journalist who's on the trail of the story and what happens, it's only wants to pick up "change is good" where can they find it, louis rossetto? >> macon county changes go.com and order their own copy of it. and then if they wait around another couple of months, there will be a copy available on kindle, on amazon. >> host: louis rossetto is a cofounder of "wired" magazine. he was fired from "wired" magazine. he has written this book, "change is good." thanks for being with us. >> guest: super pleasure. thanks for having me. >> this year booktv marks are 23 year of bring you the countries top nonfiction authors and their latest books. find this every weekend on c-span2 or online at booktv.org.

>> i think we're going to get started now. good afternoon, everyone. thanks a lot for joining us. my name is eric and i'm pretty for national public radio. thank you so much for joining us for this wonderful panel discussion. i'm going to introduce our panelists and the wonderful work and then we'll talk about their books, the first a couple of ground rules. number one, look at those pesky cell phones that you have and make sure they are silenced because i know you think your ring tone is really cool but when we're in the middle of talk about stuff we don't want to hear drake or something, all right? secondly -- >> maybe. >> may be maybe. secondly, we're going to take questions from the audience probably in the last 20, 15 or 20 minutes of our time together. and as you will see there are

microphones, and so i will let you know when we get to the point and you can kind of line up and will just take as many questions as it can before the evening is over before the afternoon is over. so be thinking while we're talking a what you want to ask, and remember it's the question, not a speech. [applause] so let's start with the lovely lady to my left, erica armstrong dunbar, that charles and mary beard professor of history at rutgers university, and the former director of the program in african american history at the library company of philadelphia. and she has written "never caught: the washingtons' relentless pursuit of their runaway slave, ona judge" ." 2017 national book award finalist. erika, thank you for joining us.

>> yes. [applause] >> into my right catherine kerrison who is a scholar of early american and gender history who was recently became a full professor of history at villanova university, and she's written jefferson's daughters, -- "jefferson's daughters: three sisters, white and black, in a young america" ." thank you very much for joining us. [applause] >> so let's get right into it. i read both of these books, and as a black person did not know how to feel about our founders after i read about in owning slaves and the relationships with their slaves. so how am i supposed to feel about this? how am i supposed to negotiate how i feel about jefferson and washington after reading about how they were slave owners and

how hypocritical they were in some ways about this? what do you think? >> yeah, i think the discomfort that we feel reading about this sort of flawed nature of our founders is natural. it's normal. it is going up with these narratives that paint our founders any specific way with the specific light for multiple reasons. so when text like never caught jefferson's daughters come out these texts challenge us to rethink not simply our founders but this moment in which the nation was created. and so i would say, i wrote a book that wasn't necessarily about george washington. the book was about an enslaved woman named ona judge who happen to be owned by martha and george washington. and so it was really, i think we

just think about it as an attempt to reshape how we see the founding of the nation, founders included. >> now, your book, the some people are even disputed a connection between sally hemings and thomas jefferson, so as you work on the book did it change how you felt about jefferson or how you felt about the founders? >> there's still naysayers to the idea that jefferson has this relationship of quite long-standing with sally hemings that produced four children who survived into adulthood, but the preponderance of the evidence really makes that position sort of untenable, right? that, in fact, he did have this long-standing relationship. and like erica with her project on ona judge, i was much more

interest in harriet hemings but, of course, i think in my work on all three daughters there's a way which looking at jefferson as a father, we actually see him in a very different way and in a way he is an edited. he was usually very conscious of this self presentation for both his peers and for prosperity, but as a father we see him rather differently, and so i didn't see jefferson differently so much as i had before i started this project. i knew he was a slave owner, but to actually kind of see him in this relationship and how he dealt with the children of his

slave sally hemings, was really quite revealing, and that what i see ultimately is jefferson is there a human. jefferson in some ways very, very conventional. and that ultimately in seeing the humanity of our founders, i think that's actually kind of freeing and liberating. we don't sort of feel as though we have to live up to these howling idols -- powering idols but, in fact, we can take the best of what they have to offer, except that this is indeed part of the american story and so what does that mean for us today and that's what i try to do. >> so your book talks about how this woman that the washington owned escaped from them, went --

resisted their attempts to bring it back in the fold. what made you decide you wanted to write this book and how did you stumble on this? >> yeah, i was actually working on another book. this is what historians always do. we are in the archives and we reading through old newspapers and manuscripts, and we find something that intrigues us. i was finishing another book about how black women became free in the north, and i was working come in the archives, reading through 18th century newspapers trying to get a few for sort of everyday life in adelphia. and so i'm in the microfilm room, 13th in locus in philadelphia, the historical society, and i'm reading through the newspapers and up pops a runaway slave advertisement.

i pause, okay, this is sort of interesting, this is the end of the 18th century, 1796 slavery is almost sort of dead, gone into the depths of interesting some in his advertising. then became clear to me that this is not just sort of any advertisement, that this was an advertisement from the house of the president. and so i did the pause moment, white, 1796, six, that's george washington, okay. who is being advertised here? what is this about? what was so, one of the things that historians have relied upon with runaway slave advertisements is that it gives us some information, typically about people of whom we know very little. and so it said absconded from the household of the president of the united states, ona judge. and i thought okay wait, who is

ona? why did she runaway? we can't know the answer to to that, right? [laughing] so what happened to her? and it did was that last question, the what happened to her that sort of just called me and never really kind of let go and i thought i've got to figure out who this is it more specifically as an expert in african-american history,, specifically african american women's history, i found myself excited but also really angry and frustrated at that moment because i had never heard her name before. and i thought why don't i know this story? why have i not encountered her or her story in source material? thought that maybe i can find a way to weave this into the first book and i said no, i'm going to come back to this. i finished the first book and

moved on to really figure out all i could about ona. and that was really a nine year search. it took me nine years to research and write this book, in part because ona was a fugitive and one the one thing that fugs rely upon his anonymity, right? she didn't want to be found for the majority of her life, until the end. it's the end of her life where she does leave behind to back newspaper interviews. we do actually have her voice to her interviews. but really it was finding ona and then being committed to telling her story, but also understanding that ona's life, her story, gives us a sort of portal into the founding of the nation, right? we have lots of books, write

books about washington, jefferson, but i was more interested in telling the story about those who worked, toiled, who labored under the founding fathers, who built this nation. and so ona gives us that perfect portal to think about race, to think about gender, to think about labor, to think about the south and the north. her life allowed all of us to understand the sort of complex nature of the early republic. >> that's what's interesting to me about both your books, because you guys are talking about slaves and you are talking about women. you were talking about the two groups that historians probably ignored during that time. an audi put together a book we are where you trying to find out about these people who is sort of the official chroniclers of history didn't pay attention to or kind of marginalized?

>> as you had alluded earlier, for decades the story of thomas jefferson and sally hemings and their children had been suppressed. and historians, , to be perfecty honest, where very much how to that project. and so they speedy proud of -- >> of suppressing the story, indeed, yes. they ignored the story told by sally hemings son madison who gave a newspaper account in 1873, so almost 50 years after jefferson's death. they suppressed that story. they even attack madisons character as incapable of telling the truth. and this, these are historians in the 20th century who did

this. so it has been a project of the latter half of the 20th century and into our own to even get historians to really take seriously the question of slavery and enslavement of to even think about that experience from the slaves point of view. and then as many of you may know, in 1998 there was a dna test that definitively linked the youngest son of sally hemings, whose name was eston, to the jefferson male line. so that's not to say thomas, but it was, all the other evidence around this relationship, taken together with the dna as they

say, it's really no longer tenable to deny that relationship. so there was all of that work that had to be done before we even get to the question of women in slavery. that field is now quite rich, particularly in the last 20 years. what i wanted to do when i first started my book, i was initially drawn to it because martha, the elders of jefferson's three surviving daughters, lived into her 60s, had 11 surviving children, although developed a rather sizable archive of letters. i remember the first time i saw this, particularly at the university of virginia i thought gee, this got to be a book in there somewhere, , right? and then i thought if i'm going

to do a book on this i'm not going to ignore maria got his second daughter with his wife, and then it would be utterly dishonest of me to do a book called "jefferson's daughters" without talking about harriet. in a slightly different way than america did for her work on ona, harriet was a bit of a challenge to try to find, because very briefly, what we know about her, what happened to her also came from madisons account. and what he said was that harriet thought it to her interest to go to washington, d.c. to take on the role of a white woman, and by her dressing conduct as such. he believed that she never revealed her identity as harriet

hemings of monticello. in fact, she married a white man of good standing in washington city, madison said, and raised a family of children. so a fugitive sort of in -- [inaudible] >> a fugitive history, , that'sa lovely way to put it. jefferson never gave her, jefferson never actually care for freedom papers but he did pay for stagecoach fair to philadelphia and he did give her $50 for her expenses. clearly he facilitated her departure, but she was still a slave at law until the 13th amendment was passed in 1865. that was what it took to formally free her. and so protecting her identity

was what she needed to do to pass as a freeborn white person, which again is somewhat of a different strategy than ona judge did and indie book me then to really discuss this whole phenomenon of passing both in the 19th century during the course of slavery and even today one researcher estimate as much as 30,000 people a year crossed the colorblind from black to white. >> wow. wow. you know, i'm interested in this idea of the modern things we struggle with that are legacies from slavery. i've always felt sort of this idea, and had a black criminality, for example, came out of the need to find a reason

to oppress black people and forced them into free labor. when you look at the work you have done about that time about what ona went through, what are the modern legacies of what youe went through in the system of slavery that she had to find a way to survive? >> that's a beautiful question, because i think someone who teaches u.s. history, and i focus on the 18th and 19th century, historians are really uncomfortable when people ask us to think about connecting the past with the present, or the future but i will bring it up anyway in this question. i'll do it, thank you for letting me. i do think we can see these direct connections between the history of enslavement, the creation of race with modern-day social justice issues, women

look at the industrial complex clearly. i do think also ona's story helps as to think about not simply the connections between slavery and the lack of any inequality thereafter, but i think ona's story is would also a coming of age story that helps us think about the importance of family, that helps us think about what one must do in very dire situations, the choices that they have to make. we also know that ona as an enslaved person was forbidden from learning to read or write your we know that at the end of her life she learns to read. i'm not certain that she ever learned to write, but clearly there are these issues about literacy, about education. and i think education in particular is one of these

themes that we can connect between the 18th -- 17th through 19th century, and the 20th and 21st 21st century. when we think about the decks were stacked for the ground was uneven, people who were legally forbidden to read and write. and affidavit education at this moment and the students and children in particular who have the least opportunity. we see some connections, racially at least, right? and do think that for the 21st century that the issue of education is going to be one of the most important civil rights issues, right, of this century. editor think it's important for historians like us to write about these women, these men, but also to make certain that readers like yourselves, adult readers, engaged readers are

invested but also children, you know? and it's our job really i think to make certain that those ideas are translated, are legible for young children, not just adult. it's too late to wait until college, right? or to wait into 18, 19, 20 years old to learn about these very sort of fundamental issues that we can connect to the founding of the nation, to the present. >> so the question i had when i came to your book, the main question i had and the question i i always have one heard about sally hemings was, what was that like? like, what was that relationship like between these two people? like you said there's not a lot of information out there. it's hard to figure what is going on. what we able to find out about what it was like? >> i think actually i have to hear, talk very briefly about a

wonderful scholars work, annette gordon-reed who wrote a pulitzer prize-winning book called the hemings is of monticello. [applause] >> and their she takes on this question sort of probing very much what historians of enslave women need to do, which is to probe the silences, right? because we don't know what we do know, what we can be sure of was this incredible power dynamic and in balance between the two people, thomas jefferson the slaveholder and sally hemings who, at age 16 in paris where she knows all just to do is go to a french court and she will

be freed, has a decision to make about whether she's going to we cross the atlantic to go back to a life of slavery in virginia or not. >> a time when crossing the atlantic was not the safest thing to do. >> no. no. they're all sorts of risks,, right? all kinds of risks. she's taken her life in her hands at that moment. the ship company jefferson back or not? in so many different ways, right? however, having stated that, which is the obvious, it's also important i think to consider sally hemings the person. a very important point i think gordon-reed made is that this 16-year-old in paris did judge correctly that thomas jefferson,

a man the years her senior, at least, yes, that he would keep his promise that the she came back to virginia with him he would free any children that they had together. and for everything we can say about jefferson and slavery, and i'm one of many voices who have said a lot, we do have to say that he kept that promise that he made. and it isn't a court in the united states that would have forced him to do so. so she was correct in that judgment. she was the person who also had a home in virginia, who had a family in virginia, who loved that view from monticello of the blue ridge mountains, as much as any. the other thing that i do in my book declassify to think about

harry it's childhood is to take sally hemings, to think about her as a person, as a mother, right? how did you raise his children, trusting them -- trusting and jefferson's promised and educating them so that they knew that unlike every other enslaved person on this plantation, when they turn 21 they were going to be free. and how did she do that? and let's think that jefferson's that the old educator on that mountain. sally hemings was as well and she clearly prepared her daughter beautifully for the life she was going to live as a freeborn white women, the wife of a white man of middle stand erased her own children.

>> can i just add, there's something that you said that it think is really important, and it's about the archives. and for a historian who writes based upon what we find in the archives, it's very frustrating if you are someone who focuses on women or the focus of people of african descent, you know, prior to the 20th century. the archives are kind of violent spaces for black women in particular because we are not there. we are ignored. our names are often not mentioned, and so it becomes a different kind of project when you are attempting to re-create and share the lies of enslave women in particular, why take so long to write a book, too, if you're doing that. but it do think it's one of the things that led me in writing this book about ona to make

certain that this was a readable book, a book for a general audience but also one that allowed me as an expert in african american women's history to speculate, right? to speculate, informed speculation and to make certain that the reader always knows when they do not necessarily have a document that says ona made round of bread this morning for breakfast. i don't have that document. but what i do have a recipes from the 19th century of brown bread, and that we know the majority of other enslaved women made that bread so it didn't make me feel uncomfortable to say ona probably made brown bread for breakfast, and the narrative in the book. but i do think that when we are writing history, at least for me, it was a risk. we are trained methodologically to only stick to the sources,

paper sources typically. that's almost impossible to do if you're writing the stories, the histories of people who were enslaved, who were murdered, who were traumatized and whose names were not counted. >> that's the thing that struck me about your book. i remember reading passages we say ona must've done this, or to my default that. i could tell you were -- i don't do so know for sure but the thing that's interesting to me is sleighs were not allowed to learn to read or write, and there's a real practical reason for that, right? from being able to make it with each other. what also did was it robs us of their history. because a lot of your book newsletters, right? that all these people wrote to each other and your people to read these letters and find out how they felt about the circumstances, what is like to live in that time, who died in when and at what. and we don't have any of that

stuff for sleighs because of not able to write any of that stuff down and leave it for us and that's a cost of slavery that i think we can't appreciate until read the book that you guys wrote. >> i do think the oral tradition that's been passed down is amazing, and that for that reason we can never dismiss the records that we do have, the oral transcription of interview somewhat happy from those who are members of slavery or perhaps had a parent or grandparent who was enslaved, and to think where to look at that source material in similar ways. ..

it's my job to look at all the stuff that's not there. >> we've got 15 minutes left already? before you do that, we're going to start taking questions from you guys next if you would line up at these microphones if you have a question and remember, no speeches . i will you off . >> i'll say very quickly, just building on what erica was talking about, it's this question of horses and the ways in which documents which is to say the written record has always sort of taken priority among historians over the oral record, the oral tradition but two things

i would say about that, first of all, let's remember that is essentially the white color. and we need to be really careful about that, so for example when jefferson's granddaughter and grandson fingers their cousins for the paternity of jefferson's children, we need to be very careful about using that and the other thing is that some readers have said to me that i get a little frustrated with all those maybes and probably is and would have us , might have but what i say that is again, in this effort to speak into the silences, what is so important is to ask the questions. as you did, what would it have been like. i don't know, i don't have his words but i have all this other information.

all this context that then allows me to think about that and it's thinking about that that is so important to go forward. >> before we take questions, one more thing. there's lots of points that i got upset, your books are wonderful things thesepeople did . the washingtons realized when they're in philly that they're there for six months, can claim their freedom so they decide surreptitiously to come up with this plan to rotate the slaves in and out of west virginia so that they never run out the clock on their freedom . >> is a moment where george, what are you doing? what is this about? i'm reading george washington's letters and he saying yes, there's a law in

pennsylvania was witnessed that said if you're a nonresident and you brought enslave people with you to: yeah, they can only remain for six months and they could be set free. they sent to the secretary saying we are going to rotate slaves . and not tell anyone. for good reason. every six months they would be rotated back to virginia or if that was too inconvenient, a quick trip to new jersey, to trenton would restart the clock and that is a moment where as a scholar you are using the documents but you're like man, come on. >> and in your case, the idea that jefferson on the one hand talk about refraining from using the web. but on the other hand is giving away slaves as it gets and breaking up families and saying you got married, at

least three people. >> jefferson is on the one hand, he will offer inducements to his enslaved population. he will provide a bed and a half as a wedding gift if his slaves would find spouses and remember of course these aren't marriages recognized by law. these exist strictly at the sufferings of the master. so on the one hand, he will encourage his enslaved population to find marriage within his own population of enslaved people, but then think nothing of separating children out as wedding gifts . that's when you really realize the enormous goal between the past and present.

>> give us your name and your questions my question goes to how we identify people in the past and i noticed that the front of this conversation, people use the word slave so i want a discussion on how we use identifiers and how we convert humanity. >> very perceptive, she has a part in the beginning of the book where we talk about using enslaved as an adjective rather than slave as a noun which is important. >> in the book i explained that when in teaching, when in talking, i typically use the phrase enslaved because it reminds us that this is an action that was taken and placed on the shoulders of enslaved africans. this was not something that we should think about in terms of identity. and that by using this term enslaved versus slave, it

reminds the reader of exactly this. however, i explained also that i sort of moved back and forth between the term enslaved and slave just for narrative reasons. we use enslaved enslaved over again and when you're reading, becomes a little heavy but you're right, i'm glad i asked this question and if you asked into any history class at this moment, we get it. the term enslaved is the term that we use to describe it. >> i want to move quickly. >> i'd like to address this to professor dunbar. i read your book and enjoyed it. you really eliminated a hidden chapter in our early history and i'd like to make an observation and get your response to it. much of the book deals with the saga of an owner living

in new hampshire in george washington, trying to recapture her and on the other hand you have a person who is triply disenfranchised as an enslaved woman. on the other hand you have by far the most powerful and prestigious person in the country and yet in the end, on a whim because she's never brought back from new hampshire. >> never caught. >> 'sfor the alert. >> i found that rather remarkable and somewhat inspiring, actually and i like your response to that. >> thank you for that and i do think that aside from -- yes, it's called never caught so you know what happens at the end but still by the book . it's worth it. i do think that it's a struggle between the most

powerful, well-known founding father and this enslaved woman who he could never see to capture and bring back into his possession, although legally he had every right to do so. he signed the slave act of 1793 to make sure he could cross datelines and because of the l from the free black community in portsmouth, of white sympathetic to men and women who were uncomfortable with human bondage, he is able to remain detached from this sort of powerful man. and i do think it's a story about perseverance and that's not just for her but when we think about the experiences of the enslaved, the mere fact that we still exist as black people is amazing. it was survival. it was a story of survival and i think owner helped us to remember that. and i think sort of at a

moment in time where we are thinking quite a bit about presidential power, about race, but i think owner's story helps us sort of unpack all of that and remain optimistic. >>. >> you mentioned earlier about how we are considering our founding fathers differently and in relation to the confederate memorials coming down, some people have taken the extreme stand that we ought to be removing memorials to the founding fathers as they were slaveholders and that sort of thing, do either of you have a strong feeling from that endpoint? >> i think the difference i think were the moment anyway is in the conversation around the statues so for example, they are as this panel shows, there are lots of conversations going on about the founders and slavery. there is very little that i'm

seeing in the public discourse anyway about the jim crow context of the erection of the confederate statues. and to me, that is a significant difference which is to say, we are not getting really the history of why those monuments to confederate generals and etc. were put up when they were directed and why. >> and where. >> and aware, so i do think if we had a bit more context that was visible and a plaque in front of those monuments, that talk about the daughters of the confederacy who arrested these things, as were also arresting this jim crow legal system, that maybe

that would be a little bit different but that isn't the conversation going on . >> talk to me about amonument to george washington is not necessarily a monumentfor slavery but a monument to the general, it's a monument to somebody who fought for slavery . >> and for treason . >> and they were directed at a time when jim crow laws were trying to hold back people of color and they were erected in people aware of people of color would have to face them. >> and i do think it's important for us to also recognize that there's space for more monuments . it's not simply about staring down monuments but it's about building. >> are you advocating an owner monument? what are youdoing ? >> okay, good. >> i want to thank the panel

and it's a discussion on enslaved women and i'd like to know,is there a story about the white women , the white wives. has that story been told or is that the subject of a couple of books? >> the wife of jefferson and how did they feel about the relationships that their husbands had with the women? what was going on in their minds ? can you enlighten us with that? >> there has been some work written about justices jefferson's wife. what in terms of your question about sort of the relationship or what white women kind of thought about the relationships that their men, husbands, fathers, brothers and there is in southern society a huge cone

of silence about that. and what i've -- specifically, one thing for example that i found is there's sort of these tiny little mentions long after jefferson's daughter dies where her son tells someone who's doing a jefferson biography that really, i'm paraphrasing is that if she has had her druthers, this is jefferson's daughter, sally hemmings would have been moved off the mountainlong before . and jefferson removed refused to remove her. and mathers daughter ellen talks with real disdain and condescension that reverberates across the centuries about the yellow children of monticello.

so in all of those and even in sort of the stories that theytell, he white women tell . about where all the light-skinned children came from or this, they never even mentioned sally hemmings children by name. not once. they don't even honor their humanity with a name. >> one thing you learn from reading both books and particularly from reading cathy's book is there's a lot about the lives of the women because there's a lot about how they wrote to each other and how they talked about how they were feeling so you do get a sense of what it's like to be a live, not necessarily jefferson's wife because she dies so quickly in the story but there is that area but we're making the point that the slaves, you don't get any of that because they won't allow them to moralize their

experiences. >> my name is mimi and i'm a recent graduate of the university of virginia and so i've lived in charlottesville the last four years and seen a lot of things changing and moving. >> and i've been really pardoned by it. the work of my friends and students but i've triedto hold the administration accountable . and i was just wondering what you as professors would say to students and alumni can do to keep that conversation and accountability moving forward because we don't want that to go away at all and there's still so much to be reckoned with . i just wanted youradvice on that . >> that's a great question, thank you for that. i mean, if i may, i'll jump in and say i think students should do what they are doing

, keep doing what they are doing which is don't be quiet. that's the great thing about being a college student, right? speak your mind and stand behind those words too. i do think you're seeing groups across the country doing exactly that whether it's at chapel hill, at university of north carolina, whether it's at antiracist protests in charlottesville, that in the past we've seen movements, really being supported and moved forward by students. so students continue to hold, administrations accountable for what the student body has to endure every day, whether it's walking into a building named after a slaveholder. or laying your head in a dorm every night in a building named after those who traded and sold enslaved people, we have to continue as professors and students to remind folks that we have to rethink this and it's up to

us to rename it. >> and what i would tell you quickly is continue to press courses that deal with this history, because as you can see, there's still a lot of thehistory to be written . and urge college students particularly to vote. right? to address -- to reject the display of that we saw last year. as unacceptable in a civil society. >> on a better note to end our time, i've been told we

are out oftime so apologies to those of you who wanted to ask questions that didn't get to ask one. once more, round of applause for erica dunbar , catherine kerrison. they will be signing books in about an hour down in the bookstore space. my name is eric and i'm with npr, thank you for joining us . >> the c-span bus is traveling across the country on our 50 capitals tour, visiting all 50 state capitals. the bus left the mainland and traveled to juneau alaska and honolulu all hawaii. join us as we feature our 50th bus stop in des moines iowa on the washington journal with our guest iowa senate president charles schneider.