Pulitzer Prize-winning author Taylor Branch discusses the final years of Martin Luther King Jr.'s life, focusing on King's attempts to move the Civil Rights Movement into protest of the Vietnam War and King's calls for broader social and economic justice.
Video and audio options are available.
From the Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History website:
"Most discussions of the Vietnam War consider whether or not President John F. Kennedy could or would have withdrawn U.S. troops from the country, thus avoiding a long and bloody conflict. In this lecture, John Prados, a senior fellow of the National Security Archive in Washington, D.C., argues that America's path to Vietnam was set long before Kennedy took office. Near the end of World War II, President Franklin Roosevelt allowed the French to maintain a foothold in Indochina (as Vietnam and its neighbors were then known). By the 1950s, when France began to cast its battle with Vietnamese nationalists as a fight against communism, the United States was already, irrevocably drawn in."
Professors Ngo Ving Long and Noam Chomsky detail the U.S.'s oppression and killing of civilians in Vietnam during the Vietnam War, arguing that the U.S. public today has not learned from the war and does not remember it clearly and objectively.
According to the SpyCast website:
"SPY Historian Mark Stout explores the importance of signals intelligence (SIGINT) to the Vietnam War with retired National Security Agency cryptanalyst Tom Glenn. Glenn served more time in country than any other civilian of the NSA. Hear about the sixth sense that good SIGINTers need to have, the difficulties of working in foreign languages, and how Glenn and his colleagues were able to predict every major Communist offensive. Learn also why American commanders did not always believe them. Finally, hear the wrenching story of Glenn’s last days in Saigon in 1975 as the city was falling to the North Vietnamese Army."
This website is devoted to the life, work, and memory of John F. Kennedy, the 35th president of the U.S. Of primary interest to historians and teachers are the "Historical Resources and Education" and "Public Programs" sections of the website, which shed light on important events in early 1960s political history, including the Cuban missile crisis, the Vietnam War, the civil rights movement, the Peace Corps, the space program, and the 1963 Nuclear Test Ban Treaty. Users unfamiliar with the history of the Kennedy White House might begin with the "Timeline," which puts events important to the Kennedy administration in a larger political and cultural context, or "Biographies and Profiles," which presents a Kennedy family tree and profiles of early 1960s notables such as Fidel Castro, Robert McNamara, and Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr. "White House Diary" further familiarizes users with Kennedy's day-to-day activities as President.
The website also includes hundreds of historical sources including speeches, photographs, telegrams, correspondence, eulogies for Bobby Kennedy, JFK, and Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis (all accessible through an Advanced Search feature), and transcripts of more than 170 oral interviews with notables such as John Kenneth Galbraith (Harvard University economic professor and Ambassador to India), Supreme Court Justice Felix Frankfurter, singer Harry Belafonte, and President Gerald Ford. In some cases, the original audio files of speeches are also included. Several lesson plans designed for elementary, middle, and high school students use materials from this archive to address topics such as Kennedy's inaugural address, the Cuban missile crisis, and the civil rights movement.
From PBS:
What drove a company of American soldiers—ordinary young men from around the country—to commit the worst atrocity in American military history? Were they "just following orders" as some later declared? Or, did they break under the pressure of a vicious war in which the line between enemy soldier and civilian had been intentionally blurred? American Experience focuses on the 1968 My Lai massacre, its subsequent cover-up, and the heroic efforts of the soldiers who broke ranks to try to halt the atrocities, and then bring them to light.
Ford Presidential Library Director Elaine Didier describes an artifact in the collection of the Gerald R. Ford Presidential Library: the staircase by which U.S. citizens and individuals loyal to the U.S. climbed to helicopters to escape Saigon during the last days of the city's fall to anti-U.S. forces. She also describes the process by which the library acquired the staircase.
To listen to this lecture, scroll to "Elaine Didier."
Professor Allan Winkler follows the passage of the 1960s, looking at the social change and unrest in the period and the political and global environment that formed a background to this domestic change. His presentation includes slides and multimedia clips.
To find the lecture, scroll down to the heading "American History Institute," and select a connection type under "Allan Winkler."
Professors John Moser and Jeremi Suri look at Wilsonianism in foreign policy post-Vietnam, particularly in the presidency of Ronald Reagan. Moser and Suri also look at foreign policy in the present day.
To listen to this lecture, scroll to the Friday, July 16th, 10:50 am-12:20 pm session; and select either the RealAudio image or link in the gray bar to the left of the main body of text.
The Richard Nixon Library and Birthplace Foundation serves three main functions. First, the Foundation aids in the operation of the presidential library for Richard Nixon. As such, the library offers an enormous amount of documents and information about the Nixon presidency, including all primary sources relevant to the administration. For research access and information, visit http://www.nixonlibrary.gov/, the official website of the Nixon Library. Secondly, the site serves as a historic house museum, and gives visitors a view of Richard Nixon aside from his presidency. Finally, the Foundation helps to raise interest and scholarship in the Nixon presidency by hosting events at the Nixon Library throughout the year.
The site offers an events calendar, a very short virtual tour of the museum, links to the the Nixon presidential library, an event planner, and limited information about current exhibits.