1 00:00:16,115 --> 00:00:30,155 Speaker 1: Pushkin The Last Archive, A History of Truth. 2 00:00:34,995 --> 00:00:38,235 Speaker 2: Ella Fitzgerald never much liked doing interviews, which was too 3 00:00:38,235 --> 00:00:41,395 Speaker 2: bad because she did them all the time. Here's what 4 00:00:41,555 --> 00:00:43,355 Speaker 2: she did in Dallas in the nineteen eighties. 5 00:00:44,195 --> 00:00:47,795 Speaker 3: Ella, welcome back to Dallas. How marvelous. Oh, thank you, 6 00:00:47,915 --> 00:00:49,755 Speaker 3: and it's a pleasure to be back here here. 7 00:00:50,515 --> 00:00:53,115 Speaker 2: From the moment she'd become famous in the nineteen thirties, 8 00:00:53,395 --> 00:00:56,315 Speaker 2: everybody loved her, and from then right on through to 9 00:00:56,355 --> 00:00:59,115 Speaker 2: this interview in the nineteen eighties, people wanted to tell 10 00:00:59,115 --> 00:01:01,675 Speaker 2: her that over and over and over again. 11 00:01:02,235 --> 00:01:04,115 Speaker 4: You know, Ella, you really are. 12 00:01:04,755 --> 00:01:06,435 Speaker 5: You're one of the national treasures. 13 00:01:06,635 --> 00:01:07,595 Speaker 1: Do you realize that? 14 00:01:08,915 --> 00:01:12,355 Speaker 3: I realized that a lot of people loved me, and 15 00:01:12,395 --> 00:01:14,315 Speaker 3: I think that's the most important thing. 16 00:01:15,115 --> 00:01:18,675 Speaker 2: One of the stories, the story really that Fitzgerald always 17 00:01:18,715 --> 00:01:20,635 Speaker 2: got asked to tell, was the story of how she 18 00:01:20,675 --> 00:01:24,435 Speaker 2: got famous the Amateur Hour at the Apollo Theater in Harlem, 19 00:01:24,475 --> 00:01:27,315 Speaker 2: when she was supposed to dance but got nervous and 20 00:01:27,395 --> 00:01:31,475 Speaker 2: started to sing instead. It was the moment everyone realized 21 00:01:31,555 --> 00:01:34,875 Speaker 2: she had an incredible voice. And it's a good story. 22 00:01:35,035 --> 00:01:38,435 Speaker 2: So she's about to tell it again, but listen closely 23 00:01:38,515 --> 00:01:40,115 Speaker 2: to what happens when she does. 24 00:01:41,595 --> 00:01:44,795 Speaker 3: Ella, as you look back on your life, here was 25 00:01:44,835 --> 00:01:50,675 Speaker 3: a child from an orphanage and now no, no, somebody 26 00:01:50,755 --> 00:01:51,555 Speaker 3: wrote that up. 27 00:01:51,635 --> 00:01:52,795 Speaker 6: Where did that get come? 28 00:01:52,955 --> 00:01:56,555 Speaker 3: I well, that was a publicity thing a long time ago. 29 00:01:56,675 --> 00:01:59,875 Speaker 3: But I have family, and I had family then, but 30 00:01:59,995 --> 00:02:03,955 Speaker 3: my mother had died, and I guess that's why they 31 00:02:04,035 --> 00:02:07,115 Speaker 3: used that. Mind that I was an orphan but I 32 00:02:07,155 --> 00:02:07,795 Speaker 3: had family. 33 00:02:07,835 --> 00:02:09,635 Speaker 6: At what age were you when your mother? 34 00:02:09,915 --> 00:02:12,195 Speaker 5: I was fifteen? 35 00:02:12,795 --> 00:02:17,395 Speaker 3: About fifteen, because from there we went to the amateur contest. 36 00:02:18,795 --> 00:02:22,675 Speaker 2: That line about the orphanage. It's not strictly true, but 37 00:02:22,755 --> 00:02:26,515 Speaker 2: it's not far off either, because Fitzgerald's not mentioning something 38 00:02:26,555 --> 00:02:28,635 Speaker 2: else that happened right around the same time as that 39 00:02:28,715 --> 00:02:32,595 Speaker 2: amateur night, a missing chapter in her story that must 40 00:02:32,595 --> 00:02:34,915 Speaker 2: have been one of the hardest, most formative times of 41 00:02:34,915 --> 00:02:38,035 Speaker 2: her life, a chapter that has a lot to do 42 00:02:38,115 --> 00:02:47,875 Speaker 2: with that question about the orphanage. Welcome to Season four 43 00:02:47,915 --> 00:02:50,395 Speaker 2: of The Last Archive, the show about how we know 44 00:02:50,435 --> 00:02:52,475 Speaker 2: what we know and why it seems like we don't 45 00:02:52,515 --> 00:02:56,755 Speaker 2: know anything at all anymore. I'm ben Matta Haffrey. This 46 00:02:56,875 --> 00:03:00,595 Speaker 2: episode is not about Ela Fitzgerald, or not only about 47 00:03:00,635 --> 00:03:03,875 Speaker 2: Ela Fitzgerald, but it is about the place where she 48 00:03:03,995 --> 00:03:08,155 Speaker 2: spent that missing time, because in Fitzgerald's a Mission lies 49 00:03:08,195 --> 00:03:11,755 Speaker 2: an experiment, social science study that I believe she was 50 00:03:11,795 --> 00:03:14,835 Speaker 2: a data point in one of the most important, overlooked 51 00:03:14,835 --> 00:03:18,435 Speaker 2: experiments of the twentieth century. These days, we're all used 52 00:03:18,475 --> 00:03:21,435 Speaker 2: to thinking of ourselves as part of social networks, chains 53 00:03:21,435 --> 00:03:24,835 Speaker 2: of influence linking us all together. This episode is about 54 00:03:24,835 --> 00:03:28,235 Speaker 2: where those ideas came from. Well, come back to Fitzgerald, 55 00:03:28,275 --> 00:03:32,675 Speaker 2: I promise, but first I want you to meet the experimenter. 56 00:03:37,195 --> 00:03:40,435 Speaker 2: In the nineteen teens, an ocean away in Austria, there 57 00:03:40,475 --> 00:03:44,395 Speaker 2: was a young and rather mysterious medical student named Jacob 58 00:03:44,675 --> 00:03:45,635 Speaker 2: Levy Moreno. 59 00:03:47,435 --> 00:03:53,155 Speaker 5: I was born on the book The Black Sea, and 60 00:03:53,195 --> 00:03:55,395 Speaker 5: I'll be traveling from one part of the world to 61 00:03:55,595 --> 00:03:57,915 Speaker 5: the others and to find myself. 62 00:03:58,715 --> 00:04:02,115 Speaker 2: Moreno was hard to miss. He'd stride around campus in 63 00:04:02,155 --> 00:04:05,715 Speaker 2: a green peasant's cloak, hatless with a long flowing beard. 64 00:04:06,315 --> 00:04:08,315 Speaker 2: When he was a baby, or so the story goes, 65 00:04:08,595 --> 00:04:10,875 Speaker 2: a woman on the street pointed out at him and said, 66 00:04:11,035 --> 00:04:13,675 Speaker 2: the day will come when this boy will become a 67 00:04:13,835 --> 00:04:16,515 Speaker 2: very great man. People will come from all over the 68 00:04:16,515 --> 00:04:20,875 Speaker 2: world to see him. And so Jacob Levy Moreno was 69 00:04:20,955 --> 00:04:25,435 Speaker 2: always invested in his own sense of destiny. In medical school, 70 00:04:25,515 --> 00:04:27,875 Speaker 2: he worked on the side as a tutor for young children, 71 00:04:28,235 --> 00:04:30,635 Speaker 2: and this is where the seed of his big experiment 72 00:04:30,755 --> 00:04:36,675 Speaker 2: was planted, the one that intersected with Ela Fitzgerald. The 73 00:04:36,675 --> 00:04:39,635 Speaker 2: more he interacted with kids, the more interested he got 74 00:04:39,715 --> 00:04:43,275 Speaker 2: in their fantasies. He'd walk through the public park and 75 00:04:43,355 --> 00:04:45,555 Speaker 2: sit on a low hanging branch of a big tree 76 00:04:45,835 --> 00:04:48,395 Speaker 2: and tell the kid's fairy tales and then watch them 77 00:04:48,395 --> 00:04:52,795 Speaker 2: play together. What interested moreno about children was how easily 78 00:04:52,795 --> 00:04:56,195 Speaker 2: they could take on new identities, play pretend, make up stories, 79 00:04:56,395 --> 00:05:00,795 Speaker 2: believe in the unreal. That spontaneity revealed who they really were, 80 00:05:01,155 --> 00:05:04,515 Speaker 2: but it also allowed them to recreate themselves together in 81 00:05:04,555 --> 00:05:07,435 Speaker 2: a group. A spontaneous game of make believe is a 82 00:05:07,515 --> 00:05:09,955 Speaker 2: kind of magic. How does everyone agree on an new 83 00:05:10,035 --> 00:05:14,875 Speaker 2: reality together instinctively? Kids do it effortlessly, and he wanted 84 00:05:14,875 --> 00:05:17,955 Speaker 2: to give that kind of freedom to everybody. So he 85 00:05:18,035 --> 00:05:21,395 Speaker 2: watched the kids play, told his stories, and started a 86 00:05:21,475 --> 00:05:25,915 Speaker 2: children's theater to think about groups and spontaneity. But this 87 00:05:26,035 --> 00:05:27,795 Speaker 2: was in the lead up to the First World War, 88 00:05:28,395 --> 00:05:31,315 Speaker 2: and when it came to make believe came grinding to 89 00:05:31,395 --> 00:05:37,475 Speaker 2: a halt. Moreno went to work at a refugee camp. 90 00:05:38,915 --> 00:05:42,915 Speaker 5: And I was an officer of health in a camp 91 00:05:43,155 --> 00:05:46,715 Speaker 5: near Vienna. They were taken away and brought into this 92 00:05:47,155 --> 00:05:51,755 Speaker 5: camp about ten thousand Italians, all presents, all Catholic, and 93 00:05:51,795 --> 00:05:55,515 Speaker 5: there I saw the community developing from scratch. 94 00:05:56,435 --> 00:06:00,035 Speaker 2: This fascinated Moreno. Watching these groups form was like trying 95 00:06:00,035 --> 00:06:02,315 Speaker 2: to figure out how those kids in the park created 96 00:06:02,355 --> 00:06:06,555 Speaker 2: small communities. Except in the camp. There was no spontaneity 97 00:06:06,595 --> 00:06:08,515 Speaker 2: in joy. There was only pain. 98 00:06:09,115 --> 00:06:12,755 Speaker 5: Immediately Igan to see attractions and repulsions, and indifferences and 99 00:06:13,035 --> 00:06:17,675 Speaker 5: jealousies and hate, which hinted the process of intubation. 100 00:06:18,435 --> 00:06:21,475 Speaker 2: As Marino saw it, the problem was the camp administration 101 00:06:21,675 --> 00:06:23,755 Speaker 2: didn't have a way of thinking of people as both 102 00:06:23,795 --> 00:06:26,675 Speaker 2: individuals and members of a group at the same time. 103 00:06:27,435 --> 00:06:31,955 Speaker 2: Social scientists often considered groups as a mass, think averages, polls, 104 00:06:32,155 --> 00:06:35,875 Speaker 2: big static numbers. But Marino knew that the truth about 105 00:06:35,875 --> 00:06:39,475 Speaker 2: these people lay in their relationships as individuals within groups. 106 00:06:40,035 --> 00:06:42,635 Speaker 2: The people in the camp weren't just generically in the camp. 107 00:06:42,995 --> 00:06:47,635 Speaker 2: They were specific individuals in specific housing near specific other people. 108 00:06:48,595 --> 00:06:50,555 Speaker 2: He wanted to figure out a way to trace that 109 00:06:50,675 --> 00:06:55,955 Speaker 2: influence a full scientific picture of social reality. He later 110 00:06:55,995 --> 00:06:58,595 Speaker 2: claimed to have brought his ideas to the government administrators, 111 00:06:59,075 --> 00:07:00,035 Speaker 2: but they shot him down. 112 00:07:01,075 --> 00:07:05,755 Speaker 5: It is it is impractical. I was, and I was 113 00:07:05,875 --> 00:07:09,395 Speaker 5: crazy his illusion, and so the result was that I 114 00:07:10,515 --> 00:07:12,675 Speaker 5: began then to study small groups. 115 00:07:14,235 --> 00:07:16,595 Speaker 2: That's how Moreno got through those hard years of war, 116 00:07:17,195 --> 00:07:19,795 Speaker 2: working in the camps and using his free time to 117 00:07:19,835 --> 00:07:22,915 Speaker 2: work on his ideas about groups. When the war was 118 00:07:22,955 --> 00:07:25,235 Speaker 2: over and ma Reno had finished his studies and gotten 119 00:07:25,235 --> 00:07:27,835 Speaker 2: his medical degree, he wanted to go out into the 120 00:07:27,835 --> 00:07:31,275 Speaker 2: world and explore his ideas about community as a practicing physician. 121 00:07:31,995 --> 00:07:34,715 Speaker 2: Problem was, these were the years of Freud and the 122 00:07:34,755 --> 00:07:38,995 Speaker 2: science of the self. You can imagine that classic scene, 123 00:07:39,515 --> 00:07:43,275 Speaker 2: lying on the couch in a psychoanalyst's office, your Freudian 124 00:07:43,315 --> 00:07:47,195 Speaker 2: psychoanalyst asking you about your childhood, your relationship with your mother, 125 00:07:47,755 --> 00:07:51,315 Speaker 2: asking you about you. In particular, the function of that 126 00:07:51,475 --> 00:07:54,075 Speaker 2: couch in the office was to shut the rest of 127 00:07:54,075 --> 00:07:56,835 Speaker 2: the world away. To them. The group was a separate 128 00:07:56,835 --> 00:07:59,275 Speaker 2: thing that had almost nothing to do with the individual, 129 00:07:59,795 --> 00:08:04,755 Speaker 2: and everyone was obsessed with the individual, everyone except Moreno. 130 00:08:05,395 --> 00:08:07,675 Speaker 2: It really annoyed him. It was as if to this 131 00:08:07,755 --> 00:08:11,315 Speaker 2: incredibly active, dramatic man, the greatest sin was to lie 132 00:08:11,315 --> 00:08:14,035 Speaker 2: down on a couch alone and think about your problems. 133 00:08:14,555 --> 00:08:16,675 Speaker 2: He used to bring it up all the time in 134 00:08:16,755 --> 00:08:18,355 Speaker 2: speeches to big groups of people. 135 00:08:18,875 --> 00:08:21,115 Speaker 6: Yes, did people who go on the college for six eights, 136 00:08:21,835 --> 00:08:24,795 Speaker 6: spending twenty thousand dollars and so forth, and then they 137 00:08:24,835 --> 00:08:25,675 Speaker 6: come to us. 138 00:08:26,115 --> 00:08:28,915 Speaker 2: But Moreno had bigger challenges than the fact that nobody 139 00:08:28,995 --> 00:08:32,755 Speaker 2: was interested in his research. Violence and persecution of Jews 140 00:08:32,795 --> 00:08:36,035 Speaker 2: is on the rise, and like so many other Jewish intellectuals, 141 00:08:36,155 --> 00:08:39,475 Speaker 2: Moreno fled Europe sailing for New York in nineteen twenty five. 142 00:08:39,995 --> 00:08:42,755 Speaker 2: But New York wasn't the most welcoming place either. 143 00:08:43,795 --> 00:08:48,915 Speaker 6: This was just after the Congress had passed legislation greatly 144 00:08:48,995 --> 00:08:51,475 Speaker 6: limiting immigration from Eastern Europe. 145 00:08:51,795 --> 00:08:55,475 Speaker 2: Jonathan Moreno is a bioethicist and historian at the University 146 00:08:55,475 --> 00:08:59,235 Speaker 2: of Pennsylvania also Jayale Moreno's son, and. 147 00:08:59,235 --> 00:09:02,555 Speaker 6: It was especially aimed at Jews and Italians. It was 148 00:09:02,635 --> 00:09:06,795 Speaker 6: a really a very clear effort to keep the white 149 00:09:06,835 --> 00:09:10,195 Speaker 6: American race as pure as possible by keeping the Jews 150 00:09:10,235 --> 00:09:11,595 Speaker 6: and Italians out. 151 00:09:11,595 --> 00:09:14,995 Speaker 2: But Marinos slipped through. He lived in a hotel on 152 00:09:15,035 --> 00:09:17,075 Speaker 2: the cheap on the Upper West Side and tried to 153 00:09:17,075 --> 00:09:20,075 Speaker 2: figure out what to do. It was hard, but after 154 00:09:20,115 --> 00:09:22,235 Speaker 2: a couple of years he began to practice a little 155 00:09:22,275 --> 00:09:25,355 Speaker 2: as a physician again. He had a small group of accolytes, 156 00:09:25,475 --> 00:09:27,155 Speaker 2: and one of them married him for a time so 157 00:09:27,195 --> 00:09:30,315 Speaker 2: he could get citizenship. By this point, he'd started an 158 00:09:30,315 --> 00:09:32,635 Speaker 2: improv theater at Carnegie Hall as part of a long 159 00:09:32,715 --> 00:09:35,275 Speaker 2: running goal he had of reforming the theater, but he 160 00:09:35,355 --> 00:09:38,275 Speaker 2: was probably also thinking through his ideas about how groups 161 00:09:38,275 --> 00:09:41,075 Speaker 2: worked as he watched the cast perform different kinds of scenes. 162 00:09:42,115 --> 00:09:44,875 Speaker 2: How spontaneous were they, how quickly did they take on 163 00:09:44,995 --> 00:09:48,395 Speaker 2: new roles. A hallmark of his philosophy was the idea 164 00:09:48,475 --> 00:09:51,435 Speaker 2: that acting things out, taking on new roles could help 165 00:09:51,475 --> 00:09:54,395 Speaker 2: people work out their problems, just on the stage, not 166 00:09:54,555 --> 00:09:58,075 Speaker 2: on a couch. Through the theater, he'd made contact with 167 00:09:58,115 --> 00:10:01,515 Speaker 2: a psychology graduate student named Helen Hall Jennings who was 168 00:10:01,555 --> 00:10:05,315 Speaker 2: as interested in studying groups as he was. Together they 169 00:10:05,355 --> 00:10:08,275 Speaker 2: began to work out a method of graphing the relationships 170 00:10:08,315 --> 00:10:11,715 Speaker 2: between people seeing as individuals and members in a group 171 00:10:11,755 --> 00:10:14,395 Speaker 2: at the same time. But to get enough data to 172 00:10:14,475 --> 00:10:18,355 Speaker 2: test it out, they needed a big experiment, bigger than 173 00:10:18,395 --> 00:10:19,755 Speaker 2: an improv theater company. 174 00:10:20,275 --> 00:10:23,435 Speaker 6: He gets his big break when he goes to the 175 00:10:23,475 --> 00:10:29,195 Speaker 6: American Psychiatric Association meetings in Toronto in nineteen thirty one, where, 176 00:10:29,315 --> 00:10:35,075 Speaker 6: for some reason, another little immigrant named Abe Brill asks 177 00:10:36,075 --> 00:10:39,275 Speaker 6: my father to comment on his paper about a psycho 178 00:10:39,315 --> 00:10:40,395 Speaker 6: analysis of Lincoln. 179 00:10:41,355 --> 00:10:45,035 Speaker 2: Brill was the president of the American Psychiatric Association. He 180 00:10:45,435 --> 00:10:48,515 Speaker 2: died in the Wolfreudian, and in a paper called Abraham 181 00:10:48,555 --> 00:10:52,195 Speaker 2: Lincoln as Humorist, he tore the president apart. He said 182 00:10:52,235 --> 00:10:55,595 Speaker 2: Lincoln's jokes were so morbid and sexual they revealed he 183 00:10:55,715 --> 00:11:00,155 Speaker 2: was a schizoid syntonic personality, whatever that means. For instance, 184 00:11:00,475 --> 00:11:04,035 Speaker 2: when Lincoln's friend worried that Lincoln would be assassinated, Lincoln said, 185 00:11:04,195 --> 00:11:07,275 Speaker 2: if they kill me, I can't die another death. As 186 00:11:07,355 --> 00:11:10,035 Speaker 2: Brill explained to the press, a normal person I ought 187 00:11:10,075 --> 00:11:12,595 Speaker 2: to have said very well, I will be very careful. 188 00:11:13,275 --> 00:11:16,315 Speaker 2: This was hot stuff, and for some reason he asked 189 00:11:16,355 --> 00:11:17,675 Speaker 2: Marino to respond. 190 00:11:18,075 --> 00:11:21,435 Speaker 6: And now my dad is really trying to integrate himself 191 00:11:21,515 --> 00:11:25,435 Speaker 6: successfully with American culture, which you have to do as 192 00:11:25,475 --> 00:11:29,355 Speaker 6: an immigrant, and so he's a great fan of Lincoln. 193 00:11:29,795 --> 00:11:30,235 Speaker 7: Of course it. 194 00:11:30,235 --> 00:11:34,515 Speaker 2: Would be Moreno decided to psychoanalyze Brill in return in 195 00:11:34,555 --> 00:11:37,515 Speaker 2: front of everybody, to stand up for Lincoln, to humiliate 196 00:11:37,555 --> 00:11:40,435 Speaker 2: Brill and to show everyone in the process how ridiculous 197 00:11:40,435 --> 00:11:41,595 Speaker 2: psychoanalysis was. 198 00:11:42,235 --> 00:11:45,555 Speaker 6: So he actually turned the tables on Brill. Why would Brill, 199 00:11:45,955 --> 00:11:50,075 Speaker 6: the little five foot Brill, need to psychoanalyze to take 200 00:11:50,195 --> 00:11:54,075 Speaker 6: down the great Abraham Lincoln, the six foot pot four 201 00:11:54,115 --> 00:11:57,475 Speaker 6: or six foot five Abraham Lincoln. Right, well, Brill is furious. 202 00:11:57,635 --> 00:12:03,195 Speaker 2: Right, Moreno had put his stake in the ground, and 203 00:12:03,235 --> 00:12:06,395 Speaker 2: he was the talk of the conference. His reputation was growing. 204 00:12:06,715 --> 00:12:08,155 Speaker 2: All of a sudden, he was a person to pay 205 00:12:08,155 --> 00:12:11,555 Speaker 2: attention to. He gave a presentation on his new way 206 00:12:11,595 --> 00:12:14,355 Speaker 2: of understanding groups. People were very curious to hear what 207 00:12:14,395 --> 00:12:18,755 Speaker 2: he had to say. One woman in particular was intrigued. 208 00:12:19,315 --> 00:12:23,355 Speaker 2: Fanny French Morse. She ran a women's reformatory upstate, the 209 00:12:23,395 --> 00:12:26,475 Speaker 2: New York State Training School for Girls. She had an 210 00:12:26,475 --> 00:12:28,915 Speaker 2: idea that it might be the perfect place for Moreno 211 00:12:28,995 --> 00:12:32,715 Speaker 2: to make his biggest study. Yet his fate was on 212 00:12:32,755 --> 00:12:38,035 Speaker 2: the upswing. But meanwhile, a teenage Ela Fitzgerald's was about 213 00:12:38,075 --> 00:12:41,235 Speaker 2: to move in the opposite direction, because right around the 214 00:12:41,235 --> 00:12:44,355 Speaker 2: time of Moreno's big break, her mother got in a 215 00:12:44,395 --> 00:12:57,555 Speaker 2: serious car accident. We'll be right back Ella Fitzgerald was 216 00:12:57,595 --> 00:13:01,555 Speaker 2: born in Virginia in nineteen seventeen. Her family moved to 217 00:13:01,595 --> 00:13:04,435 Speaker 2: New York in the early nineteen twenties to Yonkers, a 218 00:13:04,435 --> 00:13:08,515 Speaker 2: few years before jail Moreno immigrated from Austria. As a girl, 219 00:13:08,635 --> 00:13:11,515 Speaker 2: she loved to dance. She was an excellent student too, 220 00:13:11,675 --> 00:13:14,435 Speaker 2: but her real education was making the rounds of the 221 00:13:14,515 --> 00:13:18,235 Speaker 2: dance halls picking up new steps. In nineteen thirty two, though, 222 00:13:18,515 --> 00:13:21,835 Speaker 2: her life began to fall apart, to fall apart in 223 00:13:21,875 --> 00:13:23,955 Speaker 2: a way that very soon put her in the path 224 00:13:23,995 --> 00:13:27,355 Speaker 2: of jail Moreno. That was the year Moreno was finally 225 00:13:27,395 --> 00:13:30,995 Speaker 2: finding his footing. His takedown of Abril, the Lincoln diagnosing 226 00:13:30,995 --> 00:13:34,795 Speaker 2: psychoanalyst and made him a minor celebrity. Elaine was opening 227 00:13:34,875 --> 00:13:38,155 Speaker 2: up for his new ideas about researching groups, which is 228 00:13:38,155 --> 00:13:42,275 Speaker 2: how he made contact with the progressive reformer Fanny French Moorse. 229 00:13:43,715 --> 00:13:45,955 Speaker 2: She invited him to move out of New York City 230 00:13:46,235 --> 00:13:49,275 Speaker 2: and up the river to Hudson to become the director 231 00:13:49,315 --> 00:13:52,715 Speaker 2: of research at the Reformatory where she was the superintendent 232 00:13:53,395 --> 00:13:59,235 Speaker 2: the New York State Training School for Girls. Moreno headed 233 00:13:59,315 --> 00:14:02,115 Speaker 2: up to the school. There's a silent film in his 234 00:14:02,235 --> 00:14:04,555 Speaker 2: archives that was taken a bit later on, so you 235 00:14:04,595 --> 00:14:07,275 Speaker 2: can see what it was probably like when he arrived. 236 00:14:08,195 --> 00:14:10,675 Speaker 2: The reformatory was set high eye up on a ridge 237 00:14:10,675 --> 00:14:13,875 Speaker 2: in Hudson, New York, an old industrial and whaling town. 238 00:14:14,035 --> 00:14:16,835 Speaker 2: The campus sprawled across one hundred and twenty five acres, 239 00:14:16,955 --> 00:14:21,595 Speaker 2: dotted with neat brick cottages, latticework, white trim, blue shutters, 240 00:14:21,875 --> 00:14:25,035 Speaker 2: clean and tidy. The girls at the training school lived 241 00:14:25,035 --> 00:14:27,715 Speaker 2: in the cottages, each of which was presided over by 242 00:14:27,715 --> 00:14:30,875 Speaker 2: a house mother. Moreno would later write that there was 243 00:14:30,915 --> 00:14:34,475 Speaker 2: a chapel, a hospital, an industrial building, a steam laundry, 244 00:14:34,555 --> 00:14:38,675 Speaker 2: a store, an administration building, even a farm. It looked 245 00:14:38,675 --> 00:14:41,675 Speaker 2: well ordered and open, like a boarding school, tucked away 246 00:14:41,675 --> 00:14:44,955 Speaker 2: in the quiet Hudson Valley, hours from the city. Except 247 00:14:45,035 --> 00:14:48,595 Speaker 2: it wasn't a boarding school. A reporter once wrote, in 248 00:14:48,675 --> 00:14:51,275 Speaker 2: only one respect, what a visitor suspect that this was 249 00:14:51,315 --> 00:14:54,315 Speaker 2: not a junior college of the free world. The girls 250 00:14:54,315 --> 00:15:00,795 Speaker 2: refer to life as outside. The reformatory is the kind 251 00:15:00,835 --> 00:15:03,635 Speaker 2: of place that looms in the collective unconscious, like the 252 00:15:03,635 --> 00:15:06,195 Speaker 2: insane asylum, the woods at the edge of town, the 253 00:15:06,235 --> 00:15:09,755 Speaker 2: abandoned manor the island prison, the kind of dark god 254 00:15:09,915 --> 00:15:12,355 Speaker 2: thick corner of the mind where stories gather like in 255 00:15:12,395 --> 00:15:15,955 Speaker 2: the spider's web. I think that's because there's an ambiguity 256 00:15:15,995 --> 00:15:18,315 Speaker 2: to it about the degree to which it's a school 257 00:15:18,515 --> 00:15:19,075 Speaker 2: or a prison. 258 00:15:19,875 --> 00:15:20,715 Speaker 8: I mean, I hate to call. 259 00:15:20,635 --> 00:15:21,195 Speaker 7: It a school. 260 00:15:21,915 --> 00:15:25,955 Speaker 2: Nina Bernstein longtime reporter at Newsday and The New York Times. 261 00:15:26,355 --> 00:15:28,915 Speaker 2: In the nineties, she began to investigate the history of 262 00:15:28,955 --> 00:15:31,195 Speaker 2: the New York State Training School for Girls for an 263 00:15:31,235 --> 00:15:34,955 Speaker 2: amazing book called The Lost Children of Wilder. She's the 264 00:15:35,035 --> 00:15:37,315 Speaker 2: kind of person who not only goes to the archive, 265 00:15:37,675 --> 00:15:40,355 Speaker 2: but once she's there, she turns every page. 266 00:15:40,555 --> 00:15:43,195 Speaker 8: The New York State Training School for Girls actually began 267 00:15:43,635 --> 00:15:47,635 Speaker 8: as a house of refuge for women in eighteen eighty seven, 268 00:15:48,595 --> 00:15:50,915 Speaker 8: and it was the first I think it was the 269 00:15:50,915 --> 00:15:55,835 Speaker 8: first place that women were separately held, and it was 270 00:15:55,835 --> 00:15:58,835 Speaker 8: seen as a great reform. As I discovered when I 271 00:15:58,835 --> 00:16:04,595 Speaker 8: looked at the records, this was a place of solitary confinement, 272 00:16:05,115 --> 00:16:13,275 Speaker 8: very harsh punishments, and minute survey of behavior. Were they 273 00:16:13,475 --> 00:16:17,715 Speaker 8: did they speak in a low voice? Were they too boisterous? 274 00:16:18,795 --> 00:16:20,915 Speaker 8: Did they sit up straight? I mean, you know that 275 00:16:21,075 --> 00:16:21,635 Speaker 8: kind of thing. 276 00:16:22,475 --> 00:16:24,995 Speaker 2: One of the biggest accomplishments of the progressive era was 277 00:16:25,035 --> 00:16:28,315 Speaker 2: the shift from trying children in adult courts to juvenile ones. 278 00:16:29,235 --> 00:16:32,635 Speaker 2: People were especially worried about putting kids in adult prisons 279 00:16:33,035 --> 00:16:35,635 Speaker 2: or even just leaving them in fast growing cities. The 280 00:16:35,715 --> 00:16:38,995 Speaker 2: reformatory was meant to solve for that, but in its 281 00:16:38,995 --> 00:16:43,235 Speaker 2: first few decades it kept getting made and remade. Marino 282 00:16:43,355 --> 00:16:44,955 Speaker 2: was brought in as part of one of the most 283 00:16:44,995 --> 00:16:48,475 Speaker 2: dramatic pushes to reform, an effort to understand how the 284 00:16:48,515 --> 00:16:50,475 Speaker 2: girls functioned together as a group. 285 00:16:51,555 --> 00:16:55,235 Speaker 8: I bring this up in part because you have then 286 00:16:55,675 --> 00:16:58,955 Speaker 8: another reformer, Fanny French Morse. 287 00:17:00,835 --> 00:17:03,475 Speaker 2: Morse had taken over the Hudson Reform School when it 288 00:17:03,515 --> 00:17:07,075 Speaker 2: had become basically a prison. When she took over, she 289 00:17:07,195 --> 00:17:09,515 Speaker 2: made a huge pile on the lawn of all the 290 00:17:10,035 --> 00:17:13,995 Speaker 2: uniforms and the straight jackets and the restraining sheets, and 291 00:17:14,035 --> 00:17:18,395 Speaker 2: then she lit them on fire. That was Fanny Morse, 292 00:17:18,955 --> 00:17:22,115 Speaker 2: burning it all down to build it again. She'd been 293 00:17:22,155 --> 00:17:25,875 Speaker 2: born in Maine and widowed young. She'd run reformatories all 294 00:17:25,915 --> 00:17:28,955 Speaker 2: over the place, and even worked on the national one. 295 00:17:28,995 --> 00:17:32,635 Speaker 2: She was glamorous, progressive, imposing. At an old job, her 296 00:17:32,635 --> 00:17:35,395 Speaker 2: coworkers remembered she had a fancy carriage that She never 297 00:17:35,515 --> 00:17:39,995 Speaker 2: drove herself. She wore small, rounded glasses, and she had 298 00:17:40,115 --> 00:17:43,515 Speaker 2: false teeth made of solid gold and painted white, and 299 00:17:43,555 --> 00:17:46,515 Speaker 2: they locked into her a jawbone with a small gold key. 300 00:17:47,555 --> 00:17:52,155 Speaker 2: That's how I imagine morse carriage waiting, metal jaw clenched, 301 00:17:52,595 --> 00:17:58,355 Speaker 2: bonfire glinting off her glasses, and gold key in her pocket. 302 00:17:58,675 --> 00:18:02,475 Speaker 2: She was a type the progressive arrow reformer. If you 303 00:18:02,515 --> 00:18:05,435 Speaker 2: were an ambitious woman in those days, running a reform 304 00:18:05,475 --> 00:18:08,435 Speaker 2: school was one of the few clear pathways to real 305 00:18:08,435 --> 00:18:13,075 Speaker 2: political power. But it was political power at a cost. 306 00:18:13,675 --> 00:18:15,355 Speaker 8: There was this idea at the time, you know, of 307 00:18:15,435 --> 00:18:18,875 Speaker 8: the woman as the guardian of the hearth, the angel 308 00:18:18,875 --> 00:18:21,995 Speaker 8: of the hearth, and the idea was you were going 309 00:18:22,035 --> 00:18:25,515 Speaker 8: to reprogram these women to be that and that otherwise 310 00:18:25,995 --> 00:18:30,755 Speaker 8: they were going to have these offspring who would be criminals, 311 00:18:30,755 --> 00:18:35,315 Speaker 8: and you know, you would essentially be decimating the race. 312 00:18:35,795 --> 00:18:42,035 Speaker 8: She is a reformer against that eugenics attitude that all 313 00:18:42,035 --> 00:18:46,955 Speaker 8: these girls are feeble minded, and she introduces art and 314 00:18:47,115 --> 00:18:51,155 Speaker 8: gardening and so on. There are these positive aspects, but 315 00:18:51,555 --> 00:18:55,875 Speaker 8: they are also these very negative aspects. From our perspective. 316 00:18:56,435 --> 00:18:59,635 Speaker 2: Morse was on a crusade. She moved into a Rundown 317 00:18:59,635 --> 00:19:02,555 Speaker 2: Old Colonial, half a mile from the school. It had 318 00:19:02,595 --> 00:19:05,195 Speaker 2: once been a grand house, but more recently had been 319 00:19:05,275 --> 00:19:07,835 Speaker 2: used as a brothel. She had the girls from the 320 00:19:07,835 --> 00:19:11,675 Speaker 2: school fix it up, polish the curve mahogany balustrade, restore 321 00:19:11,755 --> 00:19:14,635 Speaker 2: the old antiques. She said she believed in giving them 322 00:19:14,675 --> 00:19:17,995 Speaker 2: an esthetic education, and she held herself up as a model. 323 00:19:18,635 --> 00:19:20,915 Speaker 2: At Christmas, she'd put a candle lit tree in every 324 00:19:20,995 --> 00:19:23,355 Speaker 2: room of the first floor, and nost dinner parties for 325 00:19:23,395 --> 00:19:26,315 Speaker 2: her charges. In the summer, they'd come for dinner on 326 00:19:26,355 --> 00:19:29,715 Speaker 2: the porch. She remade the school in her image too. 327 00:19:29,835 --> 00:19:33,275 Speaker 2: The guardhouse became a teacher's cottage, and the cottages began 328 00:19:33,315 --> 00:19:35,435 Speaker 2: to fill up with old antiques that she'd gathered for 329 00:19:35,435 --> 00:19:38,355 Speaker 2: the girls to fix. She bought one hundred and twenty 330 00:19:38,355 --> 00:19:40,635 Speaker 2: acre farm for them to work. She got rid of 331 00:19:40,675 --> 00:19:43,115 Speaker 2: the uniforms and let them shop in town with an escort. 332 00:19:43,635 --> 00:19:46,315 Speaker 2: She was especially proud of her choir, and she showed 333 00:19:46,355 --> 00:19:50,395 Speaker 2: it off at every opportunity. The press loved her, the 334 00:19:50,435 --> 00:19:54,355 Speaker 2: revolutionary woman, reforming the reformatory, who had remade the school 335 00:19:54,555 --> 00:19:58,595 Speaker 2: so entirely that girls were supposedly begging to stay. But 336 00:19:59,195 --> 00:20:02,715 Speaker 2: there were some ugly rumors. A former employee of hers 337 00:20:02,755 --> 00:20:06,635 Speaker 2: once said, Fanny Frenchmores went through life making decisions on 338 00:20:06,675 --> 00:20:10,515 Speaker 2: the basis of what glorified her reputation. D jested Morse 339 00:20:10,555 --> 00:20:13,635 Speaker 2: had spent money on cosmetic improvements while her girls went 340 00:20:13,675 --> 00:20:18,195 Speaker 2: without the essentials. And Morse had another problem too, from 341 00:20:18,235 --> 00:20:23,515 Speaker 2: her supposedly perfect utopian reformatory. The girls kept running away. 342 00:20:24,875 --> 00:20:28,195 Speaker 2: That's why she needed Jael Moreno. While the girls ran 343 00:20:28,235 --> 00:20:30,555 Speaker 2: away was one of the first things her new director 344 00:20:30,555 --> 00:20:31,995 Speaker 2: of research was meant to study. 345 00:20:34,675 --> 00:20:37,515 Speaker 6: So now he has for the first time a big 346 00:20:37,515 --> 00:20:42,915 Speaker 6: institution with a completely free hand to exercise his ideas 347 00:20:43,035 --> 00:20:46,075 Speaker 6: about interpersonal relations and sociometrics. 348 00:20:46,595 --> 00:20:50,435 Speaker 2: Sociometry was what Moreno called his new science. He assembled 349 00:20:50,435 --> 00:20:53,315 Speaker 2: a team of research assistants. It seems that he lived 350 00:20:53,355 --> 00:20:56,195 Speaker 2: at the school, an entirely closed world of about five 351 00:20:56,275 --> 00:21:00,155 Speaker 2: hundred and five people. Moreno could finally make his map 352 00:21:00,275 --> 00:21:02,635 Speaker 2: of what he began to think of as a social network. 353 00:21:03,195 --> 00:21:05,755 Speaker 2: The closed world of the school was perfect because there 354 00:21:05,795 --> 00:21:09,595 Speaker 2: were clear boundaries. Nobody got in or out without someone 355 00:21:09,675 --> 00:21:10,475 Speaker 2: knowing about it. 356 00:21:11,395 --> 00:21:13,995 Speaker 6: The idea that you could walk into a community of 357 00:21:14,075 --> 00:21:18,875 Speaker 6: hundreds of kids basically and staff and all the caretakers 358 00:21:18,915 --> 00:21:21,075 Speaker 6: and so forth, and just look around and see these people. 359 00:21:22,195 --> 00:21:24,675 Speaker 6: That's the visible world, right, But then there's this whole 360 00:21:24,995 --> 00:21:29,355 Speaker 6: invisible world, sort of like when you look at the stars. 361 00:21:30,595 --> 00:21:34,195 Speaker 6: You don't see constellations, you see little points of light. 362 00:21:35,155 --> 00:21:39,995 Speaker 6: So what you need to be a great astronomer, And 363 00:21:40,075 --> 00:21:41,555 Speaker 6: so he saw himself doing that. 364 00:21:43,115 --> 00:21:47,675 Speaker 2: Moreno and his collaborator Jennings were also doing something morally complicated, 365 00:21:47,915 --> 00:21:51,035 Speaker 2: making a study of a vulnerable population who couldn't consent 366 00:21:51,075 --> 00:21:54,075 Speaker 2: to participate. It was true of all the girls at 367 00:21:54,115 --> 00:21:57,835 Speaker 2: the school, poor girls under state control, but it was 368 00:21:57,955 --> 00:22:02,475 Speaker 2: especially true of the black girls. This white scientist studying 369 00:22:02,515 --> 00:22:05,275 Speaker 2: black people. It happened a lot in the progressive era 370 00:22:05,355 --> 00:22:08,515 Speaker 2: in the early nineteen thirties. That same year that Moreno 371 00:22:08,595 --> 00:22:12,875 Speaker 2: arrived at Hudson, the Tuskegee Syphilis Experiment began, where hundreds 372 00:22:12,875 --> 00:22:15,555 Speaker 2: of black men with syphilis were told by the government 373 00:22:15,595 --> 00:22:17,995 Speaker 2: that they were being treated, when actually they were just 374 00:22:18,075 --> 00:22:22,755 Speaker 2: being studied to see what happened when syphilis went untreated. Knowledge, 375 00:22:23,195 --> 00:22:25,355 Speaker 2: but at a cost of injustice that no one should 376 00:22:25,355 --> 00:22:30,555 Speaker 2: ever have to pay. At Hudson, Moreno and Jennings gave 377 00:22:30,595 --> 00:22:32,875 Speaker 2: the girls blank forms on which they could rank their 378 00:22:32,915 --> 00:22:35,875 Speaker 2: preferences for roommates as well as mark the people they 379 00:22:35,875 --> 00:22:39,955 Speaker 2: didn't want to live with. Moreno called these attractions and rejections, 380 00:22:40,115 --> 00:22:42,515 Speaker 2: and they were meant to show who was connected socially 381 00:22:42,595 --> 00:22:46,955 Speaker 2: to whom. Using the answers, they began to map the 382 00:22:46,995 --> 00:22:50,795 Speaker 2: cottage communities. Maybe the runaways all lived in cottages with 383 00:22:50,915 --> 00:22:55,195 Speaker 2: higher rejection scores. On the map, they drew the attractions 384 00:22:55,275 --> 00:22:58,555 Speaker 2: as red lines and the rejections as black until the 385 00:22:58,595 --> 00:23:01,275 Speaker 2: school filled up with all these threads spinning out from 386 00:23:01,355 --> 00:23:06,035 Speaker 2: hundreds of girls. Reading Moreno's extremely long and extremely dense 387 00:23:06,075 --> 00:23:08,395 Speaker 2: account of this work is like taping your eyes open 388 00:23:08,435 --> 00:23:11,795 Speaker 2: and scanning through a thousand lines of computer code, except 389 00:23:12,435 --> 00:23:15,715 Speaker 2: then these heartbreaking stories got through all the scientific lingo. 390 00:23:16,635 --> 00:23:19,635 Speaker 9: Ge I want in my cottage because I feel towards her, 391 00:23:19,755 --> 00:23:23,075 Speaker 9: like she was my little sister I never had any, 392 00:23:23,315 --> 00:23:26,275 Speaker 9: and I like to take care of her. Mostly, she's 393 00:23:26,355 --> 00:23:28,555 Speaker 9: just a lonesome little child you just. 394 00:23:28,475 --> 00:23:29,315 Speaker 5: Have to be fond of. 395 00:23:30,315 --> 00:23:33,595 Speaker 2: And then they'd write their reasons for rejecting others. 396 00:23:33,875 --> 00:23:36,315 Speaker 9: It's only because she has a way of edging up 397 00:23:36,315 --> 00:23:39,235 Speaker 9: to you and standing so close when she talks to you. 398 00:23:39,875 --> 00:23:43,075 Speaker 9: There's something about her that is repulsive to me. I 399 00:23:43,075 --> 00:23:45,435 Speaker 9: felt this way about her even before I found out 400 00:23:45,475 --> 00:23:49,515 Speaker 9: about her having secret meetings most every day with colored girls. 401 00:23:50,155 --> 00:23:52,675 Speaker 9: She doesn't just go with her herself, but she tries 402 00:23:52,715 --> 00:23:55,235 Speaker 9: to get new girls to carry her notes so they'll 403 00:23:55,275 --> 00:23:56,195 Speaker 9: get interested too. 404 00:23:57,115 --> 00:24:00,995 Speaker 2: Moreno and Jennings trace those connections and rejections between girls 405 00:24:00,995 --> 00:24:04,635 Speaker 2: of different races, But even with an eye towards rearranging 406 00:24:04,715 --> 00:24:08,275 Speaker 2: the community, race was an invisible wall they wouldn't cross. 407 00:24:08,635 --> 00:24:10,795 Speaker 2: If a white girl wanted to love with a black girl. 408 00:24:11,195 --> 00:24:13,555 Speaker 2: That was out of the question. Because there was something 409 00:24:13,595 --> 00:24:16,235 Speaker 2: else that no one mentioned in all the breathless news 410 00:24:16,235 --> 00:24:22,915 Speaker 2: coverage about the Reformed Reformatory. The school was segregated. This 411 00:24:23,075 --> 00:24:26,275 Speaker 2: was controversial even at the time. Just a few months 412 00:24:26,275 --> 00:24:28,835 Speaker 2: before Morse met Moreno and asked him up to Hudson, 413 00:24:29,235 --> 00:24:31,755 Speaker 2: the Attorney General of New York had found out that 414 00:24:31,835 --> 00:24:34,635 Speaker 2: a black girl was denied a spot at Morse's school 415 00:24:34,995 --> 00:24:38,075 Speaker 2: and issued an opinion about the segregation there, saying that 416 00:24:38,115 --> 00:24:41,435 Speaker 2: it should not be permitted because of the possibility of abuse. 417 00:24:42,315 --> 00:24:46,875 Speaker 2: But still Morse believed firmly that the school should stay segregated. 418 00:24:47,795 --> 00:24:49,995 Speaker 2: That was galling to black civil rights leaders. 419 00:24:50,595 --> 00:24:54,955 Speaker 10: They're seeing black kids continue to be subject to the 420 00:24:54,995 --> 00:24:59,155 Speaker 10: horrific treatment that is supposed to be at this point 421 00:24:59,315 --> 00:25:00,995 Speaker 10: reserved only for adults. 422 00:25:01,515 --> 00:25:04,715 Speaker 2: Jeff Ward is a professor of African and African American 423 00:25:04,755 --> 00:25:08,515 Speaker 2: studies at Washington University in Saint Louis, Missouri. I found 424 00:25:08,555 --> 00:25:11,155 Speaker 2: his work through the Prison Public Memory Project, which is 425 00:25:11,195 --> 00:25:14,395 Speaker 2: an amazing website devoted to the legacy of the training school. 426 00:25:15,035 --> 00:25:18,395 Speaker 2: Ward wrote a sweeping history called the Black Child Savers. 427 00:25:18,675 --> 00:25:22,395 Speaker 10: You know they're seeing their kids deny the same prospects 428 00:25:22,395 --> 00:25:26,555 Speaker 10: of self realization that why kids are seemingly having access 429 00:25:26,595 --> 00:25:28,515 Speaker 10: to visa via rebuilt dat of ideal. 430 00:25:29,555 --> 00:25:32,075 Speaker 2: Morse was trying to keep access to that ideal as 431 00:25:32,115 --> 00:25:35,835 Speaker 2: limited as possible to white girls. That dividing line and 432 00:25:35,875 --> 00:25:39,795 Speaker 2: everything else was observed in Moreno's study. The researchers watched 433 00:25:39,835 --> 00:25:42,795 Speaker 2: the girls talking in pairs while doing laundry, study them 434 00:25:42,795 --> 00:25:46,395 Speaker 2: as they made rugs together. Moreno and Jennings presented the 435 00:25:46,435 --> 00:25:49,355 Speaker 2: research as total, which of course it wasn't couldn't have been, 436 00:25:49,955 --> 00:25:53,235 Speaker 2: but every observation became a number, and those numbers helped 437 00:25:53,235 --> 00:25:56,595 Speaker 2: the researchers draw their lines between the girls, which ones 438 00:25:56,595 --> 00:25:59,915 Speaker 2: were friends, which ones were enemies and how strongly they 439 00:25:59,915 --> 00:26:00,795 Speaker 2: felt about each other. 440 00:26:01,835 --> 00:26:03,515 Speaker 6: And you could actually put a number on that, you 441 00:26:03,515 --> 00:26:06,475 Speaker 6: could calculate it right, So this was even better. One 442 00:26:06,515 --> 00:26:12,675 Speaker 6: cabin had forty five point seventy three mutual choices and 443 00:26:12,715 --> 00:26:17,195 Speaker 6: another cabin had eighty nine point six five mutual choices. Well, 444 00:26:17,235 --> 00:26:19,435 Speaker 6: what does that really mean. I don't know. It's surely 445 00:26:19,515 --> 00:26:24,035 Speaker 6: false precision. But in terms of the history of ideas, 446 00:26:24,635 --> 00:26:26,395 Speaker 6: that was really a breakthrough. 447 00:26:27,875 --> 00:26:31,435 Speaker 2: Moreno and Jennings were gathering an unprecedented amount of data, 448 00:26:31,915 --> 00:26:34,915 Speaker 2: watching the girls interact and beginning to sort it into 449 00:26:34,955 --> 00:26:38,675 Speaker 2: maps and charts, and that's when the Runaway chain began. 450 00:26:41,355 --> 00:26:44,515 Speaker 2: In the fall of nineteen thirty two, two girls named 451 00:26:44,595 --> 00:26:48,235 Speaker 2: Ruth and Marie ran away from Cottage twelve. They were 452 00:26:48,275 --> 00:26:52,075 Speaker 2: both daughters of Italian immigrants. Ruth had once been forced 453 00:26:52,075 --> 00:26:57,035 Speaker 2: into prostitution. Marie's mother said she was incorrigible and so 454 00:26:57,195 --> 00:27:00,835 Speaker 2: she was sent to Hudson. Moreno and Jennings already knew 455 00:27:00,835 --> 00:27:03,155 Speaker 2: about them because they ranked high on the list of 456 00:27:03,195 --> 00:27:06,835 Speaker 2: girls who were isolated in the community. Very few lines 457 00:27:06,915 --> 00:27:11,235 Speaker 2: ran towards them. On Halloween of that year, there was 458 00:27:11,275 --> 00:27:14,475 Speaker 2: a party a friend of Ruth and Marie's pretended to faint, 459 00:27:14,875 --> 00:27:17,715 Speaker 2: and while the house mother was distracted, they slipped away. 460 00:27:18,435 --> 00:27:22,155 Speaker 2: Then the next night, five girls ran away. Four days 461 00:27:22,155 --> 00:27:27,675 Speaker 2: after that another four girls, and then three girls. Fourteen 462 00:27:27,715 --> 00:27:32,275 Speaker 2: girls ran away over a period of fourteen days. Why 463 00:27:33,475 --> 00:27:36,595 Speaker 2: runaways had always been a problem, but only ten girls 464 00:27:36,635 --> 00:27:39,475 Speaker 2: had run away in the seven months before. During the 465 00:27:39,475 --> 00:27:42,915 Speaker 2: same stretch the previous year, only three girls had run away. 466 00:27:43,595 --> 00:27:46,195 Speaker 2: And it wasn't just that these were the loneliest girls. 467 00:27:46,595 --> 00:27:49,075 Speaker 2: There were plenty of other isolated points on Moreno and 468 00:27:49,155 --> 00:27:52,395 Speaker 2: Jennings maps who hadn't run away. And it wasn't just 469 00:27:52,435 --> 00:27:55,115 Speaker 2: that these were the people who ran away, because only 470 00:27:55,155 --> 00:27:57,875 Speaker 2: two of them had ever tried it before. Who was 471 00:27:57,955 --> 00:28:02,195 Speaker 2: a mystery. So Mareno and Jennings went to Psychological Geography 472 00:28:02,235 --> 00:28:05,355 Speaker 2: Map three and they began to trace the lines connecting 473 00:28:05,355 --> 00:28:09,355 Speaker 2: the runaways. This is why the mapping was important, they said. 474 00:28:09,395 --> 00:28:13,315 Speaker 2: They'd died ten thousand pages of data and they needed 475 00:28:13,355 --> 00:28:16,195 Speaker 2: a way to visualize it all. What they noticed was 476 00:28:16,195 --> 00:28:19,715 Speaker 2: that even though Ruth and Marie were lonely kids, there 477 00:28:19,755 --> 00:28:22,115 Speaker 2: was an important line of friendship that ran from them 478 00:28:22,155 --> 00:28:24,475 Speaker 2: to the next girls who ran away, and then from 479 00:28:24,475 --> 00:28:27,955 Speaker 2: those girls to the next, and so on. They discovered 480 00:28:27,995 --> 00:28:31,555 Speaker 2: attractions between them all, a pathway of influence that ran 481 00:28:31,595 --> 00:28:36,195 Speaker 2: from Cottage twelve unbroken to Cottage ten. Marino wrote that 482 00:28:36,235 --> 00:28:38,795 Speaker 2: it was proof that networks exist. 483 00:28:39,835 --> 00:28:43,675 Speaker 6: We're accustomed these days to thinking of social networks in 484 00:28:43,795 --> 00:28:47,515 Speaker 6: terms of epidemiology, right, And I think what he understood 485 00:28:47,755 --> 00:28:51,955 Speaker 6: was that there was an epidemiology to the influences of 486 00:28:51,995 --> 00:28:58,715 Speaker 6: ideas and patterns of ideas and social networks. So how 487 00:28:58,795 --> 00:29:02,395 Speaker 6: did the girls stimulate each other to be rebels right? 488 00:29:02,635 --> 00:29:06,195 Speaker 6: Or to be to accept the conditions of the school, 489 00:29:06,795 --> 00:29:10,075 Speaker 6: which one might well argue they shouldn't have accepted. I'd 490 00:29:10,115 --> 00:29:14,195 Speaker 6: given a deeper understanding of what those conditions probably were. 491 00:29:15,035 --> 00:29:18,395 Speaker 2: It was a powerful piece of social science, arguably the 492 00:29:18,435 --> 00:29:20,755 Speaker 2: first time the spread of an idea had been traced 493 00:29:20,795 --> 00:29:24,875 Speaker 2: so closely. Moreno and Jennings used their maps to reorganize 494 00:29:24,875 --> 00:29:28,315 Speaker 2: the cottages, and the runaway numbers began to drop, until 495 00:29:28,435 --> 00:29:32,715 Speaker 2: Moreno claimed they were unprecedentedly low. Morse must have been 496 00:29:32,715 --> 00:29:39,795 Speaker 2: thrilled Moreno had seen the unseen. On April second, nineteen 497 00:29:39,875 --> 00:29:42,675 Speaker 2: thirty three, Marino showed those maps in public for the 498 00:29:42,675 --> 00:29:46,275 Speaker 2: first time at a medical conference at the Waldorf Astoria 499 00:29:46,315 --> 00:29:49,515 Speaker 2: Hotel in Manhattan, one hundred miles away from the Reformatory. 500 00:29:49,955 --> 00:29:53,275 Speaker 2: Physicians and journalists peered at the webs of seven thousand 501 00:29:53,315 --> 00:29:56,715 Speaker 2: red and black lines spiraling out from hundreds of little circles, 502 00:29:57,035 --> 00:30:00,235 Speaker 2: some marked as white girls, some marked as black, together 503 00:30:00,275 --> 00:30:05,395 Speaker 2: comprising the scientists said the entire psychology of the Hudson Reformatory. 504 00:30:06,035 --> 00:30:09,075 Speaker 2: The next day, the New York Times proclaimed emotions mapped 505 00:30:09,075 --> 00:30:12,675 Speaker 2: by new geograph. Moreno said that the same kind of 506 00:30:12,715 --> 00:30:16,635 Speaker 2: invisible structure ran through all of society. He claimed the 507 00:30:16,635 --> 00:30:19,795 Speaker 2: study proved there were ten to fifteen million isolated people 508 00:30:19,795 --> 00:30:22,355 Speaker 2: in the country, and he said there were plans now 509 00:30:22,395 --> 00:30:25,115 Speaker 2: to make a complete psychological map of New York City. 510 00:30:27,515 --> 00:30:30,115 Speaker 2: That map never happened, or not as he planned it, 511 00:30:30,635 --> 00:30:32,515 Speaker 2: But the work on the walls of the hotel was 512 00:30:32,555 --> 00:30:35,675 Speaker 2: a forerunner of social network theory, a field that has 513 00:30:35,755 --> 00:30:39,555 Speaker 2: fundamentally shaped the way we think about policy, how ideas 514 00:30:39,595 --> 00:30:42,715 Speaker 2: and culture spread, and the way social media algorithms are built. 515 00:30:43,555 --> 00:30:46,915 Speaker 7: The mere mapping of the networks is transformational. The recognition 516 00:30:46,995 --> 00:30:52,235 Speaker 7: that there are these elaborate, you know, skins of human interactions, 517 00:30:52,275 --> 00:30:55,035 Speaker 7: you know, like where these people are interconnected. 518 00:30:54,755 --> 00:30:58,435 Speaker 2: That's Nicholas Kristacus. He directs the Human Nature Lab at 519 00:30:58,475 --> 00:31:01,235 Speaker 2: Yale and he's done a number of groundbreaking studies on 520 00:31:01,275 --> 00:31:04,515 Speaker 2: social networks. When we talked, he pulled out an old 521 00:31:04,555 --> 00:31:05,915 Speaker 2: copy of a Mareno map. 522 00:31:06,435 --> 00:31:07,995 Speaker 7: I have to be very delicate here, so it's not 523 00:31:08,035 --> 00:31:11,715 Speaker 7: to rip it. It's so geometric geography of a community. 524 00:31:11,795 --> 00:31:16,035 Speaker 7: It says this image, it's a very famous image of 525 00:31:16,555 --> 00:31:19,555 Speaker 7: these are girls. Every dot is a girl, and the 526 00:31:19,595 --> 00:31:22,515 Speaker 7: lines between them are friendships. And they're in different dormitories 527 00:31:22,795 --> 00:31:24,435 Speaker 7: in the little circles, and look at you can just 528 00:31:24,475 --> 00:31:28,435 Speaker 7: immediately see that the ties within the dormitories are tighter. 529 00:31:28,595 --> 00:31:31,595 Speaker 7: That's like a really fundamental insight. That's that's so called 530 00:31:31,675 --> 00:31:35,875 Speaker 7: community structure within the within the dormitories. So there's a 531 00:31:35,955 --> 00:31:39,395 Speaker 7: there's a just a tremendous amount of insight in the book, 532 00:31:39,435 --> 00:31:44,195 Speaker 7: No matter the man's you know, manifest a weirdness, and 533 00:31:44,195 --> 00:31:45,035 Speaker 7: and he was weird. 534 00:31:45,915 --> 00:31:49,155 Speaker 2: There was a tremendous amount of insight. But also, as 535 00:31:49,235 --> 00:31:53,755 Speaker 2: Christokus and I talked about something missing, those runaway girls 536 00:31:53,795 --> 00:31:56,955 Speaker 2: were moreno is proof that social networks existed, and that 537 00:31:57,115 --> 00:32:00,035 Speaker 2: was the basis of his new science. But they also 538 00:32:00,115 --> 00:32:03,235 Speaker 2: proved something else. We know what it was now, in 539 00:32:03,275 --> 00:32:06,515 Speaker 2: part because two weeks after that meeting, when Moreno and 540 00:32:06,555 --> 00:32:09,395 Speaker 2: his crew were back studying in Hudson, a new girl 541 00:32:09,435 --> 00:32:12,715 Speaker 2: showed up to the New York State Training School. She 542 00:32:12,835 --> 00:32:15,635 Speaker 2: was entered. In the log book they wrote the date 543 00:32:16,035 --> 00:32:20,955 Speaker 2: April eighteenth, a number three nine eighty six, and her name, 544 00:32:21,675 --> 00:32:26,635 Speaker 2: Ella Fitzgerald. And then under a fence they wrote, ungovernable, 545 00:32:28,555 --> 00:32:41,195 Speaker 2: We'll be right back. When Ella Fitzgerald's mom got in 546 00:32:41,235 --> 00:32:45,075 Speaker 2: that car accident, her family life turned upside down. In 547 00:32:45,115 --> 00:32:47,955 Speaker 2: a great upcoming book, the historian Judith Tick writes that 548 00:32:47,995 --> 00:32:51,115 Speaker 2: she survived but was badly hurt. Her job had been 549 00:32:51,155 --> 00:32:53,555 Speaker 2: the family's main source of income, and it was the 550 00:32:53,595 --> 00:32:57,315 Speaker 2: Depression they were in trouble, So Fitzgerald started taking any 551 00:32:57,315 --> 00:33:00,595 Speaker 2: work she could find. At some point she ran numbers, 552 00:33:00,675 --> 00:33:03,675 Speaker 2: and she'd worked at a brothel, keeping a lookout for cops. 553 00:33:04,075 --> 00:33:07,115 Speaker 2: Then one day the police picked her up for truancy 554 00:33:07,555 --> 00:33:09,635 Speaker 2: and brought her before a judge, who sentenced her to 555 00:33:09,635 --> 00:33:12,755 Speaker 2: the training school up in Hudson. They checked her in 556 00:33:13,155 --> 00:33:17,715 Speaker 2: one week before her birthday. Her whole life, she'd avoid 557 00:33:17,755 --> 00:33:20,795 Speaker 2: speaking publicly about her time at the reformatory, and it 558 00:33:20,835 --> 00:33:24,755 Speaker 2: wasn't even public knowledge that she'd been there until Nina Bernstein, 559 00:33:25,115 --> 00:33:28,555 Speaker 2: that investigative reporter from the New York Times, was interviewing 560 00:33:28,595 --> 00:33:29,995 Speaker 2: someone from the school. 561 00:33:30,595 --> 00:33:33,475 Speaker 8: And at some point in the interview he tells me 562 00:33:34,155 --> 00:33:38,635 Speaker 8: that there had been an effort to bring back as 563 00:33:38,755 --> 00:33:41,595 Speaker 8: role models for girls. You know, at some time in 564 00:33:41,635 --> 00:33:44,555 Speaker 8: the history of the institution, there had been this effort 565 00:33:44,755 --> 00:33:49,555 Speaker 8: to bring role models back, and that the assistant superintendent, 566 00:33:50,115 --> 00:33:54,955 Speaker 8: Muriel Jenkins, had recounted him know that Fitzgerald wanted nothing 567 00:33:54,995 --> 00:33:56,035 Speaker 8: to do with the institution. 568 00:33:56,955 --> 00:33:59,355 Speaker 2: This was the first Bernstein heard of it. When we 569 00:33:59,435 --> 00:34:02,155 Speaker 2: talked about it, she got animated, like it was happening all. 570 00:34:02,075 --> 00:34:04,915 Speaker 8: Over again, and of course I go, oh, my god. 571 00:34:05,435 --> 00:34:07,555 Speaker 2: Bernstein began to dig I. 572 00:34:07,515 --> 00:34:10,395 Speaker 8: Went back to the local historian and she was able 573 00:34:10,435 --> 00:34:14,835 Speaker 8: to give me several names and numbers of people who 574 00:34:14,835 --> 00:34:20,715 Speaker 8: had worked at the institution, including this woman in her 575 00:34:20,955 --> 00:34:24,995 Speaker 8: late eighties who had taught English, and she had been 576 00:34:25,195 --> 00:34:30,275 Speaker 8: Ella Fitzgerald's teacher. And she talked about what a great 577 00:34:30,315 --> 00:34:34,555 Speaker 8: student she was, and what a perfectionist she was, and 578 00:34:34,595 --> 00:34:39,355 Speaker 8: her beautiful penmanship. She said, I can even visualize her handwriting. 579 00:34:40,915 --> 00:34:43,115 Speaker 2: What's interesting to me is I don't think it was 580 00:34:43,155 --> 00:34:45,915 Speaker 2: the stigma that Fitzgerald was avoiding by refusing to talk 581 00:34:45,955 --> 00:34:48,875 Speaker 2: about her time at the training school. She spoke in 582 00:34:48,875 --> 00:34:52,035 Speaker 2: interviews about running numbers and working at the brothel. It 583 00:34:52,115 --> 00:34:55,435 Speaker 2: wasn't that she'd done something illegal. I'm not sure why 584 00:34:55,515 --> 00:34:57,875 Speaker 2: she didn't talk about it, but maybe it was just 585 00:34:57,915 --> 00:35:01,075 Speaker 2: too painful. Because on top of all the other indignities 586 00:35:01,075 --> 00:35:04,555 Speaker 2: and abuses of life at a segregated reformatory, there was 587 00:35:04,555 --> 00:35:08,995 Speaker 2: one thing that must have hurt Fitzgerald, especially Morse's all 588 00:35:09,035 --> 00:35:11,595 Speaker 2: white choir wouldn't let her sing with them. 589 00:35:12,235 --> 00:35:15,795 Speaker 8: I interviewed Beulah Crank, who had been a house mother 590 00:35:15,875 --> 00:35:18,235 Speaker 8: in the fifties and sixties, but who had been a 591 00:35:18,275 --> 00:35:22,115 Speaker 8: teenager who grew up in Hudson, and she told me 592 00:35:22,755 --> 00:35:27,915 Speaker 8: she vividly recalled Ella and some other black girls from 593 00:35:28,035 --> 00:35:35,715 Speaker 8: Hudson being invited to sing at her the local ame church, 594 00:35:36,155 --> 00:35:42,035 Speaker 8: and to some extent at least I came away with 595 00:35:42,155 --> 00:35:46,035 Speaker 8: the feeling from Beulah Crank that the church had invited 596 00:35:46,075 --> 00:35:50,715 Speaker 8: these girls to perform in part because they were excluded 597 00:35:50,795 --> 00:35:54,475 Speaker 8: from this white choir that was a big deal at 598 00:35:54,475 --> 00:35:58,755 Speaker 8: the time, and that she had never forgotten that she 599 00:35:58,875 --> 00:36:01,355 Speaker 8: said that girl sang her heart out. 600 00:36:02,035 --> 00:36:04,755 Speaker 2: In Marino's study, the race of the girls is noted 601 00:36:04,795 --> 00:36:07,515 Speaker 2: on some of the maps, you can see the ties 602 00:36:07,555 --> 00:36:11,555 Speaker 2: between black and white cottages. He'd written that though black 603 00:36:11,595 --> 00:36:15,515 Speaker 2: and white students lived separately in educational and social activities, 604 00:36:15,635 --> 00:36:19,835 Speaker 2: they mix freely. But from Fitzgerald's experience, it's clear that 605 00:36:19,835 --> 00:36:23,435 Speaker 2: that wasn't the case. Marino and Jennings had either totally 606 00:36:23,475 --> 00:36:27,315 Speaker 2: missed it or they'd chosen to ignore it based on 607 00:36:27,595 --> 00:36:30,635 Speaker 2: everything they'd observed. I don't think they could possibly have 608 00:36:30,715 --> 00:36:34,035 Speaker 2: missed what was really going on. And it wasn't just 609 00:36:34,115 --> 00:36:37,715 Speaker 2: segregation in the choir in the basement of those white 610 00:36:37,755 --> 00:36:40,475 Speaker 2: trimmed cottages. There were beatings too. 611 00:36:41,235 --> 00:36:44,555 Speaker 8: You know, this was a system in which the black 612 00:36:44,595 --> 00:36:48,875 Speaker 8: girls were in these black cottages were subjected to corporal 613 00:36:48,915 --> 00:36:53,835 Speaker 8: punishment by men, and you know, so beaten by men. 614 00:36:54,835 --> 00:36:57,115 Speaker 2: It turned out that Fitzgerald had been kept in the 615 00:36:57,155 --> 00:37:00,795 Speaker 2: basement and, in the words of the superintendent Bernstein, spoke 616 00:37:00,835 --> 00:37:05,555 Speaker 2: to all but tortured. This was part of life at 617 00:37:05,595 --> 00:37:09,755 Speaker 2: the New York State Training School. Soon after, an investigation 618 00:37:09,915 --> 00:37:12,435 Speaker 2: of the school revealed the full extent of what girls 619 00:37:12,475 --> 00:37:15,675 Speaker 2: like Fitzgerald were subject to. There was never enough space 620 00:37:15,715 --> 00:37:17,835 Speaker 2: for black girls because they were only allowed in two 621 00:37:17,915 --> 00:37:21,155 Speaker 2: of the many cottages. White girls got to use Moreno's 622 00:37:21,235 --> 00:37:24,795 Speaker 2: sociometric system to choose their roommates, but not black girls 623 00:37:24,875 --> 00:37:26,995 Speaker 2: because there were so few options for where they could 624 00:37:27,035 --> 00:37:29,875 Speaker 2: live in the first place. Black girls were made to 625 00:37:29,915 --> 00:37:32,355 Speaker 2: do all the laundry for the white girls, because that's 626 00:37:32,395 --> 00:37:34,635 Speaker 2: the kind of job Morse thought they could get outside 627 00:37:34,635 --> 00:37:38,595 Speaker 2: the school. All that is why Bernstein hates to call 628 00:37:38,635 --> 00:37:42,315 Speaker 2: it a school, the reason it was always a prison. 629 00:37:46,275 --> 00:37:51,555 Speaker 3: I was fifteen, about fifteen, because from there we went 630 00:37:51,595 --> 00:37:52,755 Speaker 3: to the amateur contest. 631 00:37:53,675 --> 00:37:56,835 Speaker 2: There's no record of when Ella Fitzgerald left the training school. 632 00:37:57,875 --> 00:38:00,155 Speaker 2: Based on the vague parole records and the fact that 633 00:38:00,195 --> 00:38:03,235 Speaker 2: she'd been sentenced to a few years, Bernstein thinks she 634 00:38:03,315 --> 00:38:07,115 Speaker 2: ran away, and I think so too. But she was 635 00:38:07,155 --> 00:38:10,315 Speaker 2: at Hudson when Moreno and Jennings were there the year 636 00:38:10,355 --> 00:38:13,515 Speaker 2: before they published their study. So I went back to 637 00:38:13,555 --> 00:38:17,795 Speaker 2: their account that dense text, and I can't know, but 638 00:38:17,915 --> 00:38:21,115 Speaker 2: I think that I found Ella Fitzgerald in it. On 639 00:38:21,235 --> 00:38:24,195 Speaker 2: page one hundred and ten of Moreno's book, he describes 640 00:38:24,235 --> 00:38:26,995 Speaker 2: a group of girls working on restoring a piece of furniture. 641 00:38:27,715 --> 00:38:30,795 Speaker 2: They worked with varnish and sandpaper to strip the old paint, 642 00:38:31,075 --> 00:38:33,915 Speaker 2: repair it, and paint it again. And in that group 643 00:38:34,275 --> 00:38:37,675 Speaker 2: there's a girl named Ella. Each girl was given a 644 00:38:37,675 --> 00:38:42,995 Speaker 2: two letter code. Moreno gave Ella the code GA. One 645 00:38:43,075 --> 00:38:46,675 Speaker 2: hundred pages later, there's another graph with thirty four red 646 00:38:46,675 --> 00:38:49,675 Speaker 2: circles for white girls and twenty three black ones for 647 00:38:49,755 --> 00:38:53,555 Speaker 2: black In the fourth black circle from the top you 648 00:38:53,595 --> 00:39:00,675 Speaker 2: can see the letters GA. Moreno published his book in 649 00:39:00,755 --> 00:39:04,715 Speaker 2: nineteen thirty four with the title Who Shall Survive. The 650 00:39:04,755 --> 00:39:10,315 Speaker 2: book was enormously influential, including with the Roosevelt administration. Science 651 00:39:10,555 --> 00:39:12,715 Speaker 2: was used in the New Deal and also in the 652 00:39:12,715 --> 00:39:17,155 Speaker 2: internment camps. It led to an influential journal called Sociometry, 653 00:39:17,315 --> 00:39:20,235 Speaker 2: in which the principles of social network theory were formulated. 654 00:39:20,715 --> 00:39:23,155 Speaker 2: They published the paper that tested the six degrees of 655 00:39:23,155 --> 00:39:27,635 Speaker 2: separation rule. Social science legends like John Dewey, George Gallup, 656 00:39:27,675 --> 00:39:31,235 Speaker 2: and Margaret Meade were on the editorial staff. A History 657 00:39:31,275 --> 00:39:35,235 Speaker 2: of Social network Analysis is dedicated to Moreno and says 658 00:39:35,275 --> 00:39:38,235 Speaker 2: that without him, there would be no field of social 659 00:39:38,275 --> 00:39:42,515 Speaker 2: network analysis. Moreno had finally founded that field that was 660 00:39:42,555 --> 00:39:45,235 Speaker 2: all about seeing the group and the individual all at once, 661 00:39:45,795 --> 00:39:49,675 Speaker 2: but in the process he missed something crucial about these 662 00:39:49,835 --> 00:39:54,715 Speaker 2: particular individuals. In that same year, Marino finally established himself 663 00:39:54,755 --> 00:39:58,835 Speaker 2: with his Hudson study. Ella Fitzgerald entered a contest at 664 00:39:58,875 --> 00:40:04,795 Speaker 2: the Apollo Theater. When you first started, you had visions 665 00:40:04,795 --> 00:40:05,915 Speaker 2: of not being a singer. 666 00:40:05,955 --> 00:40:08,355 Speaker 4: You were going to be a dancer, all right, right, 667 00:40:08,515 --> 00:40:09,235 Speaker 4: tell me about that. 668 00:40:09,835 --> 00:40:13,075 Speaker 3: Oh you really want to hear that? Will and started 669 00:40:13,115 --> 00:40:16,235 Speaker 3: back in my hometown in Yonkers, and I was what 670 00:40:16,275 --> 00:40:18,115 Speaker 3: they call the you know. 671 00:40:18,115 --> 00:40:25,555 Speaker 11: The greatest little dancer in Yonkers. And we used to 672 00:40:25,555 --> 00:40:28,315 Speaker 11: go down to the Pollo on amateur night, my girlfriends 673 00:40:28,315 --> 00:40:30,555 Speaker 11: and I and you know, like they always tell you 674 00:40:30,635 --> 00:40:33,195 Speaker 11: if you want to be an amateur, to sign and 675 00:40:33,275 --> 00:40:35,475 Speaker 11: drop your name in the box. And being from young 676 00:40:35,475 --> 00:40:38,035 Speaker 11: because we never thought anybody would send a postcard to 677 00:40:38,155 --> 00:40:41,155 Speaker 11: young Kers, and the three of us. 678 00:40:41,075 --> 00:40:42,155 Speaker 10: We put our names in. 679 00:40:42,635 --> 00:40:45,755 Speaker 2: She's on stage in the twilight of her career telling 680 00:40:45,795 --> 00:40:50,155 Speaker 2: that story everybody Loves Again. What nobody knew was when 681 00:40:50,195 --> 00:40:52,635 Speaker 2: she was on the stage at the Apollo, she was 682 00:40:52,755 --> 00:40:54,395 Speaker 2: just out of the training school. 683 00:40:55,355 --> 00:40:59,475 Speaker 11: And I was the one who was chosen and I 684 00:40:59,555 --> 00:41:02,035 Speaker 11: made up you know, they say, well, if you don't. 685 00:41:01,795 --> 00:41:03,635 Speaker 12: Go, your chicken right. 686 00:41:03,915 --> 00:41:06,235 Speaker 11: So we went, and I believe it or not, I 687 00:41:06,355 --> 00:41:08,955 Speaker 11: was the first amateur that they called. And there were 688 00:41:09,475 --> 00:41:12,675 Speaker 11: two sisters who were to dance, and his sisters in 689 00:41:12,715 --> 00:41:15,955 Speaker 11: the world called it Edward Sisters and they were starring 690 00:41:16,355 --> 00:41:19,995 Speaker 11: at Apollo, and they closed the show with out and 691 00:41:20,515 --> 00:41:25,115 Speaker 11: I when I saw those ladies dance, I says, no way, 692 00:41:25,195 --> 00:41:27,635 Speaker 11: I'm going out there and trying to dance, because they 693 00:41:27,755 --> 00:41:31,595 Speaker 11: stopped the show. I was the first one was called. 694 00:41:32,355 --> 00:41:35,795 Speaker 11: And when I got out there, somebody hollered out, no adice. 695 00:41:35,475 --> 00:41:36,555 Speaker 6: What is she going to do? 696 00:41:40,635 --> 00:41:43,115 Speaker 2: Fitzgerald was on stage in front of a theater that 697 00:41:43,155 --> 00:41:47,915 Speaker 2: fits over a thousand people. She was rail thin, wearing 698 00:41:47,955 --> 00:41:49,675 Speaker 2: boots and a tatter dress. 699 00:41:50,075 --> 00:41:54,035 Speaker 11: And my mother had a record of Miss Connie Boswell, 700 00:41:54,475 --> 00:41:55,155 Speaker 11: who I think. 701 00:41:55,115 --> 00:41:56,995 Speaker 12: Was one of the greatest singers that ever lived. 702 00:41:57,555 --> 00:42:01,755 Speaker 11: And she used to play Object of My Affection and 703 00:42:01,835 --> 00:42:05,235 Speaker 11: Judy and I got so I had, you know, used 704 00:42:05,275 --> 00:42:08,395 Speaker 11: to sing it. So the man said, sing something. Well, 705 00:42:08,515 --> 00:42:12,635 Speaker 11: I tried to sing Judy, and I think miss Connie 706 00:42:12,635 --> 00:42:14,795 Speaker 11: bosa because then I tried to sing like her and 707 00:42:14,835 --> 00:42:18,355 Speaker 11: I sang if a, well, it's ben brut We hope 708 00:42:18,395 --> 00:42:19,355 Speaker 11: of the broom. 709 00:42:19,595 --> 00:42:21,195 Speaker 5: That's Judy, and. 710 00:42:21,195 --> 00:42:23,955 Speaker 11: Everybody says all I grew up and sing and the 711 00:42:23,995 --> 00:42:27,115 Speaker 11: people plauted so much. I sang Object of my Affection. 712 00:42:27,235 --> 00:42:31,595 Speaker 11: That was the other side of the record, and I 713 00:42:31,675 --> 00:42:35,995 Speaker 11: won first prize. So then that made me feel like, 714 00:42:36,115 --> 00:42:38,955 Speaker 11: you know, well, I wanted to try to be a singer. 715 00:42:40,795 --> 00:42:43,555 Speaker 2: She said that if she hadn't won that contest, she 716 00:42:43,715 --> 00:42:47,235 Speaker 2: probably wouldn't have tried to become a singer. Fitzgerald started 717 00:42:47,235 --> 00:42:51,315 Speaker 2: affronting for a band, Chick Web's Orchestra. Not long after that, 718 00:42:51,795 --> 00:42:54,355 Speaker 2: she had her first big hit, and then she became 719 00:42:54,475 --> 00:42:57,835 Speaker 2: one of the most famous singers of all time. But 720 00:42:58,235 --> 00:43:00,955 Speaker 2: what I kept thinking about is she didn't write the 721 00:43:00,995 --> 00:43:04,675 Speaker 2: song she sang. It's her voice, people love, and her 722 00:43:04,715 --> 00:43:08,635 Speaker 2: voice is something so singular, so beautiful, that all she 723 00:43:08,675 --> 00:43:10,795 Speaker 2: had to do was begin to see and everyone in 724 00:43:10,835 --> 00:43:14,115 Speaker 2: that room at the Apollo fell in love. And then 725 00:43:14,155 --> 00:43:17,515 Speaker 2: I thought about Fanny French Morse's all white choir and 726 00:43:17,555 --> 00:43:20,115 Speaker 2: how they couldn't hear her voice because all they could 727 00:43:20,155 --> 00:43:24,715 Speaker 2: see was her skin. That's what segregation does to a mind. 728 00:43:25,435 --> 00:43:32,835 Speaker 2: It's a prison. And Ella Fitzgerald escaped in the summer 729 00:43:32,875 --> 00:43:36,515 Speaker 2: of nineteen thirty six, two years after Moreno's study came out, 730 00:43:36,755 --> 00:43:40,555 Speaker 2: as Fitzgerald was touring the country, a black doctor named 731 00:43:40,595 --> 00:43:43,475 Speaker 2: Emmy Ross wrote the governor of New York about the 732 00:43:43,515 --> 00:43:46,395 Speaker 2: conditions for black girls at the New York State Training School. 733 00:43:47,395 --> 00:43:50,555 Speaker 2: It led to an investigation. Morse tried to fight it. 734 00:43:50,875 --> 00:43:53,475 Speaker 2: She pressured a black member of her staff to quote 735 00:43:53,795 --> 00:43:57,635 Speaker 2: keep her mouth closed on this. Judges wrote letters to 736 00:43:57,675 --> 00:44:00,675 Speaker 2: the governor claiming that integrating the school would start a 737 00:44:00,755 --> 00:44:04,995 Speaker 2: race war. But still it went ahead, and in the 738 00:44:05,115 --> 00:44:08,635 Speaker 2: end the investigation led to Fanny French Morse stepping down 739 00:44:08,635 --> 00:44:13,155 Speaker 2: from the school, tiring from public life, and the broader 740 00:44:13,155 --> 00:44:16,235 Speaker 2: movement surrounding it led to an amendment that prohibited the 741 00:44:16,235 --> 00:44:18,275 Speaker 2: funding of a place like the Training School if it 742 00:44:18,315 --> 00:44:22,475 Speaker 2: discriminated by race. It was a groundbreaking piece of legislation, 743 00:44:22,835 --> 00:44:25,355 Speaker 2: and it led to all kinds of other civil rights laws, 744 00:44:26,035 --> 00:44:28,835 Speaker 2: like a big idea working its way through a network. 745 00:44:35,435 --> 00:44:38,835 Speaker 2: Decades later, an interviewer asked Fitzgerald what she'd have been 746 00:44:38,955 --> 00:44:42,275 Speaker 2: if she hadn't become a singer, and she said, a teacher. 747 00:44:42,755 --> 00:44:43,635 Speaker 11: I love children. 748 00:44:43,715 --> 00:44:44,995 Speaker 3: I guess put that in. 749 00:44:46,515 --> 00:44:52,915 Speaker 12: I'm a I'm a slopper children we sent thirteen thousand 750 00:44:53,035 --> 00:44:58,875 Speaker 12: children in South Carolina and we did Old MacDonald and 751 00:44:58,995 --> 00:45:01,435 Speaker 12: you should hear all of them sing in Ei eio. 752 00:45:05,315 --> 00:45:08,555 Speaker 2: This is embarrassing to admit, but I started writing this 753 00:45:08,635 --> 00:45:11,395 Speaker 2: story because I found a bunch of undigitized tapes of 754 00:45:11,435 --> 00:45:14,675 Speaker 2: Morino and his archives doing this therapeutic theater thing, and 755 00:45:14,755 --> 00:45:17,955 Speaker 2: I thought, great, this will be fun and strange. But 756 00:45:17,995 --> 00:45:21,395 Speaker 2: then I learned about social network theory, and then the prison, 757 00:45:22,075 --> 00:45:26,795 Speaker 2: and finally Elia Fitzgerald, and the story rotated on its axis. 758 00:45:27,435 --> 00:45:29,635 Speaker 2: I felt like I walked into that place with a 759 00:45:29,675 --> 00:45:32,875 Speaker 2: set of ideas, and I walked out of it with her. 760 00:45:33,595 --> 00:45:36,675 Speaker 2: I came for the group and I left with her voice. 761 00:45:37,555 --> 00:45:40,555 Speaker 12: And I've always felt that if it takes one person 762 00:45:40,595 --> 00:45:44,195 Speaker 12: to make the other person, we don't do anything more ourselves. 763 00:45:45,155 --> 00:45:49,355 Speaker 12: I think if we try to help each other. I 764 00:45:49,555 --> 00:45:52,275 Speaker 12: like the feel now that a lot of the young 765 00:45:52,395 --> 00:45:57,035 Speaker 12: people will say, well, she did it, I can do it. 766 00:45:59,035 --> 00:46:00,275 Speaker 12: You're a beautiful person. 767 00:46:01,115 --> 00:46:02,155 Speaker 5: People are beautiful. 768 00:46:02,635 --> 00:46:04,875 Speaker 3: Thanks good to see. 769 00:46:07,675 --> 00:46:10,355 Speaker 2: We live our lives in the intersecting web of social 770 00:46:10,395 --> 00:46:14,115 Speaker 2: networks that Mareno saw, for better and for worse. But 771 00:46:14,435 --> 00:46:17,275 Speaker 2: the thrust of all that, why any of it matters? 772 00:46:18,075 --> 00:46:20,635 Speaker 2: Is because it means we owe each other. We're not 773 00:46:20,995 --> 00:46:25,435 Speaker 2: just individuals, We're not only groups. It's like Fitzgerald said 774 00:46:25,435 --> 00:46:29,555 Speaker 2: in that interview, we don't do anything ourselves, and it 775 00:46:29,595 --> 00:46:32,075 Speaker 2: takes one person to make another person. 776 00:46:43,115 --> 00:46:48,195 Speaker 4: There's a saying who says and love is blind. Still, 777 00:46:48,275 --> 00:46:54,115 Speaker 4: we're often told seek and ye shall find. So I'm 778 00:46:54,155 --> 00:47:00,395 Speaker 4: going to seek a certain lad I've had in mind. 779 00:47:02,395 --> 00:47:06,235 Speaker 2: The Last Archive is written and hosted by Me Ben Nadaaffrey. 780 00:47:06,755 --> 00:47:09,875 Speaker 2: It's produced by me and Lucy Sullivan and edited by 781 00:47:09,915 --> 00:47:13,875 Speaker 2: Sophie Crane. Jake Gorsky is our engineer. Fact checking on 782 00:47:13,915 --> 00:47:18,315 Speaker 2: this episode by Arthur Comferts. Our foolproof player is Becca A. Lewis. 783 00:47:18,875 --> 00:47:22,795 Speaker 2: Sound design by Jake Gorsky and Lucy Sullivan. Our executive 784 00:47:22,795 --> 00:47:26,475 Speaker 2: producers are Sophie Crane and Jill Lapour. Thanks also to 785 00:47:26,555 --> 00:47:31,475 Speaker 2: Julia Barton, Pushkin's executive editor. Original music by Matthias Bossi 786 00:47:31,675 --> 00:47:34,635 Speaker 2: and John Evans of stell Wagon Symphon Met. Many of 787 00:47:34,635 --> 00:47:36,995 Speaker 2: our sound effects are from Harry Janette Junior in the 788 00:47:36,995 --> 00:47:41,195 Speaker 2: Star Ganette Foundation Special. Thanks to Judith Tick for sharing 789 00:47:41,235 --> 00:47:44,555 Speaker 2: an advanced copy of aur upcoming book, Becoming Ella Fitzgerald 790 00:47:44,795 --> 00:47:49,035 Speaker 2: a biography that overturns many myths about Fitzgerald's life. Thanks 791 00:47:49,075 --> 00:47:53,715 Speaker 2: also to Becky Cooper, Will Friedwald, Russa Marajan, Jessica Murphy, 792 00:47:53,955 --> 00:47:57,755 Speaker 2: and the New York State Archives. For a bibliography, further reading, 793 00:47:57,795 --> 00:48:00,475 Speaker 2: and a transcript and teaching guide to this episode, head 794 00:48:00,555 --> 00:48:03,675 Speaker 2: to the Last Archive dot com. The Last Archive is 795 00:48:03,675 --> 00:48:06,795 Speaker 2: a production of Pushkin Industries. If you love this show, 796 00:48:07,035 --> 00:48:10,555 Speaker 2: consider subscribing to Pushkin Plus, offering bo honess content and 797 00:48:10,675 --> 00:48:13,395 Speaker 2: ad free listening across our network for four ninety nine 798 00:48:13,435 --> 00:48:16,355 Speaker 2: a month. Look for the Pushkin Plus channel on Apple 799 00:48:16,395 --> 00:48:19,715 Speaker 2: Podcasts or at pushkin dot fm, and please sign up 800 00:48:19,715 --> 00:48:23,595 Speaker 2: for our newsletter at pushkin dot fm slash Newsletter. To 801 00:48:23,635 --> 00:48:28,115 Speaker 2: find more Pushkin podcasts, listen on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, 802 00:48:28,395 --> 00:48:31,555 Speaker 2: or wherever you get your podcasts. I'm Ben Mattafaffrey. 803 00:48:33,555 --> 00:48:40,555 Speaker 7: How some one to what 804 00:48:44,555 --> 00:48:50,515 Speaker 4: Oh Me