The Great War: Part 1

Drawing on the latest scholarship, including unpublished diaries, memoirs and letters, “The Great War” tells the rich and complex story of World War I through the voices of nurses, journalists, aviators and the American troops who came to be known as “doughboys.” "The Great War" premieres on PBS in April 2017.

Drawing on the latest scholarship, including unpublished diaries, memoirs and letters, “The Great War” tells the rich and complex story of World War I through the voices of nurses, journalists, aviators and the American troops who came to be known as “doughboys.” The Great War" premieres on PBS in April 2017.

The Great War tells the rich and complex story of WWI through the voices of nurses, journalists, aviators and the American troops who came to be known as “doughboys.” The series explores the experiences of African American and Latino soldiers, suffragists, Native American “code talkers” and others whose participation in the war to “make the world safe for democracy” has been largely forgotten.

The Great War is a three-part, six-hour look at the First World War—a battle that fundamentally transformed America’s place in the world, and its life at home. American Experience Executive Producer Mark Samels discusses the film and why we made it—explaining that you cannot understand the world we live in today without understanding the Great War.

Explore America’s tortured, nearly three-year journey to war. American neutrality, eroded by reports of German atrocities and submarine attacks on American ships, finally led to Wilson’s proclamation that “the world must be made safe for democracy.”

In the summer of 1917, at docks up and down the eastern seaboard, thousands of American soldiers boarded ships bound for France. They were the vanguard of a new American army, about to enter the most destructive war the world had ever known. For President Woodrow Wilson, the war was a crusade “to make the world safe for democracy,” a chance to transform the international order in America’s image.

For President Woodrow Wilson, the Great War was a crusade “to make the world safe for democracy” — a chance to transform the international order in America’s image. “No one had articulated a kind of vision of America as a global citizen,” says filmmaker Stephen Ives. But at the close of the war, Wilson’s arrogance and inflexibility ultimately undermined his own lofty goals.

Just a few months before he jumped off with the first wave of the Meuse-Argonne offensive, Private Ralph John had been working on his family’s farm in McIntosh, South Dakota. His training as a soldier consisted of two days’ practice with a rifle, and a short stint driving a bayonet into a mannequin. Then he was shipped out, handed a gas mask, and sent into battle.

Eddie Rickenbacker downed his first German airplane on April 27, 1918, and he never looked back. As Rickenbacker’s score mounted, the public fell in love with him. But unlike some early pilots of the First World War, who had reveled in the image of the gallant, chivalrous airman, Rickenbacker had seen too many friends go down in flames to romanticize combat flying.

When the United States entered the Great War in 1917, all Americans were expected to get in line to support the war efforts at home and abroad. But suffragist Alice Paul would not comply. Paul and her National Woman’s Party refused to put their campaign for suffrage on hold, publicly calling out the hypocrisy of President Woodrow Wilson’s desire to make the world “safe for democracy."

When Woodrow Wilson ran for reelection in 1916, he did so with the slogan “He Kept Us Out of War.” In 1917, when U.S. entry into the First World War seemed inevitable, Wilson faced the enormous task of convincing the American people to support the war efforts. He turned to George Creel, who headed up the Committee on Public Information, and launched a massive propaganda campaign to sell the war.

Rachel Fedde, editor of Part 3 of The Great War, shares how she selected images, footage, and an interview with Robert Laplander, a self-made expert on the Lost Battalion, to convey the desperation and hardships faced by these isolated soldiers.