projects. the non-surplus food, fiber and crops grown on lands nourished by water from hoover dam find ready markets throughout the nation. in return, these irrigated areas by farm machinery and other products from the manufacturing centers. this exchange of goods between west and east, north and south has helped develop america's free enterprise prosperity. hoover dam has pointed the way to the fullest utilization. man is adding other mighty reclamation projects to the stairway of dams in the colorado river. they await the day when they will cradle mighty, multi-purpose dams. they will write new chapters in the story of hoover dam, truly a modern civil engineering wonder. next, a 1960 interview with herbert hooverer. that's followed by u.s. army captain william johnston. later a new deal promotional video from 1938 on the importance of the mississippi river valley to the u.s. in two hours ana is a documentary details the mission to land two men on the moon. that's all come can go up on c-span3. republican herbert hoover served as president from 1929 to 1933. remembered most for his time in the oval office at the time of the great depression. in this hour how long 1960 nbc interview, hoover discusses his life beyond the presidencpresid. pe speaking with reporter ray henle he talks about his time in china and his involvement in supplying food to civilians in german occupied belgium during world war i. it's part of the stanford university library department of special collections and university archives. >> this is the campus of stanford university, one of america's great schools. this is the memorial church. this is the memorial theater. this is the library on war, revolution and peace. i'm meeting a great american and an old friend. i am here to have talk with the 31st president of the united states, mr. herbert hoover. >> thank you, sir. could you tell us what it means. >> well, it's the library on war, revolution and peace. it's to present the complete history of this war since the beginning. it has many objectives. one of them is to aid in the development of majors of peace out of display of the experience in the world. economic, military, other questions. it is now the haven of historians from all over the world because the german war library was destroyed in the last war. the french war library was destroyed and the british war library was greatly damaged. this is practically the only complete story of what has happened in the last 50 years. >> how did the idea of the library start? >> i was crossing the north sea on a journey to belgium in connection with relief and i had a book with me to read. he complained in that book that he has not been able to present the life of the people in disappearance of franklin literature in newspapers, bulletins. i was in the unique position to collect that material. i established collection agencies in all of the country's at war in europe. i was going behind the lines once a month on a circuit around in connection with my particular job and so we started the collection of that type of literature and we moved into more important documentation. >> it must contain a huge number of documents. >> it contains the day probably 20 million documents. many of them are the originals which form the turning points in world history. the most pathetic of them, i think i would show you and that is this. when they invaded poland they took about 250 polish military prison nors. later on when the germans attacked the russians, the russians anxious to increase their military strength asked the polls to reassemble those armies out of those work camps. they were able to find about 60,000 pols alive out of the original 250,000 sent. every one of these pols has to get a permit which was constituted the railway ticket to the headquarters where he was recruited. they relayed in their depositions who else was there and the tickets show the locations. so one is able to reproduce the whole slave system. at that time there were about 14 million people in slave camps. we have maps showing the locations of these labor camps made up from the 40,000 documents which we have in the library. you'll see those marked t. we have also the first issue of the communist newspaper and this announcing the victory of the communist revolution. we have a secret file of this newspaper. right down till today with the exception of three months and that three-month gap was due to an over-energetic postmaster general who considered this subversive material and he stopped it coming to us. so that we had to do something about that. >> did you take measures there to relax the situation? >> i certainly relaxed the postmaster general, but i don't think we've been able to recover the lost numbers. here is another document that's been of profound interest to me. this is the intimate diary of the prime minister of japan at the time we went to war. he made an enormous effort, strenuous effort to effect the peace of the united states and prevent the war. and the pathos of this document is a warrant for its retention, of man who made a real struggle to prevent world war ii. >> excuse me, did you have something else there, mr. hoover? >> i have some parts of the diary of one of the wickedest men ever lived. he records it private and public in this diary. apparently never expected for us to have it. >> mr. hoover, there must have been some mighty interesting stories connected to the collection of these documents? >> a multitude of dramatic incidents. i recollect after the communist revolution in hungary there arose a dictator. the people finally rebelled. one of our energetic youngsters collecting material went around to the headquarters. he found there was nobody there. he proceeded to load the whole files of that outpost of communism is a truck an they finally wound up here in the library. another case was the one where i made a request of president ebert who was the first president of germany. >> after the first world war? >> after the first world war. it would be apropos to this effort. he gave me the complete minutes of the german war council presided over by the emperor, sitting once a week or oftenor. finally at the request of a german ambassador i agreed we would keep it in the vault for a number of years. it's not yet open to the public. >> why is the library located here at the leland stanford university? >> i graduated from the university. after after that mrs. hoover had a house on the campus here while i journeyed all over the earth. i also was a trustee of the university and very naturally i was interested in the institution. >> i know you were born in hest branch, iowa. could you tell us how it is you got down here an attended leland stanford university? >> this uncle of mine was a country doctor with all of the fine attributes of the united states. i lived with him and his family parts of it for about seven years. during that time i got a job as an office boy. and on occasion a gentleman having some business with the firm came in and while he waited he talked with the office boy. he was inquiring what i wanted to do, so forth. he said, well, you ought to take up engineering. he was, himself, an engineer. we discussed it and he rather inspired my mind. soon i noticed that stanford university had announced the institution would be opened that autumn and the tuition would be free. that is more or less suited my necessities. they announced they would hold entrance examinations in portland, oregon. i went to the appointed place. i took the examinations as well as i could not ever having been at high school but having attended a night school where i had picked up some latin and some mathematics. i passed the mathematics examinations with such distinction that the professor conducting the examinations sparked a good bit of interest. inquired about my family background. he himself was quaker. he was the president of swathmore college. he thought i could get in an he would help me work my way through the university. >> i see. there really you have two cases, mr. hoover, where men, older men, showed a keen interest in a young man trying to get along. >> i have a number of unforgettable obligations to men who took an interest in a youngster. they do it yet all over the united states. there were two. there are many more to follow. >> of course, that was the beginning then of your engineering career, was it not, mr. hoover? >> i presume. you don't call yourself an engineer until you get out of college but that's where i began. >> yes, sir. could you tell me after you got your diploma then at leland stanford, what was your first job in. >> i worked during the summer vacations on the united states geological survey. i earned most of the money i needed. i went into the mines in grass valley, california. i saw a job and thought my diploma might be of importance and i might get on the staff but that diploma didn't seem to impress anybody. finally, i got to a condition where i took a job under ground in a mine five months or six as a common miner. it was not a bad experience. >> i understand you to say, sir, that you took a job as a common miner? what kind of a mine was this in, sir? >> it was a gold mine. i didn't even have the distinction of a miner. i started loading trucks. i troez that position two or three months later. >> how much time? >> 12 hours a day. i think i got $2. >> on your very first job you learned how to work with your hands, did you? >> well, that wasn't quite the whole story. i worked with my hands when i was a boy. what i really learned at that time was the agony of walking and going from mine to mine looking for a job. >> i take it during that period you were able to lay aside a little money for future activities? >> i lay enough money down to get to san francisco to look for a better job. >> how did you happen to get into professional engineering after those underground mining days experience? >> i had developed a great friend of dr. brenner here at stanford. he was one of those men that always boosted youngsters along. he introduced me to the leading engineer in san francisco. he made a temporary appointment. he had an application for an engineer to go to australia. there i went on my first $10,000 job. >> subsequently to that your work took you to countries all over the world? >> yes. we managed mines in china and india and australia, russia. i don't know where all including the united states and canada. i went around the world seven times with my family. >> it must have been good to get home. >> always a thrill to come to america. this is the place where freedom really lived. >> did you not practice engineering in russia? >> yes, sir. there we had over qqqa(bé4ñ100, and a very successful operation. the main interest is it was a complicated clhemical and metalluric operation. it was closed for 15 years or more and all those people put out of a job. >> i see. during your experience in russia how did you get awlolong with t russian people? >> we got along extremely well. the government was anxious to see the development of the natural resources of the country. we were the first americans to come in. we had no political implications. british and french and all the other nationalities carried with them certain political possibilities. the russians welcome the america. >> i see. >> we had no difficulty getting on with the people for that type of an operation we tried to get the best intelligence there was. we paid wagers far higher than the common wage of the country. we never had a strike or labor difficult. >> mr. hoover, did you ever hear from any of those russian workers afterward ? >> some years after that i took a relief of communist russia on behalf of the american people. i picked some of our staff who spoke russian, our american staff, and sent them back in connection with relief. they went to look around. there they were met by a deputation that came to them with a petition saying will you not get mr. hoover an his men to come back to life so much better. >> i see. do you have any souvenirs of those days? >> yes. i have what i think is an interesting souvenir. come along. ray, this was presented to me by the workman in the kishtim mines in russia. it's a typical russian piece. it has one curious quality and that is the curious plaque which resembles bronze. it comes from the fact they use the most impure iron in order to make it. no american iron smelted would touch more than .1%. but nevertheless they built quite an artistic industry on the basis of that curious iron and the artistic quality of the russian workman. >> what is that over there? >> those are ancient chinese porcelains. >> shall we go over and take a look at them. >> ray, this is a very unusual display of the ancient chinese porcelain art in blue and white. >> i see that. >> in form and in arrangement. they are the very height of chinese concepts in artistic arrangement and in workmanship. we thought it would be appropriate that this set should be placed in the memorial room to mrs. hoover downstairs and that's been done. >> she, of course, collected these items, did she not? >> she collected porcelains for over 40 years. well, let's go and sit down. >> you were many times in china then, weren't you mr. hoover? >> yes, i went to china originally as a part of the engineering firm i mentioned to you as the chief engineer to the then department of mines. it had been created by our reform government. that job came to an end by the boxer uprising, which threw the government out. mr. hoover and i had to spent a month under artillery and rifle fire in the town of tinsin until the american marines came in and rescued us. >> outside of your experience in the boxer rebellion, how were your relations, generally, with the chinese? >> the chinese are a very friendly people. i traveled over a great part of china during the two years prior to that and had nothing but courtesies from everybody. i, of course, was supposed to have an official position and had certain protections in the shape of a company of calvary usually. there's nothing comment on particularly. they have a seen of humor. they're highly individualistic and poverty is the total aspect of china except in a very narrow circle. >> what do you think now that the communist are in power what will happen to the chinese people? >> when the armies drove chaing kai-shek out of the garm the first thing he did was to take away the arms of the population. the consequence is that the regime is fixed until such a time until such a time as the failure of its methods, failure of productivity should cause the regime itself to change. and no doubt they will have fights amongst the chinese leaders and often enough revolutions of that kind in history are blown up by fights among the leaders. some of those fights going on now. >> the russians, of course, will have influence on the chinese. do you think that the russian attitude on easing world tension may have some effect on the chinese red. >> i think they may have to restrain them if they want to get their own objectives. we may be witnessing a phenomena as well as to that which we saw at the time that stalin came to power. he wanted time to build up his industry and his armies and he became the most peaceful thing there was running around the earth. he joined the league of nations. he made the peace treaties with some 30 of his neighbors. nothing could have been more promising for lasting peace. in 1939 he violated every one of those agreements so that one will wonder perhaps this new regime wanting time to consolidate, being troubled by a failure in agriculture and hunger amongst their people would like to have an interval of peace. i have no confidence with objectives of those people it would be lasting peace with good will towards men. it might be endurable. we might be able to reduce the armiment of the world somewhat, all of what might come out of geneva and that's what we must pray for. >> this book here looks familiar. i think i recognize it as being commonly call ed apocrypha. >> this book was published gist 400 years ago. it is in latin, it was in latin and comprehended the whole gam met of the mining and metallurgical and chemical industries of their time. the technical terms had been invented by the author. mr. hoover was an accomplished linguist and with her background of technical training and the fact i knew something about these subjects we were able to make a translation of it for the first time. it was purely a labor of love. it had no practical values at the modern times. many of the processes illustrated here are still in action. for a couple hundred years it was the textbook of those industries and one time they chained it in an iron binding in mining towns and the priests translated it for the benefit of the miners plus the illustrations. the book had at one time great weight but, of course, now, it's only a matter of interest. there is nothing particularly public about the book at the time. there were 20,000 copies printed and distributed amongst engineers. since that time it's become a rare item and it now sells for $250, but we don't have anymore of them. >> didn't get the 250? >> i didn't get the 250. >> it must have been a tremendously difficult job to translate? >> it was a difficult job. it took five years and furnished a family interest during that entire period. >> mr. hoover, when did your career as an engineer came to an end? >> it came to an end shortly after i took over the belgium relief in 1914. i didn't know at the time but we all expected the war to be over very shortly and we'd all get back to work. a i never went back to the profession. >> who was it who asked you to get into the relief work? >> that was the combined pressures of leading belgiums, the belgium prime minister and the american ambassador in london and the american ambassador in brussels. they all seem to contract on wanting me to take that job. >> you certainly must have been in some exciting experiences from time to time? >> well, most of it was a pretty humdrum business. you had to transport tremendous volume of food overseas with a fleet of 300 ships. you had to distribute it, transport it inland, ration the population and take position of the agriculture product. in fact, it was the first food administration in the history of the world. the incidents that came out of it were nothing very startling. one of them i remember rather distinctly that the service across the north sea was tamed by the dutch. they frequently lost channel steamers. they always provided methods of escape so nobody downed. i had usually paid the bill for my food and cabin at the end of the trip. the steward came to me and said you'll have to pay cash. i said how come. he said the last voyage the queen wellaminna went down and the passengered youed me money. >> i recall a story of you're having been under fire. >> i was under fire a number of times. the only time i really got wounded is when the germans were bombing a town where i was stopping overnight. i got up and looked out the window to see this performance. the germans dropped a bomb in the street and i got showered with glass. i got cut up a lot but i never got a purple heart. >> didn't some of the authorities fight the feeding of starving children during your belgium relief career? >> we had to transport all of our material through the british blo blockade and a great division rose in the cabinet. the military side of the cabinet insisted that 10 or 12 millions or 10 million starving belgiums would inconvenience the germans a lot and that it might bring the war to a quicker end. he was then prime minister were all on my side. i pushed the issue even further. five million a month. in the end i was receiving 10 or 12 million a month from the british. >> you may have inversely answered a question that was in my mind but what do you think of the policy of starvation as an instrument of warfare? >> it may be an instrument of warfare. it might bring war to an earlier end. starvation leads the massive human beings that are a liebl liability. >> your work in belgium relief did not end? >> no. the belgium relief continues throughout war, and i continued to conduct it. at that time the british and french were beginning to find difficulties and they began to call on me for advice. about that time president wilson asked me to take over the united states food administration. i became food administrator of the united states. continued in that until the time of amistice in 1918, and then i was asked to go to europe on behalf of all the allied governments. >> that work ended in what year, sir? >> well i took it up again in russia in 1923, so you'd say i spent about nine years on that kind of a job. >> you also had some relief work left to put your shoulder as secretary of commerce. >> the flood of 1927 was the greatest flood ever been known on the mississippi from cairo down. the protections were weak and they all gave way and the country for 1,000 miles north and south and from 70 to 150 miles wide and went under water. so president coolidge asked me to take over that job. we moved about a million and a half of people out of the low ground and pulled them out the water and put them in the camps and put them back in their homes again. we lost three lives in that operation. >> three lives. >> it was conducted entirely by american charity. we never called on the government for a dime except that i have the services of the navy and the coast guard. >> you refer briefly to russian relief in 1923, could you tell me more about that? >> a dreadful drought struck on behalf we sent them in and they gave them completely free movement. i raised about $70 million of american money and we unquestionably saved about 17 million russian lives. they accredited us with that. when we finished, they got out of a beautiful scroll and addressed to me and the american people gratitude and you'll find it somewhere here in the library in russian. when the american communist get too entirely abusive i send out a photograph of it in translation by way of stopping them up a little. >> i see. if i recall your next great work in relief was the organization of relief during the depression. could you tell me something about that. >> unemployment grew with the depression and especially when the whole economy of europe collapsed and brought us down. i organized relief in the united states. at the time i left office we had about 18 million people on relief in the united states. mr. roosevelt found he had to continue the same number up until about pearl harbor. >> your own next operations in the field of relief then came when, sir? >> at the beginning of the second world war, i was appealed to by some eight or nine different governments in europe that had been occupied by the germans to come to their relief. we organized some relief of them but in the course of three or four, two years, the military people in control of the allied side adopted the old british doctrine and they closed off our operations. it was not until the war was over when the inevitable post-war famine that i was called back into service. every world war will create a worldwide famine. i don't need to coin the reasons for that but it's a solemn fact and mr. truman was faced with fa anyone in 1946 even greater than the world has seen before mp he asked me to take part in the management of the famine and i did so by organizing the necessary set up in washington and again i visited 38 different nations by plane. organized their food administrations, got their cooperation and in the end we pulled through. when we started we were convinced that at least 800 million people would die in that famine. we found a food all over the world that we hadn't expected and in the end we pulled them all through. there was no mass starvation anywhere that i know of. >> it's very clear, mr. hoover, that your operations in the field of relief have been literally tremendous. may i ask you this, during all these years did you accept any compensation? >> i never accepted compensation for relief or federal service except in this sense that i have taken federal salaries and expended them on matters outside of my own needs and use. i was led to that by an overall question of conviction of my own. i don't say this in disparagement of men accepting salaries from the government because most of our officials must have them to live. it happened that i have prospered in my profession at a time when the income tax was only 1%. i was able to save a competence and i felt that i owed to my country a debt that was unpayable and i have to right to ask her to pay me, so that was the practice right up until the first day of june this year. >> i think on occasions you have been smeared to the effect you -- >> oh, yes. smeared and i take it that the final test of whether smears are of any right or effectiveness is when congress makes an investigation. i've been in federal service off and on for 40 odd years and i haven't yet been investigated by congress. >> i see. that certainly is the answer to it, isn't it? >> maybe. >> mr. hoover, i know you have had a special interest in children and i believe that you set up a special relief for children. could you tell us about that, please, sir. >> that originated during the belgium problem. there were two million belgium children and the normal ration for an adult is deficient in the type of food that will support child life. we have set up an extra meal every day for all the children in belgium, two million of neth. when we came into the relief we expanded that service and carried about 12 or 14 million children. if you catch them young enough you can feed them up so that they become normal. if it's gone too far they are the an zecestors of the banditsd racketeers in the world. >> that brings to mind, did i interrupt you, sir? >> when world war ii came on, i had set up these ranarrangement all over the world to meet that famine. i found there was a tremendous impoverrishment and under nourishment in children all over the world. there were some 30 million of them as we calculated them. i took that matter up with the united nations and the american administration. they set up an organization and i suggested the men who should operate it and these were the men who had operated in europe and world war ii and world war i. they're still operating it to this day. as far as i know they looked after nearly 50 million children in the last five years. >> i see. as you were speaking there of child welfare and child relief work, mr. hoover, my mind went back to a statement you made on the subject. as i recall it was back in 1930 when you were president and i believe you had summoned a child welfare council at that time. i have, i think it's in here in this book, i'm wondering if it wouldn't be appropriate for you to tell us about it at this time. >> i can read it to you. >> all right, sir. >> that statement has been republished in many times and it's rather an old statement. the older i grow the more i appreciate children. we approach all the problems of childhood with affection. their is the problem of joy and good humor. they are the most wholesome part of the race. they are the sweetest. they are the freshest from the hands of god. mischievous, we live a life as to apprehension of what their opinion may be of us. a life of defense against their terrifying energy. we put them to bed with a sense of relief and a lingering of devotion. we envy them, the freshness of adventure and the discovery of life. we mourn over the di disappointments which they will meet. >> thank you, sir. i think that probably brings us up to your work with the government reorganization commission. two presidents, i believe, called you to washington to take up that work. could you tell me what your reaction is from that labor. >> the problems are perhaps entirely too long to go into here. this government of ours multiplied itself from about 600,000 officials up to 2,500,000 with a growth of government agencies from about 300 up to some 1600 p and the fabulous waste and duplication and lack of efficiency. so the congress set up in both cases and i was asked to take the chairmanship. the first three organization commission of six years ago secured the adoption of great many of its recommendations, about 70%. they related largely to reorganization of different agencies and setting up a new structure of the government. the korean war came along and obscured whatever savings there were. the second examined the government from a policy point of view. we have made recommendations which if adopted would enable the balancing of the budget and a very substantial reduction in tax. last commission required five years to get its proposals adopted it may take us some years to get these but i feel certain it will come. >> and i believe you intend to keep working on it. >> the press seems on getting me retire bud i can't stop until we get these recommendations adopted. >> mr. hoover it seems to me this is an appropriate time for me to ask you this. in view of world conditions in do you think with respect to the chances of private enterprise returning and the chances of our having greater individual freedom again? >> you mentioned abroad, there has been a total economic revolution in germany. germany has gone back to a free enterprise system. the last election in britain guaranteed there a retreat from socialism and a free enterprise. in our own country we haven't made as much progress as we should. the second reorganization commission however proceeded on the thesis that this was a country where the economic and social system was based on private enterprise and individual action. both of them naturally regulated to prevent unfair practice and to prevent a monopoly. and that the government should only intervene with the people in matters in which the people could not support and take care of themselves. well our department has departed a long ways from that basis and the recommendations of the reorganization commission are very largely in the nature of methods of return back to the fundamental thesis on which this country was founded. >> you know, we covered a vast number of subjects here today. covered a lot of ground and i think the thing that comes out of it possibly is the fact that you have been a mighty hard-working man all your life. however i do think that you're also known for your relaxation. will you tell us how do you get your relaxation? >> well i go fishing whenever i get a chance. also i go to baseball games and then the other exercise of that kind. i have a rather yen for fishing because the ripple of a brook and the slap of a wave against the side of a boat will brainwash most anybody into a much cleaner position. >> didn't you once make a famous statement about fishing? >> i don't know. ime have said a lot about it. i explained why presidents all went fishing. they all have even though they never fished before and that was because the american people have respect for privacy only on two occasions one of them is prayer and the other is fishing. and presidents can't pray all the time. the fish in question is the problem of getting from here to somewhere else and getting out of an awkward spot. if you get any fish you know all men are equal before fishes. there is no ascendancy of these evil thoughts that seem to infect our social system. >> that of course brings me to another subject that i wanted to ask you about before we part your interest in boys club. i refer to that because i was thinking about your talking about baseball and fishing. you have a vital interest in the boys club. will you tell me what that means to you? >> well, i have been the chairman of the board for the boys clubs now for nearly 20 years. i was connected with it even before that. but it appeared to me as being a systematic method by which older people could be a help to youngsters outside their normal schooling and parents and so forth. the boys club have 400,000 members. they're all slum boys. it's a slum movement. it's probably the best preventive to youth delinquency there is in the united states. they are taken in and given manual training and they're given music and they have ample games and their organized into teams instead of gangs. and they have equipment that is growing in dimensions. today it would cost $120 million to replace the equipment we have in those institutions and i might mention to you that the boys clubs, these boys clubs developed five major league players. in the last series. >> wow. and it also gives a chance for the older man to do something for the boys just as older boys did things for you as you were growing up. is that right? >> a large part of it is based on voluntary help of elder people. the carpenter goes in and takes charge of the carpenter shop. >> mr. hoover, while i've been sitting here i've been wanting to ask you something about these flags. this flag is the president's flag? >> that is right. >> why is it here? >> it is the only gift that the president receives from the american people. he gets no pension. he gets no title but he gets his own flag and has a right to fly it. >> unlike a senator who is called a senator or a governor who is called a governor after he leaves office. >> you better mention the kentucky colonels and the generals. and a president is nothing but just plain mister. and i think it's a comfortable feeling. >> mr. hoover, i want to thank you for this session that you and i have had here together today. there's just one other thing i wonder if you would be able to give me something of your philosophy and your feeling about your fellow americans and about your country. >> rather an extensive subject. i wrote a passage on the subject. i don't think i could phrase it as well as i did it at that time. >> fine. >> so if you'd like i don't mind reading it to you. >> i wish you would, sir. >> perhaps without immodesty i can claim to have had some experience in what the word "america" means. i've lived in many lands, many kinds of american life. after my early boyhood in an iowa village i lived as a ward of a country doctor in oregon. i lived among those to whom hard work was the price of existence. the opportunities of america opened to me through the public schools. they carried me to the professional training and the great american university. i began by working with my own hands for my daily bread. i have tasted the despair of a fruitless search for a job. i even know the kindly encouragement of a boarding house keeper. i've seen america in contrast with many nations and many races. my profession took me into many foreign lands under many kinds of governments. i worked in governments of free men, of tyrannies of socialists of communists and met with princes and kings and despots and december pray does.