Transcripts For CSPAN3 Smithsonian Institution Castle 201708

Much of mr. Berrys last work took place here. Richard stamm is the author of the castle. We met our tour guide in the crypt. This is about 40 minutes. I am steve berry. I am here with. Richard stamm richard stamm. Has a cool job, he looks after this stuff in the building. A really interesting plays that is where it all started, the smithsonian was stored in by admin started by a man named james smithson. He was just a guy who had an interest in science at the time. Had 500,000 when he died and he left it to his nephew. His nephew had been married and had kids, life would be great, but he died childless. The provision said the money would go to washington, d. C. To found at the Smithsonian Institution for the increase and diffusion of knowledge. That is what the language says. Here is the meet part. Neat part. He had never set foot in america. Why did he leave a half Million Dollars to place he never set a foot in . To this day, nobody knows. The gas is he was somewhat bitter. The guests is he was somewhat bitter and a woman named elizabeth macy. For the first 30 years of his life, he was known as james lewis macey. Because he was illegitimate, he can never use his fathers name or fortunes or anything. There was a scrap of paper found in his personal effects, it avails me not, the name of the persons or North Cumberland will be extinct bromide will be not. To suggest he was a little bitter. Other than that, we do not know. Will be extinct, but mine will be not. And he was right. All of that was from the 500,000 investment. They could not decide what to do. A lot of people were suspicious of creating Something Like this. Southern senators thought it would be an antislavery institution. John quincy adams and the house of representatives, in 1846, they created at the Smithsonian Institution. In 1855. Mpleted broughtsmithsons tomb to the early part of the 20th century. She is not in here. He is actually down here. There he is. Just his bones are in as their bare are in there. The regents were notified that the cemetery he was buried top of a stone quarry. They notified the board of regents. On our board act of the time was Alexander Graham avail who took up bell who took it upon himself to go fences Board Members that we needed to bring james smithsons volunteer even e,ough hidden bones her even though he had never visited here or had any Close Friends that we know of. Procession with his british flag draped coffin and and they brought him here to the building and is a great middle of the hall, they had a great ceremony and they changed the flags to half american, half british. Advent took him up the stairs to the regions room and draped the coffin in an american flag. Ideas of whathe they found there were going to do and did not do. They wanted to build a proper memorial. Thisis like of the tomb, is more vague. They are both huge and would have dwarfed the lincoln memorial. As it became apparent, there was less money for the project am a the designs went into a garden bench and finally, when the regions were informed by congress that there was no money for this, he ended up in this room right here. Which in the 1880s was the janitors closet. It was totally redesigned. This was closed. You could not come in here. T was locked up they opened it in the 1970s when they opened it up when people could walk in. Effectsof his personal for most of his things were destroyed in the fire and we will tell you more about that upstairs. And we havevived them over in a refrigerated vault and the Natural History museum. There are a few little personal effects that survived. Taking place inside of the smithsonian, this is all in the book and we reopen this to as they did in 1973. They cost this panel top this this panel off and i went back in and uses it. Its fascinating to me why did 1973 . O in his tomb in nobody really knows. There was no scientific value. They decided to go in and inventory it. Across to the Natural History museum and study him for a day or so. Got into a lot of trouble, did it today . They did. The District Office got wind of it and that they contacted our lawyers to say, you have not got the proper permit. That is what we have lawyers. I am a lawyer so i can talk about the lawyers. Theyve mentally put all of backones in and it was put down. I could not resist. I have something hidden. Nobody would go in there. It is all in the novel. The reader will learn about all of that. Tory to keep my books 90 reality. I keep them as close as reality as i can keep them so you can law so you can learn along the way. On this Smithsonian Library Advisory Board and we oversee the 22 libraries. There is a museum and library. I wanted to draw attention to the smithsonian and the smithsonian libraries. She is and 12 books. A recurring character and a retired Justice Department agent and lives in copenhagen. He gets in trouble alone. I pick stuff from history. Things in a footnote. Not in the main body. Here, ideal with the knights of the golden circle, the largest, most dangerous, Clandestine Group and i we use them in the tail and i weave them in the tale. We will go downstairs to something cool that something very few people get to see. This is the great hall where we are now. Now, we are going to to the basement that is a little tight. A lot of pipes and wires. We will follow. It pays to be short here. It helps. See books and television and movies, they always talk about the mysteries under the smithsonian. Now, you are under it. There is not a love for mystery per se, a workable work area. There is an interesting something that is kind of fascinating and i put it in the book. We have a drawing to show you. We are right here. This is the Smithsonian Castle and were right here. Underneath the national mall, all across, a total of a tunnel and up. They did not actually tunnel, trench built in a causeway and filled it over. You will see that in a second. What it was designed to do is bring heating from over here to the castle. The heating ducts and is still does to this day but it is their belt a tight, narrow thing and i put it in the novel. Here one day and rick showed me and i said it has to be in there. It is too cool. In the winter time, this area is warmer where the tunnel is a you can see the line. Picture. S a cool you should have a picture of that. Gets a little warmer so you can see the line as it goes across. With the tunnel is right here. Is right here. I think we have it covered. Lets go down. Several hundred feet. Withwalked into last week the lights off and a flashlight. I guess you cannot see your hand in front of your face. In the novel, rick actually is in the tunnel with the character and allows access into this building from the Natural History across. He is in the book. I had to have somebody in the book who could do a lot of stuff. I was going to make up somebody in i said why make up somebody . I used him. He said he had to be handsome and exciting and i had to paint him, a lot of conditions he put on it. He gets shot at. He does get shot at. You save her life. You did a good job. This tunnel figures into the book. There are secrets in the smithsonian and here is 1, 1 of the real cool secrets for cool secrets. It has been there since 1910. . Do people still love the walkthrough occasionally. We had Asbestos Abatement last week last year so they were in there for three months. Chrissy said it was not the finest experience and the work he said it was not a funnes experience in the world. I was trying to film it with my cell phone. I was continually hitting my head against the pipes. It is a Straight Line and in the book, i put a couple of curves of a couple of twists. Otherwise, it is faithfully represented. Whats we will do now is see something i think is the coolest thing in the whole building. He has the office that you would think of when you think of the smithsonian and we will show it to you right now. Castle,te a book on the the definitive book on the Smithsonian Castle. I studied that book. Curators the curators office. It is decorated with pictures and chris from objects of the smithsonian. And with objects of the smithsonian. [laughter] look at all the court stuff. Over here, here is a shelf and old books and what you would think of a smithsonian curator and a little cubbyhole where nobody can get to you. We will show you something really neat discovered here about 20 years ago . Yeah, i think we have always known it was there that sealed off. But sealed off. Pretty interesting. A tour of your office. What does the curator in the office to . I am the curator of the furniture to decorate the secretary and undersecretary. 1964 by general ripley who was secretary at at the time. He felt the inside of the building should better reflect the outside a historic structure. At the time, it was green linoleum and issued a metal furniture and all of that. 1965, weext, since have been a conflicting antique furniture that fits with the building and the time period, roughly 1840 to 1900. The first initial years of the smithsonian. Then, we actually, people actually sit at the desks and the use of the tables and the building is furnished that way throughout and that is the collection i manage. Is in onee staircase of the tiny towers on the corner of the main building. It was put in in 1881 for the scientists who have Laboratory Space on a balcony in the great hall. One of them was mary jane, she was the sister of one of the young assistant secretaries. She worked in the marine collection. The wet storage was down here. They put in the staircase as a shortcut and she would have to go to the middle of the great hall down a flight of stairs and where the elevator we came down and was a flight of stairs and all the way to this end of the building, the west end. Pick up these huge and jars filled and retrace her stuff and go back up. They put in this little staircase for shortcut for those scientists. She said before she would open the door and come out into the storage space, she would stop her feet three times to scare away the rats. That is the book that is out. We put this mug dalia and on the cover. We had a cover artist draw it. We thought we should make one of these. Edalliont this much on the cover. It is used as a super way to get in and out. You cannot put it in the book. It was sealed for many years and they unsealed it and using it again. We will go from the very bottom of two wars at the top and up the road turned up towards the top in up to the rotunda, a place many people never get to see. Regions the regents room where they meet. Many people do not understand how it is governed, it is governed by a 17 member council. The Vice President of the United States serves on the board as do three members of the house of the three members of the senate and nine citizen of members of the 17 of members. This is where they meet. In the sodownstairs when they brought his body up here first, it delayed in this room. That was in the early part of the century. In 1865, january, this is where they cap smithsons purse they cap smithsons personal effects. When the fire happened, this room was destroyed and most of his personal effects. The only thing that survived were his books that are in a vault and a few of his personal items. A small painting and some arrowheads. Just his calling cards and really very minor things. What people do not realize is there is smithson night. What is it smithsonite. What is it . A minimal he discovered. Fairly useful. A minimal but very expensive on the open market. He discovered pretty it comes in many different colors. The most sought after is a turquoise color and found in mexico. I always wondered, extremely expensive mineral that has very little, if no uses whatsoever. We are not sure why it is so expensive. I have a chunk of it on my desk where i write. Dislikes the regents role. Room. S is the regents they meet a couple of times a year, sometimes a more. The chief justice takes an active role, very interested in it. Chris what kind of that what kind of things do they decided here . Everything. The fate of the institution. When a new museum is proposed, they work it out. They are the governing board. Museum andithsonian Research Center has been created in this building, if not because the collections were located but because the regents created a them. They are a fight do share reported. Fiduciary board. They set all of the policy and make all of the major decisions. Chairs is why their 18 and 70 regent 17 regents. A previous secretary preferred round tables. He had a point. At a long table, we had a antique table and if you were sitting at this end, you could or to make eye contact communicate with the person next to you. We had in this custommade to accommodate 18 chairs. This way, everyone can make eye contact and chair is more important than the other except the chief justice sits over there. That is his preferred or chair. Out to the rotunda now. This is almost like the heart of the building. Center of the Center Section of the building. Prior to 1865, we were standing in the middle of an auditorium is where we would be. Gallery,be a gigantic a couple thousand people. Here it is. You can see it. Standing in the middle of this. The smithsonian would present talks and lectures and speeches. A big controversy at the time because joseph henry refused to allow an abolitionist speak. He do now what did that in the middle. The smithsonian did a risky juggling act during the civil war. On the one hand, he was lincolns science advisor and helped with innovation in the war. To thevery sympathetic south in some ways and had a lot of connections. He tried to balance it. You are in washington, d. C. , it is a little bit of a problem. He managed to do it and survive except in january of 1865, as there was already does fire. I want to show you this first. This case is interesting. There was a horrific fire. Case. As rebuilding this it was being refurbished. I included it in the novel and i distorted in the book a little bit. It cannot really happen in real life. This key is really interesting. I do not know why i found it fascinating. It was found in the attic in the 1950s and nobody knows what it opens. It is does going to lock. It to goes into a lot of but will not turn. There is one original door left but it will not turn. It fascinated me. This key is given to the incoming secretarys time like a badge of the office but they do not give him the original. Rick has like five copies per i tried to get one. He will not let me get it. They keep about five area they get a copy. This is the original. The novel revolved around this key. And put itttle thing all together. In the novel, i figure out what it opens. And had some fun with that. That is where my 10 is. The key itself, this is the badge that was created back in the 1960s by deliberately and Dillon Ripley. That is pretty cool. The symbol of knowledge. Incorporated into the badge of office in the photograph. Dillon ripley with queen elizabeth. He loved regalia. He brought a little that is due to the job. He left a huge imprint. Much of what you see today came from him. He had all kinds of things he credited. The libraries themselves came from him. He was quite a visionary. He was what and when was the air . He was what and when was he here . He was the eighth secretary. He was a long serving secretary who made a lot of changes. And also created this maze, another simple. Smithson,from james this from the smithson cold of forms on the silver down here. Code orf arms. Themedallion represents james the cities of smithson, bath, england where we think he was born, paris, and washington, d. C. The symbolism almost incorporated in the novel but it was created for that very purpose. It fascinated me, all of the symbolism. And incorporated a piece of smithsonite. Academic carried in processions and when we and docked the new secretary indexed the new secretary induct the secretary. It is supposed to preside over the regents meeting. They never do that. Thats why i decided to relocate it to proximity of the regents room. Nothere is another case of to near as attractive, a much different case as that makes it look so much better. More glitzier. Around 1920. S a lot of novel takes place tone do. I wanted the reader to get in here. A lot of the novel takes place in the rotunda. Other offices are down here and we will see something with regard to the fire and we will show you where the fire started. , what was it called back then . It was 50 feet abide 200 feet. In january 1865, we would be standing in the picture gallery and in the report to us, some of the greatest portraits of the time, particularly of the american indians. Ad write up here, there was test and the right of there was a flute, cold, cold. They had a stove and connected it to the flue. What they did not realize was it was not a flue. The hot embers build up and eventually they exploded. When that exploded, they set of the whole thing gunfire. All of this burned. Andas a horrendous fire destroyed so much in the picture gallery and the auditorium, the apparatus room next door. Josephs office was in the north tower and it was all gone. The regents room, gone. For inry family lived the building and it was not harmed. It was so cold that day that the buckets of water all over the building for fires froze. It was ice. When they came with the pumper trucks to try to pump water, they couldnt. They have to watch it burn. It was her rent is. What it did was fundamentally altered the smithsonian. It was horrendous. It went into a different direction. Joseph wanted a collections and spend more money on science and go in that direction and got his wish after that. He also got rid of the library. Which isns area downtown which is downstairs was the library. He said we do not need book fair. Give them to the Books Library of congress. Was full of scientists and i had books. They kept accumulating all of these books for decades. They were piled up everywhere. Deliberately said lets create the smithsonian libraries Dillon Ripley said lets create the smithsonian libraries. They are the heart of the building where all of the information is in the library. That is where you go to find out istever you need and that why the lib