North Carolina Now; 223; Interview with Townsend Luddington

The midnight Christmas at the governor's mansion. You know he's like no you. Oh. Good evening everyone I'm married to her charge glad you could join us here at

North Carolina now as you have seen throughout the evening our educates Bailey is busy busy with our program called Ask you and CTV will be talking about that a little later on in our program. Tonight our guest is Dr. Townson Ludington a biographer of author John Dos Passos. Dr. Ludington will preview a program for us which airs tonight at 10:00 p.m. here and you can see TV. He himself appears in the program and it's called the Odyssey of John Dos Passos. It features not only Dr. Ludington but also Robert MacNeil who narrates it. And actor William Hurt who dramatically interprets many of the author's works. But first Maria Lundberg and producer Bill Hannah will take us on a tour of a very famous North Carolina home that's well known for its beautiful holiday decorations. Christmas is almost here and it's time for all of us to get our houses decorated for the holidays and the governor's mansion on Blunt's street in Raleigh is already all decked out in Torreon costumes sings in front of North Carolina's own Victorian cottage.

Better known as the governor's mansion. It too is dressed up in its holiday best and ready for Christmas visitors. This is actually the third governor's residence in North Carolina. The forest in 1797 was a simple two story frame building at the corner of Fayetteville and Harkat streets in 1819 an elaborate brick structure with white columns. Porticoes was completed it was known as the governor's palace but by 1865 neglect made the palace unattractive to the governors and their families during Reconstruction and until the completion of the present mansion. The chief executives resided in rented houses or hotel rooms.

The movement to build the present governor's mansion did not really begin until 1881. This was during the height of the popular queen and style of architecture. The eclectic or gingerbread architecture was characterized by steeply pitched roofs rich textural surfaces a variety of towers and turrets with machine made spindle and scroll woodwork. Eight years after construction had begun the building was finally occupied by Governor Daniel foule and his family. The steam heating was not completely installed. The plumbing was only partly completed and outdoor privies had to be used. But the governor had a home. And now here it stands one of the most beautiful and picturesque buildings in the city of Raleigh. It's only on toast Jews wanted and just grown just right.

I just hope that you are so. True. In the fine tradition of southern hospitality North Carolinians have always welcome guests

into their homes. This home is no exception. It's right to welcome you this holiday season. Thanks to the Queen's carolers for the music in this story they are from Charlotte and have been bringing music to many groups and organizations in the Queen City. The doors of the governor's mansion are open for public tours and lots of social functions. More

than 50000 school children and adults tour the building each year. Now you may want to schedule your tour during this Christmas season when North Carolina's Victorian cottages at its holiday best. But this week will be your last opportunity to do that. The house is open from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. for the remainder of this week and from 2:00 to 5:00 p.m. this Sunday. In just a moment Michel Louis will bring us a summary of today's North Carolina News. And coming up I'll speak with Dr. Townsend Ludington. Don't go away now. Good evening I'm Michel Louis. Here's a review of the events making news around the state.

Federal retirees in North Carolina seeking refunds of state income taxes they paid on their pensions may have had their claims strengthened by a Supreme Court ruling in a Georgia case. The nation's high court has upheld the claims of federal retirees demanding refunds of GA income taxes illegally collected between 1980 and 1989. The Supreme Court has now sent the case back to the Georgia courts. Georgia North Carolina are among a handful of states that have not settled with federal retirees since the Supreme Court ruled in 1989 that it was unconstitutional to tax the pensions of federal retirees while not taxing the pensions of retired state and local government workers. North Carolina officials contend its case is different than Georgia's because there was a North Carolina law requiring taxpayers to file a protest within 30 days of paying what they feel is an unjust tax. The state contends that anyone who did not follow that law is not due a refund. The cost of refunds due to North Carolina's federal retirees has been estimated to be as high as

400 million dollars. Prompted by Republican victories in last month's election Governor Jim Hunt is recommending changes in the leadership of the state Democratic Party. The party is at a crossroads as it prepares for political life when Republicans take charge of the state house for the first time this century. Hunter is recommending that 41 year old Wayne McDevitt become the new chairman of the state Democratic Party state party leaders are expected to rubber stamp hunt selection when they vote for a new party chairman in January. McDevitt would place Tom he would replace Rather Tom Hendrickson who is chair of the Democratic Party since January of 1993. Hendrickson announced last month that he would not seek a second term. McDevitt a longtime hunt aide will be charged with rebuilding the Democratic Party after last month's Republican landslide that cost Democrats control of the state congressional delegation the State House and many local offices across North Carolina. The mysterious shaking continues in Winston-Salem yesterday police

thought they had narrowed down the cost to a construction crew which had been blasting for new sewer lines. But now city manager Bill Stewart says it's likely that's not the cause. Since calls reporting the tremors came in last night long after the blasting had ended for the day last night police received about 60 calls complaining of rumbling noises and tremors. About 200 similar calls came in the previous day. A seismologist from the University of North Carolina Chapel Hill has been called in to solve the mystery that scientists is setting up an earthquake monitoring site in the area of town where the tremors have been felt Charlotte-Mecklenburg police officers have a new tool to nab drunk drivers. Video cameras mounted on their car dashboards now instead of having to describe in court how a defendant operated his vehicle in a weaving or erratic manner. Police officers can show a tape of the reckless driving that led to the DWI arrest. The tapes will allow judges to see exactly what the officers observed the highway interdiction

and traffic safety unit will install the cameras and seven unmarked Charlotte-Mecklenburg police cars. Today the skies were partly cloudy from the Triangle west and sunny in the eastern part of the state. When the 70s except in the mountains where it only got into the 50s and 60s tonight it'll be cloudy in the mountains where temperatures will be in the low 40s. The rest of the state will have partly cloudy skies and temperatures in the upper 40s and low 50s tomorrow skies will be partly cloudy almost everywhere in the state. The northern mountains will see highs only in the mid 40s. But elsewhere highs will range between the mid 50s and the mid 60s. Labor Commissioner Harry Payne is disputing a newspaper article which accuses his office of LAX inspection policies. An article in The Charlotte Observer claims that little about

factory inspections has changed in the three years since a fire at a hamlet poultry plant killed 25 people. The article also says the furniture plant in Lenore where two workers died in an explosion last month hadn't been it's inspected in 19 years paying claims that that claim is untrue. He says the Lenore furniture complex has been inspected twenty six times in the last 19 years. Payne who took office in 1993 after the tragedy at the hamlet plant has hired additional inspectors for his office. Payne says the state labor department conducts four to five thousand inspections a year. Only one thousand one hundred ninety three inspections were conducted the year of the hamlet poultry plant fire. The U.S. Agriculture Department is closing 23 of its 125 North Carolina farm offices. Another 25 farm offices in our state will move to new locations. The closings are part of the USDA is plan to streamline the agency nationwide 1070 field offices will close.

Agriculture Secretary Mike Espy says the moves will reduce the department staff by 11000 to say 3.6 billion dollars over the next five years. The stock market finished lower today the Dow Jones Industrial Average was down 10 and a half points to close at thirty seven thirty five point fifty two. Declining issues outpaced gainers by more than 2 to 1 as 285 million shares were traded on the New York Stock Exchange. The Standard Poor's 500 index was down nearly two points and the Nasdaq composite index lost about seven points. Analysts say investors had plenty to be upset about with the Orange County California bankruptcy and the Magellan Fund Dividend cancellation and addition. Congressional testimony by Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan had Wall Street worried about rising interest rates. And now for some stocks of North Carolina interest you. Airing

later this evening here on you and see TVs a documentary called The Odyssey of John Dos Passos. Our guest this evening Dr. Townson Ludington is not only featured in this documentary but he's also one of the country's foremost authorities on America's controversial author John Dos Passos. Dr. Ludington is the Carrie S. Bosler professor of English and American studies at USC Chapel Hill and so glad XTO glad to have you here with us the CNN Hero. Delighted to be here. I understand it does process is called the father of modern literature why is that. Well it's a little bit excessive but he certainly he was important for American modernism

in that along with other writers that came of age about the same time as he. Hemingway and Fitzgerald all these were all friends and then the friends later on. The heat they divert use new techniques new literary techniques and Dos Passos as as if somebody were to watch the show this evening would notice there's a discussion of the four narrative techniques which he uses in his most famous work a trilogy called USA and that kind of segmenting and kind of and uses of collage and these kinds of techniques are very much part of the modernist mode and he wasn't an inventor of literary modernism I knew that that was a long kind of thing but he was very aware of what was going on in the arts painting in particular drama. And he incorporates these into his own work and in in terms of American literature is important for that. Well tell me a little bit more I know you just touched on about some of these interesting writing techniques techniques with a very unusual

at the time that he wrote I guess it's us a trilogy right us a trilogy which was published between 130 in 1936 previous to that he'd written what I think is his most interesting artistic or modernist novel called Manhattan Transfer about the New York City in 1905 but the techniques he uses in USA and I could as a teacher spend 40 minutes talking about them. But there are things called biographies little pocket biographies newsreels which are innovative. Narratives about various characters who are the most nearly fictional aspects of the work. And then finally something called the camera by which our snippets of kind of stream of consciousness prose poetry if you will in which he gives his own sense of his himself growing up through these years and it's his stream of consciousness perspective on the world which is described in these other three narrative forms if you will.

And I understand the book was rather controversial when it came out in the 1030 is that because of the politics involved I think it's both I mean it was it was it was controversial because the techniques were innovative people that you would have thought not Sinclair Lewis but Upton Sinclair the famous writer writes and said I don't understand what you're doing with his style and so on and so forth so that it for us now I don't think it's so difficult but for people than it was then also politically because he was seen to be very much on the left wing and was but was always independently radical. He was really opposed to what he came to call monopoly capitalism. And there were several other authors and you touched on Fitzgerald Hemingway Steinbeck did they all sort of influence each other at that time. I don't really think that those passages was particularly influenced by them and others no doubt would disagree. Actually just Passos was writing before before them in a sense the specials that already published Manhattan Transfer which was one of his most famous novels When

Hemingway first collection of short stories called In Our Time appears. But there's always a kind of crossover in those vessels tells a story in a memoir about sitting on the steps of Parnassus and reading passages from the Old Testament. He and Hemingway together reading passages in the Old Testament and of course what they're doing is getting rhythm and language and things like that. But Joe Blatner who wrote the biography big biography was here in Chapel Hill for a while. He wrote the biography of William Faulkner and he wrote Dos Passos and said Faulkner. Ever influence you will those passages was polite because those passages was writing when Faulkner was nobody. But that point aside does Passos wrote back and said. And as for influences I don't really think of there being particular influences ideas or just in the air. And I think that's so so modernism. The techniques of cubism and expressionism and things like that are all part of what influenced him.

Wow. Do you think that he is still relevant or why is he still relevant today doesn't mean well I think he's read in anthologies he's not as considered as important as he was when USA came out and partly that is political because his his own politics he moved to the right and lost the favor of a lot of the literati and intellectuals I guess. But and I don't think his writing was as good later on because he had made up his mind and he wrote out of a kind of dogmatic position. But what he's relevant for are things like Manhattan Transfer and USA where he's giving us a picture of modern America and the effect of mass society and technology and all of these kinds of things working on the individual and in the sense of pressing the individual and that's very much of a theme that's still with us and very interesting and fascinating man and his story is on this evening here on your TV and I think you're going to want to tune in for this because it is really wonderful. And Dr. Ludington thank you so much for joining us this evening it's been a pleasure to have you here. Thanks for the opportunity.

We want to hear from you. Simply call out your comment line at 9 1 9 5 4 9 7 8 0 8. Or write us at P.O. Box 1 4 9 0 0 2 7 7 0 9. You can fax a message to 9 1 9 5 4 9 7 0 4 3. Or try out Internet address. That's you in c o l dot com. And please give us a daytime phone number in case we need to follow up. Now don't forget to watch the odyssey of John Dos Passos tonight at 10:00 p.m. here on your TV it is a wonderful documentary and it's very informative as well as entertaining. And tomorrow night on our show international attorney Susan stromuhr will talk with us about just how the GATT agreement which was passed last week in Congress will affect some of the main industries in North Carolina and also how it's likely to affect our state's workers.

Maria Lundberg will have a report on something North Carolina's governors have never had but soon may get the veto. And they say there's no place like home for the holidays but what if you're homeless. Billy Barnes will bring us a report on the homeless shelter where he volunteers in Chapel Hill. And tomorrow night I won't be here but Audrey will be I will be in Charlotte covering the 40th anniversary performance of the Charlotte Choral Society singing Christmas tree. Now that is something their performances are happening all this weekend but I'm getting to see a media preview tomorrow night. Now they're singing tree was the first one in the country. And I'll also be visiting the world famous Christmas Town USA in McAdam Ville near Charlotte. All for my five part series which starts on Monday on how North Carolinians celebrate the holidays. And remember to stay tuned for ask you and CTV to call in your questions and concerns about your public television station. Well that's all for now thanks for inviting us into your homes this evening. I'm Mary Lou her chart. Good night.