and by contributions to your pbs stations from viewers like you. thank you. pleased and honored always any time to welcome to this program myrlie evers-williams. t she has donated all her papers to the civil rights museum on december the 9th. a delight ever to see you. >> if you don't mind and when i found the invitation is extended to me, i went back years when you were a little boy running around in the city hall. >> uh-huh. >> opening everybody's doors. well, what do you do here? tavis, would you go on -- all of those memories kept oncoming back and i am delighted to be here with you. >> i am honored to have you here. god works in mysterious way. >> i had no idea obviously as a kid born in mississippi that i would ever meet the wife of medgar evers and muchless becoming a friend of hers and your son ends up being our principal photographer and your niece is our makeup artist. i think it would bring you to tears if you saw the number of people, every guest on our television program when they leave the program, van evers, myrlie 's baby. van gives them a set of photos that he has taken them during our sets of conversations. when she leaves the set tonight, van will give her free photos on the show. he does that the no every guest in our program. you would be amazed that every now and then for certain people who you know, i will tell certain guests the pictures that you just received as a gift was taken by the youngest son of myrlie and medgar evers. >> thank you, tavis. >> we have seen people in our stage breaks down and cry. as a long way of saying that, when you are a kid running around in mississippi and city hall or la, you never know how these things are going to work out. it is an honor to have you. >> thank you, let me say in referring to van and his dad. he never left the house without taking his camera. i have photographs and photographs and to me it is almost spiritual that his son would develop the same talent and desire and needless to say that i am very proud of him and all that he contributes with his work and to be able to work with you and it is jaus bust a big p. i am a big winner and i have two sons here. >> it is a family gather. >> speaking of family, we are both proud to be mississipians. >> a little pause, 98% of the time, i am. tavis smiley, that has to be considered with the pain and suffering and all that missisipians have gone through of both colors. with my family, there is a hate a /love relationship there. mississippi is mississippi, medgar believed in it. he believed in the possibilities and mississippi going and becoming a major part of the progress of america. and that's what he gave his life for. i on the other hand did not feel that way at all. very angry and disappointed and certainly with medgar's death. it was always more than i can bear. i entertain myself at times by imagining what i can do going around the state in secrecy striking back and striking out. not only when medgar was killed but before that time with all of those things that happened that were so heartening and distaste full and mississippi was at the bottom of the poll of all of the states and the country. that was something else and it is a little bit of love. it never went away. and i could not understand how medgar can embrace the states with all the evil and whatnot. he believed it was a possibility and that it could grow and could become what we say we want in this united states of america, freedom to pursue who we are and developing ourselves the best way as possible. i on the other hand shun that we had many arguments about it. he said you have to believe and my thing is i believe in you but don't go too far. he could not walk away with his believes. >> joe morton is here not too long ago. he played the one-man show. have you had a chance to see it yet? >> yes. >> so you know what i am talking about. i was sitting in my seat in tears when he got to the scene of the time that dick spent with medgar in mississippi just hours, days before he was assassinated. when you sit in the theater and you watch stuff like that, were you at home turning the tv channels and you stop and see something across the screen, all these years later, how did you process that, sitting in the theaters and watching the scene of dick and medgar in mississippi? >> it is still extremely painful. > >> yeah. i would be lying if i say not. it is a motivator, get up and do change and give and never stop fighting for those things that medgar believed in or dick believer believed in. dick was a true friend. medgar could pick up the phone and say dick, and he would say where. they just read each other like that. i recall the first time the play was advertised and i said wait a minute, i cannot use that. those were medgar's words. the last words that he spoke i am told p just before he died in the hospital, turned me loose and not grammatically correct but when that point you are hearing the hear after, who cared. it was the meaning and captured so beautifully of the story of dick gregory. my daughter and i were apart of the speakers at dick's funeral. >> yeah, i saw that. >> i relived everything for that moment and to see the play and i must say this, my son took me to see the play. i was so moved and not only by the words that my husband had spoken but by the acting. it was superb and moved me and where he was and being something like dick gregory who gave so freely. medgar would call and dick would say where. he would not have to ask where or what. >> it was that kind of friendship and bond that when i think about the civil rights movement and when i think of mississippi, when i think of america today, it was that kind of faith. that kind of structure and that kind of love that helped to eliminate so much of the hatred that we had in this country. >> i am working my way up to the conversation. i am going to get down, i promise. we are going to get to these museum. >> there is so much on my mind. >> so the other day and i see it all the time, it gist hit me the other day in a way that it had not hit me in a while knowing that i was going to see you on this program tonight. one of my favorite possessions in the entire world and the whole world, i have collected a lot of stuff over the years and one of the things that means the most, i have a photo of you and prescott king and me. >> i was looking at the photo the other day and thinking that medgar is gone and martin is gone and malcolm is gone and betty is gone and coretta is gone and you are here on the show tonight. again, god works in mysterious way. >> his wonders to perform. you are still here. >> i don't know why but i am. [ laughter ] >> tavis, i don't know, it is the kind of miracle and i am so thankful to be here and to be on the show with you. i truly am because i admire you so much. yes, you are my child so to speak but i just have such admiration for you and what you do with what you have and it makes such an impact on people everywhere who watched that. it is a sense of pride that i can sitt tall and throw my shoulders back. oh, i we don't want be there today. i am going to be interviewed on the tavis smiley show. >> what? they know immediately. and again, i say god works in mysterious way since the wonders to perform. i am just so thankful and blessed to be in your company and to be here and see what you do with your show because it impacts people and i believe rules. it is the same thing with the play "turn me loose." the people in the theater when van and i were there caught up in the emotions of it all and you can almost see them taking in the depth of the movement and you can almost feel the spirit of the people of that time in that theater and that's what we are looking for and hoping for for those who go to mississippi museum. even though i have to admi admit -- um, i still have a problem with that. >> let me cut into explain this. i know where you are going with this. i know where you are going and i want to explain this. there are not one and two museums that opened up in mississippi, i will let you expla explain the back story of the two figured out of a way to coexist. tell me why the two opened as oppose to one facility. >> tavis, that's still my problem. >> yeah. >> i don't believe in separate and equal. that may not be the case with those two museums but to speak to that and for those of us who have worked so long and so hard to have one unit, it is a little difficult toll swallow. those two museums are very important and you know i visited doi during construction and i asked why, too, the funding from st state and people from the outside, why do we have to have two? it is the same old separa, sepad equal? of course, that was the answer. okay, look at what you have. there is steps that join if two. in my mind, going back over the years. it took separate ones and the staffs and the architects and others who are involved that worked very, very hard to be sure that that's not what people will see or think about when they come. >> are they talking about two different stories or of the same story of the state of mississippi. it is all apart of the same story but it is also separate. >> uh-huh. >> you have the story of mississippi and then a few steps that takes you into the civil rights pod. >> uh-huh. >> i was at the dedication and we had this large crowd together and i was the loud speaker, i said something that i was criticized for and that's okay, i have been criticized. >> not the first time. [ laughter ] >> yeah, i have been criticized so much, it does not matter. i thought there and and we were on this elevated land and i told the people look over that hill, that's where our children when the adults were afraid to demonstrate and our children demonstrated it and they locked them up in that open space and they brought food and tubs, ten tubs and water in those tubs and the policeman would plop it down, spit in it and say this is for you. you know for me, i cannot get that out of my mind. >> uh-huh. >> i wish i could in a way but i am so hopeful that the two of museums separated by steps. we'll speak to the growth of mississippi. we'll spoke to the promise that we have there and that the steps will not be a divider between mississippi and shicivil rights. they are both the same. >> i have been reading about this again. mississippi and myself, i have been reading and apparently it is the hottest ticket in the state. it is sold out like immediately. so people are anxious to see a state like mississippi that finally comes to terms with its passing in the museum and it is the success that the museum is having in washington, arbitor. they tell me all the monument in washington, it is still the hottest ticket to get in the smithsonian in dc and i suspect this thing will do well. let me ask you how you went about making the museum and getting all the papers to this particular project. >> that's not exactly correct. >> let me rephrase it? >> what did you give and what of medgar myrlie did you give of the museum. >> medgar's papers were given as such to the original museum some years ago. i am the type of person that i keep every little scrap of paper that seems whatever -- it is historical to me. i had no place to keep all of medgar's paper. it seems only fitting that they should be at home in mississippi and so i worked with the museums there of the original one. and donated my papers and medgar's paper and not my papers there and some of the artifacts. okay, so here we are today years later. and there are still some papers and things there. you know, there is one thing in particular i would like to mention. it did not belong to me, tavis, it belongs to the state of mississippi now. the rifle that was used to kill medgar is apart of the exhibit there that was not mine but, there are other things that are there that belonged to my family that had been donated and i think it is critically important that those who were searching for materials went beyond the family and webt nt to medgar's friends and whatnot, the razor of one of the things he used, the intricacy of what he put in him in this is highly recommended. >> and the house that you lived in and the house that van was born in and the drive way to which medgar came home and which he was assassinated, i have been to the house a number of times. i never go to jackson. my mother and i were there not too long ago and we went there together and spent the afternoon there and took pictures and had prayers, i don't like to go as part of the state. is the house now -- it is officially a -- what is it? >> i understand it is official a national monument. >> i don't have papers that states that and i need to pursue that and be sure that i have it in my hand. well taken care of and we and my children and i donated the house because of the magnificent role that was played in the civil rights movement. just renting it out was devastation to the house and my heart and soul so we moved from that and along with the legislatures in mississippi to have this approved. >> and someone says to me, a couple of months ago when i was there, you never got the blood. interestingly enough after all of this used. >> and the stain. >> that stain cresceement is st there so y there. >> and my anguish now and my awareness of the history of my state, state ths that medgar lo and he would give his life for the state, the people, his people and the children and that's his point. and in a few days, you know hopefully, there will be large crowds there to see artifacts and there will be people coming in, i hope from other countries and oh, they will. >> they'll be coming. >> there will be discussions that are going on because ta vi, i must tell you this. all the pain and suffering, that my family has been through and this country have been through, i am afraid and i am angry. i don't know what to do about the situation in america today. i think back to mississippi and i hope there will be lessons learned and practices that'll start and that'll help to turn this country around from where we are today. >> i wrote a piece the other day for a national publication and i tried to make a point where america is loss and the only thing that's worse of being loss and headed in the wrong direction with the guy driving the car who's not taking advises from anybody or getting directions to help us get in the right path. martin and medgar are our gps. >> beautiful analogy, thank you. >> if we listen to them and what we try to tell us we can get america back to the right track and we can find our way. >> thank you for your sacrifice and our service and struggles and for always coming back and check on us and your son to make sure he's behaving and your niece, too. >> oh yeah. [ laughter ] >> tavis, let me thank you for all that you do to help keep us and i mean america on track. people talk about you more than you know in the most positive way and the service that you provide with your show we don't know what we would do without you. i love you dearly. >> i love you more. >> that's our show tonight, thank you for watching and as always, keep the faith. for more information on today's show, visit [email protected], hi, i am tavis smiley, join me next time of actor lesley odom jr. that's next time, we'll see you then. ♪ >> and buy contributions to your pbs station from viewers like you. thank you. good evening from los angeles. i'm tavis smiley. tonight, a conversation with a legendary journalist, dan rather, whose career spans a half century. he's written a collection of original essays about what it means to be an american. the text is, what unites us. we are glad you joined us. the conversation with dan rather coming up in a minute. ♪ ♪