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The Best Episodes of American Experience Season 7

Every episode of American Experience Season 7 ranked from best to worst. Discover the Best Episodes of American Experience Season 7!

Binge this in 11h 55m•Peaking at 8.5/10

TV's most-watched history series brings to life the compelling stories from our past that inform our understanding of the world today.

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Episode Rankings

  1. #1 Fan Favorite
    American Experience Season 7 Episode 1 - FDR (1): The Center of the World (1882-1921)
    8.5/10(170 votes)

    #1 - FDR (1): The Center of the World (1882-1921)

    S7:E1

    Polio at age 39, president at age 50. Explore the public and private life of a determined man who steered the United States through two monumental crises: the Depression and World War II. FDR served as president longer than any other, and his legacy still shapes our understanding of the role of government and the presidency. A film by award winning filmmaker David Grubin. This first episode looks at the early life of FDR. Born into a wealthy family, there was little about his youth that would suggest the giant of history that he would become. His entry into state politics and a significant meeting with a woman named Eleanor would change his life and the course of a nation.

    Director:David Grubin
    Writer:David Grubin

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  2. American Experience Season 7 Episode 2 - FDR (2): Fear Itself (1922-1933)
    8.3/10(100 votes)

    #2 - FDR (2): Fear Itself (1922-1933)

    S7:E2

    In this second episode, the subject is FDR's courageous fight with polio. With his wife Eleanor Roosevelt at his side, FDR, wins the Democratic nomination for president. He takes office at the beginning of the Great Depression. Exhorting the nation to keep the faith, FDR utters his famous words: "The only thing we have to fear is fear itself."

    Director:David Grubin
    Writer:David Grubin

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  3. American Experience Season 7 Episode 3 - FDR (3): The Grandest Job in the World (1933-1940)
    6.7/10(18 votes)

    #3 - FDR (3): The Grandest Job in the World (1933-1940)

    S7:E3

    In episode 3, the subject is FDR's leadership of America during the Great Depression. The nation turned to this son of great wealth for a host of social programs that promised a New Deal for the common man.

    Director:Unknown
    Writer:Unknown

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  4. American Experience Season 7 Episode 4 - FDR (4): The Juggler (1940-1945)
    6.6/10(45 votes)

    #4 - FDR (4): The Juggler (1940-1945)

    S7:E4

    The portrait of Franklin Delano Roosevelt concludes with his years as preside (1932 until his death in 1945), how he dealt with the Great Depression, and his link with Winston Churchill during World War II.

    Director:Unknown
    Writer:Unknown

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  5. American Experience Season 7 Episode 5 - Telegrams from the Dead
    8.1/10(105 votes)

    #5 - Telegrams from the Dead

    S7:E5

    For 40 years, a new religion called spiritualism affected the nation as no other ever had. Abraham Lincoln, P.T. Barnum, Frederick Douglass, senators, and scientists argued over the discoveries of the spirit world as revealed through mediums. Congress debated whether to provide $40,000 to research the feasibility of using the new wireless technology to reach the other world. But by 1880, as one spectacular fraud after another was revealed, the movement began to fade.

    Director:Unknown
    Writer:Unknown

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  6. American Experience Season 7 Episode 6 - Midnight Ramble
    7.4/10(38 votes)

    #6 - Midnight Ramble

    S7:E6

    The little-known story of a black independent film industry that thrived outside of Hollywood and produced close to 500 feature movies for African American audiences between 1910 and 1940. Many race movies tackled some of the difficult social issues that confronted black urban society: alcoholism, crime, morality, class conflict, even racism and lynching, setting the stage for today's independent black cinema movement.

    Director:Unknown
    Writer:Unknown

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  7. American Experience Season 7 Episode 7 - Battle of the Bulge
    7.2/10(28 votes)

    #7 - Battle of the Bulge

    S7:E7

    The history of World War II's "Battle of the Bulge", when the German army launched a major surprise counteroffensive against the American forces that caught them almost completely off-guard, sweeping away major portions of the front line, pushing deep into the rear areas and causing tens of thousands of casualties before it was finally halted.

    Director:Unknown
    Writer:Unknown

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  8. American Experience Season 7 Episode 10 - One Woman, One Vote (1)
    0.0/10(0 votes)

    #8 - One Woman, One Vote (1)

    S7:E10

    From Elizabeth Cady Stanton's electrifying call to arms at Seneca Falls in 1848, to the last battle for passage of the Nineteenth Amendment in 1920, a recounting of the infighting, the alliances and betrayals, defeats and victories on the way to winning the right to vote. The struggle split the suffragist movement into two opposing forces: the militants who faced imprisonment and riots and those who argued for a quieter, more persuasive ways. Both tactics, it turned out, were needed.

    Director:Unknown
    Writer:Unknown

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  9. American Experience Season 7 Episode 11 - One Woman, One Vote (2)
    0.0/10(0 votes)

    #9 - One Woman, One Vote (2)

    S7:E11

    From Elizabeth Cady Stanton's electrifying call to arms at Seneca Falls in 1848, to the last battle for passage of the Nineteenth Amendment in 1920, a recounting of the infighting, the alliances and betrayals, defeats and victories on the way to winning the right to vote. The struggle split the suffragist movement into two opposing forces: the militants who faced imprisonment and riots and those who argued for a quieter, more persuasive ways. Both tactics, it turned out, were needed.

    Director:Unknown
    Writer:Unknown

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  10. American Experience Season 7 Episode 12 - The Way West (1): Westward, the Course of Empire Takes Its Way (1845-1864)
    0.0/10(0 votes)

    #10 - The Way West (1): Westward, the Course of Empire Takes Its Way (1845-1864)

    S7:E12

    A six-hour documentary of how the West was lost and won, from the time of the Gold Rush in 1848 until after the last gasp of the Indian Wars at Wounded Knee in 1893, when the West was settled, subdued, exploited and incorporated into the American empire. Lakotas, Cheyennes, Kiowas, Poncas, Apaches, Nez Perces and Utes fought back, then watched as everything they had was taken from them, their way of life all but destroyed.

    Director:Unknown
    Writer:Unknown

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  11. American Experience Season 7 Episode 13 - The Way West (2): The Approach of Civilization (1865-1869)
    0.0/10(0 votes)

    #11 - The Way West (2): The Approach of Civilization (1865-1869)

    S7:E13

    A six-hour documentary of how the West was lost and won, from the time of the Gold Rush in 1848 until after the last gasp of the Indian Wars at Wounded Knee in 1893, when the West was settled, subdued, exploited and incorporated into the American empire. Lakotas, Cheyennes, Kiowas, Poncas, Apaches, Nez Perces and Utes fought back, then watched as everything they had was taken from them, their way of life all but destroyed.

    Director:Unknown
    Writer:Unknown

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  12. American Experience Season 7 Episode 14 - The Way West (3): The War for the Black Hills (1870-1876)
    0.0/10(0 votes)

    #12 - The Way West (3): The War for the Black Hills (1870-1876)

    S7:E14

    A six-hour documentary of how the West was lost and won, from the time of the Gold Rush in 1848 until after the last gasp of the Indian Wars at Wounded Knee in 1893, when the West was settled, subdued, exploited and incorporated into the American empire. Lakotas, Cheyennes, Kiowas, Poncas, Apaches, Nez Perces and Utes fought back, then watched as everything they had was taken from them, their way of life all but destroyed.

    Director:Unknown
    Writer:Unknown

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  13. American Experience Season 7 Episode 15 - The Way West (4): Ghost Dance (1877-1893)
    0.0/10(0 votes)

    #13 - The Way West (4): Ghost Dance (1877-1893)

    S7:E15

    A six-hour documentary of how the West was lost and won, from the time of the Gold Rush in 1848 until after the last gasp of the Indian Wars at Wounded Knee in 1893, when the West was settled, subdued, exploited and incorporated into the American empire. Lakotas, Cheyennes, Kiowas, Poncas, Apaches, Nez Perces and Utes fought back, then watched as everything they had was taken from them, their way of life all but destroyed.

    Director:Unknown
    Writer:Unknown

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Season 7 Ratings Summary

"FDR (1): The Center of the World (1882-1921)" is the best rated episode of "American Experience" season 7. It scored 8.5/10 based on 170 votes. Directed by David Grubin and written by David Grubin, it aired on 10/12/1994. This episode is rated 0.2 points higher than the second-best, "FDR (2): Fear Itself (1922-1933)".