Ken Burns
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English
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The Vietnam War: A Film by Ken Burns and Lynn Novick Ken Burns and Lynn Novick's ten-part, 18-hour documentary series, The Vietnam War, tells the epic story of one of the most consequential, divisive, and controversial events in American history as it has never before been told on film. Visceral and immersive, the series explores the human dimensions of the war through revelatory testimony of nearly 80 witnesses from all sides -- Americans who fought...
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"A treasury of American Presidents by historian Ken Burns"--
Burns explores the legacy of each of America's presidents, from George Washington to Barack Obama. Each two-page spread covers the basic facts of the era, the man, and an important aspect of his presidency.
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English
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Explore the history of a uniquely American art form: country music. From its deep and tangled roots in ballads, blues and hymns performed in small settings, to its worldwide popularity, learn how country music evolved over the course of the 20th century, as it eventually emerged to become America’s music. COUNTRY MUSIC features never-before-seen footage and photographs, plus interviews with more than 80 country music artists. The eight-part series...
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1862 saw the birth of modern warfare and the transformation of Lincoln’s war to preserve the Union into a war to emancipate the slaves. Episode Two begins with the political infighting that threatened to swamp Lincoln’s administration and then follows Union General George McClellan’s ill-fated campaign on the Virginia Peninsula, where his huge army meets a smaller but infinitely more resourceful Confederate force. During this episode we witness...
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The companion volume to the PBS documentary film about the first—and perhaps most astonishing—automobile trip across the United States.
In 1903 there were only 150 miles of paved roads in the entire nation and most people had never seen a “horseless buggy”—but that did not stop Horatio Nelson Jackson, a thirty-one-year-old Vermont doctor, who impulsively bet fifty dollars that he could drive his 20-horsepower automobile...
In 1903 there were only 150 miles of paved roads in the entire nation and most people had never seen a “horseless buggy”—but that did not stop Horatio Nelson Jackson, a thirty-one-year-old Vermont doctor, who impulsively bet fifty dollars that he could drive his 20-horsepower automobile...
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As companion to his PBS series airing in September 2007, "The War" focuses on the citizens of four towns--Luverne, Minnesota; Sacramento, California; Waterbury, Connecticut; Mobile, Alabama, following more than forty people from 1941 to 1945. Maps and hundreds of photographs enrich this compelling, unflinching narrative.
11) The Common Cause
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English
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FDR shatters the third-term tradition, struggles to prepare a reluctant country to enter World War II and, after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, helps set the course toward Allied victory. Meanwhile, Eleanor struggles to keep New Deal reforms alive in wartime and travels the Pacific to comfort wounded servicemen. Diagnosed with congestive heart failure in 1943 and with the war still raging, FDR resolves to conceal his condition and run for a...
12) Get Action
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A frail, asthmatic young Theodore Roosevelt transforms himself into a vigorous champion of the strenuous life, loses one great love and finds another, leads men into battle and then rises like a rocket to become the youngest president in American history at 42. Meanwhile, Franklin Delano Roosevelt, brought up as the pampered only child of adoring parents, follows his older cousin's career with worshipful fascination and begins to think he might one...
13) The Storm
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Franklin Roosevelt runs for vice president in 1920 and seems assured of a still brighter future until polio devastates him the following summer. He spends seven years struggling without success to walk again, while Eleanor builds a personal and political life of her own. FDR returns to politics in 1928 and, as governor of New York, acts with such vigor and imagination during the first years of the Great Depression that the Democrats turn to him as...
14) In the Arena
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Murder brings Theodore Roosevelt to the presidency, but in the seven years that follow, he transforms the office and makes himself perhaps the best-loved of all the men who ever lived in the White House - battling corporate greed and building the Panama Canal, preserving American wilderness, carrying the message of American might around the world. FDR courts and weds Eleanor Roosevelt, the shy orphaned daughter of Theodore's alcoholic brother, Elliott....
15) The Fire of Life
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Theodore Roosevelt leads a Progressive crusade that splits his own party, undertakes a deadly expedition into the South American jungle, campaigns for American entry into World War I - and pays a terrible personal price. Franklin masters wartime Washington as Assistant Secretary of the Navy, while Eleanor finds personal salvation in war work. Her discovery of Franklin's romance with another woman transforms their marriage into a largely political...
16) The Rising Road
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English
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FDR brings the same optimism and energy to the White House that his cousin Theodore displayed. Aimed at ending the Depression, his sweeping New Deal restores the people's self-confidence and transforms the relationship between them and their government. Eleanor rejects the traditional role of first lady, becomes her husband's liberal conscience and a sometimes controversial political force in her own right. As the decade ends, FDR faces two grave...
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This first part of the film follows Jack Johnson's remarkable journey from his humble beginnings in Galveston, Texas, to his entry into the world of professional boxing, where, in turn-of-the-century Jim Crow America, the heavyweight championship was an exclusively "white title." In 1908 Johnson became the first African-American to earn the title Heavyweight Champion of the World. On July 4, 1910, ex-champion Jim Jeffries, the new "Great White Hope,"...
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By the end of 1910, as the second part of this film begins, Jack Johnson was the most famous - and the most notorious - African-American on earth. But when no one was able to beat the champion in the ring, the U.S. government set out to destroy him in the courts. Unfairly charged with violating the Mann Act, Johnson was convicted and sentenced to jail. Skipping bail, he fled to Europe, where he remained a fugitive for many years. Determined to live...
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No sport is more American than baseball, but, contrary to popular opinion, the game likely predates the birth of our nation and has substantial roots overseas. This program explores baseball's origins as a folk pastime and depicts the early phases of its complex evolution. Refuting the myth that Civil War general Abner Doubleday single-handedly invented the game, the film looks at parallels in cricket and rounders, brings to light an account of George...
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During the 1920s, Babe Ruth's phenomenal performance at the plate made him the savior of baseball, rescuing the game from the Black Sox scandal of the previous decade. This program focuses on that miraculous period, in which power hitting became the centerpiece of baseball's allure and the monikers "Bambino" and "Sultan of Swat" conjured a magic understood by an entire nation. Viewers learn about the end of the "dead ball" era and the consequential...