That i grew up around and those that are being honored tonight and to concentrate on the substance not a capacious place and then to have a series of conversations and then when we are done we will take questions in chat to wrap up in an hour using the best practice not keeping you in front of your computer screen for too long especially this time of day. New to the awards and the legac legacy, we have a short video. Talk about the process of writing at the keyboard. Its not the most important par part. [inaudible] this work was detailed. And with a set of ideas and what he hoped for is the elevation of nonfiction programs. He cared so much about the craft and then said to do something and carry forward. And David Marinus and robert caro, on and on with this silly group of americans. And none of this would be possible. And talk about narrative nonfiction. And it would allow me to take more time of the debt for the first time author. It gave me confidence. Because this type of work that is narrative nonfiction is exactly what i wanted to do when i grew up. And it is the storytelling of the social conscience and if you look a few decades now you can say it is a family of excellence. Welcome back after columbia we are excited to be stewards of the prices because then then to renew that commitment to the kind of work that tony left us and also to think the past winners for being with us tonight and was mentioned we owe a great debt to the family for this institution now let me introduce our winners we are honoring together first the lucas prizewinner for an american summer, life and death in chicago you may thank you for having me. The lucas prize we are celebrating tonight, and National Bestseller and several other books that has a relationship by family tree with no children here and working the new yorker and New York Times magazine and the this American Life and writer in residence at northwestern university. Carry and she is being honored for William Monroe trotter. She has been felt by glitches but if she is here we welcome her. Are you here . We can see you but we cannot hear you. We hope you can hear us. Teaching at columbia director of program of american studies and codirector of the and joining us from massachusetts. We will try to fix her microphone. Now to the two works in progress it is a distinctive is that with those two works in progress and with those islamic terror attacks, thank you. And then university in virginia previously worked as a reporter to Christian Science moment monitor and a fulbright scholar. Then the second worth on works in progress for the forthcoming book seed money. Its a pleasure to be here. And environmental history and the class of 2017. His first book and then cocacola and to examine the Environmental Impact of worldwide operations. I will hold myself to ten minutes or less starting with works in progress but we will ask. So let me start with you. Your book is one of the big subjects of environmental debate and discourse of genetically modified foods. How impactful they are. I was struck how easy it was that you will find monsanto hasnt delivered on their promise that genetically engineered seed advanced productivity to the degree forecasted are promised. Can you say more . Steve putting changes around the world. And, this kind of recycling system so i got hooked on that. I ended up going to want you in finding that washington university. In dew point, i didnt know what was going to be the most interesting find. But being at state which is also tremendous institution with top lead scientist here, i really became fascinated with these questions but what do we actually know that we are now 20 years or more more than 20 years now, the first introduction around up ready herbicide tolerant genetically engineered seeds. Routine point, what really stood out, was the data on yield that 20 years ago the argument was that we need these things that the yield of these genetically engineered will be so much more than what we had before and i had to accept these all other costs. Such costs. But that is just business. Getting the interviewing the top scientists at that national county. And i asked if i was reading this the old data seems to be the same as we look in conventional bread. And he said yep. That is kind of what we are saying. So for me, thats a really important thing to be discussing. To think about future food. I think now historians, we can weigh in on this. Now we have 20 plus years of data. I think the real questions about whether this promise of productivity is really true. Steve so impressive result but a very dramatic upset nonetheless. He wrote that that seed are radically reshaping the ecosystems pretty sent telus how that is happened of the 20 years from your perspective environmental history and you have a net assessment as they say in washington, is this radical altering and demonstrably damaging are beneficial or suggest change that you would say it would be difficult to describe in those terms. Bartow i think one of the interesting journeys, went to vietnam because there what is fascinating is of the same company that produced agent orange, window dow chemical that is well. But if you look at volume production, they actually produce more agent orange and was interesting there was heres a company that is now coming into vietnam selling the scenes of life and food and interesting court of all things, but you know the location was really, how would somebody overcome that task. To literally down the street from the headquarters walked in unannounced, is a museum talks about mount santos agent orange on the impact on that environment. But it really point to brazil. Twenty think about the global impact, one of the big issues right now is that herbicide will die kimba which just emerged as a way to deal with weeds. We spend so much round up we became really resistant to it. So to deal with this monsanto, now a German Company selling these stacked genetically engineered pizza have both resistance to round up and resistant to this other chemical. The problem is it is very volatile particular in hot climates. In one of the things we have seen in the United States is that like about husband drift and so when you spread the service i, its actually volatile and jumps up in the air and will spread onto other farms. If you do not have the resistant genetically engineered feet, your forms get hit in their court cases that i have sent on our farmers are livid about this but the farms have been infected by this and when i went to brazil dew point, it scared the heck out of the people there. The farmers that i talked to, but wed scientists at top in brazil because they were just approving this system there if you think about hot climates is tropical environments, this document spread in the way that that was forced to be compliant. Some farmers do not want to get genetically engineered feet. Ands really concerning problem for the future. Were talking a lot about ran up right now but i really think that dicamba is the next big story. Steve thank you and so much more here. But i have an eye on the clock now i will move over here. I think your excerpts and your book proposal was a reminder of what a decade in 1974 starting with penn state and ending with in the 70s, events like stage one bombing after another but this was an enormous prices that as you point out, and remember if it was in your proposal but when you explained to people with this book was about, they would often say why has notebook of been written about this before. I think please remind us what it was exactly. As simply as possible. When and where and what happened. Bartow in three days, in march 1, 9779 through 11, about 40 hours in total where three locations in washington dc, were taken over by three groups of armed men. And all from the same group. It took about 100 and are 1250 hostages. These three locations were on rhode island avenue and another center on massachusetts avenue and in the district building which is now john wasnt building pretty kind of right across the street from the white house. They all came from the socalled muslim who was headquartered in washington dc and the leadership of the man. And it was for three days straight. Three nights, completely dominating Network Evening news and is on the front pages of newspapers across every small town newspaper in bigcity newspaper and across the world. It was in line for at least three days. It ended after three days when after these three ambassadors decided to enter with the hostage leader wasnt tried to negotiate the settlement. If that event were to happen today, i would imagine we would forget about this considering the elements. But theres a lot happening at the time and this is not something them so its more about perhaps something about what amended that time. And women to americans. Steve how did the hostage taking end. Bartow yes, spoiler alert. The tent it was a deadly event. There were casualties but in the end, the muslim ambassadors had a facetoface meeting with an Armed Police Officers when they were able to be convinced to let all of the hostages go. And on the condition that the hostages leader also walk out and he slept in his bed that let that night. Steve thinking about the honors there, here you have a very tight resident event is right for narration with detail and character but, some distant in the past how did you discover materials for the survivors who could really bring this story beyond yellow newspaper clippings to a different level of reader experience. Im very lucky that i did the story at the moment i did because silver 40 years old and but a lot of the people are around. Every kind of moment of the story before the hour there were moments in the negotiating room and the Police Command center and there were the hostages and places where people are being kept hostage. Shahan every location ive been able to find people with firsthand knowledge. So i am lucky and those people were in their 30s and 40s another in their 70s and 80s now some in the 90s to can there was an investor that survived. There were three. And in switzerland, i was able to meet one. Ive been very lucky to be able to find people and a lot of the hostages. But relying on memory that old would not have been enough. Seven really lucky help missus wendt as well. And he has been very satisfying as a reporter. To be able to get the evidence and fbi was keeping track of my main character for over 25 years. Ive been able to get those files but it took a while. In an extensive court cases after it all ended. Its just been really this satisfying narrative perspective of somebody creating a narrative and being able to use most of these things in the interview with sources. But also average archival material and print material to rely on. I could go on but i want to welcome terry into the conversation. Are you with us terry. Can you hear me. Steve i can. You have a phone, thats a solution. It looks ingenious. Yes it is. I apologize. The historian technology, its really not my strong suit. Although ive been speaking on some for the past couple of weeks. Thank you for having me. Steve we got dozens of folks students and others listening and i was grateful for the opportunity to read about the life of william. I must contest to my shame that i really didnt know very much about. I just knew about the times he lived in. The centrality of his role in the kind of trajectory that he had on the spectrum of thought and action and response and jim crow was absolutely fascinating and distinctive. It partly because he boston also because of the ideologies that he wrestled wrote with an expressed. So if it is not too difficult, introduce us to a were drawn to him as a biographical subject and what about his trajectory to that first 20 years of the last century that you thought needed to be illuminated and dislike and scale. And it was neglected in our kind of received history. Terry i approach the life from the perspective that boston, new england and areas outside of the post reconstruction south, are often ignored when we have conversations about political history. And particularly this notion that a place like boston is often due to time periods and the time before the civil war, this abolitionist time. And through history. And then, the civil war and then theres not a lot between the civil war and the 70s. Like this cut of the idea that we have. So i really want to get into what was happening in a place like new england that we often miss number one and the racial footprint in spite of abolition in the 20th century civil rights into what is a look like when you have somebody who is arguing for pretty radical emotions of rights and justice at a time of his historically, that came later. So i grew up hearing about women in the south from the grandparents who were activists. I wanted to do research on him the black press and i was often frustrated outside of my advisor that theres this notion that you cannot do history of black people outside of the stuff between 1855 in 1930. Because, they didnt have a lot of rights. The northern particular as opposed to the place that had complicated racial history. I believe that one of the people who rights and to activism and also problematic due to the events of justice in american particulate gender. Really gives us a window into the rights and also the complicated the future of africanamericans. In the political process. We had this notion the black people cannot vote. In the black people magically became democrats after roosevelt and then the gop, trajectory and trust are involvement in rebel politics. And radical black politics and challenging that notion. Steve you mentioned black press and of course one of the principal vehicles across his time was the guardian. Can you tell us about that newspaper in the place in the discourse and the arguments among black political leaders and ended intellectuals of that. Because there were the arguments, with booker t and others of his contemporaries but he had a megaphone that he is in the guardian powerfully. Terry trotters newspaper, a time. When an particular black folks were dominated by these interests. Particulate conservatives advocate between the north and the south in this notion that the press should be a way to only highlight africanamericans achievement and highlight the political and Economic Issues in africanamericans in deconstruction. So the newspaper as the press, it would be a vehicle for trotter but also a vehicle for africanamerican people who most of whom i can do my involved with washington. Why it is an academic debate but most people are the average person in 1905, a black person living in new york or chicago was not really involved in it so what people are actually talking in the newspaper is a great way to look at how it is that this black culture is being used in a format that for the most part except for the guardian in about 1910 was dominated by the interest within the newspaper that was black discontentment. Newspaper i think i said something about in the introduction about how the newspaper really illustrates the power of the press and of newspapers. Independent newspapers in particular and particle consciousness and people whom and were considered demobilize of the reconstruction of the press became the vehicle to which this socalled exercise their activism. Steve this last question, naturally and you will do, places like conservative and radical, in the context of boston and new york on the guardian in that period, how would you describe his ideology in context. Terry the reason that trotter was in this deciding for themselves how they were going to see themselves as laborers and i argued that within that tradition, that trotter is someone who fundamentally believes africanamericans should decide based on their own speech and desires and that it should not be dictated by people who called themselves race men for race women. And it should be not decided by others. From that sense he was radical. And he was also somebody who do not believe that either Political Party were serving the africanamerican people. He was all critical of the gop but also he believed that black people need to vote in terms of greatest interest in the majority of africanamerican people economically and socially. Five thank you so much for that and for the book. Regulations on the price. And sure we will circle back to when we get to our audience questions in a few minutes. Terry okay, thank you so much. Steve living introduce and the context of gun violence in chicago. You wrote there are no children here. Freud you justly celebrated even almost 30 years after it was published. As really dedicated himself across the long. Time to the setting into these issues. I was struck alex in the way that you find the book. And i dont want to mischaracterize this money and setting up the narrative, in several you do this great emergent reporting and narrative, it was there to guide the reader by saying what the book is not. Its not a book about solutions, not a book about Public Policy and even allow yourself to comment, and i have no idea what woodworker what would change the environment and i dont want to pretend that i am guiding you towards these sites about public action. Hunting is the bread that two ways. One was signal signaling that this will be a narrative. What happened and who was there. So please abandoned your aspirations for something of that narrative but also a little bit of a i have been with the subject for so long, and i am now at a loss pretty can you talk about both of those. Alex personal i want to say that this award is such a profound honor. And i remember reading common ground. In thinking that this was what i wanted to do. To be able to somehow create literature. I was inspired to create literature so this honor it means a lot. I didnt have this kind of confession in the front of the book. That this was not a book about public honesty. It is not going to present solutions. And part of it is i feel very strongly when we just stories not necessarily to answer questions but to ask them really. So my hope is that by going out and listening and ultimately becoming the stories of individuals, you begin to ask what you begin to see things that you have not seen before. It may begin to ask questions that you have not thought to ask before. Then it also is kind of this to the corporate not so much with the gun violence really think about poverty and equity in our cities and push the violence of think is much a symptom of. And ideally, i feel so strongly in the power of narrative that i think its a small story to me till these small intimate stories, the speaker something larger. Something more universal. That was what i was hoping to get towns in this book. And really to begin to ask questions that have not been asked. Steve all our winners tonight are teachers as well is writers. You are a writer resident and i am sure many master classes abou