BackStory; The Green Show

This is backstory. I'm Peter Onof. It's the hue of Hollywood monsters, a crescent color for NASCAR drivers and fashion magazine editors. It's a shade associated with envy, money, and toxic waste. But it's also a vibrant symbol of the environment and healthy living, a staple of Irish American pride. It's the color that took Jimmy Carter to the White House in 1976 when other presidential candidates preferred to campaign in red, white, and blue. And every once in a while, it illuminates our literature. Cats be believed in the green light, the Augustic future that year by year recedes before us. It eluded us then, but that's no matter. Tomorrow, we will run faster, stretch out our arms farther. This week on Backstory, a St. Patrick's Day special. We're seeing green in American history. Major funding for Backstory is provided by an anonymous donor, the University of Virginia, the National Endowment for the Humanities, and the Joseph and Robert Cornell Memorial Foundation.

From the Virginia Foundation for the Humanities, this is Backstory, with the American History Guys. Picture a traffic light. You know, three round lenses, red on top, yellow in the middle, green on the bottom. Unless you live on Tipperary Hill in Syracuse, New York. It's a very unique traffic signal. It's the only one in the United States that features the green lens over the red. This is John McCarthy, a photographer who grew up on Tipperary Hill. He's looking at this traffic signal with a green light on top and the red on the bottom. In the whole days, when we were kids, MacArthur remembers hanging out on the corner as a teenager and watching drivers pull up to the light. Some of them were color blind and they would stop at a green light. And we'd all start yelling at him saying, go, go, go, and they'd say, no, no, we're not, and they'd wave us off. And then the next thing, you know, they pull out,

it's a red light. They pull out against the light and you hear tires squealing. And we all start laughing and we say, yeah, we told you, we told you. So if having this green light on top has been such a safety hazard, why is it still there? Now, I don't know this for a fact. All I know is that a myth was created around this light. To understand the myth, you need to know that Tipperary Hill and Syracuse has been an Irish neighborhood since the mid-1800s when Irish immigrants settled in the area after working on the Erie Canal. In the 1920s, traffic signals started going up in cities across the country. But when Tipperary Hill got its light, the locals were not impressed. There were a bunch of young guys around in their teens and the first thing they decided to do when they saw the red lens above the green was to destroy it. The local legend has it that the guys in the neighborhood were outraged that red, which was associated with the English, had dominant placement above green,

the Irish color. So they threw rocks at the light. And so they kept breaking the light and the city would have to come up the next day and fix the light because it was a busy intersection. A few weeks would go by. The kids break the light. The city fixes it. The kids break the light. And finally, the alderman went to the city fathers and said, you know what, they're not going to stop this unless you put that green lens over the red. The alderman was successful. The neighborhood got its upside down traffic light. Now, John McCarthy doesn't put much stock in this story about throwing stones, but a lot of other people do. In the 1990s, a local pub owner succeeded in getting a statue to the stone throwers erected right next to the intersection. Whatever the details of the story, it's clear that to people who see the light, it's a potent symbol of Irish immigrants turning traditional power dynamics on their head. They left oppression and when they ran up

against that here in Syracuse and in America, they knew about the game. They knew and they knew that there was strength in numbers and they knew that they could change things if they stuck together. And all that history is encompassed up to this very day in a suspended little circle that's color green. It's not bright green. It's not like a primary green. It's kind of a terrible cyan color if you really look at it. I'm Ed Ayers and I'm here with fellow history gents, Peter Onaf and Brian Ballot. Hey there Ed. And today in the show, we're doing something a little bit different. Most weeks, we repotopic from the headlines and spend an hour tracing its history over three centuries. But today, we're mixing things up and instead, we'll be bringing you a sort of grand bag of stories with absolutely nothing in common except for the fact that they all have

something to do with a color green. That's right, Peter. In honor of St. Paddy's Day, we're dying our show green. We've got stories about an iconic green statue, an iconic green book, and an iconic green superhero. Plus, we're going to hear Peter recount his favorite deployment of a color green in the American Revolution. So sit back, put on your green eye shades, get out your green stamps, and maybe put on your green sleeves and journey with us down a historical river of green. In December 1862, Northern and Southern troops faced off on the slopes of Marie's Heights in Fredericksburg, Virginia. The Union assault on the Confederate protected hill behind a stone wall would amount to a suicide mission. Among the Northern troops was a unit called the Irish Brigade, known by the Emerald Green Flag, its soldiers carried into battle.

That winter's day in Fredericksburg, the Brigade's battle-worn Emerald Flag was making its way back to New York for some much-needed repair, and so the Irish troops instead put sprigs of boxwood in their caps to identify their Irish heritage. The Northern troops were slaughtered in that battle, but in the years after the war, it was commonly said that no one showed more bravery in the face of certain death than the troops with the green in their hats. Craig Warren is an English professor at Penn State Eury. He says that this tale of Irish triumph hides a much darker story. In fact, it was the low point in the war for most of Irish America, of the 1200 soldiers who took part in the battle, 545 were killed wounded or missing, and because the Brigade suffered such horrendous casualties, and because so many people on the home front lost loved ones and neighbors, it was ultimately one of the reasons that many Irish turned against the war. And many Irish

Americans decided that what had happened was that the Irish Brigade had been wantonly sacrificed during the battle by generals who saw them simply as cannon fodder. And that's because of their Irish heritage, that's just because they were seen as something less than full citizens. That's right. As a result, they just decided the war had nothing, there was nothing that would benefit them. The war effort wasn't bringing people around to see the Irish as true Americans. And so they turned their backs on that war effort and decided that it was not worth investing for their time, energy, lives, and money into. And it's not too much to say that you can draw a straight line between the Battle of Fredericksburg and the New York City draft riots of 1863. Those happened in the summer of 1863. So that roughly six or seven months after the battle? That's correct. There were mass riots in the streets of New York. There was a mob

of white protesters who did a number of destructive things, smashing buildings, finding African American freedmen in the streets and lynching a number of them. It took actually detachment of soldiers from the army of the Potomac to come into the city and restore order. And at the end of this encounter, the vast majority of the rioters who were killed or were imprisoned were a Irish descent. And so this really was a black eye for the Irish American population during the war and convinced a number of other Americans that in fact they were not loyal to the war effort. Now I've seen references to the Irish Brigade and the story of their heroism. I never see any reference to the draft riots or actually the response back home that you just described. So explain how that got erased from history. What happened was after the war,

Irish Brigade veterans forged a remarkable body of literature that took the low point of the Irish Brigade's history, the Battle of Fredericksburg, after which they effectively ceased to operate as a brigade and transformed it into the brigade's most glorious moment. And they did this by publishing a series of memoirs that championed the Irish soldier that portrayed him in the best light possible and which showed his suffering and sacrifices at such places as Antietam and especially at Fredericksburg as his ultimate sacrifice on behalf of his American nation. And all of them wanted memory of Irish participation in the war to remember the Irish Brigade soldiers on the field not riding Irishmen back home in the city. And so they did everything they could to elevate and even mythologize the Irish soldier during the Civil War.

What do you mean elevate or mythologize it? Do you have any examples? One of the infacies that we find in the memoirs of Irish Brigade veterans is the story of the Irish Brigade encountering a full brigade of Confederate Irish who supposedly recognized their countrymen by those sprigs of boxwood in their caps and who though reluctant, fired into those ranks standing by their southern convictions. And that was enhanced and embellished in the post-war memoirs to be seen as this tragic, poignant, ironic conflict between Irishmen north and south. So let me get this straight. Being loyal to the Confederacy proved that the southern Irish soldiers were true Americans even though they were fighting against America.

That's right. How does that work? In the late 19th century there is this move towards reconciliation and there became over time this understanding that as long as one had participated in the Civil War and fought for one's section and stood up for one's beliefs, then that person had demonstrated their loyalty to the American experiment. And each were fighting for American ideals. Now maybe for the Union, maybe for the Confederacy, but the idea was that to have participated in the war was what mattered. So in the mythology of what all of this meant, and again we're looking back at this from roughly let's say the 1890s, what this was saying from the Irish perspective was don't worry we will be loyal to the ideals and the principles of America. We are not going to be just loyal to our fellow Irishmen. We're not going to participate in machine politics

in the cities. We're not going to hire Irish over other ethnicities. We are capable as Irish of being loyal in fact dying for ideals and principles. Exactly. Yeah the message was that contrary to pre-war beliefs that the Irish were not true Americans that they were interested only in the stake of Ireland across the Atlantic. Then instead these men were willing to fight and die for their adopted country and for their homes be it north or south. And that that was stronger connection ultimately than the shared heritage. And do you think that these memoirs helped with American acceptance of Irish immigrants in the late 19th century? I believe so. And I think that their strategy worked. There was a wide-scale celebration of the Civil War veteran during the late 19th century and early 20th. And there was a receptive audience for stories about

soldiers in uniform and their adventures and achievements and sacrifices. And so this story folds the Irish American story into the larger story that we so often hear about the Civil War. And that is that it was a brother's war. And Irish memoirists stressed this as a way to show that they were as true Americans as any other citizens of the United States. Craig Warren is a professor of English at Penn State Eury. We'll post a link to his article about the Irish Brigade at backstoryradio.org. We're going to take a short break now but don't go away when we get back what the Statue of Liberty meant to Americans before it turned green. You're listening to backstory and we'll be back in a minute. Hi history guys. This is Christian from Hampton, Connecticut. I think we're one of the most

important green things in American history. He was one of Washington's most trusted officers and was instrumental in fighting the Revolutionary War. Where would we be without the efforts of General Green? Happy Fame Patrick Day. We're back with backstory, the show that looks to history to explain the America of Today. I'm Brian Ballot. I'm Ed Ayers and I'm Peter Onov. Today on the show we're reflecting on episodes in American history that have something to do with the color green. Our next story focuses on perhaps the most iconic green object in America, the Statue of Liberty. What you may not know is that the statue didn't start out green. When it was installed in New York Harbor in 1886, the statue was actually brown, copper to be exact. Over the years, the copper oxidized and by 1910, Lady Liberty had developed an interesting modeled look, half brown and half green. By 1920, she was completely covered in that familiar green patina. At the very same time, the statue was

also undergoing a transformation in meaning. Though today we associate the statue of liberty with immigration, Americans at the dedication ceremony were not much concerned with welcoming the huddled masses yearning to breathe free. Backstory producer Jess Anchor-Bretzen has the story of how the statue changed from an austere symbol of Republican values to a monument known as the Mother of Exiles. It all started in 1865 at a French dinner party near Versailles. The guests, mostly intellectuals and artists, were not fond of the current French government, a repressive regime headed by Emperor Napoleon III. They wanted to find some way to celebrate the values important to them. We're talking about, you know, liberal values. This is Peter Scary, a political scientist at Boston College. Individual rights, the importance of freedom of the press, freedom of speech. Those values were not flourishing in France, but they did seem to be flourishing in the US,

which had just abolished slavery. And so the dinner guests dreamed up a grand gesture that would help connect France to the American story of expanding freedoms. A statue of liberty, lifting a torch and crushing a broken chain beneath her feet. It would be a gift from French citizens to the US, representing Franco-American friendship, the expansion of liberties in both countries, and the hope for world peace. But one thing it wouldn't represent was immigration. The notion of the United States' refuge or goal for migrants wasn't part of what the French liberals had in mind at all. Nor were Americans particularly pushing the idea of US as refuge. By the time the statue was finally inaugurated, 20 years had passed. It was the fall of 1886, and Americans were feeling decidedly skeptical about immigration. That spring, the Haymarket bombing in Chicago had killed 11 people and injured dozens more.

The actual bomb-thrower was never identified, but eight men were convicted for conspiracy. Six of them were immigrants. So five months later, at the Statue of Liberty's inaugural festivities, Haymarket was still on many Americans' minds. The main speaker made sure to emphasize that the US was only interested in welcoming some immigrants. There is room in America and brotherhood for all who will support our institutions and aid in our development. But those who come to disturb our peace and to throne our laws are aliens and enemies forever. Three years later, the editor of the Atlantic Monthly wrote a similarly anxious poem about the statue. It's title, Unguarded Gates. O Liberty, white goddess, is it well to leave the gates unguarded? On thy breastfold, sorrow's children, sued the herds of fate,

lift the downtrodden, but with hand of steel, stay those who to the sacred portals come to waste the gifts of freedom. Of course, today there's another poem associated with the Statue of Liberty. Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free. This on it was written by Emma Lazarus to commemorate the plight of Jewish refugees fleeing violence in Russia. It was auctioned off to help support the Statue of Liberty's installation. But it didn't have a direct connection to the Statue until 17 years later, when a friend of Lazarus had a plaque made. And that plaque is put in some relatively obscure place on the inside of the pedestal in 1903, and there it sits for several decades, relatively unnoted. During those decades, immigration to the US plummeted. A new quota system introduced in 1924, sharply limited admission from what many believe to be

undesirable groups, Asians, Jews, Southeastern Europeans. But meanwhile, Lady Liberty was as popular as ever. On the 50th anniversary of the Statue, which would have been in 1936, Franklin Delano Roosevelt came to celebrate that 50th anniversary, and nothing was mentioned about Emma Lazarus' sonnet, nothing was mentioned about immigration or refugees. But around the same time, some people were starting to connect the Statue with immigration, and with refugees in particular. One of them was a journalist named Louis Adamic, who wrote books with names like America and the refugees. He was especially concerned about the rise of Nazism in Germany, and argued that the US should admit many more Jewish refugees. But in 1939, a bill that would have allowed an additional 20,000 German-Jewish children into the country died in committee. The same year, a fortune magazine poll

suggested that 83% of Americans favored retaining the limits on immigration. It wasn't until after the war that Adamic's position became mainstream. Footage of US troops liberating Nazi concentration camps reinforced many American sense that their country was on the side of freedom. But it also raised troubling questions about the US government's resistance to admitting refugees before the war. That blend of pride and uneasiness led many to embrace a new, more welcoming version of Liberty. In 1945, the bronze tablet with the emellaserous sonnet on it that had been inside the pedestal in a rather obscure place was removed and put outside in a prominent place beside the main entrance to the Statue. The move solidified the association between immigration and the Statue. Lady Liberty was no longer the white goddess. Instead, she was the mother of exiles.

And in 1965, the restrictive quota system was replaced by a new law, the baseline for current immigration policy. When President Lyndon B. Johnson signed that bill into law, he did so. Where else? At the Statue of Liberty. For my shoulders here, you can see Ellis Island, whose vacant corridors echo today the joyous sound of long ago voices. And today, we can all believe that the lamp of this grand old lady is brighter today, and the golden door that she guards bleems more brilliantly in the light of an increased liberty for the people. Jess Angabretzen is one of our producers. Helping her tell the story was Peter Scari, a political

scientist at Boston College. We'll link to his article about the Statue of Liberty's changing meaning at backstoryradio.org. In the early and mid-20th century, African Americans often had a hard time when they traveled. Many hotels, gas stations and restaurants, both in the north and the south, refuse to serve black patrons. So in the early 1930s, a New York City Postman named Victor Green began collecting contact information for local businesses that would serve African Americans. He figured that by collecting and publishing this information, he could help others avoid the inconvenience and the humiliation of being turned away. Green soon expanded the project to cover the entire country. In 1936, he published the first edition of the Negro Motorists Green Book. The Green Book, for short, it looks something like a phone book with the names and addresses of

friendly businesses, as well as private homes willing to lodge African American visitors. The Green Book was published for decades and became a staple of African American households, but Victor Green hoped that eventually his book would become irrelevant. In the introduction, he imagined, quote, a day some time in the near future when this guide will not have to be published, when we as a race will have equal rights and privileges in the United States. With the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, the Green Book ceased publication for good. Ironically, letters from northern blacks recounting their experiences with discrimination on the nation's roadways may have played a role in getting that landmark legislation passed. Historian Susan Rue has researched these letters. In an interview from a few years back, she told us about how vacationing blacks helped shape one of the century's most important political debates. When I first started working on this, people would say, blacks vacationed, and I began to

resent that as a very racist remark. Of course, they vacationed half the households in the United States after the war on a car. By 1960, that's three quarters or 80 percent of households. And the idea of the car for blacks was, if we have a car, then we don't have to sit in the Jim Crow section on the train. It promised them more freedom, more opportunity, and so to randomly run into this discrimination must have been very sobering. Dear Madam, I'm writing to find out if something can be done, maybe bringing a suit against mobile oil company because of an incident that happened in Treesport, Louisiana. The media may have focused its attention on buses and the more violent confrontations. These were everyday confrontations, what I call the foot soldiers of the civil rights movement, who were just right in and they had all of this evidence of people being discriminated against. We asked for the restrooms and were informed they didn't have

restroom facilities for colored. Yes, sir. I am a member of the NAACP. The letters were sent to headquarters a lot of them, especially in the most egregious cases. And, you know, Thurgood Marshall early on in the 50s, before he was appointed to the court, would look at them, a Constance Baker, Motley would look at them, and they did take action in courts. The attendant or manager left the lugs loose deliberately. And when we was a good way is out on Highway 67, the wheel ran off. The rim contacted. I cannot tell you what handicaps are endured by Negro motorists traveling through the south, often for long and weary miles, unable to be sure of finding adequate accommodations for taking care of the normal physiological functions of the body and for rest. The first two places displayed vacancy signs, but we were unable to get accommodations because they had been reserved. They used these guidebooks, the green guide to Negro tourism, and travel guiding other guides in part to tell them where they could stay and not be turned away. And the slogan of one of those books is vacation without humiliation.

People to the left, the right, in front and behind were served. Finally, I sensed that we were being ignored. If you think of all the black people who packed their lunch in their car, who couldn't buy lodging, that was adding up. And this is where the change in travel and transportation industry comes through because as it becomes corporate and as it becomes change, then the NAACP puts pressure on chains like Hilton at the top where some of these people went to conventions to get change in the south and throughout the country. They wanted their way to the ladies' restrooms that were in plain sight and had to be called back. We then had to stop on the highway like animals. We are members of the NAACP. My sense is that the civil rights leaders recognized the power of the family image in a time when the family was the dominant image of domesticity, this nuclear family. And I think they played to that in the hearings. And certainly Roy

Wilkins plays to that and says, imagine a family on vacation. And this is July when he's talking. It's hot in Washington. The senators are probably thinking, when is the congressional break? I'm going to go on vacation. And so they have families and they can relate to this stranded family that's sleeping in his car. It must have had an incredibly powerful impact on political leaders, at least thinking about how their constituents are going to feel about this. It was powerful enough for them to vote for the Civil Rights Act. So I think it was it was effective. I venture to predict that it will not be too much longer before concentrated action is taken by Negro Americans to combat this evil which has held sway for far too long along the nation's highways. Sincerely yours, Mrs. Joel L. Gresham, doctoral student, Columbia University. Susan Ru is a historian at Brigham Young University.

Her book is, are we there yet? The Golden Age of American Family Vacations. It's time for another quick break. When we get back, Peter O'Nuff will make the case for his favorite historical personage with a green connection. And just so you want me disappointed, it's not the Johnny Green Giant, nor the Hulk, nor even Gumby. So keep listening to backstory, we'll be back in a minute. Hello, my name is Catherine Ball. I'm calling from the Chicago suburbs by way of Peoria, by way of Tennessee. But I think it's the most important green for the American history, which is the idea of greener pastures. The idea that Americans even as immigrants have felt the desire to go from one place to the next in search of something better, whether it's for

a job or for land or for opportunity, the idea that we're always looking for the next thing, the next green thing. Thank you very much. Goodbye. This is backstory. I'm Peter O'Nuff. I'm Brian Ballot. And I'm Ed Ayers. Today on the show, we're marking St. Patrick's Day with an entire episode devoted to the color green. Now so far, we've been hearing about things that happened in the 20th century and the 19th century. But our 18th century guy, Peter O'Nuff, has been chopping at the bit here. I think they had bits in the 18th century. He says, this is the perfect opportunity to revive a story that is key to understanding the founding of our nation, even though it's a story that's been all but forgotten. And it's all tied very conveniently to the color green. All right. So what is that green thing that Peter so worked up about? It's the green mountain boys. Yep. I'd love their blue grass

album. So Peter, our producers probably very unwisely have agreed to give you the floor. You're going to make your case. We're going to stay out of the way. Okay. But first you got to let Ed and I sketch the story as we kind of know it, right Ed? Yep. Okay. It takes place in the green mountains in a place that's going to be called Vermont. Green mountains. The story starts in 1749. There is no Vermont, but there's a New Hampshire. And the governor of New Hampshire is doing what governors in those days did. He's handing out land. He's basically selling land. That's how states got revenues. No problem, right? Well, there is a problem because New York is selling the same land. Well, there's that. That is a, that's a real problem. And New York gets in this huge fight. It says, New Hampshire, you can't be selling this land. We're selling this land. And so it

gets such a huge fight. It has to go back to daddy back over in London, you know, in 1764. And they said, New York, you're right. You had this land before. And suddenly all those New Hampshire claims are pretty worthless. And this is where our main character enters the scene, Ethan Allen. He's a small time farmer from Connecticut. He starts buying up a bunch of these worthless New Hampshire claims on the cheap. And he knew what he was doing, right? I mean, he knew he was getting a deal. Oh, yeah, because I mean, you're paying so little. It had to be a deal, right? Exactly. So he heads back up to the landing question there on the western side of the Connecticut River. And with some relatives, he puts together a militia. They call themselves, you guessed it, the green mountain boys. And for the next several years, they terrorize the settlers from New York. They burn their cabins. They destroy their crops. They basically dare them to stick around. Yeah. Well, this goes on for several years. And everybody knows New York's a much bigger, powerful state. They are about ready to squash this pain in the neck militia. When guess what

happens? The American revolution breaks out. Didn't see that. At this point, Alan always the opportunist takes his so-called militia, this rag tag team. And he storms the British fort, Fort Ticonderoga, capturing it, seizing all the pencils, right? All right. So this guy, who's a speculator and kind of a vigilante, all of a sudden, he's a war hero in our fight with the British. So it wasn't long before Alan was captured by the British in a different battle somewhere else. And while his imprison his compatriots make a play for statehood, they call themselves Vermont, a kind of imagined, fringified version of green mountains. But the new American government says, no, despite your cool name, you're still in New York. And this goes on for 14 years. Alan gets out of prison. He's once more at the helm of the statehood movement. And finally,

in 1791, the new American government says, fine, we need some ice cream for Montana and joint our union. Vermont becomes the 14th state. But by that point, Ethan Allen's already dead. Right. So Peter, two questions for you. One, did Brian and I get this story, right? Yeah. And two, why do you think this opportunistic thug is so key to our understanding the story of America's founding and the story of green? Yeah. What I want to focus on is Ethan Allen, and how he represents what I think is really the spirit for better and for worse of the American revolution. And the big picture for me, of course, it's property. We've talked about his green speculators and opportunities. Well, who isn't George Washington, even the St. Thomas Jefferson, everybody's in it for the land. Because after all, you think about it. You don't need land to guarantee your civic existence. No. That is, your citizenship is not contingent on your owning that farm out there. No. Land is not important in that way anymore. But it is everything

in Ethan Allen's day. And what the settlers of Vermont want, the founders of Vermont want, they want secure title in their land. So they can live decent lives. You know, if he wanted secure title, he should have gone to a state that could provide it. Yeah. Not that some cock and baby land speculation. I want you to know about New York. Under New York, we have these enormous manners with tenants who don't own their own land. And the big land claimants in the Green Mountains and what we're called the New Hampshire Grants, they want to monopolize the land. The people who are coming up from Connecticut like Ethan Allen are trying to take it down to the earth. Well, they're just Yankee settlers. Okay. And they want to establish farms. They want to establish towns. And that's where we get to the new state movement. Vermont had a constitution in 1777. It was functioning as a state. And it was looking around for opportunities.

If you don't want us, they say to Congress, you don't want Vermont to be the 14th state in your mighty union. We will take our marbles and we'll see maybe we can play ball. I'm mixing metaphors. Maybe we can play marbles with the British Empire in Canada. Sounds more like Benedict Arnold than Ethan Allen to meet Peter. What Ethan Allen and his allies want is recognition. That's what it's all about. He wanted an empire to tie into basically. Absolutely. Because if you don't get recognized, even that sovereign claiming, hey, this is my property. Well, who says it's your property? I get it. Land defines the patriot. Land defines the citizen. Yeah. But then you have to justify it, Brian. That's the big challenge. And the ultimate justification used to be that it came from a grant from the king. But now we're not saying that anymore. If it's not the king, who is it? I'll tell you who it is. It's God. What kind of God? What's the God who gives good

title? It's nature's God, as Jefferson calls him. It's the God who has organized this marvelous universe. It's the God who has made this green earth who has given us this mountain home. And this is the first American colony or state that calls itself after the land itself. It's not new Hampshire. It's not named after some kind of Indian name. It's not Massachusetts. It is the land itself speaking through Ethan Allen, who's channeling nature's God. We don't need a king to be the agent of God, some pseudo divine right king to say, oh, all the land was mine. I grant this to you. No. We are taking title from God directly as he meant us to take it because we are improving the land. We are supporting our families. Peter, I'm I'm pretty much sold. But tell me why the next Joe Schmo regular salt to the earth guy can't come along and take away Ethan

Allen's land. Well, this interpreting God's will thing sounds pretty dangerous to me. Well, you're exactly right. The central problem of the revolution is everybody could start a country. In fact, that's what's happening in the Connecticut River Valley. Towns in New Hampshire and Vermont are voting. Which state will they be part of Brattleboro? Well, they vote to be part of New York. This is town sovereignty. Well, think you could break up towns. You could have precinct sovereignty. We could have true anarchy, which is the thing that everybody fears. And then you won't have property. Okay. So maybe the answer to my other question will answer everything. Because earlier in this, what I thought was going to be a short platform for you, you said that Ethan Allen had gone in search of a network of an empire, something larger that would recognize him. That's right. So you've got to give up a little bit of your direct line to God really. Right. But what he's saying

is that all Americans have an interest in supporting this idea of the sovereignty of the people of their natural right to their own land. Now, no Americans are going to argue with that. They just argue with the implications of that. And so what I'm saying is that Ethan Allen represents, I think the three important dimensions of the American Revolution. First, that need to establish effective control over land and secure property rights against taxation against other property claimants to get clear title. Second, to get that title secured in a collective security arrangement of a union that will then guarantee state jurisdiction. Oh, that happens after he dies. Right. And then the third thing is to confirm, to affirm the fundamental principle of the revolution. And that is the right of the people by nature, by nature's God to govern themselves on their own land. That is the justification. That's the ultimate principle. And that's what Ethan Allen

really cares about. He doesn't care about the vast acres of accumulates. He doesn't accumulate vast acres. He doesn't own slaves. He doesn't have a vast plantation like Thomas Jefferson. But what he has achieved is independence as a farmer, his neighbors have independence, and they have clubbed together to secure their rights and then to vindicate those rights through the recognition of the other states in the union. New York comes to terms. They know they're not going to get the New Hampshire grants back. And New York capitulates. And it's just a matter of time before they cut the deal. They make the treaty Vermont becomes part of the union. Go Green. If you're just joining us, this is backstory. And we're devoting today's show to stories about the past that have something to do with the color green. In the early 1960s, new comic book heroes

like Spider-Man, the Fantastic Four, and the X-Men, all created by Stanley and Marvel comics, seemed to be rescuing the industry from a sales slump in the 1950s. But as the 60s progressed, sales declined yet again. The Vietnam War, civil rights struggle, and overall generational upheaval had realigned what young people were looking for. They wanted comic books to take on the issues they were facing every day. So comic books, well, they turned the page. By the early 1970s, iron man had shut down his company's weapons division. Captain America teamed up with a black superhero whose day job was being a social worker in Harlem. But perhaps no comic represented the shift better than a series that featured two green superheroes he would gotten their start nearly 30 years before. Green Lantern and Green Arrow. backstory producer Andrew Parsons has the story. In early 1970, Danielle walked into DC Comics for his weekly editorial meeting. DC was the home

of Batman and Superman. But when he got there, his editor put a different hero on the table. He said in effect that the Green Lantern book was floundering. So he asked me if I had any ideas. The answer was yes. A 30 years old O'Neill was part of a new generation of comic writers filling the places of pioneers who had been promoted to editors. And this new generation was young enough to be part of the highly political counterculture protesting the Vietnam War. But protests weren't really O'Neill style. I was never going to be a fiery leader and overthrowed the man. But I felt I should do something and I had access to comic books and I had kind of had been given a blank slate. Green Lantern had been created in the early 40s and was basically an intergalactic cop. To Danielle, he was an establishment guy, always busy fighting villains and other galaxies for an

ancient alien police force. So O'Neill decided that the series would bring Lantern down from space and educate him about what was going on in America, racism, drugs, violence, pollution. But he also wanted a more anti-establishment voice of justice. So he revived another 40 superhero, one that looked a lot like Robin Hood. Green Arrow. Green Arrow represented the counterculture. For him, authority would damn well have to prove itself. But what really made the Green Lantern Green Arrow alliance different was the villains. Previously Green Lantern had fought powerful aliens and mad scientists. One of his Nemesis had a bulging oversized brain with telekinetic powers. Danielle's new portrait of evil looked quite a bit different. He's overweight, he snares, he smokes a big smelly cigar, and he wreaks arrogance. The bad guy he is describing, a slum word. In the series first issue, an evil inner city building owner named Jubal Slade is trying to

evict African-American tenants. At first Green Lantern sides with him, only to be called a Nazi by Green Arrow. But Lantern's eyes are eventually opened. And one of the people who lives in this ghetto is saying, I've been reading about you, how you work for the blue skins, how on a planet, some place you help out, they aren't skins. You're done considerable for the purple skins, only those skins you never bothered with the black skins. I want to know how come. Answer me that, Mr. Green Lantern and the last panel Green Lantern with his head about saying, I can't. And the rest of it is Green Lantern going against his slum lord. But that doesn't mean he uses many superpowers. After the slum lord hires men to kill the two superheroes, Green Lantern and Green Arrow team up with the local district attorney to help take Slade down. That kind of set the tone for the rest of the series. Honestly, when I read this issue, it struck me as kind of like an after

school special. A bit cheesy and oddly overt. There is a bunch of action and adventure, but Green Arrow is also prone to these mini speeches about injustice. In one, he starts out with a line about how a good black man was killed in Memphis, and a good white man in Los Angeles. Here's Daniel Neal describing the rest. Something is wrong, something is killing us all, some hideous moral cancers, writing our very souls. In the background behind Green Arrow is smart Luther King and Bobby Kennedy. Well, the Green Lantern Green Arrow series got a lot of attention. This is a story in Bradford right. He wrote a book on the history of comics. The mainstream press ran a lot of stories on it. The New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Newth Week, and the term that came out of this coined by the media anyway was relevance to characterize these comic books that had, quote, grown up. The series wasn't the first in their relevance trend, but Green Lantern,

Green Arrow possessed more gall. It was directly calling out authority figures for acts of injustice. And it didn't take long for politicians to recognize the utility of comic books for their own messaging campaigns. New York City Mayor John Lindsay bought a page in DC Comics, and the Nixon administration asked Marvel to put an anti-drug message in Spider-Man. A message Green Lantern and Green Arrow were quick to pick up on. And not too subtly. You had on the cover of a Green Lantern Green Arrow speedy, Green Arrow sidekick shooting up with heroin, and Green Arrow discovers that a sidekick is a junkie. Though the series had critical acclaim, it only lasted a few years. By the mid-70s, the industry was ready to move on. One day I came in and we were not going to do the book anymore. I think there was kind of a, the sense of what comic books superheroes are really supposed to do had been a little bit muddled during the whole relevance trend.

Essentially I think comic book makers had concluded that the readers wanted less profiletizing and more punching from the superheroes. In other words, superheroes had kind of stopped being superheroes. These days, Green Lantern's still around, but he's flying without his liberal partner and is battling outside supervillains again. In the 2011 Green Lantern movie, one of the members of the intergalactic Green Lantern Corps warns of an evil life force. That's... It's a far cry from the villains of the relevance trend, where bad guys were recognizable people with recognizable agendas. Now, in the age of the war and terror government surveillance and the Great Recession, maybe we're just more comfortable with villains in the shadows.

Once we don't fully understand. Andrew Parsons is one of our producers. You can read more about that 1970s relevance trend in Bradford Wright's book, Comic Book Nation. We'll post a link to that along with a few frames from the Green Lantern Green Arrow series at backstoryradio.org. That's going to do it for us today, but before we go, one last thing. You might remember that in our recent Oscar show, we opened up voting for the history, the film that best captures a historical subject. You all have weighed in with your votes and your reasons, and so, without further ado, we present the first annual history awards, Brian. Ed, could you hand me the envelope, please? Here you go, Brian. Why is it green, Ed? All right, the winner of the first annual history is...

12 years, a slave. And it's a landslide. It came in with a whopping 72% of the votes. And I have to acknowledge that was Ed's pick. Thanks so much to everyone who shared their thoughts on this year's Oscar nominees. As always, we'd also love to hear your thoughts about today's show. Let us know what you think is the most important green thing in American history. You can weigh in at backstoryradio.org or reach us by email at backstoryradio.edu. Don't be a stranger. Today's episode of backstory was produced by Tony Field, Jess Angabrexon, Nina Ernest, Andrew Parsons, and Jesse Dukes. Emily Charnock is our research and web coordinator, and Jamal Milner is our engineer. Special thanks to Peter Norton, John Miller,

Ethan Cheel, and Sean Howe, a special shout out to the jolly green giant. Backstories executive producer is Andrew Wyndham. Major support for backstory is provided by an anonymous donor, the University of Virginia, the National Endowment for the Humanities, and the Joseph and Robert Cornell Memorial Foundation. Additional funding is provided by Weinstein Properties and History Channel. History made every day. Brian Ballot is professor of history at the University of Virginia, Peter Ona of his professor of history emeritus at UVA, and senior research fellow at Monicello. Ed Ayers is president and professor of history at the University of Richmond. Backstories was created by Andrew Wyndham for the Virginia Foundation for the Humanities. What I want to be.