Benjamin Franklin

TV's most-watched history series brings to life the compelling stories from our past that inform our understanding of the world today.

American Masters is a PBS television series which produces biographies on enduring writers, musicians, visual and performing artists, dramatists, filmmakers, and others who have left an indelible impression on the cultural landscape of the United States.

Don Wildman unearths relics from the world's greatest institutions to reveal secrets from the past. He examines each artifact to illuminate history's most incredible triumphs, sensational crimes and bizarre encounters.

Utilizing the latest scientific innovations and leading-edge filmmaking technology, this documentary reveals the secret powers and super-senses of the world’s most extraordinary animals, and invites viewers to see and hear beyond normal human perception to experience the natural world as a specific species does — from seeing flowers in bee-vision to eavesdropping on a conversation between elephant seals to soaring the length of a football field with glow-in-the-dark squirrels.

Motoring programme featuring reviews of and reports about cars of all types.

This docuseries captures the remarkable rise and unprecedented success of one of the most dominant and iconic franchises in professional sports. Featuring exclusive access to the Buss Family and probing, revealing interviews with players, coaches, and front office execs, this series chronicles this extraordinary story from the inside – told only by the people who lived it.

Actor Zac Efron journeys around the world with wellness expert Darin Olien in a travel show that explores healthy, sustainable ways to live.

Explore Ali’s challenges, confrontations, comebacks and triumphs through recordings of his own voice. The two-part documentary paints an intimate portrait of a man who was a beacon of hope for oppressed people around the world and, in his later years, was recognized as a global citizen and a symbol of humanity and understanding.

Chronicles the lives of Theodore, Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt, three members of the most prominent and influential family in American politics. It is the first time in a major documentary television series that their individual stories have been interwoven into a single narrative. This seven-part, fourteen hour film follows the Roosevelts for more than a century, from Theodore’s birth in 1858 to Eleanor’s death in 1962.

A documentary on the American Civil War narrated by Ken Burns, covering the secession of the Confederacy to the assassination of Abraham Lincoln.

MegaStructures is a documentary television series appearing on the National Geographic Channel in the United States and the United Kingdom, Channel 5 in the United Kingdom, France 5 in France, and 7mate in Australia. Each episode is an educational look of varying depth into the construction, operation, and staffing of various structures or construction projects, but not ordinary construction products. Generally containing interviews with designers and project managers, it presents the problems of construction and the methodology or techniques used to overcome obstacles. In some cases this involved the development of new materials or products that are now in general use within the construction industry. MegaStructures focuses on constructions that are extreme; in the sense that they are the biggest, tallest, longest, or deepest in the world. Alternatively, a project may appear if it had an element of novelty or are a world first. This type of project is known as a Megaproject.

A British genealogy documentary series in which celebrities trace their ancestry, discovering secrets and surprises from their past.

Come one, come all to The Circus. This real-time documentary series pulls back the curtain on the current political stories, revealing the intense, inspiring and infuriating stories behind the headlines. Key characters and events are presented in real time, as they are happening.

Explore American cinema through the decades and the cultural, societal and political shifts that framed its evolution.

The American Revolution was at once a war for independence, a war of conquest, a civil war, and a world war, fought by neighbors on American farms and between global powers an ocean or more away. It impacted millions from Vermont’s Green Mountains to the swamps of South Carolina, from Indian Country to the Iberian Peninsula. In defeating the British Empire and giving birth to a new nation, the American Revolution turned the world upside-down. Thirteen colonies on the Atlantic Coast united in rebellion, won their independence, and established a republic that still endures. The American Revolution will present the story of the men and women of the Revolutionary generation, their humanity in victory and defeat, and the crisis that they lived through.

Investigates a wide range of historically compelling topics and the mysteries surrounding each including the Titanic, D.B. Cooper, Roswell, John Wilkes Booth, and more. Fresh, new evidence and perspectives will be showcased, such as never-before-released documents, personal diaries and DNA evidence.

This docuseries takes an unprecedented look at the enduring and influential legacy of DC, allowing fans to rediscover the universe of characters, as well as the iconic comic book company’s origins, its evolution and its nearly nine-decade cultural impact across every artistic medium.

Steve Martin is one of the most beloved and enigmatic figures in entertainment. Dive into his extraordinary story from two distinct points of view—past and present—as Martin reflects on how his beginnings led to his unexpectedly fulfilling life today.

For the first time ever, global superstar, Ed Sheeran opens the doors to a definitive and searingly honest view into his private life as he explores the universal themes that inspire his music. This series follows Ed after he learns of life changing news and reveals his hardships and triumphs during the most challenging period of his life. Featuring exclusive footage behind his iconic hits, never-before-seen personal archive with his friends and family, and epic stadium performances giving insight into Ed’s world.

The fascinating stories of the families behind the food that built America, those who used brains, muscle, blood, sweat and tears to get to America's heart through its stomach, those who invented new technologies and helped win wars.

A fascinating look at the life of trailblazing Hollywood icon Sara Montiel, widely considered Spain's first international star.

Forever enshrined in myth by an assassin's bullet, Kennedy's presidency long defied objective appraisal. Recent assessments have revealed an administration long on promise and vigor, and somewhat lacking in tangible accomplishment. His proposals for a tax cut and civil rights legislation, however, promised significant gains in the months before his assassination. While maturation, as evidenced in the handling of the Cuban missile crisis, was apparent, the potential legacy of the New Frontier will forever be left to speculation.

Myths die hard, and the history of the 20th century is no exception to this rule. Even today, we hold popular beliefs that we take for Evangelical truths. Thus, we believe that Hiroshima caused Japan to surrender, that the Marshall Plan saved Europe, that Adolf Hitler was a military genius, or that Mao Zedong was a necessary evil for China’s modernization. Of course, these judgements contain some truth; but, too broad-stroked to be accurate, they contradict the historical reality by denying its complexity. What if the truth was slightly different? Through an exploration of great national or international myths, this full archive documentary collection revisits the key moments of the 20th century with a new perspective in order to provide a new, smarter and more subtle interpretation, bringing elements to light that have been forgotten or sometimes overshadowed.

How the Silk Road Made the World 3 x 60' NHNZ/CCTV (China Central Television) The Silk Road is one of humanity’s greatest enterprises. For thousands of years across the vastness of Eurasia, a trade route linking east and west has deeply influenced history. Silk Road trade has helped to build and break empires, fed revolutions and profoundly affected civilisations. Humanity as we know it, and all we have created, owes much to the legendary Silk Road. This is true of objects as basic yet revolutionary as a piece of paper, to the complex metropolis of New York City. Travel through time to witness the evolution of ancient warfare, experience the horror of the Black Death, see the explosive impacts of innovations and live through radical social change. Embark on a dramatic historical journey throughout Eurasia and delve into the captivating tales of this world-famous trade route. Discover How the Silk Road Made the World.

Our cities, transformed a mere century ago to accommodate cars, now want to rid their streets of them. Countries go to war over fuel shortages, and automobiles are at the core of a global ecological crisis. Today, the history of automobile has hit its climax. How did we get here? How did the invention of a single machine reorganize how we work, revolutionize our lifestyles, transform our landscapes, trigger global crises and wreak havoc with the equilibrium of our planet? This documentary series explores the creation and meteoric development of an unprecedented object - the automobile - and its role in mankind’s wild race toward progress.

In this adaptation of the award-winning podcast, Slow Burn’s Leon Neyfakh excavates the strange subplots and forgotten characters of recent political history—and finds surprising parallels to the present.

Women write art history – but in turn are systematically ignored by it. LOST WOMEN ART tells the story of the suppressed female avant-garde and by doing so introduces a new art history.

Jonathan Roberge dives into the world of Montréal crime during the 1957-1977 period, when the city saw a prolonged war between the police and bank robbers.

History as we generally know it is full of holes or half-truths, and a mother lode of juicy details have been lost, distorted, covered up or simply ignored along the way. Former Naval officer and actor Jamie Kaler is on a mission to set the record straight on the most familiar and beloved stories from our nation's and military's past, filling in the blanks, debunking the occasional myth, and exploring why we sometimes get our own history, well, slightly wrong

Dickens is a 2002 three-part docudrama presented by Peter Ackroyd, on whose biography of Dickens it was based. An unorthodox style is taken: actors play various individuals in Dickens' life (as well as Dickens himself), interviewed as if appearing in a contemporary documentary. Their words are from actual letters and journals of the individuals involved, and serve to illuminate the hardships and successes in Dickens' life, and the way his experiences found their way into his works.

Nearly 1,000 years ago, the Vikings left Scandinavia and settled across Europe - giving their name to Normandy along the way - before their Norman descendants seized the English throne at the Battle of Hastings in 1066. But what do we really know about them? By combining expert analysis with compelling drama, 'The Last Journey of the Vikings' (Swedish title: 'Vikingarnas sista resa') tells a new and often surprising story about this complex people.

This documentary series tackles one of history's most horrifying subjects: the Holocaust and the infamous Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration camp.

Who was Homer, and what is the meaning of The Odyssey? In this documentary we follow the footsteps of Ulysses, also known by his Greek name Odysseus—a hero as relevant today as he was nearly three thousand years ago, on a journey across some of the most fascinating landscapes and seascapes of the Mediterranean region. With the help of prominent international scholars, we seek to resolve the questions that still surround one of humanity’s greatest literary works and its enigmatic author.

Between 1914 and 1945, two major conflicts engulfed the planet. Among the combatants of the First World War, eight men would play a decisive role in the next one.

A look at the life of Australian pop star Kylie Minogue, who opens her personal archives and reflects on a career in which she has sold 80 million records and reinvented herself, and by extension pop, several times. Home movies, personal photographs and new interviews reveal the picture, as Kylie addresses how she’s faced public scrutiny, personal loss and illness.

A multimedia course for secondary school and college teachers that examined global patterns through time, seeing history as an integrated whole. Topics were studied in a general chronological order, but each is observed through a thematic lens, showing how people and societies experience both integration and differences.