University. It is an honor and pleasure to have you with us today, eric and what brings us here today is your latest book the splendid and the vile, as all of you probably know eric is the author of fabulous books in the garden of beats, thunderstruck, and white city, i have read most of your books but i have not read your first book, i was intrigued looking at your biography that you wrote a book called the naked consumer, how Companies Plan individual consumers which is a future tense subject, maybe we will have you come back and talk about that one, i also loved on your website which all of you listening should check out, its eric larson books. Com, and love on your website you have an alternative biography which is fantastic and you described the consumer that you really like nobody else did they fiercely doubt that but im going to take a look at that. So welcome and thank you for having me rethink you for being with us. I think we should get right to it, because were having this conversation today of all days i feel like i should ask a question that if you like is on everyones mind, how did Winston Churchill celebrates and go to my. I am kidding. [laughter] that is not one of the things we discussed, and all seriousness we are having this event on zoom as opposed to in person which i wouldve loved because were on lockdown, quarantine, house arrest, choose your term in the face of a Global Pandemic. So i want to read a paragraph from your book, you wrote churchills notion of what constituted the office was expansive, often generals, ministers and Staff Members would find themselves meeting with churchill while he was in his bathtub, one of his Favorite Places to work, he also liked working in bed and despite hours are each morning going to dispatch and report with a type cedar nearby, always present was the box, black dispatch box and minutes from other officials required his attention, replenished daily by his private secretary. Clearly Winston Churchill was someone who had mastered the art of working from home and Something Real puzzling to do this day in this discussions with your book, im curious as to whether you think churchill would have. And from working from home. Im doing the zoom interview with you right now, i would be in the bathtub and churchill had no sense of that any very likely wouldve been completely naked doing it. But he was an ace work at home or, he would get up relatively late in the morning and get up and work in bed and he had his personal secretary nearby and at all times with the typewriter taking notes, he was more likely to have a panel and frankly more than likely which is very appropriate today would have a tumbler full of water and whiskey very little whiskey but nonetheless was whiskey and water. It is interesting you talk about, we tend to think about the epic relationship, friendship, partnership, alliance, whatever you want to call between fdr and churchill and the Communications Going back and forth between washington but it was interesting reading your book how the early conversations in d. C. When churchill enters office is about the drinking and his overthetop nature of his personality and i guess people were wondering is a summary we can take fiercely . People have noted about churchill but it is a mistake, that he was a drunk or an alcoholic, he certain he was not and in fact it was very close to the private secretary wrote later on that he had never seen churchill drunk or in any way limited by alcohol, churchill himself with his canteen and they said they were criticizing him and he said its taken a lot more out of an alcohol then alcohol is taken out of me. Thats how we felt, and weenies working at home, one thing that resonates today, they spend a lot of time at the Prime Minister every weekend and i actually had to Country Homes and he would be very likely quite at home with this whole situation. I was struck, i did not know this that checkers was donated by somebody, to the government, was that correct . Like at camp david, more of a traditional country home i suppose. In america before the war, i believe he donated it in 1914, dont quote me on that one, the idea of being the checkers was to be used, no work was to be done. It was a place of Prime Ministers then enjoy the countryside and let their faculty restore, churchill of course took that very, very differently and he decided to make this country impact every week and with guest and booze and fun. I have to confess when i first heard this was the subject of your next book, i was intrigued, i felt like i had read quite a lot about this first year churchill began an office in the finest hour and so forth, recently i read i think was Andrew Robertsons biography of churchill and i feel like even for not specialists weve been inundated with books about the great historical character, i mightve skipped this book added not been written by you but having read your other boo books, i felt like he is going to have a new angle and a new insight into framing but wasnt daunting at all, did you write about churchill because he felt like there were two new books written about Abraham Lincoln or what was it that drew you. I was totally in daunting but let me be clear, it was not actually churchill that drew me too this book, churchill became and entered the party a little bit late in the process but what happened, i had decided for a variety of roughly complicated reasons it would be very interesting to look into how it was that people got through the day during the blitz in the German Campaign including the portion as we know as the blitz. How did they actually do it, the reason was i moved from seattle to new york city and another thing i had an epiphany about what 9 11 has been for new yorkers versus perhaps washington in realtime had experienced, world of difference, not just the sense but the sense of violation having your home city attack, thats what made me start writing about how people actually got to the blitz, and then 57 consecutive nights, how do people get through, the original, this is about the typical framework, i thought about that and then i said wait a minute why not the quest essential churchill, his family and advisors, exactly how they got through the day and nobody had actually done that were decided to take a close look at that, at the daytoday experience and thats what really help me get through it, and 0 yes, how much material had been written about church on how much good stuff also and people like andrew roberts, my favorite of the churchill scholars either born writer, so much had been done early on i was happy to make a strategic decision of the search and the idea of reading everything that has ever been written about churchill wrote by churchill which itself was a task and i realized he was there and it would take me a decade and now and then even by the time i got to the tenth year, and would not be done because two more books were, about churchill and i made a decision, i was going to simply read as much as i could to get a sense of churchill and the landscape in the period and then dive right into the archive to see what was really there, thats what i felt most comfortable with original materials and so forth. So thats how i managed to pair things down otherwise it wouldve been overwhelmed, thats not to say every single day for the last four and half years i did not in fact ask myself what am i doing. It was very interesting to see, it did feel like a portrait of churchills orbit and we were often seen churchill and the historical moment through the eyes of his personal secretary or his daughter or other advisors that sometimes are not quite, we dont necessarily see things through their perspective as much in some of the other accounts that i read, you mentioned churchills own writing, one thing that astonished me, roberts biography, i had never realized just how prolific the history he wrote after the war but the fact throughout his life he would always get himself out of the financial holes by his own writing and he was so prolific and commanded quite a lot of money for his journalistic writings earlier in a way that i had not fully appreciated. And it was his writing that got him ultimately out of the financial hole read this is where it comes back about churchill that is a remarkable, he was extremely wellrounded, he was an extremely talented writer and often a quite good painter. All of this went into the machine in churchills brain and it really helped him in the process of trying to lead the nation through this particular crisis of the campaign. It is interesting that you said you gravitated toward this moment by thinking about what it mustve been like to be in new york on 9 11 and multiply that by 57 nights of the blitz and so forth. And then your book comes out in early 2020 and then of course the entire world is fighting off this Global Pandemic which is the next potential challenge for society that is quite different from war although we see people reaching from the analogies, the analogy is unquestionable and the need for leadership to mobilize society to meet the crisis on hand that requires extraordinary efforts and sacrifices. So i want to ask you about that and whether theres a secret sauce for the churchill leadership, before we get to that and you started alluding, before we set the scene, mamay , 1940, amazing day where your account starts, 80 years from this coming sunday i was also thinking about that, to just set the scene of describing what it was that the uk and Winston Churchill were facing. In 1940 which is when the action started in my book was a day that churchill became Prime Minister, the greatest day in his life, i think he would agree this is the thing that he wanted most of all, he became Prime Minister in the rebellion in the house of commons or the consensus was Neville Chamberlain was a Prime Minister and was not up to the challenge of dealing with hitler in germany. But the same day in may 10, 1940 was the day that hitler seemed to be a foaming were and when hitler invaded the low countries, heres a situation where churchill, this is a greatest day of his life was one of the darkest days in the history of the world. This did not. Churchill, this is like added spice to the challenge, youre in charge of this great empire at such a dire time. So he becomes a Prime Minister and this is a crucial moment when you talk about people in particular in the main characters in this book and in other words are really needed to secondary last year, but he was confronting when you talk about next potential threat, the presumption of the time and once germany consolidated over france, the air force is being expelled in the chaos at dunkirk and so forth. Once france fell they would transform in the strategic picture would change prior to france falling in the assumption that france would always stand and this would keep it at bay because the planes would not be fighter escrows particularly and not have the endurance to fly all the way. Suddenly when france followed at the german airbases on the coast of the English Channel was minutes away from england and minutes away from london, something that planners and britain had never even speculated. Assuming you had that threat and very real fear that hitler in germany was going to invade in a cross channel attack, this seems that most people was a certainty, and they thought it was going to be an invasion. If you can imagine taking control of britain at this time when not only has hitler begun invading various countries in europe and succeeding in crushing them, but now suddenly he is facing the expos on till threat in terms of invasion across the channel, what a hellish prospect for any normal but not actually for churchill he took this on time and time again. We were listening to snippets of the speech and his oratory all overall exposed to it in the hollywood rendition, there is obviously the gift of the language but when you think of his recipe for leadership, there is a tendency to focus on the oratory in that ability to communicate and inspire through leveraging the english language, maybe it should not be underestimated, wasnt mostly the great communicator or how much of the ratio of elements its a mix of things, first of all were familiar with the great lines and it never has been moved by from anybody for so few, thats not the strong point of his future unto speeches and at the time that particular line it did not have the same resignations as they had for all of us it is basically a speech, but the thing that made churchill particularly excellent and communicating, not just news and information by communicating a sense of reason for courage is how destructive his speeches. We got a taste of that opening speech at dunkirk, first of all was a great story, he was telling as he was opening, he was telling it as a story, this is what was happening, this is how it was unfolding, a thrilling story if you think about it. What he would do he would give his audience a sober, not happy talk, really down to earth, sometimes to sober into detailed and scared the heck out of them on occasion but then he would follow with comments about real grounds why people should be optimistic and how this problem of dunkirk and potential, how this could be resolved, topic of reason for optimism, not happy talk, real grounds for optimism and then, the route toward goal metaphorically and have people raising insane going to be part of this, were going to take this on and this is how this is going to be. Were going to beat hitler. But there is no other element to churchills leadership, one is this becomes a playoff in terms of its ability to communicate. During this great leader of history, he had an ability to put people in place them into the grand epic of greatest history to make them feel that they were part of a great island story as you would put it, that was very important to make them feel part of a thing and a tradition but also he had a real understanding of the power of symbolic and they want to continue, something as simple as refusing to call hitler by his name, he would say that man or that wicked man and when you think about it, thats a powerful thing, if you dont identify and you dont demonize to the end and makes it seem like its an unimportant presence often a distance. But then in the continuing he would go in the depths of power and found out areas and find himself there and showing himself surveying the damage, talking to people, expressing emotion, he was not afraid of public but also showing his resolve and being there and he was engaging in egregious act and showing the client, this was a very, very powerful thing. , this was a separate example, and then we saw the Vice President mike pence at the mayo clinic without a mask and everybody around him was wearing a mask into think about and the optics of that, possibly appealing to the size of america maybe with somebody like churchill would be wearing that mask and charging around in saying this is what we do. That is the power and the symbolic act. If you engage in symbolic acts that create with audience, you dont wear a mask when your audience knows damn well you should be wearing the mask, that is a problem, that is a problem and undercut your credibility as a leader. Churchill had this to keep the sense of power symbolic acts, another example of that, you certainly seem to be fearless and frankly fearless is infectious and as i like to argue with fearless. Churchill is more than likely to go to a nearest roof and people to win including stack, that is a kind of leader he was. Ive actually been to the bunker, theyve expanded to a nice museum in london, i was there for him and he wasnt going to spend that much time there because he was going to the rooftop. He only spent three nights. One things that fascinates me, i need to talk a little bit of the source, the sense in which we have some realtime information on how people responded to his speeches and so forth through this project of Mass Observation, its when we first read britains war by daniel, a book about the home front and describing the Mass Observation and i guess it was a sociological project, can you describe that a little bit, the equivalent of that would maybe be social media or peoples google searches but talk a little bit about that. So it was a social Science Organization that was founded before the work into create, as its founder said to create a social psychology of ourselves, the idea of being to recruit hundreds o to write about daily life in britain, one way to sharpen their skills and describe things on their mantelpiece, it is that kind of daily personal detail of whats going through these. Here are these viruses and keeping them for Mass Observation. And then the worst start and then it continues to keep diaries, what a tremendous resource. One of my favorite diarist out of the group, young woman who is a clerk for scotland, she is dating a married man ended a love affair with an older man and her diary shows metaphorically what the broader culture in britain was experiencing and how they evolved. Here comes a blitz, she is terrified. This is a shocking thing, up until then the belief was for whatever reason by the german director. She is terrified. Over time she becomes less terrified, Pivotal Moment is when a bomb leans outside of her house and the germans attacked at night there would be send bombs into set things on fire and so the flames with serve as a beacon to follow and an era when flying at night was best done with the moonlight, if you dont have moonlight you had to have these fires. , she was outside of her house and she put out these bombs, she struck this thing out and she was so proud of herself and so related that suddenly she is no longer afraid, she had stood up by this assault from germany and she had the courage to put this thing out, we went out and her lover became, shes quite candidate about her lover and their life. Meanwhile her lover became more and more fearful in my favorite moment is as the story proceeds and the time passes, and they hereto bombs falling and her mother tells for her to get down, get down. That is great. As a mentioned future tense, we are usually focused on our relationship with the technology and the impact of technology on society and part of the reason i want to have this conversation with you other than the fact that i am a fan of the history books, there is a future tense connection which one of the other things i was struck by reading your book, however, familiar i may or may not of been with churchill, you really portray him, i dont know if you would call him a technologist in todays word but a tech enthusiast in the character professor in the book is an interesting one and his goal as part of churchill circle, if you can just talk a little bit about that relationship and churchills relationship to science and technology, whether it was radar or the photography were familiar with and technology was a huge part of what turned the tide and help the allies in particular the english contribution, that was not we have this image of churchill of the figure from the distant past. As Technology Savvy is another thing that comes to mind but in your book that was an interesting theme. First of all he loved the idea of secret weapons, he was a big believer in the potential for with technology to give a significant weaponry and so forth, towards the end which is another leadership of smarts and the special sauce if you will, he had quite an advisor that he knew would give him the straight story, he did not like people who are going to suck up to him and say youre doing exactly what i think. But frederick was one of the most disliked men in the government and the British Government except maybe churchill and churchills wife and churchills children because frederick never forgot their birthdays because certainly after churchill became Prime Minister he appointed him to be his personal scientific advisor, very smart savvy move because first of all game churchill and insight on what technological things actually happening within the defense establishment, also it gave frederick to investigate anything that he wanted to, any technological issue and this is very powerful because it assured that churchill was going to begin a straight story, not something that was fabricated or massaged because frederick had this ability to look into anybodys affairs, and ease affairs and bring back a report to churchill. And in some cases he actually had his own memoranda for churchill design that would be distributed to the administration, whats proved to be a very valuable thing, for example it turned out that the british actually did know how many planes and how many aircraft germany had, it was just important to know in terms of offense. They also didnt know how many aircraft, that was another mention, that comes out and there were such a conundrum that churchill decided he would hire a criminal court judge to review the evidence on both sides, this was the judge that had a murder case the jigsaw murder that the bodies were cut up into so many pieces and before we can make a determination of cause of death who the victims were and so forth, he had the higher a judge to sit in on this meeting of the minds of the most statistically assessment in all these technological elements in coach and so forth and how many planes did these people have and how many do we have, but its one of those characters that get in churchill history and use crucial. There is also what you said about churchill not needing to surround himself with men who are going to tell them and if it was a cultural shift in politics it seems i cannot have press conference or cabinet meetings without everybody going around and thinking the leader and the Trump Administration has taken on to a new level is more widespread and theres updates about the situation on the frontline but their thinking churchill for his great leadership. And content for the situation, i would argue that it serves a purpose today are frederick and the difference being the Current Administration does not run the import, and does not like having somebody like dr. Fauci like a loose cannon and churchill wanted frederick to be in everybodys face, this was his mandate to get out there cause trouble in the. I want to remind people how you can upload question on the q a future but dont forget about that. And on the industrial side you had the production and hes an interesting character and i feel like i might be more familiar they had to realize they needed a lot more, that was another interesting delay. With another key element in rbc i have a lot of biographies but i feel in larger biographies of churchill, it was crucial in their and the wonderful thing that he was widely hated as well and in that case he did not like the book and immediately after he appointed the minister of aircraft reduction and set up an entire ministry of aircraft production because churchill recognized early on and that is the military visors recognized early on if britain was ever to be able with an invasion it would require that they hold the potential for an invasion and it would be very, very big indeed. He realized the only way to prevent germany is through the use of aircraft to take down. The point for aircraft is the express goal of ramping up production and always starting to increase but on a program. Churchill recognized much more had to be done in britain needed vast numbers of fighters. He did not express that and he would not admit an industrial object before his smarts were in the newspapers and ramping up circulation and putting the material on everybody else. Now suddenly hes in charge of the aircraft production. The whole point was to shake things up, churchill knew he was hated and he knew his incredibly energetic and smart and he knew it would be more paperwork, he came through to an incredible degree and people would remember its an incredible degree and save the day. Its not exactly the Technology Side but he really understood, not the manufacturing of the aircraft, the motivation of people. The one of the most thing that he did, he made sure that raf pilots, people who actually had their wings would visit Aircraft Industries and Manufacturing Companies to talk about what the planes were doing and how valuable it was that they were doing it, another thing, he was very good at the symbolic gestures as well, they would bring german aircraft if they were shot down, they would put them on the back of a truck and driving through town like they were bringing aircraft to show people we have tentatively brought down the german aircraft. One of the things that we forget is a longevity that churchill had on historical sing. He does not become part minister until 1940 and as you say, by that point he is how old . Hes 65. Okay 65. He had been a famous character even in his youth because of the experience in the world war and writing about it and then he is in a high position in the cabinet during world war i with some controversies but there is a question. He gets kicked out as first lord. Right, i was putting it nicely but you are right. So Andrew Jackson has a question, shes in the audience and shes asking an interesting question, the longevity because of course churchill during the timeframe i think, hes a character in dead wake which is also amazing, i highly recommend it. So amys question was did your research for this book change the image of churchill that you have then and that you pretrade and that way . I was wondering if that led you to want to write more about this character. The answer to your question is no, thats a very interesting question, i am writing about churchill and i actually liked churchill even then, i know he screwed up and thats a really interesting story of itself, but i think rather than changing the perception, it flashed up my sense of what churchill was really all about, and made it seem a richer, his expression turned world war i informing research in the current book by making him seem more of nuanced character, a fraud character which he was and make no mistake, you can criticize churchill for many, many things especially in his post world war ii and also some of the things that he did prior to me was an arch imperialist, during this period he was the leader of the moment and the man of the hour and his experience during world war i was important to know because he screwed up, he screwed up big time in the prior experience, now here he was coming in, i think its an apparent exponential threat, and how he muster the confidence to do so, it was a tremendous story. But the first did not lead me too do this at all. You talk about him being a fraud character and him being an arch imperialist, always got the sense, this comes across in the roberts biography to that even in his days he seemed somewhat, his way of thinking seemed a little bit outdated and nostalgic and in the 30s, hes seen by many people is a good preposterous and overthetop into dramatic and partly its because hes beating the drums on the threats that they pose and they want to have a more temperate. But when you think about the leadership that we need when the Democratic Society is facing an x potential crisis, is that the persona and the traits that you want when you need a leader, maybe theyre different from the kinds of leaders and leaders that you want in a time of normalcy. In the 1940s they turned to churchill who was this largerthanlife character that had been out of the mainstream and so caught up they had no more choice in a way and then one of the things that is so poignant about the whole saga of the work from the british perspective and the churchill protagonist is that he gets voted out of office in two months after beating in a month before the war in the japan, its so unimaginable, its less learning about this and 80 years on that that would happen to somebody who sort of carry the country through this experience on his shoulders, was there a realization then that this is for an emergency but theres too much drama in this leadership for peace. I dont know about the meltdown but clearly churchill had a profound sense that chamberlain was not up to the task and clearly the British Public at the end of the war, just before the end of the war had a hearing about churchill and they thought he was great during the war and confident, strong and really able to rouse from the public, then maybe thats not what we need, maybe now we need more stability into managed the postwar era, i think there are people who have some sort of leadership in the have certain generals that have desk jobs and suited for going out there on the battlefield. So yeah. Theres a couple of questions about coventry which are interesting that you hear often on and im not clear exactly on what urban legend is true and tom herman asked churchill was told by decoders by an impending attack on germany and they chose not to warn the target because that would make the germans realize their code had been cracked, any true to that story . Not in the case of coventry, nothing that i found, the story of coventry is this, thanks for deciphering german in the communications, there was a big raid that was coming and it was called moonlight and it was codenamed it wasnt at all the presumption was among the intelligence and presumption was the attack was going to be on one of them and they thought it was going to be on a particular event that happened one night earlier, churchill, report was done, full of detail that was meant for the Prime Minister who is given to him your path and according to one account it was given to him in the car as he was leaving town to go to checkers and it was so alarming suggesting that they were at a massive raid that was going to occur in that night he came back and he was at the industry building on the rooftop waiting for the huge raid that he feared would come and it was not coming to london, it was coming to coventry, did he know which way it was going to come, he did not know, he did not know, he presumed the target was going to be london but he had no idea coventry was going to be. Also on the subject for coventry which he described the aftermath very movingly, david peters thank you for joining us and he said you found your description to our current moment in particular the speech by the bishop by the first mass funeral was but now before god to be better friends and neighbors in the future because we suffered this together and i sit here today providing this book and many others and what have you found to be critical, what would be the modernday equivalent of the bishop speech. The modernday equivalent of bishop speech, nothing frankly from the federal government but i would think that andrew cuomo one thing im impressed by his daily briefings in his offenses on things that are improving now like hospitalization and so forth are coming down in new york state, its almost very, very careful to emphasize how tragic in the disaster of all these deaths, night after night, they have never let us all forget the fact that even though we are in this race and the virus to make it subside, hes always reminding us of the great losses that we are still experiencing, he never loses that perspective and thats a very important thing. Another aspect of leadership and churchill had the sons will, first of all to be an effective leader, you have to have a strong wellbalanced moral compass in one effect of having a strong moral compass, you are also able to experience and express empathy in madison they churchill was very good about and he could manage both, he would be the first of the defense and he was also deeply impassive and understood and on a personal level what people of britain were expensing, and the speech coventry was to be here and it was moving and very christian in the best sense because i found it very important to make reference to that. So were saying a lot of nice things about churchill in terms of rising to occasion in the first year end meeting in the moment but janet, i asked the question, is there any unhappiness in the churchill and the family of the war, the under there was indeed very little. I cannot go through all those and tell you what i found it did not find but the sense was satisfied with churchill but there were moments when they were thus satisfied and it depends on which one you want to talk about. You may depends on the public and churchill and the Mass Observation. And it was very, very satisfying and happy with his leadership and with his critics. And certainly in time of war when youre facing exponential threat and theres a rally around the flag in the fact you mentioned over time if people adjusted and as we talked about four years later voting him in office and you are talking about 9 11, i think we can forget two months after 9 11 in novembe november 2001, george w. Bush Approval Rating stood at 91 in the u. S. And obviously in a Global Pandemic with the current environment that will not necessarily put out the same w way. And everything about churchill, one of the reasons he became military in the first place was because we had overwhelming public support and this is something that became in the levels with the polymer attorney and and they acknowledged that they had a great popularity in a persistent at least in this period. A couple people, i want to turn to this because a couple of people watching, this is my reaction to it felt like churchills diary was a tradition to your book and somebody is asking can you talk about the diary, has this been used before have used in other books . Churchill is my favorite character, i think the diary is a tremendous asset working on this book, when i got permission to use it from her daughter, i was at that. 1 of only two people who have looked at the diary and its very new in terms of new material and in terms of perspective, first of all shes very smart, astute inaccurate observer and she endured her father. She was 17 at the time and when he came under the criticism periodically for perceived errors, but she was a wonderful observer and all of that but the thing that i really loved about that she was the presence or an observer that i was trying to corral for this book and how they got through this thing, how did they do this on a daily basis because in addition to being an observer, very smart and very articulate, she was after all a 17yearold girl who like to have fun in their reference with the pilots and going to parties at the basis and this is a lovely counterpoint also talking about they were going to learn the shakespearean, one per day. I dont think they completed the mission but anyway it is a wonderful charming character. I think she makes the book honestly. Lastly, we have a question from victoria how she struck by churchills appreciation and understanding of history and something she did share with the previously referenced Abraham Lincoln and you can say a little bit about that but also a question what are you as a buddy who appreciates history choosing to read these days while you are homebound in new york. I will tell you when it comes to reading for pleasure during this particular time, i love thrillers and have to qualify a little bit, i just finished reading and they read it for godforsaken reason but it actually turned out to be a really great constant read for this. And its a question of my house to be on the island and actually turned out to be a need for distraction and i love a good thriller in one of my favorite things was the couple next door, sherry, a terrific and nice sharp edgy thriller, that is my ambition right now. Eric, this is been such a pleasure, the hour flew by, on a personal note i wanted to mention that a read a lot of your other books and im not sure a lot of us watching have and in the garden of beast was a personal connection to it because my father, agrippa mexico and my father, my mom was american and my father was mexican and runway father was going to night School Mexico city in the 50s, he was offered in Administrative Office job by somebody named alfred stern and got to know and when i was a kid i would hear these interesting stories about these people and he was studying and working during the day for the character who turns out was a great interest to the u. S. Government and read your book where martha is the daughter of the u. S. Ambassador 20 years before that in quite the character and into interesting collaboration and post script on the stories. Interesting. Thinking for that. Thank you so much, thank you to all of you for watching the latest future times social, we do these tuesdays and thursdays at 4 00 oclock eastern, please check out the events page and come join us for more of these and thank you so much. Say save everybody. Thank you. Binge watch book tv this summer saturday evening at 8 00 p. M. Eastern, settle in and watch over hours of your favorite authors, saturday were featuring programs with Toni Morrison whose books include the bluest eye and beloved. Watch saturday august 22 as we feature programs with awardwinning biographer. Binge watch book tv, all summer on cspan2. Katherine sharp landdeck on the history of the female pilots that served in the u. S. Army air forces during world war ii. Her book is the women with silver wings. This Virtual Event was hosted by the National World war ii museum. It runs 45 minutes. My name is kali martin and i am a historian. Today i had the pleasure of them true elite co interviewing katherine sharp landdeck about her book the women with silver wings. Thank you for joining us today. Guest thank you for having me. Im going to give you a second. She has a stream of photos shes going to put up as we discussed about today. See if i can figure this out for us. There we go. This is just going to roll. Theres nothing specific. Enjoy as we