I'm Ann Bocock and welcome to Between the Covers Summer Series.

Doctor Robert Watson has written forty plus books today.

It's George Washington's Final Battle.

This book has just been awarded the Silver Medal in History at the Independent Publishers Awards which is the largest international book competition in the world.

So, welcome.

Thank you, Anne.

It's good to be back.

You have to set the scene here.

This is this time period, it's a brand-new nation.

It's a brand-new kind of government.

There is no capital building yet.

So what is George Washington's vision?

So George Washington was eager to retire after the after the revolutionary war.

He wanted to go back to his beloved Mount Vernon but he realized there was work still to be done.

And that was the period when the war ended.

The war ended in 17 eighty-3.

From 1783 until 1787.

That period is often times referred to by historians as the critical period because the nation should not have survived.

We were massively in debt.

The new states were bickering.

We had no revenue stream.

There were still threats from abroad.

Uh it it it shouldn't have have existed.

Plus, we still didn't have a permanent capital.

We went from the start of the revolutionary war which was in 1775 until the year 18 00.

That's 25 years without a permanent capital or permanent seat of government.

That's no way to start a nation.

So George Washington realized duty still called.

He was still needed.

And he pretty much dedicated the final 10 years of his life.

That's why I called it his final battle to trying to build a capital city.

And he said of all the a great accomplishments in his life.

This was by far the most difficult and during the constitutional convention of seventeen eighty-seven.

Washington said of all the bitter fights over putting together a constitution.

The one that was by far the most heated was do we have a capital?

Where should it be and what should it look like?

So this was a an enormous political battle.

Well you know I think of DC and I think of these iconic buildings.

It's a majestic place to to walk around to visit.

This particular period in the time there's literally nothing there but but I guess fields.

So what were the physical challenges?

The challenges were many.

You're correct.

It was bogs, fields, and forests at the time.

So, when Washington proposed building a great glorious capital on the banks of the Potomac where there were bogs and fields, people thought he was mad but Washington had a remarkable vision.

His vision was to recreate Rome and to channel the democratic values of ancient Athens, Paraclese, the birthplace of democracy of say and he wanted to build it in the US.

Uh he wanted to do it for a few reasons.

One, he said that a great challenge is our people, the American people had no sense of a national identity.

If you were to take a time machine and go back and meet Thomas Jefferson back in seventeen seventy-six and if you were to ask him about his nation, he would answer Virginia.

So we we needed to do something to imbue the people with a sense of national identity and purpose.

We had no credibility in the eyes of Europe.

So he's going to build a city that's greater than ancient Rome that's bigger than Paris and London.

That'll give us instant credibility.

And our economy attacked after the war.

So what a jobs program.

Building an entire city for the ages as he called it on the banks of the Potomac.

So that was his grand vision.

The one big challenge was we were broke.

The second challenge we didn't have any architects hardly.

Um and a third challenge was Jefferson and a lot of southerners.

Their vision was for what they called a small federal town.

They wanted the capital to be a one-story little brick building.

Uh they separated by fields and forests.

So that's not much of a capital.

Um their argument for it was what I call the politics of architecture.

And that was if your capital is only a handful of little one story brick buildings in the middle of fields and forests you don't have much of a government.

Therefore, the states and the institution of slavery are safe.

Uh Washington wanted the great glorious capital to bring everyone together and instill this sense of national identity.

You do an enormous amount of research for everything that you do.

I'm curious if there's something that really surprised you in doing for this book.

Yeah, I knew it was a difficult undertaking but I couldn't get my brain around just how much political opposition there was.

Uh it took Washington years and here's the kicker.

Washington dominated his times.

I mean, his gravitas, his charisma, his stature.

What Washington wanted Washington got but not in this case.

In fact, in 1790 when they put this to a vote, the 1790 Residents Act, they were four votes shy in the senate which doesn't sound like a lot but it was bitterpartisan politics like today and you only had a few senators.

So, four votes is quite a mountain to climb and it shocked me that Washington wasn't able to get his way but what he did was over lunch he told Madison and Hamilton call for another vote in the Senate right away they thought he was mad your four vote shy nobody's going to change their mind over lunch you're going to begin to look desperate and then it's going to be harder to cut a deal to get any kind of capital Washington said call for a vote over lunch he visited count a man four four senators flipped all four he knew exactly which four to flip and he got his capital done but so this was from the by the skin of his teeth So, that that was surprising to me the amount of political opposition to building a capital city.

So, nothing much has changed but here we go.

Let's switch it up a little bit from George Washington to you, Doctor Robert Watson.

I'm going to ask you a few questions about yourself.

Number one, your love of history.

Where did it start?

Who was your inspiration?

Well, I I love history.

You're right.

It's if if I played the lottery and if I won, I wouldn't change a thing.

I I love what I do.

I spend an enormous amount of time visiting archives and museums around the country and sitting in the basement during research research but for me, that's like a kid in a candy store.

I suppose it starts that I grew up right near Gettysburg, a battlefield and some of my early memories were running around the battlefield climbing on cannons when you could do that back then and pretending to point with my finger and shoot confederate soldiers and I also grew up near Valley Forge and of course ran around Valley Forge pretending I was one of George Washington's soldiers when I was a little kid.

So I suppose through osmosis it kind of stuck and I you know what's the old saying if you if you do what you love you never work a day in your life and I I really feel like that.

Speaking of working you teach college students.

I want to know what you have learned from them.

Well I've learned that you know a lot of folks my age you know always criticize college students slackers this generation they spend all day looking at their technology but I find them to be inspiring and here's why they're not you know weighted down with the baggage of racism homophobia sexism antisemitism like previous generations they're almost impatiently entrepreneurial you know virtually everyone of my students will develop an app.

Everybody will have a startup.

Uh they're social entrepreneurs.

They you know my generation we you know we worked in the same job for thirty, 40, 50 years.

Uh they want to work for a company that's going to make a difference socially.

They want more than just a paycheck.

So I have great confidence in this generation.

Uh they're much more open minded.

Uh they have that indefatigable can-do attitude.

We just have to look past all the social media.

That's hard.

If the day was 25 hours and not twenty-four hours, what would you do with that extra hour every day?

Uh more time with the kids.

Um I've got two kids and they're off to college so it's time is is precious although they'll both be in Washington DC and I make multiple visits to DC every year.

The publisher of this book is Georgetown University Press and a forthcoming book of mine as well and the Library of Congress, the Smithsonian, and the National Archives.

These are are are you know, treasures for someone like me to be able to spend time doing research there.

So, yeah, another hour with the kids would work.

Doctor Robert Watson, it is always great to have you here.

I learned something every single time and this one about George Washington and the Capitol, Who Knew?

Thank you so much.

Thank you, Anne.

Thank you for what you do.

I'll see you on the next Between The Covers.