Eyes on the Prize: America's Civil Rights Years (1954-1965) is a documentary series about the American Civil Rights Movement. It originally aired on PBS in early 1987 with six initial parts; eight more parts were broadcast in 1990 as Eyes on the Prize II: America at the Racial Crossroads (1965-1985), for a total of fourteen episodes. It uses archival footage to record the growth of the American Civil Rights Movement, with special focus on the ordinary people who affected the change. It was produced by Henry Hampton at Blackside Inc .

The series has been hailed as more than just a historical document. Clayborne Carson, a Stanford University history professor and editor of Martin Luther King Jr.'s papers, remarked that "it is the principal film account of the most important American social justice movement of the 20th century." Because of its extensive use of primary sources and the depth of coverage of the material, it has been adopted as a key reference and record of the civil rights movement.

It has also seen extensive use in schools and other educational settings as a way to convey the experiences and history of that period in the struggle for civil rights.

Currently it is unavailable on video or TV due to limits on the licenses of the copyrights of the archival footage used. While the production company and their lawyers are seeking means to re-secure the rights to further use of that footage, the only legal means available for accessing the series is through aging and deteriorating video tapes.

Controversies

Independent of the producers, the organization Downhill Battle initiated the "Eyes on the Screen" project, along with civil rights activist Lawrence Guyot, in January of 2005 to encourage the use of file sharing networks to distribute the film - without regard for copyright restrictions. They also called for people to display the film, particularly on February 8 - during Black History Month.

The Eyes on the Screen campaign has been endorsed by groups such as the Bay Area Veterans of the Civil Rights Movement , who wrote: "Therefore, in the spirit of Southern Freedom Movement , we who once defied the laws and customs that denied people of color their human rights and dignity, we whose faces are seen in "Eyes on the Prize," we who helped produce it, tonight defy the media giants who have buried our story in their vaults by publicly sharing episodes of this forbidden knowledge with all who wish to see it."[1], [2]

Some have taken exception to Downhill's use of the series as a tool in the cause of challenging existing copyright law[3]. Some affiliated with the production of the series (particularly producer Henry Hampton's family) have decried the positioning of the series as an icon of the copyright reform movement[4].

Topics Covered

The topics covered in the episodes of the series:

Part 1

• School integration,
• Little Rock, Arkansas,
• Montgomery Bus Boycott,
• Selma,
• Lunch counter sit ins,
• ....

Part 2

• Black Panthers,
• the Nation of Islam,
• Affirmative Action,
• ....

Episodes

• Episode 1: Awakenings (1954-1956)
• Episode 2: Fighting Back (1957-1962)
• Episode 3: Ain't Scared of Your Jails (1960-1961)
• Episode 4: No Easy Walk (1962-1966)
• Episode 5: Mississippi: Is This America?
• Episode 6: Bridge To Freedom

External links

• PBS Lesson Plans
• IMDB entry for Eyes On the Prize (1987)
• IMDB entry for Eyes On the Prize II (1990)
• Regarding the controversies:
  • Wired Article on Archival footage issue
  • Eyes on the Screen
  • Wired Article on Eyes on the Screen screening in the Bay Area