American Experience 31
2019-01-15 | Documentary | 7 episodes37 Seasons
Episode
The Swamp (2019)
The history of the Everglades is a dramatic yet little known story of humanity’s attempt to conquer nature. The Swamp, told through the lives of a handful of colorful and resolute characters, explores the repeated efforts to reclaim, control and transform what was seen as a vast wasteland into an agricultural and urban paradise, and, ultimately, the drive to preserve America’s greatest wetland.
Sealab (2019)
In 1969 off the California coast, a US Navy crane carefully lowered a massive tubular structure into the waters. It was an audacious feat of engineering — a pressurized underwater habitat, designed for an elite group of divers to spend days or even months at a stretch living and working on the ocean floor.Sealab tells the little-known story of the daring program that tested the limits of human endurance and revolutionized undersea exploration.
Chasing the Moon - A Place Beyond the Sky (2019)
On 4 October 1957, Soviet scientists launched Sputnik 1 - a beach ball-sized, radio-transmitting aluminium alloy sphere - into orbit. The satellite caused a sensation. Amid Cold War tensions, the Soviet Union’s accomplishment signalled a dramatic technological advantage and American felt it had little choice but to join the Space Race.
Directed By
- Robert Stone
Chasing the Moon - Earthrise (2019)
What exactly was it going to take for America to beat the Soviets to the moon? Cold War tensions persisted, as rumours circulated that the Soviets were preparing to send an unmanned spacecraft to the moon. Nasa quickly developed the Gemini program, sending astronauts into orbit around the Earth to practice critical manoeuvres for the eventual trip to the moon.
Directed By
- Robert Stone
Chasing the Moon - Magnificent Desolation (2019)
After the immediate celebration of 1968’s successful Apollo 8 mission, underlying questions about the space programme emerged with new intensity as politicized young Americans challenged the nation’s priorities. Nasa pushed brashly forward.
Directed By
- Robert Stone
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