Documentary / Biography

When our investigators find two ghostly locomotives, upright and intact, just a few miles off the New Jersey coast, they must figure out how these massive land vehicles ended up 90 feet below the Atlantic. With no shipwreck nearby, our detectives launch an investigation...

Using cutting-edge computer gaming technology, we recreate conflicts that shaped the ancient world and witness great battles like never before. Hosted on location by Matthew Settle, we return to Thermopylae in 480 BC, where 300 Spartans occupied a mountain pass and held off the...

Chalons, 451 AD. What made this battle so compelling? Attila the Hun, the terrifying menace who had his eyes set on what was left of the Western Roman Empire. By this time, huge chunks of the Roman Empire operated under the autonomous control of...

At 24, Sara had everything she ever wanted in her sleepy Minnesota town. She had a fairy-tale wedding in Hawaii, a beautiful baby girl, a house, three cars, and even competed in beauty pageants. Then, it all abruptly ended in divorce. Not knowing how...

The Tecumseh was an iron-hulled, single-turret monitor, similar in design to the famous USS Monitor. In August 1864, she was in the vanguard of a monitor flotilla that spearheaded the Federal attack on Mobile Bay. The Confederate defense centered on theirshore batteries and the...

In 1641, a deadly combination of treacherous waters and high winds brought the Concepcion to an untimely end. Though the ship would never sail again, its saga was just beginning. For over 300 years, tales of the treasure aboard the lost galleon brought adventurers...

Host John Chatterton dives the remains of a ship recently found off Florida whose past is as illustrious as her demise was mysterious. The Eleanor Bolling was the workhorse that carried Admiral Richard Byrd on his 1928 Antarctic expedition. But after Byrd's return to...

Earth gives birth to volcanoes when hot magna rises to the surface, infiltrates weak spots in the outer crust, and explodes in a spectacular burst of energy and power that can kill thousands in moments. Despite this apparent danger, people insist on living near...

Here's the fascinating story of Catherine Shelton, a criminal defense attorney in Dallas, Texas. Catherine was known as a tough, smart lawyer and a dogged advocate for her clients; she was also known for her own run-ins with the law outside of the courthouse....

A rapist who attacked a woman on a barroom pool table, a thief who absconded with over $10,000 in gold jewelry from a casino, and a prostitute who plied her trade while testing HIV-positive ask the board for parole.

Floodwaters wreak havoc beneath the streets of Chicago, and intrepid cave diver Jill Yager discovers a 150-million-year-old species of crustacean. Bill Kurtis hosts.

For a dozen turbulent years between WWI and WWII, the U.S. Navy poured millions of dollars into an audacious dream: to rule the skies with a fleet of massive airships. Armed with squadrons of scout planes, these "Battleships of the Skies" could travel far...

Through rain, snow, heat, or gloom of night, we have all come to count on our trusty postman to deliver our mail. The United States Post Office handles more than 603 million pieces of mail a day. Six days a week, over 128 million...

Arising from the horrible carnage, deprivation, and suffering caused by war is a countless array of everyday items--from hairbrushes to microwaves--that directly descend from wartime innovations. Wartime research and development have revolutionized communication, transportation, and medicine. From Spam to nuclear power to hair spray...

In darkened alleys and on city streets, a war of flames rages on. Firefighters rush into burning buildings, one step behind and arsonist who strikes the match. Join Bill Kurtis and arson investigators from Chicago's police and fire departments as they sift the ashes...

In March 2002, in Vilnius, Lithuania, construction workers uncovered a mass grave filled with close to 2,000 skeletons. Scientists determined that the remains belonged to the last remnants of Napoleon's Grand Army retreating from Moscow in 1812. The find offers new insight into Napoleon's...

Estas son las historias que han surgido durante los siglos del milenio. Estan llenas de leyendas y mitos, y envueltas en un halo de verdades tentadoras. Ellas hacen parte de los MISTERIOS DE LA ANTIGUEDAD. Cuando los pioneros y aventureros llegaron al Caqsn del...

In Tucson, a young man is found shot to death on the street. Detectives Bill Hanson and Mike Carroll follow two clues that could lead to a suspect - a dropped cell phone and a pawnshop slip tucked in the victim's pocket. In Memphis,...

For many, fame is a dream: critical acclaim, privilege, wealth, and a world of adoring fans. But in a split second, everything can disappear, and in Celebrity Close Calls, it almost did. In this new BIO series, celebrities share exclusive firsthand accounts of near-death...

You're in the cockpit with some of the fiercest dog fighting ever seen in Vietnam! These pilots fight in a supersonic world, and split second decisions determine life or death. American F4 Phantom pilots Fred Olmsted and Dan Cherry take on the famed MiG-21--the...

Motel Massacre/Pure Innocent (#52). A Memphis motel turns into a war zone when a gunfight leaves two men dead and another critically injured. Sgt. WD Merritt and the homicide team spring into action to find their shooter. In Kansas City, homicide Det. Everett Babcock...

Profile of the Hollywood directing legend who became known for his "spectaculars", making such lavish productions as The Ten Commandments and The Greatest Show on Earth. Cecil B. DeMille helped establish Hollywood as the movie-making capital of the world, and contributed many innovations to...

In the wilds of the American West, average citizens often stepped into the fray to keep their towns from being taken over by society's dregs. It seemed like pickpockets and pimps rolled into main street the moment gold was struck. And often, it was...

THE ALLIES: In this episode we uncover Allied secrets off WWII, like a battleship made of ice, bat bombs, floating tanks, rocket-propelled wheels that would roll through enemy lines, pigeon-guided missiles, and earthquake bombs designed to penetrate the earth and shake structures to pieces....

September 14, 1944--the South Pacific. While clearing mines for the Allied invasion of the Palau Islands, the USS Perry is rocked by a huge explosion and immediately begins to list. All hands abandon ship into open waters, drawing enemy fire from shore. Two days...

The U-2513 is what's known as a Type 21 German U-boat. In the 1940s, the Type 21 was a secret weapon that threatened to change the course of two wars: WWII, and then later, the Cold War. During WWII, German hopes were riding on...

For more than a thousand years, the Taino people flourished on the islands comprising the Greater Antilles--modern-day Cuba, Jamaica, Haiti, Puerto Rico, and the Dominican Republic. Five centuries ago, they seemingly vanished--millions of people gone in the blink of an eye. The DSD team...

More than 1000 years ago in Mexico, the great temple-city of Palenque thrived as an important center of the Mayan world. Mysteriously abandoned in 835 AD, it has preserved countless secrets ever since. Journey to the Mexican jungle on a quest to unearth the...

In 1944, a Japanese plane carrying a copy of "Z-Plan" - Japan's strategy to win the war in the Pacific - went down in the Philippines. The papers fell into the hands of pro-American guerrilla forces, and US military officials desperately wanted to retrieve...

For more than a half-century, America's Central Intelligence Agency has systematically suppressed, distorted, and even fabricated reports of UFO sightings. With the assistance of the CIA's official historian and newly declassified documents, we provide anobjective, balanced, and at times, highly controversial examination of the...

A visit to "Supermax" high-security prisons to meet inmates who are isolated in tiny cells 23 hours a day. Includes interviews with penal experts who say that this extreme isolation is cruel and inhuman punishment.

Spartacus is one of the Ancient World's most famous figures. A Thracian soldier, Spartacus was captured by Romans and sold as a slave for training as a gladiator. With 70 other gladiators, he escaped and hid on Mount Vesuvius in 71 BC, where he...

Teutoburg Forest, 9 AD. According to the Roman historian Dio, Arminius (aka Herman), Chief of the Cherusci, and his father Segemerus, ambushed and wiped out three legions led by Quinctilius Varus. Not a good day to be out in the woods of Germany if...

In 197 BC, the classic military conflict between the Ancient World's two dominant military systems took place in a chain of hills called Cynoscephalae (Greek for "Dogs' Heads") in Thessaly, Greece. King Philip V led the Macedonian phalanx, the fighting force that conquered the...

Follows the revolutionary rise of the legendary blackjack team, the Tommy Hyland Team. Beginning with Hyland's bold decision to turn blackjack card-counting into a business venture, we follow as he implements a multi-person card-counting system. The well-oiled plan works without a flaw, and the...

The Nazca lines in Peru stretch for miles, forming perfect images of animals visible only from the air. Immense and precise, the pyramids remain among mankind's greatest accomplishments, and experts still debate how they were built. Span the globe in this riveting look at...

It was the most impressive fighting machine ever assembled. Its prowess on the battlefields of the ancient world was unmatched, and its power could challenge even that of the emperor. From its humble beginnings as a band of part-time soldiers to its ultimate evolution...

At the turn of the 19th century, upper-class men of Europe and America fought pistol duels to the death. The pistols created for these duels were some of the most beautiful ever made. We'll examine these magnificent weapons that gave this strange ritual its...

Born of immigrant parents in 1912, Phil Silvers grew up on the mean streets of Brownsville in Brooklyn. His talent and wit launched a show business career that culminated with the smash Broadway show, Top Banana, and the heights of TV stardom in the...

In 2002, a series of mysterious oil spills spread alarm up and down the Northern California coastline, when a 200-mile stretch of beaches became littered with the carcasses of oiled animals. Experts soon realized they had an escalating disaster on their hands. Finally, the...

When the tank first appeared on the battlefield in World War I, it was slow, clumsy and unreliable. But its potential was undeniable. By World War II, tanks developed into the most effective ground weapons the world had ever seen. HELL ON WHEELS is...

Ramses II was perhaps the greatest pharaoh to rule ancient Egypt. His reign lasted 67 years--it was one of the longest in Egyptian history. As king of one of the most powerful civilizations in the world--he possessed endless energy and a determination to insure...

It is one of the lowlights in the history of American government, an agency that almost immediately ran into problems and has since bounced from scandal to tragedy to the verge of bankruptcy. The Office of Housing and Urban Development was created to provide...

On November 29, 1992, 35-year-old Judy Blake Moilanen went walking with her five springer spaniels on Michigan's upper peninsula. When one of her dogs returned without her, Judy's mother went looking for her. She found her daughter's body in the woods, shot to death....

Hop in the cockpit for a daring century-long ride through the history of aircraft weaponry--from the first handgun fired from a biplane. Features interviews with Chuck Yeager, Korean ace Major Frederick Blesse, and pilots from Desert Storm and Kosovo, and historic footage of "Red...

Traces the marriage of firepower and the versatile chopper. From early testing in the 1950s to deployment in Vietnam and beyond, the helicopter has proven to be the most elusive weapons platform ever.

For centuries, popular culture has depicted Captain Kidd as an illiterate, devious, merciless pirate. But we turn the tables on accepted fact to uncover a different story. Kidd was an intelligent, well-read businessmen living in New York, when English King William III commissioned him...

Host Bill Kurtis explores the new, high-pressure world of children's sports where kids no longer play for fun, but for the dream of a lucrative professional career. Meet a 14-year-old girl besieged by college basketball recruiters, and a 12-year-old figure skater who spends two...

A day in the life of the New York Police Department's Emergency Services Unit as it saves lives and captures crooks around the clock. Viewers will see these elite cops stop a suicidal man from jumping off a bridge, nab dangerous drug dealers, and...

World premiere documentary that looks at the possibility of alien contact through the eyes of the UFO community, mainstream scientists and religious theologians.