The American President

Abstract

Just as the historical profession has essentially weaned itself from the presidential synthesis, pbs has been actively promoting presidential historians and presenting presidential documentaries, from episodes of American Experience to The American President. The latter tenpart series, first aired in April 2000, featured narration by Hugh Sidey and commentary by Richard Neustadt, along with such celebrity narrators as Tim Russert as Millard Fillmore, Andrew Young as Thomas Jefferson, Bob Dole as Herbert Hoover, Dan Rostenkowski as Chester Arthur, and, yes, Don Imus as Andrew Johnson. The American President is the TV series' eponymous Web site. Designed for educational outreach, in coordination with the National Council for the Social Studies, the site promises to provide teachers and students “with exciting tools and resources” that will “make learning about the presidency interactive and fun.” To a considerable degree, it accomplishes those objectives with information that is abundant, accurate, and well illustrated. The Web site provides descriptions of each episode in the series, interviews with the producers, and presidential “galleries” chockablock full of “fast facts,” biographical sketches, summaries of foreign and domestic issues, samplings of quotations and images, recommended readings, lesson plans, issues to ponder, and a glossary of nicknames, campaign slogans, and related references. Beyond its own offerings, The American President provides links to additional Web sites (rated by teachers) for each president. These sites in turn offer their own links to other resources, creating a seemingly infinite cybernetwork of presidential data.