"Views of a Vanishing Frontier" is a nice episode from "The American Experience" because it talks about the early plains tribes in the United States...a group seldom talked about or studied apart from two men. It seems that Prince Maximillian of Bavaria was an avid scientist and loved to explore and catalog native groups. Following such a trip to the Amazon, he traveled to the US to study the American Indians. He brought with him an artist, Karl Bodmer, and the two lived in the Plains for two years...befriending the natives, painting them and taking copious notes and specimens.
It's sad that today so much of what we know of these tribesmen comes from a couple foreigners, as Americans simply didn't care. And, we sure owe a big debt to the expedition...as well as "The American Experience" dramatizing it (using the voice of Werner Klemperer as the Prince). Very well made and well worth seeing.... I just wish the story had been longer and told more about the Prince and Bodmer and their later careers and exploits.
It's sad that today so much of what we know of these tribesmen comes from a couple foreigners, as Americans simply didn't care. And, we sure owe a big debt to the expedition...as well as "The American Experience" dramatizing it (using the voice of Werner Klemperer as the Prince). Very well made and well worth seeing.... I just wish the story had been longer and told more about the Prince and Bodmer and their later careers and exploits.
