American Experience

1624 - 1865
1866 - 1900
1901 - 1925
1926 - 1945
1946 - TODAY

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CHRONOLOGICAL: 1926 - 1945:

1926 | 1930 | 1938 | 1941

Alone on the Ice (1926-1934)
Richard Byrd's solitary adventure in Antarctica.

In June 1934, Richard Byrd lay alone in a small hut within the polar ice, hovering near death. No one before Byrd had ever experienced winter in the interior of the Antarctic. In an age of heroes, he was one of America's greatest. An explorer, aviation pioneer and scientist, Byrd was also an egotist, a risk-taker, and, his critics claim, a fraud who sometimes took credit for the accomplishments of others.

Fatal Flood (1927)
A dramatic story of greed, power and race during one of America's greatest natural disasters.

In the spring of 1927, after weeks of incessant rains, the Mississippi River went on a rampage from Cairo, Illinois to New Orleans, inundating hundreds of towns, killing as many as a thousand people and leaving a million homeless. In Greenville, Mississippi, efforts to contain the river pitted the majority black population against an aristocratic plantation family, the Percys-and the Percys against themselves. A dramatic story of greed, power and race during one of America's greatest natural disasters.

Lindbergh (1927-1945)
The first man to fly across the Atlantic.

At 25 , Charles A. Lindbergh arrived in Paris, the first man to fly across the Atlantic -- handsome, talented, and brave -- a hero. But the struggle to wear the mantle of legend would be a consuming one. Crowds pursued him, reporters invaded his private life. His marriage,travels with his wife and the kidnapping and murder of their first child were all fodder for the front page.

Ballad of a Mountain Man (1927-1965)
(no website available)
Bascom Lamar Lunsford and his campaign to preserve mountain music and dance.

Bascom Lamar Lunsford was a pioneer folklorist who in the 1920s began a campaign to preserve mountain music and dance. He dignified what was known as "hillbilly music." Knocking on doors of local banjo pickers and fiddlers, listening to their songs, he amassed an extraordinary repertoire, recorded for the Library of Congress and started the first folk music festival.

Amelia Earhart (1928-1937)
(no website available)
The first woman to fly solo across the Atlantic.

The first woman to fly solo across the Atlantic, Amelia Earhart was America's "Lady Lindy." What the public didn't know was the cost of her courage. The record-breaking flights, races, interviews, speeches and promotional commitments pushed her to the point of exhaustion. This beautiful, accomplished woman would disappear without a trace on the eve of her 40th birthday.

Love in the Cold War (1928-1960)
(no website available)
A family torn apart by political beliefs.

Eugene Dennis fled to Moscow to avoid indictment and prison for his work for the American Communist Party in the late 1920s; his wife Peggy and 18-month-old son soon followed. In 1935, they were reassigned to America but ordered to leave behind their five-year-old who spoke only Russian. A second son, born in America, offers an honest and touching examination of the lives of his parents, whose political beliefs tore the family apart.

A Brilliant Madness (1928-2002)
The story of Nobel Prize-winning mathematician John Nash.

A Brilliant Madness is the story of a mathematical genius whose career was cut short by a descent into madness. At the age of 30, John Nash, a stunningly original and famously eccentric MIT mathematician, suddenly began claiming that aliens were communicating with him and that he was a special messenger. Diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia, Nash spent the next three decades in and out of mental hospitals, all but forgotten. During that time, a proof he had written at the age of 20 became a foundation of modern economic theory. In 1994, as Nash began to show signs of emerging from his delusions, he was awarded a Nobel Prize in Economics. The program features interviews with John Nash, his wife Alicia, his friends and colleagues, and experts in game theory and mental illness.

The Crash of 1929 (1929-1929)
The unbounded optimism of the age -- and the shocking consequences when reality finally hit on October 29th.

In 1929, while the stock market was rising, there were few critics. It was a "New Era" when everyone could get rich. But it was a small group of bankers, brokers and speculators who by manipulating the stock market grew fabulously wealthy. The film captures the unbounded optimism of the age and the shocking consequences when reality finally hit on October 29th.

Riding the Rails (1929-1941)
The evocative stories of teen hoboes crisscrossing America during the Depression.

During the Depression-era 1930's, tens of thousands of teenagers hopped freight trains in search of a better life elsewhere. What they found was a mixture of adventure, camaraderie, hardship and loneliness. The evocative stories of teen hoboes crisscrossing America during tough times.

CHRONOLOGICAL: 1926 - 1945:

1926 | 1930 | 1938 | 1941