Product Description

From the fearless resolve of a single man to the remarkable voices of thousands marching VOICES OF CIVIL RIGHTS provides a stunning overview of one of America s greatest defining moments.VOICES OF CIVIL RIGHTS: This collection of personal narratives was created by a group of journalists photographers and videographers as they embarked on a bus trip around the country to create the largest archive of oral histories of the Civil Rights Movement.MISSISSIPPI STATE SECRETS: Go inside the shadowy operations of the Mississippi State Sovereignty Commission whose job was to spy on people connected to the Civil Rights Movement.CROSSING THE BRIDGE: In 1965 a line of civil rights protestors crossed the Edmund Pettis Bridge in Selma Alabama on a march to the capital in Montgomery. Alabama State Troopers blocked their path and the unprovoked brutality that followed shocked a nation.BIOGRAPHY: MARTIN LUTHER KING JR.: THE MAN AND THE DREAM: This one-of-a-kind profile uses rare footage and photos to show how King s ideas and views adapted to the rapidly changing climate of the Civil Rights Movement.BIOGRAPHY: THURGOOD MARSHALL: JUSTICE FOR ALL: As a civil rights lawyer he turned the floor of the Supreme Court into his personal battleground. As a member of the court he presided over some of the most influential decisions in American history.System Requirements:Running Time: 243 MinFormat: DVD MOVIE Genre: DOCUMENTARIES/MISC. UPC: 733961717167 Manufacturer No: AAE-71716

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #52175 in DVD
• Brand: A&E HOME ENT.
• Released on: 2006-01-31
• Rating: NR (Not Rated)
• Aspect ratio: 1.33:1
• Formats: Black & White, Color, NTSC
• Original language: English
• Number of discs: 2
• Dimensions: .50 pounds
• Running time: 243 minutes

Features

• From the fearless resolve of a single man to the remarkable voices of thousands marching, VOICES OF CIVIL RIGHTS provides a stunning overview of one of America s greatest defining moments.VOICES OF CIVIL RIGHTS: This collection of personal narratives was created by a group of journalists, photographers, and videographers as they embarked on a bus trip around the country to create the largest archi

Amazon.com
The civil rights movement in the 1950s and '60s--a tumultuous time marked by frequent tragedy and occasional triumph--is examined in this provocative two-disc, four-hour set containing five programs produced for the History Channel. The first of these, "Voices of Civil Rights," eschews the standard documentary format of narration, interviews, photos, etc. in favor of personal, firsthand reminiscences by people, black and white alike, who lived through the turbulent years when there were two very separate Americas, especially in the South. For "Negroes," there was the world in which they were reared, loved and cherished; then there was "the real world," where they were hated by whites and discrimination was a bitter fact of daily life. Major events and issues like the struggles for school integration and voter registration, the killing of Medgar Evers, and the Ku Klux Klan's reign of terror are covered, but it's the anecdotal accounts of these exceptionally well-spoken people that really drive them home. The extraordinary tale of the KKK's atrocities against the family of Vernon Dahmer, for instance, is told not only by the victims but by one of the Klansmen who participated. Repentant and deeply ashamed to this day, the latter ultimately testified in court against his "brethren"; later, while serving his own sentence, he was visited in prison and forgiven by the very people whose lives he had shattered.

The remaining documentaries on the first disc detail the villainous tactics of the "Mississippi State Sovereignty Commission" (a government-appointed agency whose mission was to use whatever was needed--propaganda, threats, actual violence--to suppress the civil rights movement in that state), and the events surrounding March 7, 1965, the "bloody Sunday" when marchers in Selma, Alabama were viciously attacked by the local police. These are stories that evoke grim memories of folks like Sheriffs Jim Clark and Bull Connor, and racist governors Ross Barnett (Mississippi) and George Wallace (Alabama), all of them driven by a flammable combination of ignorance, hubris, and the fear of losing a preeminence they'd done nothing to earn. But it was a time that also witnessed the emergence of Martin Luther King, Jr. and a call to action by President Lyndon Johnson, who knew there was something very wrong about a country where young black people could fight in Vietnam but were denied the right to vote at home. Disc Two includes a biography of King, depicting a "reluctant hero... who raged beneath the weight of his burden," a leader who did not seek his position but was chosen for it. A second bio details the life and work of Thurgood Marshall, the first African American justice to sit on the U.S. Supreme Court. Neither disc contains any bonus features. --Sam Graham

Customer Reviews

If you buy one DVD on Civil Rights buy this one!
I could not believe how good this 2 disc DVD set is.
I will keep it forever and watch it over and over again.
The DVD mixes historical film with modern interviews of the people who lived through the civil rights struggle. Blacks and whites. For and against.
One of the most moving parts for me was to watch Billy Roy Pitts, former Klansman, discuss how he was ordered to assist in the murder of Vernon Dahmer in 1966. Why? Vernon was a civil rights and NAACP leader in Mississippi. Vernon was helping people to register to vote by allowing them to register in his store. Billy Roy Pitts tells his story. He turned on the Klan and testified against them. He also tells how the Dahmer family visited him in prison, forgave him for killing Vernon Dahmer and asked the Governor to pardon him. He tells how at that time he thought he was doing the right thing. That interview was worth the price of the DVD alone. To see Vernon Dahmer's widow interviewed. To learn that his 4 sons were away serving in the military at the time their father was being murdered. To decide as a family they would forgive the man that killed their husband and father.
I was born in 1964 in New York so I missed so much, and so much of this history isn't taught in schools. There is so much more on these 2 disks.