Traveling West
Listening to America
Listening to America
4.6 • 1.1K Ratings
🗓️ 10 August 2018
⏱️ 5 minutes
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Summary
"I would have been able to produce an account of that tour — and I mean no self-aggrandizement in saying this, but just from the sheer discipline of writing every day at great length — would have been one of the classics of the literature of exploration."
— Clay S. Jenkinson portraying Thomas Jefferson
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Thomas Jefferson is interpreted by Clay S. Jenkinson.
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Good Day citizens and welcome to what would Jefferson do our weekly opportunity to discuss |
| 0:06.9 | current American events with President Thomas Jefferson who is seated across from |
| 0:12.0 | me now. |
| 0:13.0 | Good day to you, Mr President. |
| 0:15.0 | Good day to you, citizen. |
| 0:16.3 | Mr Jefferson, you know, I know you did not travel probably as much as you wanted to. |
| 0:22.1 | You didn't get very far west. |
| 0:24.3 | I wanted to ask you about that, sir. |
| 0:26.9 | I never traveled farther than 70 miles west |
| 0:30.6 | of my birthplace in Virginia. And yet you corresponded with folks who traveled all over the country, really, most notably Lewis and Clark. |
| 0:40.0 | I'm wondering, sir, had you had the opportunity to say come to where I live, the state of North Dakota, |
| 0:47.0 | perhaps see the Missouri River, the Little Missouri River, would you have entertained that, sir? |
| 0:54.0 | Probably not. |
| 0:56.0 | Really? |
| 0:57.0 | I cannot live without books. |
| 0:58.0 | I cannot live without music. |
| 1:00.0 | I cannot live without |
| 1:02.7 | or a violin or a cello. |
| 1:04.9 | I cannot live without scientific instruments, |
| 1:07.1 | although I did send some along with Lewis and Clark. |
| 1:10.2 | If you added up all the things that I could not live without, |
| 1:13.0 | probably it would have taken two or three keel boats to get me to the source of the Missouri River. |
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