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The Best Episodes of American Experience

Every episode of American Experience ranked from best to worst. Let's dive into the Best Episodes of American Experience!

Binge this in 15d 21h•Peaking at 10.0/10

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

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#1 Fan Favorite
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10.0/10(1 votes)
#1 - Walt Whitman
S20:E114/14/2008
This American Experience tells Whitman's life story, from his working class childhood in Long Island, to his years as a newspaper reporter in Brooklyn when he struggled to support his impoverished family, then to his reckless pursuit of the attention and affection he craved for his work, to his death in 1892.
Director:Unknown
Writer:Unknown
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Director:Unknown
Writer:Unknown
10.0/10(1 votes)
#2 - God in America (Parts 5-6)
S23:E310/13/2010
Hour five explores the post-World War II era, when rising evangelist Billy Graham tried to inspire a religious revival that fused faith with patriotism in a Cold War battle with Godless Communism.
Director:Unknown
Writer:Unknown
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Director:Unknown
Writer:Unknown
10.0/10(1 votes)
#3 - Into the Amazon
S30:E11/9/2018
The remarkable story of President Theodore Roosevelt’s journey with legendary Brazilian explorer Candido Rondon into the heart of the South American rainforest to chart an unexplored tributary of the Amazon.
Director:Unknown
Writer:Unknown
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Director:Unknown
Writer:Unknown
10.0/10(1 votes)
#4 - The Secret of Tuxedo Park
S30:E21/16/2018
In the fall of 1940, British Prime Minister Winston Churchill delivered his country’s most valuable military secret — a revolutionary radar component — to a Wall Street tycoon, Alfred Lee Loomis. Using his connections, his money, and his brilliant scientific mind, Loomis and his team of scientists developed radar technology that played a more decisive role than any other weapon in World War II.
Director:Unknown
Writer:Unknown
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Director:Unknown
Writer:Unknown
10.0/10(1 votes)
#5 - The Gilded Age
S30:E32/6/2018
Meet the titans and barons of the glittering late 19th century, whose materialistic extravagance contrasted harshly with the poverty of the struggling workers who challenged them. The vast disparities between them sparked debates still raging today.
Director:Unknown
Writer:Unknown
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Director:Unknown
Writer:Unknown
10.0/10(1 votes)
#6 - The Bombing of Wall Street
S30:E42/13/2018
Explore the story behind the first terrorist attack in the U.S., a mostly-forgotten 1920 bombing in the nation’s financial center that left 38 dead – a crime that remains unsolved today.
Director:Unknown
Writer:Unknown
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Director:Unknown
Writer:Unknown

The 20 WORST Episodes of American Experience

10.0/10(1 votes)
#7 - The Circus (1)
S30:E710/8/2018
Explore the early days of this popular, influential and distinctly American form of entertainment during an era when master showmen P.T. Barnum, James Bailey and the Ringling Brothers transformed the nation’s popular culture.
Director:Unknown
Writer:Unknown
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Director:Unknown
Writer:Unknown
10.0/10(1 votes)
#8 - The Circus (2)
S30:E810/9/2018
Revisit the heyday of this distinctly American form of entertainment when former rivals Barnum, Bailey and the Ringling Brothers joined forces to present the “greatest show on earth” in big cities and small towns across the country.
Director:Unknown
Writer:Unknown
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Director:Unknown
Writer:Unknown
10.0/10(2 votes)
#9 - Chasing the Moon - Earthrise
S31:E47/9/2019
What exactly was it going to take for America to beat the Soviets to the moon? Cold War tensions persisted, as rumours circulated that the Soviets were preparing to send an unmanned spacecraft to the moon. Nasa quickly developed the Gemini program, sending astronauts into orbit around the Earth to practice critical manoeuvres for the eventual trip to the moon.
Director:Robert Stone
Writer:Unknown
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Director:Robert Stone
Writer:Unknown
10.0/10(1 votes)
#10 - Chasing the Moon - Magnificent Desolation
S31:E57/10/2019
After the immediate celebration of 1968’s successful Apollo 8 mission, underlying questions about the space programme emerged with new intensity as politicized young Americans challenged the nation’s priorities. Nasa pushed brashly forward.
Director:Robert Stone
Writer:Unknown
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Director:Robert Stone
Writer:Unknown
9.7/10(3 votes)
#11 - Chasing the Moon - A Place Beyond the Sky
S31:E37/8/2019
On 4 October 1957, Soviet scientists launched Sputnik 1 - a beach ball-sized, radio-transmitting aluminium alloy sphere - into orbit. The satellite caused a sensation. Amid Cold War tensions, the Soviet Union’s accomplishment signalled a dramatic technological advantage and American felt it had little choice but to join the Space Race.
Director:Robert Stone
Writer:Unknown
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Director:Robert Stone
Writer:Unknown
9.0/10(1 votes)
#12 - Victory in the Pacific
S17:E95/2/2005
No description available
Director:Unknown
Writer:Unknown
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Director:Unknown
Writer:Unknown
9.0/10(1 votes)
#13 - The Lobotomist
S20:E21/21/2008
In the 1940s Dr. Walter Freeman gained fame for perfecting the lobotomy, then hailed as a miracle cure for the severely mentally ill. But within a few years, lobotomy was labeled one of the most barbaric mistakes of modern medicine.
Director:Unknown
Writer:Unknown
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Director:Unknown
Writer:Unknown
8.5/10(2 votes)
#14 - Bonnie & Clyde
S28:E11/19/2016
Though their exploits were romanticized, the Barrow gang was believed responsible for at least 23 murders, including two policemen, as well as numerous robberies and kidnappings. Discover the true story of the most famous outlaw couple in U.S. history -- Bonnie and Clyde.
Director:Unknown
Writer:Unknown
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Director:Unknown
Writer:Unknown
8.0/10(1 votes)
#15 - Kinsey
S17:E52/14/2005
Profiling Dr. Alfred Kinsey, the Indiana University zoologist whose "revolutionary picture of American sexuality" rocked the country in the late 1940s and early '50s. Filmmakers Barak Goodman and John Maggio interview Kinsey colleagues and biographers, along with people took part in his studies, to paint a portrait of an "unyielding" proponent of sexual freedom who practiced what he preached. Says sexologist Paul Gebhard, a Kinsey assistant: "He was a rebel."
Directors:Barak Goodman, John Maggio
Writer:Barak Goodman
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Directors:Barak Goodman, John Maggio
Writer:Barak Goodman
8.0/10(1 votes)
#16 - Custer's Last Stand
S24:E21/17/2012
A profile of Gen. George Armstrong Custer (1839-76), nicknamed "the boy general" for his Civil War exploits, who died with many other members of the 7th Cavalry while battling the Cheyenne and Lakota along the Little Bighorn River in Montana Territory. The documentary details his time at West Point, where he became infamous for his rebellious nature; his relationship with his wife Libbie; his year-long suspension from the service; and the campaign against the Cheyenne that led to his death.
Director:Unknown
Writer:Unknown
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Director:Unknown
Writer:Unknown
8.0/10(1 votes)
#17 - Clinton: The Survivor (2)
S24:E42/21/2012
The conclusion of the Bill Clinton biography recalls the Monica Lewinsky scandal, which led to Clinton becoming the second U.S. president to be impeached. It also details his face-off over the federal budget with Newt Gingrich, whose refusal to compromise led to a government shutdown, and successful 1996 reelection campaign. Among those commenting: Whitewater independent counsel Kenneth Starr; Paula Jones' attorney James Fisher; and White House counsel Bernard Nussbaum.
Director:Unknown
Writer:Unknown
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Director:Unknown
Writer:Unknown
8.0/10(1 votes)
#18 - Ripley: Believe It or Not
S27:E11/6/2015
Robert Ripley's obsession with the odd and keen eye for the curious made him one of the most successful men in America during the Great Depression. Over three decades, his Believe It or Not! franchise grew into an entertainment empire, expanding from newspapers to radio, film and, ultimately, television. Americans not only loved his bizarre fare, but were fascinated by the man himself, and the eccentric, globetrotting playboy became an unlikely national celebrity. This is the story of the man who popularized the iconic phrase, and proof of why we still can’t resist his challenge to “Believe it — or not!”
Director:Cathleen O'Connell
Writer:Cathleen O'Connell
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Director:Cathleen O'Connell
Writer:Cathleen O'Connell
8.0/10(1 votes)
#19 - The Pilgrims
S27:E1111/24/2015
The challenges the Pilgrims faced in making new lives for themselves still resonate almost 400 years later: the tensions of faith and freedom in American society, the separation of Church and State, and cultural encounters resulting from immigration. Staring: Roger Rees (1944 - 2015) as William Bradford in his final Television appearance.
Director:Unknown
Writer:Unknown
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Director:Unknown
Writer:Unknown
8.0/10(1 votes)
#20 - The Boys of '36
S28:E68/2/2016
The story of nine working-class young men from the University of Washington who took the rowing world and America by storm when they captured the gold medal at the 1936 Olympic Games in Berlin. Their unexpected victory, against not only the Ivy League teams of the East Coast but Adolf Hitler's elite German rowers, gave hope to a nation struggling to emerge from the depths of the Great Depression.
Director:Margaret Grossi
Writer:Aaron R. Cohen
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Director:Margaret Grossi
Writer:Aaron R. Cohen
8.0/10(2 votes)
#21 - The Swamp
S31:E11/15/2019
The history of the Everglades is a dramatic yet little known story of humanity’s attempt to conquer nature. The Swamp, told through the lives of a handful of colorful and resolute characters, explores the repeated efforts to reclaim, control and transform what was seen as a vast wasteland into an agricultural and urban paradise, and, ultimately, the drive to preserve America’s greatest wetland.
Director:Unknown
Writer:Unknown
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Director:Unknown
Writer:Unknown
8.0/10(4 votes)
#22 - The Feud
S31:E79/10/2019
Anderson Hatfield and Randolph McCoy, the patriarchs of the legendary feud, were entrepreneurs seeking to climb up from hardship after fierce economic competition and rapid technological change had turned their lives upside down. When members of both families took their grievances to court, their dispute escalated into a war between two families and a struggle between two states. The Feud reveals more than an isolated story of mountain lust and violence between “hillbillies” — the Hatfield - McCoy feud was a microcosm of the tensions inherent in the nation’s rapid industrialization after the Civil War.
Director:Unknown
Writer:Unknown
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Director:Unknown
Writer:Unknown
7.6/10(5 votes)
#23 - War of the Worlds
S25:E610/29/2013
A broadcast that struck fear into an already anxious nation, Orson Welles' War of the Worlds radio broadcast was the most famous alien invasion that never happened.
Director:Unknown
Writer:Unknown
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Director:Unknown
Writer:Unknown
7.2/10(5 votes)
#24 - Murder of a President
S28:E32/2/2016
The story of James Garfield, one of the most extraordinary men ever elected president, and his assassination by a deluded madman named Charles Guiteau. The story follows Garfield's unprecedented rise to power, his shooting only four months into his presidency, and its bizarre and heartbreaking aftermath.
Director:Unknown
Writer:Unknown
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Director:Unknown
Writer:Unknown
7.0/10(1 votes)
#25 - Do You Mean There Are Still Real Cowboys?
S1:E611/8/1988
A year in the life of Wyoming cowboys and the ranching families who have lived in Big Piney for six generations. Although very much the same as it was one hundred years ago -- tough, lonely, but still romantic -- ranching is now a threatened way of life.
Director:Unknown
Writer:Unknown
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Director:Unknown
Writer:Unknown

Best Episodes Summary

"Walt Whitman" is the best rated episode of "American Experience". It scored 10/10 based on 1 votes. Directed by Unknown and written by Unknown, it aired on 4/14/2008. This episode scored 0.0 points higher than the second highest rated, "God in America (Parts 5-6)".