Watch the best of Ken Burns this July on WTIU
This July watch the best of Ken Burns. The American filmmaker and his collaborators have been creating acclaimed historical and cultural documentaries and series for over 40 years.
 
Ken Burns: America’s Storyteller – Thursday, July 4th at 2 p.m. & Sunday, July 7th & Sunday, July 21st at 1 p.m.
Join host Tom Hanks for a celebration of filmmaker Ken Burns, whose nearly four-decade career has resulted in some of the most acclaimed historical documentaries ever made. Featuring interviews with Henry Louis Gates, Jr., Doris Kearns Goodwin, George Lucas, Yo-Yo Ma, Wynton Marsalis, Meryl Streep, Sam Waterston and others. 
Ben Franklin: A Film by Ken Burns Part 1 – Thursday, July 4th at 2 p.m.
Leaving behind his Boston childhood, Benjamin Franklin reinvents himself in Philadelphia where he builds a printing empire and a new life with his wife, Deborah. Turning to science, Franklin's lightning rod and experiments in electricity earn him worldwide fame. After entering politics, he spends years in London trying to keep Britain and America together as his own family starts to come apart.
Ben Franklin: A Film by Ken Burns Part 2 – Thursday, July 4th at 4:30 p.m.
Benjamin Franklin leaves London and returns to wartime Philadelphia where he joins Congress and helps Thomas Jefferson craft the Declaration of Independence. In Paris, he wins French support for the American Revolution then negotiates a peace treaty with Britain. He spends his last years in the new United States, working on the Constitution and unsuccessfully promoting the abolition of slavery.
Ken Burns: The National Parks – Friday, July 5th at 12 p.m. & Sunday, July 7th at 11 a.m. & Sunday, July 21st at 2:30 p.m.
The story of an idea as uniquely American as the Declaration of Independence and just as radical: that the unique places in the nation should be preserved, not for royalty or the rich, but for everyone. 
Ken Burns Country Music – Friday, July 5th at 2 p.m.
Explore the history of a uniquely American art form: country music. From its deep and tangled roots in ballads, blues and hymns performed in small settings, to its worldwide popularity, learn how country music evolved over the course of the 20th century, as it eventually emerged to become America’s music. Country Music features never-before-seen footage and photographs, plus interviews with more than 80 country music artists. The eight-part 16-hour series is directed and produced by Ken Burns; written and produced by Dayton Duncan; and produced by Julie Dunfey. 
Ken Burns: The Civil War – Friday, July 5th at 4 p.m.
The Civil War, an epic nine-episode series by the award-winning documentary filmmaker Ken Burns and produced in conjunction with WETA, Washington, D.C., first aired in September of 1990 to an audience of 40 million viewers. The film is a comprehensive and definitive history of the American Civil War, and the recipient of 40 major film and television awards, including two Emmys and two Grammys. 
Ken Burns: Hemingway – Sunday, July 21st at 4:30 p.m.
Ken Burns and Lynn Novick explore the life and work of the legendary writer, Ernest Hemingway, and his enduring influence on literature and culture. Hemingway, yearning for adventure, volunteers for the Red Cross during World War I. He marries Hadley Richardson and moves to Paris, publishes The Sun Also Rises and finds critical and commercial success with his second novel, A Farewell to Arms.