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REEL SOUTH
THE STATE OF EUGENICS
Season 2
Episode 223
Between 1933 and 1974, the state of North Carolina ran one of the most aggressive eugenics programs, sterilizing more than 7,600 men, women and children. This film follows the journey of survivors, legislators and journalists who insist the state confront its role in the tragic, forced sterilization of thousands of Americans thought to have “undesirable” genetics
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16:53
A historian revisits the oral history of a 1920s school teacher in the Mississippi Delta.
21:10
In 1971, one of the worst industrial tragedies in U.S. history shook rural Georgia.
17:18
An ode to one man’s fight against strip mining the Appalachian mountains he loved dearly.
14:26
Jared Dawson embodies his drag persona, Lavonia Elberton, in Atlanta, Georgia.
30:26
A Southern restaurant adjusts to newfound fame after appearing on Korean television.
24:04
Two Korean-American adoptees meet their birth mothers for the first time.
27:09
An Alabama inmate fights to keep a jailhouse romance alive while advocating for parole.
27:32
Youth suicide at a Louisiana juvenile detention center exposes a legacy of abuse.
56:15
An ode to the poetry and power of the American South’s diverse landscape and its stewards.
21:55
A Florida woman battles media scrutiny and public outrage to save her pet alligator.
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55:46
Louis Armstrong was an icon, but for Sharon, he was the father she could never reveal.