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♪ ♪

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♪ ♪

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"December 4, 1921.

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"Samara District, Soviet Russia.

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"Today I came upon a group of
men in a makeshift cemetery

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"digging a mass grave.

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"When I asked where
the bodies were,

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"one of them explained...

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"'We are trying now
to make a place

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"'to put the future corpses.

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We are afraid we won't have
the strength to do it later.'"

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"As I looked at them,
I wondered if any of those men

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thought he might be digging
his own grave."

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Will Shafroth,
American Relief Administration.

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In July 1921, noted Russian
author Maxim Gorky

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issued a plea to the West.

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♪ ♪

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"Gloomy days have come
for the country of Tolstoy,

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Dostoyevsky, Mendeleev,"
Gorky wrote.

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"I ask for prompt aid
to the Russian people.

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Give bread and medicine."

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Gorky never mentioned
Vladimir Lenin

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or his Bolshevik revolution.

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Russia had suffered a drought,
which was not unusual.

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The famine of 1921 was.

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It would become the worst
natural disaster in Europe

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since the Black Plague
in the Middle Ages.

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There was this historical
coincidence

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of a number of social forces:

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the collapse of
the tsarist regime,

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the outbreak of civil war,

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the policies of the Bolsheviks
themselves.

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The government carried out
mass requisitioning of grain,

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which prevented peasants
from feeding themselves

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or even having enough seed
to carry on next season

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planting a new crop.

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♪ ♪

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Herbert Hoover, the new
secretary of commerce

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under President Warren Harding,

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spotted Gorky's plea
in a newspaper.

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Hoover was also the director

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of the American Relief
Administration,

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known as the ARA.

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For most Americans,

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Herbert Hoover is associated
with the Great Depression.

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But back in the 1920s,

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his image was one of being
a very efficient...

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a hardheaded humanitarian

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who knew how to get
the food through.

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No one in the West had
better credentials

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to answer Gorky's request
than Herbert Hoover.

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Hoover was a Stanford-trained
mining engineer

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who had operated
in Australia, China,

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and Russia's Ural Mountains,

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and knew the logistics
of moving men and materiel

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around the world.

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When World War I broke out, he
was asked to organize the relief

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of an entire nation.

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There were seven million
Belgians

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living under German occupation.

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So it became Hoover's
responsibility

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to provide daily food assistance

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that would keep
all those people alive.

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And Hoover showed that he had
the administrative talents

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as well as the humanitarian
sympathies to pull this off.

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And he became an American hero
and even an international hero.

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♪ ♪

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After the war,

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the Paris Peace Conference
asked the United States

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to feed tens of millions
in 21 countries

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throughout war-torn Europe
and the Near East.

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The U.S. created the ARA
with Herbert Hoover as its head.

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It has been said,
and I think correctly,

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that Herbert Hoover
was responsible

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for saving more lives than
any person who has ever lived.

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He became known as the
"Master of Emergencies"

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and the "Great Humanitarian,"

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the embodiment of an America

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proud of its newfound sense of
itself as an altruistic nation.

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Hoover accepted Russia's plea
for help.

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♪ ♪

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Will Shafroth, 29, son of
the governor of Colorado,

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joined other famine relief
workers from the United States

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and headed for Moscow.

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Spurred by a sense of adventure
and altruism, "Hoover's boys,"

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as they came to be known,

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had done relief work
after World War I

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and represented an America
that emerged from the war

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as a world power.

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Now their idealism
would be tested

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by a railroad system
in disarray...

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a forbidding climate...

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a ruthless government suspicious
of their motives...

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and the shear scale
of starvation and death.

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They would be among
the first Americans to see

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the earth-shaking revolution

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that Vladimir Lenin and
his Bolsheviks had wrought

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and the first to feel
the tensions

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that would mark U.S.-Soviet
relations

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for much of the century.

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♪ ♪

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On September 1, 1921,

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the first ship carrying
American relief supplies

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arrived from Hamburg, Germany,

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and docked at Petrograd,
the former St. Petersburg.

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It began to unload 700 tons of
rations that had been in storage

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since the European relief.

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♪ ♪

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The ARA's goal in Russia was
to do what it had done

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in postwar Europe:

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feed children,
mainly in the cities.

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Feeding one million seemed
a manageable task.

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Within a week, the first ARA
feeding station opened

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in Petrograd School number 27.

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The menu was white bread,
corn grits, rice, milk, cocoa,

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and sugar.

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At a time when there was not
a spark of hope anywhere,

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unexpectedly,
without any reason,

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nobody could explain
why Americans came,

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why they provide food
for children.

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♪ ♪

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The "Chicago Tribune" began
running a story

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that would captivate America.

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♪ ♪

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It also appealed for funds.

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Private donations began to flow
to the ARA.

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Five days after his arrival
in Moscow,

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Will Shafroth was part of an ARA
scouting party sent east

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to evaluate the famine
in the Volga valley.

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♪ ♪

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People had fled their villages,
desperate to escape the famine.

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At the station at Kazan
on the northern Volga,

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Shafroth noted
"wretched creatures

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huddled together in compact
masses like a seal colony."

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Most were children whose mothers
had deserted them or had died.

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♪ ♪

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Shafroth and his fellow scouts
then drove to a home

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for orphaned and
abandoned children

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whose lice-ridden clothes
had to be destroyed.

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"I saw emaciated
little skeletons,

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"whose gaunt faces and toothpick
legs testified to the truth

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of the report that they were
dying daily by the dozen."

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"The stench was nauseating."

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He served with the ARA in Poland
right after the war,

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but he had never witnessed
scenes of horror like this.

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Shafroth witnessed the same
or worse in Simbirsk,

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in Sengiley, in Samara.

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Once the richest grain-growing
province in the Volga valley,

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Samara was now at the heart
of the famine.

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My father wrote about
one children's home

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in Samara where 283 children
were confined to three rooms.

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"They were sitting on the floor,

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"and when I asked the brave
little lady where they slept,

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"she pointed to the floor
and said, 'There.

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"We have no other place
for them.'

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"And then she had those
little, hungry, homeless waifs

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sing for me."

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My dad said he had to turn away.

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It was more than he could stand.

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In October 1921,
Colonel Walter L. Bell,

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a National Guardsman
from Syracuse,

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was dispatched into the abyss
of the unknown...

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Ufa in Bashkiria,
725 miles from Moscow,

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at the foot of
the Ural Mountains.

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His relief district would expand
east across the Urals

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to the edge of Siberia.

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♪ ♪

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"It is impossible to describe
the suffering and misery

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that presented itself
on every side."

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"I found the only food
was made from weeds

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mixed with ground-up bones,
tree bark, and clay."

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The famine was awful.

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People were eating
almost everything

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that could be swallowed.

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They ate straw from the roof.

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Using this straw and such
substitutes of food,

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they became ill and they look

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something like fat men,

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but it was the beginning
of their illness.

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We had a camel...
two camels our family had.

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Finally, of course,
we ate him, our family.

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So we ate all cats, dogs,
horses, everything.

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Shafroth and Bell
wired their reports

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to Colonel William Haskell
in Moscow,

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a retired Army officer
who was the director

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of the ARA's Russian relief.

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Haskell began to grasp the
enormity of the problem.

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In October 1921,
he wired Hoover in Washington

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that the starvation would peak
in the winter

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and affect 16 million people.

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♪ ♪

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Hoover realized the challenge

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was not hunger,
as in postwar Europe.

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Soviet Russia faced the greatest
famine in history.

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Feeding one million children
would only scratch the surface.

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He needed to feed
adults as well.

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That would mean funding
from Congress.

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♪ ♪

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Yet he worried Americans
would be reluctant

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to spend their tax dollars
on people

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whose Communist government
many saw as monstrous

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and intent on spreading
revolution.

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We had had a Red scare
in our own domestic politics

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in 1919, 1920,
a general strike in Seattle,

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a bombing of the home

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of the attorney general of the
United States, never solved.

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There were many reasons to fear
that left-wing agitation,

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even of the Communist variety,
was a serious menace.

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Hoover had a reputation
not just as a humanitarian

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but also as a staunch
anti-Communist.

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In postwar Central Europe,

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he had helped thwart Lenin's
attempts to expand Communism

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by threatening to withhold
relief supplies

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from countries sympathetic
to the Bolsheviks.

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That worried the American left.

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♪ ♪

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Left-of-center people...
legitimately, I think...

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suspected that his motivation
here wasn't pure,

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because he had this
counterrevolutionary record

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with respect to food relief
in Eastern Europe.

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To them, a Socialist revolution
or a Socialist regime in Russia

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was an experiment that should be
encouraged.

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In Hoover's mind,

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there was no conflict
between feeding people...

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giving sort of straightforward
humanitarian relief

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on the one hand...

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and using food as a political
weapon to stop Bolshevism.

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Bolshevism was wicked.

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It was evil.

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Stopping it was humanitarian.

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Hoover felt the example
of American efficiency

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and generosity might do more
than just feed the Russians.

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That was part of his pitch
to President Warren Harding.

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He wanted and I think implied

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that food famine relief
could, perhaps,

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lead to a regime change

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and that it might get rid
of the Bolsheviks.

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He thought that by bringing in

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Americans with their talents
and administrative expertise...

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their efficiency, if you will...

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that they could serve as
an example to the Russians.

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Lenin was afraid that he would
try to sneak arms in with food

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and try to organize
a resistance.

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No, no, Hoover was not trying
to do that at all.

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♪ ♪

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Hoover's primary argument
for helping the Russians

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was an economic one.

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Feeding Russians would help
American farmers

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who were sitting
on huge surpluses.

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00:16:44,300 --> 00:16:49,542
Hoover asked Congress for
$20 million to buy surplus corn

255
00:16:49,566 --> 00:16:53,400
for an expanded relief program
for children and for adults.

256
00:16:55,366 --> 00:16:57,342
Some in the House feared
it would bolster

257
00:16:57,366 --> 00:16:59,042
the Bolshevik government.

258
00:16:59,066 --> 00:17:03,209
With unemployment reaching
five million during a recession,

259
00:17:03,233 --> 00:17:06,242
some senators favored projects
that would create jobs

260
00:17:06,266 --> 00:17:09,400
for Americans or help veterans
in distress.

261
00:17:11,833 --> 00:17:16,476
Hoover supporters and the Farm
Belt lobby carried the day.

262
00:17:16,500 --> 00:17:20,542
On December 22, 1921,
with Harding's backing,

263
00:17:20,566 --> 00:17:23,066
Congress approved the purchase
of surplus corn.

264
00:17:24,933 --> 00:17:27,709
Hoover also insisted
the Soviets buy wheat seed

265
00:17:27,733 --> 00:17:33,142
to plant in the spring to secure
the harvest of 1922.

266
00:17:33,166 --> 00:17:35,809
The ARA campaign in Russia

267
00:17:35,833 --> 00:17:40,609
would be the largest relief
operation to date...

268
00:17:40,633 --> 00:17:44,833
and the first to provide relief
to an adversary.

269
00:17:45,733 --> 00:17:48,376
The challenge was
to get the food

270
00:17:48,400 --> 00:17:50,609
almost halfway around the world,

271
00:17:50,633 --> 00:17:54,400
where up to 100,000 Russians
were dying every week.

272
00:17:59,733 --> 00:18:03,742
♪ ♪

273
00:18:03,766 --> 00:18:07,909
America's surplus corn and wheat
seed began to move quickly

274
00:18:07,933 --> 00:18:11,076
from the heartland to the holds
of oceangoing freighters.

275
00:18:11,100 --> 00:18:13,833
♪ ♪

276
00:18:18,200 --> 00:18:22,342
The first relief ships left
New York in mid-January 1922,

277
00:18:22,366 --> 00:18:25,533
carrying 300,000 tons of grain.

278
00:18:27,700 --> 00:18:32,576
The task before the ARA workers
in Russia was Herculean.

279
00:18:32,600 --> 00:18:35,376
During the child feeding,

280
00:18:35,400 --> 00:18:38,776
the ARA had divided Russia
into ten districts.

281
00:18:38,800 --> 00:18:43,966
Each had an American supervisor
and a small staff of Americans.

282
00:18:45,733 --> 00:18:48,309
Once again,
these relief workers set off

283
00:18:48,333 --> 00:18:50,642
into the far corners
of their districts,

284
00:18:50,666 --> 00:18:54,876
estimating the new needs,
arranging for more warehouses

285
00:18:54,900 --> 00:18:57,342
to store 20 million bushels
of corn

286
00:18:57,366 --> 00:18:59,466
and thousands of tons of seed...

287
00:19:01,600 --> 00:19:04,476
and directing
the village committees

288
00:19:04,500 --> 00:19:08,600
to identify starving adults
for the expanded relief.

289
00:19:10,966 --> 00:19:14,176
They traveled over the flat
expanses of the Russian steppes

290
00:19:14,200 --> 00:19:17,676
for silent days
in crude sleighs,

291
00:19:17,700 --> 00:19:19,800
by train if they could find
a private car.

292
00:19:22,666 --> 00:19:26,742
Their greatest physical threat
was typhus, spread by lice.

293
00:19:28,266 --> 00:19:31,042
They're afraid to travel
with ordinary Russians

294
00:19:31,066 --> 00:19:36,109
in third-class cars
because of lice.

295
00:19:36,133 --> 00:19:37,476
They're traveling along
in a sled,

296
00:19:37,500 --> 00:19:39,742
and they get out and they go
into a peasant hut

297
00:19:39,766 --> 00:19:44,533
for the night and they see
the walls crawling with lice.

298
00:19:46,366 --> 00:19:49,742
So they go back in the sled,
they bundle up, and they know

299
00:19:49,766 --> 00:19:53,509
"Mr. Louse," as they called him,
couldn't survive in that cold.

300
00:19:53,533 --> 00:19:56,242
♪ ♪

301
00:19:56,266 --> 00:20:00,076
The ARA had to expand its staff.

302
00:20:00,100 --> 00:20:03,076
With no more than 200 American
supervisors in Russia

303
00:20:03,100 --> 00:20:09,509
at any one time, it hired
120,000 Russians to do the work.

304
00:20:09,533 --> 00:20:11,642
They invited those
who could speak

305
00:20:11,666 --> 00:20:14,842
at least a little bit English
or other foreign languages.

306
00:20:14,866 --> 00:20:18,309
For ARA, it was
practical reasons.

307
00:20:18,333 --> 00:20:20,809
They had an education.

308
00:20:20,833 --> 00:20:23,442
Because most Communists were
without any education,

309
00:20:23,466 --> 00:20:27,209
no languages, but the Russian
authorities,

310
00:20:27,233 --> 00:20:31,176
they interpreted this
as an opportunity for the ARA

311
00:20:31,200 --> 00:20:36,076
to find people who would be able
to support

312
00:20:36,100 --> 00:20:37,676
counterrevolutions,
all these things.

313
00:20:37,700 --> 00:20:39,376
So, different perceptions.

314
00:20:39,400 --> 00:20:44,576
Will Shafroth's Samara district
was divided into eight regions,

315
00:20:44,600 --> 00:20:47,500
each with at least
one warehouse.

316
00:20:49,600 --> 00:20:52,076
Every village had a committee
of local citizens

317
00:20:52,100 --> 00:20:54,366
who decided who got fed.

318
00:20:57,166 --> 00:21:02,666
Shafroth would supervise 16,000
Russians in 900 kitchens.

319
00:21:03,200 --> 00:21:07,409
♪ ♪

320
00:21:07,433 --> 00:21:10,076
In his sprawling
Ufa Urals district,

321
00:21:10,100 --> 00:21:12,866
Walter Bell faced
even greater challenges.

322
00:21:14,466 --> 00:21:18,576
The population of that district
was almost nine million

323
00:21:18,600 --> 00:21:21,176
and the territory is bigger
than France.

324
00:21:21,200 --> 00:21:23,776
And there were only
five or six Americans

325
00:21:23,800 --> 00:21:26,342
supervising the operations.

326
00:21:26,366 --> 00:21:28,676
They didn't know Russian at all.

327
00:21:28,700 --> 00:21:31,676
They knew nothing about
Bashkir and Bashkiria.

328
00:21:31,700 --> 00:21:33,642
They kept asking each other,

329
00:21:33,666 --> 00:21:36,209
"Have you ever heard
about those Bashkirs?"

330
00:21:36,233 --> 00:21:38,842
They, they didn't know that
such people exist.

331
00:21:38,866 --> 00:21:41,542
♪ ♪

332
00:21:41,566 --> 00:21:44,176
The Bashkirs had been
a nomadic people

333
00:21:44,200 --> 00:21:48,833
who settled in what would become
Russia's lawless wild east.

334
00:21:50,400 --> 00:21:52,176
♪ ♪

335
00:21:52,200 --> 00:21:54,776
In addition
to the Muslim Bashkirs

336
00:21:54,800 --> 00:21:56,309
who were hostile to the Russians

337
00:21:56,333 --> 00:21:58,042
and had a reputation
for plunder,

338
00:21:58,066 --> 00:22:01,142
Bell's district
contained Kazakhs,

339
00:22:01,166 --> 00:22:03,676
who for centuries had attacked
the Bashkirs

340
00:22:03,700 --> 00:22:06,042
and hated the Russians.

341
00:22:06,066 --> 00:22:10,542
"The diplomatic entanglements
involved," Bell would write,

342
00:22:10,566 --> 00:22:12,809
"make the Paris Peace
Conference seem

343
00:22:12,833 --> 00:22:15,100
like a well-conducted
private school."

344
00:22:16,900 --> 00:22:20,009
Walter Bell faced
a formidable task.

345
00:22:20,033 --> 00:22:23,342
Unlike Shafroth,
he had no previous experience

346
00:22:23,366 --> 00:22:25,533
with relief work.

347
00:22:30,833 --> 00:22:34,033
Vladimir Lenin kept
a watchful eye on the ARA.

348
00:22:37,033 --> 00:22:40,442
In February, the Cheka...
His secret police...

349
00:22:40,466 --> 00:22:45,133
ordered its agents "to purge the
ARA of undesirable elements."

350
00:22:46,566 --> 00:22:50,742
These agents began
to infiltrate ARA offices,

351
00:22:50,766 --> 00:22:54,142
hired as Russian assistants.

352
00:22:54,166 --> 00:22:56,876
They reported
to Alexander Eiduk,

353
00:22:56,900 --> 00:23:00,009
a Cheka agent who was
the Soviet government's liaison

354
00:23:00,033 --> 00:23:02,209
with the ARA.

355
00:23:02,233 --> 00:23:06,642
Was there any political activity
made by the ARA?

356
00:23:06,666 --> 00:23:10,309
Did they meet any
suspicious persons here?

357
00:23:10,333 --> 00:23:12,342
Did they agitate
against anything?

358
00:23:12,366 --> 00:23:15,909
Did you notice any
anti-Communist slogans

359
00:23:15,933 --> 00:23:18,342
in their declarations?

360
00:23:20,033 --> 00:23:24,709
Eiduk also tried to undermine
the ARA's American staff.

361
00:23:24,733 --> 00:23:30,309
One target was David Kinne, the
29-year-old district supervisor

362
00:23:30,333 --> 00:23:34,509
of Saratov Province
on the Volga.

363
00:23:34,533 --> 00:23:38,076
Cheka agents had secret
instructions from their chiefs

364
00:23:38,100 --> 00:23:40,509
to use every American weakness

365
00:23:40,533 --> 00:23:43,076
to get control
over American supply.

366
00:23:43,100 --> 00:23:47,676
And David Kinne was
a perfect match for them

367
00:23:47,700 --> 00:23:50,109
because he was an alcoholic.

368
00:23:50,133 --> 00:23:52,409
♪ ♪

369
00:23:52,433 --> 00:23:57,309
The Cheka exploited
Kinne's weakness.

370
00:23:57,333 --> 00:24:00,576
The Soviet notion is if they can
get control of the food,

371
00:24:00,600 --> 00:24:05,509
they can funnel it to the people
they want to get the food,

372
00:24:05,533 --> 00:24:08,209
and they can keep the food
away from people

373
00:24:08,233 --> 00:24:11,300
they don't want receiving
the food.

374
00:24:12,600 --> 00:24:15,776
Poretskii, that guy from Cheka

375
00:24:15,800 --> 00:24:18,809
who was supervising American
operations in Saratov,

376
00:24:18,833 --> 00:24:21,333
he knew exactly
what he was doing.

377
00:24:23,366 --> 00:24:26,776
The Cheka agents took over
Kinne's operation

378
00:24:26,800 --> 00:24:30,609
and diverted food from children
to their political allies.

379
00:24:32,233 --> 00:24:35,809
It took several months before
the ARA could reclaim

380
00:24:35,833 --> 00:24:38,866
American control
in Saratov province.

381
00:24:40,400 --> 00:24:42,642
♪ ♪

382
00:24:42,666 --> 00:24:46,376
In March, David Kinne was
dismissed from the ARA

383
00:24:46,400 --> 00:24:49,533
and sent out of Russia
a broken man.

384
00:24:50,300 --> 00:24:53,600
♪ ♪

385
00:25:00,633 --> 00:25:04,976
American relief ships got
as far as the Baltic Sea,

386
00:25:05,000 --> 00:25:08,966
only to become icebound in
February and for much of March.

387
00:25:11,966 --> 00:25:14,866
It was the coldest winter
in 15 years.

388
00:25:17,200 --> 00:25:19,076
"The Lord seems to have
a particular animus

389
00:25:19,100 --> 00:25:22,642
toward the Russian people,"
an ARA staffer mused.

390
00:25:22,666 --> 00:25:25,242
"He cuts off the rain
in the summer

391
00:25:25,266 --> 00:25:28,266
and freezes up the Baltic
in winter."

392
00:25:36,133 --> 00:25:39,809
While touring his district
in the fall of 1921,

393
00:25:39,833 --> 00:25:43,076
47-year-old Walter Bell
contracted typhus.

394
00:25:44,766 --> 00:25:47,642
His Russian assistants drove him
for three days

395
00:25:47,666 --> 00:25:50,466
back to Ufa, delirious.

396
00:25:53,000 --> 00:25:58,109
He was unconscious for
three weeks and almost died.

397
00:25:58,133 --> 00:26:02,109
Harold Blandy,
Bell's assistant in Ufa,

398
00:26:02,133 --> 00:26:03,966
also came down with typhus.

399
00:26:05,000 --> 00:26:08,176
Harold Blandy had a big heart.

400
00:26:08,200 --> 00:26:10,042
Harold Blandy was the type
who could not

401
00:26:10,066 --> 00:26:12,109
simply go into a children's home
and inspect it.

402
00:26:12,133 --> 00:26:13,842
He had to go into
a children's home

403
00:26:13,866 --> 00:26:18,542
and interact with the children,
put his hand on the kid's head.

404
00:26:18,566 --> 00:26:21,342
♪ ♪

405
00:26:21,366 --> 00:26:24,676
It wasn't a surprise
to the Ufa Americans

406
00:26:24,700 --> 00:26:28,542
that Blandy caught typhus.

407
00:26:28,566 --> 00:26:31,566
Blandy died a week later.

408
00:26:33,766 --> 00:26:36,709
To the Russians,
his death warranted a tribute...

409
00:26:36,733 --> 00:26:40,833
an elaborate funeral procession
in Moscow.

410
00:26:42,200 --> 00:26:47,342
To the ARA, anyone who caught
typhus, much less died from it,

411
00:26:47,366 --> 00:26:49,609
was an embarrassment.

412
00:26:49,633 --> 00:26:52,376
To be outwitted by lice
was to fall short

413
00:26:52,400 --> 00:26:55,933
of being a cautious and
efficient relief worker.

414
00:27:01,266 --> 00:27:03,609
When Walter Bell recovered,

415
00:27:03,633 --> 00:27:06,076
he resumed his tour of some
of the remotest parts

416
00:27:06,100 --> 00:27:07,666
of his district.

417
00:27:09,400 --> 00:27:13,766
He found a home in what he
called "the wilds of Russia."

418
00:27:19,166 --> 00:27:21,942
He would stop at a village
and spend days at a time

419
00:27:21,966 --> 00:27:24,642
with the local Bashkirs
and Soviet officials,

420
00:27:24,666 --> 00:27:27,409
including Eiduk's Cheka agents.

421
00:27:27,433 --> 00:27:29,909
♪ ♪

422
00:27:31,633 --> 00:27:34,976
"He outthinks these people,"
a colleague noted,

423
00:27:35,000 --> 00:27:37,566
"and wins them by his courtesy."

424
00:27:39,466 --> 00:27:43,142
The other directors
of the ARA regions,

425
00:27:43,166 --> 00:27:48,709
they were not polite
with Russian authorities.

426
00:27:48,733 --> 00:27:51,442
And I have read some letters.

427
00:27:51,466 --> 00:27:55,642
They were full of sarcasm,
irony,

428
00:27:55,666 --> 00:27:59,476
and sometimes they used
rather rude words.

429
00:27:59,500 --> 00:28:04,109
Mr. Bell, he was polite,

430
00:28:04,133 --> 00:28:08,076
and sometimes,
when there were his mistake,

431
00:28:08,100 --> 00:28:11,776
he accepted that
he was not right.

432
00:28:16,733 --> 00:28:19,909
"One big reason
for the friendly contact

433
00:28:19,933 --> 00:28:22,242
"that existed between us
and the authorities

434
00:28:22,266 --> 00:28:25,509
"was whenever we had an
important question to decide,

435
00:28:25,533 --> 00:28:28,576
we had a conference
with the ones concerned."

436
00:28:30,533 --> 00:28:34,909
Bell was older than most
of the ARA workers.

437
00:28:34,933 --> 00:28:38,076
And it was easier
for local population

438
00:28:38,100 --> 00:28:40,809
to perceive him as a boss.

439
00:28:40,833 --> 00:28:44,642
He's Colonel Bell.

440
00:28:44,666 --> 00:28:48,609
He's, as the Russians would say,
"Polkovnik Bell."

441
00:28:48,633 --> 00:28:50,609
And we're dealing
with a country here

442
00:28:50,633 --> 00:28:53,376
that has just seen a civil war,

443
00:28:53,400 --> 00:28:55,609
Whites and Reds going back
and forth.

444
00:28:55,633 --> 00:28:57,909
Military authority counts
for something.

445
00:29:02,033 --> 00:29:04,742
With the Baltic frozen
and supplies running low,

446
00:29:04,766 --> 00:29:07,109
Polkovnik Bell told
his colleagues

447
00:29:07,133 --> 00:29:08,942
he was forced to put
the children's kitchens

448
00:29:08,966 --> 00:29:11,100
on half rations.

449
00:29:12,666 --> 00:29:15,276
Yet he continued to feed
the children

450
00:29:15,300 --> 00:29:19,176
of both Russians and Bashkirs
with their cooperation,

451
00:29:19,200 --> 00:29:21,066
not interference.

452
00:29:28,433 --> 00:29:31,176
On February 6, 1922,

453
00:29:31,200 --> 00:29:35,242
the first American ship carrying
corn to feed Russian adults

454
00:29:35,266 --> 00:29:38,976
docked at Novorossiysk
on the Black Sea.

455
00:29:39,000 --> 00:29:42,133
Six weeks had passed since
Congress had voted.

456
00:29:44,633 --> 00:29:47,409
The next link in the chain
to feed the starving Russians

457
00:29:47,433 --> 00:29:50,866
would be a crucial one,
and the weakest.

458
00:29:53,633 --> 00:29:57,733
Years of war had wrecked
80% of Russia's railroads.

459
00:30:00,533 --> 00:30:01,876
An American journalist wrote

460
00:30:01,900 --> 00:30:03,842
of locomotives resting
in graveyards

461
00:30:03,866 --> 00:30:07,542
"silently like sleeping
monsters"...

462
00:30:07,566 --> 00:30:11,109
of "miles of sick box cars
on sidings

463
00:30:11,133 --> 00:30:13,600
like rows of skeletons."

464
00:30:15,266 --> 00:30:16,876
♪ ♪

465
00:30:16,900 --> 00:30:22,300
The corn had traveled by ship
almost 5,500 miles in 16 days.

466
00:30:26,033 --> 00:30:30,642
The trip from Novorossiysk to
Samara was only 1,300 miles,

467
00:30:30,666 --> 00:30:33,666
yet it would take 21 days.

468
00:30:35,633 --> 00:30:38,776
"The dilapidated railroads were
urged to do the impossible,"

469
00:30:38,800 --> 00:30:43,409
Will Shafroth wrote,
"and they did it."

470
00:30:43,433 --> 00:30:47,009
Shafroth received a small
first installment of corn

471
00:30:47,033 --> 00:30:49,209
in mid-March.

472
00:30:49,233 --> 00:30:51,409
And actually the Bolsheviks paid

473
00:30:51,433 --> 00:30:54,176
to railroad workers
with American corn

474
00:30:54,200 --> 00:30:56,442
to make the trains run.

475
00:30:56,466 --> 00:30:58,309
And it was a big help

476
00:30:58,333 --> 00:31:00,976
because Russian government
didn't have money

477
00:31:01,000 --> 00:31:03,133
and didn't have food
to pay them.

478
00:31:06,600 --> 00:31:09,742
With relief workers desperately
waiting for more supplies,

479
00:31:09,766 --> 00:31:13,642
entire trains began
to disappear.

480
00:31:13,666 --> 00:31:17,576
Shafroth wired Moscow that
local officials in Samara

481
00:31:17,600 --> 00:31:22,166
had commandeered 95 corn cars
for railroad employees.

482
00:31:24,933 --> 00:31:28,400
The authorities in Moscow had no
control over their railroads.

483
00:31:30,133 --> 00:31:35,476
By mid-March, almost 7,000
freight cars had left the ports.

484
00:31:35,500 --> 00:31:39,509
At the end of the month, 60,000
tons of supplies were waiting

485
00:31:39,533 --> 00:31:41,566
for the empty cars to return.

486
00:31:42,933 --> 00:31:46,609
♪ ♪

487
00:31:55,166 --> 00:31:59,342
Forty-six trains from Odessa
in Ukraine were stalled

488
00:31:59,366 --> 00:32:02,209
in one yard west of the Volga.

489
00:32:02,233 --> 00:32:05,100
♪ ♪

490
00:32:08,633 --> 00:32:11,309
Supplies from the Baltic
via Moscow were stalled

491
00:32:11,333 --> 00:32:13,100
at another train yard.

492
00:32:15,433 --> 00:32:19,442
♪ ♪

493
00:32:19,466 --> 00:32:23,076
The result was like logjams
on rivers.

494
00:32:26,033 --> 00:32:28,909
Trains were hemmed in.

495
00:32:28,933 --> 00:32:32,642
For three weeks,
nothing could move.

496
00:32:32,666 --> 00:32:34,776
♪ ♪

497
00:32:34,800 --> 00:32:37,742
Relief supplies from both
the Black Sea and the Baltic

498
00:32:37,766 --> 00:32:39,676
to much of the Volga valley

499
00:32:39,700 --> 00:32:43,666
and all of Walter Bell's
Ufa-Urals district were stalled.

500
00:32:46,533 --> 00:32:48,742
An estimated 25,000 Russians

501
00:32:48,766 --> 00:32:51,733
died in these regions
each week...

502
00:32:53,133 --> 00:32:56,600
75,000 more deaths
by the end of March.

503
00:32:59,233 --> 00:33:04,066
People had been dying at this
rate all over Russia all winter.

504
00:33:05,300 --> 00:33:09,900
Will Shafroth described
a scene he witnessed in Samara.

505
00:33:11,633 --> 00:33:13,942
"I have seen piles of corpses,

506
00:33:13,966 --> 00:33:17,009
"half naked and frozen into
the most grotesque positions

507
00:33:17,033 --> 00:33:21,742
"with signs of having been
preyed upon by wandering dogs.

508
00:33:21,766 --> 00:33:24,842
"I have seen these bodies

509
00:33:24,866 --> 00:33:28,433
and it is a sight that
I can never forget."

510
00:33:31,100 --> 00:33:33,709
Shafroth cabled Haskell
in Moscow

511
00:33:33,733 --> 00:33:36,609
that the body of a Russian
assistant who recently died

512
00:33:36,633 --> 00:33:40,676
from typhus had been dug up
and eaten.

513
00:33:40,700 --> 00:33:43,476
Ten butcher shops, he said,

514
00:33:43,500 --> 00:33:45,833
had been closed for
selling human flesh.

515
00:33:49,833 --> 00:33:53,233
Americans read that Shafroth
himself had been eaten.

516
00:33:54,900 --> 00:33:59,909
The government tried to stop
people eating corpses.

517
00:33:59,933 --> 00:34:03,709
And they led propaganda
against this,

518
00:34:03,733 --> 00:34:06,809
and they tried to put guards
in the cemeteries

519
00:34:06,833 --> 00:34:10,876
in order to prevent people
from eating dead bodies.

520
00:34:12,966 --> 00:34:15,809
Grandma told me about it.

521
00:34:15,833 --> 00:34:17,642
When the dark was coming,

522
00:34:17,666 --> 00:34:23,176
they put a huge lock
to save children,

523
00:34:23,200 --> 00:34:26,309
because children were the
main target of cannibals.

524
00:34:26,333 --> 00:34:30,842
There were cases of killing
children by their own mothers,

525
00:34:30,866 --> 00:34:34,176
by their own parents,
and eating them.

526
00:34:34,200 --> 00:34:38,476
Some mothers did that for mercy.

527
00:34:38,500 --> 00:34:42,242
But some mothers killed them
to feed other children,

528
00:34:42,266 --> 00:34:44,709
especially very small babies.

529
00:34:44,733 --> 00:34:46,676
♪ ♪

530
00:34:48,033 --> 00:34:51,009
And now, at the end
of March 1922,

531
00:34:51,033 --> 00:34:54,433
dozens of trains with relief
supplies were stalled.

532
00:34:56,466 --> 00:35:00,476
It was unclear why the first
trains were detained.

533
00:35:00,500 --> 00:35:04,376
What was clear is that only
the Russians could undo

534
00:35:04,400 --> 00:35:06,809
the train jam.

535
00:35:06,833 --> 00:35:10,776
Alexander Eiduk,
the Russian in charge,

536
00:35:10,800 --> 00:35:14,476
told Haskell
everything was under control.

537
00:35:14,500 --> 00:35:17,209
For two weeks, he did nothing.

538
00:35:17,233 --> 00:35:21,976
Another 50,000 Russians
starved to death.

539
00:35:22,000 --> 00:35:25,409
If the American wheat seed were
not planted that spring,

540
00:35:25,433 --> 00:35:27,809
there would be no harvest
in the fall.

541
00:35:27,833 --> 00:35:31,142
The famine would continue
another year.

542
00:35:31,166 --> 00:35:35,542
Haskell decided it was time
for a showdown.

543
00:35:35,566 --> 00:35:38,642
He decides to send a cable

544
00:35:38,666 --> 00:35:41,242
in the clear...
Not coded, in the clear...

545
00:35:41,266 --> 00:35:42,876
To Herbert Hoover,

546
00:35:42,900 --> 00:35:45,342
meaning that the Kremlin
would be able to see

547
00:35:45,366 --> 00:35:46,776
the message he was sending.

548
00:35:46,800 --> 00:35:50,809
And the message was the Soviets
are not only not helping,

549
00:35:50,833 --> 00:35:52,509
they're being obstructionist,

550
00:35:52,533 --> 00:35:56,509
and that until he got
better cooperation,

551
00:35:56,533 --> 00:35:59,009
all relief supplies
from the United States

552
00:35:59,033 --> 00:36:01,142
ought to be held up at port.

553
00:36:01,166 --> 00:36:04,000
♪ ♪

554
00:36:08,200 --> 00:36:11,309
The engineer in Herbert Hoover
had foreseen the limits

555
00:36:11,333 --> 00:36:13,742
of Russia's railroads.

556
00:36:13,766 --> 00:36:17,042
He had testified before Congress
that $20 million worth of corn

557
00:36:17,066 --> 00:36:20,709
would test these limits.

558
00:36:20,733 --> 00:36:23,442
When Haskell's telegram arrived,

559
00:36:23,466 --> 00:36:26,142
Hoover was being blamed
by his critics on the left

560
00:36:26,166 --> 00:36:30,376
for exaggerating Russia's
transportation problem.

561
00:36:30,400 --> 00:36:34,109
He was attempting "to kill the
Soviet government," they argued,

562
00:36:34,133 --> 00:36:37,066
by limiting relief supplies.

563
00:36:38,166 --> 00:36:39,909
Hoover could have silenced
these critics

564
00:36:39,933 --> 00:36:42,309
by releasing Haskell's telegram.

565
00:36:42,333 --> 00:36:45,076
But he felt stirring up
anti-Soviet feelings

566
00:36:45,100 --> 00:36:47,409
would be inappropriate
for an agency

567
00:36:47,433 --> 00:36:50,566
"engaged in the business
of saving human lives."

568
00:36:51,633 --> 00:36:53,509
♪ ♪

569
00:36:53,533 --> 00:36:55,909
Lenin's government
got the message.

570
00:36:55,933 --> 00:37:00,209
It humiliated,
then fired, Eiduk.

571
00:37:00,233 --> 00:37:02,709
It brought in Felix Dzerzhinski,

572
00:37:02,733 --> 00:37:05,109
People's Commissar
of Transportation,

573
00:37:05,133 --> 00:37:07,676
better known as the founder
of the Cheka

574
00:37:07,700 --> 00:37:12,276
and mastermind of the Red Terror
during the civil war.

575
00:37:12,300 --> 00:37:16,309
He was the most feared man
in Soviet Russia.

576
00:37:16,333 --> 00:37:19,842
It was very important
symbolically.

577
00:37:19,866 --> 00:37:23,142
The dreadful Iron Felix
was appointed

578
00:37:23,166 --> 00:37:25,109
as a railroad commissar.

579
00:37:25,133 --> 00:37:28,576
And every railroad worker
understood.

580
00:37:28,600 --> 00:37:30,276
It's a sign.

581
00:37:30,300 --> 00:37:33,476
"We should do something,
otherwise we will be shot."

582
00:37:33,500 --> 00:37:35,342
And the trains started to run.

583
00:37:42,033 --> 00:37:45,309
♪ ♪

584
00:37:56,000 --> 00:37:58,833
The corn was finally on its way.

585
00:38:00,666 --> 00:38:02,409
Its distribution
would be planned

586
00:38:02,433 --> 00:38:06,476
in hundreds of ARA offices
across Russia.

587
00:38:06,500 --> 00:38:11,442
Here the Americans still faced
major hurdles.

588
00:38:11,466 --> 00:38:15,142
The culture clash was profound.

589
00:38:15,166 --> 00:38:18,376
A lot of the people
the Americans hired

590
00:38:18,400 --> 00:38:21,042
had never really worked
in an office before.

591
00:38:21,066 --> 00:38:22,476
If they had worked in an office,

592
00:38:22,500 --> 00:38:24,342
it wasn't like
an American office.

593
00:38:24,366 --> 00:38:26,509
The Americans wanted you
to get to work on time.

594
00:38:26,533 --> 00:38:29,209
You start work at 8:00.

595
00:38:29,233 --> 00:38:31,809
What the Americans found was the
Russians would wander in late.

596
00:38:31,833 --> 00:38:33,942
"Well, there was a goat
for sale up the street,

597
00:38:33,966 --> 00:38:35,609
and I had to go check that out."

598
00:38:35,633 --> 00:38:38,309
It would drive them nuts.

599
00:38:38,333 --> 00:38:41,776
♪ ♪

600
00:38:41,800 --> 00:38:46,009
There were even problems
with the elite they hired.

601
00:38:46,033 --> 00:38:48,476
"With the best will
in the world,

602
00:38:48,500 --> 00:38:51,976
it is rather difficult for an
ex-princess to do cross-filing,"

603
00:38:52,000 --> 00:38:55,233
wrote a relief worker
from Montana.

604
00:38:57,900 --> 00:38:59,842
Especially baffling
to the Americans

605
00:38:59,866 --> 00:39:02,409
was the sense of passivity
and resignation

606
00:39:02,433 --> 00:39:05,033
on the part of peasants
who came for help.

607
00:39:06,233 --> 00:39:08,042
♪ ♪

608
00:39:08,066 --> 00:39:13,176
Many Russians saw in that famine
a sign of...

609
00:39:13,200 --> 00:39:16,509
a sort of God will,
a sort of retribution

610
00:39:16,533 --> 00:39:19,276
for their bad behavior
during the revolution.

611
00:39:19,300 --> 00:39:21,842
They seized church land.

612
00:39:21,866 --> 00:39:23,676
They killed priests.

613
00:39:23,700 --> 00:39:27,366
"So we can only suffer,
because we deserved it."

614
00:39:28,833 --> 00:39:32,242
These Americans got pretty
impatient with this.

615
00:39:32,266 --> 00:39:36,876
Their attitude was, "Look,
it's time to get to work."

616
00:39:36,900 --> 00:39:38,776
This is their Protestant
ethic speaking.

617
00:39:38,800 --> 00:39:40,276
"Your fate is in your hands.

618
00:39:40,300 --> 00:39:43,842
"Get up off your knees,
start to help out,

619
00:39:43,866 --> 00:39:45,533
and let's get moving."

620
00:39:52,400 --> 00:39:55,700
♪ ♪

621
00:39:58,200 --> 00:40:02,876
Despite the culture clash,
romance flourished.

622
00:40:02,900 --> 00:40:08,509
The Americans had comfortable
quarters, food, and cars.

623
00:40:08,533 --> 00:40:11,042
Their Russian staff
was mostly women.

624
00:40:11,066 --> 00:40:15,276
♪ ♪

625
00:40:15,300 --> 00:40:19,742
Of the 300 American supervisors,
26... nearly ten percent...

626
00:40:19,766 --> 00:40:22,600
came home with Russian brides.

627
00:40:34,200 --> 00:40:37,642
Weather had helped
cause the famine.

628
00:40:37,666 --> 00:40:41,409
Now it once again
delayed the relief.

629
00:40:41,433 --> 00:40:45,876
A spring thaw made it almost
impossible to get the corn

630
00:40:45,900 --> 00:40:48,733
from the railheads
to the villages.

631
00:40:49,933 --> 00:40:53,266
♪ ♪

632
00:41:00,800 --> 00:41:03,600
The return of winter helped.

633
00:41:05,666 --> 00:41:08,800
♪ ♪

634
00:41:12,700 --> 00:41:14,709
Horses were important...

635
00:41:14,733 --> 00:41:18,809
those which had not died
or been eaten.

636
00:41:18,833 --> 00:41:23,966
Many were too weak to draw heavy
loads over long distances.

637
00:41:26,666 --> 00:41:28,109
♪ ♪

638
00:41:28,133 --> 00:41:33,009
Where horsepower was lacking,
some relied on camels.

639
00:41:33,033 --> 00:41:35,676
"The camel can live
where the horse dies,"

640
00:41:35,700 --> 00:41:38,076
the "Chicago Daily News" noted.

641
00:41:38,100 --> 00:41:40,476
"It grubs up herbage
from under the snow.

642
00:41:40,500 --> 00:41:43,766
It will exist on anything."

643
00:41:45,933 --> 00:41:51,009
An ARA Russian inspector
remembers seeing 2,500 wagons,

644
00:41:51,033 --> 00:41:53,142
drawn mostly by camels,

645
00:41:53,166 --> 00:41:56,633
leave Tsaritsyn
and head for Leninsk.

646
00:41:57,800 --> 00:42:00,309
♪ ♪

647
00:42:00,333 --> 00:42:03,242
"In spite of the immensity
of the steppes," he wrote,

648
00:42:03,266 --> 00:42:06,109
"it was impossible to see
the beginning

649
00:42:06,133 --> 00:42:08,733
or the end of this train."

650
00:42:10,400 --> 00:42:14,076
"Even the oldest and most
experienced teamsters admitted

651
00:42:14,100 --> 00:42:17,000
they had never seen
such a sight."

652
00:42:22,766 --> 00:42:26,633
♪ ♪

653
00:42:36,900 --> 00:42:39,776
"Contrary to the
popular imagination,

654
00:42:39,800 --> 00:42:43,009
the corn was not heralded with
the ringing of church bells,"

655
00:42:43,033 --> 00:42:46,166
an ARA physician wrote.

656
00:42:46,933 --> 00:42:49,376
♪ ♪

657
00:42:49,400 --> 00:42:52,909
"These people have borne so much

658
00:42:52,933 --> 00:42:56,066
that their emotions have
long since exhausted."

659
00:42:59,600 --> 00:43:02,700
♪ ♪

660
00:43:10,300 --> 00:43:12,976
He observed the only surviving
member of a family of five

661
00:43:13,000 --> 00:43:15,266
clutch her 21-day ration.

662
00:43:20,866 --> 00:43:23,842
My father said that there were
a half a million people

663
00:43:23,866 --> 00:43:26,476
in his district
who faced starvation

664
00:43:26,500 --> 00:43:28,933
when he began to distribute
the corn.

665
00:43:31,000 --> 00:43:35,433
Every household got a month's
supply... two pounds per day.

666
00:43:37,533 --> 00:43:40,109
That's the job he came
to do, and he was doing it,

667
00:43:40,133 --> 00:43:41,566
and he was very pleased.

668
00:43:43,266 --> 00:43:46,466
♪ ♪

669
00:43:53,233 --> 00:43:56,376
People used to call that food
"America."

670
00:43:56,400 --> 00:43:59,009
So, we were handed
out "America."

671
00:43:59,033 --> 00:44:03,309
At home, people cooked soup out
of it, fed their children.

672
00:44:03,333 --> 00:44:06,009
This, of course,
was great help to us.

673
00:44:06,033 --> 00:44:09,876
My father used to say, "See, the
Americans did the right thing,

674
00:44:09,900 --> 00:44:12,909
sent us help."

675
00:44:12,933 --> 00:44:15,709
♪ ♪

676
00:44:15,733 --> 00:44:19,142
Every day in his Ufa
Ural Mountains district,

677
00:44:19,166 --> 00:44:23,609
Walter Bell fed 1.6 million
Russians, Bashkirs,

678
00:44:23,633 --> 00:44:29,342
Tatars, and Kazakhs
in 2,750 kitchens.

679
00:44:29,366 --> 00:44:33,242
One was a three-year-old boy.

680
00:44:35,933 --> 00:44:38,609
I still remember
they gave us corn

681
00:44:38,633 --> 00:44:43,100
and sweetened condensed milk.

682
00:44:46,200 --> 00:44:49,609
I was little then, but
I still remember the taste

683
00:44:49,633 --> 00:44:52,066
of that American canned
condensed milk.

684
00:44:55,533 --> 00:44:58,033
Our father brought it to us.

685
00:45:00,700 --> 00:45:04,442
Thanks to this help I survived,

686
00:45:04,466 --> 00:45:08,466
and then studied and
became a famous dancer.

687
00:45:16,700 --> 00:45:21,242
♪ ♪

688
00:45:21,266 --> 00:45:23,476
Before the corn and wheat seed
arrived,

689
00:45:23,500 --> 00:45:28,909
up to five million Russians
had starved to death.

690
00:45:28,933 --> 00:45:31,909
By August 1922,

691
00:45:31,933 --> 00:45:34,742
five months after the corn
reached the villages,

692
00:45:34,766 --> 00:45:38,409
the ARA was feeding up to
11 million Soviet citizens

693
00:45:38,433 --> 00:45:41,966
every day in 19,000 kitchens.

694
00:45:45,100 --> 00:45:47,566
♪ ♪

695
00:45:51,466 --> 00:45:56,542
Jesus Christ brought
13 people bread.

696
00:45:56,566 --> 00:46:00,642
Herbert Hoover gave millions
of people bread.

697
00:46:00,666 --> 00:46:06,533
You cannot find other example of
such behavior in world history.

698
00:46:08,000 --> 00:46:11,976
Herbert Hoover had insisted
the Russians buy wheat seed,

699
00:46:12,000 --> 00:46:15,633
which the peasants planted
in the spring of 1922.

700
00:46:17,433 --> 00:46:19,342
The wheat harvested that fall

701
00:46:19,366 --> 00:46:22,200
ensured the famine
would not return.

702
00:46:24,900 --> 00:46:29,009
The starvation in the Volga
valley was finally over.

703
00:46:29,033 --> 00:46:32,576
♪ ♪

704
00:46:32,600 --> 00:46:35,542
"Whether the Russians
or anyone else realizes it,"

705
00:46:35,566 --> 00:46:37,576
the ARA's historian wrote,

706
00:46:37,600 --> 00:46:41,533
"we have saved a nation."

707
00:46:45,733 --> 00:46:49,909
♪ ♪

708
00:46:49,933 --> 00:46:54,133
The ARA's relief operation
in Russia began to wind down.

709
00:46:56,666 --> 00:47:00,966
♪ ♪

710
00:47:03,100 --> 00:47:07,442
Will Shafroth soon wrote
of his experience.

711
00:47:07,466 --> 00:47:10,309
"The thing which gives me
the most satisfaction

712
00:47:10,333 --> 00:47:14,342
"is the gratitude with which
our help was received,

713
00:47:14,366 --> 00:47:16,309
"from the simplest peasant
who would have died

714
00:47:16,333 --> 00:47:19,409
"if he had not been fed
by America,

715
00:47:19,433 --> 00:47:23,809
"from the mother whose children
ate at an ARA kitchen.

716
00:47:23,833 --> 00:47:27,800
These are the people for whom
we brought in the food."

717
00:47:30,766 --> 00:47:32,942
Nowhere was that
gratitude greater

718
00:47:32,966 --> 00:47:35,076
than among Russia's
14 million Muslims,

719
00:47:35,100 --> 00:47:39,242
who paid Colonel Walter Bell
a special tribute.

720
00:47:39,266 --> 00:47:42,876
This was an extraordinary moment

721
00:47:42,900 --> 00:47:47,842
when the local Muslim officials
decide to show Bell...

722
00:47:47,866 --> 00:47:53,109
This infidel...
A copy of the Koran.

723
00:47:53,133 --> 00:47:55,076
It was incredible.

724
00:47:55,100 --> 00:47:58,909
They had never shown it
to anyone before, to any...

725
00:47:58,933 --> 00:48:01,666
to anyone who is not Muslim.

726
00:48:03,800 --> 00:48:06,842
And they had never shown it
even to Russians,

727
00:48:06,866 --> 00:48:11,009
with whom they lived
side by side for many years.

728
00:48:14,433 --> 00:48:17,942
Before he left Russia
in July 1923,

729
00:48:17,966 --> 00:48:21,476
Bell, who served longer than
any other ARA supervisor,

730
00:48:21,500 --> 00:48:25,709
was named honorary mayor of Ufa.

731
00:48:25,733 --> 00:48:30,633
He became known as the
"idol of the Bashkirs."

732
00:48:33,000 --> 00:48:36,176
"I feel as though I were a part
of them.

733
00:48:36,200 --> 00:48:39,242
"I have lived with them through
the worst period of suffering

734
00:48:39,266 --> 00:48:40,742
"they have ever endured.

735
00:48:40,766 --> 00:48:45,576
"I have traveled into every
corner of their republic,

736
00:48:45,600 --> 00:48:46,876
"slept under their roofs,

737
00:48:46,900 --> 00:48:49,842
"broken their bread

738
00:48:49,866 --> 00:48:53,176
and listened to their tales
of woe and happiness."

739
00:48:56,666 --> 00:48:58,866
"They nursed me through typhus."

740
00:49:01,766 --> 00:49:06,233
"I feel as if I am part
of their new existence."

741
00:49:11,833 --> 00:49:14,076
♪ ♪

742
00:49:14,100 --> 00:49:17,242
Herbert Hoover had hoped
the ARA's efficiency

743
00:49:17,266 --> 00:49:21,742
would inspire the Russians
to overthrow the Bolsheviks.

744
00:49:21,766 --> 00:49:25,066
Instead, it may have saved
the Soviet regime.

745
00:49:26,733 --> 00:49:28,176
He himself in the late '20s

746
00:49:28,200 --> 00:49:31,342
said to a reporter
named Henry Wolfe

747
00:49:31,366 --> 00:49:35,609
that he thought "he had set
the Soviets up in business."

748
00:49:35,633 --> 00:49:39,009
Now, that was a kind
of revelatory statement

749
00:49:39,033 --> 00:49:40,476
for him to make,

750
00:49:40,500 --> 00:49:46,709
because he had sold the program
of emergency relief to Russia

751
00:49:46,733 --> 00:49:51,733
as something that would perhaps
effect regime change.

752
00:49:53,933 --> 00:49:56,876
Hoover was president when
the Great Depression began

753
00:49:56,900 --> 00:50:00,309
a decade after
he rescued the Russians.

754
00:50:00,333 --> 00:50:02,376
As Americans went hungry,

755
00:50:02,400 --> 00:50:05,800
his image as the "Great
Humanitarian" began to fade.

756
00:50:07,000 --> 00:50:11,009
The story of his Russian relief
was soon forgotten.

757
00:50:11,033 --> 00:50:13,909
Yet the humanitarian spirit
he planted

758
00:50:13,933 --> 00:50:16,409
in the American character
lived on.

759
00:50:16,433 --> 00:50:18,176
♪ ♪

760
00:50:18,200 --> 00:50:21,976
Hoover was really, in some ways,
the vanguard

761
00:50:22,000 --> 00:50:24,776
of that whole approach that has
become associated

762
00:50:24,800 --> 00:50:26,442
with America in the last
hundred years,

763
00:50:26,466 --> 00:50:29,742
namely that when there
is a humanitarian tragedy

764
00:50:29,766 --> 00:50:33,609
in the world, whether from war
or from famine or revolution

765
00:50:33,633 --> 00:50:36,776
or a typhoon or an earthquake,

766
00:50:36,800 --> 00:50:40,100
that Americans will be there
to organize the relief.

767
00:50:42,233 --> 00:50:45,242
The memory of the American
Relief Administration

768
00:50:45,266 --> 00:50:48,376
lives on in Russia
by word of mouth

769
00:50:48,400 --> 00:50:51,176
among the families
who were saved.

770
00:50:51,200 --> 00:50:54,542
My grandma told me many times,

771
00:50:54,566 --> 00:50:59,409
"Dear Anatoly,
do not forget American help

772
00:50:59,433 --> 00:51:03,676
at the time of our
national disaster."

773
00:51:03,700 --> 00:51:07,676
Among those people who were
saved were my family,

774
00:51:07,700 --> 00:51:12,009
family of my father,
of my grandmother.

775
00:51:12,033 --> 00:51:14,933
My family will never forget.

776
00:51:15,266 --> 00:51:17,633
♪ ♪

777
00:51:20,966 --> 00:51:27,533
♪ ♪

778
00:51:40,700 --> 00:51:47,366
♪ ♪

779
00:51:57,166 --> 00:52:04,033
♪ ♪

780
00:52:10,600 --> 00:52:17,333
♪ ♪

780
00:52:18,305 --> 00:53:18,160
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