San Antonio College Library

Ludwig II was obsessed by the desire to re-create in stone the castles in the air that commoners build in their dreams. Being a king, having been reared amidst the Germanic mythology of giants and dragons sky-riding Valkyries, he had the opportunity to carry out his fantasies. And so he created his own precursor of Disneyland, bankrupting the monarchy. This program tells the story of a mad king whose fantasies embodied many of the concepts that, half...

The history of the development of coal, iron, and steam during the Industrial Revolution is extensive and complex. In the era of the microchip, it is easy to overlook the critical role of the steam engine in powering the 19th-century machine. This program looks at the role of water power, examines Newcomen's and Watt's machines, looks at the interdependence of steam, coal, and iron and at the new demand for coal, and examines the growth of electrical...

This program examines how liberal ideas from the French Revolution fueled the fires of European nationalism, and how extreme nationalistic beliefs led to World War I. In Germany, Chancellor Otto von Bismarck constructed the philosophical and political framework for a unified Germany, steeped in the mythology of a German super-race and its destiny: to rule Europe. Serbians, inflamed by nationalism, assassinated Austrian Archduke Ferdinand, and Germany,...

In the early 1800s, an extraordinary event occurred in British politics: a small pressure group successfully lobbied against the entrenched, well-moneyed interests of slavery. This program uses dramatic reenactments, readings of Parliamentary minutes, and expert commentary to tell the story of the three men largely responsible for slavery's abolition: William Wilberforce, Granville Sharp, and Thomas Clarkson. Michael Dottridge, the director of Anti-Slavery...

Social barriers were crumbling, and this showed in fashion. Elegance was the goal. His fancy huge cuffs were proof that the wearer was a gentleman; he couldn't work in such garb. When George III came to the throne (he who lost the American colonies), he was the youngest monarch since Elizabeth, and the general style became younger. As he grew older, coiffures became larger, and some of the decorations-fruits, feathers, sculptural ornaments like ships-made...

When Victoria ascended the throne, there were one-and-a-half million Londoners; at her death, there were four-and-a-half million, a population explosion spurred by the Irish potato famine and new laws which allowed Jews escaping from Russian pogroms to immigrate. London was the largest city in the world-new bridges opened up the city; railroads and docks brought people and goods. The 1851 Crystal Palace exhibition was the largest greenhouse in the...

Paris in 1871 was a city of stark contrasts: Napoleon III and his Empress Eugenie ruled over a splendid Court; the Universal Exhibition was celebrating the miracles of the Machine Age; Baron Haussmann, redesigning Paris to create avenues splendid both for the vista and for the effective firing of cannons, had unleashed a speculative fever in Parisian real estate; and the poor, squeezed by industrialization, were squeezed beyond the point of no return...

The years of Napoleon's reign between 1806 and 1815 were characterized by unremitting war-against his neighbors through force of arms on the battlefields of Europe and against impregnable Britain through an embargo on commercial transactions known as the Continental System. In this program, the stories of a high-ranking nobleman under sentence of death, war profiteers, smugglers, and anti-French rebels illustrate the abuses of the French army committed...

As the age approaches our own, time accelerates; and in the six-and-a-half decades of Victoria's reign, changes came thick and fast: England's population doubled, the economy exploded, railways shrank the country's size, iron and steel were everywhere-in clothing too, in the women's steel hoops and cages and bustles. This was an age that began in moderation and soon became a contest for conspicuous consumption; an age of contradictions, too, when...

At a time when revolutionary France was assailed from all sides, there emerged a young military officer whose genius and ambition assured him of great fame-and notoriety. In this program, Dr. David Chandler-world-renowned authority on the Emperor Napoleon and author of The Campaigns of Napoleon-provides full commentary on the strategies and tactics of the Napoleonic Wars. Large-scale reenactments bring to life the military campaigns that so strongly...