So this product, Washington Post associate editor and Pulitzer Prize winner traveled across the world to kansas, indonesia, kenya, hawaii, new york and chicago. President obama and kenya discovered the president african ancestral history. He toured houses for Young Barack Obama in indonesia and found homes and sites with his family mother. Began. Discussing his latest book, barack obama. You write and barack obama about the story, no life could have been more the product of randomness than that of barack obama. It is the world coming together accidentally and honolulu, hawaii in 1960. Her father who happens to come from kenya because he read a story in the saturday evening post describes the great place because of the diversity and mother who gets there because she has a father is a wonder and hands up hawaii telling furniture. Here comes barack obama, he emerges as a global existence. Where did their lives begin . s grandmother corrupter, i start the story in topeka which is the state capital because they lived there a short time, his father, the president greatgrandfather was an auto repairman and their greatgrandmother, a very difficult marriage. The book begins with her suicide in topeka. Stan lee, the president s grandfather back Butler County and thats where he meets the grandmother and the story begins. We want to show you a little Video Montage shop by your wife on your trip to kansas in 2009. What are we doing . [inaudible] topeka, kansas. Thats where they committed suicide. Obamas grandfather and his brother, the house here on buchanan street, the auto shop, sixth avenue right around the corner and thanksgiving, 1826 buchanan, that little white twostory, shotgun house, more than 10 feet wide, one house on the corner of seventh of buchanan. 1946, this is where he died. That looked cold. How old was she when she killed herself . She was 26. Why did she killed herself . What we know is she left a suicide note that said she was distraught over her husband, i was the immediate call. That was the president s grandfather, stanleys father. Yes. Because of that traumatic event, they went back to toledo, with his grandparents. And his greatgrandfather, Christopher Columbus clark who fought in the civil war. Where did stan lee, the grandparent meet . Agusta which is about 12 or 15 miles from toledo in Butler County, thats where metal grew up. Madeleine was a senior in high school. Hes working in construction, renovation there and thats where he met her. What was her life like in kansas . Before or after they were married . After. Her parents didnt the like him. The first thing her father said, the dark skin, an element of race evening that and she married in secret. Before she graduate high school, she was a smart, young woman was on the honor roll until she met stan lee who was talking. Thats what she wanted. Shed grown up loving betty davis in the sophistication of hollywood. It already been to california, he promised to take her back there. It was somewhat unstable. Not that the marriage was unstable but jobs were unstable, they never knew where they were going next. It was a rocky road. Where did the obama clan begin . It began several hundred years ago but i start the story in the small by vittoria to the south and east of the city, and what we call newer, it was like underwear tribe, basically centered in the Third Largest tribe there. Thats where the obamas found themselves. On the president paternal side, who are his grandparents . His grandfather with hussein who was born in the late 1800 and the first wave in western kenya, learned english and otherwise became in the British Culture of the british colony so he worked for many British Military people and mother was a woman who came from another village in the area and she did not, it was very different. He had several wives which was part of the culture and when he moved, the area near where she grew up, it was back to another homestead of the obama clan. Shed had enough. A new wife with him so she ran away. She left the family when barack obama, the president s father, who was author also Barack Hussein obama. Grandparent and kenya died in 1979 in 2006, president obama ever meet them . No. He never met his kenyan grandparents. He got there in the 80s when his grandfather was already dead. The very early days of his life but he didnt get back to kenya until both of his grandparents went on. For barack obama, sorry, honey interviews did you do over the past four years . Almost 400. I had a wonderful assistant, gabriel who helped with some of the later interviews in specific parts of the story but i traveled all around the world, everybody i could find in every part of the life of president obama, his parents and his grandparents. Barack obama senior was born in 1936, was his childhood like . From an early age, he was dealing with western culture and the british, his father was difficult to get along with he was lucky in the sense, he got into a good school in the area and although he never totally finished, he was a very smart student. You have that sort of clash of old and new almost anyone in his generation had to deal with. Is living in a colonial country in a poor part of kenya so he lived in mud huts and dealing with cows and no television or anything like that, centric behind in some ways. Kenya was starting to emerge and it was beginning. He was part of that so he struggled. How long for you in kenya . What did you see over there . Kenya was one of the great experiences in life, every day was unforgettable. We were there about two weeks and it felt like a year. In a wonderful sense though. We moved from washington to london to nairobi and spent a couple of days there he spent much of his career there. Then after several days, we drove from nairobi across the highway, all the way up west, experience there was so different. My goal was to find as many as i could. A great Young Journalist there and he and i had been working in aspects of getting information many months before we got there. We were incredibly lucky to also have a translator who i met in the u. S. Who happened to be in kenya and are driver. How many interviews did you do in kenya . About 40. Most of them were there, a few of them over the phone, later interview were not available so i provided the questions and he conducted interviews afterwards. Book to be traveled with you to kenya and conducted an interview there as well. We want to show you that now. January 16, 2010. Youve been in western kenya for about two days now as you work on your new book, out of this world, the making of barack obama. How has it been worth it . Days remind me of when i do, why i do what i do. Everything morning until night, it energizes me, even as i get tired of doing interviews, this is the reality behind so many things you think you know but you dont really know and it is of vibrant life and things i could never see my lifetime any other way because of what i do but i think wow, i am so lucky. These last few days, we traveled around this part of western kenya, based in consumer, the capital of this part of the country. Informally called wildland because the main tribe are the the well. It is the tribe from where his family came. We drove down to a little town where we interviewed Barack Obamas only living paternal aunt. The sister of barack obama, senior. Living in a small, mud floored oneroom house, back in the back streets of this tiny village was only a couple of couches there in about five pictures and a few calendars on the wall, most of them related to the president of the united states. This woman, he kept going further into the middle to the western world to this small village in africa, the president of the u. S. Is just kind of mindboggling, awesome and obligatory. That is how we started today and from there, we interviewed three other members of the obama clan in the cando bay area around lake victoria. I was told stories you could never get anywhere else about obamas grandfather, his father, barack obama senior, we walked through the compounds of the obama clan and saw the gravesite obama, his greatgrandfather, the person from whom the obama name derives. Its kind of amazing stuff all day. You spent a lot of time in your interviews talking about the situation here in kenya. What importance does that have to your bookmarks. It explains a lot about barack obama senior. This book is more than just a biography of barack obama who became president of the u. S. It is about the places that created him, the people who created him, starting two generations back and moving through to obama himself and his father, in some ways, represented the promise and frustration of africa and of kenya and brilliance and flaws and some of it had to do with tribalism, the second largest tribe in kenya and the colonial. Of one kenya created this tribalism, putting all of these different tribes in different reserves in different parts of the country, when they got in, there was this unfortunate sort of conflict or power. They were basically, ever since 19 to 63 had been dominated by the larger tribe. Barack obama senior was a nationalist, he wasnt a tribalist. When he came back to kenya in 1965 and started his career here, suffered and i wanted to get the full context of that. Another character in the story from a fascinating guy, he was the intellectual leader, a major spokesman for all of the Independence Movement in kenya before he left. His only a possible future president of kenya. He was very, in the cold war era is western of it and it helped in many ways. There is also the patron of barack obama senior because of him obama got to the u. S. The whole reason barack obama, the president , exist, it wouldnt have happened without him who organized the airlift that brought the canyons to the u. S. Tom boyer was assassinated in 1969. The presumption is by people high up in the leadership who were afraid he would become president. It was nearly clearly established the man who was tried and hanged, some of his last words, why didnt you call after the big man . Meeting somebody who organized the whole thing. Assassination also fueled barack obama fuel assassination, the tribalism that was created ever since. You talk to folks about barack obama senior, attorney keeps coming up and it might be misleading but politically connected and political entry. Barack obama senior was trained as an economist at both the university of hawaii where he went to undergraduate and harvard where he left before he got his phd project quite a bit of study there and he was a fairly brilliant macro economist. But his rise in all of his movement within the government in nairobi over the decade was filled with political frustrations. After just doing four or five days of interviews in kenya, street in nairobi and to out here, my mind is spending with all that ive heard, one story of an another your manipulations. Death threats and people losing their jobs because of tribalism or some other power. Barack obama, unavoidably was caught up in that. Another term thats come up as alcoholic. I think barack obama senior definitely had a drinking problem. Many of the people call them outright and alcoholic some of his family members were reluctant to go that far. Just say he drank a lot. But he certainly there were a lot of occasions where many of the people said loved his double double, double double scotch and would drink it in the hour of the day but it did affect his wife. They attributed in part just because an alcoholic is a dramatic thing but also the frustrations he had over the years because of his family life and his job in climate ups and downs, just exaggerated. Womanizer. Ive heard two things. Hes an excellent dancer and another, he loved women. I dont think the word womanizer is used in kenya in the same way it is in the u. S. Partly because much of kenya is a polygamist culture. From where he came, definitely part of the culture. His grandfather from what weve been told over the last few days and perhaps as many as 15 lives, barack, himself, senior had four lives but not all at the same time. At most, two at the same time divorced from his two wives at different times. But he also had many other wom women, the word womanizer to me, i dont feel comfortable using that but definitely had a lot of women in his life. Children . I have no idea. That has not really come up, except one, children scattered all over western kenya by from his wives, he had eight children. Of those eight, or any talking . Well, not yet. Its interesting within the obama family, is a lot of friction going on. They dont all get along. Some of them imply they want renumeration for us. Others have been asked to be protective of the family. Ive interviewed a lot of people who havent talked before but half brothers tomorrow. Common mistakes and how do you handle it . It is not common in the states. I dont know if its a dilemma but had to think about a lot of Different Things including cultural values, expectations, they are giving up talk to me and what it means to them and in the culture. The Washington Post, traditionally, the strongest ethics rules you can ever imagine, give back a christmas gift, couldnt accept anything, our editors for couple decades went on, he didnt even vote. Pure and pristine, i myself, the boys have very strong personal ethics but i am operating in a different culture here so ive had to make a few interesting decisions, a few months ago, who wanted to interview before i got here, and other in a Little Village said he would talk got a he goat. In that village, when you visit that other, you are expected to bring a gift. It wasnt like paying to talk to him, it was like a business. I debated it for a while, its about 60 bucks. Yesterday and today, there have been situations where people have left work to talk to me and ive made up for that differen difference. Weve gotten a few photographs because of the photographs and its been hit up by publishers 1000, why cant pay canyon 141 . Its been that kind of situati situation. Youve already been to hawaii, kansas, texas, tell us about your research on this book and in kenya, windows and . You just know when you get there. You wont know. The research never ends actually. There is a time when i say im ready to start writing. I started this book, essentially the day after obama was elected resident, thats when i decided got to do this book. Ive written a few pieces before that so i had some basis of research, particularly on his mother. I think when i get home from this incredible kenyan journey, ill have a kenya and kansas story pretty much completed in fact where the story begins. Two incredibly different worlds created unique person. I was just bouncing around out of africa and i said out of africa, out of hawaii, out of kansas, out of indonesia, out of this world. The book is two things. Its a world that created obama and how he recreated himself so the first, im not sure the proportions get, its important for me to get it right but perhaps even the first half of the book, theres not quite that much. The character wasnt even on the stage yet. The second half of the book is largely in chicago, also his education california and new york and boston thrown in some. But largely chicago and thats when he recreated himself as a political being so you think about it, were all sort of created from a lot of different strengths but i cant think of anybody more fascinating than obama. Tell us about your team here. I cant tell you how happy about the people i am working with. I dont know swahili, i dont know the well which is the mother part, swahili is the language there. Drive on the other side of the road here and i think i would have been dead in the first day if i tried to drive myself. Plus, no road signs. So i definitely needed a great driver and we got one. Hes a friend and interested in politics, getting, a great guy. I needed somebody to help set up the interviews and help me get documents from the National Archives and elsewhere. I looked out got powerless, 40 years old, a great investigative journalist in kenya, very tough, straightforward, smart, savvy, politically instinctive guy whos helped me immeasurably also does some interpreting of the swahili for me. Then the interest of ocala, a graduate student in wisconsin and last summer when i needed documents translated into english, my wife and i lived there in the summers, theres one from a futures, should come over to my house in the afternoon and translate for me and i discovered she would be here and right now, we were going to come to kenya and family is from about ten minutes from one of the obama homes emotional beatrice has been our interpreter of today and tomorrow. My wife, linda came along she is an environmentalist, terrific environmentalists who retired about seven years ago and has gone on almost every major trip since then. Im not a grump or anything but i seemed like it compared to my wife the best, any person could ever have so she makes friend wherever we go. This is not a cheap trip. Youve got three people on staff the whole time for a number of weeks. There is an advanced cover all of this or every author . I cant speak for every author in this is my tenth book. I get enough of an advanced to pay for all this and i have, i have my own corporation. That has funds i can use for all of this stuff and i do spend why do it if youre not going to do it thoroughly . I couldnt have done this trip without that kind of team put together so its not like you get an advance and then spend it all on vacation. A lot of it goes into the work of making the book. The family connections, the obama family connection, my head is stuck. [laughter] and is going to be a challenge for me in the book, for couple of reasons. It is a fairly complicated family web and the second reason, which is unavoidable is kenyan names read by greeters in the u. S. Can sound different to remember. I have to be able to deal with that and that is a challenge for any writer. Have some ways ive done it in the past and essentially, what is important to me is not quoting somebody, when you write a long narrative, youre not putting together a string of quotes, or during a narrative story so i will take elements from each of the people ive interviewed and weave them into the story i tell. It was the family tree that will become understandable. Theres a whole obama plan down in one section of the bay area and another one which the u. S. Knows better in a larger district and thats where mama lived, thomas ran for the theyre not even flood relatives but shes the one everybody goes to visit, everybody thats with the obamas are from. A whole other group of obamas going to deal with. Probably in a more substantive way in terms of where the story really comes from. It reminded me a li