What Katie Couric, Noah Kahan & Ken Burns Learned From Their Moms

Now we turn to a project that's celebrating the life-changing lessons we learn from our mothers.

What I learn from Mom is a new book by Sherrie Rollins Westin.

She is the CEO of Sesame Workshop, which produces the beloved children's TV show Sesame Street.

And she asks some of America's best-known success stories, how their childhoods and relationships with their mothers made them into who they are today.

And she tells Hari Sreenivasan it's a shout out to the unique influence of mothers everywhere.

- Christiana, thanks, Sherrie Westin.

Thanks so much for joining us.

You and your co-author, Jeff Dunn, compiled a book of essays, "What I Learned From Mom."

And you got to speak to some amazing people, amazing moms.

You heard stories about how their moms have affected their lives.

27 different contributors here, everybody from Robin Roberts to Governor Westmore.

I'm looking at Diane von Furstenberg.

And I guess when you started hearing and seeing these stories, was there a parallel?

Were there similarities that started to leap out to you given how wide the range of people that you were speaking with?

- Well, first of all, thank you so much for having me.

But yes, I mean, there were sort of certain common themes but I think one of the things I love most about the book is how different they are.

And so, you know, each story is really unique and some surprise you, some are rather humorous.

They're all moving.

And, you know, when I think of some of the similarities, I do think of gratitude that comes out a lot in terms of not just those we interview being grateful for their mothers, but the fact that their mothers sort of exemplified gratitude.

And I love that, you know, there are other real sort of themes along resilience, putting things in perspective, you know, that these things are not gonna be that big a deal.

There are some wonderful stories.

But I think that what's most interesting is it's not so much, if we were interviewing the moms, I don't think they necessarily would have had the same examples.

Because it's not so much what my mom taught me or what was the best advice my mother gave me, it's what I learned from my mother.

And so often it was just these incredible examples or things that our individuals noticed and it had a real impact on them.

- I'm thinking about just this 20,000 foot view perhaps, but the idea of motherhood or the CEO of the household in itself has been kind of overlooked in society.

And Katie Couric kind of mentions that, that she was, what was it, trying to talk to somebody about an obituary for her mother.

- And her mother said, what was her job?

And because her mother hadn't had a career in terms of a title, they didn't want to write the obituary.

I mean, and that's, you know, it's just... And Katie's mother was amazing.

And when you listen to Katie's stories, you know, just how important it was.

I think Katie always says it's so important to have a cheerleader.

Her mother was always her cheerleader.

And to have such incredible, unconditional love.

I think that's another theme that comes through.

Kindness.

You know, Noah Kahn said that his mother said to him, you don't have to like everybody, but you do have to be kind to everyone.

There are just a lot of wonderful takeaways around just the examples that mother set.

I love the story that Téa Leoni tells where her mother sort of, when a bully was beating them up in the front yard, her mother ran out with, I think, a shoe and then marched over to the boy's home to knock on the door and his father slammed the door in her face.

Okay, but fast forward and Taya notices that her mother is constantly finding that young boy and sitting with him and reading to him and talking to him.

And it dawns on her how much empathy her mother has and that she saw, you know, when that door was slammed in her face, probably why that boy was struggling.

You know, so it's wonderful examples that are just very moving.

And there's a lot of humor too.

- Right now in the past couple of decades, we've had this idea of kind of helicopter parenting or creating almost this bubble around your children.

And what struck me is throughout this, the conversations that you had, there were several examples of, you know, making people stronger and resilient through the adversity and not trying to really shelter them, but saying, "Hey, this is our reality."

One that comes to mind is Governor Wes Moore's mom too.

- Also the sacrifices that mothers have made.

You know, Wes, Governor Moore, sorry, has a wonderful line where he says that she wore sweaters so we could wear coats.

I think that what I love about it is you could dip in and you could just read people that you, you know, you may be a big Ken Burns fan or Henry Louis Gates or, or you may read it cover to cover.

And, and again, it's, I owe Jeff Dunn the credit.

He's a former CEO of Sesame, as you mentioned, he's the co-author.

And it really was his idea because he felt like if his mother had been born in a different time, she would have been the CEO.

And that he was just a work in progress for her.

And, you know, it was his idea to see if other people had these similar stories of the, the big sort of impact that their mothers had on their lives.

- You mentioned, you know, mom being a cheerleader, but it's also remarkable how many people, how many moms kind of instilled a confidence in their children just by being present and kind of being the backstop and the safety net and kind of just letting their kids know, you got this, I'm already here.

- And also putting other things in perspective, I think it was Soledad O'Brien's mother who said, "People are idiots.

So don't worry about what other people think.

People are idiots, you know, or just, you know, that sort of perspective of, of I think Tory Burch's mother said, whenever there was sort of negativity, that you just had to think of negativity as noise and tune it out.

And Darren Walker was mentioning about, you know, here he is growing up, black, gay, in a small town.

And that's not easy in the era that he was growing up, or really even today.

- No, and when you look at the sacrifices his mother made, who moved to make sure that he was somewhere where he could have more of a chance, he was one of the first in Head Start, 1969, the same time that Sesame started.

And it's a wonderful tribute.

Darren writes about his mother and his aunt, the role she played in his upbringing.

- There's also, you have this story with Ken Burns, who really kind of shares this moment about his mom's passing, and ends up really giving you a glimpse into what he's been doing his whole professional life.

- Well, I think that's a fascinating chapter because he literally says that it dawned on him, his mother died when he was only 11 years old.

And he said, you know, every year, when he blew out that birthday candle, he was wishing for his mom to be back.

So someone pointed out to him, isn't it interesting that your entire career is bringing people back to life?

It's bringing them, you know, when you look at, you know, Abraham Lincoln or Louis Armstrong, Jackie Robinson, it's waking the dead.

And he said, this is really the impact my mother had on me.

- You and Jeff Dahn kind of take your own personal journeys through this.

You mentioned how Jeff came up with this idea, but I also wonder, you know, you said that you kind of thought you were more like your dad before starting this project.

And I wonder what it is that you learned about yourself and what you learned from your mom.

- Well, it is true.

I remember when Jeff said, you know, we need a chapter on your mom.

And I said, well, you know, I'm really more like my father.

And he said, well, I'll interview you.

So Jeff interviewed me just as we had interviewed all of the other participants.

And he kept saying, I don't know, Sherrie, I think the apple doesn't fall far from the tree.

It was really lovely because in a way, I'm not saying it was an epiphany, but it was, I did develop much more of an appreciation for how much I have gotten from my mom, how much I am like her, you know, in both good and bad, but I say with love, but also I just think I appreciate how much more of an impact she had on my life and where I am than I had really realized.

She's stubborn, but that has, you know, served me well in my work.

And she, but she also, when I really thought about it, because he was asking about my childhood, my mother was everybody's favorite mom.

I mean, every kid in the neighborhood was at our house.

And if we were in the top of the apple trees, she was in the top of the apple trees, which was quite young when she had me.

But I realized how much she loved being a mom I can so identify with.

I wasn't in the top of the trees with my children, but I've really loved creating those same traditions, and especially when my children were little.

- And your mom, you said, was still literally climbing trees into her late 70s, early 80s?

- Oh, 80s.

She broke her hip.

She fell from the top of an apple tree.

And I was like, "Why are you in the top of the apple tree?"

And she said, "Well, I was stringing the Christmas lights and they just look so much better if they're up high."

- What's interesting to me also is now, here we are kind of having this conversation in the context of Mother's Day.

And I had to look this history up a little bit, but back in 1870, the author of the Battle Hymn of the Republic is the person kind of credited with Mother's Day.

And at that time, it was really more of a pacifist cause.

She wanted women around the world to basically stand up for peace and not have their sons go out to war.

And now it's kind of like Mother's Day is kind of a commercial shopping event.

And it just seems to have, I don't know, taken a totally different turn than how we think about mothers, mothers in society and kind of the reverence that we give.

- Well, I think that's one of the things that makes this book so special.

And of course I do believe it would be a great Mother's Day gift.

But the fact that it is these celebrations and really thoughtful essays about each mom and the impact they had.

And it doesn't matter whether to, you know, to the point you made earlier, whether there's a career or a title, it's the lasting sort of relationship and impressions that a mother has, you know, on their children.

And when I bring it back to Sesame, you know, all of the author proceeds we are giving to Sesame Workshop to support our mission, driven work.

Most people love Sesame Street, but don't always know that we're a nonprofit and need a support.

So that was an opportunity.

But also we know at Sesame how important the early years are and how important the engagement with a caring adult is, which is awesome.

That first engagement is often mom.

And one of the stories, we dedicated the book to Joan Ganz Cooney, who is the creator of Sesame Street.

We like to think of her as the mother of Sesame Street.

And when she was creating Sesame Street all those years ago, in 1969, she said she had a hunch that the learning would be deeper if a parent were watching with a child.

And that's why there were Muppets and celebrities and musicians and humor.

And you fast forward, and I think that's one of the reasons Sesame is so relevant today, that of all ages, and so impactful because so much of what we do is creating content that is a catalyst for engagement between a parent and child, a caregiver and child.

So I think it's wonderful to dedicate it to her.

She's such a visionary.

We should know that the Peter G. Peterson and Joan Ganz Cooney Fund are underwriters of this program.

So much of the work that Sesame does is grounded in research.

It's in developmental psychology.

It's about early learning science.

What does the science say about really just the importance of moms in a child's development?

- Well, there's nothing more important in the first five years of life than the nurturing care.

That would be the development term.

That is engagement with a caring adult, a mom, a parent, a grandparent, a caregiver.

And when I say that the prescience of Joan to focus on the early years, 56 years ago, and engagement with an adult, when you fast forward today, we have all of the research, the neuroscience, that proves in fact that the way a child learns is that serve and return between an adult, between a caring adult and a child.

And that's how their synapses are formed.

And their brain develops faster in those first five years of life than any other time.

So there is nothing more important in a young child's life than having that engagement with a caring adult.

And this book is such a tribute to, you know, those incredibly caring adults, our moms.

This is also a time where people are becoming a little bit more open with the difficult relationships that they might have with their moms or their parents.

There are more women choosing not to have children, sometimes by choice, sometimes by circumstance, right?

And I guess, how do you talk about this work to all these different people who are kind of in a different space for that traditional definition that we say as mothers, the image that gets conjured?

Listen, it's very interesting because I won't say who, but there were some people we asked to be a part of the book, who said, you know, I love Sesame, I'd love to help, but I just don't have the relationship with my mother that would lend itself to this.

And I appreciate that and understand that.

And I don't think it means that, that those individuals are any less successful, I'm sure they had another caring adult in their life with a really strong relationship.

And, you know, I did a book event recently and someone raised their hand at the end and they said, "Thank you for doing this book.

I lost my mother a year ago."

And she said, "This book helped me reflect on the things that I loved about my mother throughout her lifetime."

Because so often when a parent is struggling or, you know, as we age, it's not quite the same relationship you had earlier.

And she was saying my mother was difficult in the end, you know, through no fault of her own, through her health, through dementia, through all the things that we deal with as we get to a certain age with our, with, you know, as our parents age.

And to reflect, she said, the thought of it really made me stop and reflect on not the last few years, but my mother as a person and growing up.

And I think that's very powerful.

- About a year ago, Sesame had, I think it was Andrew Garfield on to discuss grief and healing after losing a parent.

And obviously that was a conscious decision by the program and you're trying to teach children how to navigate these difficult topics.

I mean, it's what you've done literally the entire time of the program.

How important is it that children are exposed to these kinds of conversations, these kinds of ideas at a young age?

I mean, frankly, 'cause the parents who are watching along with their children benefit from this too.

- Well, I think it's critical.

And you know, we often make the mistake, we think of issues as adult issues, mental health, addiction, but parental addiction really impacts young children.

And we often think, well, they're too young, we wanna shelter them, when in fact, that's the opposite of what we should do.

It's so important to talk to children, to respect them, to help them work through these issues in an age appropriate way.

And I think one of the things that SESAME does so well is we give resources to parents how to tackle tough issues.

We've just launched new resources around emotional well-being.

Because again, mental health issues are not just adult issues.

But to help parents know what is the right way to raise issues with their children, giving them incredible content, storybooks, videos that help model that in terms of the Muppets.

And then something like you mentioned with Andrew Garfield is a wonderful bit that we were able to share on social media with Elmo.

I cannot tell you the response, you know, from all ages on how powerful that is.

When you were writing this book, were there kind of aha moments for the people you were interviewing?

Because some of them not only are looking back at the impact their mother had, but you know, whether it's supermodel Cindy Crawford or other people you're talking to, they also have children and they are moms now.

And you know, sitting down for an hour or whatever to think about this is nowadays a rare opportunity.

So it wasn't so much aha moments as it was how much each of them resonate.

And then when you mentioned being parents themselves, Cindy Crawford's daughter, Kaya Gerber is also in the book.

And it's a lovely, lovely two chapters to have her talking about her mother and her grandmother growing up.

It's quite a moving story.

When you look at Diane von Furstenberg, her mother was in a concentration camp and she was liberated, I think at only 22 years old, like 40 some pounds, was told that she could not have children for at least three years.

And nine months later, Diane was born.

And so her entire life, she feels her mother said that, "God gave me life to give you birth."

So Diane says life is just a victory and everything on top of it is gratitude.

So, you know, there were some really powerful stories that I just think have wonderful takeaways.

- The book is called "What I Learned From Mom," co-author Sherrie Rollins Westin, who also happens to be the president and CEO of the Sesame Workshop.

Thank you so much for your time and for writing the book.

Well, thank you so much for having me.