Good evening, everyone. Welcome to the New York Historical society. I am New York Historicals president and ceo. I am thrilled to see so many of you here in our beautiful robert h. Smith auditorium. An infamousogram, nazi rally, 1939, as part of our distinct speakers series. I would like to thank mr. Swartz for his generous for his generosity to bring so many speakers to this base. [applause] i would also like to recognize and thank a number of trustees who joined us this evening. I would like to recognize our herr and thank pam for truly outstanding work on behalf of this institution. Ournt to depart from trustees to recognize pams husband scott. We had three programs this evening, and he has been to two of them. I would also like to recognize susan, andbin, slightly departing from our trustees, i want to recognize a great friend of this institution, the head of the carnegie foundation. He is known as president of brown, head of the public library, and all sorts of other things. He is known to us as a great friend. Thank you for joining us. [applause] louise this Evenings Program lasts about an hour and will include a screening of the short film a night at the garden and question and answer session. You should have received a notecard and pencil. My colleagues are going up and down the aisles. The note cards with your questions will be collected later on in the program. We are truly honored to welcome marshall back to the New York Historical society this evening. He is a director, cinematographer, and editor. He has been nominated for an Academy Award four times, including this year for his liveaction short. His other oscarnominated films include cory bookers first run for mayor of new work, new journey new jersey, a story that chronicles the radical environmental group, and a night at the garden, the subject of tonights discussion. His films won top honors at the sundance and tribeca film festivals. We are also delighted to welcome our moderator this evening, and welcome him back to New York Historical. He has worked for the New York Times for three decades as a foreign correspondent, for in editor, and now columnist. He previously worked for the wall street journal and reuters. He writing earned him a Lifetime Achievement author of numerous books, including his latest, a memoir, entitled the girl from human street, ghosts of memory in a jewish family. Tells me hes working on a novel now, so we have something to look forward to, i hope, soon. As always, i want to ask you thatyou please make sure anything that makes a noise like a cell phone is switched off. Now, before just before we welcome our speakers to the screen theill nominatedard documentary short, a night at the garden. The film runs about seven minutes. Thank you. [music] [music] [cheering] undivided allegiance to the the United States of america and the republic for stands, one nation, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. [cheering] ladies and gentlemen, fellow americans, american patriots, i do not come before you tonight as a complete stranger. Me. All have heard of press, as a creature harm, alarm tales. With american ideals, demand that our government shall be peopled to the american who founded it. [cheering] [crowd noise] [singing] [starspangled banner] the land of the free and the home of the brave [cheers and applause] [music] good evening, everybody. Marshall, i remember when i documentary. And i was in a state of shock. Such a state of shock that i promptly wrote a column about it. You know, this happened in new york city. No idea. In it, was it hard to unearth . Hidden forffect been seven, eight decades . Sitting there . So i didnt know about it either. Id never heard of it. In fact, i was at dinner with a friend of mine, who is a screenwriter. And he was he was telling me that he was working on a screen that takes place in new york in 1939. And that this rally had happened. And i didnt believe him when he told me actually. I thought surely this was would have heard about. I went to college. This is american. This sort ofw thing. So i went home that night and looked it up. Right. Ough, he was not only that, there were some historical documentaries that little fivesecond clips of the rally. I thought, if theres five theresof this thing, got to be a lot more than that. Archivist, who is also a friend, and said, could you dig around and see if you footagend where this is . Turned out that there was some of it in the National Archive uclas archivein and grinburg. Places. D in a bunch of the National Archive even had had never been scanned highdef before. Got field of vision, which company, sort of financier, to give us the money. And we got all of the footage. And once i saw the footage, i oh, my gosh, we need to share this with people. Of why thisquestion isnt thing that Everybody Knows about, its not our proudest time. A story that we should be proud of. You know no. Think that it was sort once worldaside, war ii started. Likee kind of pretended these kinds of ideas had never had any purchase in america, they had. Was it the current drift of political events in the United States that inspired you to make this movie . See parallels . Yes. Thoughte footage and i this unfortunately seems elements of this feel familiar to me. Know, i think that demagoguery is something that were seeing all around the world. I mean, in brazil, in the philippines, in parts of europe, in venezuela. And in the United States. And were seeing people who use playbook that is that predates this by 2,000 years. And it is to attack independent press. Rs, the to scapegoat minority groups. To wrap your ideology in the of patriotism. Well, the charlottesville, the crowd whe in 2017, when chantinghe crowd was jews will not replace us, the you know, as we all know, responded that there were fine people, fine people on both sides. Right. What do you think about that . Mean, onee of the, i of the things about the drift totalitarian rule is that it is a drift and every Human Capacity forimited outrage. And when outrage fatigue sets begins tohe field clear for the demagogue to move his and it is always a man, it seems with his program. Yeah. I mean, i think one of the things that was so shocking to footage, wasw this antisemitice were leaders. Theres always going to be sort element. Ge but to see the crowd. That was what shook me. To see 20,000 new yorkers who im a new yorker. These are my neighbors. Nice that they were same as in nuremburg. To see them. Withdropped off their kids the babysitters and they put on suits and hats and they went to and just sort of laughed and cheered as the spectacle unfolded in front of them. And to me, that was the thing that i really felt was so that thereout it, is are regular people who can be into ideas like this. And there are good people who when they see it. Remindingoped that by people of what happened in 1939, thingsese kinds of happened, that, you know, it sharpen ourf sensitivities today. Bit about a little the jew who charges up on stage and says, ok, maybe you guys are all gonna sit here. Not. I am not going to sit here and listen to this. And get theo try leader of bund off the stage, throw him off the stage. Conscience. Of its a brave act because there were 20,000 people there who were hostile to what he was right . Who was he and what became of him . And why have we not heard more him . He was a jewish plumbers assistant from brooklyn who just went that night. Was not planning on trying to disrupt the event. See what waso going on. And was so outraged by what he feltearing that he just like he had to go out on stage and try to do something. Was arrested that night. A fine theto pay next day. It was a fine for disturbing the peace. Pay a 25 fine, which was inconsequential then. And at his sentencing, the judge to him, dont you realize that someone could have been hurt from what you did . And he said, dont you realize that someone could be hurt from was being said up on stage . Whats gonna happen . Ini think he said some jews europe could be hurt or elsewhere by that. Out to be sixrned million. Theres something so chilling event beingthis killings hadf the begun. And to have a snapshot of what is like, none of the people probably in that room almost the world could have imagined what was about to unfold. Unfold. It did theres something so emotionally powerful to me about thinking and saying,ife where are we going . Greenbalm, he ended up joining the military. Was in world war ii. Interviewed bys people who said, you know, how you summon the courage to go out on stage . And he said, gee, what would you have done . The fact is that most people in such situations will be bystanders. The one who decides that people or whenknow about this, i was in berlin covering barracks was renamed for sergeant schmidt, who almost lithuania had witnessed the mass killings of jews and had decided to try to help them. Was promptly executed. But he where to his wife, much like that, that he could not act much differently, that he just physically could not. People whose consciences will not be quieted. Films funny, when the came out, his grandson got in touch with me. Wed been talking about whether would be some way of isador greenbalm, a park named after him or like that. And theres nothing. No. Forgotten to history. Couple of slides. Theres a photo of him from later. Im going to jump through. This is the article from the New York Times of when tbrm was when greenbalm was fined. T stars and stripes, the a profileagazine, did of him during world war ii and somehow the story became that he landed a punch on fritz kuhn before being taken out. Such a good story. In thean, the attack documentary, i mean, kuhn takes the bund leader, at the jewish controlled press. The failingts New York Times, its the fake news, New York Times. People,mies of the weve heard from the white house several times, which is a phrase pure totalitarian pedigree. How worrying do you see these attacks on the press . Once you give up the ability facts, then your ability to negotiate differences of opinion become impossible. Very frightening, i think. Because there in the movie, people all these saluting the image of washington, and then next to it, theres the swastikas. Right. Which those swastikas in that negationre a complete of everything that we stand for as americans, of freedom, of a press, checks and balances, independent judiciary. Right. And there you have it, right . Ourhe First Amendment of constitution is respect for religious minorities, respect for the press, respect for the to protest. An event that is front as a proamerica rally, could disrespect all of those institutions so violently. Perhaps you could show some the New York Times coverage, the rally. N you know, we ill say we. Play it kind of right down the middle. Sense of outrage. Was a rally. This was said. Greenbalm tried to stop it. Went before a magistrate. The magistrate said to him, well, you behaved irresponsibly. People could get hurt. Made this comment about, well, a lot more people could get hurt in europe if you thing. His kind of there is absolutely nothing in the piece, as i read it, in you could detect any whatsoever of the paper. Course, press the timess great failings in covering the holocaust. Know, thatsee, you copy . How did it strike you . I will say, one of the wonderful things about having a New York Times subscription, is Digital Access through their website of every newspaper that theyve ever printed. Now you have no excuse, ok . And it can be a rabbit hole find something that youre interested in, because just to see the juxtapositions articles and to see, you know, the advertisements next to is insidee, so this the inside. And theres a little bit more, a bit more depth here. And in fact, they cover it again a little bit as well. But youre right. News. Asically report the and though they do include points of view, strong points of view, in quotes throughout. And that was also something that interesting about feltebate over this event extremely contemporary. Bigan, there was a question. Should this kind of thing be permitted . And one of the leading jewish groups said, these people are antisemites. Theyre antidemocratic. But the difference between the United States and fascist germany is that, in america, idiots are allowed to say what they think. Mayor laguardia sort of dismissed the whole thing with a sort of humors sneer where he said that the gathering that night was the largest assembly of international cooties ever under one roof. In the way that you sunlight. Es is with so were gonna let them say what they think and were gonna righteousnessith and truth. Were, also tore be fair, people who said, ok, in america you can say what you want. But should you be given Madison Square garden as the place to be it . To say which i think kind of mirrors a that aree debates happening on College Campuses and places like that, where you can saysure, what you want, but show be money . You know, school should you be given a school to say these things . Just even the subtleties of the now,e that were having were happening in 1939. Tell us a little bit about bund. Appened to the what happened to this movement . Did it fizzle quickly or not . It you know, it never was a mainstream movement. It was always a little bit fringe. But if you have a rally where 20,000 people show up, you know lot more people than that who support your more who sortven of passively accept it. And i think that that is the real lesson of this fatheras that you had coughlin, whose comments on the favor of mussolini and hitler were reaching 30 million peoplens and you had like henry ford and lindbergh who were sympathetic fascism. Emitism and at they were never probably majority point of view. But they were accepted. Discourse off the normal people. And i think what happened is when world war ii happened and suddenly, you know, this is 39, couple morel a bombslater before japan pearl harbor and we get involved in world war ii. That happened, and people with swastikas started killing american kids, i think decided this was not an acceptable point of view not , and it was and it took that . And it took that to get to that point. They had power. They didnt just have this event. 86th street this is on october 30. Big rally on 86th street. In new jersey and pennsylvania, out to wisconsin. Come. Camps for kids to and it was frighteningly still relatively fringe. I think partly it was fringe because it was german. And so, you know, you can even hear, fritz kuhn has this german are probably ae lot of people who didnt whoicularly like germans, werent gonna be lured into joining that. But that also is another thing thats so frightening about this kind of movement today, is that its so american. They know how to navigate the internet. Know how to be sarcastic and funny and mean in these ways that you said, the movement today, what exactly are you referring to . Mean, just sympathetic to fascism and all of it, you know, antisemitism or or just destructive of americas social fabric, checks and of balances, destructive of the press. That they have saying frommous this time period that when fascism comes to america, it have a stamp on it that says made in germany. Have swastikas. It wont even be called fascism. It will be called americanism. And that is that is where we are. Thats the warning. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, its striking again that fritz kuhn calls for United States to be returned to its essence, which he describes as white, gentile america, against the subversion of the jews. And today we have attacks on brown people. Mexicans ascks on rapists. We have attacks on muslims. And in a way, perhaps you can happeningof what is in our country as a white reaction against the demographics of the 21st century. So, again, do you i dont but to push this too far, do you see parallels of that kind . I do. I mean, i dont want to i the film. E to watch theres a reason that it doesnt i dont cutes, that back and forth between modern politics. I want people to look at it openly and say to themselves, is there something in here that me . S familiar to and if so, is there something that i could be doing about that . What about the counterargument, you know, were up here chatting. The New York Times is still around. We Just Announced record results. Are intact. Ions three years into the current presidency. Even begin to to worry along the lines that were doing right now up here on stage farfetched and probably viewe who take a different fachuos. I think those were the conversations they were having in 1939. In fact, there were protesters handing out flyers. Had a scan of it. But well put it on our website. Online ats anightatthegarden. Com. The pamphlet that people were now, beforesaid act the camps get out of control or some phrase like that. When i saw it, i thought, u bet people thought these people were handing thesee out. I bet they were seen as fringey fanatics, making a big hoopla kooky, tiny group, talking about death camps. Camps. Is gonna do death its not to say that that is our future, but we dont know what our future is. Things could have been different in the United States, if roosevelt wasnt the president , were apanese roosenfelt, as they called him. If japanese had not bombed harbor, we could have easily skated through and not gotten involved in world war ii world would be very different. You know, theres phillip rothbuck, the plot against america, which has just been made into either a film or a im not sure on hbo that i saw the trailer for. Few people have sent me the trailer, because it from couple of shots in it the rally. Itso and, you know, counterfactual history. Its what could. But thats what we know of history, is history is made by dont doo do things or things. And when lots of people do things or dont do things, history goes this way or it goes that way. Its written by us. What sort of reaction did you big did you get a reaction . I know there was a column in the New York Times. [laughter] other than that. Was there the sort of wonderment, incredulity, and preoccupation that assailed me when i watch