Free History Documentaries

Chernobyl Heart is a 2003 documentary film by Maryann DeLeo. The film won the Best Documentary Short Subject award at the 2004 Academy Awards.

Leftist filmmaker Emile de Antonio compiled this documentary out of 187 hours' worth of kinescopes recorded during the 1954 Senate Army-McCarthy Hearings.

500 Nations is an eight-part documentary on the Native Americans of North and Central America. It documents from pre-Columbian to the end of the 19th century.

The eminent art historian Sir Kenneth Clark was commissioned to write and present an epic examination of Western European culture, defining what he considered to be the crucial phases of its development. Civilisation: A Personal View by Lord Clark would be more than two years in the making, with filming in over 100 locations across 13 countries.

American Experience, television's most-watched history series, brings to life the incredible characters and epic stories that helped form our nation.

Seeing Red is a 1983 American documentary film directed by Jim Klein and Julia Reichert. It was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature.

As Nelson Mandela prepares to step down as president of South Africa, FRONTLINE presents a deeply personal biography of one of the great figures of the 20th century.

Coney Island is the story of a tiny spit of land at the foot of Brooklyn that at the turn of the century became the most extravagant playground in the country. In scale, in variety, in sheer inventiveness, Coney Island was unlike anything anyone had ever seen, and sooner or later everyone came to see it.

Neil Armstrong, Apollo 11 Commander and first person to walk on the moon, guides us through the history of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration in the half-century since its establishment in 1958.

The visceral impact of history's great speechmakers is at the heart of Say It Plain....