Chair. On one side of her desk theres a stapler, and then next to it a fragment of a cannonball that ez soo using as a paperweight something she could have picked up on the civil war battlefield. All sorts of other useful and interesting things are here on this desk. Red cross windows are here. People on the street car could see those windows. People on the road would know what this house was about by the windows and the red cross flag that ordinarily flies above the windows. Clara barton died in her bedroom in this house three days before the titanic sank april 12th, 1912. You can watch this and other american artifacts programs anytime by visiting our website at cspan. Org history. Keep track of the Republicanled Congress and follow its new members through its first session. New congress best access. On cspan, cspan 2, cspan radio, and cspan. Org. Each week American History tvs reel america brings you archival films that help tell the story of the 20th century. Republican Herbert Hoover served as president from 1929 to 1933. Remembered most for his time in the oval office at 9the start of the Great Depression hoover also served as the secretary of commerce under president harding and coolidge. In this hourlong 1960 nbc interview hoover discusses his life beyond the presidency. Speaking with reporter ray henley he delves into topics including his childhood, his time in china during the boxer rebellion, and his involvement in supplying food to civilians in germanoccupied belgium during world war i. This program is part of the collections of the Stanford University libraries collections and university archives. This is the campus of Stanford University. One of americas great schools. This is the memorial church. This is the memorial theater. And this is the library on war, revolution, and peace. The news commentator. I am meeting a Great American and an old friend. Im here to have a talk with the 31st president of the United States, mr. Herbert hoover. Sit down, ray. Thank you sir. Could you tell us what it means . Well it is the library on war, revolution and peace. The purpose of it is to present the complete history of this world since the beginning of the First World War i. It has many objectives. One of them is to aid in the development of measures of peace out of the display of the experience of the world. It covers economic, military other questions. It is now the haven of historians from all over the world. Because the german war library was destroyed in the last war, the french war library was destroyed, and the British War Library was greatly damaged. This is practically the only complete story of what has happened in the last 50 years. How did the idea of the library start . I was crossing the north sea on a usual journey to belgian collection with relief and i had to book to read written by andrew p. White. He was the great historian of the french revolution. And he complained in that book that he had not been able to present the life of the people in general of france because of the disappearance of fragmentary literature newspapers, bulletins, a thousand things that displayed the lives of the people. I concluded that i was in a unique position to collect that material. So i established collection agencies in all of the countries at war in europe. I was going behind the lines once a month on the circuit around in connection with my particular job. And so we started the collection of that type of literature and we moved into more important documentation. Library must contain a huge number of documents. It contains today probably 20 million documents. Many of them are the originals, which have formed the turning points in world history. The most pathetic of them i think i would show you and that is this. When the russians invaded poland they took about 250 polish military prisoners. They set up work camps all over siberia. Later on when the germans attacked the russians the russians, anxious to increase their military strength, asked the poles to reassemble those armies out of those work camps. They were able to find about 60,000 poles still alive out of the 250,000 that were originally sent. But every one of these poles coming out of a work camp had to get a permit, which was constituted as sort of a Railway Ticket to the headquarters where he was recruited. The poles were a small minority in each camp and their positions, who else was there and how many, and these tickets themselves show the location. So one is able to reproduce the whole slave system at that particular period. And at that time there were obviously about 14 Million People in slave camps. We have here a map showing the location of these slave labor camps made up from the 40,000 documents which we have in the library. Youll see those marked t. We have also the first issue of the communist newspaper pravda. And this issue announces the victory of the communist revolution. We have a file of this newspaper and the other great communist newspaper izvestia right down to today. With the exception of three months. And that three months gap was due to an overenergetic postmaster general who considered this subversive literature, and he stopped it coming to us. So that we had to do something about that. Did you take measures there to relax the situation . I certainly relaxed the postmaster general. But i dont think weve ever been able to recover the lost numbers. Here is another document thats been of profound interest to me. This is the int diary of the Prime Minister of japan at the time we went to war. He made an enormous effort, strenuous effort, to effect a peace with the United States and prevent the war. And the pathos of this document is a warrant for its retention. Of a man who made a real struggle to prevent world war ii ii. There must have excuse me did you have Something Else there, mr. Hoover . I have also some parts of the goebbels diary. He probably was one of the wickedest men that ever lived. And he records his various wickednesses, private and public, in this diary. Apparently he never expected for us to have it. Mr. Hoover, there must have been some mighty interesting stories connected with the collection of these documents. There were a multitude of dramatic incidents. I recollect that after the communist revolution in hungary, at which time there arose a man named bela kunig as the dictator, the people rebelled and he fled in an airplane. One of our energetic youngsters collecting material went around to the headquarters. He found there was nowhere to go. Sew proceeded to load files into that outpost of communism in that truck and he finally found out in the library. I made a request of president hebert. For a documentation that would be apropos to this effort. And he gave me the complete minutes of the german war council presided over by the emperor during the entire First World War wall the documentation attached to those measures. That is the only set in the world. And finally, at the quf a german ambassador i agreed we would keep it in the vault for a number of years. Its not yet open to the public. Where is the library located here at the leland Stanford University, mr. Hoover . Mr. Henle i graduated from this university. And after that mrs. Hoover kept a house on the campus here. I also at the same time was a trustee of this university. So very naturally i was anxious to build up the institution. I know you were born in west branch, iowa. And i think that generally people know that after your mother and father died that an uncle asked you to share his home in oregon. Could you tell us, sir how it happened then that you got down here and attended leland Stanford University . The uncle of mine in oregon was a country doctor. With all of the fine attributes of the country doctors of the United States. I lived with him and his family parkts of it, for seven years. And during that time i got a job as an office boy. And on an occasion a gentleman came in and he talked with the office boy. And he was inquiring what i wanted to do so far. And he said, well, you ought to take up engineering. And he was himself. In engineering. We discussed p. Soon i noticed that Stanford University had announced the institution would be opened that autumn. And the tuition would be free. And that is more or less fitted in my necessities. They announced they would hold entrance examinations in portland oregon. I went to the appointed place i took examinations as well as i could. Not having been in high school but having attended a night school where i had picked up some latin and some mathematics. I passed the mathematics examinations with such distinction that the professor conducting the examinations sparked a good deal of interest sent for me, inquired about my family background. He himself was a quaker. He was a great professor of mathematics and subsequently was the president of Swathmore College for many years. But in any event he said to come down to university and he thought i could get in and he also thought he could help me with my way through the university. So there you have two cases where older men showed a key interest in a young man trying to get along. I have a number of unforgettable obligations to men who took an interest to a youngster. They do it yet all over the United States. There were two or many more to follow. Of course that was the beginning then of your engineering career was it not . Well, i presume. You dont call yourself an engineer until you get somewhere out of college. But that was where i began at Stanford University. Could you tell me, mr. Hoover, after you got your diploma then at Leland Stanford what was your first job . Well i had worked during the summer vacations during my entire time at stanford on the United States geological survey. There was a spot where i earned most of the money i had needed. And after having finished that season, not having a job, thats after i had graduated, i went into the mines at grass valley in california, being familiar with those mines from the previous work id done for the geological survey. I saw the job, and i thought my diploma might field importance and i might even get on the staff of some mine. But that diploma didnt seem to impress anybody. And finally i got to a condition where i took a job underground in a mine and i worked five months i think or six as a common miner. And it was not a bad experience. I understand you to say, sir that you took a job as a common miner . Yeah, sure. A gold mine. I didnt even have a distinction of being a miner. I was started by loading trucks. I rose to that eminent position some two or three months later. How many hours did you work a day there sir . Oh, the regulation hours at that time was ten hours a day and six days a week. Do you remember what you got, how much wages you got . 2 a day. I think i got 2 1 4 after i was promoted to run the drill. Well, then sir on your very first job you learned to work with your hands, didnt you . Well that wasnt quite the whole start. I worked with my hands when i was a boy. And thats how i really learned at that time, was the agony of walking and going from mine to mine looking for a job. But i take it then that you during that period you were able to lay aside a little money for future activities. Well i certainly laid enough money aside to get down to San Francisco and look for a better job. Mr. Hoover, then how did you happen to get into professional engineering after those underground mining days experience . Well, i had developed a great friend of dr. Browner here at stanford. He was one those men who always boosted youngster alone. He introduced me to the leading engineer in San Francisco mr. Louis gem. He gave me a temporary appointment. He had an application for an engineer to go to australia. And there i went on the first 10,000 job. Then subsequently to that your work took you to countries all over the world didnt it mr. Hoover . Yes. As a partner in an Engineering InternationalEngineering Firm. We managed mines in china and india and burma and australia and russia. I dont know where all. Including the United States and canada. So that during the first seven years of this century i wandered around the world seven times with my entire family. Well, it must have been good to get home then after one of those long trips in those days. Always a thrill to come back to america. This is a place where freedom really lived. Did you practice engineering in russia during the czarist days . Yes, sir. We had very large operations which we managed in russia. One of them was at a place called kishtem in the urals. There we had over 100,000 little men. And a very successful operation. The main interest in it was that it was a complicated chemical and metallurgical operation. But subsequently the bolsheviks when they seized it werent able to manipulate because they had locked up all the brains in the staff and expelled all our american staff. And so it shut down and it was closed i think for 15 years or more. And all those people were put out of a job. I see. During your experience in russia how did you get along with the russian people . We got along extremely well because at that time the government was anxious to see the development of the Natural Resources of the country and we were the First Americans to come in. We had no political implications. British and french and all the other nationalities carried with them certain political possibilities. So the russians welcomed the americans. I see. We had no difficulty getting on with the people because for that type of an operation we tried to get the best intelligence there was. We paid wages far higher than the common wage of the country. We hadnt had a strike or a labor difficulty. Mr. Hoover, did you ever hear from any of those russian workers afterward . Some years after that i undertook a relief of communist russia on behalf of the American People. And i picked some of our staff who spoke russian, american staff, and sent them back in connection with relief. They went to kishtem to look around. There they were met by a deputation who came to them with a pet whoigs said will you not get mr. Hoover and his men to come back . Life was so much better. I see. Do you have any souvenirs of those days mr. Hoover . Yes. I have what i think is an interesting souvenir. This was presented to me by the workmen in the kishtem mines in russia. Its a chemical russian piece. It has one curious quality. Aside from its artistic merit which is really very good. And that is the curious plaque which resembles bronze and comes from the fact that they use the most impure iron in the world in order to make it. Runs 10 of sulfur. No american iron smelter could touch iron ore more than a tenth of 1 . But nevertheless they built up quite an artistic industry on the basis of that curious iron and the innate artistic quality of the workmen. Shall we go over and take a look at them . Ray this is a very unusual display of the ancient chinese porcelain art in blue and white in form and arrangement. They are the very height of chinese concepts in artistic arrangement and in workmanship. We thought it would be appropriate that this set should be placed in the memorial room to mrs. Hoover downstairs, and that has been done. She of course collected these items, did she someone. She collected porcelains for 40 years. Lets go sit down. You were many times in china, werent you, mr. Hoover . Yes. I went to china originally as a part of the Engineering Firm ive mentioned to you as the chief engineer to the then department of nines. It it had been created by a reform government. That job came to an end by the boxer uprising which threw the government out. And mrs. Hoover and i had to spend a month under artillery in the town of tin sin until the American Marines came in and rescued us. Outside of your experience in the boxer rebellion, mr. Hoover, how were your relations generally with the chinese . The chinese are very friendly people. I have traveled over a great part of china during the two years prior to that. And had nothing but courtesies from everybody. I was supposed to have an official position and had certain protections in the shape of a cup of cavalry usually. But theres nothing to comment on it particularly. An infinitely friendly people. They have a sense of humor. Theyre highly individualistic. And of course poverty is the total aspect of china except in a very narrow circle. Mr. Hoover what do you think now that the communists arent in power what will happen to the Chinese People . When mao tse tung and his armies drove Chiang Kaishek out of the mainland the first thing he did was disarm the chinese civil population right down to the last butcher knife. And no civil population with pitchforks can ever create a revolution to throw out machine guns. The consequence is that regime is fixed until such a time as the failure of its methods, failure of productivity, should cause the regime itself to change. And no doubt they will have fights amongst the chinese leaders. Theyve already showed that. And often enough revolutions of that kind in history have blown up by fights among the leaders. And there are some of those fights going on now. The russians of course will have influence on the chinese. Do you think that the russian attitude on easing world tension may have some effect on the chinese reds . They may have to restrain them if they want to get their own objectives. We may be witnessing a phenomenon which may be similar to that we saw at the time that stalin came into power. He wanted time to build up his industry and his armies and he began the most peaceful thing that there was rubbing around the earth at that time. He joined the league of nations. He signed the kellogg pa