You can find the best of history every Thursday night on WLRN Channel 17.
Discover the incredible characters and epic stories that have shaped America’s past and present. Separate fact from fiction in these two episodes from American Experience’s popular The Wild West series:
Butch Cassidy & the Sundance Kid: American Experience (8:00 p.m.)
Long before Paul Newman and Robert Redford immortalized them on screen, Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid captivated Americans from coast to coast. In the 1890s, their exploits — robbing banks and trains in the West and then seemingly vanishing into thin air — became national news and the basis of rumors and myth. But who were Robert Leroy Parker and Harry Alonzo Longabaugh? How did they come together to form the Wild Bunch gang? And how did they pull off the longest string of successful holdups in history?
Jesse James: American Experience (9:00 p.m.)
A kid in appearance, but a warrior in spirit, 16-year-old Jesse James rode into the Missouri woods in the spring of 1864 to join one of the dozens of groups of guerrilla fighters defending the Confederacy during the Civil War. This is the true story of an outlaw whose myth has captured the imagination of Americans for generations.
Cool Spaces! Performance Spaces (10:00 p.m.)
Architecture, the ancient and constantly renewing discipline, forms the foundation of our everyday lives. It shapes our world in visible ways by defining the streetscape and the skyline. it also shapes our world in tangible ways by creating spaces where we live, work, and play in relative safety and comfort. This new four-part series is hosted by architect Stephen Chung who calls such spaces cool. Stephen draws us into interesting projects, unlocking architecture for a generation that values design but wants to learn more.
