Speaker 1: Live from Television City in Hollywood.
Speaker 2: On the evening of October thirteenth, nineteen fifty seven, millions
Speaker 2: of Americans sat down to watch a special event on
Speaker 2: television featuring some of the country's most popular entertainers.
Speaker 3: Ing Crosbie, Frank Sinatra, lorosbry Clony, Loie Armstrong.
Speaker 2: But the real star of the show its yes, the Edsel,
Speaker 2: the car that the Ford Motor Company, sponsors of this show,
Speaker 2: was introducing to the public with unprecedented fanfare. Here's being
Speaker 2: Crosbie with old blue eyes, Frank Sinatra.
Speaker 1: This is an opening show.
Speaker 3: Oh you're know on TV for Edzel to go all
Speaker 3: the way. It's a great card too, bing and they're
Speaker 3: putting on a great square.
Speaker 2: It was a big night when the Edzel first came out.
Speaker 2: This was a big deal, right.
Speaker 4: It was about as big a deal as you can imagine.
Speaker 2: But not too big to fail. Just two years after
Speaker 2: its launch, the ed Sell was out of gas. The
Speaker 2: very name immortalized as a byword for failure. But Edzell
Speaker 2: wasn't just the name of a car.
Speaker 4: Edgell was the name of Henry Ford's only son.
Speaker 2: And one of history's most famous NEPO babies. Yes, nepo baby.
Speaker 2: The nepo is short for nepotism. You may have heard
Speaker 2: the term nepo baby to describe celebrity children born to
Speaker 2: celebrity parents and all the advantages that come with that.
Speaker 2: But family connections affect every field of work and always
Speaker 2: have And when family is involved, so is drama. In
Speaker 2: this episode, we'll tell you the story of Henry and
Speaker 2: Ed sul Ford. Oh the pressure of being the son
Speaker 2: of that guy.
Speaker 4: It had to be tough, knowing that you would never
Speaker 4: be able to top what your father had done because
Speaker 4: it couldn't be done anymore.
Speaker 2: You'll also hear about the first father and son to
Speaker 2: make it to the White House. Service is the family business.
Speaker 5: Service is the family business because the family business is America.
Speaker 2: And speaking of the White House, we'll recount the tale
Speaker 2: of the famous daughter who strolled into sixteen hundred Pennsylvania
Speaker 2: Avenue on four legs. Was Pushinka a nepo baby?
Speaker 6: I would have to say yes, I mean, look at
Speaker 6: the lineage she came from.
Speaker 2: Three stories, three families, three big names, well two if
Speaker 2: you don't count the dog from CBS Sunday Morning and
Speaker 2: iHeart I'm Morocca. And this is mobituary this moment, NEPO,
Speaker 2: Babies of History, Edzel, Ford, John Quincy Adams, and Prushinka
Speaker 2: the Dog. You say the word ed Sel and most
Speaker 2: people think what.
Speaker 4: A synonym for failure or commercial product failure in any event.
Speaker 2: That's Matt Anderson. He's the curator of Transportation at the
Speaker 2: amazing Henry Ford Museum of American Innovation in Dearborn, Michigan.
Speaker 2: For ten seasons, I've hosted the CBS television series Innovation
Speaker 2: Nation at the Henry Ford, and Matt is my go
Speaker 2: to guy for all things automotive.
Speaker 4: I like to think that the ed Sel was overstyled, oversold,
Speaker 4: and overpriced.
Speaker 2: Would you say it was a bad car.
Speaker 4: I don't think the Edzel was a bad car per se.
Speaker 4: I mean it was a solid vehicle. The engineering did work,
Speaker 4: but it just wasn't what the market wanted. Ford promised
Speaker 4: something entirely new in automotive engineering and design, and in
Speaker 4: the end, the Edgel just had things that are kind
Speaker 4: of gimmicky.
Speaker 2: The Edzel was meant to compete with mid priced cars
Speaker 2: like Chrysler's Dodge and GM's Pontiac and Buick, and it
Speaker 2: boasted several genuine innovations like system warning lights on the dashboard,
Speaker 2: which every car made today has, But it also had
Speaker 2: features no one seemed to need, like a rolling dome speedometer,
Speaker 2: and debuting in the midst of a recession, it's low
Speaker 2: miles per gallon was a non starter for most consumers.
Speaker 2: As for the design of the car, it got attention
Speaker 2: all right, the wrong to attention the oddly shaped vertical
Speaker 2: grill at the front. Comedian Danny Thomas said it made
Speaker 2: the car look like an Oldsmobile sucking a lemon. Others
Speaker 2: likened the grill's shape to something more risque.
Speaker 4: That was a comment made at the time. It made
Speaker 4: ever since, yes, at the Edzel represented a certain anatomical part,
Speaker 4: and we'll leave it at that.
Speaker 2: The company had spent ten years and two hundred and
Speaker 2: fifty million dollars on the Edsol. After just three model
Speaker 2: years and a loss of three hundred and fifty million,
Speaker 2: the Edzel was discontinued over sixteen years after the man
Speaker 2: for whom it was named, someone who had nothing to
Speaker 2: do with the car, had died. The final insult to
Speaker 2: a man who never got the credit he deserved from
Speaker 2: the public or from his own father.
Speaker 4: When folks generations into the future think back on the
Speaker 4: twentieth century. There are just a few names that are
Speaker 4: going to be remembered, and Henry Ford's is one of them.
Speaker 2: Henry Ford revolutionized mass industrial production with the assembly line.
Speaker 2: He introduced the five dollar workday, helping to create a
Speaker 2: middle class, and he was the man behind the vehicle
Speaker 2: that changed America.
Speaker 4: The Model T which Henry Ford had designed and introduced,
Speaker 4: changed the automobile from being a plaything for the wealthy
Speaker 4: into a tool of everyday life.
Speaker 3: It ended the isolation of the farmer and made the
Speaker 3: Sunday ride at National Institution.
Speaker 2: When Edsel Ford rolled off the assembly line on November sixteenth,
Speaker 2: eighteen ninety three, courtesy of Henry and Clara Ford, the
Speaker 2: family wasn't yet wealthy. Henry was still just getting started.
Speaker 4: Just about six weeks after Edsel was born, he built
Speaker 4: his first internal combustion engine and it worked. He only
Speaker 4: ran it for about thirty seconds or so, but that
Speaker 4: moment kind of was a Eureka moment for Henry Ford
Speaker 4: and knew that this was what he was going to do.
Speaker 4: He was going to get into the automobile business.
Speaker 2: An only child, Edseell grew up alongside that business. At
Speaker 2: age two, he wrote in his father's first gas powered automobile,
Speaker 2: the Quadricycle PSI, I've driven in a replica of the original,
Speaker 2: four big bicycle wheels, a little buggy seat and no brakes.
Speaker 2: You had to use your foot to stop at Fred
Speaker 2: Flintstone style. As a young boy, Edsell spent hours drawing
Speaker 2: imaginative designs for his own cars. As a teenager, he
Speaker 2: spent as much time as he could after school at
Speaker 2: his father's auto plant, helping with the mail, attaching brass
Speaker 2: tags to new vehicles, and in nineteen oh eight, when
Speaker 2: Edseell was sixteen years old, Henry unveiled the Model T.
Speaker 4: I think it's a measure of the esteem in which
Speaker 4: his father held him at that point that Edzell was
Speaker 4: a part of a very small group who was involved
Speaker 4: in designing the Ford Model T. Henry literally built a
Speaker 4: kind of a secret room in the corner of the
Speaker 4: factory where his top engineers would sit and work through
Speaker 4: what this automobile should be, and Edzell was there for
Speaker 4: all of those discussions.
Speaker 2: As soon as he graduated from high school, Edzell went
Speaker 2: to work for his father full time, a newspaper at
Speaker 2: the time described him as quote a quiet, hard working
Speaker 2: youngster with a desk in his father's office, as familiar
Speaker 2: with every branch of the business as any of the
Speaker 2: officers in the company.
Speaker 4: He was elected to the board of directors in nineteen
Speaker 4: fifteen when he was all of twenty two years old.
Speaker 4: So he moves pretty quickly from the bottom up to
Speaker 4: the upper reaches of Ford Motor Company.
Speaker 2: Do you think that he worried that people thought he
Speaker 2: was there only because he was the boss's son.
Speaker 4: That had to nagg at the back of Edgell's conscious
Speaker 4: that people somewhere up or down the line at Ford
Speaker 4: Motor Company would have thought he was just there by
Speaker 4: virtue of who his father was.
Speaker 2: When Edzell asked for an exemption from military service during
Speaker 2: World War One to keep working at Ford Motor Company,
Speaker 2: he was accused of being a draft dodger.
Speaker 4: I think that on him because he really did believe
Speaker 4: that he was of more value working at Ford Motor
Speaker 4: Company than overseas.
Speaker 2: But Edseell, who was named president of the company at
Speaker 2: age twenty five, would prove himself worthy of his position
Speaker 2: and in many ways a stark contrast to his father.
Speaker 4: They were very much different. In fact, about as polar
Speaker 4: opposite as you could imagine. Henry grew up on a farm.
Speaker 4: He never finished his grade school education and kind of
Speaker 4: worked his way up to his ultimate career goals.
Speaker 2: Here's Henry espousing his belief that success starts and ends
Speaker 2: with hard work.
Speaker 6: The young man makes his mind the work.
Speaker 2: There's no event of what he can do, makes up
Speaker 2: his mind to.
Speaker 5: That's the idea.
Speaker 2: Where he has much an.
Speaker 7: He must study.
Speaker 2: And Henry was proudly unpolished. On the other hand, ed
Speaker 2: Sell was urbane and sophisticated. Henry did trust experts. Edseell
Speaker 2: admired them. Henry had little interest in the arts. Edzell
Speaker 2: was a great patron of music and art in Detroit.
Speaker 2: He commissioned the monumental Detroit Industry Murals from Mexican artist
Speaker 2: Diego Rivera for the Detroit Institute of Arts, and let
Speaker 2: me tell you, if you are ever in the Motor City,
Speaker 2: you must must go see them. Henry never drank and
Speaker 2: kept a close circle of friends. Edsell loved to socialize.
Speaker 2: You know, people talk about work life balance today. Did
Speaker 2: they differ on that score?
Speaker 4: Absolutely? Henry lived and breathed his work. Even when he
Speaker 4: was at home, he was still thinking about what was
Speaker 4: going on at the Ford Motor Company. Whereas Edsel he
Speaker 4: would put in his forty hours of fifty hours, whatever
Speaker 4: it took in the company. But when he went home,
Speaker 4: that was his time to enjoy with his family, to
Speaker 4: enjoy recreational pursuits, to enjoy education in Richmond, whatever it
Speaker 4: might be.
Speaker 2: Edseell married Eleanor Clay in nineteen sixteen. They wasted no
Speaker 2: time in starting a family. Their first child, Henry Ford,
Speaker 2: the second, was born in nineteen seventeen. They went on
Speaker 2: to have three more. Now, in terms of whom you'd
Speaker 2: rather have.
Speaker 4: As a boss, Henry had a very gruff management style,
Speaker 4: his way or the highway. Edzel preferred to let people
Speaker 4: talk about different options and think it over and come
Speaker 4: to a logical conclusion.
Speaker 2: Edseel was just a lot friendlier.
Speaker 4: And ed made a point of greeting everybody on the
Speaker 4: way into work in the morning, from the people on
Speaker 4: the ground level there right on up to the senior executives.
Speaker 4: And Henry always had a kind of a holder look
Speaker 4: about him, particularly as he got older, you know, almost
Speaker 4: a scowl about him, which would make him a little scary.
Speaker 2: And not to be rude, but from certain angles he
Speaker 2: could look like mister Burns from the Simpsons.
Speaker 4: That's an adequate embarrasson I think there.
Speaker 2: I wonder if Henry was a jealous of his son
Speaker 2: when he saw how much employees liked Edsel.
Speaker 4: I would imagine to some extent too, Henry was probably
Speaker 4: yellis just of Edzel's youth. It's inevitable as we get older,
Speaker 4: and here's Edzel rising up and just hitting the peak
Speaker 4: in the prime of his own life. And it's a
Speaker 4: time that's passed for Henry. So that had to have
Speaker 4: been a part of it too.
Speaker 2: Did Henry ever try to undermine his son?
Speaker 4: Unfortunately, Henry undermined his son at just about every turn.
Speaker 2: Edseell may have been the company's president, but Henry never
Speaker 2: actually gave up the wheel. He retained full authority. Case
Speaker 2: in point, when the Highland Park plant was becoming overcrowded,
Speaker 2: senior managers appealed to Edseell.
Speaker 4: So after listening to this and seeing the evidence, Edgel said,
Speaker 4: let's build an annex, a new building for administrative offices.
Speaker 4: And they gotten to the point where they dug a
Speaker 4: hole for the foundation.
Speaker 2: But when Henry saw the hole, he didn't like it.
Speaker 2: He put the kebash on Edsel's expansion plans.
Speaker 4: And try to reason with his father pushed back against
Speaker 4: this idea. Henry wouldn't hear it, and Edsel finally just
Speaker 4: as okay, fine, we'll close everything down, We'll fill in
Speaker 4: the hole. You'd think that would be the end of it,
Speaker 4: but it wasn't. Henry said no, no, don't fill in
Speaker 4: the hole. Leave it that way. And so for several
Speaker 4: months afterwards, everyone who came into Ford Motor Company saw
Speaker 4: this big, gaping hole in the ground. They were infect
Speaker 4: reminded every morning of who had the final say at
Speaker 4: Ford Motor Company. So absolutely humiliating.
Speaker 2: And to do that to his own son, yeah, very
Speaker 2: very cruel. Driving father and son farther apart where they're
Speaker 2: differing views on the world. Henry was viciously and very
Speaker 2: publicly anti semitic.
Speaker 4: That is the darkest stain on Henry Ford's character and
Speaker 4: one that has not gone away and won't and shouldn't.
Speaker 4: He was a virulent antisemit.
Speaker 2: In nineteen eighteen, Henry purchased the Dearborn Independent newspaper, which
Speaker 2: a year and a half later under his direction, began
Speaker 2: publishing a series of articles entitled The International jew The
Speaker 2: World's Problem, which claimed there was a vast Jewish conspiracy
Speaker 2: and blamed the Jewish people for everything from war to
Speaker 2: jazz music. The newspaper was distributed at dealerships across the country,
Speaker 2: reaching a circulation of nine hundred thousand, and.
Speaker 4: Edzell and Clara too. To their credit, they were on
Speaker 4: the board of directors quote unquote of the Dearborn Independent
Speaker 4: because it was owned entirely by the Ford family. They resigned.
Speaker 4: Edgell in particular, said no, I'm not going to have
Speaker 4: anything to do with this newspaper. He knew he couldn't
Speaker 4: stop his father from publishing it, but at least he
Speaker 4: wasn't going to be a part of it.
Speaker 2: And then in the mid nineteen twenties came a rift
Speaker 2: over Henry's other child, his beloved Model T.
Speaker 4: The car was absolutely cutting edge in nineteen oh eight
Speaker 4: nineteen oh nine when it was built and introduced, but
Speaker 4: by the mid twenties eight to ninosaur.
Speaker 2: The Chevrolet was helping General Motors roar passed Ford. But
Speaker 2: Henry didn't want to hear it.
Speaker 4: That slump in the Model Tea's sales which really fall
Speaker 4: off a cliff. Starting about nineteen twenty five is where
Speaker 4: the break between Henry and Edsel really begins, where they're
Speaker 4: more or less friendly and familial relationship starts to fall apart.
Speaker 2: After years of pleading, Edzell finally convinced Henry to trade
Speaker 2: in the Model T for the bigger and better looking
Speaker 2: Model A.
Speaker 4: The Model A is no doubt the first Ford automobile
Speaker 4: that had real style to real class.
Speaker 2: Boy, it seems like the cars that each of them
Speaker 2: championed were sort of a reflection of them temperamentally right.
Speaker 2: The Model T so important, ultimately very practical, The Model
Speaker 2: A nicer to look at, more comfortable to drive.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: With its design supervised by Edseel, the Model A went
Speaker 2: on to sell over four and a half million and
Speaker 2: put Forward back on top. Henry took the credit, but
Speaker 2: it was Edsel's triumph and not his only one. Ed
Speaker 2: Soul was the driving force behind Ford's first luxury vehicle,
Speaker 2: the Lincoln Continental, which architect Frank Lloyd Wright called the
Speaker 2: most beautiful car in the world.
Speaker 4: To this day, critics enthusiasts alike will refer to it
Speaker 4: as one of the most beautiful American production cars ever built.
Speaker 3: The United States, even when it is running and low,
Speaker 3: is a pretty big business proposition.
Speaker 2: You are now hearing rare audio of the press shy
Speaker 2: ed soel Ford appearing alongside his father in nineteen thirty five.
Speaker 3: What I believe the country is getting ready to make
Speaker 3: a very decided step forward next year, and we are
Speaker 3: doing all we can to help it along. What do
Speaker 3: you think of that, Brodoc? But I think everybody has
Speaker 3: decided that they've.
Speaker 1: Got to go to work.
Speaker 2: By that point, Ford Motor Company, under ed Sel, was
Speaker 2: playing a major role in aviation.
Speaker 4: People might not realize Ford Motor Company was very busy
Speaker 4: in the aviation business in the nineteen twenties into the
Speaker 4: very early nineteen thirties. They built one hundred and ninety
Speaker 4: nine four Trimotor airplanes, which were really the first successful
Speaker 4: all metal commercial aircraft flown in the United States.
Speaker 2: When America entered World War II, Edsel oversaw production of
Speaker 2: one bomber per hour at the company's Willow Run plant.
Speaker 4: It was Edseel that was there running the company, meeting
Speaker 4: with the government, meeting with the military, making things happen.
Speaker 4: I don't think it's too much of a stretch to
Speaker 4: say that Edgell made his dying breadth toward for World
Speaker 4: War II production of Ford Motor Company. He gave his
Speaker 4: every last ounce to that effort.
Speaker 2: It was during the war, in nineteen forty three that
Speaker 2: Edseell began experiencing intense pain in his stomach. His physician
Speaker 2: diagnosed him with ulcers. When the pain didn't subside, Edseell
Speaker 2: visited specialists who discovered that he was suffering from stomach cancer.
Speaker 4: Sadly, at that point it had spread to other organs,
Speaker 4: and you have to wonder if they had not misdiagnosed
Speaker 4: it as ulcers. You know, even in the early forty
Speaker 4: stomach cancer wasn't necessarily fatal.
Speaker 2: But even as he weakened, Edzell continued working at the office,
Speaker 2: does he tell his father?
Speaker 4: Edgell tells his father about his condition. Unfortunately, Henry sort
Speaker 4: of dismissed the whole thing. He said, well, no, Edgell's
Speaker 4: just feeling sick because he's partying too much, he's drinking
Speaker 4: too much, he's not eating the right foods, and Henry
Speaker 4: was a fanatic on diet. I think Henry refused to
Speaker 4: accept that his son could be terminally ill because this
Speaker 4: was the person who was going to keep for Boter
Speaker 4: company going.
Speaker 2: Eventually, Edzell was confined to his home in Gross Point.
Speaker 2: Henry and Clara visited their son's bedside, but even in
Speaker 2: Edzell's final weeks of life, Henry was ignoring reality, insisting
Speaker 2: to associates that Edzell would be back at work in
Speaker 2: just a few weeks. Edzell Bryant Ford died on May
Speaker 2: twenty ninth, nineteen forty three. The obituary from the New
Speaker 2: York Times read, in the untimely death of Edsel Ford
Speaker 2: at age forty nine, the nation has suffered a serious loss.
Speaker 2: Self effacing and instinctively avoiding the limelight. He had been
Speaker 2: for more than two decades, in every sense, a full
Speaker 2: partner of his father.
Speaker 4: There's a great story about some of the Ford production
Speaker 4: managers coming in to work the day after Edgel passed
Speaker 4: away and seeing the flag and half deaf, and they
Speaker 4: just upped the car and kind of burst into tears
Speaker 4: because they all knew what that meant and who they
Speaker 4: had lost. So, you know, people really did admire Edsel,
Speaker 4: and in whole life, Henry had just been trying to
Speaker 4: turn Edseel into something that he wasn't He wanted his
Speaker 4: son to be more like himself, the same personality, the
Speaker 4: same kind of throat instincts, and that just wasn't going
Speaker 4: to happen.
Speaker 2: After Edzell's death, had his own health went into rapid decline.
Speaker 2: He suffered a series of small strokes and a brain hemorrhage,
Speaker 2: and four years later died at his home in Dearborn
Speaker 2: on April seventh, nineteen forty seven. A decade later, the
Speaker 2: Ford Motor Company debuted its ed Cel line. How should
Speaker 2: edsel Ford be remembered?
Speaker 4: Edsel Ford should not be remembered for the Edseel automobile.
Speaker 4: And that's one of the great ironies in American automotive history.
Speaker 4: People hear that name, they think about that failed car,
Speaker 4: and of course only did he have nothing to do
Speaker 4: with it. It really is the antithesis of what he stood for.
Speaker 4: And he should be remembered for his successes, certainly aviation
Speaker 4: for the Lincoln Continental, and he should also be remembered
Speaker 4: for his work during World War Two. So there's no
Speaker 4: question that he served his country in the highest and
Speaker 4: best sense.
Speaker 2: Coming up the Adams family, a NEPO baby seeks to
Speaker 2: redeem his father at the ballot box.
Speaker 5: I think he realized that he would have to carry
Speaker 5: on the family's name but also make it his own.
Speaker 2: Imagine a Mount Rushmore of Nepo babies. We would probably
Speaker 2: include edsel Ford. We'd also have to save a spot
Speaker 2: for Jesus, since after all, he's the son of God.
Speaker 2: I'd give the third spot to e Liza Minelli. She's
Speaker 2: the daughter of Judy Garland and director Vincent Manelli, so
Speaker 2: she had a leg up in Hollywood from birth, but
Speaker 2: she earned that Oscar for Cabaret. As for that fourth slot, well,
Speaker 2: considering that the actual Mount Rushmore is for presidents, I'm
Speaker 2: giving it to our sixth president, who was also the
Speaker 2: son of our second president. I'm talking about John Quincy Adams.
Speaker 2: And yes it's Quinsy, not Quincy. Now edsel Ford's father
Speaker 2: helped invent the modern age, that's daunting. But John Quincy
Speaker 2: Adams's dad helped invent a country, the United States. When
Speaker 2: your father is not just your father, but is a
Speaker 2: founding father, that's got to be a lot of pressure.
Speaker 5: It's a tremendous amount of pressure. And it's not just
Speaker 5: any of the founders. It's John and Abigail Adams.
Speaker 2: Alexis co is a presidential historian. She calls John and
Speaker 2: Abigail the original helicopter parents. And yes, I realized helicopters
Speaker 2: didn't exist in the colonial era, but you get the picture.
Speaker 5: They were involved in every aspect of their children's life.
Speaker 2: They were all up in it, right.
Speaker 5: There is a really long to do list. It's exhausting.
Speaker 2: Just one item on that list translating the works of
Speaker 2: Greek historian Thucydides. Mind you, Quincy was just ten years
Speaker 2: old at the time.
Speaker 5: And from a young age he showed promise. It wasn't
Speaker 5: just that he was the eldest son, It's that he
Speaker 5: was exceptional.
Speaker 2: The second of six, Quinsy was born July eleventh, seventeen
Speaker 2: sixty seven in Braintree, Massachusetts.
Speaker 5: He is funny, he is pithy, but he's so serious
Speaker 5: and like his parents, and more like his father, he's
Speaker 5: always stressed out.
Speaker 2: Well, of course, this is not a normal child rearing.
Speaker 2: Aside from being the son of a founding father. There's
Speaker 2: a revolution going on.
Speaker 7: Yeah.
Speaker 5: Literally outside their home they're seeing soldiers march by. They
Speaker 5: are aware that they are a prominent family in what
Speaker 5: the British are calling a rebellion. They're not calling it
Speaker 5: a revolution.
Speaker 2: If this rebellion fails, his father could be executed right.
Speaker 5: Very likely it is a treasonous act.
Speaker 2: During the height of the Revolutionary War, the young boy
Speaker 2: traveled with his father on missions to Europe on behalf
Speaker 2: of the fledgling Republic. Crossing the ocean wasn't exactly smooth
Speaker 2: sand First, their ship was struck by lightning, and then
Speaker 2: they traded fire with and captured an enemy vessel. At
Speaker 2: the ripe old age of fourteen, Quincy was sent off
Speaker 2: without his father to Russia, where he served as secretary
Speaker 2: to the American diplomat, Francis Dana. The CBS News archives
Speaker 2: don't go back that far, but here's the dramatized version
Speaker 2: courtesy of the HBO John Adams mini series, with the
Speaker 2: excellent Paul Giamatti in the title role.
Speaker 8: You must not let the idea of going to Russia
Speaker 8: frighten you. You're fourteen years old, Johnny, already a man
Speaker 8: and never one for childish pursuits. Yes, and I have
Speaker 8: confidence that you will make both of us very proud.
Speaker 9: I would rather stay you with you, father.
Speaker 2: Funny. When I was fourteen, my father was sending me
Speaker 2: off to the drug store with quarters to play Ms.
Speaker 2: Pac Man. Now, even as a kid, Quinsy documented it all,
Speaker 2: but his diaries had pictures.
Speaker 5: He's a doodler, So we have all these great journals
Speaker 5: in which he's drawing ships and people, and he's writing
Speaker 5: not only for himself and for the letters he has
Speaker 5: to write home, but also because he's really aware that
Speaker 5: they are significant in history if they make it. But
Speaker 5: if they make it.
Speaker 10: I love though that he's doodling because it's the reminder
Speaker 10: that he's just a kid. He's fourteen, so he's doodling
Speaker 10: in the eighteenth century equivalent of a trapper keeper basically right.
Speaker 2: Absolutely, And while there were no pop stars around back then,
Speaker 2: Quincy definitely had an American idol.
Speaker 5: He was nothing short of a fanboy for George Washington.
Speaker 5: When he was abroad on his own and he was
Speaker 5: living at the Hague, he put up what is basically
Speaker 5: the equivalent of a poster of George Washington.
Speaker 2: And George Washington was impressed by young Quincy, as were
Speaker 2: many of the founding fathers.
Speaker 5: They all believed that he had incredible potential to continue
Speaker 5: their legacy without However, nepotism, because, of course, we were
Speaker 5: not a monarchy.
Speaker 2: Now. Most of the children of the founding fathers could
Speaker 2: only land jobs through their connections. By and large, they
Speaker 2: were a pretty mediocre bunch, including Quinsy's own siblings. His
Speaker 2: brother Charles was described by their father, John Adams as
Speaker 2: quote a madman possessed of the devil. At fifteen, Charles
Speaker 2: was caught streaking across Harvard Yard. By age thirty, he'd
Speaker 2: abandoned his law practice, and his family brother Thomas, was
Speaker 2: described as a bully and a brute, and was equally unsuccessful.
Speaker 2: Their sister Nabby, married a man, Abigail Adams, deemed wholly
Speaker 2: devoid of judgment. His shady business dealings consigned Nabby to
Speaker 2: a life of financial insecurity. Quincy, on the other hand,
Speaker 2: sought only to please John and Abigail. The first and
Speaker 2: deepest of all my wishes, he wrote, is to give
Speaker 2: satisfaction to my parents. He graduated with highest honors from Harvard,
Speaker 2: whereby all accounts, he kept his clothes on in public,
Speaker 2: before embarking on a brilliant career in diplomacy, serving every
Speaker 2: president from Washington through Monroe. Quinsy helped negotiate the Treaty
Speaker 2: of Ghent ending the War of eighteen twelve, and as
Speaker 2: President Monroe's Secretary of State, he formulated the policy barring
Speaker 2: European involvement in the Americas, also known as the Monroe Doctrine.
Speaker 2: Now early in his diplomatic career, his father served as
Speaker 2: the nation's first vice president. Then in seventeen ninety six,
Speaker 2: John Adams was elected the nation's second president. Shortly after
Speaker 2: his father's inauguration, Quinsy married the British Louisa Catherine Adams.
Speaker 2: She would become our first fife foreign born first lady.
Speaker 2: They would have four children. Of course, there were some
Speaker 2: family drama of their own when they named their eldest
Speaker 2: after none other than George Washington.
Speaker 5: Which was not totally unheard of, but it's certainly significant
Speaker 5: to name your child George Washington when your father was
Speaker 5: also kind of a big deal.
Speaker 2: Let me ask did that hurt his parents' feelings.
Speaker 5: Here's what's interesting is John Adams would complain about the
Speaker 5: smallest of things for pages upon pages, and he would
Speaker 5: not only do it in one letter, he'd repeat it
Speaker 5: in nine different letters. But sometimes he left this kind
Speaker 5: of personal business. Shall we say to Abigail, and Abigail
Speaker 5: wrote to Quincy's brother that when Quinsy named his child
Speaker 5: George Washington, that it hurt his father's feelings.
Speaker 2: It seems that Quinsy got the memo. He named his
Speaker 2: second son, John George Washington Adams, was born just a
Speaker 2: few months after his grandfather was voted out of the
Speaker 2: White House. John Adams was the first president to lose
Speaker 2: a bid for reelection and serve only one term, a
Speaker 2: tough pill to swallow for the whole Adams family. How
Speaker 2: did this affect John Quincy Adams.
Speaker 5: I think he realized that he would have to carry
Speaker 5: on the family's name but also make it his own.
Speaker 2: And so Quincy decided to run for president in eighteen
Speaker 2: twenty four. According to biographer Paul C. Nagel, one of
Speaker 2: Quincy's motives was to quote emulate or surpass his revered
Speaker 2: father's distinguished career and thereby burnish the Adams family name.
Speaker 2: After a nasty four way race that included Andrew Jackson,
Speaker 2: John Quincy Adams was elected our sixth president. When he
Speaker 2: notified his father, the aging and normally reserved former president
Speaker 2: responded movingly, never did I feel so much solemnity as
Speaker 2: upon this occasion, the multitude of my thoughts and the
Speaker 2: intensity of my feelings are too much for a mind
Speaker 2: like mine. In its ninetieth year.
Speaker 5: It's the first American dynasty. It's significant. He's proud, but
Speaker 5: he's also got to then sort of instill certain boundaries
Speaker 5: with his father, with other people, and he's well aware
Speaker 5: that he needs to be his own.
Speaker 1: President.
Speaker 2: John Quincy Adams became the first non founding father to
Speaker 2: hold the nation's highest office, but he'd seen all his
Speaker 2: predecessors in action up close. This is where being a
Speaker 2: NEPO baby, I think is probably useful for everyone, because
Speaker 2: he kind of knew all these guys growing up.
Speaker 5: He did, and he took notes. He understood it was
Speaker 5: a great privilege.
Speaker 2: Alas much like his father's time in office, Quinsy struggled.
Speaker 2: He'd come into the office without a popular majority, and
Speaker 2: throughout his term he faced opposition on everything from his
Speaker 2: support for education to his proposal for a national observatory.
Speaker 2: His happiest time as president kneeling in the White House
Speaker 2: garden growing vegetables. It was during his term that his
Speaker 2: father died on July fourth, eighteen twenty six, the very
Speaker 2: same day, Thomas Jefferson died, the fiftieth anniversary of the
Speaker 2: country's founding. Yes, that sound you're hearing is thunder. In
Speaker 2: the following presidential election, a dispirited Quinsy was trounced by
Speaker 2: Andrew Jackson. He returned to Massachusetts an unsuccessful one termer,
Speaker 2: the only one term president since his father.
Speaker 5: I think he almost always felt like he was on
Speaker 5: the precipice of failure. To have it realized was probably
Speaker 5: the worst thing that ever happened to him.
Speaker 2: And then months later a terror personal loss. His son,
Speaker 2: George Washington Adams died by suicide by throwing himself from
Speaker 2: a ferry into the Long Island Sound. Quinsy, like John
Speaker 2: Adams before him, was a demanding father, and it may
Speaker 2: have been an imminent confrontation with the old man that
Speaker 2: pushed George over the edge. At this point, John Quincy
Speaker 2: Adams could have retired to a quiet life.
Speaker 5: He would have felt as if he was wasting his potential,
Speaker 5: because these are people who believe in service.
Speaker 2: Service is the family business.
Speaker 5: Service is the family business, because the family business is America.
Speaker 2: John Quincy Adams did not retreat into private life. Instead,
Speaker 2: after much encouragement, he decided to run for a seat
Speaker 2: in the House of Representatives from his home state of Massachusetts,
Speaker 2: and he won in a landslide. But wasn't this a
Speaker 2: step down from the presidency.
Speaker 5: Absolutely not. It's doing real work, meaning legislation, representing people,
Speaker 5: not just this performance of being the president and hosting
Speaker 5: and all those things which nobody really likes. You're actually
Speaker 5: doing work, and I think he loved it.
Speaker 2: At age sixty four, service in Congress meant a chance
Speaker 2: at redemption for himself and the Adams family, and in
Speaker 2: this final act Quincy found a new passion in the
Speaker 2: fight against slavery. It's important to note of the first
Speaker 2: twelve presidents, John Adams and John Quincy Adams were the
Speaker 2: only two not to own slaves.
Speaker 9: This is the most important case I've come before this
Speaker 9: court because what it didn't fat concerns it's the very
Speaker 9: nature of man.
Speaker 2: That's Anthony Hopkins as John Quincy Adams in the nineteen
Speaker 2: ninety seven Steven Spielberg film Armistad. In eighteen thirty nine,
Speaker 2: fifty three enslaved Africans managed to take control of their
Speaker 2: captor's ship, the schooner Armistad, before the ship itself was
Speaker 2: taken into custody off the coast of Connecticut. The fate
Speaker 2: of the Africans, whether they'd be allowed to return to Africa,
Speaker 2: divided the nation. The case made its way to the
Speaker 2: Supreme Court, and the now seventy two year old Quincy,
Speaker 2: who had earned the nickname Old Man Eloquent, argued the
Speaker 2: case on behalf of the Africans. Here's Hopkins as Quinsy,
Speaker 2: addressing the court, we.
Speaker 9: Desperately need your strength and wisdom to triumph over our fears,
Speaker 9: our prejudices, ourselves. Give us the courage to do what
Speaker 9: is right. And if it means civil war, then let
Speaker 9: it come. And when it does, finally the last battle
Speaker 9: of the American Revolution.
Speaker 2: Quincy's stature as a former president and the son of
Speaker 2: a founding father meant he could not be easily dismissed.
Speaker 2: Invoking the Declaration of Independence, he called for the African's
Speaker 2: inalienable rights of life and liberty to be restored. The
Speaker 2: Court agreed and ruled for the Africans. It was a
Speaker 2: great triumph for Quincy, perhaps the most significant of his long,
Speaker 2: long career. Seven years later, moments after casting a vote,
Speaker 2: John Quincy Adams suffered a cerebral hemorrhage and collapsed on
Speaker 2: the floor of the House of Representatives. He died two
Speaker 2: days later. The Bible's Book of Luke includes the verse
Speaker 2: to whom much is given, much is required. You may
Speaker 2: be more familiar with the version in Spider Man. With
Speaker 2: great power comes great responsibility. John Quincy Adams used all
Speaker 2: that he'd been given in life to serve others until
Speaker 2: the very end. A Nepo baby done good, coming up
Speaker 2: after the break? Is she fluffy?
Speaker 1: She is definitely a fluffy dog.
Speaker 2: For babies can be Nepo babies do.
Speaker 3: Mister Khushav and I had a very full and frank
Speaker 3: exchange of views on the major issues that now divide
Speaker 3: are two countries.
Speaker 2: That's President John F. Kennedy in June of nineteen sixty one,
Speaker 2: just back from his summit meeting in Vienna with Soviet
Speaker 2: Premier Nikita Khrushchev. It was an especially tense time between
Speaker 2: the superpowers. The arms race was in full swing, and
Speaker 2: only months before Soviet Yuri Gagarin became the first man
Speaker 2: in space. But in the public relations arena it was
Speaker 2: no contest. The Soviets were definitely playing defense. Against JFK
Speaker 2: and First Lady Jackie Kennedy. So Khrushchev launched his own
Speaker 2: charm offensive by sending a glamorous young emissary to the
Speaker 2: White House. Her name was Pushinka, and she was the
Speaker 2: daughter of a famous Soviet cosmonaut. When Pushinka arrived on
Speaker 2: us soil, she was naturally met with suspicion. Could she
Speaker 2: be a spy? Some wondered if she might be bugged.
Speaker 2: Legendary White House correspondent Helen Thomas wrote at the time
Speaker 2: that a dark eyed, platinum blonde temptress has invaded the
Speaker 2: White House. But Pushenka was no spy. She wasn't even human.
Speaker 2: Pushinka was a small white dog. Her name actually means
Speaker 2: fluffy in Russian. I first learned about Pushenka back in
Speaker 2: twenty oh four when I was writing my thriller about
Speaker 2: presidential pets and their secret role in presidential decision making,
Speaker 2: entitled All the President's Pets. Pushinka was the daughter of
Speaker 2: the pioneering Soviet space dog Strelka. In August nineteen sixty,
Speaker 2: Strelka and her co pilot Belka made headlines worldwide as
Speaker 2: the first two dogs to come back from space. Alive.
Speaker 2: Side note, Leika was the actual first dog in space.
Speaker 2: In nineteen fifty seven. The Soviets shot her into space
Speaker 2: without any expectation she'd survive. She didn't. I don't even
Speaker 2: want to know what the Soviets did to cats. So yes,
Speaker 2: Pushinka was a NEPO puppy.
Speaker 1: She is definitely a fluffy dog.
Speaker 2: Alan Price is the direct of the John F. Kennedy
Speaker 2: Library and Museum.
Speaker 1: Kushink is a beautiful dog, absolutely and a lovely temperament,
Speaker 1: very friendly dog.
Speaker 2: And the Kennedys were very comfortable around dogs. When they
Speaker 2: moved into the White House the winter before, they brought
Speaker 2: a long clipper, the German shepherd, Shannon the Cocker spaniel,
Speaker 2: and Wolf the Irish wolfhound. And then there were all
Speaker 2: their other pets.
Speaker 1: They've got Tom Kitten the cat. They have hamsters named
Speaker 1: Debbie and Billy. They've got parakeets named blue Bell and
Speaker 1: may Bell. It's really just incredible.
Speaker 2: They had a rabbit named Jaja, a gift from a magician.
Speaker 1: They embrace ponies. They have three of them, right. They've
Speaker 1: got Macaroni and tex and Leprechaun.
Speaker 2: Funny enough, the President was allergic to both horses. And dogs,
Speaker 2: But it seems he loved dogs more than he hated
Speaker 2: to break out. Enter Poushinka, the only dog that came
Speaker 2: with a passport. Seriously, she actually had a passport. I
Speaker 2: like to imagine the day Poushenka came to Washington, the
Speaker 2: other pets lined up inside the White House's grand foyer,
Speaker 2: awaiting her arrival, wondering who is this mysterious creature they've
Speaker 2: been hearing about. Suddenly the front doors open, the sunlight
Speaker 2: floods in, first a silhouette, then the sound of the
Speaker 2: dainty padding of feet, as the glamorous Pushinka strides in
Speaker 2: her nose in the air, taking it all in but
Speaker 2: not terribly impressed. The sense of nepo entitlement would be
Speaker 2: galling if she weren't so beautiful. Indeed, before long, Pushenka
Speaker 2: set tongues wagging, none more so than that of Charlie,
Speaker 2: yet another one of the family's dogs, a roguishly handsome
Speaker 2: Welsh Terrier and favorite of the President's Soon enough, Charlie
Speaker 2: and Pushinka were an item.
Speaker 1: I believe they were exclusive, though there were certainly other
Speaker 1: dogs who may or may not have been interested.
Speaker 2: Now, Charlie may have had the confidence to put the
Speaker 2: moves on Pushenka because he too came from privilege. It
Speaker 2: was said that his uncle was Skippy, the wirefox terrier
Speaker 2: who famously plaid Asta in the thin Man series. So yes,
Speaker 2: Charlie was a nepo nephew. It should be noted that
Speaker 2: Poushenka wasn't just physically attractive.
Speaker 1: She's a very smart dog. She learns very quickly from
Speaker 1: the gardeners that she can climb the ladders on the
Speaker 1: children's slide, and so they put a peanut on each
Speaker 1: step to get her to climb higher and hire and
Speaker 1: then learn to slide down the slide on her own.
Speaker 2: The relationship between Charlie and Pushenka progressed quickly. I like
Speaker 2: to imagine that they did that lady in the tramp
Speaker 2: thing with the string of spaghetti. I assume all dogs
Speaker 2: who fall in love do that. And in June nineteen
Speaker 2: teen sixty three, Pushinka and Charlie became parents to four
Speaker 2: adorable pups named Blackie, Butterfly, White Tip, and Streaker. President
Speaker 2: Kennedy dubbed the offspring Pupnicks. Five thousand Americans wrote to
Speaker 2: the Kennedys pleading to adopt the Pupnicks. Two lucky Midwest
Speaker 2: families were given the honors. To some the union of
Speaker 2: Charlie and Pushinka became a symbol of peaceful coexistence, a
Speaker 2: heartwarming image during a particularly frosty period. But just five
Speaker 2: months later, the meaning attached to the dogs would change.
Speaker 3: President Kennedy was assassinated in Dallas, Texas.
Speaker 9: Today he was shot.
Speaker 1: When President Kennedy is assassinated, these pets become a big
Speaker 1: part of the memories that America holds of a time
Speaker 1: that ends so abruptly.
Speaker 2: Within weeks of the murder of President Kennedy, the family
Speaker 2: and all their pets vacated the White House. Charlie was
Speaker 2: sent to live with a Secret Service agent. But what
Speaker 2: happened to Prushenka?
Speaker 3: So you still have Pushenka?
Speaker 6: And how old is she now?
Speaker 2: She's going on four years. Oh now, that's the voice
Speaker 2: of Chief White House Gardener Irvin Williams. He was interviewed
Speaker 2: in nineteen sixty five as part of an oral history
Speaker 2: for the JFK Library. He recalled that he met with
Speaker 2: Missus Kennedy just two days after the president was buried.
Speaker 7: And she asked me that time, did I still want
Speaker 7: Pushenka and I said I should did, and she's as well.
Speaker 7: The sheika is yours forever.
Speaker 6: They were very close.
Speaker 2: This is Irvin Williams's son, Bruce Williams.
Speaker 6: She kind of hung out in his office. I have
Speaker 6: a picture of her under his death.
Speaker 2: Candidly, when I wrote about Shinka in my book on
Speaker 2: Presidential Pets twenty years ago, I never gave much thought
Speaker 2: to what happened to her after the President's assassination. But
Speaker 2: after some Internet sleuthing, we were able to track down Bruce.
Speaker 2: We connected on zoom. He's now in his mid sixties.
Speaker 6: I can get the picture and read to hear the caption.
Speaker 2: Bruce showed me a framed photo of the famous White
Speaker 2: House Rose Garden that his father helped design. Missus Kennedy
Speaker 2: signed the photo.
Speaker 6: She says for Irwin Williams, who made this garden so beautiful,
Speaker 6: for the President who loved it so much, And it
Speaker 6: says who will care for it now that he is gone?
Speaker 2: With deep regrets, Jacqueline Kennedy. So, Missus Kennedy trusted your
Speaker 2: father to take care of the rose garden. Yes, she
Speaker 2: also trusted him to take care of Pushinka.
Speaker 6: Yes, And he was very happy to do that, and
Speaker 6: that's when she came home to our house.
Speaker 2: The Williams family lived in a more modest home in Vienna, Virginia,
Speaker 2: just outside of Washington. Bruce was just six years old,
Speaker 2: the fourth of five kids. So one day, just Pushenka
Speaker 2: shows up in your house.
Speaker 6: Yes, my father comes home from work and Pushenka comes
Speaker 6: in behind him, and she immediately runs under a chair,
Speaker 6: and five kids are now eyeballing her, and my brother
Speaker 6: sticks his hand in and she nips them. So we
Speaker 6: all realized that we just need to leave her alone.
Speaker 2: But Pushenka soon adjusted to her new suburban life. Often
Speaker 2: she'd perch on top of the couch gazing out the window.
Speaker 2: The Williams has lived on three acres, so Pushenka may
Speaker 2: have very well assumed that this was her country home
Speaker 2: or datcha.
Speaker 6: And she knew when my father was coming home because
Speaker 6: she would get up and go to the door. Her
Speaker 6: tail was really almost like a fan or a fluff
Speaker 6: or something. It was just full of hair. Was very cute.
Speaker 2: And was she as soft as you wanted her to be?
Speaker 3: Oh?
Speaker 6: Yes, but she really wasn't a lap dog. I mean
Speaker 6: she liked her belly to be rubbed, especially when you
Speaker 6: were outside in the yard. She would like roll over
Speaker 6: on her back and legs up in the air and
Speaker 6: you could rub her belly.
Speaker 2: In honor of her heritage, Bruce and his siblings photographed
Speaker 2: Pushinka in a Russian fur cap, and I have to
Speaker 2: tell you, I love this picture.
Speaker 6: That was something we did as kids, so I think
Speaker 6: that's when we realized that she was a Russian dog.
Speaker 2: I mean in that picture she really looks like Julie
Speaker 2: Christi and doctor Shabako. You can just hear Laura's theme
Speaker 2: just playing from that movie there.
Speaker 6: I think she was just a little princess in her
Speaker 6: own right.
Speaker 2: As for this princess's throne, my.
Speaker 6: Father had a little bathroom that he would get ready
Speaker 6: in the morning, and she found the niche behind the toilet,
Speaker 6: and that was her home until nineteen seventy seven. That
Speaker 6: was her happy place.
Speaker 2: And though she had receded from the spotlight, Pushinka was
Speaker 2: still receiving fan mail until the very end. Pushinka died
Speaker 2: in nineteen seventy seven. She was sixteen. Bruce's father, Irvin Williams,
Speaker 2: was devastated.
Speaker 6: I was the one who took her to have her
Speaker 6: put down, and he didn't want to be home when
Speaker 6: I did that. I mean, she was really bad, but
Speaker 6: he couldn't bring it himself to do that. So I
Speaker 6: was the one who volunteered to do that. I mean
Speaker 6: it was sad to do, but she was at peace.
Speaker 6: That was the important part.
Speaker 2: Irvin Williams died in twenty eighteen. He was the longest
Speaker 2: serving gardener in White House history, serving presidents from Harry
Speaker 2: Truman through George W. Bush. But he once told a
Speaker 2: reporter that he would probably be remembered more for his
Speaker 2: association with Poushenka, and it seems that Irvin Williams was
Speaker 2: more than fine with that. Poushenka's ashes were sprinkled in
Speaker 2: his casket and engraved on the back of Williams's tombstone
Speaker 2: were the words with trusted companion Poushenka.
Speaker 6: So she's with him the rest of his life or
Speaker 6: internity wherever they're going.
Speaker 2: Was Poushinka a nepo baby?
Speaker 6: I would have to say yes, I mean, look at
Speaker 6: the lineage she came from.
Speaker 2: But there's oftentimes a bad association with nepo baby. Did
Speaker 2: Poushinka give off the kind of arrogance often associated with
Speaker 2: nepo babies.
Speaker 6: I would say, no, she was just just a dog.
Speaker 6: I think she'd just like to be by herself and
Speaker 6: away from kids.
Speaker 2: And behind the toilet and behind the it. I certainly
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