SACRAMENTO – In celebration of Black History Month, KVIE Public Television will broadcast local and national programs that honor the spirit, creativity, and determination of significant heroes of the Civil Rights Era, as well as important individuals in history and today.
KVIE will air three documentaries from its original series, ViewFinder, that highlight African Americans in the region. The first examines Sacramento during the Civil Rights era, and the significant, yet unknown, heroes during this turbulent time. African Americans in California’s Heartland – The Civil Rights Era, airs Tuesday, February 5, at 10:30pm. Then, meet Regina Louise, an African American orphan who grew up in more than 30 foster homes, group homes, and psychiatric facilities. Experience the foster care system through her first-person account in ViewFinder: Someone’s Somebody, Wednesday, February 13, at 7pm. Examine the life of the city’s first practicing African American attorney in The Time is Now – The Civic Life of Sacramento’s Nathaniel Colley. Produced in partnership with the Center for Sacramento History, this documentary traces the work of the civil rights activist, who spent 50 years shaping the course of American history, and airs Wednesday, February 20, at 7pm.
Journalist Gwen Ifill interviews entrepreneur, songwriter, movie director, and producer Berry Gordy in An Evening with Berry Gordy, airing Sunday, February 3, at 10pm. Gordy began in Detroit, where he founded Motown Records in 1959 and grew the company into the most successful African-American owned enterprise in the United States.
Find inspiration in the story of a courageous band of young civil-rights activists who journeyed through the Deep South in 1961. Learn how their endeavors brought the president and the American public face-to-face with the challenge of correcting civil-rights inequalities in, American Experience: Freedom Riders, airing Monday, February 4, at 10pm.
KVIE will air two documentaries from AfroPop: The Ultimate Cultural Exchange, a series that aims to portray a balanced view of Africa and
provide fuel for conversations about the present realities and lifestyles of Africans worldwide. Burning in the Sun airs Wednesday, February 6, at 11pm., and follows 26-year-old social entrepreneur Daniel Dembele, who works to use solar panels to electrify rural households in his native country of Mali, Africa. That’s My Face, airing Wednesday, February 13, at 11 pm, chronicles documentarian Thomas Allen Harris’ quest to Africa and Brazil to find his spiritual ancestors.
Take a fascinating look at the work of one of the nation’s leading atmospheric scientists, Dr. Warren Washington in Night with Warren Washington, Wednesday, February 20, at 11pm. Dr. Warren Washington explores his family’s African American history from the 1900s in Portland, Oregon, to his being awarded the National Medal of Science in 2010.
Sister Rosetta Tharpe introduced the spiritual passion of her gospel music into the secular world of rock ‘n’ roll. Discover her life, music, and influence in American Masters: Sister Rosetta Tharpe – The Godmother of Rock and Roll, which premieres Friday, February 22 at 9pm.
Produced by The HistoryMakers, the nation’s largest African American video oral history archive, Conversation with Henry Louis Gates, Jr. provides an interesting and rarely seen look into the life and career of the Harvard professor. This program will air Friday, February 22, at 11 pm.