American Experience: Season 16
Season 16 Lore Primer
Key plot threads, lore context, and character stakes you need to remember before diving into this season.
- Directly follows the overarching narrative developments of American Experience Season 15.
- Faction dynamics and core character alliances shift under escalating external stakes.
- Crucial mysteries introduced previously reach key turning points and narrative reckonings.
- Sets up serialized story arcs that build directly toward the climactic season finale.
Episode Guide
Season 16 Progress Shield
New York (8): The Center of the World
Sep 8, 2003 · 55 min
Filmmaker Ric Burns adds a poignant postscript to his series "New York: A Documentary Film" with this chronicle of the World Trade Center's rise and fall. Burns recounts Sept. 11 w
Reconstruction: The Second Civil War (1): Revolution
Jan 12, 2004 · 55 min
"Reconstruction: The Second Civil War," a two-part report, follows political leaders and ordinary Americans alike as it chronicles one of the most contentious periods in American h
Reconstruction: The Second Civil War (2): Retreat
Jan 13, 2004 · 55 min
"Reconstruction" concludes by following whites and blacks in Georgia, South Carolina and Louisiana between 1867 and 1877. It begins with the granting of widespread voting rights fo
Citizen King
Jan 19, 2004 · 55 min
"Citizen King," a reverential chronicle of the final five years of Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.'s life, employs eyewitnesses to the history King made to recall it. Among them: Coret
Remember the Alamo
Feb 2, 2004 · 55 min
"Remember the Alamo" recalls the contributions of Tejanos (Hispanic Texans) to the struggle for Texan independence. It profiles Tejano leader Jose Antonio Navarro (1795-1871), an a
Tupperware!
Feb 9, 2004 · 55 min
"Modern dishes for modern living" (and they "burped," no less), sold by women at "home parties." This slice of 1950s Americana is recalled in "Tupperware!" "The era and the product
Emma Goldman
Apr 12, 2004 · 55 min
Recalling Emma Goldman (1869-1940), the fiery and formidable radical whose life, says narrator Blair Brown, was "dedicated to free speech, free thought and free love." This profile
Patriots Day
Apr 19, 2004 · 55 min
"Patriots Day" follows Revolutionary War re-enactors as they prepare to re-fire those shots heard 'round the world on April 19, 1775, in Lexington and Concord. Filmmaker Marian Mar
Golden Gate Bridge
May 3, 2004 · 55 min
Recalling the construction of the Golden Gate Bridge, a "graceful leap over an unprecedented space," as narrator David Ogden Stiers calls it. The Golden Gate presented its engineer