This May marked 40 years since the Senate Watergate hearings began. We are airing oral history interviews from the Richard Nixon Presidential Library that provide a new look into the Nixon impeachment inquiry. After a silence of four decades, key staff charged with investigating whether there were grounds to impeach the president have recorded their part in history. These interviews were conducted by the former director of the Richard Nixon Presidential Library, Timothy Naftali.

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This May marked 40 years since the Senate Watergate hearings began and we're airing oral history interviews from the Richard Nixon Presidential Library that provide a new look into the Nixon impeachment inquiry. After a silence of four decades, key staff charged with investigating whether there were grounds to impeach the president have recorded their part in history. These interviews were conducted by the former director of the Richard Nixon Presidential Library, Timothy Naftali.

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Last June, as the 40th anniversary of the Watergate break-in approached, the Richard Nixon Presidential Library released interviews with key staff charged with investigating whether there were grounds to impeach President Nixon. These interviews were conducted by the former director of the Richard Nixon Presidential Library, Timothy Naftali. We hear from Jeffrey Banchero, who was a research assistant for the U.S. House Judiciary Committee during their impeachment inquiry. Mr. Banchero talks about transcribing tapes of the president’s private conversations, working with special counsel John Doar, and the reactions of congressmen as they listened to the secret tapes. Mr. Doar admonished his staff not to talk about the proceedings – a warning they heeded for four decades.

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At the direction of Congress, the voices and experiences from the Civil Rights Movement of the mid-20th century are being documented in an oral history project. This effort is a collaboration of the Smithsonian National Museum of African American History & Culture, the Library of Congress and the Southern Oral History Program at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill.

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These are unedited excerpts from a 1995 conversation with President Eisenhower’s son, John. A retired U.S. Army Brigadier General, he talks about his father’s role as Supreme Allied Commander Europe. He also discusses Ike’s relationships with American and British generals and how he compromised with Allied nations to bring World War II in Europe to an end. Independent producer George Colburn conducted this interview as part of a documentary series on Dwight D. Eisenhower’s military and political career – a period covering from 1941 to 1961.  His latest project –  “Eisenhower’s Secret War” – debuts on public television stations nation-wide in May. Hosted by Evan Thomas, author of “Ike’s Bluff," Mr. Colburn’s two-part program focuses on Ike’s campaign to wage peace in the aftermath of World War II.

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These are unedited excerpts from a 1992 conversation with former President Gerald Ford. He remembers Dwight D. Eisenhower from the perspective of the Michigan congressman that he was in the 1950s. Topics include the 1952 election and the GOP’s domestic agenda, McCarthyism, civil rights, and Ike’s legacy for the Republican party. He also discusses the day he took his young sons to visit Eisenhower at his Gettysburg farm, and the impromptu lesson the former World War II general gave the Ford boys on one of this nation’s most storied battles.   

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We continue our series of interviews from the Eisenhower Legacy Collection with unedited excerpts from a 1995 conversation with former CIA chief Soviet analyst Ray Cline. He details the growth of the Central Intelligence Agency under President Eisenhower – and describes Ike as a “man devoted to the facts” who valued intelligence as a wartime leader and as the nation’s chief executive. Topics include U.S. covert actions in the 1950s, Soviet relations, the Korean War, CIA involvement in Iran, Sputnik and the so-called “missile crisis.”

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At the direction of Congress, the voices and experiences from the Civil Rights Movement of the mid-20^th century are being documented in an oral history project. This effort is a collaboration of the Smithsonian National Museum of African American History & Culture, the Library of Congress and the Southern Oral History Program at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill.

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We continue our series of interviews from the Eisenhower Legacy Collection with unedited excerpts from a 1992 conversation with former U.S. Attorney General Herbert Brownell. Mr. Brownell was Dwight D. Eisenhower’s senior campaign strategist in 1952, became Attorney General in 1953 and served in that capacity until after the Little Rock integration crisis in 1957. In this oral history, Mr. Brownell talks about his relationship with Ike, the election, U.S. involvement in Korea, and the Warren Court.

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These are unedited excerpts from a 1995 conversation with journalist James Reston. He was the New York Times Washington Bureau Chief during Dwight D. Eisenhower’s presidency, and he offers his observations about Ike’s foreign policies, his relations with the GOP’s conservative wing, and the influence of Secretary of State John Foster Dulles. He also explains why the downing of an American U2 spy plane led Eisenhower to consider resigning the presidency.

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