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entirely book-learning, except for the part that he picked up from the people in the Hudson Valley. That was perhaps partly book-learning, but it was all illustrated and verified by personal memories.

Whereas Smith hadn't read much until he became an Assemblyman. Then he had to read bills, laws, constitutional opinions and that kind of thing. He had nevertheless picked up a great deal about the history of the state. I do remember being at Fort Ticonderoga at the same time Al Smith was. Why I was there, or what the occasion was, I have no idea, but I know that he was there on some official occasion, probably to open something or other. I remember that Fred Greene was there at the time. I don't know why we were there, but I have this memory of being there and of having Al reminisce and sort of discuss it. He had either been briefed on it, or had learned it, or had read about it in thinking over this project. He discussed Fort Ticonderoga and its place in American history and the history of New York.

He was also very well informed about the whole history of the Mohawk Trail and the extraordinary things that had happened there and its extreme importance. He was extremely well-informed about the Erie Canal. The importance of that to the State of New York, the enormous foresight of DeWitt Clinton and the imagination of DeWitt Clinton in doing that