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Private Notes
Man's history on Earth dates back at least tens of thousands of years, yet written records stretch back to only a fraction of that. Helping clarify the picture of humanity past is the science of archaeology. Though the cinematic escapades of Indiana Jones describe a world of globe-trotting adventure, in truth archaeologists are more like detectives, piecing together clues to mysteries of what has come before.
Howard Carter's unflagging persistence and stubbornness led to one of the greatest archaeological discoveries of the 20th century: the tomb of King Tut. Yet it was that same strong-headedness that would time and again jeopardize Carter's career. Learn more about the man and his discovery which propelled Egyptology into the pop culture landscape.
He was an action hero as well as an intellectual hero. T.E. Lawrence escaped a safe office job during World War I to become a guerilla war mastermind in desert combat, fighting alongside Arabs to throw off the rule of the Ottoman Empire. But despite British promises of Arab independence, the Middle East would end up being carved by European colonial treaties, and Lawrence faced the challenges of keeping his word to his trusted compatriots of the desert.
Humanity has lived in, with and on the profits of slavery for most of its history. Many of its greatest achievements and monuments have tragically been built on the backs of slave labor. How could people place their economic needs ahead of the humanity of their fellow beings? How could this horrific system have lasted for so long? In this documentary track the history of slavery from Ancient Greece, to the Crusades, to the colonization of the new world and the racial slavery that sparked the American Civil War. The journey from slavery to freedom is incomplete and continues as there are still over 20 million people enslaved today.
Known during his time as "the American Lion," Theodore Roosevelt led the U.S. into the 20th Century. He was the first president to travel abroad, the first to travel on an airplane - a grandiose figure of huge personality, Roosevelt led enough life and followed enough passions for five lifetimes. One of his many legacies is the move towards conserving the nation's abundant natural resources for future generations.
As far as we know, planet Earth stands alone as a cradle of life in the universe. Ecological efforts strive to protect the balance that fosters that life. In this documentary, see the important role humans play as stewards of the planet's health, correcting the mistakes of the past century, with specific examples from northern California.
Perhaps no artist came to capture the optimistic spirit of America in the first half of the 20th Century better than Norman Rockwell. In an era before television became the mass medium that united the nation, Americans turned to the pages of The Saturday Evening Post to learn about themselves and the world abroad. Facing them on the covers of the most popular issues was a perfectly frozen picture of Americana captured by Rockwell. And yet for all his achievements, he never took comfortably to the label "artist."
Paris in the last half of the 19th Century was a city on the move. It was a modern metropolis expanding into the future, with electric lights and steel towers. And yet its art was just as staid as it had been for the past 300 years. None of energy and innovation was translated onto the backwards-looking canvas. But some passionate young artists were about to rise up in revolt, to express an edgy new personal vision that would forever change art and the way we see the modern world.
Among the ranks of fed-up young artists reshaping the world of modern art was Edgar Degas. At the heart of the movement, Degas stood alone as coming from an aristocratic and wealthy family, unlike his more earthy compatriots. Yet he still managed to shock the art world by observing and painting his fellow Parisians in everyday life. His work with the female nude was particularly striking and scandalous, as he never posed his subjects as "classical artists" would. Political and socially conservative, Degas would nonetheless be branded as a rebel for his landmark works.
Enthusiasts of maverick artist Pablo Picasso will readily credit him and him alone for envisioning the bold new form of cubism, but a much quieter yet no less integral artist deserves equal mention. George Braque and Pablo Picasso enjoyed a close, collaborative relationship fueled by competitiveness, as each of their new works served as inspiration for the next great achievement. This documentary examines the relationship between Picasso and Braque and the remarkable outcome of their collaboration.
To this day, an opera by Giacomo Puccini will play to a packed house. Puccini's works -- including La Bohème -- are engaging stories set to stirring music that are still very much in demand. Rather than craft operas about mythological concepts, momentous historic events or classical literature, Puccini's stories were about of real people in relatable circumstances, inspired by Puccini's own life experience.
Most everyone can recognize the sound of opera when they hear it, but few of us know what opera really is. What is the secret to opera? Discover how the complex interplay of multiple art forms -- song, music, costume, stage direction and drama -- blur to become a truly unique experience by visiting a modern class of opera performers, learning of the historic origins of opera, and following a performance of The Marriage of Figaro.
In June 1914, a special train carried Archduke Franz Ferdinand, heir to the Austrian throne, to Sarajevo. Terrorists would strike, and a 19-year old gunman killed the Archduke and his wife. A chain-reaction disaster followed, as a web of diplomatic alliances dragged the world into a war that would kill millions, maim millions more, and bring an end to royal dominance of Europe.
Between August 1914 and November 1918, 27 countries would declare war. Over 60 million men from around the world would fight and over eight-and-a-half million would die. In the summer of 1914, none of the world's leaders set out to wage the most destructive war the world had yet known, and yet they did. Why?
There was a time where doctor-patient relationships were strictly authoritarian -- doctors did not listen, but rather prescribed -- and those suffering from mental problems endured cold and brutal recuperative programs. Sigmund Freud changed all that with the development of psychoanalysis, wherein he listened to the patient, mapped the unconscious and elevated the study of dreams from mysticism to science. Freud's bold and occasionally regrettable conclusions stirred the conservative society of his time, yet still hold considerable influence on the world today.
A protégé of Freud, Carl Gustav Jung felt that his mentor's ideas were too limiting, and he sought other sources of influence on the behavior of individuals and cultures. It was Jung's explorations that allow us to identify how we typify people and behavior into archetypes, and how the underpinnings of culture and society shape who we are. Through it all, Jung remained steadfastly committed to the strength and quality of the individual, regardless of what the outlying society dictates the norm to be.
The analysis of the mind and the exploration of human motives and behavior are some of the breakthrough areas of study in the 19th and 20th century, shaped by visionary thinkers and landmark experiments. This documentary tracks the development of the first scientific approaches of Wilhelm Wundt, the practical applications of Sigmund Freud, the controversial philosophy of eugenics and the startling discovers of B.F. Skinner and Stanley Milgram.
Born into the highest circles of Russian society, Leo Tolstoy wrestled with himself for the excesses of his aristocratic life. His conflicted journals became the basis for lifetime of writing which would produce the masterpieces War and Peace and Anna Karenina. The latter work exhausted him emotionally, causing him to discover new life with a pragmatic brand of Christianity, and live out his final days as a simple peasant.
Beginning in the 19th century, Russian writers created a national literature unparalleled in its moral and philosophical depth and intensity. They rebelled against conventions of what was expected in a novel and changed the course of world literature while facing unique political challenges. Learn more about the works of Aleksandr Pushkin, Nikolai Gogol, Ivan Turgenev, Leo Tolstoy, Feodor Dostoyevsky, Anton Chekhov, Maxim Gorky and Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn.
No other philosopher has ranged so broadly over so many topics, nor made so many discoveries than Aristotle. In ancient Greece, Aristotle differed from his mentor Plato by not attributing answers to an unseen hereafter, but rather seeking to understand life by examining the here-and-now. Aristotle's analytical leanings and quest for knowledge led to the development of logic, and his constructions continue to shape our world today, from the syllogisms employed by lawyers to win cases to the rules that define the latest computer code.
Since the dawn of time, human beings have looked at the world around them and each other and have asked questions about what they saw. Every human is a natural born philosopher, but many throughout history have risen to shape our understanding of what it is to be human.
He was plucked from poverty and illness in India and was declared to be the new messiah, groomed to bring salvation to the world. As a boy, he became the symbol of a new spiritual movement and spoke to those weary of social strife, religious dogma and materialism. As a man, he came to reject his position and instead discovered his own path. In front of throngs of followers, Jiddu Krishnamurti defied the expectations of those around him, and did not offer salvation. Instead, he called for an abandonment of religious dogma, and encouraged those who could hear him to discover their own answers.
Annie Besant was strong-willed woman in an authoritarian era. Journeying from vicar's wife to spiritual leader, Besant lived courageously and passionately. She brought attention to the working conditions of the poor, she spoke out on such radical issues as women's rights, birth control, Indian nationalism and the brotherhood of man. The common thread was her compulsion to end the world's suffering and to seek spiritual enlightenment.
One of the world's oldest civilizations, China created a complex and sophisticated culture emphasizing on order and harmony. Part of that culture was a system of health care radically different than that of the West. Today, traditional Chinese medicine is practiced well beyond China's borders. How did that happen? What is Chinese medicine? Does it really work? And if it does, how?
The world's religious beliefs as determined by compass points group the major faiths into Western spirituality (Christians, Jews and Muslims) and Eastern spirituality (Buddhist or Hindu). These faiths have much in common in the questions they ask, yet their differences in tradition are quite pronounced. In the West, death is the end of the human experience while in the East, it is on step in a continuing cycle. In the West, happiness can be achieved by the ultimate fulfillment of all desires, while in the East, fulfillment is achieved by the abolishment of all desires. In the West, there is no brook for ambiguity, while the Eastern path to enlightenment requires relinquishing the need for certainty.
The country was already singing Thomas Edison's praises for his astonishing invention of the phonograph, but that was just one of his many record-breaking number of patents. His greatest ambition was to illuminate modern life not with gas-lamps, but with electricity. The quest for the electric light bulb was filled with controversy and confrontation, and though Edison won the battle of the bulb, the conflict over current would prove to be the biggest challenge.
The US patent office is filled with a seemingly endless array of well-intentioned but ultimately ridiculous ideas for devices meant to make life better. Dog ear-warmers? Protective glasses for chickens? How do you separate a great idea from the rest? What turns an invention to an innovation? This documentary follows modern inventor Dean Kamen as he applies the ingenuity that created the Segway, the mobile dialysis machine, and the iBot, into new territory and new ideas.
The characters that Edward Stratemeyer created are some of the most endearing and enduring fictional heroes ever, and yet few know of the author's name. His prolific writing and phenomenal success drove early editors to insist he hide behind pen-names, lest it be known just how much of the volume of these early periodicals was produced by one man. He tapped into the imaginations of children, providing non-stop adventure and excitement, and his creative legacy includes Tom Swift, the Hardy Boys and Nancy Drew. The father of series fiction, Stratemeyer's characters continues to hold young readers spellbound even in this new millennium.
At least 100 ballads sing his name and his praises, telling tale of a mythical figure: outlaw, bandit, lover, a modern Robin Hood. His image was even carefully crafted by Hollywood so that Americans revered Francisco Villa as a hero. But on March 9, 1916, US troops on the southern border and were told to prepare for an invasion of Mexico. Thousands of American soldiers to join in a hunt for just one man: Villa -- idealistic revolutionary had transformed into an enemy by his shocking nighttime raid into US territory.
When the Great War erupted in 1914, the US remained on their side of the ocean, deeming it to be a solely European conflict. When German submarines targeted American civilian targets, the US had no choice but become involved. Placed in charge of the US military was John J. Pershing, veteran of the hunt for Pancho Villa. The Allies wanted American men thrown into the existing military system to alleviate their appalling casualties, but Pershing refused. Rather than disperse his troops among British and French forces, Pershing wanted to keep it as an American force. That resolve resulted in shaping what is now the modern American military.
He longed for combat, saying that he was destined for war. Serving on the punitive hunt for Pancho Villa, Patton enjoyed a brief moment of fame for gunning down some of Villa's lieutenants and returning to US camps with their bodies draped over the hood of his jeep. It was a small taste of the glory he deeply desired, a desire nearly stolen from him by an injury sustained in World War I that took him out of the thick of fighting. He would return as a ferocious, implacable military commander in World War II, as the first US General to battle against the Nazi forces. His outstanding tactics in the Mediterranean as well as his brilliant command of the mobile tank forces in Europe changed the battlefield. But Patton's belligerence, his profane and violent mood-swings that erupted on his own men, were nearly his undoing.
Easter, 1916: At noon, Dublin explodes in gunfire as a motley band of Irish rebels takes on the world's most powerful empire. They begin by hijacking a post office. Despite a fierce spirit of independence, the disorganized rebellion failed to capture the heart of the people, who branded it as a reckless, humiliating act of deplorable violence. But in the aftermath of the Rising, the British response to the captured rebels would cement their roles as martyrs and institutionalize the use of violence for political change in Ireland for the remainder of the century.
Up until the early 20th century, contemporary Irish literature barely existed in the world's imagination. Everyone looked to England for great literature. One man changed all that: William Butler Yeats set out to revive Irish literature. Countering the clichés and caricature that was the outward face of Irish culture to the uninitiated, Yeats' poetry and plays drew upon Celtic mythology and unleashed a distinctive Irish voice. The motivations driving this creative force were manifold, but unrequited love was central to Yeats' contributions.
As Ireland struggled for Independence, writer Sean O'Casey watched the needs of the poor become increasingly overlooked as matters of flag and nation took center-stage. O'Casey bristled at the hypocrisy of pompous speeches, and the jingoistic glory that accompanied fervent nationalism. He questioned what was sacred in Ireland: the words of the priests and the words of the patriots. He questioned these pillars not through editorial or ideology, but by crafting real, human characters that represent such ideas in plays that were embraced by his countrymen.
Poetry is powerful in Ireland. This harsh land, besieged by violence, poverty and strife has produced some of the world's most enduring lyric poets. Since ancient times, Ireland's poets have wielded great power, from the noble bards that accompanied the chieftains to the modern era, where the insight and commentary provided by poets have helped forge social change in the country. This documentary features Irish poets Eavan Boland, Paul Muldoon and Seamus Heaney.
Brilliant, arrogant and energetic, Winston Churchill led the nation he loved throughout World War II when Britain's very existence was threatened. In the early 1930s, Churchill was an out-of-power politician who many viewed as past his prime, but he saw the threat that Hitler posed to the world. When his prophetic concerns proved true, Churchill became Prime Minister, and his eventful life to that point had well prepared him for the struggle that lay ahead.
In 1913, the British government was under assault by its own people who were torching buildings, shattering office windows, and attacking the homes of government leaders. These revolutionaries were frustrated British women furious that their government refused to take them seriously. Their goal was simple: suffrage, the right to vote. But in Victorian England, their request was dismissed as too outrageous to be taken seriously. The press labeled these militant women "suffragettes," and they were led by the fiery Emmeline Pankhurst and her two strong-willed daughters Christabel and Sylvia. The Pankhursts helped alter the political landscape and the perception of women, but in the process, each of them paid a heavy personal price.
At the birth of the United States, the Declaration of Independence affirmed the principles and intentions of the country's founders. But when the nation was born, the principles applied almost exclusively to taxpaying property-owning white men. Only they were guaranteed suffrage: the right to vote. The majority of the population could not participate in the government, but that would change. The struggle for women's suffrage in the United States was nothing less than a social revolution. It challenged the established roles of men and women and held the government accountable to the principles on which the country had been founded: liberty and equality for all. Yet few Americans are aware of the effort that the struggle for women's suffrage entailed.
Join H.W. Brands, professor of history at the University of Texas Austin, on the changes that occurred in the late-19th and early-20th Centuries.
Begun in July of 1916, the devastating Battle of the Somme was a turning point in warfare, demarking the modern combat arena in horrific carnage. Unseasoned and poorly trained British soldiers vastly overestimated the tenacity of German forces. Despite a solid week of bombardment where over a million artillery shells rained down upon German fortifications, they stood ready for the British advance. More British soldiers died on the first day of the Battle of the Somme than any other day in the history of British warfare. As the battle slogged on, troops effectively fought within an open graveyard, as there was no time to bury the multitude of the dead. As attrition wound down the 141-day conflict, almost 420,000 British soldiers lay dead, along with 200,000 French, and nearly half-a-million Germans, and all for a questionable purpose.
He was a soldier's soldier, decorated for bravery by the British government and respected by the men in his battalion. But war had taken its toll on Siegfried Sassoon, and he felt a deep resentment against his country's military campaign. Sassoon returned from the trenches of hell in World War I to fight another battle in the halls of government back home. His resentment took the form of poetry: searing indictments that ran counter to popular opinion. This is the story of how one man's poetry and his protest against World War I shined a light of truth on the subject of war forever framed that conflict in the memory of his country.
Writer Robert Graves took many unpredictable turns on his fascinating journey through life. Though Graves would describe himself first and foremost as a poet, he was a man of enormous literary talent who wrote more than 150 books. He was eccentric, brilliant, and visionary and his vivid imagination was fueled by a volatile mixture of emotional highs and catastrophic lows. His most memorable works emerged when the world around him was falling apart. At the peak of his writing career, Graves attempted to unravel the mystery of his creative process. That effort took him on a journey across time and culture through which he envisioned a mythical female muse that he called the White Goddess.
In France's darkest hours of World War II, a lone French voice emanated from BBC radio in an attempt to rally free French forces to resist the power of invading Germany. Recognizing his value as an ally, Winston Churchill acknowledged de Gaulle as the French leader despite the fact that a national government still existed in France. As he was forced to the sidelines of Allied Command decisions, de Gaulle led military campaigns defending France's colonies, building his reputation. Despite this, he was excluded from Normandy operations. He nonetheless accompanied US forces with great theatricality as they arrived in Paris, and was soon elected head of the French government. Years after his retirement, the French people turned to de Gaulle for guidance during the Algerian crisis, but his mythic position as the face of France would end during the social upheaval of the 1960s.
They called Verdun the Meat Grinder. The Furnace. Hell. When the fighting died down, almost a year after it began, French and German armies were back where they started -- minus close to one million men. The Battle of Verdun came to symbolize the senseless slaughter of the First World War, but for the French, who won the war at enormous cost, it left a deeper and more personal mark. The soul of France was ripped out in the muddy trenches of Verdun.
In 1916, 60-year old General Henri Philippe Pétain, who'd been passed by for promotion most of his life, took charge of a horrific World War I battle that would mark France for generations. The Battle of Verdun, called the Meatgrinder, was the first in modern history where one army's goal was just to kill maximum numbers of the enemy. Amidst this death and destruction, Pétain came to life. Thirty years later, Pétain would go on trial, accused of treason at age 89. He had saved France once, on a First World War battlefield. But when his countrymen turned to him to save them again, as head of government during World War II, he failed spectacularly.
A palpable tension held its grip on Paris in 1917. It was the third disastrous year of World War I. France was losing badly -- and looking for someone to blame. In mid-February, word spread through the city that one of the most famous women in Europe had been arrested and accused of spying for Germany -- France's enemy in the war. Her name was Mata Hari.
Over the course of the 20th century, the secretive government agencies and the spies who ran them would complete the transformation of espionage from an amateur activity to a full-time profession. Nations have come to rely on spies for protection from terrorists, other spies, and attacks by enemies. Secrecy keeps their activities out of sight until a rogue agent is caught using espionage for treasonous or greedy ends, or when their efforts to protect us fail. But as spy-tools grow more and more sophisticated, one thing is certain: espionage is here to stay.
The war in East Africa was far different from the hell of the Western Front. The stories that emerged there had a human dimension, where individuals could actually put their imprint on this war. One of the most memorable and notable legends to emerge was German Colonel Paul von Lettow-Vorbeck, who led his German troops in a game of cat and mouse against the British over hundreds of miles of harsh African terrain, a game von Lettow had nearly always won.
Frederick Selous was a hunter, explorer, and celebrated author. Most of all, he was the envy of thrill-seekers everywhere, who coveted his life of mystery and danger. So large a figure was he that no less than Theodore Roosevelt considered him a hero. But when Selous first set foot in Africa decades earlier, he was a lost teenager with a big dream of finding adventure on the African continent. He had no idea what lay ahead.
As the only man to sign both the Treaty of Versailles at the end of World War I and the Paris Peace Treaty that brought an end to World War II, Jan Christiaan Smuts was a voice for democracy and freedom. He also helped draft the charter of the United Nations. But back in his native South Africa, Smuts' policies were anything but forward-thinking. This man gifted with insight and charisma did not use these talents to push for a more inclusive racial vision, which could have saved the country decades of trauma and strife.
In 1953, Albert Schweitzer won the Nobel Prize for peace, and magazines and newspaper articles were calling him "the greatest man in the world." He was one of the most unlikely candidates for such accolades -- having spent the majority of his life working as a doctor, tending to the poor in a remote corner of Africa. In addition to being a doctor, Schweitzer was a concert organist and a respected theologian, but it was for uncovering a simple philosophy that he won the Nobel Prize. He called his way of thinking and living "Reverence for Life."
The Congo encompasses a million square miles of the richest land in Africa. Yet despite that wealth -- or perhaps because of it -- throughout their history the Congolese would nearly starve to death, economically and politically. Their vast riches would bring only suffering, corruption, and death.
As the 20th century approached, governments all over Europe were doing their best to win the deadly game of the arms race. But some of their subjects were beginning to fear that if the arms race led to a real war, there would be no victors. Modern weapons, argued the pacifists, had become too powerful, too destructive. If they were unleashed they might destroy Europe and roll back centuries of cultural, scientific and economic progress.
When World War I began, the rival armies charged into battle with frightening new weapons that seemed ready to change the very nature of war. One promising new piece of military hardware -- the airplane -- wasn't quite ready to hit its mark. That didn't stop a few passionate advocates from making big plans for airplanes, or from dreaming up ways to use them in war. By the end of the war these visionaries would transform the flimsy airplanes of 1914 into powerful and dependable weapons, and take war where it had rarely gone before: beyond the two dimensional realm of our planet's surface, into the third dimension of the air above.
Today, historians and aviation buffs still celebrate the Red Baron as the ideal fighter pilot. A daring knight of the sky who helped write the book on aerial combat during the world's first air war. For the man behind the myth, however, the real story is a tale of disillusionment; a blood red saga in which ancient ideals of chivalry, honor and duty came crashing down in the fires of modern war.
In a war that claimed millions of lives, most who served in the military fought because they had no choice. But the high flying men of the Lafayette Escadrille were different: they didn't have to be there. They were American adventurers who volunteered for World War One long before their country joined. They were lawyers, authors, heirs to banking and railroad fortunes, Ivy League graduates, friends of royalty, sons of privilege. All they wanted was a chance to fly. The young pilots came to the war with romantic ideas of adventure and heroism. They had no idea what they were in for.
On November 11, 1918, the Germans laid down their arms, finally ending World War I. In the surrender agreement, the Allies listed the numbers of cannons, machine guns and other weapons that Germany had to turn over. Yet of 1,700 airplanes demanded, only one type was so feared that it was mentioned by name: the D-7. The deadly machine was the masterwork of a 28 year-old Dutchman who had become Germany's most skilled -- and unconventional -- plane maker: Anthony Fokker.
Karl, the last Emperor of Austria and King of Hungary, was labeled a traitor and failure during his lifetime. His own people exiled him. Still, there has been recognition that perhaps Karl's short reign should be remembered less for his failures than for his unsuccessful yet sincere attempts to transform his empire and bring an end to World War I.
In 1991, the Soviet Union, one of the most powerful nations on Earth, collapsed. Born in socialist revolution almost three-quarters of a century earlier, its birth in 1917 sent shockwaves around the world. Right from the start, the Russian Revolution promised a better world of equality, dignity, and social justice. What happened to those promises?
To create the utopian world he envisioned, Lenin did what he thought he had to. His violent seizure of power -- and the harsh measures he took to hold onto it -- inspired generations of revolutionaries, and dictators. Brilliant and driven, Lenin wanted to change history. He did, but not in the way he expected.
Fearless, strong-willed and always a champion of the modern, Sergei Diaghilev discovered a talented group of artists and inspired them to reach new creative heights. Diaghilev wasn't a dancer, choreographer or composer, but he was the impresario, and the show couldn't go on without him. Together, they shaped ballet into a new art form, leaving an indelible mark on art for the 20th Century.
Beautiful and effortless, ballet is one of the world's most elegant art forms -- the human body as poetry in motion. Achieving and maintaining the artful illusion of ballet is all-important; but it's just that, an illusion meant to appear effortless. What kind of commitment does it take for dancers to master the unmistakable yet rigorous style of ballet? And where does that commitment lead young dancers in their pursuit of excellence?
Franz Kafka had made his living as an attorney in an insurance company, where he'd eked out an obscure and unexceptional life. But when the lawyer put pen to paper, the writer conjured a disturbing world where the absurd was commonplace and reality a nightmare. Since his death, Franz Kafka's work has become enormously influential. It remains unrivaled for its intensity, modernity and prescience.
The Ottoman Empire once spanned three continents, stretching from Budapest to Basra to Algiers. Founded around 1300, it created a rich, multi-ethnic world that was Islamic in faith and tolerant in practice. But by the early 20th century, the Empire was under attack from without and challenged from within. When World War broke out in 1914, the Ottomans had to choose sides. They cast their lot with Germany and Austria, and against Britain, France, and Russia. That decision would lead to the Empire's final destruction -- and the creation of the modern Middle East.
He was an action hero as well as an intellectual hero. T.E. Lawrence escaped a safe office job during World War I to become a guerilla war mastermind in desert combat, fighting alongside Arabs to throw off the rule of the Ottoman Empire. But despite British promises of Arab independence, the Middle East would end up being carved by European colonial treaties, and Lawrence faced the challenges of keeping his word to his trusted compatriots of the desert.
Join H.W. Brands, professor of history at the University of Texas Austin, on an hour-long lecture on the wars and revolutions of the early 20th Century..
Ernest Hemingway was the best-selling, most celebrated author of his time. He wove war, love, pain and death into unforgettable patchworks of prose, and sought adventure and craved risk. Behind a cheerful façade were wounds much deeper than any physical ones sustained in an eventful lifetime. Hemingway battled devastating personal wounds he found impossible to shake.
For almost two hundred years one group of fighting men has held an unrivaled grip on the world's imagination. Shadowy pasts have made them outcasts. Glorious victories have made them heroes. And bitter defeats -- often in hopeless battles to the death -- have transformed them into legends. They are the men of the French Foreign Legion. Today, the mystique that surrounds these unusual soldiers still fascinates, still draws young men to enlist in their ranks.
In 1905, all of New York was riveted by the story of Lily Bart, a stunning young woman hoping to claim her place in society through marriage to a wealthy man. As her prospects for marriage unraveled, Lily's life spiraled downward. No longer the toast of New York society, she ended up in a rooming house, alone and penniless. After drinking an overdose of sleeping medication, she died. This tragic figure whose story so captivated New York was not real. She was a character in the novel The House of Mirth. The writer who exposed the dark side of High Society was herself a member of it; Edith Wharton was in a unique position to chronicle -- and critique the upper class. She did -- mercilessly -- and her literary success came at a price.
Over the course of his illustrious career, Lowell Thomas was an adventurer, a showman, the most familiar voice in radio, a television personality and a media pioneer. He was one of the first to be called a newscaster, but through it all, one thing always was true about Lowell Thomas: he was a supreme storyteller.
At the end of World War I, the Ottoman Empire paid the ultimate price for choosing the wrong side. The winners, Britain and France, marched in and began to carve it up. Then an army arose out of nowhere, expelled the invaders from its homeland, and proclaimed the Republic of Turkey. All because of one man, Mustafa Kemal, or, as he came to be known, Atatürk -- father of the Turks. Enormously ambitious for himself and his people, Atatürk saw independence as just the beginning. He would not only transform the government, but also how people dressed, worshipped, wrote, and named themselves -- individually and as a nation.
In novels, memoirs, and essays, the Turkish writer Halide Edib chronicled the most cataclysmic change in the history of her country: its creation after World War I from the ashes of the Ottoman Empire. She not only wrote about it, she was one of the creators. And in that process, she helped secure a prominent place in public life for Turkish women. But in 1919, her country was about to become a colony. British and Greek invaders patrolled key cities, and wanted more. In occupied Istanbul, Halide Edib put down her pen, sent her two young sons away to safety abroad, and headed to the hills to join a small rebel band fighting for freedom. For Halide Edib, the choice was clear: she had to go. But she also kept a record of events -- memoirs -- for the youth on both sides fighting and dying around her, and for her own sons, far away.
The Ottoman Empire lasted some 600 years, and spanned three continents. It was not only their military campaigns that made the Ottomans a force to be reckoned with for centuries. In an era when neighboring states persecuted, exiled, or massacred their minorities, the Islamic Ottoman state was willing to tolerate difference. Its subjects included not only Muslims, but large numbers of Christians and Jews. As Ottoman power eventually ebbed, the diversity that been a strength in one era became a weakness in another. Changing political forces within and without the Empire created a toxic stew of ethnic and religious hatred. That hatred would finally boil over amid the carnage of World War I, and contribute to the Ottoman Empire's own death rattle.
Few figures are so well known and strike as much terror as that of the vampire known as "Dracula." This creature -- not yet dead, but no longer alive -- has at one time or another tempted, fascinated and repelled us all. When writer Bram Stoker published Dracula in 1897, he couldn't have predicted that he was creating a figure who was larger than death. Today, he might be timeless, but in the 15th century, he was all too real. His name was Prince Vlad Dracula whom history has come to know as Vlad the Impaler. In many ways, the reality of Dracula's life was more terrifying than the fiction he helped inspire, his story more shocking than anything Hollywood could manufacture.
In 1915, a Polish scholar named Bronislaw Malinowski landed on a tiny island off the coast of New Guinea. He had come as an anthropologist -- a scientist who studies the origins and behavior of human kind. He had come to investigate the lifestyle, customs and beliefs of the people who lived there. The methods he would develop to conduct his investigation would change anthropology forever.
For over 100 years anthropologists have been learning from people in every corner of our world, and using the data they gather to create a group portrait of the human race. And wherever they find their subjects -- whether they live on the other side of the globe or just down the block, hang out in a tropical rainforest, a corporate boardroom or a parking lot, anthropologists help us to understand our fellow human beings, and our selves
A land of mystery and danger, it's been said that New Guinea contains more strange and new and beautiful things than any other part of the globe. Located off the coast of southeast Asia just North of Australia, this rugged and vast tropical island was one of the last places on Earth to be explored by white men. Tantalizing glimpses of the fierce people who lived in New Guinea as well as the island's stunning plant and animal life have long lured Western adventurers looking to make new discoveries. They were not disappointed.
In May 1919, six months after the end of the Great War in Europe, a French train departed from Berlin, carrying the German delegation to the Paris Peace Conference. The victors decided to meet in Paris to begin the daunting task of rebuilding the world and making a lasting peace settlement with Germany. In a clash of personalities and agendas, facing unimaginable circumstances, the world's leaders met for six months to try to deliver that promise. But just a few years later, their plan for peace would unravel, catapulting the world toward the very tragedy they had wanted to prevent... Was it their fault? Or was it inevitable?
In 1913, 56 year old Woodrow Wilson was inaugurated President of the United States. He came to the job with little practical experience. Still, he arrived in Washington confident, determined to change America. Just over a year after he assumed office, World War I swept across Europe, and Wilson became committed to not just changing the United States, but to changing the world. Although Wilson didn't live long enough to see his dream of lasting international cooperation become reality, decades after his death, in the somber aftermath of World War II, his ideals once again took center stage.
On March 20, 2003, the United States invaded Iraq. Saddam Hussein, the dictator who'd controlled this nation for nearly 25 years was deposed. Many Iraqis celebrated this turning point. However, before long the troops the Iraqis had greeted as liberators were viewed as occupiers. This wasn't the first time these scenes had played out on the streets of Baghdad. In the aftermath of World War I, the British faced nearly the same situation when they took control. One of those challenged was a fiercely independent archaeologist, map-maker and intelligence officer who'd come to know the region as few westerners had. Her name was Gertrude Bell.
In the summer of 1966, the United States found itself in a war it couldn't win, against an enemy it didn't understand. For the Americans, it was a war against Communism. But for the Vietnamese, it was a war to break free from centuries of foreign oppression. At this pivotal moment in their history, they were led by one man who would stop at nothing to free his people. They called him Uncle Ho. To the rest of the world, he was Ho Chi Minh. Millions of Vietnamese would pay the price for Ho Chi Minh's vision of a free Vietnam. A vision that was as bold as it was unbreakable.
Paul Robeson was great at everything he did. And he did a lot: an acclaimed singer, actor, all-American football player, Ivy-league educated lawyer, prize-winning orator. Robeson spoke over a dozen languages in a bass-baritone voice that moved people. But when Robeson used that voice to disagree with the political establishment, people turned on him.
Since our ancestors first stood on two legs, we've looked up at the universe with wonder. And we've been lighting up the night sky since the Chinese first invented rockets some 2000 years ago. In the early 1900s, American inventor Robert Goddard brought space and rockets together -- and launched a new era in human history.
Jazz was born in America, in cotton fields and cities... in brothels and churches. In the opera house, and the night club... jazz was music of the people. It began as part of a quest for freedom among those who were disenfranchised. From their struggle, it became a platform for self-expression. For more than one hundred years, jazz has been played throughout America, and everywhere it has been played, it has been more than just a style. It has been more than just a technique. It has been a way of liberation through music.
In the 1920s the sprawling, brawling, skyscraper-studded city of Chicago ruled the American heartland. And one man seemed to rule Chicago. A racketeer, pimp, bootlegger and cold-blooded killer named Al Capone. Capone's empire lasted just six blood-soaked years. But his image as the ultimate American mobster still survives, decades after his days of gangland glory.
On October 10th, 1919, for the first time in American history, lawmakers voted to change the Constitution and strip away one of people's personal freedoms. Prohibition, the 18th amendment, outlawed alcohol. Many Americans believed Prohibition --later called the Noble Experiment -- would last forever, bringing the country closer to God and family. Instead, the 14 years under Prohibition are remembered for binge drinking, illegal parties, promiscuity, organized crime, and reckless disrespect for morality and government.
In the late '20s, gangland killings were tearing Chicago apart, as mob leader Al Capone battled to be top dog. Valentine's Day 1929 was be a bad day to be in Chicago if you worked for the competition. Newly elected President Herbert Hoover was outraged, and declared a war on crime in his inaugural speech. Within months, an elite squad of federal investigators called the Capone Squad, AKA the Untouchables, hit the streets of Chicago. The man in charge was the hard-driving, bright-eyed, and squeaky clean 26 year old, Eliot Ness. Capone's path was clear. He was going straight to hell. But Ness's path took a series of unexpected turns. The man who could track down bad guys with ease, wouldn't always detect the secret malice in people's hearts.
At the height of his career, Louis Armstrong and his band toured Europe. The sextet had come to perform America's greatest export -- jazz -- but Armstrong's adoring audiences knew him as much more than a musician. He was known as the ambassador of goodwill. Armstrong's joyous stage presence electrified audiences, but many of them didn't know he was the father of jazz itself. He pushed music into the 20th Century by inventing a new way of playing. By doing so, he helped to change the world of music, and the culture we live in, forever.
Chicago in the roaring twenties was a hotbed of activity -- mostly criminal. Mobsters controlled gambling and the flow of alcohol, and they brutally exacted their revenge on their rivals. It was a bloody way of life for gangsters, but newspapermen had a field day. Ben Hecht was a reporter who could find and tell great stories, bringing the harsh realities of Chicago life on to the front page with a human dimension. Exploring the human condition with words would always be important to Hecht, even when he traded the back alleys of Chicago for Hollywood's back-lots, becoming tinsel-town's most respected screenwriter.
On July 14, 1919, French, British and American troops paraded down the Champs-Élysées in Paris, celebrating their triumph in the bloody trenches of World War I. But one American regiment was missing from the Allied ranks. It hadn't been sidelined by injury or a poor service record. In fact, the 369th Infantry was one of the most decorated regiments in the war. The men -- nicknamed the Harlem Hellfighters -- were excluded for one simple reason: they were black.
Perhaps no artistic medium has acted as a more accurate cultural barometer than the popular song -- charting the nation's passions and pastimes with color and immediacy. In the early 20th century, Americans reveled in new found comfort, convenience and prosperity. A group of creative businessmen on Tin Pan Alley celebrated their arrival in song.
"All the things I really like to do are either immoral, illegal or fattening." / "That woman speaks 18 languages and can't say no in any of them." / "Why don't you get out of that wet coat and into a dry martini?" / "Anything can happen, but it usually doesn't." / "Beauty is only skin deep, but ugly goes clean to the bone." -- New York City. 1920. The First World War was over. Flush with victory and dreams of riches, America was ready for something new. Manhattan was the place to be. New Yorkers were feeling confident and sassy. The connoisseurs of the new culture could be found at a daily lunch at a circular table inside a hotel called the Algonquin. They became known as the Algonquin Round Table.
The year was 1927, and the New York theater district called 'Broadway' was entering what would be its greatest season in history. More than 264 shows were going to open that year -- and as many as 11 would open on a single night. Every new production was an overflowing of talent that was expressly American. In the years following World War I, America's identity came into sharp focus, and it did so on the Broadway stage.
He was unmistakable. With his suave demeanor, impeccable wardrobe and bullet head, on screen Erich von Stroheim played sadistic and sometimes seductive Prussians. As a director, von Stroheim earned a reputation for unparalleled egomania, arrogance and self indulgence. Though he was fired by nearly every studio he worked for and most of his films he directed were finished by others, or destroyed, what remains offers a glimpse of one of Hollywood's pioneers, one whom everyone loved to hate.
To the outside world Hollywood seemed like a magic place. Here, the sun was always shining, everyone had a swimming pool, and glamorous people earned enormous salaries working in factories called movie studios. Every year millions of fans bought tickets to see the studios' latest releases, but no one traveled farther to get here, or worked harder to get to the top, than the men who built the studios and ruled them like feudal overlords. Men who started out with nothing, and transformed themselves into Hollywood's movie Moguls.
Named for one of Hollywood's most legendary filmmakers, the Thalberg Award is given to "creative producers personally responsible for a consistently high quality of motion picture production." A standard of quality set during Hollywood's golden age, by Irving G. Thalberg himself.
People called it the Dust Bowl, an environmental disaster that struck the Great Plains in the late 1930s, when the country was already reeling under the Depression. John Steinbeck's best-selling novel, The Grapes of Wrath, profiled some of the hardest hit: tenant farmers forced off their land and into migrant labor far from home. When the movie version was announced, people worried that Hollywood would ruin it. They didn't need to. It was directed by John Ford.
Join H.W. Brands, professor of history at the University of Texas Austin, on the societal movements and massive cultural changes of the early 20th century.
