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Speaker 1: And I sat down and read it, and I realized

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Speaker 1: I could see why it was so popular, but I

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Speaker 1: could also see the traces of the real author.

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Speaker 2: On this episode, we're going to learn about one of

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Speaker 2: the greatest American literary cons of all time, or was

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Speaker 2: it a con at all? The good news is that

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Speaker 2: at the Navigation Helm, we'll have author and Southern historian

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Speaker 2: doctor Dan T. Carter, Professor Emeritus at the University of

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Speaker 2: South Carolina, and New York Times bestselling author and crow

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Speaker 2: call extraordinaire Steve Runella of Meat Eater. These guys are

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Speaker 2: going to talk to us about a book called The

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Speaker 2: Education of Littletree and the wild life of its author.

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Speaker 2: There aren't any better guests on Planet Earth to tell

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Speaker 2: us the story of a double life lies in racism

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Speaker 2: that produced a brilliant piece of literature so rooted in

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Speaker 2: American wilderness and values it'll make you want to bard

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Speaker 2: owt hoot and kiss your mama after the trill.

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Speaker 3: I really doubt you're gonna want.

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Speaker 2: To miss this one. And Hey, I want to let

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Speaker 2: you know that my friend Brent Reeves has a new

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Speaker 2: podcast coming out on this feed starting on April twenty first,

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Speaker 2: called This Country life. It's incredibly fun and we're thrilled

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Speaker 2: to bring it to you on this bear Grease feed.

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Speaker 2: My name is Klay Nukem, and this is the bear

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Speaker 2: Grease podcast where we'll explore things forgotten but relevant, search

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Speaker 2: for insight and unlikely places, and where we'll tell the

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Speaker 2: story of Americans who live their lives close to the land.

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Speaker 2: Presented by FHF Gear, American made purpose built hunting and

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Speaker 2: fishing gear as designed to be as rugged as the place.

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Speaker 2: As we explore, Grandpa stopped and pointed by the side

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Speaker 2: of the trail. There she is, Turkey run see. I

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Speaker 2: dropped to my hands and knees and saw the tracks

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Speaker 2: little stick like impressions coming out of a center hub. Now,

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Speaker 2: Grandpa said, we'll fix the trap, and he moved off

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Speaker 2: the trail until he found a stump hole. We cleaned

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Speaker 2: it out, first the leaves, and then Grandpa pulled out

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Speaker 2: his long knife and cut into the spongy ground and

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Speaker 2: we scooped up the dirt, scattering it among the leaves.

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Speaker 2: When the hole was deep so that I couldn't see

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Speaker 2: over the rim, Grandpa pulled me out and we dragged

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Speaker 2: branches to cover it and over these spread armfuls of leaves.

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Speaker 2: Then with his long knife, Grandpa dug a trail sloping

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Speaker 2: down downward into the hole and back toward the Turkey run.

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Speaker 2: He took the grains of red Indian corn from his

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Speaker 2: pocket and scattered them down the trail and threw a

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Speaker 2: handful into the hole. Now we will go, he said,

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Speaker 2: and we set off again up the high trail. I

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Speaker 2: spewed from the earth like frosting, crackling under our feet.

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Speaker 2: The mountain opposite us moved closer as the hollow far

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Speaker 2: below became a narrow slit, showing the spring branch like

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Speaker 2: the edge of a steel knife sunk in the bottom

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Speaker 2: of its cleavage. We set down in the leaves off

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Speaker 2: the trail just as the first sun touched the top

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Speaker 2: of the mountain across the hollow. From his pocket, Grandpa

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Speaker 2: pulled out a sour biscuit and deer meat for me,

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Speaker 2: and we watched the mountain while we ate. The sun

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Speaker 2: hit the top like an explosion, sending showers of glitter

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Speaker 2: and sparkle.

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Speaker 3: Into the air.

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Speaker 2: The sparkling of the icy trees hurt my eyes to

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Speaker 2: look at it, and it moved down the mountain like

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Speaker 2: a wave. As the sun backed the night shadow down

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Speaker 2: and down, a crow sent three hard calls through the air,

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Speaker 2: warning we were there. And now the mountain popped and

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Speaker 2: gave breathing sighs that sent little puffs of steam into

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Speaker 2: the air. She pinged and murmured as the sun released

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Speaker 2: the trees from their death armor of ice. Grandpaul watched

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Speaker 2: same as me, and listened as the sounds grew with

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Speaker 2: the morning wind that set up a low whistle in

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Speaker 2: the trees. She's coming alive, he said, soft and low,

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Speaker 2: without taking his eyes from the mountain. Yes, sir, I said,

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Speaker 2: She's coming alive. And I knew right there that me

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Speaker 2: and Grandpa had an understanding that most folks didn't. Your

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Speaker 2: ears and the engine of your imagination have just partook

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Speaker 2: of the writings of Forest Carter. In the opening chapter

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Speaker 2: of his book called The Education of Little Tree, published

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Speaker 2: in nineteen seventy six, Carter identified himself to the world

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Speaker 2: as a Cherokee Indian raised in a cabin with his

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Speaker 2: grandparents in East Tennessee. This is the story he told

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Speaker 2: to Barbara Walters in nineteen seventy five on The Today Show.

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Speaker 2: It would be my guess that you've probably never heard

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Speaker 2: of this book, even though it became a New York

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Speaker 2: Times bestseller in nineteen ninety one, selling over one million copies,

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Speaker 2: and in the heyday of Oprah Winfrey's Book Club in

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Speaker 2: the late nineteen nineties, it made her list, staying there

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Speaker 2: until two thousand and seven, when she removed it.

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Speaker 3: And it isn't surprising because.

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Speaker 2: It's incredibly good, with descriptive prose, intriguing plot themes, and

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Speaker 2: brilliant displays of the beautiful and functional connection the protagonists

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Speaker 2: have to the natural world. That's why I was originally

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Speaker 2: interested in it. It's got some turkey trapping, fox hunting

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Speaker 2: with hounds, corn and watermelon planting, mules, moonshining, and some

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Speaker 2: insight on management. It even takes some big swings at

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Speaker 2: the establishment. It has a where the red fern grows

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Speaker 2: feel with a young orphaned boy learning moral and practical

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Speaker 2: lessons from his Cherokee grandfather in the Great Depression era

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Speaker 2: of the nineteen thirties. A big delivery of the book, however,

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Speaker 2: is a deep empathy for Native Americans and a display

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Speaker 2: of their wisdom and how they got a raw deal.

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Speaker 2: Remember that if something hadn't happened to this book. It

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Speaker 2: would have been an American classic like the Adventures of

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Speaker 2: Huckleberry Finn or Charlotte's Webb. But something did happen, and

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Speaker 2: I've got to fess up. You've already been misled. Forest

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Speaker 2: Carter wasn't a Cherokee Indian at all, and his name

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Speaker 2: wasn't even Forest Carter.

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Speaker 3: Here's my friend, Steve Ranella. He knows this book.

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Speaker 2: Steve, When is the first time that you read The

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Speaker 2: Education of Littletree?

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Speaker 4: When you and I first started talking about this book

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Speaker 4: a while back, it forced me to try to recollect

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Speaker 4: how I became familiar with it. I know now, I

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Speaker 4: absolutely I became familiar with it when I was in college.

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Speaker 4: I was in a class called the Literature of Political

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Speaker 4: Rhetoric by taught by a guy named doctor Gillis, and

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Speaker 4: he gave us that book to read. In addition to

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Speaker 4: things like some of the works of Martin Luther King Junior,

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Speaker 4: writings of the Unibomber, writings of Camille Paglia, just wild

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Speaker 4: stuff all over the place, we read works from people

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Speaker 4: who had like an axe to grind, okay, and you

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Speaker 4: threw that in the.

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Speaker 3: Mix, people with an acts to grind.

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Speaker 2: I really wish We could have done this different, and

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Speaker 2: you could have read this book before you know what

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Speaker 2: you're about to know. But I wasn't afforded this privilege either.

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Speaker 2: I read the book after I learned that Forrest Carter

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Speaker 2: wasn't Forrest Carter at all, but rather his name was

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Speaker 2: Asa Earl Carter. I'd be really impressed if you knew

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Speaker 2: that name from American Southern history, and you will. Doctor

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Speaker 2: Dan T. Carter, who is no relation to Asa Carter,

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Speaker 2: is a University of South Carolina professor emeritus and renowned

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Speaker 2: Southern historian and acclaimed author. He wrote a biography of

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Speaker 2: the Alabama governor George Wallace, who became famous for opposing desegregation.

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Speaker 2: Most recently, doctor Carter wrote a book called Unmasking the Clansman,

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Speaker 2: just published in April of twenty twenty three. More on

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Speaker 2: that in a minute, though, I wanted to ask doctor

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Speaker 2: Carter about the Education of Little Tree's unusual rise to

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Speaker 2: national fame after being published in nineteen seventy six but

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Speaker 2: not becoming a New York Times bestseller until nineteen ninety one.

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Speaker 2: This is an extremely rare thing. Here's doctor Carter.

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Speaker 1: That book was reissued in nineteen eighty eight, and then

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Speaker 1: it just by word of mouth. It had no advertising.

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Speaker 1: It was published by a University of New Mexico press.

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Speaker 1: It just kept picking up, picking up more and more

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Speaker 1: people reading it, and by the summer of nineteen ninety

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Speaker 1: one it had climbed on to the New York Times

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Speaker 1: bestseller list. Then I did become interested in it. And

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Speaker 1: as as it continued, I realized I'd never read the book,

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Speaker 1: and I knew about it, and I sat down and

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Speaker 1: read it, and I saw on one level why people

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Speaker 1: loved it so much. I think we love books about

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Speaker 1: coming of age. And as one agent said who represented Carter,

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Speaker 1: at one time, Indians were hot. By the nineteen eighties

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Speaker 1: and nineteen nineties, people were interested in Native Americans, and

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Speaker 1: particularly at a time when you're trying to develop broader

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Speaker 1: ranges of books for adolescents and young people, and the

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Speaker 1: education story seemed to fit right within this. You've got

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Speaker 1: a story about a young Native American growing up in

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Speaker 1: the mountains of East Tennessee, and it's an appealing story,

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Speaker 1: and it seems to have a kind of moral core

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Speaker 1: to it, because obviously he's learning moral lessons from his

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Speaker 1: Cherokee grandfather. And it's the kind of moral lessons that

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Speaker 1: you like to believe you'd teach your children or grandchildren.

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Speaker 1: But it's also embedded in what Americans were coming to,

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Speaker 1: if not revere, at least respect a lot more. And

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Speaker 1: that was the Native American frame of cosmic reference and morality.

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Speaker 1: And so it was just a winner all the way around.

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Speaker 1: And I realized as I read it carefully, I could

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Speaker 1: see why it was so popular, But I could also

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Speaker 1: see the traces of the real.

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Speaker 2: Author, traces of the real author. In storytelling, the listener

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Speaker 2: you have to be handled with great care, like a

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Speaker 2: little baby ducklin trying to jump out of your hands

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Speaker 2: while you're carrying it to the pond. The listener will

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Speaker 2: try to jump out of your hands if you don't

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Speaker 2: tell him the hook at just the right moment. They've

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Speaker 2: got to be intrigued enough by the unknown to keep

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Speaker 2: listening but not get bored. So get ready for the hook,

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Speaker 2: the down load, the dirty scoop, And here it is.

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Speaker 2: The author said his name was Forrest Carter, that he

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Speaker 2: was a Cherokee Indian, and that his story was semi

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Speaker 2: autobiographical of his upbringing Tennessee. But his real name was

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Speaker 2: Asa Carter. We know that he wasn't a Cherokee, we

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Speaker 2: know that he wasn't raised by his Cherokee grandfather. We

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Speaker 2: know that, But he was actually from Anniston, Alabama, and

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Speaker 2: he was a leader in his own strict sect of

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Speaker 2: the klu Klux Klan. He was a vehement segregationist and

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Speaker 2: an ardent prophet of the white supremacy movement, and his

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Speaker 2: message was carried by his successful print publication he founded

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Speaker 2: and his radio broadcast. Doctor Carter's book, Unmasking the Klansman

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Speaker 2: is the one and only biography on Asa Carter. Asa

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Speaker 2: Carter was the Klansman, and Doctor Carter, of no relation

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Speaker 2: to A. SA Carter, is undoubtedly the nation's expert on A.

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Speaker 3: SA Carter. The book is fascinating.

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Speaker 2: I wish I could have thrown all this information on

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Speaker 2: you at the end after we've learned about the education

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Speaker 2: of Littletree, because it's an amazing book, and it won't

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Speaker 2: make a lick of sense when you understand who this

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Speaker 2: man was. And as we understand what the book's about,

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Speaker 2: we're trying to understand how this dude wrote this book.

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Speaker 2: It just doesn't add up. And I haven't even told

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Speaker 2: you the wildest part. It involves a man by the

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Speaker 2: name of George Wallace, who, on January fourteenth, nineteen sixty three,

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Speaker 2: gave his inaugural speech on the steps of the state

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Speaker 2: capital of Alabama after being elected governor. Wallace would become

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Speaker 2: the face of opposition to the civil rights movement when

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Speaker 2: he delivered his infamous Segregation Forever speech in the name.

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Speaker 3: Of the greatest people that have ever tried this earth, I.

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Speaker 2: Draw the line in the dust and passed the gauntlet

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Speaker 2: before the feet of Tierney, and I say segregation now,

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Speaker 2: segregation tomorrow, and segregation forever. Wallace's words segregation now, segregation tomorrow,

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Speaker 2: and segregation forever, would be an unforgetable moment in American history,

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Speaker 2: branding him is the face of racism. However, these weren't

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Speaker 2: his words. He had secretly hired Asa Carter to write

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Speaker 2: this speech. Those are Ace's words. How could this man

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Speaker 2: have written a book so brilliantly empathetic and authentic that

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Speaker 2: he fooled the world? And I can tell you We're

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Speaker 2: gonna have to guess. Because Asa Carter died unexpectedly and

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Speaker 2: tragically in nineteen seventy nine at the age of fifty

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Speaker 2: four years old. There is just drama stacked on top

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Speaker 2: of drama with this story and with this guy. And

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Speaker 2: I want to say up front that I am uninterested

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Speaker 2: in villainizing Asa Carter. He didn't need any help with that.

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Speaker 2: And I'd like to say that forty three years after

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Speaker 2: this man's death, we should not be affected or damaged

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Speaker 2: by the things he said or believed. However, we can

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Speaker 2: learn something about the extremes of human nature from his life.

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Speaker 2: Were in pursuit of uncovering the true identity of Asa

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Speaker 2: Carter and decide if he was a.

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Speaker 3: Changed man when he died or a con man.

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Speaker 2: Here's more from doctor Carter on how he learned about

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Speaker 2: the double life of Asa Carter. Your original interest in

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Speaker 2: Asa Carter was you were doing a biography on George Wallace, right,

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Speaker 2: and then you went to meet Seymour Trammel, who was

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Speaker 2: George Wallace's right hand man.

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Speaker 3: Right hand man.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, tell me about meeting him, but then him telling

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Speaker 2: you about about the book, and.

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Speaker 1: Well, of all the people, and I interviewed about forty

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Speaker 1: people for the bick But this I started this in

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Speaker 1: the late eighties, so there were still a lot of

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Speaker 1: these people around, manyrem long now.

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Speaker 5: Of all the people I.

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Speaker 1: Interviewed, by far the most interesting and insightful was Seymour Trammel.

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Speaker 1: He was a country boy from South Alabama who became

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Speaker 1: Wallace as a finance commissioner in his right hand man.

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Speaker 1: As smart as he was, really smart, got in trouble,

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Speaker 1: ended up in prison, and by the time I knew him,

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Speaker 1: he was a different person. He just prison had changed him.

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Speaker 1: He had had trouble drinking, he'd stopped all that, and

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Speaker 1: he was introspective in a way that he never was

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Speaker 1: as a young man, you know, looking back on his life.

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Speaker 1: He could see all the mistakes he had made and

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Speaker 1: all the things he said, I've done wrong, you know.

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Speaker 1: But he was the one that gave me insight when

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Speaker 1: I started talking to him.

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Speaker 5: One day.

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Speaker 1: We had several long conversations and I was talking to

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Speaker 1: him and I said something about this guy. He's a carter,

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Speaker 1: I said, I keep running into him. I said, was

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Speaker 1: he really George Wallace's speech writer for that famous segregation

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Speaker 1: Today's aiation? And he began laughing. He said, of course

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Speaker 1: he was. He said anything that was he said George

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Speaker 1: was good. But he said the best stuff was always

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Speaker 1: from Asa, you know. He said, you know he was

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Speaker 1: a real writer. And I knew that Asa had Carter,

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Speaker 1: who was a white supremacist and a radio announcer, had

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Speaker 1: written a bunch of radio programs in the fifties, published

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Speaker 1: a very slick magazine called The Southernert Southern, And he said,

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Speaker 1: you know, he wrote novels. He one of them was

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Speaker 1: made into a movie. I just thought, I think, Seymour,

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Speaker 1: he's not that old, but clearly his mind is slipping

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Speaker 1: away here. And because I didn't know about the Double Life,

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Speaker 1: you know, all I knew was Asa Carter had written

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Speaker 1: this and he was a writer. So that was in

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Speaker 1: nineteen ninety, I think it was. And it wasn't more

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Speaker 1: than about six months later that my son and I

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Speaker 1: were watching a film called The Outlaw Josie Wales by

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Speaker 1: Clint Eastwood, sort of his breakthrough film. And I don't

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Speaker 1: know why. I came to the end of it it

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Speaker 1: said based on the book by Forrest Carter, and I

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Speaker 1: thought Forrest Carter. Didn't think about it. And the next

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Speaker 1: morning I woke up and I said, Forrest Carter, Asa

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Speaker 1: Carter worshiped Nathan Bedford, Forrest General Nathan, the Confederate General Nathan,

284
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Speaker 1: So I started. It didn't turn out to be hard

285
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Speaker 1: at all. It was like something that was in plain sight. There.

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Speaker 1: All you had to do was go back to the

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Speaker 1: original publication of the book, which was called Gone to

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Speaker 1: Texas but became The Outlaw jose Wells, and it had

289
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Speaker 1: the copyright. I went to the copyright thing in Washington

290
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Speaker 1: and there was his address, Asa Carter's address in Alabama,

291
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Speaker 1: the exact same address. He'll be ten Bears.

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Speaker 5: I am ten Bears.

293
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Speaker 1: I'm Josie Wales.

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Speaker 5: I have heard you're the great writer.

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Speaker 1: You would not make peace with the Bluecoats.

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Speaker 5: You may go in peace. I reckon that.

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Speaker 3: Got nowhere to go.

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Speaker 4: Then you will die.

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Speaker 1: I came here to die with you.

300
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Speaker 5: I live, will you.

301
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Speaker 1: It's so hard for men like you and me.

302
00:19:33,080 --> 00:19:35,480
Speaker 2: It's living. It's hard, and all you've ever cared about

303
00:19:35,520 --> 00:19:40,320
Speaker 2: it's been butchered and raped. Asa Carter didn't just write

304
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Speaker 2: The Education of Little Tree. He wrote a book originally

305
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Speaker 2: called Gone to Texas, and Clint Eastwood turned it into

306
00:19:46,960 --> 00:19:51,520
Speaker 2: his breakout movie, The Outlaw Josee Wales. In this scene,

307
00:19:51,800 --> 00:19:56,080
Speaker 2: the Comanche ten Bears respects Josie Wales because he didn't

308
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Speaker 2: give in to the Union Army in the Civil War.

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Speaker 2: This is a good movie and it's hard not to

310
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Speaker 2: love the protagonist, Josie Wells, the Confederate soldier played by

311
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Speaker 2: Clint Eastwood. Asa was a prolific novelist. Here's more from

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Speaker 2: doctor Carter.

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Speaker 1: And then I began looking in this forest. Carter, operating

314
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Speaker 1: out of Applene, Texas, had written four books, The Outlaw

315
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Speaker 1: of Josie Wells, a Vengeance, Trail of Josie Wells, and

316
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Speaker 1: a book called A Watch Far Mail on the Mountain,

317
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Speaker 1: which is a fictional biography of Geronimo.

318
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Speaker 5: It's a really good book.

319
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Speaker 1: I mean, I think it's the best book he ever wrote,

320
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Speaker 1: and it's pretty accurate, but it's also is just powerfully written.

321
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Speaker 1: In fact, one of the major writers and reviewed it

322
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Speaker 1: in New York Times said this is the best book

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Speaker 1: ever written by a Native American.

324
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Speaker 2: And then they believed Forrest Carter was.

325
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Speaker 1: From from East Tennessee who had spent years as a

326
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Speaker 1: cowboy out in the way, moved out west and was

327
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Speaker 1: a cowboy out there, a Cherokee cowboy.

328
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Speaker 2: So if Seymour trammell knew this, yes, who would have

329
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Speaker 2: known this?

330
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Speaker 3: Lots of people, So all the people in Alabama.

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Speaker 1: Not all but his close friends knew.

332
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Speaker 2: Who knew that Asa Carter was Forest Carter? Yeah, yeah,

333
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Speaker 2: And I guess there wasn't they were They just kind

334
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Speaker 2: of why wouldn't they have brought that up?

335
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Speaker 3: Or was it just they thought it was his pen name.

336
00:21:30,040 --> 00:21:31,920
Speaker 2: They just didn't see any relevance to it.

337
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Speaker 1: A whole range of things. Sometimes some of them said, well,

338
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Speaker 1: you know, he'd never have gotten anything published as far

339
00:21:38,320 --> 00:21:40,840
Speaker 1: as Asa Carter because of all the trouble he got

340
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Speaker 1: into in the fifties as a white supremacist. A lot

341
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Speaker 1: of it though Clay was I'm going to show those

342
00:21:47,840 --> 00:21:52,480
Speaker 1: Yankee liberals. A lot of his close friends, I mean,

343
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Speaker 1: for example, as Forrest Carter, when the Outlaw Josie Wells

344
00:21:56,400 --> 00:22:01,159
Speaker 1: came out, he was introduced and interviewed on The Today

345
00:22:01,200 --> 00:22:04,359
Speaker 1: Show with Barbara Walters, which is one of the most

346
00:22:04,600 --> 00:22:09,879
Speaker 1: watched television shows in America at the time, and he

347
00:22:10,040 --> 00:22:13,119
Speaker 1: told several people back in Alabama that he was going

348
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Speaker 1: to be on the Today Show, and his friends thought

349
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Speaker 1: it was hilarious that he was tricking this Yankee newspaper

350
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Speaker 1: order and it was kind of a big joke.

351
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Speaker 5: I mean, one of his closest friends.

352
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Speaker 1: Ray Andrews said, I literally lay down the floor laughing,

353
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Speaker 1: and another one of his friends kept saying, oh my god,

354
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Speaker 1: I hope she doesn't ask him about the Cuklut Slam,

355
00:22:37,600 --> 00:22:41,000
Speaker 1: which he had a cuklut Slam group. So that was

356
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Speaker 1: part of it. But here's the other thing that's so

357
00:22:43,440 --> 00:22:48,040
Speaker 1: fascinating to me, Clay is when that show ran, the

358
00:22:48,160 --> 00:22:52,480
Speaker 1: switchboard at the Today Show lit up with people from

359
00:22:52,520 --> 00:22:56,480
Speaker 1: Alabama who were not his friends, say, you people are stupid.

360
00:22:56,800 --> 00:23:01,000
Speaker 1: This isn't Forrest Carter, it's Asa Carter. And they totally

361
00:23:01,040 --> 00:23:06,560
Speaker 1: ignored it. His editor said, this nonsense. You know I

362
00:23:06,600 --> 00:23:09,120
Speaker 1: know him, I've known him for years. Of course he's

363
00:23:09,160 --> 00:23:14,879
Speaker 1: an Indian. Absolutely, he's an Indian. His movie agent, she

364
00:23:15,240 --> 00:23:18,120
Speaker 1: wrote a wire. She said, I couldn't believe that I'd

365
00:23:18,160 --> 00:23:20,200
Speaker 1: had him in my house. I knew he was an Indian.

366
00:23:20,280 --> 00:23:22,399
Speaker 1: He looked like an Indian, he talked like an Indian,

367
00:23:22,400 --> 00:23:25,919
Speaker 1: he acted like an Indian. And it was just a

368
00:23:26,000 --> 00:23:31,280
Speaker 1: kind of to me. It's an example of how you

369
00:23:31,320 --> 00:23:34,080
Speaker 1: get your mindset in a certain way and you just

370
00:23:34,160 --> 00:23:37,439
Speaker 1: don't change it. The other thing that was critical, I

371
00:23:37,480 --> 00:23:40,480
Speaker 1: think you think about this now. This is the nineteen seventies.

372
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Speaker 3: There's no internet, no internet.

373
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Speaker 1: And there's no way for social media to catch up

374
00:23:45,680 --> 00:23:49,159
Speaker 1: amplify any of this. This could never have happened in

375
00:23:50,080 --> 00:23:53,040
Speaker 1: after two thousand and five or twenty ten, you know.

376
00:23:53,320 --> 00:23:57,840
Speaker 1: But at that time it simply disappeared. The story simply disappeared.

377
00:23:58,080 --> 00:24:01,879
Speaker 1: And the claims Wayne Greenhaw, his friend of mine, I

378
00:24:02,000 --> 00:24:04,080
Speaker 1: discovered and I didn't even know this at the time.

379
00:24:04,760 --> 00:24:08,920
Speaker 1: He wrote a story in nineteen seventy five saying that

380
00:24:09,040 --> 00:24:11,640
Speaker 1: there are a lot of similarities he said, between Asa

381
00:24:11,760 --> 00:24:14,640
Speaker 1: Carter and Forrest Carter. This is when he was big

382
00:24:14,680 --> 00:24:18,440
Speaker 1: time with the movie with Clint Eastwood and everything, and

383
00:24:18,600 --> 00:24:21,280
Speaker 1: he pitched it to the New York Times, and they

384
00:24:21,320 --> 00:24:24,800
Speaker 1: were so scared of being sued that they changed that

385
00:24:24,920 --> 00:24:26,800
Speaker 1: story and it appeared in the New York Times. But

386
00:24:26,840 --> 00:24:30,600
Speaker 1: it was so ambivalent that you couldn't figure out whether.

387
00:24:30,359 --> 00:24:32,320
Speaker 3: He really was or wasn't really.

388
00:24:32,359 --> 00:24:37,640
Speaker 2: So in nineteen seventy five, yeah, in New York Times said, yeah,

389
00:24:37,680 --> 00:24:38,560
Speaker 2: that Eric Carter.

390
00:24:39,320 --> 00:24:41,080
Speaker 1: There are a lot of similarities between the.

391
00:24:41,040 --> 00:24:46,440
Speaker 2: Two, talk about pulling the wool over the eyes of America.

392
00:24:46,960 --> 00:24:50,640
Speaker 2: And before he died he would outright deny that he

393
00:24:50,720 --> 00:24:55,280
Speaker 2: was as of Carter. In part two of the series,

394
00:24:55,320 --> 00:24:57,960
Speaker 2: We're going to learn a lot more about Ace's life

395
00:24:57,960 --> 00:25:00,520
Speaker 2: and why he did what he did. Before we go

396
00:25:00,560 --> 00:25:04,600
Speaker 2: any further, we've got to understand this book. The first

397
00:25:04,600 --> 00:25:07,040
Speaker 2: thing we have to do is understand The Education of

398
00:25:07,119 --> 00:25:10,000
Speaker 2: Little Tree, because it will show us a window into

399
00:25:10,040 --> 00:25:14,280
Speaker 2: the mind of Ace of Carter. Here's Steve Ranella and I.

400
00:25:15,200 --> 00:25:17,679
Speaker 2: The Education of Little Tree was written in nineteen seventy

401
00:25:17,720 --> 00:25:20,919
Speaker 2: six by a man who went by the name of.

402
00:25:20,960 --> 00:25:24,119
Speaker 4: Forrest Carter, and it was initially understood to be a

403
00:25:25,400 --> 00:25:28,040
Speaker 4: was taken to be autobiographic.

404
00:25:28,119 --> 00:25:34,480
Speaker 2: Autobiographical of a young Cherokee Indian boy and his parents

405
00:25:34,560 --> 00:25:37,280
Speaker 2: die and he goes to live with his grandparents in

406
00:25:37,320 --> 00:25:38,000
Speaker 2: the mountains.

407
00:25:38,080 --> 00:25:40,879
Speaker 4: Very late on backstory, I mean it opens with a

408
00:25:40,920 --> 00:25:43,720
Speaker 4: collection of people trying to figure out what to do

409
00:25:43,760 --> 00:25:47,200
Speaker 4: with an orphaned child. Yeah, he latches onto his grandpa's

410
00:25:47,280 --> 00:25:51,320
Speaker 4: leg and stays there without saying anything, without crying, holding

411
00:25:51,359 --> 00:25:55,040
Speaker 4: his legs so long that eventually it's just determined that

412
00:25:55,080 --> 00:25:56,200
Speaker 4: the grandpa will bring him home.

413
00:25:56,240 --> 00:25:56,600
Speaker 3: He's five.

414
00:25:56,720 --> 00:25:57,960
Speaker 5: No one's got a better idea.

415
00:25:58,280 --> 00:25:59,360
Speaker 3: The boys five years old.

416
00:26:00,359 --> 00:26:04,320
Speaker 2: The story is this boy being leaving his mother and

417
00:26:04,359 --> 00:26:05,639
Speaker 2: father who have died.

418
00:26:06,200 --> 00:26:09,040
Speaker 4: I think it was just like out of let's agree

419
00:26:09,040 --> 00:26:11,320
Speaker 4: to use the terminology used by the author.

420
00:26:11,640 --> 00:26:13,840
Speaker 5: Okay, the boy is.

421
00:26:13,920 --> 00:26:16,639
Speaker 4: It's clear up front the boy is regarded as a

422
00:26:16,680 --> 00:26:22,040
Speaker 4: bastard child. Okay, he's but he's not. His parents were

423
00:26:22,040 --> 00:26:25,760
Speaker 4: married in the Cherokee way, but there's a treatment of

424
00:26:25,840 --> 00:26:28,479
Speaker 4: him as such. And he goes to live with his

425
00:26:29,200 --> 00:26:35,000
Speaker 4: full Cherokee grandmother and his half Cherokee, half Waite grandfather,

426
00:26:35,040 --> 00:26:38,000
Speaker 4: who is very much presented to be very much.

427
00:26:37,840 --> 00:26:38,399
Speaker 5: Of the Cherokee.

428
00:26:38,440 --> 00:26:43,400
Speaker 2: And so the book is basically just a few years

429
00:26:43,720 --> 00:26:46,080
Speaker 2: of his of the boy's life. It's just it's a

430
00:26:46,119 --> 00:26:51,160
Speaker 2: small sliver of time when his grandfather teaches him essentially

431
00:26:51,240 --> 00:26:53,239
Speaker 2: how to how to be a man, and how to

432
00:26:53,240 --> 00:26:56,800
Speaker 2: be a Cherokee, and how to survive in the modern

433
00:26:57,000 --> 00:27:00,120
Speaker 2: modern world and time. The opening chapter of the book,

434
00:27:00,320 --> 00:27:04,080
Speaker 2: they go and trap turkeys, They fox hunt with hounds.

435
00:27:04,680 --> 00:27:08,760
Speaker 2: The grandfather in later chapters teaches the boy how to

436
00:27:08,800 --> 00:27:09,720
Speaker 2: make moonshine.

437
00:27:10,000 --> 00:27:12,280
Speaker 5: That's his trade. He's in the whiskey.

438
00:27:11,960 --> 00:27:16,080
Speaker 2: Trade, right, And so the book is about the education

439
00:27:16,200 --> 00:27:18,680
Speaker 2: of Little Tree because the boy quickly when he comes

440
00:27:18,680 --> 00:27:21,320
Speaker 2: home with his grandfather, is named Little Tree.

441
00:27:21,520 --> 00:27:25,159
Speaker 4: He's learning very practical skills, when to plant, how to

442
00:27:25,200 --> 00:27:28,200
Speaker 4: fertilize soil, how to make whiskey, how to catch calffish,

443
00:27:28,280 --> 00:27:30,600
Speaker 4: all these very practical skills. But what he's really getting

444
00:27:30,840 --> 00:27:32,480
Speaker 4: the education is.

445
00:27:32,840 --> 00:27:33,320
Speaker 5: How to be.

446
00:27:34,200 --> 00:27:36,760
Speaker 4: What is your obligation to your family, what is your

447
00:27:36,800 --> 00:27:40,320
Speaker 4: obligation to the natural world around you. He gets a

448
00:27:40,440 --> 00:27:46,280
Speaker 4: moral a very pure moral education by doing very practical things.

449
00:27:46,720 --> 00:27:49,720
Speaker 2: The book like from a literary perspective to me, the

450
00:27:49,760 --> 00:27:53,800
Speaker 2: book just reeks of you feel like you're in western

451
00:27:53,800 --> 00:27:56,960
Speaker 2: North Carolina. You feel like you're in the mountains.

452
00:27:57,119 --> 00:28:02,000
Speaker 4: Oh, I feel it feels completely authentic. Yeah, well, let

453
00:28:02,040 --> 00:28:04,600
Speaker 4: me say this. You know when you're watching some kind

454
00:28:04,600 --> 00:28:07,600
Speaker 4: of poorly done show or movie and there's a scene

455
00:28:07,600 --> 00:28:12,760
Speaker 4: that involves a contractor, okay, and the contractor is doing something,

456
00:28:13,760 --> 00:28:17,280
Speaker 4: someone's doing a construction thing or preparing something, and you're

457
00:28:17,359 --> 00:28:20,320
Speaker 4: watching it and you know that that actor has never

458
00:28:20,400 --> 00:28:23,240
Speaker 4: repaired anything. Yeah, and you know that no one on

459
00:28:23,280 --> 00:28:27,720
Speaker 4: that set has ever watched someone repair something, And it's

460
00:28:27,800 --> 00:28:31,159
Speaker 4: all just a stab in the dark about how someone

461
00:28:31,240 --> 00:28:37,360
Speaker 4: repairing something might approach that, and there's zero authenticity. I'm

462
00:28:37,400 --> 00:28:40,040
Speaker 4: sensitive to that. I don't like to see that that'll

463
00:28:40,040 --> 00:28:42,880
Speaker 4: make me turn something off when I see that. In

464
00:28:43,000 --> 00:28:47,000
Speaker 4: reading this, and I have a lot of exposure, not

465
00:28:47,080 --> 00:28:48,840
Speaker 4: as much in the South, I have a lot of

466
00:28:48,880 --> 00:28:54,080
Speaker 4: exposure to rural culture all across America. In reading this,

467
00:28:54,800 --> 00:28:59,960
Speaker 4: I would say that person knows what they're talking about.

468
00:29:00,440 --> 00:29:03,640
Speaker 4: That person when it comes to the physical stuff, right,

469
00:29:04,160 --> 00:29:07,040
Speaker 4: that person has fished, They've been there. That person has

470
00:29:07,080 --> 00:29:10,480
Speaker 4: been to a still. That person has worked in corn patches.

471
00:29:10,960 --> 00:29:15,120
Speaker 4: That person has raised melons, right, that person has dealt

472
00:29:15,120 --> 00:29:15,720
Speaker 4: with dogs.

473
00:29:16,320 --> 00:29:19,360
Speaker 2: Let me read you another section Steve about when he

474
00:29:19,480 --> 00:29:23,000
Speaker 2: was out at night and as a coon hunter myself.

475
00:29:23,200 --> 00:29:26,080
Speaker 2: When I read this, I was like, this guy has

476
00:29:26,160 --> 00:29:28,560
Speaker 2: been in the mountains at night, because he described it

477
00:29:28,600 --> 00:29:32,000
Speaker 2: better than I could. They were going fox hunting, and

478
00:29:32,360 --> 00:29:35,760
Speaker 2: he said dark fell in close, and the mountains moved

479
00:29:35,800 --> 00:29:38,320
Speaker 2: in on either side as we walked. Before long we

480
00:29:38,400 --> 00:29:41,080
Speaker 2: came to win and the trail Grandpa had taken the left,

481
00:29:41,360 --> 00:29:43,960
Speaker 2: and there was no more room in the trail except

482
00:29:43,960 --> 00:29:46,480
Speaker 2: for right on the edge of the spring branch. Grandpa

483
00:29:46,600 --> 00:29:49,320
Speaker 2: called this the narrows seemed like you could stretch out

484
00:29:49,360 --> 00:29:53,239
Speaker 2: your arms on either side and touch the mountains straight up.

485
00:29:53,280 --> 00:29:56,880
Speaker 2: They went dark and feathered with tree tops, which left

486
00:29:56,920 --> 00:30:00,760
Speaker 2: a thin slice of stars above us. I love that

487
00:30:00,840 --> 00:30:03,680
Speaker 2: when I read that, like a thin slice of stars

488
00:30:03,720 --> 00:30:07,760
Speaker 2: above us. Now this author had been there. He went

489
00:30:07,800 --> 00:30:10,680
Speaker 2: on to say, way off, a mourning dove called long

490
00:30:10,720 --> 00:30:12,880
Speaker 2: and throaty, and the mountains picked it up and echoed

491
00:30:12,920 --> 00:30:15,600
Speaker 2: the sound over and over, carrying it further and further away,

492
00:30:15,680 --> 00:30:18,600
Speaker 2: until you wondered how many mountains and hollows that call

493
00:30:18,640 --> 00:30:21,800
Speaker 2: would travel, And it died away so far it was

494
00:30:21,880 --> 00:30:27,880
Speaker 2: more like a memory than a sound. He said that

495
00:30:27,920 --> 00:30:30,239
Speaker 2: the call of a mourning dove was more like a

496
00:30:30,320 --> 00:30:33,800
Speaker 2: memory than a sound. I mean that's some good writing.

497
00:30:34,000 --> 00:30:34,440
Speaker 3: That's something.

498
00:30:34,520 --> 00:30:40,040
Speaker 4: It's poetic without being pretentious. It's there's just great. All

499
00:30:40,080 --> 00:30:44,640
Speaker 4: the metaphor is great. They hide their still so well.

500
00:30:44,720 --> 00:30:47,160
Speaker 4: He says that a bird couldn't find it. I mean,

501
00:30:47,200 --> 00:30:50,600
Speaker 4: it's just it's it just is good writing. Like it's

502
00:30:50,640 --> 00:30:51,160
Speaker 4: good writing.

503
00:30:52,280 --> 00:30:58,400
Speaker 2: Steve said he recognized authenticity in this author. I want

504
00:30:58,440 --> 00:31:01,959
Speaker 2: to read an excerpt where Grandpa is telling a childhood

505
00:31:02,040 --> 00:31:05,520
Speaker 2: story about a Civil War vet named Coonjack who gets

506
00:31:05,560 --> 00:31:11,800
Speaker 2: offended in church. Coonjack stood up and said, I here

507
00:31:12,000 --> 00:31:14,600
Speaker 2: tell the sum in here been talking about me behind

508
00:31:14,600 --> 00:31:17,600
Speaker 2: my back, and I want you to know that I'm awares.

509
00:31:18,160 --> 00:31:21,400
Speaker 2: I know what's the matter with you. You're jealous because the

510
00:31:21,480 --> 00:31:23,720
Speaker 2: deacon board put me in charge of the key to

511
00:31:23,800 --> 00:31:26,480
Speaker 2: the song box. Well, let me tell you, and if

512
00:31:26,480 --> 00:31:29,200
Speaker 2: you don't like it, I got the difference right here

513
00:31:29,320 --> 00:31:33,640
Speaker 2: in my pocket. Grandpa said, sure enough. Coonjack lifted his

514
00:31:33,800 --> 00:31:37,840
Speaker 2: deer shirt and showed a pistol handle he was stomping.

515
00:31:38,000 --> 00:31:38,280
Speaker 1: Mad.

516
00:31:38,760 --> 00:31:42,040
Speaker 2: Grandpa said that church house was full of some hard men,

517
00:31:42,320 --> 00:31:45,640
Speaker 2: including his Paul, who would soon as not shoot you

518
00:31:45,680 --> 00:31:49,560
Speaker 2: if the weather changed. And nobody raised an eyebrow, he said,

519
00:31:49,560 --> 00:31:53,640
Speaker 2: his pau stood up and said, Coonjack, every man here

520
00:31:53,840 --> 00:31:57,240
Speaker 2: admires the way you've handled the key to the songbook box,

521
00:31:57,880 --> 00:32:02,000
Speaker 2: best handling ever been done. If words have been mistook

522
00:32:02,080 --> 00:32:05,560
Speaker 2: to cause you discomfort, I here and now state the

523
00:32:05,600 --> 00:32:11,360
Speaker 2: sorrow of every man present. Konjack sat down, total mollified

524
00:32:11,400 --> 00:32:12,960
Speaker 2: and contented, as.

525
00:32:12,840 --> 00:32:13,720
Speaker 3: Was everybody else.

526
00:32:14,520 --> 00:32:17,960
Speaker 2: On the way home, Grandpa asked his paw why Konjack

527
00:32:18,000 --> 00:32:20,880
Speaker 2: could get away with such talk, and Grandpa said that

528
00:32:21,040 --> 00:32:25,000
Speaker 2: he got to laughing about Konjack acting so important over

529
00:32:25,040 --> 00:32:28,120
Speaker 2: the key to the songbook box, and he said his

530
00:32:28,240 --> 00:32:32,400
Speaker 2: paw told him Son don't laugh at Coonjack. You see,

531
00:32:32,640 --> 00:32:34,920
Speaker 2: when the Cherokee was forced to give up his home

532
00:32:35,080 --> 00:32:38,160
Speaker 2: and go to the nations, Coonjack was young, and he

533
00:32:38,240 --> 00:32:40,640
Speaker 2: hid out in the mountains, and he fought to hold on.

534
00:32:41,240 --> 00:32:44,400
Speaker 2: When the war between the states come, he saw maybe

535
00:32:44,440 --> 00:32:47,440
Speaker 2: he could fight that same government and get back the

536
00:32:47,560 --> 00:32:51,880
Speaker 2: lands and home. He fought hard both times he lost.

537
00:32:52,440 --> 00:32:55,920
Speaker 2: When the war ended, the politicians set in trying to

538
00:32:56,000 --> 00:32:59,160
Speaker 2: get what was left of what he had. Koonjack fought

539
00:32:59,240 --> 00:33:02,680
Speaker 2: him and run and hid and thought some more. You see,

540
00:33:03,040 --> 00:33:06,440
Speaker 2: Coonjack came up in a time of fighting. All he's

541
00:33:06,520 --> 00:33:10,239
Speaker 2: got now is the key to the songbook box. And

542
00:33:10,280 --> 00:33:14,880
Speaker 2: if Konjack seems cantankerous, well there ain't nothing left for

543
00:33:15,000 --> 00:33:20,360
Speaker 2: Coonjack to fight. He never knowed nothing else. Grandpa said,

544
00:33:20,520 --> 00:33:24,360
Speaker 2: he come might near crying for old Coonjack. He said

545
00:33:24,360 --> 00:33:28,160
Speaker 2: that after that, it didn't matter what Konjack said or did.

546
00:33:28,720 --> 00:33:36,160
Speaker 2: He loved him because he understood him. He loved him

547
00:33:36,200 --> 00:33:41,160
Speaker 2: because he understood that's powerful empathy and deep insight into

548
00:33:41,200 --> 00:33:45,040
Speaker 2: human nature. When we heard Forrest Carter right about the

549
00:33:45,160 --> 00:33:49,320
Speaker 2: natural world, it's clear he had experienced it. But also

550
00:33:49,560 --> 00:33:53,080
Speaker 2: when I hear him talk about empathy and understanding people's issues.

551
00:33:53,480 --> 00:33:57,400
Speaker 2: It feels just as authentic. I want to read you

552
00:33:57,480 --> 00:34:00,320
Speaker 2: one more excerpt, and it's a window into the home

553
00:34:00,360 --> 00:34:05,080
Speaker 2: of Little Tree's grandma and Grandpa. Will learn that Grandpa's

554
00:34:05,160 --> 00:34:11,080
Speaker 2: name is Wales. Grandma's name was Bonnie B. I knew

555
00:34:11,120 --> 00:34:14,239
Speaker 2: that when I heard him late at night say I

556
00:34:14,480 --> 00:34:17,840
Speaker 2: ken ya, Bonnie B. He was saying I love you.

557
00:34:18,440 --> 00:34:20,799
Speaker 2: When they would be talking, Grandma would say, do you

558
00:34:20,960 --> 00:34:24,560
Speaker 2: kin me, Wales, and he would answer, I kenya. It

559
00:34:24,680 --> 00:34:29,480
Speaker 2: meant I understand you. To them, love and understanding was

560
00:34:29,520 --> 00:34:33,239
Speaker 2: the same thing. Grandma said. You couldn't love something you

561
00:34:33,320 --> 00:34:37,640
Speaker 2: didn't understand, nor could you love people nor God if

562
00:34:37,719 --> 00:34:41,640
Speaker 2: you didn't understand the people and God. Grandpa and Grandma

563
00:34:41,840 --> 00:34:45,320
Speaker 2: had an understanding, and so they had a love. Grandma

564
00:34:45,400 --> 00:34:48,439
Speaker 2: said the understanding run deeper as the years went by,

565
00:34:48,960 --> 00:34:52,600
Speaker 2: and she reckoned it would get beyond anything mortal folks

566
00:34:52,680 --> 00:34:56,880
Speaker 2: could think upon or explain, and so they called it ken.

567
00:34:57,800 --> 00:35:02,080
Speaker 2: Grandpa said, back before his time, ken folks meant any

568
00:35:02,160 --> 00:35:06,520
Speaker 2: folks that you understood and had an understanding with, so

569
00:35:06,640 --> 00:35:11,200
Speaker 2: it meant loved folks. But people got selfish and brought

570
00:35:11,200 --> 00:35:14,880
Speaker 2: it down to mean just blood relatives, but that actually

571
00:35:14,960 --> 00:35:20,120
Speaker 2: it was never meant to mean that you can't love

572
00:35:20,239 --> 00:35:25,560
Speaker 2: something you don't understand. These uneducated hill folks mapped out

573
00:35:25,719 --> 00:35:30,120
Speaker 2: and functionalized love in a way they suspected mortal people

574
00:35:30,200 --> 00:35:34,640
Speaker 2: couldn't understand or explain. They recognized that genuine love and

575
00:35:34,719 --> 00:35:39,239
Speaker 2: understanding should be spread much wider than the rudimentary understanding

576
00:35:39,280 --> 00:35:43,000
Speaker 2: of blood relatives. Ken folks are all the people that

577
00:35:43,080 --> 00:35:47,759
Speaker 2: you truly understand and that understand you, and thus you

578
00:35:48,000 --> 00:35:53,239
Speaker 2: love them. This is deeply philosophical, and it sprung from

579
00:35:53,280 --> 00:35:58,000
Speaker 2: the creative loins of a racial supremacist. This would be

580
00:35:58,160 --> 00:36:01,799
Speaker 2: the last thing that we think he'd under stand. Incredible

581
00:36:01,840 --> 00:36:06,120
Speaker 2: writers usually have a uniquely comprehensive grasp on their topic

582
00:36:06,239 --> 00:36:11,160
Speaker 2: of expertise, and in this situation, Asa Carter's expertise was

583
00:36:11,200 --> 00:36:15,880
Speaker 2: on the inner gold and purest character of these marginalized people.

584
00:36:16,480 --> 00:36:21,400
Speaker 2: This man seemed to truly understand love, which begs the

585
00:36:21,520 --> 00:36:25,560
Speaker 2: question of where did he get access to this? We're

586
00:36:25,719 --> 00:36:30,279
Speaker 2: roiling towards a deeper and more difficult question, though. Does

587
00:36:30,320 --> 00:36:34,040
Speaker 2: the outside life of an author matter or should the

588
00:36:34,120 --> 00:36:38,080
Speaker 2: content simply be taken for what it is? Can we

589
00:36:38,200 --> 00:36:41,880
Speaker 2: draw meaningful ideas from a flawed source.

590
00:36:42,600 --> 00:36:44,440
Speaker 3: I want you to be thinking about that.

591
00:36:44,960 --> 00:36:48,960
Speaker 2: And doctor Carter has some ideas, and he's going to

592
00:36:49,040 --> 00:36:53,120
Speaker 2: show us a place where ASA didn't get it quite right.

593
00:36:55,200 --> 00:36:59,919
Speaker 1: Writers are not perfect people, and their backgrounds are off

594
00:37:00,040 --> 00:37:03,120
Speaker 1: on things that make us cringe, and yet we can

595
00:37:03,160 --> 00:37:06,680
Speaker 1: still look at their books and their works. Their writing

596
00:37:06,760 --> 00:37:10,680
Speaker 1: works is great worthwhile we don't know. Shakespeare may have

597
00:37:10,719 --> 00:37:15,719
Speaker 1: been a jerk, you know, for all we know. But

598
00:37:16,040 --> 00:37:18,279
Speaker 1: the other thing I think it was mixed in with

599
00:37:18,320 --> 00:37:24,719
Speaker 1: this Clay was having interviewed Native Americans who did know

600
00:37:24,880 --> 00:37:29,440
Speaker 1: something about Cherokee culture, and they found the book some

601
00:37:29,600 --> 00:37:33,120
Speaker 1: of it interesting. They didn't dislike the book at all,

602
00:37:33,719 --> 00:37:38,759
Speaker 1: but they found it false in some respects, and they

603
00:37:38,880 --> 00:37:42,319
Speaker 1: talked about how he got some of it right, but

604
00:37:42,400 --> 00:37:46,320
Speaker 1: he got some of it fundamentally wrong, and they talked.

605
00:37:46,560 --> 00:37:51,799
Speaker 1: I think the thing that they found most bewildering and

606
00:37:53,040 --> 00:37:58,680
Speaker 1: they disliked the most, was that they felt reading it

607
00:37:59,120 --> 00:38:03,920
Speaker 1: that it was more kind of New Age philosophy in

608
00:38:03,960 --> 00:38:10,200
Speaker 1: which you're embracing Native American ideas but not really authentically capturing.

609
00:38:10,440 --> 00:38:13,160
Speaker 1: I'll give you just one example. I mean, there's some examples.

610
00:38:13,160 --> 00:38:15,560
Speaker 1: One of them is a language which was made up.

611
00:38:15,800 --> 00:38:19,000
Speaker 1: It's not Cherokee. But that didn't that didn't bother them.

612
00:38:19,040 --> 00:38:24,120
Speaker 1: You know, what bothered them, both of them, was that

613
00:38:24,560 --> 00:38:28,720
Speaker 1: the ideas he expressed about the cosmos, about the world

614
00:38:28,840 --> 00:38:33,719
Speaker 1: religious view of Cherokees tended to be vague earth mother,

615
00:38:34,160 --> 00:38:38,000
Speaker 1: you know, this kind of thing. And what what both

616
00:38:38,040 --> 00:38:44,279
Speaker 1: of them said is that Cherokee's ideas about God, the

617
00:38:44,320 --> 00:38:47,400
Speaker 1: Great Spirit, whatever you want to call it, is very

618
00:38:47,440 --> 00:38:51,839
Speaker 1: deeply rooted in specifics. And one of them was very

619
00:38:51,880 --> 00:38:56,239
Speaker 1: eloquent talking about how he talks about how beautiful a

620
00:38:56,280 --> 00:38:58,640
Speaker 1: mountain is, and he said, he's a good writer, you know,

621
00:38:58,680 --> 00:39:03,600
Speaker 1: he can describe just but he said, a Cherokee would

622
00:39:03,640 --> 00:39:08,600
Speaker 1: describe precisely the mountain, the name of it, the exact river.

623
00:39:09,080 --> 00:39:13,840
Speaker 1: Everything has to be specific because it's very specific to

624
00:39:13,920 --> 00:39:17,040
Speaker 1: their world view. And he said this does a site

625
00:39:17,040 --> 00:39:22,200
Speaker 1: specific sites said yes, site specific religion, everything. And one

626
00:39:22,200 --> 00:39:24,400
Speaker 1: of them said, very he grew up in an area

627
00:39:24,400 --> 00:39:27,399
Speaker 1: where there were lots of whites as well as and

628
00:39:27,440 --> 00:39:31,399
Speaker 1: he said, uh, it struck me reading it that it's

629
00:39:31,440 --> 00:39:36,759
Speaker 1: this mixture of both Indian life and white rife. He said,

630
00:39:36,760 --> 00:39:43,440
Speaker 1: for example, virtually no Indians made corn whiskey. Uh it

631
00:39:43,480 --> 00:39:45,839
Speaker 1: was a white man's thing, and it was they didn't

632
00:39:45,880 --> 00:39:50,720
Speaker 1: drink it. They did, but but he said, Scotch Irish

633
00:39:50,800 --> 00:39:54,160
Speaker 1: were pretty tight about that, and you get into trouble

634
00:39:54,200 --> 00:39:57,240
Speaker 1: if you started. They were the ones that controlled control

635
00:39:57,280 --> 00:39:58,560
Speaker 1: of the whiskey making business.

636
00:39:59,080 --> 00:39:59,279
Speaker 2: Uh.

637
00:39:59,320 --> 00:40:03,000
Speaker 1: So it was also that they didn't think nullified the book.

638
00:40:03,400 --> 00:40:05,480
Speaker 5: But and they wasn't quite consistent.

639
00:40:05,600 --> 00:40:08,480
Speaker 1: But it's not really And so their whole thing was

640
00:40:08,760 --> 00:40:11,120
Speaker 1: read it as a I saw it or a kind

641
00:40:11,120 --> 00:40:14,600
Speaker 1: of novel, but don't give it out to students and

642
00:40:14,680 --> 00:40:18,520
Speaker 1: say this is Cherokee life.

643
00:40:18,560 --> 00:40:23,080
Speaker 2: Shakespeare may have been a jerk. That's funny, doctor Dan T.

644
00:40:23,320 --> 00:40:23,600
Speaker 5: Carter.

645
00:40:24,160 --> 00:40:26,560
Speaker 2: And the truth is we don't really know much about

646
00:40:26,640 --> 00:40:31,120
Speaker 2: Shakespeare's private life. And if you remember, we've heard about

647
00:40:31,200 --> 00:40:35,600
Speaker 2: site specific religions and our tacumpsas series Doctor Dave Edmunds

648
00:40:35,640 --> 00:40:39,120
Speaker 2: said that that was part of why relocating Native Americans

649
00:40:39,200 --> 00:40:43,239
Speaker 2: was so devastating to their culture. We're going to now

650
00:40:43,320 --> 00:40:46,160
Speaker 2: get back into the fabric of this book with mister

651
00:40:46,239 --> 00:40:50,440
Speaker 2: Steve Ranella. Did y'all hear that CBS called him the

652
00:40:50,640 --> 00:40:52,879
Speaker 2: Julia Childs of the Campfire?

653
00:40:53,560 --> 00:40:55,600
Speaker 3: That's funny. Here's Steve.

654
00:40:57,920 --> 00:41:00,560
Speaker 4: Part of the education of Little Tree b on the

655
00:41:00,600 --> 00:41:04,560
Speaker 4: things that we spoke about being how to utilize the

656
00:41:04,680 --> 00:41:09,640
Speaker 4: landscape through hunting, fishing, agriculture, how to treat the landscape

657
00:41:09,760 --> 00:41:12,799
Speaker 4: with respect, how to treat the people around you and

658
00:41:12,840 --> 00:41:17,480
Speaker 4: the people you love with respect and empathy, and how

659
00:41:17,520 --> 00:41:21,760
Speaker 4: to not be boastful or prideful, and how to behave

660
00:41:21,880 --> 00:41:25,880
Speaker 4: in a discreete fashion. There is also another thing that

661
00:41:26,000 --> 00:41:30,720
Speaker 4: little Tree is educated on are the evils of pretty

662
00:41:30,760 --> 00:41:35,760
Speaker 4: much everything that is organized. He has taught to understand

663
00:41:35,960 --> 00:41:42,360
Speaker 4: that politicians are by definition corrupt, that the education system

664
00:41:42,600 --> 00:41:47,960
Speaker 4: is corrupt in and of itself, government is corrupt, organized

665
00:41:48,040 --> 00:41:53,319
Speaker 4: religion is corrupt. You have your word, you have the

666
00:41:53,400 --> 00:41:57,280
Speaker 4: promises of the people around you, but anything that comes

667
00:41:57,280 --> 00:42:00,880
Speaker 4: from you that has been institutionalized you should be very

668
00:42:01,280 --> 00:42:05,160
Speaker 4: suspicious of. And that is like a key part of

669
00:42:05,200 --> 00:42:05,840
Speaker 4: the education.

670
00:42:06,920 --> 00:42:11,400
Speaker 2: And it comes about in such natural ways inside the books, sure,

671
00:42:11,440 --> 00:42:14,640
Speaker 2: like for instance, the grandfather is making whiskey and there's

672
00:42:14,640 --> 00:42:16,600
Speaker 2: a whiskey tax, so they have to hide their still

673
00:42:16,680 --> 00:42:19,040
Speaker 2: so they don't pay the tax. So in the book,

674
00:42:19,040 --> 00:42:23,160
Speaker 2: the grandfather loves George Washington until he finds out that

675
00:42:23,280 --> 00:42:26,759
Speaker 2: Washington is the one that instituted the whiskey tax, and

676
00:42:26,880 --> 00:42:31,640
Speaker 2: then he really tries to justify, like, how could Washington

677
00:42:31,640 --> 00:42:32,040
Speaker 2: have done? That?

678
00:42:32,120 --> 00:42:35,960
Speaker 4: Must have been a mistake. Yeah, he seethes. He can't

679
00:42:35,960 --> 00:42:39,319
Speaker 4: get it out of his head. He normally refuses, he

680
00:42:39,480 --> 00:42:42,080
Speaker 4: likes to walk, refuses to be picked up by a car,

681
00:42:42,520 --> 00:42:45,200
Speaker 4: allows himself to get picked up by a car just

682
00:42:45,239 --> 00:42:47,839
Speaker 4: so he can ask the driver of the car what

683
00:42:47,880 --> 00:42:50,440
Speaker 4: he thinks about what Washington did. He can't get it

684
00:42:50,440 --> 00:42:53,200
Speaker 4: out of his head. Yeah, in his mind. If I

685
00:42:53,239 --> 00:42:56,480
Speaker 4: grow corn on my land and I have a contraption

686
00:42:56,640 --> 00:42:58,880
Speaker 4: I made on my land and I can take my

687
00:42:59,000 --> 00:43:01,319
Speaker 4: corn and make a beverage with it, how in the

688
00:43:01,360 --> 00:43:02,680
Speaker 4: world is this anything?

689
00:43:02,719 --> 00:43:04,680
Speaker 5: How does this have anything to do with the government?

690
00:43:04,880 --> 00:43:08,960
Speaker 4: Yeah, explain like what has gone bad? When I've done

691
00:43:08,960 --> 00:43:11,319
Speaker 4: this all with my hands, so on my.

692
00:43:11,320 --> 00:43:15,279
Speaker 2: Property, beautifully laid out. Because the grandfather, you trust him

693
00:43:15,320 --> 00:43:20,960
Speaker 2: so much. He's so straightforward, he's so certain, he's so naive,

694
00:43:21,600 --> 00:43:25,320
Speaker 2: but he's so honest, like you, just the writer wants

695
00:43:25,320 --> 00:43:28,759
Speaker 2: you to think, this man sees the world in his

696
00:43:28,880 --> 00:43:34,840
Speaker 2: most simplistic terms, but the right way. It's hard not

697
00:43:35,000 --> 00:43:38,759
Speaker 2: to love Grandpa. He and little Tree once had to

698
00:43:38,760 --> 00:43:41,920
Speaker 2: bury a fox dog named Ringer that had died on

699
00:43:41,960 --> 00:43:44,799
Speaker 2: the hunt, and little Tree was very sad. This is

700
00:43:44,800 --> 00:43:48,000
Speaker 2: what Grandpa said. And it's important to know that this

701
00:43:48,080 --> 00:43:51,799
Speaker 2: book is written in dialect, so sometimes it sounds kind

702
00:43:51,800 --> 00:43:56,080
Speaker 2: of funny when you take it out of context. Grandpa said,

703
00:43:56,120 --> 00:43:59,440
Speaker 2: everything you lost which you had loved, give you that feeling.

704
00:44:00,120 --> 00:44:00,439
Speaker 3: He said.

705
00:44:00,440 --> 00:44:02,800
Speaker 2: The only way around it was to not love anything

706
00:44:02,840 --> 00:44:05,680
Speaker 2: which was worse, because you would feel empty all the time.

707
00:44:06,400 --> 00:44:10,080
Speaker 2: Grandpa said, supposing old Ringer had not been faithful, then

708
00:44:10,120 --> 00:44:12,719
Speaker 2: we wouldn't be proud of him. That would be a

709
00:44:12,800 --> 00:44:16,640
Speaker 2: worse feeling, which is right. Grandpa said, when I got old,

710
00:44:16,760 --> 00:44:19,080
Speaker 2: I would remember old Ringer, and I would like it.

711
00:44:19,640 --> 00:44:21,920
Speaker 3: He said. It was a funny thing. But when you got.

712
00:44:21,719 --> 00:44:25,280
Speaker 2: Old and remember them you loved, you only remembered the good,

713
00:44:25,719 --> 00:44:29,320
Speaker 2: never the bad, which proved the bad didn't count.

714
00:44:29,480 --> 00:44:34,400
Speaker 3: Know how the bad didn't count. Know how.

715
00:44:35,080 --> 00:44:39,640
Speaker 2: That's deeply philosophical too. It makes me wonder if Asa

716
00:44:39,760 --> 00:44:43,080
Speaker 2: hoped his life would be judged by the same rules

717
00:44:43,160 --> 00:44:47,520
Speaker 2: as Ringer. Here's more from Steve Ranella, and we're gonna

718
00:44:47,520 --> 00:44:50,360
Speaker 2: get into something a bit more serious.

719
00:44:51,120 --> 00:44:55,319
Speaker 4: There's a thing we haven't looked into which is the

720
00:44:55,320 --> 00:44:59,239
Speaker 4: philosophy and viewpoints on poverty. Almost everybody in this book

721
00:44:59,280 --> 00:45:03,000
Speaker 4: is exceptionally poor, very very poor, like cash economies of

722
00:45:03,719 --> 00:45:07,080
Speaker 4: sub one thousand dollars annually. When Little Tree and his

723
00:45:07,120 --> 00:45:10,920
Speaker 4: grandpa go to sell their bootleg whiskey as a store,

724
00:45:11,480 --> 00:45:14,440
Speaker 4: the storekeeper will always have Little Tree do an errand

725
00:45:14,520 --> 00:45:17,800
Speaker 4: for him. The storekeeper wants to reward Little Tree with

726
00:45:17,840 --> 00:45:20,880
Speaker 4: a piece of candy, but he knows that he cannot

727
00:45:20,960 --> 00:45:23,759
Speaker 4: give Little Tree a piece of candy for free, so

728
00:45:23,840 --> 00:45:25,440
Speaker 4: he needs to put it to Little Tree that he

729
00:45:25,480 --> 00:45:29,960
Speaker 4: has expired candy. He can't sell. It feels very wasteful

730
00:45:30,040 --> 00:45:32,520
Speaker 4: throwing it out, and that Little Tree would be doing

731
00:45:32,600 --> 00:45:34,760
Speaker 4: him a favor to take a piece of the candy.

732
00:45:35,520 --> 00:45:40,040
Speaker 4: Under those conditions, Little Tree will eat that candy. Little

733
00:45:40,080 --> 00:45:43,080
Speaker 4: Tree meets the daughter of a sharecropper at the store.

734
00:45:43,480 --> 00:45:46,640
Speaker 4: She has no shoes. Little Tree's grandma makes her a

735
00:45:46,640 --> 00:45:49,520
Speaker 4: pair of moccasins. He gives the girl a pair of

736
00:45:49,560 --> 00:45:52,359
Speaker 4: moccasins the next time they go to the store. When

737
00:45:52,480 --> 00:45:55,799
Speaker 4: the girl's sharecropper father sees her in the moccasins and

738
00:45:55,840 --> 00:45:58,400
Speaker 4: sees how glad she is, he gets a stick and

739
00:45:58,440 --> 00:46:02,480
Speaker 4: whips her until she bleeds, makes her give the moccasins

740
00:46:02,520 --> 00:46:04,960
Speaker 4: back to little tree. You think the grandpa is going

741
00:46:05,000 --> 00:46:08,759
Speaker 4: to condemn the man. The grandpa says, I understand, they

742
00:46:08,800 --> 00:46:12,040
Speaker 4: can't get used to nice stuff. They'll never have nice stuff.

743
00:46:12,120 --> 00:46:15,480
Speaker 4: There's no reason for her to want things she won't

744
00:46:15,520 --> 00:46:18,160
Speaker 4: get them. So I understand why he had to do

745
00:46:18,200 --> 00:46:22,120
Speaker 4: what he had to do, like a great reluctance to condemn.

746
00:46:22,680 --> 00:46:26,040
Speaker 4: And then sometimes I'm like, it's like a vicious scene. Yeah,

747
00:46:26,080 --> 00:46:28,719
Speaker 4: but he's like, I understand. He was not for me

748
00:46:28,760 --> 00:46:29,280
Speaker 4: to judge.

749
00:46:29,600 --> 00:46:32,839
Speaker 2: The grandfather was very empathetic towards people. And that's a

750
00:46:32,880 --> 00:46:36,560
Speaker 2: word that will go back to because when you see

751
00:46:36,600 --> 00:46:39,920
Speaker 2: that whoever wrote this book was trying to I mean,

752
00:46:39,960 --> 00:46:42,560
Speaker 2: it feels like they were trying to promote a message

753
00:46:42,600 --> 00:46:43,239
Speaker 2: of empathy.

754
00:46:43,400 --> 00:46:45,640
Speaker 4: On the issue of empathy, and it is. There is

755
00:46:45,680 --> 00:46:50,360
Speaker 4: a very strong environmental message, like a rigid, very strong

756
00:46:50,480 --> 00:46:53,040
Speaker 4: environmental message. There's a lot of all empathy.

757
00:46:53,160 --> 00:46:56,560
Speaker 2: Nowhere is there an environmental message in this The environmental

758
00:46:56,600 --> 00:47:02,600
Speaker 2: message of that trees are sentient life forms, Okay, that

759
00:47:02,640 --> 00:47:04,400
Speaker 2: you don't cut one down for no reason.

760
00:47:04,920 --> 00:47:05,520
Speaker 5: Yeah.

761
00:47:05,560 --> 00:47:08,520
Speaker 4: They would mostly try to only use trees that had

762
00:47:08,560 --> 00:47:12,080
Speaker 4: been felled by lightning strucks, or that fell over. You

763
00:47:12,080 --> 00:47:16,399
Speaker 4: could communicate through trees not to take more than your

764
00:47:16,440 --> 00:47:20,360
Speaker 4: share of anything. That if you didn't love birds, birds

765
00:47:20,400 --> 00:47:23,880
Speaker 4: won't show themselves to you. If you didn't love game animals,

766
00:47:23,920 --> 00:47:26,600
Speaker 4: game animals won't come near you. They know that you

767
00:47:26,719 --> 00:47:29,440
Speaker 4: love them, they want to be near you. It's a

768
00:47:29,480 --> 00:47:34,240
Speaker 4: really strong environmental message, and it's got teeth right. Bad

769
00:47:34,280 --> 00:47:37,400
Speaker 4: things can befall people that disrespect nature. It's not just

770
00:47:37,440 --> 00:47:40,759
Speaker 4: appealing to emotion and beauty. It's like these are like

771
00:47:40,920 --> 00:47:44,520
Speaker 4: real things with real implications, like you can cut yourself

772
00:47:44,600 --> 00:47:46,760
Speaker 4: off from life by disrespecting nature.

773
00:47:47,160 --> 00:47:47,640
Speaker 3: Yeah.

774
00:47:47,680 --> 00:47:51,160
Speaker 4: But within all that, all the messages of empathy, there's

775
00:47:51,200 --> 00:47:53,960
Speaker 4: another message there too, and it can be read in

776
00:47:54,000 --> 00:47:55,800
Speaker 4: a way that reflects on what I said to you

777
00:47:55,880 --> 00:47:59,680
Speaker 4: when I talked about institutions. It teaches empathy, but it

778
00:47:59,680 --> 00:48:02,880
Speaker 4: teaches something else too. I mean it teaches distrust.

779
00:48:04,239 --> 00:48:08,440
Speaker 2: Distrust for the organized systems of man, primarily the government,

780
00:48:08,719 --> 00:48:12,120
Speaker 2: are strong themes of the book. However, they're presented in

781
00:48:12,239 --> 00:48:15,640
Speaker 2: such conjunction with the lovable protagonists. I feel like it

782
00:48:15,680 --> 00:48:18,960
Speaker 2: would be hard for anyone to disagree with its sentiment,

783
00:48:19,080 --> 00:48:22,400
Speaker 2: as it's presented, and the fact that a Cherokee Indian

784
00:48:22,560 --> 00:48:25,600
Speaker 2: is the one making the judgment, it feels very just

785
00:48:26,040 --> 00:48:29,360
Speaker 2: like he's got the right to believe that, And in general,

786
00:48:29,800 --> 00:48:34,640
Speaker 2: I'd say I feel the same way. Here's Steve bringing

787
00:48:34,800 --> 00:48:36,400
Speaker 2: closure to this book.

788
00:48:37,800 --> 00:48:40,719
Speaker 4: There's something that happens really interesting in the book. From

789
00:48:40,719 --> 00:48:46,359
Speaker 4: a structural standpoint, the main plot point, the main conflict,

790
00:48:47,160 --> 00:48:50,799
Speaker 4: isn't even introduced until the end of the book. There's

791
00:48:50,800 --> 00:48:53,799
Speaker 4: a definition of story that goes that a story is

792
00:48:54,000 --> 00:48:58,359
Speaker 4: someone or something wants something, but there are obstacles to

793
00:48:58,400 --> 00:49:02,879
Speaker 4: them getting it. A story is someone or something overcoming

794
00:49:03,040 --> 00:49:06,799
Speaker 4: obstacles to get what they want. Okay, that's true of

795
00:49:06,880 --> 00:49:10,200
Speaker 4: The Tortoise and the Hair, It's true of Shakespeare's works, right,

796
00:49:10,400 --> 00:49:13,400
Speaker 4: It's like, that's what story is. The conflict in this

797
00:49:13,400 --> 00:49:15,960
Speaker 4: book only comes up in the end. The conflict, the

798
00:49:16,000 --> 00:49:18,040
Speaker 4: real conflict in the book, comes up that eventually the

799
00:49:18,120 --> 00:49:21,960
Speaker 4: institutions that little Tree has been trained to be suspicious

800
00:49:22,000 --> 00:49:25,359
Speaker 4: of the institutions come for him. It emerges you don't

801
00:49:25,360 --> 00:49:28,759
Speaker 4: even know who. It emerges that people have complained that

802
00:49:28,880 --> 00:49:32,239
Speaker 4: this boy is being raised, this bastard child, is being

803
00:49:32,360 --> 00:49:36,040
Speaker 4: raised by heathens and isn't going to get a formal education,

804
00:49:36,640 --> 00:49:39,759
Speaker 4: and that they don't have formal custodial rights over him.

805
00:49:39,920 --> 00:49:42,600
Speaker 4: They're just sort of they fell into being his caretakers.

806
00:49:42,800 --> 00:49:46,160
Speaker 4: And all you've seen is the extremes the grandmother and

807
00:49:46,200 --> 00:49:49,960
Speaker 4: grandfather have gone through to give him, like the best

808
00:49:49,960 --> 00:49:53,880
Speaker 4: of everything, the best moral education, the best work education.

809
00:49:54,400 --> 00:49:57,319
Speaker 4: He has a study from the dictionary. They have the

810
00:49:57,440 --> 00:50:01,480
Speaker 4: librarian recommend books to bring home that neither of them

811
00:50:01,520 --> 00:50:03,759
Speaker 4: can read, so that the grandma can read them the books.

812
00:50:03,760 --> 00:50:07,959
Speaker 4: He's getting a formal education. And then the suits show

813
00:50:08,080 --> 00:50:11,520
Speaker 4: up and say he's not being educated, and they take

814
00:50:11,560 --> 00:50:15,239
Speaker 4: him away. No sooner does he go away though. That

815
00:50:15,360 --> 00:50:19,440
Speaker 4: conflict is resolved and he's back home. It's like the

816
00:50:19,520 --> 00:50:21,880
Speaker 4: thing you expect to be coming the whole time comes

817
00:50:21,880 --> 00:50:25,239
Speaker 4: in the end and it gets resolved very quickly, but

818
00:50:25,280 --> 00:50:28,160
Speaker 4: then you quickly launch into this this other thing, and

819
00:50:28,200 --> 00:50:32,560
Speaker 4: then the heartbreak because then everyone he cares about dies.

820
00:50:33,760 --> 00:50:36,240
Speaker 4: His friend that we haven't talked about, Willow John, dies,

821
00:50:36,360 --> 00:50:38,560
Speaker 4: the grandpa dies, the grandma dies.

822
00:50:39,160 --> 00:50:40,240
Speaker 5: Then you go through.

823
00:50:40,120 --> 00:50:43,760
Speaker 4: All of the dogs dying one by one until he's alone.

824
00:50:44,360 --> 00:50:47,879
Speaker 4: Then the book, without any the book just ends. He

825
00:50:47,920 --> 00:50:52,520
Speaker 4: buries the last dog and it's done. There's not even

826
00:50:52,520 --> 00:50:57,319
Speaker 4: the sentence the mule dies, So it's Southern literature. There's

827
00:50:57,320 --> 00:50:59,560
Speaker 4: a dead mule, all the dogs die.

828
00:50:59,680 --> 00:51:03,879
Speaker 5: It's yeah, and you have no idea like.

829
00:51:04,200 --> 00:51:06,960
Speaker 2: Yeah, you're left. We don't know what happened.

830
00:51:06,960 --> 00:51:08,000
Speaker 5: Only we don't even know.

831
00:51:08,800 --> 00:51:12,280
Speaker 4: We don't know what kind of person he became, because

832
00:51:12,400 --> 00:51:14,879
Speaker 4: even when you get into the end, when he leaves home,

833
00:51:15,280 --> 00:51:16,200
Speaker 4: he just walks away.

834
00:51:16,680 --> 00:51:18,759
Speaker 5: When he leaves, he walks out, shuts.

835
00:51:18,520 --> 00:51:20,719
Speaker 4: The door behind him, and walks out, And we don't

836
00:51:20,719 --> 00:51:23,560
Speaker 4: see him come up against anything moral. We don't see

837
00:51:23,600 --> 00:51:26,560
Speaker 4: him come up against any conflict. We don't see him

838
00:51:26,600 --> 00:51:29,600
Speaker 4: interact with any other human. We just see him go

839
00:51:29,719 --> 00:51:32,239
Speaker 4: through the act of burying everything he loves in an

840
00:51:32,320 --> 00:51:36,080
Speaker 4: areas alone. You assume that he carries with him this

841
00:51:36,160 --> 00:51:38,000
Speaker 4: strong moral compass, but we don't see it.

842
00:51:40,200 --> 00:51:46,320
Speaker 2: Spoiler alert, everything dies. If you choose to read this book,

843
00:51:46,440 --> 00:51:49,560
Speaker 2: which I would recommend, you have to take the big

844
00:51:49,600 --> 00:51:53,120
Speaker 2: boy approach, knowing all the while what's coming, while still

845
00:51:53,239 --> 00:51:56,040
Speaker 2: allowing it to take you on a journey. It's a

846
00:51:56,160 --> 00:51:59,920
Speaker 2: double whammy because you'll also know Asa Carter's story too.

847
00:52:01,360 --> 00:52:05,799
Speaker 2: In this closing section, Steve asked me a very difficult

848
00:52:05,920 --> 00:52:09,680
Speaker 2: question and then delves into a very serious topic in

849
00:52:09,760 --> 00:52:13,320
Speaker 2: today's America. It's good insight from Steve.

850
00:52:15,440 --> 00:52:17,120
Speaker 4: When you were working on this, I've spoke to you

851
00:52:17,200 --> 00:52:20,640
Speaker 4: and you mentioned talking to an academic who said to you,

852
00:52:20,640 --> 00:52:26,440
Speaker 4: you know that book's been blacklist blacklisted. I understand that,

853
00:52:26,600 --> 00:52:29,680
Speaker 4: and I understand why I was given the book not

854
00:52:29,719 --> 00:52:32,000
Speaker 4: as a kid, but as a student, as a college student,

855
00:52:32,080 --> 00:52:34,640
Speaker 4: and I was very quickly after giving the book, I

856
00:52:34,680 --> 00:52:37,560
Speaker 4: was invited to wrestle with the identity of the author.

857
00:52:38,360 --> 00:52:41,080
Speaker 4: Here's a question for you. Do you read this to

858
00:52:41,120 --> 00:52:46,359
Speaker 4: your kid? I can't decide. Hmmm, man, eight ten and twelve.

859
00:52:46,440 --> 00:52:48,200
Speaker 4: My kids are eight ten and twelve. Do I read

860
00:52:48,239 --> 00:52:51,239
Speaker 4: them that book and then say, let me tell you

861
00:52:51,239 --> 00:52:52,080
Speaker 4: something about that person?

862
00:52:52,120 --> 00:52:52,840
Speaker 3: A tough question.

863
00:52:53,120 --> 00:52:53,760
Speaker 5: I haven't.

864
00:52:53,880 --> 00:52:57,040
Speaker 2: But that is the biggest question here is that I

865
00:52:57,120 --> 00:53:00,359
Speaker 2: read this book and was fascinated by it, not even

866
00:53:00,400 --> 00:53:02,520
Speaker 2: looking at what we know about the author, but just

867
00:53:02,600 --> 00:53:07,879
Speaker 2: the connection to nature. The way the grandfather presented the

868
00:53:07,920 --> 00:53:11,080
Speaker 2: world to little Tree was just so interesting, and it

869
00:53:11,120 --> 00:53:13,120
Speaker 2: would be hard to find fault with much of it,

870
00:53:13,160 --> 00:53:15,680
Speaker 2: even the stuff about the government. I mean, a lot

871
00:53:15,680 --> 00:53:18,760
Speaker 2: of people I think would read it and be like, yeah.

872
00:53:18,520 --> 00:53:22,240
Speaker 4: After the fact, after the revelations came out, people came

873
00:53:22,360 --> 00:53:25,040
Speaker 4: forward and like, well, you know, it is very stereotypical,

874
00:53:25,120 --> 00:53:26,880
Speaker 4: and the characters very stereotypical.

875
00:53:27,120 --> 00:53:28,759
Speaker 5: But go find me people that were saying that in

876
00:53:28,760 --> 00:53:29,280
Speaker 5: the seventies.

877
00:53:29,360 --> 00:53:31,920
Speaker 3: Yeah, they weren't. It's a full Oprah Winfrey.

878
00:53:32,160 --> 00:53:34,800
Speaker 4: It's a real tough one. Once people were armed with

879
00:53:34,840 --> 00:53:36,799
Speaker 4: the truth, then they found all kinds of things. Well,

880
00:53:36,920 --> 00:53:39,080
Speaker 4: once they knew it, you know what, once they knew

881
00:53:39,080 --> 00:53:41,359
Speaker 4: what they were looking for, they found it. But they

882
00:53:41,360 --> 00:53:42,480
Speaker 4: didn't find it ahead of.

883
00:53:42,440 --> 00:53:45,840
Speaker 2: Time, right, Steve, you tell me what you think happened here.

884
00:53:46,880 --> 00:53:51,000
Speaker 2: I could not find an academic person. It's someone that

885
00:53:51,000 --> 00:53:55,040
Speaker 2: worked for university literary professor that would talk to me

886
00:53:55,080 --> 00:53:58,720
Speaker 2: about this book. And it wasn't necessary. At first, I thought,

887
00:53:58,920 --> 00:54:01,680
Speaker 2: this book is well. The first person that did respond said, hey,

888
00:54:02,200 --> 00:54:05,600
Speaker 2: you realize this book has been blacklisted. That was essentially

889
00:54:05,640 --> 00:54:08,960
Speaker 2: his response, and I said, yeah, that's why I want

890
00:54:09,000 --> 00:54:11,040
Speaker 2: to talk about it. And then I began to get

891
00:54:11,080 --> 00:54:14,360
Speaker 2: the feeling that people didn't want to talk about it, yeah,

892
00:54:14,440 --> 00:54:18,600
Speaker 2: because it's just like, hey, don't even go there. But

893
00:54:18,840 --> 00:54:22,279
Speaker 2: I also think that I was sending emails out to

894
00:54:22,320 --> 00:54:24,959
Speaker 2: a bunch of people in contacting a big, wide web

895
00:54:25,000 --> 00:54:27,319
Speaker 2: of people, which we did, to which we had very

896
00:54:27,360 --> 00:54:30,759
Speaker 2: little response, which is unusual. I've rarely been found a

897
00:54:30,800 --> 00:54:33,279
Speaker 2: book that I couldn't find somebody willing to talk to

898
00:54:33,280 --> 00:54:36,560
Speaker 2: me about. I think that might also be a response

899
00:54:36,600 --> 00:54:40,000
Speaker 2: to the thing being blacklisted thirty years ago. Absolutely so,

900
00:54:40,120 --> 00:54:42,759
Speaker 2: just nobody's read it, nobody's read it in thirty years, and.

901
00:54:42,840 --> 00:54:44,440
Speaker 4: They're gonna be afraid to talk about it now. I

902
00:54:44,440 --> 00:54:46,680
Speaker 4: know you don't like to get like overtly political. I'm

903
00:54:46,680 --> 00:54:47,960
Speaker 4: not going to get political, but I'm going to make

904
00:54:47,960 --> 00:54:48,920
Speaker 4: a point about something.

905
00:54:49,120 --> 00:54:49,440
Speaker 3: Sure.

906
00:54:49,600 --> 00:54:53,600
Speaker 4: At a time Republicans. At a time, the Republican Party

907
00:54:54,000 --> 00:54:58,040
Speaker 4: was free trade in nation building. Okay, you just go

908
00:54:58,080 --> 00:55:00,799
Speaker 4: back to the Neo kons free trade, nation building. It's

909
00:55:00,840 --> 00:55:05,759
Speaker 4: now not right. So there's protectionism, not free trade, emerging

910
00:55:05,800 --> 00:55:10,480
Speaker 4: as a pronomenant thing in the Republican Party. Protectionism and isolationism,

911
00:55:10,520 --> 00:55:14,880
Speaker 4: not meddling and not meddling in foreign affairs. Okay, protecting

912
00:55:14,960 --> 00:55:17,560
Speaker 4: our own trade, not meddling in foreign affairs. Had you

913
00:55:17,600 --> 00:55:20,080
Speaker 4: said ten years ago what a Republican is, you'd have

914
00:55:20,120 --> 00:55:23,360
Speaker 4: brought up nation building and free trade. So things change

915
00:55:23,920 --> 00:55:28,440
Speaker 4: Universities used to be heralded as a place where there

916
00:55:28,440 --> 00:55:30,839
Speaker 4: was a free exchange of ideas, where you could talk

917
00:55:30,880 --> 00:55:37,560
Speaker 4: about dangerous stuff. They're not now, by and large, universities

918
00:55:37,600 --> 00:55:40,440
Speaker 4: have become places where you need to tread very lightly.

919
00:55:40,960 --> 00:55:43,879
Speaker 4: You do not talk about dangerous stuff because you will

920
00:55:43,880 --> 00:55:47,239
Speaker 4: get reprimanded, and you'll get blacklisted, and you'll lose your job.

921
00:55:47,800 --> 00:55:53,480
Speaker 4: Universities have somehow become somewhat anti intellectual, and they have

922
00:55:53,560 --> 00:55:57,239
Speaker 4: become places where people are afraid of the exchange of ideas.

923
00:55:57,520 --> 00:55:59,000
Speaker 4: So that you're now not going to be able to

924
00:55:59,040 --> 00:56:01,000
Speaker 4: get someone to talk to you about this book. Is

925
00:56:01,040 --> 00:56:02,480
Speaker 4: because they probably want to.

926
00:56:02,840 --> 00:56:03,360
Speaker 5: They're scared.

927
00:56:03,480 --> 00:56:05,399
Speaker 4: Yeah, because someone's going to come for them for talking

928
00:56:05,400 --> 00:56:06,480
Speaker 4: about dangerous stuff.

929
00:56:06,560 --> 00:56:06,920
Speaker 5: Yeah.

930
00:56:06,960 --> 00:56:09,360
Speaker 4: I guess now, if you want to talk about dangerous

931
00:56:09,360 --> 00:56:10,920
Speaker 4: stuff and free ideas, you got to listen to the

932
00:56:10,920 --> 00:56:11,760
Speaker 4: bar Grease podcast.

933
00:56:11,920 --> 00:56:12,399
Speaker 3: That's right.

934
00:56:13,200 --> 00:56:15,719
Speaker 2: Steve Ranella, the old guy in the country that would

935
00:56:15,719 --> 00:56:23,960
Speaker 2: talk to me about the education of Little Tree. We

936
00:56:24,239 --> 00:56:27,840
Speaker 2: ended on a light note, but the content was very serious.

937
00:56:28,719 --> 00:56:32,319
Speaker 2: Often it seems the people who demand tolerance in their

938
00:56:32,400 --> 00:56:37,000
Speaker 2: pursuit of enforcing it are incredibly intolerant. We live in

939
00:56:37,080 --> 00:56:40,759
Speaker 2: a messed up world, and the most powerful contribution we have,

940
00:56:41,360 --> 00:56:45,520
Speaker 2: bigger than voting, bigger than shouting down the crazies, bigger

941
00:56:45,560 --> 00:56:49,880
Speaker 2: than fighting foreign armies, bigger than our political doctrine, is

942
00:56:49,920 --> 00:56:57,120
Speaker 2: to build our individual lives and families intentionally, introspectively, empathetically

943
00:56:57,560 --> 00:57:03,440
Speaker 2: and with an unembittered, humble boldness towards truth. And it

944
00:57:03,560 --> 00:57:07,000
Speaker 2: helps to have a macro perspective of history that shows

945
00:57:07,080 --> 00:57:10,400
Speaker 2: us that life is short, and our lives are like

946
00:57:10,480 --> 00:57:11,799
Speaker 2: the flowers.

947
00:57:11,280 --> 00:57:11,880
Speaker 3: Of the field.

948
00:57:11,960 --> 00:57:15,440
Speaker 2: We pop up, then fade away. And I believe with

949
00:57:15,560 --> 00:57:19,400
Speaker 2: great certainty that will give account for our lives after

950
00:57:19,520 --> 00:57:23,320
Speaker 2: our death, and that knowledge is a powerful driver in

951
00:57:23,440 --> 00:57:28,480
Speaker 2: my life and actions here. I want to have integrity.

952
00:57:29,200 --> 00:57:32,720
Speaker 2: That's why fearlessly looking back into our history at some

953
00:57:32,920 --> 00:57:36,480
Speaker 2: bad stuff and sorting through it will help us navigate

954
00:57:36,640 --> 00:57:37,240
Speaker 2: the future.

955
00:57:37,800 --> 00:57:39,320
Speaker 3: I think this is powerful stuff.

956
00:57:40,080 --> 00:57:44,160
Speaker 2: And man as crazy as Asa Carter was, I cannot

957
00:57:44,200 --> 00:57:48,880
Speaker 2: lie my life was enriched by reading the Education of Littletree.

958
00:57:49,040 --> 00:57:50,480
Speaker 3: I don't fully understand it.

959
00:57:50,960 --> 00:57:53,560
Speaker 2: You have to make that decision for yourself if you'd

960
00:57:53,640 --> 00:57:57,360
Speaker 2: read this book to your kids. On the next episode,

961
00:57:57,400 --> 00:58:00,440
Speaker 2: we'll again have Steve Vanella and doctor Dan Carr, and

962
00:58:00,480 --> 00:58:03,480
Speaker 2: we'll look even deeper into the double life of Asa

963
00:58:03,560 --> 00:58:06,200
Speaker 2: Carter and try to make sense of his life to

964
00:58:06,320 --> 00:58:09,919
Speaker 2: decide if he was a changed man, a con man,

965
00:58:10,600 --> 00:58:16,080
Speaker 2: or a crazy man. It's gonna be really good. Thank

966
00:58:16,120 --> 00:58:19,280
Speaker 2: you so much for listening to bear Grease, and don't

967
00:58:19,320 --> 00:58:22,720
Speaker 2: forget our big news about my bro Brent Reeves and

968
00:58:22,760 --> 00:58:26,880
Speaker 2: his new podcast, This Country Life that'll be on this

969
00:58:27,040 --> 00:58:30,480
Speaker 2: Bear Grease podcast feed. I hope you have a great

970
00:58:30,520 --> 00:58:33,240
Speaker 2: week and I look forward to discussing this with the

971
00:58:33,320 --> 00:58:35,760
Speaker 2: crew next week on the Bear Grease Render.