PBS series "THE WEST"

This website is based off of an eight-part documentary series, “THE WEST” which premiered on PBS in 1996. The multimedia tour is split up into seven sections titled, the program, people, places, events, resources, lesson plans and quizzes which progress chronologically by the episodes in the series. The program section gives information about the actual TV series. The people section contains a huge biographical dictionary of both Native Americans and how western expansion affected them and there tribes, along with many commonly known and many unknown white men who appeared in the show. The places section is very interactive and allows the observer to click on a state then view a detailed archival map from the 1860s-1880s that shows natural features of the region, trails used by whites and trails/settlement of Native Americans. Unfortunately, while this section does include some pictures representing the time period, more non-map pictures would be useful to the viewer. The events section contains a detailed timeline from pre 1500 to 1917. The resource section, probably the best part of this site, provides a library of primary source material on the history of the American West including full texts of many memoirs, journals, diaries, letters, autobiographies, archival photographs, and other documents/images found during the five years’ research that went into the production of “THE WEST”. The last two sections are useful to someone looking at this site from a teaching prospective because the site includes lesson plans and quizzes. Overall, this is a great detailed site, but it is very broad so if you are trying to only focus on one aspect of Western expansion, such as, its impact on Native Americans, a lot of exploration of this site is necessary to determine what sections and documents are important.