Race

A chronicle of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.'s campaign to secure equal voting rights via an epic march from Selma to Montgomery, Alabama, in 1965.

When the Civil War ended in 1865, more than four million slaves were set free. Over 70 years later, the memories of some 2,000 slave-era survivors were transcribed and preserved by the Library of Congress. These first-person anecdotes, ranging from the brutal to the bittersweet, have been brought to vivid life, featuring the on-camera voices of over a dozen top African-American actors.

In 1788 the slave ship Africa, set sail from West Africa and headed for America with its berth laden with a profitable but highly perishable cargo-hundreds of men, women and children bound in chains. Six months later the survivors were sold in Natchez, Mississippi. One of them, a 26-year-old man named Abdul-Rahman made a remarkable claim to the farmer who purchased him at the auction that he was an African prince and that his father would pay gold for his ransom. The offer was refused and Abdul-Rahman did not return to Africa for another 40 years. During his enslavement he toiled on the Foster plantation, married, and fathered nine children. His story also eventually made him the most famous African in America, attracting the support of powerful men such as President John Quincy Adams. After forty years of slavery, Abdul-Rahman finally reclaimed his freedom, but he defied the order to return immediately to Africa, and instead traveled throughout the northern states, speaking to huge audiences in a partially successful attempt to raise enough money to buy his children's freedom. Finally at the age of 67, and after raising funds to free two of his children, Abdul-Rahman returned to Africa, only to fall ill and die just as word of his arrival reached his former home of Futa Jalloo in present-day Guinea. Abdul-Rahman survived the harsh ordeals of slavery through his love of family and his deep faith as a Muslim.

A story of slavery, set in the southern U.S. in the 1930s.

Two women, black and white, in 1955 Montgomery Alabama, must decide what they are going to do in response to the famous bus boycott led by Martin Luther King.

Biographical epic of the controversial and influential Black Nationalist leader, from his early life and career as a small-time gangster, to his ministry as a member of the Nation of Islam and his eventual assassination.

An in-depth look into Martin Luther King Jr. and his courageous efforts to lead the civil rights movement is explored through interviews and film clips. Freedom Riders, the March on Washington, and Selma to Montgomery are revisited.