This is fresh air. I'm Terry Gross. One night when my guest Rich Benjamin's mother was staying over at his Brooklyn apartment, he awoke to her screaming,

Please don't kill me. Please don't kill me. She was having a nightmare. Here's the back story. Her father, Rich Benjamin's grandfather, was appointed president of Haiti by a temporary government in 1957.

But 19 days after taking office, he was overthrown by a military coup.

Soldiers with submachine guns stormed into a cabinet meet him, took him away, and gave him a

letter of resignation to sign. His wife was also kidnapped by soldiers. They were both

ejected and sent to the U.S. Soldiers also came for the president's children, including

Benjamin's mother, who was 13 at the time. The children were taken to barracks where his mother

was raped. She never got over the terror of that day. Through her

aunt's negotiations with the military government, she was able to get out of confinement and go to

New York, where she was reunited with her parents. The family never really talked about the coup and the

trauma. It wasn't until Benjamin went to Haiti, to help after the 2010 earthquake, that he decided to do some research to better understand how to the trauma. It wasn't until Benjamin went to Haiti to help after the 2010 earthquake,

that he decided to do some research to better understand his family and himself. As part of his

research, he sued the U.S. State Department to get access to classified documents, which revealed

the U.S. played a role in the coup. His new memoir is called Talk to Me, Lessons from a Family Forged by History.

It's also about being black, the son of immigrants, and gay. He says he's enjoyed advantage and endured exclusion.

Benjamin's first book, published in 2009, is called Searching for Whitetopia, An Improbable Journey to the Heart of White America.

Rich Benjamin, welcome to Fresh Air. What did you learn about the Eisenhower administration's role in overthrowing your grandfather's presidency?

Terry, first of all, it's great to be here.

It's great to have you. Thank you. Thank you.

What I learned in writing this book is that executives of American corporations, after my grandfather assumed Tate's presidency, called the White House directly to ask them to intervene.

In those phone conversations, they called him a rabble-rouser.

They said he wasn't fit to be president.

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