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The Dust Bowl

Season 1 2012
TV-14

  • 2012-11-18T13:00:00Z on PBS
  • 1h 53m
  • 3h 56m (2 episodes)
  • United States
  • English
  • Documentary
THE DUST BOWL, a film by Ken Burns, chronicles the worst man-made ecological disaster in American history, in which the frenzied wheat boom of the "Great Plow-Up," followed by a decade-long drought during the 1930s nearly swept away the breadbasket of the nation. Vivid interviews with twenty-six survivors of those hard times, combined with dramatic photographs and seldom seen movie footage, bring to life stories of incredible human suffering and equally incredible human perseverance. It is also a morality tale about our relationship to the land that sustains us—a lesson we ignore at our peril.

2 episodes

Series Premiere

2012-11-18T13:00:00Z

1x01 The Great Plow-Up

Series Premiere

1x01 The Great Plow-Up

  • 2012-11-18T13:00:00Z1h 58m

The grasslands of the southern Plains were rapidly turned into wheat fields. Then following the early years of the drought, storms killed crops and livestock and literally rearranged the landscape. The worst storm of them all was on April 14, 1935—Black Sunday—a searing experience for everyone caught in it, including a young songwriter from Pampa, Texas, named Woody Guthrie.

Season Finale

2012-11-19T13:00:00Z

1x02 Reaping the Whirlwind

Season Finale

1x02 Reaping the Whirlwind

  • 2012-11-19T13:00:00Z1h 58m

Black Sunday was only halfway through the decade-long crisis. The storms continued. The Great Depression still affected people. Government programs were instituted to help. Learn what FDR’s administration did to try to keep the southern Plains from becoming a North American Sahara desert. Find out why some residents finally decided they had to give up and move somewhere else and how some held on.

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