many believe lincoln transcended all other presidents who have since.before him and his great american story has --ched and continued continues to reach across anders and oceans, races religions, politics and party lines. on reel:00 p.m., america, the march in washington. 1963, the u.s. information agency filmed the march on washington for jobs and produced a documentary for foreign audiences. at 430 chicago p.m. eastern, this year marks the the nasaversary of viking landing on mars. recently discussed viking program. >> the events surrounding the 1976, werey 20, incredibly exciting. when the lander landed it was

powered up and the team had programmed in two photographs to be taken so they be delivered quickly back to earth for the press to see and nasa confirm that the landers had landed on mars. >> historians look at president harry truman's leadership and how he interacted with three politicians. state secretary of madeleine albright speaks with beshlocshmichael about harry truman's commitment to public service. life, this is someone who should have gone to college, a great college, should have school, deeplye wanted to but could do it economicf his family's circumstances. if there was one thing he felt strongly was if he became president, he wanted to help

others. for a complete schedule go to c-span.org. watchc-span.org, you can our public affairs and political programming any time at your convenience on your desktop, laptop or mobile advice. go to c-span.org and click on bar.ideo library search you can type in the name of a speaker, sponsor of a bill or event topic. review the list of search results and click on the program you'd like to watch or refine your search with many search tools. if you're looking for the most current programs and don't want to search the video library, many current programs ready for immediate viewing. is a public service of your cable or satellite provider. c-span.org. at >> each week american history

america brings you films that provide context for issues.public affairs ♪ ♪ [video clip] ronald reagan: it is morning, 20 miles from the enemy. these are american boys going to work. the morning fighter patrol. they're flying over italy, and there are others like them flying over burma, over holland, over china and over germany.

in search of the enemy. enemy planes. the odds are bad this morning, nearly three to one. the routine morning patrol goes out. they close the range -- 3500 feet, 3000, 2500, 2000. the odds are still three to one. [gunfire] but there are three nazis spinning down in blood and flame to every one of ours. routine morning patrol. they're good planes, wonderful planes, and their pilots are good, too. listen. >> yesterday i fulfilled one of

my ambitions as a combat pilot. i got one airplane. ronald reagan: an american far from home fighting a war around the world. listen again. >> this is my leader. and the second shift was me and right.e to my i turned right and put up a stone wall of bullets. ronald reagan: a wall of bullets. it was not so long ago these men were students in a university, workmen in a shipyard, just plain citizens from everywhere, u.s.a. they changed jobs, they changed clothes. they took a train into the future. they did not know what the future would be, but many hoped they would get the chance to fly and fight in the air. some wanted that chance more than anything in the world. deep inside alabama is a famous school called the tuskegee institute. it was founded on july 4, 1881, and since that independence day,

it has graduated many thousands into agriculture, into science, into industry. this school was the first of its kind, and its founder, booker t. washington, was a pioneer who broke open a road for others to follow. this man had a dream. and the dream became stone. he lifted the veil of ignorance from his people and pointed the way to progress through education and industry. this school, close to the work this man had done, the united states government an airfield. build three years ago, this was just another farm in alabama. more than trees had to be cleared away. there was misunderstanding and distrust and prejudice to be cleared away. three years ago, there was only an idea, but ideas are powerful things. and today, there are fighter planes flying overhead.

instead of swamp and yellow pine, there are hangars, repair shops, barracks. instead of patches of corn, concrete flight strips. but that's not enough. you can't make a fighter squadron out of concrete and aluminum and a can of paint. it takes men. a chemistry student, a welder, a shoe salesman must learn how to fly. a group of average americans must become a team of fighting men with wings. ♪ there is a new world out there. a man has to learn his way around. it takes many weeks of learning to make a fighter pilot. and a lot of that learning is done in a hard, wooden chair. because a fighter pilot is a combination of mathematician and athlete, a scientist and a sharpshooter.

he's got to know what goes on inside his plane. the heart of this fighter is steel and copper, the oil.stream is gas and but its brain is the man who flies it. he begins in a safe, slow plane, two wings instead of one. but he flies many hours inside a closed room. in the morning, he may be flying a prescribed course over a sheet of paper. in the afternoon, he may fly the same course above the clouds. he trains his muscles down here very close to the ground, but he'll use the same sense of balance and coordination in the skies above tuskegee. for this job of flying is never easy, and sometimes it is very, very tough. but he's learning how high and how fast and how far he must go

to reach the enemy. pilotage, dead reckoning, theory of flight, radio code. yes, he's getting muscles in his mind. he is getting hard, keen, quick. he's coming into the clear. here above the warm, familiar hills of alabama, these americans are learning to fly in those tight combat formations they will use some day to hunt down the german and jap above his own cities. in addition to fighter groups, a year ago this field began to train men for bombers. that, too, was a pioneer step. but one thing it proved -- you cannot judge a man by the color of his eyes or the shape of his nose. on the flight strip, you judge a man by the way he flies. here is the answer to the

-- adolph and hirohito. here is the answer to the propaganda of the japs and the nazis. here is the answer -- wings for this man. here is the answer -- wings for these americans. squadron after squadron out of tuskegee flying p-40's, then striking with thunderbolts, p-47's. then riding the mustangs, p-51's. no, it was never easy for these men. they were pioneers and no pioneer has it easy. they fought lies, they fought heartbreak and they won. now they fight the enemy on his own soil. [gunfire] they fought the enemy not

without loss. out of the first class to graduate almost three years ago, only a handful are left alive so that liberty might not perish from the earth. ♪ three years have passed since the founding of tuskegee airfield. 750 pilots have been trained, 50% have been in combat, and this is only the beginning. listen to major general butler at the celebration of this third anniversary. >> here for the first time, negro aviation cadets were being to fly warplanes of a their unit and squadron.y, the 99th these men were pioneers of a venture so new that you who stand before me now after three years may still be considered forerunners in a movement that has given you a place in the fighting men of the sky. ronald reagan: under the feet of these men, a new road is being

beaten out, broad enough for thousands and tens of thousands. a good road for our country. these men remember that, marching or flying. they remember backing them up -- their families, their friends who expect so much of them. and backing them up, the men and women of every creed and speech and color who made these planes. and backing them up, the most powerful force in the world -- the strength of the american people. ♪ these men were pioneers of a >> monday, author malcolm gray describes how neuroscience researchers are working to

develop ways for wounded soldiers and par plegics to use move prosthetic limbs and manipulate computers. trying to maket soldiers coming back afghanistan this search, who, because of advances in body armor, are suffering that previously would have been fatal but are coming back with amputations so they're 20's or 30'stheir with their entire life before the and ling, who studied brain, really had kind of a that this zeal to say is a program that will make these people whole because we them for the service they did for the country. watch the communeicators

8:00 eastern.t >> each week, american history tv's reel america brings you archival films to help provide to today's public affairs issues. 1966"ublic: august includes scenes from lucy baines johnson's wedding, a trip through new england and president johnson's birthday celebration at his texas ranch. the naval photographic center created monthly film reports on between 1964nson and 1969. [video clip] ♪ >> this country is smaller than the state of vermont. it is sandwiched between two unfriendly powers. wasears ago, it