on the c-spand networks, tonight at 8:00, the funeral for forming -- former washington post editor ben bradlee. at 10:00, on booktv's afterwords, james mcpherson on the confederacy's president, jefferson davis. sunday live at noon on in-depth, our conversation with the former tour editor-in-chief at simon & schuster publishers. ,onight at 8:00 on c-span3 propaganda and america's view of the japanese during world war ii. a 1936 film on tuberculosis in america. fine our television schedule at www.c-span.org and let us know about the thing -- programs you are watching. call us on the number on our

screen. join the c-span conversation. like us on facebook, follow us on twitter. all weekend long, american history tv is featuring colorado springs, colorado. and explore is credited with discovering pikes peak in 18 oh six. it lies west of colorado springs. a trip to the summit inspired katharine lee bates to write "america the beautiful." we recently traveled to colorado springs to explore the city's rich history. learn more about colorado springs all weekend here on american history tv. garden of the gods is so magnificent. many people don't realize it is a city park. it has a world-famous view.

the fact that we are a national, natural landmark, i really love the description of the garden of the gods park as being perhaps the most striking contrast between mountains and plains in all of north america. history, the history of the earth is almost like an open book here in colorado springs. what we are seeing here is remnants of sand dunes, lagoons, the bottom of an ocean, and even glacial gravels that have occurred from the last 3 million years. if you walk from the visitor's center out into the park, it's a walked back in time. in half a mile you can go 300 million years ago. the first people that we know of in the pikes peak region where the unit.

this was our hometown, the whole pikes peak area was their homeland. they would circumnavigate hikes peak as part of their seasonal journey. finde summers, they could plenty of game and elk on the west side of the mountain. as fall would approach, they would start making their seasonal journey back to this area of colorado springs. in the wintertime, if you can think of walks dividing shelter and some more areas -- warm areas, we have parts that have been dated to 3000 -- hearths that have been dated to 3000 years ago. the pressures of the new united states and people heading certainly made a huge, tumultuous impact on the native people. however, the ute did negotiate

with the u.s. government to keep part of their homeland in colorado. only in partsnot of the reservation in southwestern colorado, but certainly all over the state and the nation. rush.e had the gold that gold was actually found in cherry creek in the denver area. pikes peak is such an amazing landmark that it became the pike's peak or bust gold rush. 1858 new theren would need to be a supply town. they came to this area to set up a small town. they were just stunned by the beauty of these up and it rocks. a place fit for the gods to assemble. we should call this garden of the gods. that name stuck. it has been the garden of the gods ever since.

this is truly an extraordinary city park. >> in 1909, the wisdom of charles perkins was to give this gift to the city of colorado springs, that it would remain free to the people forever. story of this park is about a gift that really follows after our founder, general palmer, who provided a very large section of our existing parks department today. charles perkins like that philosophy. he informed his children that's what he was going to do. charles perkins was a friend of general palmer's. he owned the burlington railroad , probably speculated on developing some of this land, but because palmer was so engaged and wanting to make certain he had the right environment for the people who were going to live here that he adopted his same philosophy. when he can to do something to do with this property, it was

easy for him to make the decision that it would stay a park and be forever free to the people. it stays that way today. unusual for a city parks and recreation department to have to take on something that really has national significance. this has always been a draw. people come here for two natural reasons in addition to health and other things. and come for pike's peak the garden of the gods. those are the natural reasons. it remains that today, from before 1909 when charles perkins gave the gift, he realized that this would always be important to the people. we keep that functioning today. city has well over 150 parks, but this is the park that is the

most significant because of the national draw. it is unusual to have to maintain something like this with the same kind of dollars you would perhaps do a neighborhood or smaller community park. in 1995, a foundation was established by a benefactor of to create a system for the visitors center to be owned by the foundation and that the profits from the visitors center would go to help maintain the garden of the gods park. we are proud of that effort, because this is so significant. they attempted to make this a national park. they were trying to combined garden of the gods and pike's peak, but there was too much privately owned land between the two. that request was set aside by i think, and otherwise

it would have been if not the first, the second national park. yellowstone certainly captured that. this remains a draw to an excess of two, two and a half million according to park records today. when you get that kind of attention, you know the economic >> lout the weekend, american -- americant the weekend, history tv is featuring colorado springs, colorado. our staff recently traveled about its ric history. learn more about colorado springs and other stops on c-span's cities tour at c-span.org/local content. watching american history tv, all weekend, every weekend, on c-span 3.

>> history bookshelf features writers andican airs on american history tv. 4,years og, on november 1979, iranian students stormed embassy in iran. john limbert was one of the hostages held for 14 months. book, "negotiating with iran," he discusses the history u.s.-iran relations and his time in captivity. the u.s.iewed him at annapolis where he teaches international affairs. >> john limbert, in your book, "negotiating with iran: ofstling the ghosts history," you talk about four u.s.-iranian history. >> two of the crisis are actually prerevolution, two postrevolution. the first was the crisis over