AMERICAN EXPERIENCE

AFTER THE MAYFLOWER

SATURDAY, OCTOBER 23 @ 7:00PM

In March of 1621, in what is now southeastern Massachusetts, Massasoit, the leading sachem of the Wampanoag, sat down to negotiate with a ragged group of English colonists. Hungry, dirty, and sick, the pale-skinned foreigners were struggling to stay alive; they were in desperate need of Native help.

Massasoit faced problems of his own. His people had lately been decimated by unexplained sickness, leaving them vulnerable to the rival Narragansett to the west. The Wampanoag sachem calculated that a tactical alliance with the foreigners would provide a way to protect his people and hold his Native enemies at bay. He agreed to give the English the help they needed.
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WALLANDER, SERIES II

THE FIFTH WOMAN

FRIDAY, OCTOBER 22 @ 7:30PM & 10:30PM

A bird-watcher falls to his painful death while being observed by a masked figure. A florist with a violent past has gone missing, stains of blood spotting the floor in his orchid-lined shop. Inspector Kurt Wallander (Kenneth Branagh) is torn between two disparate murders while dealing with one harsh and heartbreaking reality — the demise of his father. When another victim is found, it is clear that a serial killer is at work in Ystad. It is one of Wallander’s most personal and harrowing cases — one that will even bring him into an unexpected kinship with a killer.

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PATTY GRIFFIN & FRIENDS

SATURDAY, OCTOBER 16 @ 9:00PM

Patty Griffin’s remarkable ability to copiously fill every note on her newest album with the soulful passion of a gospel veteran leaves even the most discerning gospel critics in awe. And with her fifth appearance on the Austin City Limit stage, Griffin, and her group of special guests, will be inspiring awe with her “uplifting, moving, and exquisite” (Slant Magazine) live performance.

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EMPERORS OF THE ICE

THURSDAY, OCTOBER 14 @ 8:00PM & 11:00PM

Antarctica. The last place on Earth. It’s a continent lost to eternal ice – yet in this frozen desert, there is life. Antarctica is home to a unique ecosystem – and no other creature embodies this frozen continent like the Emperor penguin. Tthe Emperor is the largest diving bird on the planet. Emperor penguins are the only species to breed in the frozen night of the Antarctic winter. They are sublimely built to conquer the cold – but in a world threatened by climate change, can they take the heat? Biologists Drs. Jerry Kooyman and Paul Ponganis are on a mission to find out and dive deep into the lives of the magnificent Emperor penguin.

SOUL OF A NATION/OF GOD AND CAESAR

WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 13@ 7:00PM & 10:00PM

God in America examines the potent and complex interaction between religion and democracy, the origins of the American concept of religious liberty, and the controversial evolution of that ideal in the nation’s courts and political arena. The series considers the role religious ideas and institutions have played in social reform movements from abolition to civil rights, examining the impact of religious faith on conflicts from the American Revolution to the Cold War, and how guarantees of religious freedom created a competitive American religious marketplace.

Episode Five, “Soul of a Nation”

Hour Five explores the post-World War II era, when rising evangelist Billy Graham tried to inspire a religious revival that fused faith with patriotism in a Cold War battle with “godless communism.” As Americans flocked in record numbers to houses of worship, non-believers and religious minorities appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court to test the constitutionality of religious expression in public schools. And civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr. emerged as a modern-day prophet, calling upon the nation to honor both biblical teachings and the founders’ democratic ideals of equal justice.

Episode Six, “Of God and Caesar”

The final hour of God in America brings the series into the present day, exploring the religious and political aspirations of conservative evangelicals’ moral crusade over divisive social issues like abortion and gay marriage. Their embrace of presidential politics would end in disappointment and questions about the mixing of religion and politics. Across America, the religious marketplace expanded as new waves of immigrants from Asia, the Middle East and Latin America made the United States the most religiously diverse nation on earth. In the 2008 presidential election, the re-emergence of a religious voice in the Democratic Party brought the country to a new plateau in its struggle to reconcile faith with politics. God in America closes with reflections on the role of faith in the public life of the country, from the ongoing quest for religious liberty to the enduring idea of America as the “city on a hill” envisioned by the Puritans nearly 400 years ago.

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WALLANDER, SERIES II

THE MAN WHO SMILED

FRIDAY, OCTOBER 15 @ 7:30PM & 10:30PM

Gustaf Torstensson quietly chants “Mea culpa, mea culpa,” as he drives to his death. His son Sten Torstensson, a friend of Inspector Kurt Wallander (Kenneth Branagh), begs the detective to investigate the suspicious case — Wallander is his last hope. But hope has all but drained from Wallander’s life, as he’s now on indefinite leave from his work and has been all but forgotten after enduring an on-the-job trauma. When Sten is found dead, an apparent suicide, Wallander is drawn back to inquire. The clues and suspects are provocative enough — postcards with death threats, a respected and reviled philanthropist working in Africa and a former cop tormented by his own personal demons.

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AN AMERICAN ORIGINAL

THURSDAY, OCTOBER 7 @ 8:00PM & 11:00PM

The dawn of the 20th century was a fluid time in America. Mass production was at a fever pitch, traditional values were in flux, the roles of men and women were changing, and America’s consumer culture was emerging. A new aesthetic was also entering the vernacular – Arts and Crafts. It evolved out of a socialist movement in England that rejected the dehumanizing effect of mechanization in favor of honest craftsmanship.

Elbert Hubbard was one of the most influential forces in American business as the new century opened and the Roycroft artisan community that he founded in East Aurora, New York was the first and most successful purveyor of Arts and Crafts in the nation.
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MICHAEL FEINSTEIN’S AMERICAN SONGBOOK

A New Step Every Day

WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 20@ 6:00PM

Throughout a long golden era, the American movie musical transformed Hollywood into a Mecca for the biggest singing stars and leading songwriters of the ’30s, ’40s, and ’50s. Hosted by Michael Feinstein, THE GREAT AMERICAN SONGBOOK offers a dazzling parade of American popular songs as seen and heard in some of the most beloved films ever made. With stars ranging from Al Jolson to Judy Garland to Frank Sinatra, and sounds from the Gilded Age to New Orleans jazz to Broadway musicals, THE GREAT AMERICAN SONGBOOK tells the story of the first 50 years of American popular music. Whether it was from the vaudeville stage or Tin Pan Alley, on the radio or the record player, it all found its way to the silver screen. This treasure trove of musical clips overflows with the very best of George Gershwin, Irving Berlin, Jerome Kern, Lorenz Hart, Richard Rodgers, Oscar Hammerstein II, Cole Porter, Harold Arlen, and many more artists.

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The Most Dangerous Man in America:

Daniel Ellsberg and the Pentagon Papers

TUESDAY, JUNE 7 @ 6:00pm & 9 :00am

In 1971, Daniel Ellsberg, a leading Vietnam War strategist, concludes that America’s role in the war is based on decades of lies. He leaks 7,000 pages of top-secret documents to The New York Times, a daring act of conscience that leads directly to Watergate, President Nixon’s resignation and the end of the Vietnam War. Ellsberg and a who’s-who of Vietnam-era movers and shakers give a riveting account of those world-changing events in POV’s The Most Dangerous Man in America: Daniel Ellsberg and the Pentagon Papers by award-winning filmmakers Judith Ehrlich (The Good War and Those Who Refused to Fight It) and Rick Goldsmith (Tell the Truth and Run: George Seldes and the American Press). A co-production of ITVS in association with American Documentary/POV.

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Keepers of the Deep

Monday, October 4 @ 8:30pm & 11:30pm

Georgia Aquarium: Keepers of the Deep brings viewers up close and personal with creatures at the Georgia Aquarium, including whale sharks, beluga whales and a couple of spunky sea otters named Oz and Gracie. Go behind the scenes to see how scientists, engineers and veterinarians maintain the world’s largest aquarium, located 300 miles inland of the nearest ocean.

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