american icons

American Icons: ‘Uncle Tom’s Cabin’

This is the novel that gave slavery a bad name.

American Icons: ‘Uncle Tom’s Cabin’

American Icons: ‘Spoon River Anthology’

American Icons: ‘Spoon River Anthology’
President Obama

American Icons: ‘Amazing Grace’

American Icons: ‘Amazing Grace’

American Icons: ‘Leaves of Grass’

American Icons: ‘Leaves of Grass’
President Obama

The complicated story behind the famous hymn ‘Amazing Grace’

The complicated story behind the famous hymn ‘Amazing Grace’

American Icons: Shaft

The movie that changed the face of American action by creating a new kind of black male lead, and kickstarting Blaxploitation.

American Icons: Shaft

American Icons: Leonard Bernstein's Young People's Concerts

The story behind Leonard Bernstein’s Young People’s Concerts.

American Icons: Leonard Bernstein's Young People's Concerts

American Icons: “Fiddler on the Roof”

How a milkman from a Russian shtetl became a Broadway star and a hero of postwar American culture.

American Icons: “Fiddler on the Roof”

American Icons: Migrant Mother

Dorothea Lange’s photo of a mother and her children became the iconic image of the Great Depression. But both Lange and the woman in the photo came to wish she hadn’t taken it.

American Icons: Migrant Mother

Remembering Five American Icons

To celebrate Independence Day, WNYC is airing a marathon of Studio 360's American Icons series. Hear all five featured documentaries here.

Remembering Five American Icons

American Icons: “Spoon River Anthology”

A landmark in American poetry, Edgar Lee Masters’ “Spoon River Anthology” shocked readers when it came out in 1915 by tackling subjects like suicide and sex.

American Icons: “Spoon River Anthology”

American Icons: Nirvana’s “Nevermind”

How did “Nevermind” come to define 90s rock — and make Nirvana the last universally acclaimed rock band?

American Icons: Nirvana’s “Nevermind”

Mel Brooks & "Anything Goes"

This special edition brings you all things Mel Brooks: the landmark recording "2,000 Year-Old Man," the musical that inspired his love of show business, and of course, the man himself. 

Mel Brooks & "Anything Goes"

"Kind of Blue"

Even people who don’t like jazz know Miles Davis’s “Kind of Blue.” What makes it so different — and why does it continue to influence musicians today?

"Kind of Blue"

John Henry

John Henry wins a race against the machine that threatens to take his job, but then he dies of exhaustion. Some victory.

John Henry