Summary: In the late 19th century, as America's teeming cities grew increasingly congested, the time had come to replace the nostalgic horse-drawn trolleys with a faster, cleaner, safer, and more efficient form of transportation. Ultimately, it was Boston, a city of so many firsts that overcame a litany of engineering challenges, the greed-driven interests of businessmen, and the great fears of its...

Format: moving image

Publisher / Publication Date: 2017

Copies Available at Woodmere

Summary: "On June 12, 1970, Dock Ellis threw a no-hitter for the Pittsburgh Pirates. In 136 years of baseball history, only 276 no-hitters have been recorded. Dock is the only pitcher to ever claim he accomplished his while high on LSD. During his 12 years in the major leagues, Dock lived the expression "Black is Beautiful!" He wore curlers on the field. He stepped out of his Cadillac wearing the widest...

Format: moving image

Publisher / Publication Date: 2014

Copies Available at Woodmere

Summary: In 1960, a filmmaking group was granted direct access to John F. Kennedy, filming him on the campaign trail and eventually in the Oval Office. This resulted in three films of remarkable, behind-closed-doors intimacy, Primary, Adventures on the New Frontier, and Crisis, and, following the president's assassination, the poetic short Faces of November. Collected here are all four of these titles,...

Format: moving image

Publisher / Publication Date: 2016

Copies Available at Woodmere

Rockwell, Anne F.

Summary: The true story of James Lafayette, a spy in the American Revolution. After America won its freedom, James returned to slavery. But James's fight for freedom wasn't over.

Format: moving image

Publisher / Publication Date: 2017

Copies Available at Woodmere

Summary: Narrated by Tony-and Academy Award-winner Joel Grey, this entertaining documentary mingles cultural history with illuminating perspectives on the origins and meanings of some of Broadway's most beloved songs, stories, and shows. With performances by Matthew Broderick, Kelli O'Hara, Zero Mostel, Nathan Lane, Barbra Streisand, Idina Menzel, Kristin Chenoweth, and many more!

Format: moving image

Publisher / Publication Date: 2021

Copies Available at Woodmere

Summary: "Frontline investigates the causes of the worst economic crisis in 70 years and how the government responded. [The film] chronicles the inside stories of the Bear Stearns deal, the Lehman Brothers' collapse, the propping up of insurance giant AIG and the $700 billion bailout. The film examines what Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson and Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke didn't see, couldn't...

Format: moving image

Publisher / Publication Date: WGBH Educational Foundation 2009

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Summary: Bill Traylor was born into slavery in 1853 on a cotton plantation in rural Alabama, and continued to farm the land until the late 1920s when he moved to Montgomery and worked odd jobs in the thriving segregated black neighborhood. A decade later, in his late 80s, Traylor became homeless and started to draw and paint, devising his visual language to depict his memories of slavery and scenes of a...

Format: moving image

Publisher / Publication Date: 2021

Copies Available at Woodmere

Summary: From Baryshnikov to break dancing, from Fred and Ginger to Shirley and Bojangles, from movement depicted on Grecian urns to the kaleidoscopic pizzazz of Busby Berkely spectaculars.

Format: moving image

Publisher / Publication Date: 2007

Copies Available at Woodmere

Summary: "Tells the unforgettable story of the 250,000 teenagers who left their homes and hopped freight trains during the Great Depression"--Container.

Format: moving image

Publisher / Publication Date: 2005

Copies Available at Woodmere

Summary: In 1969 the police raided the Stonewall Inn, a gay bar in New York City's Greenwich Village, leading to three nights of rioting by the city's LGBT community. With this outpouring of courage and unity the gay liberation movement had begun. Newly restored for the 50th anniversary of the Stonewall Riots, this documentary pries open the closet door, setting free the dramatic story of survival,...

Format: moving image

Publisher / Publication Date: 2019

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Summary: Filmmaker Byron Hurt looks at the past and future of soul food, covering its roots in Western Africa, its incarnation in the American South, and the role it plays in the health crisis in the African American community. Examines the socioeconomics of the modern American diet, and how the food industry profits from producing cheap calories while healthy options remain expensive and hard to find.

Format: moving image

Publisher / Publication Date: PBS 2013

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Summary: Chronicling the riveting history and personal experiences, at once liberating and challenging, harrowing and inspiring, deeply revealing and profoundly transforming, of African Americans on the road from the advent of the automobile through the seismic changes of the 1960s and beyond, it explores the deep background of a recent phrase rooted in realities that have been an indelible part of the...

Format: moving image

Publisher / Publication Date: 2021

Copies Available at Woodmere

Summary: By the mid-1980s, the fabled animation studios of Walt Disney had fallen on hard times. The artists were polarized between newcomers hungry to innovate and old timers not yet ready to relinquish control. The following is no fairy tale. It's the true story of how Disney regained its magic with a staggering output of hits such as The Little Mermaid, Beauty and the Beast, Aladdin, The Lion King,...

Format: moving image

Publisher / Publication Date: Buena Vista Home Entertainment 2010

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Summary: Solidarity! All for One and One for All!₄ Founded in Chicago in 1905, the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW) took to organizing unskilled workers into one big union and changed the course of American history. This compelling documentary of the IWW (or The Wobblies' as they were known) tells the story of workers in factories, sawmills, wheat fields, forests, mines, and on the docks as they...

Format: moving image

Publisher / Publication Date: 2022

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Summary: A unique glimpse at more than fifty years of American history. Educator, civil rights champion, advisor to presidents, envoy to popes, theologian and activist, Rev. Theodore Hesburgh was called on by countless world leaders to tackle the most challenging issues of the day. He built a reputation as a savvy political operator with a penchant for bridging the divide between bitter enemies. Through...

Format: moving image

Publisher / Publication Date: 2019

Copies Available at Woodmere

Summary: Nineteen graduates of the Class of '69 of the all women's Skidmore College discuss what it was like to live through the tumultuous era of the late '60s and how the experience defined and empowered them as women.

Format: moving image

Publisher / Publication Date: 2016

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Summary: On March 8, 1971, eight ordinary citizens broke into an FBI office in Media, Pennsylvania, a town just outside of Philadelphia, took hundreds of secret files, and shared them with the public. In doing so, they uncovered the FBI's vast and illegal regime of spying and intimidation of Americans exercising their First Amendment rights. Despite conducting one of the most thorough investigations in...

Format: moving image

Publisher / Publication Date: 2015

Copies Available at Woodmere

Summary: Filmed in Georgia, Kentucky, Ohio, Tennessee, Virginia, and West Virginia, the movie uncovers an unexpected set of artists, poets, activists, queer musicians, 'Affrilachian' poets, and intersectional feminists, all unexpected voices emerging form this historically misunderstood region.

Format: moving image

Publisher / Publication Date: Passion River 2019

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Summary: The three-part natural history series merges science, culture, and history and brings audiences along for an unforgettable voyage through hundreds of millions of years of history.

Format: moving image

Publisher / Publication Date: 2020

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Summary: The show takes audiences inside the hearts and minds of the Sesame Street creators, artists, and educators who established one of the most influential and enduring children's programs in television history. With exclusive behind-the-scenes footage and over 20 original interviews, it introduces audiences to the people who entertained and educated children like never before.

Format: moving image

Publisher / Publication Date: Screen Media 2021

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Summary: Trail of tears : Cherokee legacy: Documents the forced removal in 1838 of the Cherokee Nation from the southeastern United States to Oklahoma. Shows the suffering endured by the Cherokees as they lost their land and the difficult conditions they endured on the trail. Describes how thousands of Cherokees died during the Trail of Tears, nearly a quarter of the nation, including most of their...

Format: moving image

Publisher / Publication Date: Mill Creek Entertainment 2009

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Summary: The life and work of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., from the beginnings of the Civil Rights movement in Montgomery, Alabama, and culminating with his assassination in Memphis in 1968. Including archival footage, this film is an indispensable primary resource of a pivotal moment in American and world history. Originally screened in theaters for only a single night in 1970.

Format: moving image

Publisher / Publication Date: 2013

Copies Available at Woodmere