You again in 2018. Thank you very much for coming. You are watching American History tv, all weekend on cspan3. To join the conversation like us on facebook at cspan history. Monday night on the communicators. Michael beckerman, president and ceo of the Internet Association made up of 40 Internet Companies including google, facebook and amazon talks about new internet regulation proposals from the fcc and how to preserve a free and open internet. He is interviewed by Margaret Harding magill. It looks like the fcc is proposing to move internet traffic exchange. Can you explain why that might be a problem for your members . Day it isend of the about consumers. You are looking to access the internet. You pay your Internet Service provider and you are paying a lot of money and you want access to the entire internet. If your experience is altered in some way or your site is blocked and other things are going on, as a consumer you do not know where that is happening. It could be happening at a point of interconnection but you do not know. All of that should be included there to protect consumers and their ability to access the entire internet. The communicators monday night at 8 00 eastern on cspan2. I will never publish a word of these reports, at least on my own even though i am proud of the work. Why . One major report for treaty rights. It involves analyzing a phrase ran treaty clause that less. I have to explain the contemporary meaning of the terms usual and a custom in places. That cultivate. I parade those few words into a report that ran several hundred pages. Mike arch led me to to considering myself for a time the countrys leading historian of cultivation. Titles which i have never aspired and to which i did not have competition. As an Expert Witness i have experienced the most gratifying moments of my career. Asked Oracle Knowledge that make andprofessional standards latter professional standards to make an immediate difference in the world. 40 years of this have left me weary of the whole endeavor. A new book by one of my colleagues at stanford have mainly recognize my work and has its own history. Been upwardly grafted onto the adversarial tradition of american jurisprudence that ver through and replace i am implicated for the best of motives. Practices that i would rather not be a part of. I do not see base governments is a good thing. Do not think adversarial procedures are the best way to settle matters historical facts and interpretations. That is what i engage in as an expert good i am always uneasy forcing impoverish people to extend their rights and identity in forms that are not of their choosing. That is what the tribe has to do. X you can watch this and other programming on our website. The span. Org history cspan. Org history. Each week, american artifacts takes you to museums and Historic Places to learn about American History. Located in washington, d. C. Tudor place was the home of , thomas peter and his wife Martha Parke Custis peter, the granddaughter of Martha Washington. Six generations of the peter family lived in the house from 1805 until 1984. We take into her with curator grant quertermous who shows us a letter from George Washington, a bomb shelter, and a signed photo of woodrow wilson. Grant i am the curator at tudor house and historic garden and we will take a look at some of the Amazing Things we have in our collection. Tudor place was home to the peter family from 1805 until 1983, five different generations of the peter family lived here. It was the wishes of the last owner that the house become a museum so that the public could enjoy and experience this amazing collection of objects. First, i want to talk about the architecture. When thomas and martha peter purchased the house in 1805, it was eight and a half acres and only the two end wings were here with nothing in between. The owner originally planned to build a larger house but never did. They started talking with their friend, a doctor and amateur architect, about designing a grand house for them. By this time, he had already won the Design Capital for the u. S. Capitol building and designed the Octagon House in washington. He incorporated the two wings and a center block of the house into a fivepart house, and architectural style very typical in the chesapeake in the 18th and 19th century. The key is the domed portico. With a domed roof and a marble floor. Thornton made the temple portico come into the superstructure of the house with this wall of floor to ceiling windows. The temple portico provides a transition between the interior places of the house and exterior places of the lawn. His inspirations were classical sources. That is a brief architectural overview of the house. The other thing i want to talk about is the peter familys connection to george and Martha Washington. The best place to do that is here in the drawing room. These are the very public rooms of the house where the family entertained. One notable visitor was the marquis de lafayette. He visited in 1824 and presented the family with this engraving on the wall. The family always kept it here in this room. He had met martha peter as a young girl at mount vernon. So it was a reunion for them to see each other during the 1824 visit. Across the wall from the engraving is an engraving of George Washington. This is one that Martha Washington left to martha peter in her will. She notes it previously hung in the passage at mount vernon and was a gift from the artist john trumbull. Engraving is after one of his portraits of washington. I think it is interesting the peter family kept both engravings in the drawing room hanging across from each other. After Martha Washingtons death, thomas and martha peter attended vernon andmount purchased items. One of the items was this punch bowl. It is chinese export porcelain, and what is interesting is this theme on the interior is taken from an english source of a foxhunting scene, where is the exterior depicts chinese rice cultivation. A very interesting mix of eastern and western themes. Thomas and marthas daughter tells us this punch bowl was used at tudor place to serve apple toddy, a spiced apple cider with rum and spices. And lots of alcohol. She also tells us a congressman came here to one of their parties and drank too much, and apparently made a spectacle of himself but she does not tell us which congressman that was. Speaking of politics, i should also say thomas and martha peter were very ardent federalists and they named their three daughters columbia, america, and britannia. As part of our tour today i have pulled two of our most significant washington items. They are right across in the parlor, so lets take a walk and look at those items. When thomas and martha peter were married in 1795, George Washington asked martha what she wanted as a wedding present and she replied a likeness of him. Washington complied and had the artist Walter Roberts paint this portrait miniature of him, a piece that martha treasured for the rest of her life. In 1812 description said she was wearing a portrait miniature of general washington as large as a warming pan to a ball in washington. We even have an 1850 image of holdings an older woman this as if to say i am the granddaughter of george and Martha Washington. The other item we have is a letter, one of three surviving documents from george to Martha Washington. This letter and another were found in Martha Washingtons writing desk when martha peter owned it. What is so significant about this letter is it is the letter from june 1775 where george tells martha he has been given command of the continental army. He is riding from philadelphia he is writing to her at mount vernon from philadelphia and tells her she must proceed in merely to boston to take command of the army it is such a. Significant document, because Martha Washington burned all of the correspondence between she and her husband after his death because she felt like that was one aspect of their Public Relationship that could remain private. This is very much a treasured item in our collection. One of the other washington objects i wanted to highlight is this stool. It is one of two surviving camp stools washington used in his tent during the American Revolution. A very significant object with great ties to our countrys history. I want to talk about britannia peter, thomas and marthas youngest daughter. Born in 1815, britannia was a longtime owner of tudor place. In 1842, she married commodore beverly kennett. You can see his picture on the table. The common door was commandant of the Washington Naval yard. And a very distinguished naval officer. Unfortunately they were only married 14 months before he was tragically killed on the explosion aboard the princeton. This engraving on the wall illustrates that tragic scene. On february 20 8, 1844, they were demonstrating a gun aboard the princeton and it backfired and exploded, sending shrapnel and splintered wood everywhere. The commodore was killed. The secretary of state and the secretary of the navy were also killed. President tyler was on board boat but below deck and spared. Britannia at 29 years old was a widow with a fourmonthold daughter. And she came back to tudor place and lived here for the next 67 years. Here is a picture of her with her daughter in about 1846. And then we have an image of britannia much later in life. A fascinating person. During the civil war she turned tudor place into a boarding house to prevent the house from being seized as a hospital. Her southern leanings were no secret during the war. She was a cousin by marriage to robert e. Lee, and she was a member of their wedding party. She had a number of Family Members fighting for the confederacy as well, but most of her borders here at tudor house were union officers. One rule during dinner time was that the civil war not be discussed. In the late 19th century she became a celebrity of sorts as the living greatgranddaughter of Martha Washington. It is amazing how britannia really stewart did this remarkable collection of objects she received from her parents. She would tell her grandchildren stories about when lafayette would visit, she was a nineyearold girl and the grandchildren wrote all these reminiscences down. It is a fascinating historical record and key source for us at tudor place. When britannia died in 1911, the estate and the house was divided amongst her five grandchildren. She died on the eve of her 96th birthday in january 1911. Because she lived so long, she outlived both her daughter and soninlaw. The estate went to her five grandchildren. Britannia wanted to ensure that everything was divided equally among her grandchildren so the contents of the house were inventoried. A paper inventory was done and every object got a paper label. You can see a number label on this small cup, and everything with a washington history got a mount vernon label. Many of these objects you can see still have paper labels on them and it is an interesting part of their history as well. The thing to remember about a Historic House like tudor place is room use changes over time. We are going to step into the dining room, originally a bedchamber. This was thomas and Martha Peters bedchamber, and a fascinating story related to this space is on the evening that the british burned washington in 1814, martha peter and the wife of mr. Thornton stood at the window and looked out, and they could see the smoke and fire from the white house burning, from the naval yard burning across the city. Mrs. Thornton wrote about it in her diary. Thanks to her diary, we know the two women stood here and watched washington burn. Martha peter was pregnant with britannia at the time. She was born about four months later after this event. Now if we can look at the dining table, presently it is focused with a number of objects that thomas and martha peter purchased at the 1802 mount vernon sale. You see a number of plates and tableware have those stickers on them, mount vernon as well as the numbers from the 1911 inventory. The plates, the plateau, the glassware, all of these are pieces that came from mount vernon and were used at tudor place by the peter family. After britannias death in 1911, her grandson purchased his siblings share to own the home outright. Modernizedwife adding electricity, telephones, the house adding electricity, telephones, and a steam radiator system. Now we can take a look in the office which was a space that Armistead Peter junior and his son used as an office. The office is also a great place to highlight some of the art in the collection, and a number of engravings. On the wall, you see henry clay, who was a frequent visitor to the house in the 19th century. Next to him, president woodrow wilson. An interesting story about that engraving. Armistead peter wanted the president to sign it so he sent it to the white house and had president wilson sign it. Another interesting thing you are probably noticing is the extension cord off the chandelier. Recognizedeter iii the history of the house and did not want to tear up walls to put an additional electric outlet in, so he had an extension cord run off the chandelier. The desk in the office is a colonial revival copy of the desk George Washington used as president in new york city. I think that is another connection the family was making to their relationship to george and Martha Washington. The office is really a time capsule as well and shows how the family really kept everything in the house. As i mentioned earlier, Armistead Peter junior and his wife modernized the house. Here is one of the original telephones and it was actually an intercom system. Next to it is a rotary Dial Telephone from the 1960s. We are going to go from the office into what is more the servants area of the house, and corridors and spaces used by the family servants. The backhaul is typically a servant area, and you can see the original call bells hanging on the wall. Each would have wrong a different tone and corresponded to various rooms of the house. Servants would know which room a Family Member was calling them from. This system became obsolete when the house got electricity in 1913 and 1914, so lets step into the servants sitting room and look at the system that replaced it. On the wall, you see the call r. X and enunciato the Family Member would push the and thend it would buzz arrow would swing indicating which room a Family Member was in. This room was typically furnished, the servants sitting room where servants would await being called upon. Where they would do tasks. It is the perfect example of one of our preservation projects in action. In the next couple of days we are going to be removing, you see a number of the paint on the wall is flaking off due to some plaster that needs to be repaired beyond the paint. The paint will be repaired, the plaster redone, and the room repainted. We realize at tudor place, the house is our largest artifact. Over 200 years old and requires careful maintenance and upkeep. Again a great example of the , ongoing preservation we are doing here at tudor place. Here in the servants sitting room, i also wanted to talk about domestic servants. It is a very important part of the tudor place story. We want to tell the story of the enslaved Domestic Workers as well as servants at the family had here at tudor place, and we are fortunate to have photographs of a number of those people, thanks in part to Armistead Peter juniors interest in photography. We have records in our archives, stories of the number of these people as well as images of them. One especially interesting story at tudor place is john luckett, the gardener for over 40 years. John was an escaped slave from virginia during the civil war who happened to be walking down the street and asked britannia if she needed help. She said she was looking for someone to work in the garden , so she hired him and he worked here for over 40 years. In addition to being the gardener, he took britannias grandsons hunting and fishing. They said he knew the best places for fishing on the river and the best places for hunting. And we are fortunate through our extensive archives to have a number of photographs of john with the family, including this image with Thomas Armistead owner, as athe last young boy. We are going to go into the Butlers Pantry where the china and dinnerware would be stored. When Armistead Peter junior added the steam radiator system in 191314, the radiator here is a combination plate warmer. At the time, meal service was done in the russian style, which meant many different plates for many different courses because they would come out separately. You needed somewhere to warm the plates. The Butlers Pantry is also a good place to look at the large collection of tableware, pieces with over 50 different patterns. A number of them are the pieces that were inherited from Family Members and acquired because of his interest in porcelain. Now we are going to go upstairs and look at some of the bed chambers. As were coming upstairs,