tries to achieve a compromise and they wont do it. So the two men start planning a giant march on washington, d. C. And they threaten so much with this march that roosevelt puts through an executive order saying there can be no discrimination against africanamericans in the eyes of democracy and works out pretty well. And that gets postponed until Martin Luther<\/a> king brings it back. So theres a fantastic history. I think theres an entire other obsession about that going on. But im so glad you brought that up. Interestingly, i just add that we have a temporary exhibit up right now about, the roosevelts race and civil rights, and you can actually listen to the audio of that meeting that youre youre responding. But one other thing i forgot to mention is that part of the reason i called my book verge for victory, because there was a Campaign Among<\/a> africanamerican newspapers called double v campaign, which was have a victory overseas and then victory home against racism. Yes, bess, how did the labor unions figure into the national right . So the head of one of the head of labor takes an active in handling all this. And theres a great deal of tension because people are calling strikes all the time in the early moments of this and they send out the nlrb the National Labor<\/a> relations had just gotten started during the new and theyre trying to they trying to monitor the situation so boeing announces it cant make bumpers because their people are on strike and theyre affecting security and they go out to see whats going on and they find out that the reason theyre on strike is because boeing is incompetent at managing its workers, so they ameliorate that there are strikes in mind. There are strikes. Its a hugely turbulent time for american labor, but its also very because finally they have the upper theres theres so little that the companies have sort of turn on a dime and learn how to take care of things and though you have stories of people cooking hot dogs on the heat of newly bombs and both the husband and the wife working and theyre actually passing the baby back and forth in the car as one goes in the shift when they the shift. But people are making so money and theres so little employment that really is a high point for labor. Think at this moment. The time for one more is so by. When industry move to wartime production, making tanks and ship planes rather than automobiles was it on a volunteer or did roosevelt have convince them . Right. So some of them did it. But im actually surprised that more of them didnt do it voluntarily. The government gave you they covered all of your costs and then gave you 8 of sales as a profit which i mean, i would do that right now. So i was a little surprised that. People were making so much money they didnt want do it. And part of the reason knutson got kicked out was because he could not force his detroit people to do it. So they came up with a solution, which was they were going to give you any rubber for tires if didnt make didnt switch. So i think the last domestic produced came off the runway i think it like i think was may 42. But by after pearl harbor, they had, of course, Popular Support<\/a> to get it only. 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