How Brian Lamb Changed American Politics—Without Ever Running For Office

Most people change politics by running for office. Brian Lamb did it by turning on the cameras.

In this episode of Explain It To A Teenager, I got to talk with the founder of C-SPAN about how a kid from a small town in Indiana ended up creating one of the most game-changing TV networks ever. We also talked about what he’s learned from interviewing thousands of people—and why he’s been visiting every U.S. president’s grave (yes, really).

Rio Damata: So, to start off—what is your name, and what do you do for a living?

Brian Lamb: At the moment, I'm retired. My name is Brian Lamb.

RD: Well, I mean, what did you do for a living?

BL: For about 46 years—maybe a little longer than that—I worked at C-SPAN. And what is C-SPAN? C-SPAN stands for Cable Satellite Public Affairs Network. It's a mouthful, and the world in Washington lives with acronyms, so we just call it C-SPAN.

And it was a concept 47 years ago to bring television into long-form politics, government, the way the world works behind the scenes in this town.

RD: How did it do that?

BL: Well, we did it by asking everybody that would listen, “Can we bring our cameras into your meeting?”

The first one was the House of Representatives—that had never been on television—and that started in 1979. Then, as time went by, we just kept asking everybody in government, trade associations, and think tanks, “Can we bring our cameras in?”

Those were the days when there weren’t cameras like the one we’re talking to. Yeah—they didn’t exist.

RD: And how did bringing cameras into those places sort of help out? What did C-SPAN do?

BL: What the objective was—I mean, I grew up in a small town in Indiana, and when I came out here in the Navy, I realized that we didn’t get as much information as people do here.

When you have the ability to walk into a hearing room, sit up in the gallery of the House of Representatives, get involved in conversations and think tanks—and as technology changed—that would be something that everybody today understands, because it’s changing so fast.

We had the satellite. We were able to connect the satellite and the cable system and have it be a network. We now have three, plus a radio station.

RD: Oh wow. So essentially C-SPAN helped bring the conversation on the inside to the outside.

BL: Essentially, what we did was permit anybody that was interested—and that’s a big step, because a lot of people aren’t—to see how their laws are being made, what their politicians were saying, in a much longer form than 15 seconds on the evening news.

RD: And what did you do at C-SPAN?

BL: I started—and actually finished—as the Chief Executive Officer. But because we were small, yeah, we did everything.

That was the exciting thing about it—it was brand new, not a lot of money. So I did a lot of on-air hosting. We started a call-in show in 1980, which had never been done on television.

Let the public call directly to their elected representatives and put them on the spot—ask them questions.

RD: And how did you get started at C-SPAN?

BL: When I came here in the Navy—but I came from Purdue University, Lafayette, Indiana.

In high school, I was in broadcasting, worked all through Purdue as a broadcaster, disc jockey, things like that. And when I got here, I worked in the public affairs office at the Pentagon for two years and watched the big-time guys do their jobs—and I learned a lot from them.

And then, when the technology changed in 1975, we saw we could televise something as long-form as C-SPAN. Again, it’s not everybody’s cup of tea.

We could afford it on the satellite—you couldn’t afford it on the AT&T long lines.

RD: What would your advice be to someone who wants to start out or do something that you did?

BL: My advice to anybody who wants to start out on something new and different is to find people that can tell them how to start something new and different.

I had a lot of help—not only from the cable industry, but from the individuals. I wouldn’t have been able to start it without them.

I’ll give you one quick story. I had no idea what I was doing. I didn’t study business. I was just interested in creating something that would be helpful for people to better understand politics.

When we got started in the very beginning, we raised a little bit of money, and I said to the guy who ended up being my first chairman, before we had started, “What do I do now?”

He said, “You’ve got to write a business plan.” And I said, “What’s a business plan?”

And I said, “I don’t know how to write a business plan.” And he said, “Well, if you’ll come up to Connecticut and spend a day with me, I’ll teach you how to write a business plan.”

So yeah—I can tell you 150 stories about how somebody else helped me.

RD: So you think that’s beneficial?

BL: Totally beneficial. Networking is the most important thing I can tell any young person.

Find where people are doing things that you’re interested in and ask them if you can help.

RD: I heard you wrote a book. Tell me about that.

BL: I really don’t claim to have written a book. I love books—but at C-SPAN, we’ve put a spotlight on books for the last 30 years.

Spent a lot of time talking to authors, covering book festivals, interviewing people who’ve written history books.

And you know, again, I was never what you’d call a Mensa candidate—but I loved to learn, and you can learn a lot in books.

I’m afraid today some people don’t know that—especially young people don’t realize how important it is.

I didn’t when I was your age. But as time went by, I realized if I was going to really learn something in depth, I had to read a book.

RD: What do you think one of the biggest things you’ve taken away from reading so many books would be?

BL: Frankly it’s history—and understanding what happened in the past and how much that might impact the future.

People argue all the time: “Is history past? Is past prologue? And are we going to have the same thing happen again?” No. But the things that happened before are happening today.

People walk around saying, “This is the worst time in the history of the United States.” It’s not.

You may not like what’s going on, you may hate what’s going on, but believe me—if you dip into history, you’ll find out most of it is about getting perspective.

RD: What other advice do you have?

BL: One thing about interviewing people—it’s not for you. They don’t want to hear from you.

A lot of people in our business get paid a lot of money, they show off, and it works. They make money and get ratings and all that. But if you want to learn how to interview, you should just start asking questions.

Listen. A lot of people don’t listen. And just absorb it.

And don’t be in a hurry to ask a question from a piece of paper. Somebody says something—follow up with them.

I was interviewing a famous historian named Richard Norton Smith years ago—30 years ago—and he started telling me his personal story: and that he made his parents when they went on vacation, take him to the gravesite of every president, because he was a history nut.

He was nine years old.

So they did—and I was sitting there listening, thinking, “When this is over, I’m going to do that.”

It took me 18 months, but before it was over, I’d been to every presidential gravesite.

Then I thought,“Why not a book?”

Richard Norton Smith helped us a great deal—if you read the book, he’s written a lot of that book. Fantastic historian.

In my case, I took pictures and went to the gravesites. It was so interesting.

Three times, there was nobody there at all, so I had to take my own picture—to prove I was there—with a selfie.

RD: Whose graves?

BL: One of them was Andrew Johnson, who was president after John Wilkes Booth shot Abraham Lincoln.

Another was Chester Arthur—he’s outside Albany, New York.

When I got there, the cemetery was closed, the gates were locked. I said, “Not good. I didn’t come all the way to Albany to miss this picture.” So I climbed over the fence, took my picture after 5 p.m., and got out.

There was nobody else there.

RD: Any famous last words from the presidents that stood out?

BL: That’s in the book—probably the one from Franklin Delano Roosevelt.

I was on a radio show one time, talking about it, and the host said, “You have these famous last words—what do you remember?”

And I said, “Well, I remember what Franklin Delano Roosevelt said when he died: ‘I have a terrible headache.””

The host hadn’t been listening and said, “You do?” He thought I had a terrible headache.

We laughed.

It’s interesting—the older you get, the more you think about, What are your last words going to be?

You’ve got a long way to go.

RD: Have you learned anything from visiting so many presidential graves?

BL: Well, first and foremost, you have to study them—the men who are buried there. Some of them are so obscure in history that you have no idea.

Secondly, it’s the geography—you see what part of the country they came from. In the early days, we were putting people in the presidency from Virginia, Ohio, New York, and Ohio again—it was this trade back and forth.

Now that doesn’t matter like it used to.

But you also realize that some had the biggest monuments you’ve ever seen—and did the least for the United States.

One of them was Warren Harding—his gravesite is enormous. He was in office for two and a half years, and not much happened except for a lot of scandal.

RD: And who had the smallest gravesite?

BL: The smallest I’ve been to is Spiro Agnew’s, who was vice president of the United States.

He was run out of office in a scandal for taking money when he was governor of Maryland—and also when he was vice president.

When you go to find Spiro Agnew’s gravesite, which is not too far from here in Maryland, it’s flat on the ground—you really can’t find it unless you look hard.

Oh, yeah—that’s a good question, because there are others. Calvin Coolidge’s, for example, is small, just a regular stone.

RD: What’s your favorite gravesite?

BL: My favorite—actually, one of my favorites—is Calvin Coolidge. He’s not a well-known president.

He followed Warren Harding and served for almost six years.

He was quiet—they called him “Silent Cal.” He never said much. He’s buried up in Vermont.

He started out as mayor of Northampton, Massachusetts, and he was just an interesting guy.

I think the last time we had a surplus in our budget was when Calvin Coolidge was president—back in the 1920s, the Roaring Twenties.

He wasn’t roaring, though. He was quiet.