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Browse the entire American Experience series featuring over 200 films. Watch full films online, download teacher’s guides, go behind the scenes, and learn more about your favorite films.
Ten years after American troops arrived in South Vietnam, communists seized Saigon in an attack that brought the war to a startling conclusion. The final chapter in American Experience's 11-hour series, Vietnam.
The personal journey of three generations of a Japanese American family, including their stint in internment camps during World War II.
In 1927, the Mississippi River flooded from New Orleans up to Illinois, leaving a million people homeless and leading to a major black migration to the North. A dramatic natural disaster story.
Franklin Delano Roosevelt restored hope after the Great Depression and led the nation during World War II. Part of the award-winning The Presidents collection.
Cuba's Communist leader defied the odds, surviving his Soviet benefactors, the wrath of U.S. presidents, the Bay of Pigs invasion, the Cuban Missile Crisis, and several assassination attempts.
Joe Louis became a symbol of African American equality and democracy. Max Schmeling represented Hitler's Aryan racial theories and fascism. The two boxers fought in 1938 -- on the eve of World War II.
During World War II more than a thousand women signed up to fly with the U.S. military as WASPS. 38 died in service, though they received no benefits as they had no official military status.
Before World War II, San Francisco's Chinatown was closed to outsiders, but second generation Chinese Americans defied cultural tradition to pursue their passion for American music and dance.
Nearly every American town has a baseball diamond. A wry philosophical essay on what makes baseball the great American pastime.
The Freedom Summer of 1964 saw whites and blacks coming together in a nonviolent army to register African American voters, create schools and bring national attention to the struggle for racial equality.
French settlers in Louisiana merged with African Americans, Afro-Caribbeans and others to create Cajun and Zydeco musical traditions.
Of all the alphabet agencies of the New Deal, none captured the public's imagination like J. Edgar Hoover's FBI. G-Men were public heroes, doing battle with John Dillinger, Bonnie and Clyde and other criminals.
A biography of the 41st U.S. president, from his service in World War II to his days in the Oval Office with the fall of the Berlin Wall, the race riots in Los Angeles and the breakup of the Soviet Union.
The Alabama governor and four-time presidential candidate promised segregation forever, but after an assassination attempt he asked to be forgiven by African Americans.
Before he became the first U.S. president, service to the colonies would profoundly change George Washington. The man who came to symbolize the American Revolution scorned attempts to participate in any system but democracy.
The Native American leader fought against U.S. expansion onto Apache tribal land. The story of a tragic collision of two civilizations.
A nostalgic and humorous look at how old world Chicago lives side by side with the new.
In a nostalgic celebration of old fashioned neighborhood life, the black residents of Tulsa relive their community's remarkable rise and tragic decline.
The Klondike Gold Rush in Canada's Yukon Territory, the largest American gold rush, inspired a Charlie Chaplin film when 100,000 people made the treacherous journey in search of riches.
Discovery of a precious metal inspired worldwide migration by Forty-Niners, the eager gold-seekers who settled the westernmost state and turned California into a land of opportunity and fierce competition.
San Francisco built one of the "Seven Wonders of the Modern World" during the Great Depression while battling wind, fog, ocean currents, and earthquake-prone land.
The dramatic story of the construction of New York City's Grand Central Terminal in 1913, lauded as the greatest railroad terminal in the world, with electrified train service under the city streets.
The first around-the-world air race was sponsored to prove that the airplane had a commercial future. Four pilots took off from Seattle and two returned 175 days later.
In 1900 Major Walter Reed proved that mosquitoes spread yellow fever. The discovery halted an outbreak during the construction of the Panama Canal, and led to the disease's eventual eradication.
Vivid memories of those trapped in the terrifying temblor of 1906 that killed thousands of Californians.
The laying of the transatlantic telegraph cable - an underwater communications link between North America and Europe - is a remarkable story of mid-19th century ingenuity and perseverance.
With over a million already dead, heroic American soldiers and nurses served in the closing battles of World War I. New mechanized weapons led to the bloodiest war of the 20th century.
The bizarre saga of the Symbionese Liberation Army, Patty Hearst's kidnapping, Hearst's conversion to her captors' cause, and the bank robberies and shootouts that followed.
The story of Liliu'okalani, the last queen and ruler of the independent Kingdom of Hawaii.
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