Robert Caro talks Lyndon Johnson, music and the 1960s

NEW YORK – Robert Caro has been thinking a lot about the 1960s.

The Pulitzer Prize winning historian shared some observations this weekend during an address at the New-York Historical Society. Caro has been immersed in the decade as he works on the fifth, and presumed last, of his Lyndon Johnson books. He spoke of Johnson’s signature achievements, including passage of the Voting Rights Act, and his tragic decision to commit hundreds of thousands of ground troops in Vietnam. The conflict led to Johnson’s 1968 announcement that he wouldn’t seek reelection.

Caro’s talk centred on the growing disillusionment of the ’60s, as symbolized by two songs — the hopeful civil rights anthem “We Shall Overcome” and Pete Seeger’s bitter anti-war song “Waist Deep in the Big Muddy.”