Randall recounts prez politics in the cowland

Author: Kelly Janis

In spite of its puny stature, the Green Mountain State wields mighty political brawn, which has made it an alluring attraction for some of history's most remarkable figures.

On a snowy Wednesday night, Middlebury residents flocked to Ilsley Public Library's community meeting room for "Presidents Come to Vermont," a free humanities lecture delivered by Champlain College historian Willard Sterne Randall. The talk detailed the phenomenon by which a flurry of United States presidents have been, by Randall's description, "caught by history in Vermont, and their lives profoundly changed."

The event was part of the fifth annual First Wednesdays lecture series, brainchild of the Vermont Humanities Council's pursuit to bring regionally and nationally acclaimed speakers to local libraries. From October to May, lectures are presented monthly in Brattleboro, Burlington, Middlebury, Montpelier and St. Johnsbury, as well as at alternating venues in Newport and in Stanstead, QuÈbec. Topics are diverse, ranging from Dante to German POWs in New England.

In the town of Middlebury, the series is sponsored by The Friends of Ilsley Public Library, a 400 member, 40-year-old organization which, according to membership forms distributed at the event, "supports the activities, projects, and programs that help make Ilsley Public Library an outstanding community resource."

Introducing this latest event, Chris Kirby, Director of Adult Services and Technology at Ilsley, described Randall as an authority who "knows our founding fathers very well and is well positioned" to deliver an account of their Green Mountain State exploits. The former investigative reporter has written 12 books, been interviewed on such programs as NBC's "Today Show" and National Public Radio's "All Things Considered," and garnered three Pulitzer nominations during his self-described "17 years of gumshoe reporting." Currently, he is Historical Scholar in Residence at Burlington's Champlain College.

"I'm a biographer," said Randall. "I'm an old-fashioned features writer who can't write anything short anymore."

The lengthy writings to which he refers pivot on the historical contributions of such figures as Benjamin Franklin, Benedict Arnold, Thomas Jefferson and George Washington. His focus on such lofty subjects does not, however, prompt him to lose sight of the more minute details.

"All history is local," Randall said. "It's a mosaic of many pieces you have to assemble."

Randall has spent much of his career working to assemble these pieces as they concern the state of Vermont. The task is both compelling and challenging. In terms of its size and population, "Vermont has been more important than it deserves to be politically," Randall said.

As a testament to this political importance, American presidents have made the state a prime travel destination for over two centuries. "There is not one clear motive for their visits," Randall said. One condition, however, remains constant: whether these presidents were campaigning, engaging in politics or giving commencement speeches to "take the rough edges off raw politics," they were never merely on vacation.

Randall submitted Thomas Jefferson as a worthy model, relaying the crux of an article he authored for American Heritage Magazine.

"By the end of the first Congress, in the spring of 1791, Thomas Jefferson badly needed a vacation," Randall wrote. "The first Secretary of State disliked the noise, dirt, and crowds of the capital, Philadelphia, and the cramped routines of office work. He had suffered near-constant migraine headaches for fully six months; one cause of them may have been his growing struggle with Treasury Secretary Alexander Hamilton, who had views opposite to Jefferson's on almost every issue facing the new government Ö Jefferson sorely needed to get away for a while from a job he had never wanted."

This getaway was realized locally. "For a long time Jefferson had wanted to visit Vermont," Randall's article continued. "As the champion of the frontier farmer, he had come to think of the new state as the frontier ideal, a sort of unspoiled Virginia without slavery or entrenched tidewater aristocrats, a place where everyone would have a chance to own a home and land and make a good living."

In his lecture, Randall chronicled Jefferson's decision to team up with James Madison, with whom he was "the closest of friends," and high-tail it up north to satisfy "their deep curiosity about this new place."

When they weren't admiring Lake Champlain and killing chipmunks to make hunter's pie, Madison and Jefferson "encouraged Vermonters to start new industries to become more self-sufficient," said Randall.

The presidential duo was proceeded by James Monroe, Martin VanBuren and Millard Filmore, the latter of which Randall called "a very handsome fellow."

The state was a hot spot during the Civil War era because, according to Randall, "Vermonters always gave twice as much as they were asked in money and soldiers."

Though it cannot be substantiated that Abraham Lincoln ever visited the state, his wife and children did. "They liked Vermont so much that they were going to bring the old man back," Randall said. "But then he was shot."

Randall proceeded chronologically, pointing out the likes of Calvin Coolidge, who "liked to autograph maple syrup buckets and give them to friends," and Ronald Reagan, who was "pelted by snowballs in Barre." Randall concluded with an anecdote of our current President George W. Bush's travels to the state.

"He told the 'Vermontians' how happy he was to be there," Randall recalled with a smirk. "It was starting already," he said, referring to the President's often-mocked propensity for tangling his tongue. "It didn't happen overnight."

The nearly two hour lecture succeeded in sustaining the attention of its rapt audience, with the exception of a couple who darted out the door minutes prior to its completion. "They had to go," a Friend of Ilsley member hurriedly explained to Randall after the lecture. "They have a meatloaf in the oven."

"That's the best excuse I've ever heard," Randall said.

The First Wednesdays lecture series concludes for the 2006-2007 season on May 2 with Dartmouth Shakespeare scholar Peter Saccio's "Henry V: War in Shakespeare, Olivier, and Branagh."