Shannon McKenna Schmidt, "You Can't Catch Us: Lady Bird Johnson’s Trailblazing 1964 Campaign Train and the Women Who Rode With Her" (Sourcebooks, 2026)

Summary

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Podcast Summary:

New Books Network: Shannon McKenna Schmidt, "You Can't Catch Us: Lady Bird Johnson’s Trailblazing 1964 Campaign Train and the Women Who Rode With Her" (Sourcebooks, 2026)
Host: Jane Semeka
Guest: Shannon McKenna Schmidt
Date: May 10, 2026

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Episode Overview

This episode features historian and author Shannon McKenna Schmidt discussing her book, "You Can't Catch Us: Lady Bird Johnson’s Trailblazing 1964 Campaign Train and the Women Who Rode With Her". Host Jane Semeka leads a conversation exploring Lady Bird Johnson’s pivotal four-day whistle-stop tour through the American South during the 1964 presidential campaign—a historic journey that marked the first time a First Lady led such a public, political campaign effort. The discussion delves into Lady Bird’s political acumen, the social and political context of the time, and the collective achievements—and courage—of the women (and men) who accompanied her.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Origins: Why Write about Lady Bird Johnson?

• Schmidt’s inspiration (02:49): After writing about Eleanor Roosevelt, Schmidt sought to uncover other momentous First Lady journeys. She noticed Lady Bird’s campaign train, a story intertwined with Eleanor Roosevelt’s legacy, as Lady Bird viewed Eleanor as a role model.

  “Lady Bird's role model was Eleanor Roosevelt...she first met Eleanor when she was a young congressman's wife...and looked to Eleanor's legacy for inspiration.” — Schmidt [03:17]

2. Parallels with Eleanor Roosevelt

• Both women believed government should work for the people and were relentless travelers, bridging the administration and the public.

  “Their belief in...the government should work for the American people...Eleanor was famous for crisscrossing the country, [and] Lady Bird did the same.” — Schmidt [03:41]

3. The Political and Social Climate of 1964

• Occurred months after JFK’s assassination and passage of the Civil Rights Act.

• The South, roiled by the Act, viewed LBJ as a “traitor.” It was considered too dangerous for the president to tour the region.

• Lady Bird steps up: She and her team devised the “Lady Bird Special,” a nearly 2,000-mile train trip from DC to New Orleans.

  “A trip like this is deemed too dangerous for LBJ to make. The Secret Service forbade it...But Lady Bird is having none of this.” — Schmidt [04:45]

4. Lady Bird as a Political Force

• Her campaign experience stretched back to the 1940s, including fundraising and direct political advocacy, breaking gender barriers.

  “First ladies are not supposed to do this...Lady Bird is a brilliant campaigner...She’s not going to let this socially constructed gender barrier hold her back.” — Schmidt [06:16]

• She financially backed LBJ’s first Congressional campaign and was integral in subsequent campaigns.

  “She actually put up the money, she went toe to toe with her father to get an advance...so that she could stake his campaign.” — Schmidt [07:16]

5. Feminism, Women’s Roles, and Social Change

• While Lady Bird might not have called herself a feminist, her actions demonstrated otherwise. She ran a media empire and advocated for women’s public engagement. Her Radcliffe commencement speech in 1964 was noted as highly progressive.

  “She certainly was [a feminist] in deeds...she turned [a radio station] into a media conglomerate...there was a severe lack of role models in this regard. And then we have Lady Bird on the national scene.” — Schmidt [07:49]

6. The Whistle Stop Tour: Strategy and Impact

• Using a train in the jet age was “genius”—it enabled the campaign to reach communities ignored by modern campaigns.

  “It was actually quite genius to take this train...stopping in communities where people felt underrepresented.” — Schmidt [09:42]

• Lady Bird’s approach: giving “hard-hitting political points, but in her own genteel, sincere style.”

  “She was able to tell people in a very nice way to get with the times and leave racial animosity behind...” — Schmidt [12:20]

• The idea of “Love over hate” was central to her messaging, and her personal Southern roots helped her connect authentically.

  “Love over hate...she really was the perfect person to do this and maybe the only person who could have done this trip with this message.” — Schmidt [14:11]

7. Organizing the Tour: Teamwork and Custom Touches

• The “Lady Bird Special” came together in just a few weeks, with a core team of six women preparing meticulously researched, personalized speeches for each stop.

• Liz Carpenter, Lady Bird’s press secretary, was a key orchestrator. Legendary women like Helen Thomas rode along.

  “A team of six women came together...custom speech for every single stop...one of the headlines [read], Lady Bird did her homework for tour.” — Schmidt [19:08]

8. Book Title: “You Can't Catch Us”

• Inspired by a moment when Linda Bird Johnson, addressing Goldwater-supporting hecklers, said: “You’re running after the 20th century, you can’t catch us.” The title reflects both the forward momentum of the campaign and the era's social change.

  “It reflects the forward momentum of the train, but [also] social progress and civil rights and women’s rights.” — Schmidt [20:31]

9. Women Leading the Way

• The advance teams, logistics, messaging—all women-led, with men in supporting roles.

  “Men were a very important part of the endeavor...But the women were calling the signals, and they had women all down the line.” — Schmidt [22:31]

• Camaraderie and a sense of mission pervaded the group.

  “I just really, really loved the sense of camaraderie among these women...” — Schmidt [23:48]

10. Election Results and Political Impact

• The Lady Bird Special demonstrably changed political calculations in key states—delivering crowds up to 25,000, winning over skeptical governors, and shoring up party unity. Notably, Florida went to LBJ after being considered a “lost cause.”

  “It did help make a difference...[Virginia’s governor] changed his tune...North Carolina also ended up going for LBJ...Florida also went for LBJ.” — Schmidt [24:45-25:54]

11. Facing Hostility and Danger

• The group encountered hecklers, particularly in South Carolina, but Lady Bird’s poise prevailed.

  “Lady Bird...held up her hand and she admonished them very politely. And they were quiet while she finished her speech.” — Schmidt [26:37]

• Security was tightened after bomb threats were received. Lady Bird was aware of and accepted the risks, still believing no harm would come to her in the South.

  “Agents canvassed towns ahead of time...there was a Ku Klux Klan member in Mississippi [threatening] to bomb the train...But Lady Bird, she was determined to do this.” — Schmidt [29:41]

12. Family and Generational Legacy

• Linda and Lucy Johnson, Lady Bird’s daughters, participated and handled crowds and hecklers with poise. Schmidt’s interviews with them highlighted their charisma and connection to this unique moment in political history.

  “They gave speeches and, they, too, faced down hecklers with poise...Linda flips on the loudspeaker...‘You’re running after the 20th century; you can’t catch us.’” — Schmidt [31:34, 33:48]

13. Contemporary Resonance

• The book’s themes echo current debates over civil rights, voting rights, and gender equity.

  “Everything that they worked for in 1964 is being undone now...I think that one thing I would like people to take...is the idea of the collective and what we can do, coming together...Never stand on the sidelines.” — Schmidt [34:53-36:47]

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• “She does it with style, she does it with sass, and she makes headlines the entire way.” — Schmidt [05:05]
• “She was a brilliant campaigner...she’s not going to let this socially constructed gender barrier hold her back.” — Schmidt [06:16]
• “Love over hate...she really was the perfect person to do this and maybe the only person who could have done this trip with this message.” — Schmidt [14:11]
• “Lady Bird did her homework for tour.” [Newspaper Headline, via Schmidt, [19:08]]
• “You’re running after the 20th century, you can't catch us.” — Linda Bird Johnson, [20:31]
• “The women were calling the signals, and they had women all down the line.” — Schmidt [22:31]
• “Only a miracle could deliver Florida for LBJ...and [the Lady Bird Special] appears to have been that miracle because Florida also went for LBJ.” — Schmidt [25:15]
• “She held up her hand and she admonished them very politely. And they were quiet while she finished her speech.” — Schmidt, on Lady Bird facing hecklers [27:13]
• “Never stand on the sidelines.” — Lady Bird Johnson, to college students, [36:41]

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Important Timestamps

• 02:49: Schmidt’s inspiration and Lady Bird’s Eleanor Roosevelt connection
• 04:45: The political climate, danger, and planning the Lady Bird Special
• 07:16: Lady Bird’s early campaign involvement and financial backing
• 09:42: The strategy behind using a train in 1964
• 12:20: Lady Bird’s speech style and message of unity
• 19:08: Preparing personalized speeches; women-led logistics
• 20:31: Origin of the book title
• 22:31: The female leadership and camaraderie on the train
• 24:45-26:28: Concrete political impact in Southern states
• 26:37: Handling hecklers and adversity
• 29:41: Security dangers post-Kennedy assassination
• 31:34: Interviews with Linda and Lucy Johnson; generational legacy
• 34:53: Relevance to modern struggles over civil and voting rights
• 36:41: Lady Bird’s exhortation: “Never stand on the sidelines”

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Tone & Language

The conversation is warm, incisive, and engaging, combining historical detail with spirited commentary. Both Schmidt and Semeka emphasize Lady Bird’s practical idealism, trailblazing courage, and down-to-earth connection with ordinary Americans.

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Overall Takeaways

• Lady Bird Johnson carved out a unique legacy by blending personal authenticity, progressive ideals, and deft political strategy, leading a team of women to pioneer new roles for First Ladies and women in politics.
• The 1964 “Lady Bird Special” was more than a campaign tour—it was a bold assertion of political agency, the power of collective action, and the belief in a more inclusive America.
• The story’s timely resonance underscores ongoing challenges to civil and women’s rights, inspiring listeners to "never stand on the sidelines."

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Transcript

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[Shannon McKenna Schmidt]

Welcome to the New Books Network.

[Jane Semeka]

Welcome to the New Books Network. I'm Jane Semeka, professor of history at Brookdale Community College. Today we'll be discussing a new book by Shannon McKenna Schmidt called you can't catch Lady Bird Johnson's trailblazing 1964 campaign train and the Women who Rode with her, published by Sourcebooks. I am pleased to welcome Shannon back to the New Books Network. We spoke last in 2023 about her book the First lady of World War II, Eleanor Roosevelt's daring Journey to the Front Lines and back. Shannon McKenna Schmidt is also the co author of Novel A Travel Guide to Literary Landmarks, From Jane Austen's Bath to Ernest Hemingway's Key west and Writers between the the scandalous romantic lives of legendary literary Casanovas, coquettes and cads. Shannon has also traveled the world and has written for National Geographic Traveler, Shelf Awareness, and npr. Shannon, welcome back to the New Books Network.

[Shannon McKenna Schmidt]

Well, thank you for having me back to talk about another extraordinary first lady.

[Jane Semeka]

Absolutely. I'm really excited to talk about Lady Bird Johnson. So what prompted you to write about her?

[Shannon McKenna Schmidt]

Well, after I wrote the first lady of World War II about Eleanor Roosevelt's journey to the South Pacific, I was curious to find out what other momentous journeys First Ladies might have taken. And there was Lady Bird Johnson. Whistle Stopping down the tracks during the 1964 election season, doing something that no other first lady had done. She was the first first lady to take a leading role on the campaign trail. And the other neat thing is that Lady Bird's mentor or not her mentor, Lady Bird's role model was Eleanor Roosevelt. And I didn't know about that neat connection between the two of them. She first met Eleanor when she was a young congressman's wife in Washington D.C. and then of course, she looked to Eleanor's legacy for inspiration when she became first lady herself.

[Jane Semeka]

Did they bear any similarities?

[Shannon McKenna Schmidt]

They absolutely did. I think one of the greatest similarities was their belief in how that the government should work for the American people, beginning with their president husbands. And Eleanor was famous for crisscrossing the country, meeting people, gathering information, very much being a conduit between the Oval Office and the American people. And Lady Bird did the same thing before she even set out on this campaign trip in October 1964, she had already logged 10, tens of thousands of miles in her first 10 months as first lady, traveling the United States doing the same thing, talking about the administration's policies and seeing and meeting people.

[Jane Semeka]

So this book takes us to a moment in United States history. The months after the assassination of President John F. Kennedy, the passage of the Civil Rights act, and during Lyndon Johnson's campaign for president in 1964. So can you talk about Lady Bird's decision to embark on a four day whistle stop campaign through the South?

[Shannon McKenna Schmidt]

Yes. So this is October 1964, and it's three months after LBJ has signed the Civil Rights act into law. The south is roiling. It hates lbj. They're calling him a traitor to the south because he too is from the South. He's from Texas. He threw his political heft behind the Civil Rights act to get it passed. A trip like this is deemed too dangerous for LBJ to make. The Secret Service forbade it. They thought that 2,000 miles of railroad track were going from Washington D.C. to New Orleans would be too challenging for them to protect. And some of the President's advisors are against campaigning in the South. They say it's a lost cause. Why make the effort? Why spend the resources? But Lady Bird is having none of this and neither is the President. And Lady Bird is also from the South. She's from Texas and has very strong Alabama roots. And she's proud of her Southern heritage and she's proud of what her husband has done to advance civil rights. And she and her team look for a way to campaign into the south. And they decide on this four day, nearly 2,000 mile trip. And that's what she does. And she does it with style, she does it with sass, and she makes headlines the entire way.

[Jane Semeka]

We really learn in this story what a talented politician she was. You know, we all have heard about LBJ's political talent and drive and love for politics, but I think we learn a lot about her as a politician, too.

[Shannon McKenna Schmidt]

Yeah, absolutely. And that's a great point. So she first began campaigning for LBJ for his run for the Senate in 1948, and she's been campaigning for him since then. In 1960, when LBJ was on the ticket with JFK, JFK personally asked Lady Bird to take the voter outreach to women, which she did. So now it's 1964, and first ladies are not supposed to do this. This is the first time any first lady has done it. Not even our beloved, intrepid Eleanor Roosevelt did this. She did not campaign for FDR at all. But now we're 1964. Lady Bird is a brilliant campaigner. She's a pro. She's not going to let this socially constructed gender barrier hold her back, saying that first ladies should just basically be seen and not heard on the campaign trail.

[Jane Semeka]

And she's so supportive of LBJ's political ambitions, going all the way back to his first campaign for Congress.

[Shannon McKenna Schmidt]

Right, his first campaign for Congress. And she actually put up the money, she went toe to toe with her father to get an advance, $10,000 advance on an inheritance so that she could stake his campaign. This is in the 1930s. And then once she put up the money, she stayed in the background. And then she really gradually took on more. But in 1948, she really kicked it into high gear and began campaigning for him. Yeah. And do you think that the fact that the women's movement was sort of

[Jane Semeka]

starting to kind of sprout at this time, do you think that gives her that kind of bolsters her?

[Shannon McKenna Schmidt]

Yes, absolutely. Because, you know, I thought about things like, well, you know, feminism and would Lady Bird refer to herself as a feminist? And I said, I don't know that she ever referred to herself as a feminist, but she certainly was one in deeds. And she not only helped LBJ with his career, she bought a rundown radio station in Austin, Texas, and she turned it into a media conglomerate. And the year before the Lady Bird special, the name of the campaign train went through the South. The feminine mystique was published by Betty Friedan, upending this belief that women's fulfillment came solely from domesticity. And there was a very severe lack of role models in this regard. And then we have Lady Bird and some other very strong women now on the national scene. And something that I loved is earlier in 1964, she gave what was called the best commencement speech of the season. And she talked to the graduating seniors at Radcliffe, and she told them that they were pioneers of a new age. And she said, ultimately, it comes back to the spirit in which you can direct your own life. And I'm paraphrasing, but how happily you can marry man or job, or how happily you can marry both. And these were noted as very progressive words at the time. And one of the headlines ran, radcliffe seniors hear Lady Bird Johnson describe the modern US Woman. And so I just thought that that was so neat also. And then you have her whistle stopping down the tracks. The American people seeing their first lady doing something that had never been done before.

[Jane Semeka]

Yeah, that's really great. So they're gonna take a train through the South. So this is gonna be a whistle stop campaign. 1964 train seems a little old fashioned.

[Shannon McKenna Schmidt]

Yes. So we're now in the jet age in 1964, and it is a little old fashioned, but it's also genius. And in 1960, there was the LBJ special that had gone through the south, and Lady Bird was on that train. And some of the other women who worked on her team with her also worked on that campaign train. So they built on that knowledge of what they had learned. But the great thing about it is that this train could get them into communities that didn't normally see people. There was the town of A Hoskie, North Carolina, that sent a telegram to the White House and said, please stop here. No important person has visited here since Buffalo Bill's Wild west show. And no passenger train has come through in 12 years. And they got 10,000 people out at that stop. So it was actually quite genius to take this train and stop in these communities. There were some major cities as well. Columbia, Charleston, Savannah. But they also got into a lot of communities where people felt underrepresented.

[Jane Semeka]

Yeah. And they can really reach people. You can just walk off the back of the train and shake hands and you can really. It's kind of up close and personal.

[Shannon McKenna Schmidt]

It is. It's very up close and personal. And it was also very efficient. So the train would roll into these towns. One of the things that they had to do, they outfitted a 19 car train and the caboose, they tried very hard to find a parlor observation car which had lounge style seating and a balcony on the back, a platform. And these somebody said, had gone, gone out the way of bustles. So again, this very old fashioned idea, they had to find one off a junk heap because they just weren't popular anymore. And so they refurbished this into their hospitality car. Painted Lady Bird special on the side. And that's where Lady Bird would speak from. So the train stopped in each of these towns and you would talk to the crowd and then the train would keep on moving. And she slept on the train for four days. She said it was like doing a month's worth of work in four days.

[Jane Semeka]

Yeah, they kept up such a schedule, but. So let's talk a little bit about what she wanted to do with her time speaking at all these different whistle stops. So they would stop between 18 and 15 stops a day for four days. And you write that she wanted to woo the people and to thaw the chill between the north and the South. So what did she say to the people at these campaign stops?

[Shannon McKenna Schmidt]

So she's very much doing this for two reasons. To garner votes for LBJ's reelection and as you said, to help bridge this divide and ease the animosity. And the brilliant thing about Lady Bird is that she gave hard hitting political points, but in her own personal, genteel, sincere style. And I really think that nobody else could have done this trip and been successful at it the way that Lady Bird was, because she is from the South. And she had this sincerity which I think people responded to and recognized. And she, her press secretary, Liz Carpenter said that she never said anything that wasn't her own belief. And so she was able to tell people in a very nice way to get with the times and leave racial animosity behind and that it was going to be best for everyone and lift up the entire region. And at the end of the line in New Orleans, one reporter said that at various times through the trip, Lady Bird traded lace mitts for iron gloves. And so she really was able to deliver these hard hitting political points in a softer package, but still get her points across.

[Jane Semeka]

And she talks about the New South a lot, you know, the Old south and the New south and how proud she is of being a Southerner. And I thought that was very effective way of reaching out to people who are feeling insulted, feeling that their priorities maybe are being not being paid attention to. And I, I thought that she really emphasized this idea of love over hate.

[Shannon McKenna Schmidt]

I think that's a perfect way to put it. Love over hate. And one of the things that, I think how that came to pass along the trip was she spent 10 or more years every summer going to visit relatives in Alabama, which is in the Deep South. It's one of the states that hates LBJ the most. And they were unsure what was going to happen in mobile, Alabama. And 20,000 people turned out to. To. To see this daughter of the South. And so she really was the perfect person to do this and maybe the only person who could have done this trip with this message.

[Jane Semeka]

Yeah, I think that she. She really makes a cultural connection with the people she's speaking to. She's really reaching out to them and offering her, you know, kind of offering her love to them and also trying to convince them to come along into the future.

[Shannon McKenna Schmidt]

Yes. And, you know, and to a large degree, I think she was successful. The trip was widely deemed a success by political pundits and the press. And she really did. I think it was about 500,000 people that she addressed in person. And of course, part of the point of the campaign train, a key orchestrator was this very brilliant woman named Liz Carpenter, a former journalist who was Lady Bird's press secretary and the first East Wing staff director. And it was all magnified, intended to give publicity. They wanted the maximum amount of publicity possible for this trip from everything was a. A political or a. A talking point for the press who rode along, by the way. They had a couple hundred members of the press riding along on this train.

[Jane Semeka]

Amazing how they fit all those.

[Shannon McKenna Schmidt]

Yes. Yes. Yeah. I mean, it was just everything about this. So I think it's a very interesting snapshot of this moment in time for all of the women trailblazers that it brought aboard the train, one of whom was legendary White House correspondent Helen Thomas.

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[Jane Semeka]

Oh yeah, I loved, I loved learning more about that. She was there. I was like, oh, Helen Thomas, that was really neat. And one more thing about the speeches that Lady Bird made. She had speeches prepared for each city, each place that was sort of tailored to each place. And I thought that was really a nice touch that in the planning that they had develop the talking points, but also were sensitive to making a connection, to reaching out to each of these places. And I thought that was a very interesting decision that they made as a team.

[Shannon McKenna Schmidt]

Yeah. And this goes back to her connections with people. She would study the briefing books that the president was given for state dinners. She would learn about people so that she could make a personal connection with everybody in the receiving line. And that, you're right, that's exactly what she did for this trip. As part of the extensive preparations which they did, the whole Lady Bird special came together in a matter of weeks. And a team of six women came together to help Lady Bird prepare the speeches. But she got materials from National Geographic. She got books from the library. She spoke with members of Congress from the states and their wives in states where she would be traveling so that she could put together, yes, a custom speech for every single stop. And she touched on a lot of the same Talking points promoting LBJ's legislative accomplishments, his many, many years in government service. But every single one was customized. And again it's just that personal connection that she made with people. And one of the headlines I thought was very cute, it said, lady Bird did her homework for tour. So they noticed that. I think that was after Fredericksburg, Virginia. So they noticed the effort that she put into this.

[Jane Semeka]

Yeah. So can you talk a little bit about the title, you Can't Catch Us?

[Shannon McKenna Schmidt]

Well, riding along on the campaign train was 20 year old Linda Bird Johnson and 17 year old Lucy Johnson, and they were the two daughters of LBJ and Lady Bird. And at one of the stops in North Carolina, the train is leaving the station and, and some boys run after the train holding up Barry Goldwater signs and Linda flips on the loudspeaker and she very cheerfully schools them saying, you're running after the 20th century, you can't catch us. And that ultimately became the title of the book. And I loved it because it not only reflects the forward momentum of the train, but the surrounding social progress and civil rights and women's rights that was taking place at the time.

[Jane Semeka]

Yeah, it's great. And I think too, the story of racial justice and the integration of women into the administration is also a very strong part of this idea of you Can't Catch us. Women are being accepted finally in these highest echelons of politics. And I was, I was very impressed that LBJ really walked the walk in integrating his office staff and really making an effort to bring more women into the administration.

[Shannon McKenna Schmidt]

Yeah, I think that might come as a surprise to people about lbj. And Lady Bird was very much a proponent of him doing that. And also Liz Carpenter, as I mentioned, she actually worked for LBJ when he was vice president and still did projects for him when he was president. And she was very instrumental on that agenda as well.

[Jane Semeka]

So I love, and I love the second part of the title, which is the women who rode with her, because it makes me think of We Ride at Dawn.

[Shannon McKenna Schmidt]

Exactly.

[Jane Semeka]

The idea that these women are linking arms and are going on this adventure together.

[Shannon McKenna Schmidt]

Going on this. I love how you said that. And this was also newsworthy at the time because this was a women led undertaking which hadn't happened before in politics. And as Liz Carpenter said, men were a very important part of the endeavor. LBJ was heavily involved in the planning. They had a couple of men, Hale Boggs, a Louisiana congressman. His wife, Lindy Boggs, was an orchestrator of the Lady Bird special. He rode along the entire way as one of the emcees. So as Liz Carpenter made sure to say, men were an important part of the endeavor. But the women were calling the signals, and they had women all down the line. This time they had advance men and advance women, which was also newsworthy. The advance team would prime each location for the arrival of the train. They would get people to the stations. They would help make all the arrangements. And so it really was this amazing women led endeavor. And something else that you said makes me think of the camaraderie on the train. And I just really, really loved the sense of camaraderie among these women and how they came together to achieve this.

[Jane Semeka]

Yeah. And they have guts, right? That's the title of one of the chapters. These are women with guts. And I wrote down in my notes that lbj, LBJ wrote that women had, quote, imagination, initiative and ingenuity. That's why they were given this difficult task of going to the south during this fraught time to try to smooth over, to campaign for, get people to still vote for him even though they were mad at him for the Civil Rights act, many of them. And as the Dixiecrats were starting to peel away and go and join the Republican Party, like Strom Thurmond is woven through this story as well, that it was the women who get this. Get this operation right. They get handed the difficult task of trying to do this.

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Yeah.

[Shannon McKenna Schmidt]

And I think it did make a difference when they went. Before they went through Virginia, the governor said that he thought that the state would go to Barry Goldwater. And then after he rode the Ladybird Special and it went through Virginia and they made a lot of stops in Virginia, he changed his tune. And the very next day, he said that he thought that the state would go for lbj. So it did help make a difference. Liz Carpenter, when she was checking out the route, she went ahead of the train. She went back and reported to LBJ that North Carolina was a mess. You know, the Democratic Party in North Carolina was just, yeah, in shambles. And so the Lady Bird Special really helped shore up party unity as well. And North Carolina also ended up going for lbj. And my favorite is that there was a West Wing memo circulated before the train the day. I think it was the day before the train set out that said only a miracle could deliver Florida for lbj. And the Lady Bird Special also went through Florida and appears to have been that miracle because Florida also went for lbj. And so she.

[Jane Semeka]

Did she draw big crowds?

[Shannon McKenna Schmidt]

She did. So altogether there were about 500,000. One of the biggest, like I said, was Mobile, where one of the reporters said a white backlash was going to ruin the trip. Mobile gave the answer, and it did not because they turned out 20,000 people there. The biggest crowd was 25,000 in New Orleans at the end of the line for the Lady Bird special at the Union passenger terminal. And that is where lbj, he was there when the train pulled into the station to greet Lady Bird.

[Jane Semeka]

And she did have some hecklers. So that's sort of sprinkled through this too. So it's not all positive, but can you talk a little bit about that?

[Shannon McKenna Schmidt]

Yes, it, it was not all positive. There were always, all along the route, there were Goldwater supporters at every stop, holding up their signs. All through Virginia and North Carolina. I mean, they were there, but they were largely respectful. But when they got into Columbia, South Carolina, the tone and the mood really changed. And again, there was a huge crowd, thousands and thousands of people, but there was a very small cluster of hecklers who surged the platform. And as Liz Carpenter said, it was so ugly, it left us all aghast. But Lady Bird, she's a pro. Nobody could get this group of hecklers to calm down, not the governor, not the mayor, nobody. And Lady Bird at one point held up her hand and she admonished them very politely. And they were quiet while she finished her speech. Later that day, they get into Charleston also, another rough stop. Again, a very huge crowd, but an even larger group of hecklers, more vocal. And so. But then I love Lady Bird kept everything in perspective. So a reporter at the end of that day, this is at the end of day two, asks her about these two incidents in Charleston and Columbia. And she said, well, you have to keep it all in perspective. She said, thousands and thousands of people have turned out to greet us, have shown us so much love. And it's just dozens of people who have done the heckling. And what the hecklers would do, though, is because they were usually small ish groups, they would surge the platform so that they're heckling and their catcalls and their crude gestures and their ugly signs would be more prominent.

[Jane Semeka]

So these women kind of go through a real intense four day experience together in addition to the weeks of planning beforehand. But they must have formed quite a bond.

[Shannon McKenna Schmidt]

They did. And so Lady Bird called. She was on the political scene with LBJ for decades, nearly 30 years. And she said that the campaign train, that they were the fourth four most dramatic days in her political life. And she said that even years afterwards, like, somebody would come up to her on a receiving line and say, I rode with you on the Ladybird special. And they would clasp hands because it was that momentous of an experience for them.

[Jane Semeka]

They were handed a mission and they accomplished it. And it really is a. It's really such a great story.

[Shannon McKenna Schmidt]

So you had.

[Jane Semeka]

And so it's dangerous too. So we want to kind of talk a little bit about how they were remembered just less than a year after President Kennedy's assassination in Dallas. And you talk about that in the book. How is the Secret Service going to be able to keep this train safe?

[Shannon McKenna Schmidt]

Yeah, that is an excellent point. And it's hard to escape the circumstances under which LBJ and Lady Bird came into the White House. The unbelievably tragic circumstances. And this is 10 months after President Kennedy's assassination in their home state of Texas. Another thing that kind of weighed on them. And the Secret Service is very nervous about LBJ taking a trip like this. They're nervous about Lady Bird taking a trip like this, but they can't really forbade Lady Bird from doing it. But they did institute very tight precautions. Agents canvassed towns ahead of time. They rode on the train. They were present flanking the platform. Every time Lady Bird spoke, they circulated among the crowd because they did have a bomb threat before. After the Ladybird Special was announced to the press, there was a Ku Klux Klan member in Mississippi, tried to recruit other Klan members. This was reported to the FBI by an informant. He wanted to bomb the train, but he couldn't get anyone else to go along with him. So that plan fizzled out. But they were coming into Florida and there was another bomb threat phoned into the sheriff's office. So it was not risk free. But Lady Bird, she was determined to do this. And she. It's not that she didn't care about the danger. They also had an extra engine preceding the train by 15 minutes. And that weighed heavily on her conscience. So she was cognizant of the danger that she was undertaking. But I think that ultimately she believed that no harm was going to come to her in the south other than Heckler's.

[Jane Semeka]

Yeah. And you got a chance to interview both Lucy and Linda Byrd and that the Johnsons daughters. Can you talk about that?

[Shannon McKenna Schmidt]

That was really extraordinary. I'm just so appreciative that they each gave me their time to talk to me about being on the Lady Bird Special. And they would have been the youngest of the people who had ridden on the train. And just to have this link with that historic event was really wonderful. And when I spoke with Linda, the first thing she says to me is, I've been doing my homework. And that just Made me smile. Because, of course, we heard earlier about how Lady Bird was very much known for doing her homework. And Linda had been calling up other people who had also been on the train to prep herself for her conversation with me.

[Jane Semeka]

Oh, that's so neat. I mean, it made me think, why aren't they in politics? You know, that they had been, you know, they had this mentorship of these two amazing parents, and it made me. Made me think, wow, that would. That would be. I mean, although, you know, also, I understand why they're not in politics as well.

[Shannon McKenna Schmidt]

Yes, yes. Well, they have the genes and the role models. I believe. Linda's husband was governor of Virginia for a while. Yeah. And she. I think she helped him campaign. And.

[Jane Semeka]

Yeah, I totally agree. I mean, I understand, you know, why they would want to and not want to, considering what they've been, you know, what they live through.

[Shannon McKenna Schmidt]

But it's true, they both are very charismatic, though. And again, making. Cause I've met Linda in person, spoke with both of them on the phone. I've seen speeches that they've given and events that they've done on video. And again, very charismatic. But also that personal connection they seem to make with people. Yes, they were very popular. Linda and Lucy were both enormously popular with the crowds, and there was a lot of young people turned out, and they, of course, were very popular with them, but they were popular with everybody. They gave speeches, and they, too, faced down hecklers with poise.

[Jane Semeka]

Was there anything that they said that surprised you?

[Shannon McKenna Schmidt]

Well, I love the you Can't Catch Us, which became the title, which was Linda. And then in Savannah, Lucy. These hecklers, teenagers like herself. She was 17, just very, very persistent heckling. And she, in a very soft, measured voice, told them that it was easy to holler a lot and make a lot of noise when you were not the ones that were going to have to solve the problems, but that their generation, that they were going to have to take the reins probably sooner than they would like. And here she is, 17 years old.

[Jane Semeka]

Oh, that's. That's very impressive. Poise in the face of that. So let's talk a little bit about now. So this book is very timely in light of what's happening with the Supreme Court. Decisions on voting rights, on different initiatives to try to limit voting access and the race issues, the gender issues in the country today. This is really very timely book.

[Shannon McKenna Schmidt]

Yes. So when I began researching and writing this several years ago, we were not in the climate that we are now. That is very much different. And it is Eerie to see everything that they worked for in 1964 is being undone now. Women's rights, civil rights, the Voting Rights act, which came the next year in 1965. And I think about this a lot. You know, what could we take from this story? And one of the things that I think about is that Eleanor Roosevelt, During World War II, Lady Bird, now during this very turbulent time in the fall of 1964, they both took these trips during times of very great upheaval. And we see both of these first Ladies as heroes in motion, rising to meet the moment and how they're both willing to face discomfort and danger, to make a difference and exhibiting qualities that are timeless. You know, their courage, their compassion. And I think that one thing I would like people to take from the story of the Lady Bird Special, and something that I think about a lot myself, is this idea of the collective and what we can do, coming together, supporting each other, and what the collective can achieve in making a historic undertaking. And there was one of the stops where Lady Bird Johnson, it was primarily a group of college students, and she said to them, never stand on the sidelines. And so I do think there's a lot that we can take from this story and apply to today.

[Jane Semeka]

Oh, yeah. That's beautiful. And so thank you so much for

[Shannon McKenna Schmidt]

coming on New Books Network again.

[Jane Semeka]

It was so nice to see you and to talk to you about this wonderful book, you can't catch lady bird Johnson's trailblazing 1964 campaign train and the Women who Rode with her, published by Sourcebooks.

[Shannon McKenna Schmidt]

Until next time, this is Jane Sameka

[Jane Semeka]

and Shannon McKenna Schmidt.

[Shannon McKenna Schmidt]

Keep reading.