Transcripts For CSPAN2 Terry Alford On Fortunes Fool 2024062

Lunch, got in his car shut the door locked it, cranked up before he pulled off someone was pounding on drivers side window, and mr. East looked and there was a very scary looking individual saying, are you p. D. East, the troublemaking newspaper man . [laughter] and with more courage than he felt, mr. East said is, yes, i am. The man said if you get out of this car, ill beat your brains out. Mr. East, said, if you want me to get out of this car, youve got to give me a lot more incentive than that. [laughter] the regard i have for the Virginia Historical society where, where i spent many, many weeks working on this book for nelson, for graham, for the wonderful work here thats all the incentive i needed to come. And, again, i thank you for the invitation. The book grew actually from a class i taught on great crimes. And in that class we would take a different crime every week the lindbergh kidnapping, haymarket riot the next week, then the lincoln assassination. Hands down the lincoln assassination was the favorite. The students were most interested in it. I mean, the characters were, you know great. The issues, very substantial. And it was, of course, wonderfully set in washington d. C. So i began to think about a book, and i realized there were a lot of books on the assassination, but there werent any books on booth. The reason i realized that might be a problem is one of booths coconspirators said he alone was the driving force in everything we did. So the assassination books and some of them quite good but in a way theyre looking at the trunk, polishing the windshield, theyre vacuuming the inside of the car. Youve got to look at the engine if you really want to see what was driving that vehicle. So that was my, my one of my motivations in going forward. Now, this map im going to high light down here at the bottom baltimore. So this is baltimore here. And this would be roughly going up to the upper righthand corner would be i95. So up toward philadelphia, up toward wilmington on 95. And this was booths home neighborhood. In fact, he was born just outside this little place here bel air, maryland. This is Hartford County, and theres a little place named churchville, and he was born just outside of that village. In this house. Now, this house is no longer standing. It was gone by the late 1900s by the late 1800s but booth was born in this log house. Youll notice if you can see it, theres a family in the front yard. These are not the booths. This photo was taken in 1865 after booth made the neighborhood infamous. A photographer came out, there was a neighborhood family who was renting the place and so they just kind of came out and stood in the front yard. This house is still standing, its just a few feet from the log house. This is the house where booth was a teenager. Its named tudor hall for being kind of a large tudor cottage. It was built in the early 1850s, about ten years before the war. Again, the neighborhood family is posing on the front porch there. But this house is still there. Its opened by Hartford County, maryland, after a series of private owners for years and years and years. In fact when i first came on the scene is, it was still privately owned by dorothy and howard fox. And they knew i was interested in booth so they just totally threw the front door open. And is you never knew what you were going to get when you came. Sometimes howard would give you a beer, sometimes he would give you a paint brush. [laughter] you never knew what was going to happen, but they were always very hospitable. Howard said one time, i know youre really interested in booth, do you want to spend the night in booths bedroom . I said, i dont think so. [laughter] you know . I dont want him asking me, you know why are you asking all these questions about me all over the United States. So howard said, you dont believe in ghosts do you and i said no, and i dont intend to change my mind either. [laughter] now, booth also spent some time in this central townhouse. This is in baltimore. If any of you know baltimore, we have the inner harbor in bald more, and then theres baltimore, and then theres a residential neighborhood to the east. This house is gone too, but that was the Baltimore City townhome. And when he was young booth would perform amateur theatricals in the backyard there with his brothers. This is John Wilkes Booths father. He and his wife came to the United States in 18 21, so you can see the booth family had been to the country about 40 years when the civil war took place. They came in 41. He was an actor and in the generation just before lincoln, the generation of Andrew Jackson on the 20 bill, you know . His dad was one of the and at times, the best actor in the United States making a pretty good salary, well known. A really good actor when he was focused and interested but at other times he might not show is up for a performance. He might insult the audience, he might dress inappropriately. Or threaten his fellow actors. You just never knew. It was different from daytoday to day and, of course, he was a very challenging parent because you know, you werent getting consistency out of him. He could be loving and charming then next week he could scare the hell out of you. And one of the things he did to punish children and i think we all know, weve all been on the receiving end of Something Like this he would simply clam up and shun you. He would just simply go totally quiet like you werent even in the room. He also had those actor eyes that could bore a hole into you and it could be very intimidating to a child. But happily johns mother shown here in a painting by thomas sully this is mary app holmes who was johns mary app holmes, she was open, engaging loving, unjudgmental. Just a very healthy wholesome counterweight to the erratic father. Now, they would have ten children, four of them died, though, before making it out of childhood. So when she grew into older age she had essentially she had four boys and two girls. One of the four boys, of course, being John Wilkes Booth. The oldest of the boys, who looks a little bit like the father in my eye, was Junius Brutus booth jr. This was John Wilkes Booths oldest brother. He had neither the taint nor the talent of his father or of his younger brothers. But made a competent living on stage. When the brothers are up there im reminded about the story of a minister who preached a funeral sermon, and then when he got through, he asked the congregation would any of you here like to say anything, somebody in the congregation said, his brother was even worse. [laughter] i dont think were going to hear that about junius not with a brother like john wilkes. A more famous older brother this is edwin booth who was a fine actor in the late 19th century. I can always tell who he is by his haircuts. This is the 186162 haircut. Its funny how you can use that as well as the clothes and other things, but the haircuts are real cues about how hes doing. This is johns older sister, asia. She was not a public figure, of course, like her brothers were, but she was a pretty good writer a pretty good poet, and she wrote a secret memoir of her brother john. She wrote it about ten years after the lincoln murder. She had to hide it from her husband who im going to show right here. This is her husband, john sleeper clark. She had to hide it from clark because he had grown hostile to the family and a very unpleasant person to be around sort of blamed the booth family and especially john wilkes for all the problems he was having in his life. So she had to hide it, and then before she died, since she died before john sleeper clark did, she gave it out of the family to make sure he didnt find and destroy the memoir. I published the memoir separately in a small volume some years ago and its longest this is, again the memoir written by asia this is the longest most extensive account of John Wilkes Booth we have by any family member. John didnt like clark very much and once during the middle of the war years he assaulted him during a political discussion. They were talking about this, that and the other the war came up, clark began to tear into the south. John drummed his fingers kind of sullenly impatiently, and when clark started adding personal insults about jefferson davis, somebody said john just leapt onto clark and tried to pull that big head right off his shoulders, and John Wilkes Booth was incredibly strong. And it was with some difficulty they were able to get booth off this guy. This is the youngest of the booth children. This is a brother named joseph booth. Its interesting to think about joe here because this is the one everybody was concerned about. When you look at family letters during the civil war they never say anything about johns getting weird or anything like that. They always say weve got a little trouble in the family, but the trouble was always joe. This was the brother that they were worried about doing something strange, maybe to himself, maybe to others. At some point during the civil war, he left the United States and went to australia, lived on a sheep ranch, finally came back to San Francisco took a job delivering letters for wells fargo. And that was where he was most of the American Civil War. I never met ella mahoney who owned the booth house. She was way back before me. She came to tudor hall the booth home you remember, as a bride of 20 in 1878. And she lived there for almost the next 70 years. This was tudor hall as it looked in the mid 1930s during the depression period. And she says, frankly she didnt know anything about tudor hall when she came there because she was from the neighborhood, but, you know, the booths had left. Her husband bought the house from the booths, but she lived there a farm life a farm wife, but people would come by. They would say this is the booth house, can i come in, look around . We used to play on that cherry tree right there. She would, you know just meet people, talk to people. She began to collect stories, write things down. Just like the foxes, she was very generous and threw open the door to the place, and one day in the 1930s again, this is during the depression this fella came down the road, stanley kimmel. Kimmel was kind of a soldier of fortune, footloose traveler, poet musician, journalist. And he came to visit the house because he had in mind doing a book on the booth family. Now, im not sure i havent decided yet whether kimmel wasnt totally honest with mrs. Mahoney about what he intended to do or maybe, you know, shes too elderly at that point to pick up the signs that he was interested in doing a booth book, because she had always wanted to do one. This is kimmels Research Notebook from 1934 as he began to travel around and interview people. Mrs. Mahoney drove him places, he stayed attu door hall, he ate meals that she prepared and she was just shocked beyond shocked when he published a book. She always thought that she would do it or they would do it together. But when his book came out, she was very disturbed and, in fact, she particularly disliked the adjective mad. She had grown to love the booths after living in their house for 70 years. She thought they were great people. And once you start knowing and loving somebody, you start making excuses for them, and she was making excuses for everybody, even john wilkes at that time. While kimmel enjoyed his success, poor mrs. Mahoney idled away her last few years with her booth collection at tudor hall. You can see family portraits and things and her caretaking the place. One say somebody happier came down the lane. It was a woman named helen colby. Helen was maybe two generations younger than mrs. Mahoney was, and she said is, dont let that kimmels a rat dont let him discourage you. So they worked for years and years and years on a project but then world war ii came along, helen got married, people moved away, the war. Mrs. Mahoney died right after the war. So when i came on the research ten years ago everybody knew that mrs. Mahoney and helen had worked together on a book, but nobody knew what happened to helenen, where the work was. So i just decided i dont even know if helen was still alive. Shed be in her 80s at that point, but im going to find her, and anytime i saw anybody with her last name or her married last name, you know, i would call them up, you know . I couldnt tell you how many times the phone was slammed down in my ear right . John wilkes booth bam, they dont want to hear that, right . Innut job. [laughter] but i kept look, kept looking, and one day there she was. Ill be damned, i found her. Theres helen colby many years later living down south on a farm. She was delighted to see me. She hadnt had anybody to talk about booth for decades and she was very gracious and very helpful, very welcoming and she handed over to me the motherload. I mean she just had piles of stuff that they had done some of it going back to the period you know, right at the end of civil war. I might just say the motherlode of papers. I noticed one thing, this was something mrs. Mahoney wrote at the type let me help you out this is the way up at the top the way he went. This is mrs. Mahoneys account of going along John Wilkes Booths escape tour down through prince georges and across into virginia down below fred ricks burg fredericksburg. Also in that pile a letter from a descendant of john ford of fords theater. And if you can see what the envelope says there, contents, eight hairs from the head of John Wilkes Booth. Howd you like to pop open a letter and find that thing stuck in there . The thing i really enjoyed was this. This is the house that booth built, the house by ella mahoney. I really decided after working on this that she is coauthor of this man manuscript. And i make pretty good use of this in the early part of the book, i hope i did, youll see i credit her as coauthor of the book. She had all the stories that mrs. Mahoney had heard over the years. People just dropped by. One time, for example Woodrow Wilson dropped by. She opened the doors theres Woodrow Wilson. H. L. Mencken. All sorts of famous people came by. A lead in mrs. Mahoneys book led me to this document. Now, this is a quaker wedding certificate. Some of you may know, right that historically friends dont pay clergy. So at a wedding everybody comes up and signs the wedding certificate. Its almost like, you know you sign it as part of your promise to support this young couple, right, in their life and their love together. So everybody in the congregation signed. Down at the bottom here right in this area, john w. Booth signed. And that made a little sense because up here its ely lamb who ran a school that booth attended. Theres john emerson lamb another member of the family. So reverend lamb just had some of the students from the school troop over and attend the wedding, and although booth was only 12 years old hes signing the certificate. The wedding, incidentally, took place you know how theyre set up and this is a gun powder meeting in maryland. John wilkes booth went to a academy, Hartford County academy, at belair, maryland. He also attended this school run by the quakers. This is in sparks maryland, its now a very very fine restaurant. And inside theyve restored it and you can see these are the floors in one of the dining rooms with the old planks nice yellow pine squarehead nails a very nice look. Weve all seen that in historic homes. John also attended what was essentially, a high school and that is st. Thim thinks Timothys School in caytonsville, maryland. And and it was run by this episcopalian minister who was an intelligent man but one i dont think who had very good understanding of boys. One of his less successful ideas was to have classes before breakfast. [laughter] and the boys didnt care much for that, and as one of them said, no wonder the school is named for timothy st. Timothy is the patron saint of people with stomach problems. [laughter] it was exactly how they felt. In fact, at one point there was a revolt of the students. About a hundred of them camped out in the woods and wouldnt come back to the school, so they had to bring participants in from baltimore to broker an end to a threeday student rebellion. [laughter] essentially, what this is all about is John Wilkes Booth had no college. He got on, i would say on a modern scale about halfway through high school. A better education than his older brothers, but he didnt take to it as easily. He could learn but it was more of a struggle. His sister asia said that john had to plod, it was a little harder for him to learn things. Now, were in richmond. Richmond actually, has almost two chapters in my booth book because i think next to washington, it is the most important city to John Wilkes Booth. Washington, of course, where the murder takes place, thats got to have center stage toward the back of the book but in the early part, you know, in the years right before the war john acted at the richmond theater and, of course, a lot of us will know that at fords theater where he assassinated lincoln the play that night was our american cousin. He played that for almost two weeks in the richmond theater, but it wasnt known until just before the book came out what role he actually played in our american cousin, and this clipping please dont bother reading it, but it does say in richmond, lets see what it says. He was a very good light comedian in emotional parts the the best richmond had seen, and he played lord duncareer in our american cousin. That was a play he knew real, real well. Ill have more to say about this in just a second. Somebody who recognized john brown, maybe an unfriendly presentation of him, as kind of a nut job. While booth was at the theater browns raid at Harpers Ferry took place. Heres a companion showing henry rise rallying the citizens of virginia to defend the commonwealth and booth went with the virginia militia to charlestown and was present when brown was executed. One misunderstanding about this is he somehow pushed his way onto the train with soldiers. Actually, that is a complete misunderstanding because in the state archives a friend and i found this document. This is a pay voucher where the commonwealth is paying Virginia Historical<\/a> society where, where i spent many, many weeks working on this book for nelson, for graham, for the wonderful work here thats all the incentive i needed to come. And, again, i thank you for the invitation. The book grew actually from a class i taught on great crimes. And in that class we would take a different crime every week the lindbergh kidnapping, haymarket riot the next week, then the lincoln assassination. Hands down the lincoln assassination was the favorite. The students were most interested in it. I mean, the characters were, you know great. The issues, very substantial. And it was, of course, wonderfully set in washington d. C. So i began to think about a book, and i realized there were a lot of books on the assassination, but there werent any books on booth. The reason i realized that might be a problem is one of booths coconspirators said he alone was the driving force in everything we did. So the assassination books and some of them quite good but in a way theyre looking at the trunk, polishing the windshield, theyre vacuuming the inside of the car. Youve got to look at the engine if you really want to see what was driving that vehicle. So that was my, my one of my motivations in going forward. Now, this map im going to high light down here at the bottom baltimore. So this is baltimore here. And this would be roughly going up to the upper righthand corner would be i95. So up toward philadelphia, up toward wilmington on 95. And this was booths home neighborhood. In fact, he was born just outside this little place here bel air, maryland. This is Hartford County<\/a>, and theres a little place named churchville, and he was born just outside of that village. In this house. Now, this house is no longer standing. It was gone by the late 1900s by the late 1800s but booth was born in this log house. Youll notice if you can see it, theres a family in the front yard. These are not the booths. This photo was taken in 1865 after booth made the neighborhood infamous. A photographer came out, there was a neighborhood family who was renting the place and so they just kind of came out and stood in the front yard. This house is still standing, its just a few feet from the log house. This is the house where booth was a teenager. Its named tudor hall for being kind of a large tudor cottage. It was built in the early 1850s, about ten years before the war. Again, the neighborhood family is posing on the front porch there. But this house is still there. Its opened by Hartford County<\/a>, maryland, after a series of private owners for years and years and years. In fact when i first came on the scene is, it was still privately owned by dorothy and howard fox. And they knew i was interested in booth so they just totally threw the front door open. And is you never knew what you were going to get when you came. Sometimes howard would give you a beer, sometimes he would give you a paint brush. [laughter] you never knew what was going to happen, but they were always very hospitable. Howard said one time, i know youre really interested in booth, do you want to spend the night in booths bedroom . I said, i dont think so. [laughter] you know . I dont want him asking me, you know why are you asking all these questions about me all over the United States<\/a>. So howard said, you dont believe in ghosts do you and i said no, and i dont intend to change my mind either. [laughter] now, booth also spent some time in this central townhouse. This is in baltimore. If any of you know baltimore, we have the inner harbor in bald more, and then theres baltimore, and then theres a residential neighborhood to the east. This house is gone too, but that was the Baltimore City<\/a> townhome. And when he was young booth would perform amateur theatricals in the backyard there with his brothers. This is John Wilkes Booth<\/a>s father. He and his wife came to the United States<\/a> in 18 21, so you can see the booth family had been to the country about 40 years when the civil war took place. They came in 41. He was an actor and in the generation just before lincoln, the generation of Andrew Jackson<\/a> on the 20 bill, you know . His dad was one of the and at times, the best actor in the United States<\/a> making a pretty good salary, well known. A really good actor when he was focused and interested but at other times he might not show is up for a performance. He might insult the audience, he might dress inappropriately. Or threaten his fellow actors. You just never knew. It was different from daytoday to day and, of course, he was a very challenging parent because you know, you werent getting consistency out of him. He could be loving and charming then next week he could scare the hell out of you. And one of the things he did to punish children and i think we all know, weve all been on the receiving end of Something Like<\/a> this he would simply clam up and shun you. He would just simply go totally quiet like you werent even in the room. He also had those actor eyes that could bore a hole into you and it could be very intimidating to a child. But happily johns mother shown here in a painting by thomas sully this is mary app holmes who was johns mary app holmes, she was open, engaging loving, unjudgmental. Just a very healthy wholesome counterweight to the erratic father. Now, they would have ten children, four of them died, though, before making it out of childhood. So when she grew into older age she had essentially she had four boys and two girls. One of the four boys, of course, being John Wilkes Booth<\/a>. The oldest of the boys, who looks a little bit like the father in my eye, was Junius Brutus<\/a> booth jr. This was John Wilkes Booth<\/a>s oldest brother. He had neither the taint nor the talent of his father or of his younger brothers. But made a competent living on stage. When the brothers are up there im reminded about the story of a minister who preached a funeral sermon, and then when he got through, he asked the congregation would any of you here like to say anything, somebody in the congregation said, his brother was even worse. [laughter] i dont think were going to hear that about junius not with a brother like john wilkes. A more famous older brother this is edwin booth who was a fine actor in the late 19th century. I can always tell who he is by his haircuts. This is the 186162 haircut. Its funny how you can use that as well as the clothes and other things, but the haircuts are real cues about how hes doing. This is johns older sister, asia. She was not a public figure, of course, like her brothers were, but she was a pretty good writer a pretty good poet, and she wrote a secret memoir of her brother john. She wrote it about ten years after the lincoln murder. She had to hide it from her husband who im going to show right here. This is her husband, john sleeper clark. She had to hide it from clark because he had grown hostile to the family and a very unpleasant person to be around sort of blamed the booth family and especially john wilkes for all the problems he was having in his life. So she had to hide it, and then before she died, since she died before john sleeper clark did, she gave it out of the family to make sure he didnt find and destroy the memoir. I published the memoir separately in a small volume some years ago and its longest this is, again the memoir written by asia this is the longest most extensive account of John Wilkes Booth<\/a> we have by any family member. John didnt like clark very much and once during the middle of the war years he assaulted him during a political discussion. They were talking about this, that and the other the war came up, clark began to tear into the south. John drummed his fingers kind of sullenly impatiently, and when clark started adding personal insults about jefferson davis, somebody said john just leapt onto clark and tried to pull that big head right off his shoulders, and John Wilkes Booth<\/a> was incredibly strong. And it was with some difficulty they were able to get booth off this guy. This is the youngest of the booth children. This is a brother named joseph booth. Its interesting to think about joe here because this is the one everybody was concerned about. When you look at family letters during the civil war they never say anything about johns getting weird or anything like that. They always say weve got a little trouble in the family, but the trouble was always joe. This was the brother that they were worried about doing something strange, maybe to himself, maybe to others. At some point during the civil war, he left the United States<\/a> and went to australia, lived on a sheep ranch, finally came back to San Francisco<\/a> took a job delivering letters for wells fargo. And that was where he was most of the American Civil War<\/a>. I never met ella mahoney who owned the booth house. She was way back before me. She came to tudor hall the booth home you remember, as a bride of 20 in 1878. And she lived there for almost the next 70 years. This was tudor hall as it looked in the mid 1930s during the depression period. And she says, frankly she didnt know anything about tudor hall when she came there because she was from the neighborhood, but, you know, the booths had left. Her husband bought the house from the booths, but she lived there a farm life a farm wife, but people would come by. They would say this is the booth house, can i come in, look around . We used to play on that cherry tree right there. She would, you know just meet people, talk to people. She began to collect stories, write things down. Just like the foxes, she was very generous and threw open the door to the place, and one day in the 1930s again, this is during the depression this fella came down the road, stanley kimmel. Kimmel was kind of a soldier of fortune, footloose traveler, poet musician, journalist. And he came to visit the house because he had in mind doing a book on the booth family. Now, im not sure i havent decided yet whether kimmel wasnt totally honest with mrs. Mahoney about what he intended to do or maybe, you know, shes too elderly at that point to pick up the signs that he was interested in doing a booth book, because she had always wanted to do one. This is kimmels Research Notebook<\/a> from 1934 as he began to travel around and interview people. Mrs. Mahoney drove him places, he stayed attu door hall, he ate meals that she prepared and she was just shocked beyond shocked when he published a book. She always thought that she would do it or they would do it together. But when his book came out, she was very disturbed and, in fact, she particularly disliked the adjective mad. She had grown to love the booths after living in their house for 70 years. She thought they were great people. And once you start knowing and loving somebody, you start making excuses for them, and she was making excuses for everybody, even john wilkes at that time. While kimmel enjoyed his success, poor mrs. Mahoney idled away her last few years with her booth collection at tudor hall. You can see family portraits and things and her caretaking the place. One say somebody happier came down the lane. It was a woman named helen colby. Helen was maybe two generations younger than mrs. Mahoney was, and she said is, dont let that kimmels a rat dont let him discourage you. So they worked for years and years and years on a project but then world war ii came along, helen got married, people moved away, the war. Mrs. Mahoney died right after the war. So when i came on the research ten years ago everybody knew that mrs. Mahoney and helen had worked together on a book, but nobody knew what happened to helenen, where the work was. So i just decided i dont even know if helen was still alive. Shed be in her 80s at that point, but im going to find her, and anytime i saw anybody with her last name or her married last name, you know, i would call them up, you know . I couldnt tell you how many times the phone was slammed down in my ear right . John wilkes booth bam, they dont want to hear that, right . Innut job. [laughter] but i kept look, kept looking, and one day there she was. Ill be damned, i found her. Theres helen colby many years later living down south on a farm. She was delighted to see me. She hadnt had anybody to talk about booth for decades and she was very gracious and very helpful, very welcoming and she handed over to me the motherload. I mean she just had piles of stuff that they had done some of it going back to the period you know, right at the end of civil war. I might just say the motherlode of papers. I noticed one thing, this was something mrs. Mahoney wrote at the type let me help you out this is the way up at the top the way he went. This is mrs. Mahoneys account of going along John Wilkes Booth<\/a>s escape tour down through prince georges and across into virginia down below fred ricks burg fredericksburg. Also in that pile a letter from a descendant of john ford of fords theater. And if you can see what the envelope says there, contents, eight hairs from the head of John Wilkes Booth<\/a>. Howd you like to pop open a letter and find that thing stuck in there . The thing i really enjoyed was this. This is the house that booth built, the house by ella mahoney. I really decided after working on this that she is coauthor of this man manuscript. And i make pretty good use of this in the early part of the book, i hope i did, youll see i credit her as coauthor of the book. She had all the stories that mrs. Mahoney had heard over the years. People just dropped by. One time, for example Woodrow Wilson<\/a> dropped by. She opened the doors theres Woodrow Wilson<\/a>. H. L. Mencken. All sorts of famous people came by. A lead in mrs. Mahoneys book led me to this document. Now, this is a quaker wedding certificate. Some of you may know, right that historically friends dont pay clergy. So at a wedding everybody comes up and signs the wedding certificate. Its almost like, you know you sign it as part of your promise to support this young couple, right, in their life and their love together. So everybody in the congregation signed. Down at the bottom here right in this area, john w. Booth signed. And that made a little sense because up here its ely lamb who ran a school that booth attended. Theres john emerson lamb another member of the family. So reverend lamb just had some of the students from the school troop over and attend the wedding, and although booth was only 12 years old hes signing the certificate. The wedding, incidentally, took place you know how theyre set up and this is a gun powder meeting in maryland. John wilkes booth went to a academy, Hartford County<\/a> academy, at belair, maryland. He also attended this school run by the quakers. This is in sparks maryland, its now a very very fine restaurant. And inside theyve restored it and you can see these are the floors in one of the dining rooms with the old planks nice yellow pine squarehead nails a very nice look. Weve all seen that in historic homes. John also attended what was essentially, a high school and that is st. Thim thinks Timothys School<\/a> in caytonsville, maryland. And and it was run by this episcopalian minister who was an intelligent man but one i dont think who had very good understanding of boys. One of his less successful ideas was to have classes before breakfast. [laughter] and the boys didnt care much for that, and as one of them said, no wonder the school is named for timothy st. Timothy is the patron saint of people with stomach problems. [laughter] it was exactly how they felt. In fact, at one point there was a revolt of the students. About a hundred of them camped out in the woods and wouldnt come back to the school, so they had to bring participants in from baltimore to broker an end to a threeday student rebellion. [laughter] essentially, what this is all about is John Wilkes Booth<\/a> had no college. He got on, i would say on a modern scale about halfway through high school. A better education than his older brothers, but he didnt take to it as easily. He could learn but it was more of a struggle. His sister asia said that john had to plod, it was a little harder for him to learn things. Now, were in richmond. Richmond actually, has almost two chapters in my booth book because i think next to washington, it is the most important city to John Wilkes Booth<\/a>. Washington, of course, where the murder takes place, thats got to have center stage toward the back of the book but in the early part, you know, in the years right before the war john acted at the richmond theater and, of course, a lot of us will know that at fords theater where he assassinated lincoln the play that night was our american cousin. He played that for almost two weeks in the richmond theater, but it wasnt known until just before the book came out what role he actually played in our american cousin, and this clipping please dont bother reading it, but it does say in richmond, lets see what it says. He was a very good light comedian in emotional parts the the best richmond had seen, and he played lord duncareer in our american cousin. That was a play he knew real, real well. Ill have more to say about this in just a second. Somebody who recognized john brown, maybe an unfriendly presentation of him, as kind of a nut job. While booth was at the theater browns raid at Harpers Ferry<\/a> took place. Heres a companion showing henry rise rallying the citizens of virginia to defend the commonwealth and booth went with the virginia militia to charlestown and was present when brown was executed. One misunderstanding about this is he somehow pushed his way onto the train with soldiers. Actually, that is a complete misunderstanding because in the state archives a friend and i found this document. This is a pay voucher where the commonwealth is paying John Wilkes Booth<\/a> 64. 58 for his time as a soldier with the virginia militia at the brown execution. So hes actually a, he was a corporal, a sergeant rather, in the virginia militia at the time of the brown execution. Now, over here i dont know if you can see it, notice the date that the money was paid, april 14 1859. So thats exactly six years before the assassination. This is the flag that booths militia friends marched under and so did he, the flag of the richmond grace. Heres the canton of the flag of the richmond grace. Semper tyrannis. If that sounds familiar from fords theater, you know, it was obviously ingrained in booths head because as i say he marched under this banner at the john brown execution. The trouble with the semper approach to things is this, look at this flag. This is an africanamerican unit from the north during the civil war. We see sic semper tyrannis, and that stuff can come back and bite you i think. Now, this is a fellow thats escaped attention, i think, until my book came out. His name is herman stump. He was a lawyer from that part, rural part of maryland where booth grew up. He was a very, very broke been confederate fellow, and he said booth joined a company in maryland as the civil war was breaking out. What they were going to do look at the extent of this Covered Bridge<\/a> but they were going to destroy this bridge. You may or may not know once the war began confederate marylanders wanted to destroy the railroad bridges leading into maryland, right . In an effort to cut maryland off from the can key yort yankee north. And this was one of the bridges that booth and others were going to destroy. Many of his friends in maryland did go into the army stump chose not to, he chose to go into exile in canada. Stump just chose to stay in maryland and malinger during lincolns reunion campaign. Booth reached a crisis point in the summer of 61 about what he wanted to do. The story is that, of course, his politics were actively southern. The time he had spent before the war had permanently cemented his allegiance to this city and to its course with the confederacy. And he had many, many friends here. He was well received here, he loved this town. And he wanted to go into the Confederate Army<\/a>. In fact, he had his bags packed, but john ford at fords theater said his mother set him down and said look ive already lost four children. She had also had a premonition. When he was six months old to, she had a strong premonition that he would die an early and violent death. She was sure something would happen to him. He was the son she loved the most, he was the most affectionate and attentive to her, and she had protected him rather, i might say from that eccentric dad of theirs from time to time. And she had done such a good job that he had told her that when i get to be a man youre happiness will be everything to me, you know . Thisll mean everything to me. Ill never forget what youve done for me as a child, and ill be there for you when you need help. And, you know, she just turned it on, man. She prayed, she pled, she wept, she pulled out every trick she had, and he won she won. At the end of the day, she talked him out of the war but it was a bad mistake in a way because his political feelings and perm instincts personal instincts, and it would have been more proper for him to bo into the Confederate Army<\/a>, and by 1863 hed be filling a cavalrymans grave. I think that was the natural course. But, you know, that didnt and as his friends and classmates filled out the Confederate Army<\/a> of virginia is, he gave his Confederate Flag<\/a> this is John Wilkes Booth<\/a>s personal Confederate Flag<\/a> from 1861. Its in the collection of the American Civil War<\/a> museum is. He gave it to a friend up in the maryland countryside there, and he went into acting. This is the arch street theater in philadelphia. And booth went to a number of venues where he acted. He never acted on a confederate stage. He acted in the south but only in areas like new orleans that had been cop kerred by conquered by the north. He did act in the south, but only in occupied cities like new orleans or st. Louis or in northern cities like boston, chicago, new york and places like that. And he was very good. He was a natural actor. I mean, he was in some way he had the inner the inner fire for it, you know . He had the love of applause. He was very ambitious, very determined. For most of his life through the years, war years he was really focused on being a fine actor the best as he could be. Very very ambitious. I remember some of you may remember the redskins had a great years and years ago in their glory days the redskins had a great offensive lineman named joe jacoby. And joe was famous for saying to win the super bowl, i would run over my own mother. [laughter] his teammate, matt millen said i know that sounds strange, but i know how he feels. Matt said, to win super bowl i would run over joes mother also. [laughter] im just saying, john had that type of focus right . And determination. I love this photograph from the 1840s. Not only is it early but its its the ancestor of a Famous Family<\/a> of actors. This is louisa lane drew who ran the arch street theater. She is the grandmother of john, lionel and ethel barry jr. More barrymore the direct descendant of Drew Barrymore<\/a> the actress. She brought him to the arch street, he wasnt her type of actor, and he had come on too far, too fast. He became a star in a matter of months just months. He had a real serious tutelage here in richmond as a junior actor, but once he headed for stardom, right he just soared. And, you know, or veteran actresses like louisa lane drew thought he had come too far too fast. She brought him many because he told sixties but nevertheless he sold tickets. If she didnt like you she had a terrifying sense of humor and one thing she would do, she would pretend to look to him for advice. Now, hes only 23 years old right, and just Getting Started<\/a> and hes reluctant to give advice to a grand lady of the theater, obviously right . But she would, you know, embarrass him by doing stuff like that. Heres a stage set from 63. This could be booth. This is a rehearsal obviously. Notice the gas footlights at the front. They would run across here on our stage and you had to be careful, right . You had to know where you were or you could get too close to those and, in fact, here in richmond in december of 1858 a young actress named kate fisher wandered too close to one, her dress caught on fire right in the richmond theater. The audience members saw it, but they were too much to help her too far to help her so they cried to the actors help, help. She had a large loosefitting marino dress it began to flame up right on her, and the newspapers said that John Wilkes Booth<\/a> ran across, put the fire out with his own hands and saved her life. There are two or three times during the war years when he does stuff like that or just before when he actually saves people from accidents of different kinds. One of the popular plays he did was the apostate. This is a prop book. If we could open this thing up, it would have names o. Characters, their lines and every actor would have one of these so you could do your rehearsals. And then the apostate would be featured with playbills like this. Heres booth in 64 less than a year before the assassination of lincoln. This was the bloodiest guy on the civil war statement. This was an absolute villain. I mean, its one of the scariest of the scariest characters that you could see. He would individualize the problem like a soldier and attack like a soldier would do and is booth said i make in my problems personal i can always conquer them and to some extent those personalized lincoln into all of the issues and controversies of the war. I was telling my friends today one of the problems with working in the 19 centuries you dont get to interview anybody. I did run down a few grandchildren. Iran down the grandchildren of this journalist. This is George Alfred<\/a> townsend and did a lot of writing in the postwar years seeking out and interviewing people in the conspirators and wrote 40 years of newspaper articles and books and novels about the assassination. He gives us a lot of information that can supplement some of the things we find in the federal records. Heres a wonderful thing from the assassination. This is the lincoln assassination memorial. Mating cuba for the latin latin american and european markets. It has scenes of the assassination and im going to show you several of those in the second but i want to say this also as Something Else<\/a> going for it that you dont know unless you study it to there is a fourinch dagger concealed in this thing. I never read that he went shopping in the stores of washington but i do know that he took a Carriage Rides<\/a> to peoples homes went to hospitals, where two soldiers retreat. This is thomas of lower maryland a daring river crosser in the neighborhood where the rappahannock and potomac are in the fredericks neighborhood. He was going to help those get lincoln to richmond. And twice booth and his gang laid out for lincoln but once they were totally ready to go, once in january once in march but were disappointed both times because link it at changes in plans. At some point once richmond had considered if you capture lincoln there is no richmond noted that her government to present him to. The hardcore bega Abraham Lincoln<\/a> and that happened at fords theater. Notice of horse booth has led lincoln come to him. This has led lincoln come to the place that he worked. He wasnt in the cast and wasnt an employer. Remember he was a star. He traveled from theater to theater but the ford family for baltimoreans just like john wilkesbooth was in so well identified with fords theater that he got his mail delivered at fords theater. Not at the hotel and not at their home in washington but at fords theater. He had total access and he could come to the front or the backside and come and go anytime he wanted to and on the night of the assassination he came to the theater 10 minutes past 10 00. It was friday, good friday and i think because good friday the place wasnt packed. There were a lot of people there there was a group of people who would not go to the theater on good friday. There were some who wouldnt go on good friday in particular so its a nice crowd but not stuffed. This came up the balcony so what good is this like if you have been to the fords theater you know what it looks like. This is orchestra seats. Booth went up a set of stairs and walked around the dresser and came to adore that would lead to the president s box here. The door was attended by Charles Forbes<\/a> was a white house ballet. Our form price supports interest our entitlement but welfare traditional welfare is not because they appropriate the money on an annual basis so those sorts of things a lot of people miss. Host one third of the budget goes through the appropriation process and twothirds of the budget doesnt go through it all. How do people decide which program is which and how do you decide which is a mandatory program or entitlement versus the discretionary to go see the process which is a pretty different process. How is it determined which is which . Guest essentially it specifies in the enacting legislation and whether or not its going to be subject to annual appropriations and how its legally defined in terms of the budget process. Certain programs have fiveyear they bowed every five years or every 10 years. Some programs like Medicare Medicaid<\/a> and Social Security<\/a> have no vote at all. Essentially you can look at those programs are subject to domestic Discretionary Spending<\/a> everything from the fbi to the fda part of the Commerce Department<\/a> of education. Thats about 16 of federal spending and another 16 as defense spending Discretionary Spending<\/a> them on warfighting part of spending. Thats essentially it area thats all Congress Talks<\/a> about what its talking about spending. That is what the budget bill is about is those two sets of programs. Everything from Entitlement Program<\/a> in Social Security<\/a> and medicaid interest on the debt multiyear programs like farm programs is outside congresss annual votes. Host and in other words sequester. Would he put in place the sequestered. Talk about that. Guest the sequester was basically a cap on how much could be spent over the next 10 years. I think it was three years into it now. But that only affected the two types of Discretionary Spending<\/a>. Only affect a discretionary defense spending and defense Discretionary Spending<\/a> and limited essentially bad design to impose essentially a set of cuts each year they would be split evenly between Discretionary Spending<\/a>. We are are they saying in the republican budget that they managed to take money from defense spending and shifted to the Contingency Operations<\/a> the warfighting portion so it doesnt apply to that portion of it to essentially there was no sequester reduction to the mandatory spending programs. That was outside of the pier sequester so its basically a cap on those two types of programs and it is largely responsible i think for the slowdown we have seen in spending over the last couple of years. Host you bring up something we do a lot in washington which is budget gimmicks. Oh which he does mention the overseas Contingency Operations<\/a> is becoming a slush fund for other parts of the budget where the government talks about putting more money into this emergency area than the normal budgeting areas put the money into that and they are both to spend more than they are supposed to. Budget gimmicks, we see that all the time in washington as a way to get around things. Guest i think there are dishonest in what the republicans did with the defense spending was simply designed to get out from underneath the sequester. They were in a situation where if they waived the defense spending that democrats would insist that they waved the domestic spending so they took money that is not overseas warfighting material or not emergency spending which is what its really meant for and took routine spending and put it in. The congress does this all the time with emergency spending whether its a National Natural<\/a> disasters which ends up spending money in states that had nowhere near the Natural Disaster<\/a> that occurred or defense spending much of the iran and iraq wars was bought off what to and simply spending that didnt apply to the normal budget rules because of that. The congress does this sort of thing all the time and it makes on this budgeting very difficult certainly it also raises questions about how much you can trust promises into the future when they come up with these gimmicks they will have as well. We will balance the budget 10 years from now in some way not exactly trustworthy. Often those balanced budget involve savings that are very mysterious. One of my favorites is to continually save money by not invading countries. For years after we pulled out of iraq we continue to save money by not invading iraq. You see the numbers for 10 years. A lot of times the savings are backloaded to thats the point you or me can which is you cant trust something where the saving started the future but right now there is more borrowing. We just did this and medicare called the doc fix which is essentially medicare was required i love during the Bush Administration<\/a> to reduce spending every year basically. It didnt actually ever do that but it did more than was necessary. The requirements would have reduced reimbursement to doctors and hospitals in ways it was unrealistic. Host cut doctors pay and have them drop out of the system. Guest we were going to do that every year but faced with that it did force them to come up with other ways to save money and medicare and they did do some of that. Maybe never as much as they were supposed to but they did do some of that. They got tired of having to play this game and they have come up with what they call a permanent fix to this. Essentially where they got rid of this requirement that physician payments because that and they said dont worry we will come up with additional 200 billion to offset the money that we are not going to save anymore. They havent said what those Additional Savings<\/a> are going to be but we shouldnt worry. Someday they will think of them. Host so they ended up adding more money to the debt. Guest it actually gets worse. They said dont worry we will fix fix it someday and about the new republican budget in college the fact that they will have to come up with savings. They just dont. Host on one hand you have the republican budget that assumed you would add more to the debt and at the same time theyre passing a bill well over 100 billion even half a trillion over two decades to the debt so significant borrowing and whats interesting is was heralded as a bipartisan success. One of the only times republicans and democrats can agree in a very polarized town is whether barring money instead of paying for things because things are tough rated. Guest thats one of the problems we have is Neither Party<\/a> wants to balance the budget. Democrats are happy to tax and spend and republicans are happy to borrow and spend spend. But, tonight my nader is spend so the idea of reducing spending is something that Neither Party<\/a> seems to be serious about. Host one of the interesting things you bring up in this book and there is a difference of opinion about this is what is fiscal responsibility . I often think of fiscal responsibility as you pay for what you spend. In bad times you may need to borrow an balance the budget but over a certain amount of time you pay for what you spend. You make the case and i want to spend time talking about this that is less just about bringing your deficit down but about bringing spending down. From your perspective and well talk more about cato and the libertarian perspective but from your perspective its about the spending issues. Guest Milton Friedman<\/a> is to say the real cost of government is aware the attacks are borrow but how much you spend. Both taxation and dashed out of the productive economy and transferred to government. Most of it is not invested its consumed. While there is distributional affects different people pay taxes in essence they are the same thing. They are both taking money out of the economy and transferring it over to the government to spend. Both are equally bad. The republicans and democrats referred to different ones because different boxes are gored by which of those you choose. In this book i try to make that point but i think ultimately you can cant have a government that is simply so bid and so much of the economy that the economy cant function regardless of how you pay for it. The cbo estimated that we will ultimately end up spending 21 of gdp or so by the government and the federal level 10 at the state level so you are spending a little over a third of the economy by the government. We are going up to a point where we will spend 40 to 50 at the government level under current projections. I would argue that even if you pay for it all somehow you can raise taxes enough to pay for every penny of that spending you still could have a functioning economy where the government is spending half of everything the government has produced. Host what would you cut . Guest i think we need to be willing to cut acrosstheboard. There are the usual suspects but they dont get you very far. Posted the usual suspects being two x. Guest the republicans talking about waste fraud and abuse will tell you lets cut foreign aid or killed big bird or defund planned parenthood. Thats not going to get you anywhere. Federal spending i think a lot of people out there believe we spend all this money on foreign aid or its 1 federal spending and that includes foreign aid that we want to keep going. Big bird and planned parenthood combined r. One 10,000th of a of federal spending senator not valid in the budget that way. Defense will have to be on the table and despite the current climate theres no doubt theres waste in the defense budget. We defense spending for countries that spend a lot less on defense because we will do it for them. We spend 4 of gdp on defense. Europe is 1. 5 and maybe two. Nowhere near what we spend because we are essentially being their army for them so we have to cut there as well. The big money is an Entitlement Program<\/a>s. The fact is we spend 47 on just three programs alone Medicare Medicaid<\/a> and Social Security<\/a>. He cant do much of anything unless you are willing to take on those three programs. Host we are going to talk about those programs and detailed. First would you raise any taxes . Would you look at fixing this on the spending side . Guest i want to do spending first. One of the problems ive seen with many of these balance puzzles they raise taxes today and promise reduced spending tomorrow and i frankly dont trust that reduction in spending. I want to see the spending reductions locked in and then we can talk about whether or not there are taxes to be raised. Im not necessarily opposed to specific taxes being raised as to overall revenue. There are certainly tax breaks out there that are distortionary should we have a special tax breaks for ethanol . Those sorts of things dont benefit the economy. They distort how money moves around in the economy and i have no public producing those types of breaks. I would rather see it done on a revenueneutral basis but i certainly dont think any particular tax break is sacrosanct. Host a trillion dollars a year in lost revenue for the federal government so whether you want to broaden the base reform the tax bill to use them to close the deficit or spend them on Something Else<\/a> theres a lot of money there and many people i saw concluded think spending through the tax code then lowered taxes. Guest unless you believe the government owns the money and anything you dont get to keep the somehow spending. That said i think many of these harm the economy. Everything from the mortgage interest adoption which is highly distortionary. The deduction or the tax break you currently get for Employer Provided Health<\/a> insurance which is the second biggest deduction out there, these things actually harm the economy in many ways and i would certainly favor limiting nearly all of these in moving from much flatter and simpler system and we can argue about what the proper rate should be. Host they tend to be really popular. You get a lot of people mad by what i think people dont know is tax breaks that are targeted toward certain things into pushing up prices of those things so if you have a Home Mortgage<\/a> interest of action to help people buy homes you have made housing more expensive and a lot of it goes to the business and industry which is why they end up lobbying to keep those tax breaks. Guest thats right and a lot of a lot of it goes to second homes and vacation homes and things like that. And you are right whether its the tax breaks or direct spending in many cases its passed through to the final user. The same thing is true with college aid which helps drive up the cost of college. They raise their tuition to go with it. Host lets take a step that before we get to the specific programs but talk about cato and being a libertarian and how that affects your thinking in this. Guest the Cato Institute<\/a> is a think tank in washington considered one of the big four in terms of size. The Heritage Foundation<\/a> which is conservative on the right think tank. You have the Brookings Institution<\/a> on the Left American Enterprise Institute<\/a> which is where i think all politicians go to hang out until the next administration. Host considered to be on the right. Guest maybe centerright. But we are libertarian in orientation which means we take the idea of limited government very seriously. We believe government doesnt belong in your wallet their bedroom, your business or your medicine cabinet so we would reduce the government control over pretty much all aspects of peoples lives. We are probably the only think tank in washington that simultaneously wants to cut defense spending domestic spending legalize drugs we will favor and increased immigration increased free trade so we are acrosstheboard of believers in individual liberty. Host what are the issues that you write about at the think tank the most . Guest is a senior fellow i generally work on the domestic side of the budget so i deal with social welfare issues including Poverty Issues<\/a> welfare probe rants and things of that nature. I deal with health care from the Affordable Care<\/a> act to medicare and medicaid to how we can Reform Health<\/a> care at the local level and also retirement issues like Social Security<\/a> and all of that is exempt to the overall budget deficit and the general need for economic growth. Me were looking at issues like poverty income inequality. Guest thats an issue and working on right now and ive done a couple of books on the past on welfare reform and basically the need to find ways way to get people out of poverty. Our goal should be lifting people out of poverty permanently and i think we need to do a lot with that. It lures them into a life of crime because they can make in profits in the short term off of the illicit drug trade and it leads to a lot of the criminal Justice Thomas<\/a> we are seeing so thats a big terrier. Most things are not things the government can fix. Thats one we can fix. Host lets jump to the big parts of your progress is where you look at where the fixes need to to come in lets start with the Biggest Program<\/a> Social Security<\/a>. Talk about how it works and talk a little bit about what we need to do. Guest Social Security<\/a> is often misunderstood. People think when they painted Social Security<\/a> taxes that is somehow paying for retirement than Social Security<\/a> when you pay your taxes done with that money is put away for your retirement and its nothing to do with you. You pay for people who are retired today and then you hope when you come to retirement theres another generation behind you that will pay into the system that will support you and your retirement. In some ways that scheme that people in the bottom pay for the people at the top of the people at the top generally the first retirees made out pretty well. Host it used to be that each generation was getting bigger and bigger. Guest in 1950 with 16 people paying in for every person who was getting benefits out into dates about three and we are headed to two were slightly less than two. We will have to support each retiree in retirement. We are making higher wages but ultimately the system will break down. You can only tax workers so much for each retiree before they are going to resist and the tax burden potential and future generations is enormous. It would be double in terms of payroll tax to keep the system solvent longterm. And add to that we are all living longer than when the program started. Guest thats right. The First Brother<\/a> was acting in cincinnati. He had to hide out for several days and slipped to philadelphia. He found some safety by being arrested by the government and brought to washington and held for six or eight weeks for questioning. His brother ed was acting in boston. He felt that inadvisable in boston was a city that everyone had a lot of connections. Asias husband was arrested and imprisoned for a wild. Yes there were some trouble there but after a couple of weeks it was safe enough. This family has to make a living in public. Its not like they were in the store where they could shop for six months and you dont like the booth you dont go and buy. They have to get out an act. They have to get out in front of hundreds of strangers everyday and make a living in public. Some point they withdrew from the stage and they all had to come back and they were worried the public would receive them but the public, there was a lot of favorable press. Not john of course but to everyone else in the public was sane enough to realize they were not their brothers keeper. One final question. I recently received a letter not through the mail but through purchase from 1862 in which a lady from port royal mentions dr. Child charles coming out to see the children. This was the same doctor they treated booth. Was he the best or just hand the . Im glad you identified him and im glad you he got the letter. Theyre surprisingly little known about him. This is the doctor he was brought by the soldiers to the garrett farm after booth had been shot to see if there was anything they could do to save his life. There is very little known about him. My guess is he live the closest to the farm four miles or so from where booth was shot and of course as you know once he got to the farm at quick exam showed them that booth was going to die. Again thank you so much for your kind attentiveness. [applause] booktv is on twitter. Follow us to get a fishing news, scheduling updates author information and to talk directly with authors during our live programs. Twitter. Com booktv. We continue our visit to augusta georgia with lee ann caldwell. Guest the book we are talking about today is sub five then and now. Its a book i wrote with the Augusta Museum<\/a> of history so no better place to talk about the book and what we learned about the history them here in this awardwinning local museum and we are in an exhibit entitled acosto story. It tells us about how augusta developed and how it then came to be the augusta that it is now. 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