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Power of Place
How geography, environment, and communities have shaped history.

Featured "Power of Place" Stories


Mr. Besley's Forest
In 1906, Maryland was third in the nation to establish a state system of forests and parks. Fred W. Besley, appointed by Governor Edwin Warfield, became Maryland's first State Forester. During his 36 years, Besley created a model for scientific forest management and the Big Tree formula. Today, Marylanders are learning his lessons of forest conservation and listening to the music of the trees.


Boom and Bust: America’s Journey on the Erie Canal
American industrial workers in steel, grain, textiles, and shipping tell their stories of labor and life along the Erie Canal. These are the men and women who built American economic prosperity on the Canal for 150 years, and bore the brunt of its decline in the final decades of the 20th century.


The Price of Silence: The Search for Freedom in New Jersey
The third part of “The Price of Silence” series explores the Black American flight to New Jersey during the Great Migration. Blacks hoped to find a better life in the region, devoid of the racism and discrimination they experienced in the South.


Mt. Washington Auto Road to the Sky
Determined dreamers built a road through the clouds, clear to the summit of the tallest peak in the Northeast. Experience the year-round adventures of the "Rockpile".


Return of the Trumpeters
The majestic trumpeter swan, North America’s largest waterfowl, was once hunted to the brink of extinction. Thanks to the remarkable...


This American Land
Reporting from the front lines, This American Land brings you compelling stories on critical issues impacting America's natural...


The Humble Oyster
The Humble Oyster examines the fragility of Northwest Florida’s threatened coastal ecology and efforts to bring back the health of local...


The Latinx Photography Project
A bilingual documentary film that explores a town in rural California working to integrate two distinct ethnic and linguistic groups...
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