Daniel Ellsberg was an American political activist, economist, and United States military analyst. While employed by the RAND Corporation, he precipitated a national political controversy in 1971 when he released the Pentagon Papers, a top-secret Pentagon study of U.S. government decision-making in relation to the Vietnam War, to The New York Times, The Washington Post, and other newspapers.
A conscientious objector is an "individual who has claimed the right to refuse to perform military service" on the grounds of freedom of conscience or religion. The term has also been extended to objecting to working for the military–industrial complex due to a crisis of conscience. In some countries, conscientious objectors are assigned to an alternative civilian service as a substitute for conscription or military service.
Frontline is an investigative documentary program distributed by the Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) in the United States. Episodes are produced at WGBH in Boston, Massachusetts. The series has covered a variety of domestic and international issues, including terrorism, elections, environmental disasters, and other sociopolitical issues. Since its debut in 1983, Frontline has aired in the U.S. for 42 seasons, and has won critical acclaim and awards in broadcast journalism. In 2024, Frontline won its first Oscar at the 96th Academy Awards for Best Documentary Feature, 20 Days in Mariupol, made by a team of AP Ukrainian journalists. Frontline has produced over 800 documentaries from both in-house and independent filmmakers, 200 of which are available online.
Nova is an American popular science television program produced by WGBH in Boston, Massachusetts, since 1974. It is broadcast on PBS in the United States, and in more than 100 other countries. The program has won many major television awards.
Desmond Thomas Doss was a United States Army corporal who served as a combat medic with an infantry company in World War II. Due to his religious beliefs, he refused to carry a weapon.
ITVS is a service in the United States which funds and presents documentaries on public television through distribution by PBS and American Public Television, new media projects on the Internet, and the weekly series Independent Lens on PBS. Aside from Independent Lens, ITVS funded and produced films for more than 40 television hours per year on the PBS series POV, Frontline, American Masters and American Experience. Some ITVS programs are produced along with organizations like Latino Public Broadcasting and KQED.
Ric Burns is an American documentary filmmaker and writer. He has written, directed and produced historical documentaries since the 1990s, beginning with his collaboration on the celebrated PBS series The Civil War (1990), which he produced with his older brother Ken Burns and wrote with Geoffrey Ward.
Harvey Kurek Ovshinsky is an American writer, story consultant, media producer, and teacher, and has been described as "one of this country’s finest storytellers" by the Detroit News. The Metro Times called Ovshinsky's career chronicling life in Detroit during the 1960s, 70s, 80s, and 90s "a colorful and fantastic voyage, at times brave and visionary," spanning the universe of print, broadcast television and radio, and digital storytelling.
Jon Alpert is an American journalist and documentary filmmaker, known for his use of a cinéma vérité approach in his films.
Elizabeth Freya Garbus is an American documentary film director and producer. Notable documentaries Garbus has made are The Farm: Angola, USA,Ghosts of Abu Ghraib,Bobby Fischer Against the World,Love, Marilyn,What Happened, Miss Simone?, and Becoming Cousteau. She is co-founder and co-director of the New York City-based documentary film production company Story Syndicate.
The Erik Barnouw Award—also known as the OAH Erik Barnouw Award—is named after the late Erik Barnouw, a Columbia University historian and professor who was a specialist in mass media. The OAH -- Organization of American Historians -- gives one or two awards annually to recognize excellent programs, from mass media or documentary films, that relate to American history or further its study. The award was first presented in 1983.
George Cooper Stevens Jr. is an American writer, playwright, director, and producer. He is the founder of the American Film Institute, creator of the AFI Life Achievement Award, and co-creator of the Kennedy Center Honors. He has also served as Co-Chairman of the President's Committee on the Arts and Humanities.
Gordon Randall Kehler was an American pacifist, tax resister, and social justice advocate. Kehler objected to America's involvement in the Vietnam War and refused to cooperate with the draft. He, along with his wife Betsy Corner, stopped paying federal income taxes in protest of war and military spending, a decision that led to the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) seizing their house in 1989.
The Most Dangerous Man in America: Daniel Ellsberg and the Pentagon Papers is a 2009 American documentary film directed by Judith Ehrlich and Rick Goldsmith. The film follows Daniel Ellsberg and explores the events leading up to the 1971 publication of the Pentagon Papers, which exposed the top-secret military history of the United States' involvement in Vietnam.
Solly Granatstein is an American television producer and director, formerly with CBS 60 Minutes, NBC News and ABC News. He is co-creator, along with Lucian Read and Richard Rowley, of "America Divided", a documentary series about inequality, and was co-executive producer of Years of Living Dangerously Season 1. He is the winner of twelve Emmys, a Peabody, a duPont, two Polks, four Investigative Reporters and Editors awards, including the IRE medal, and virtually every other major award in broadcast journalism. He is also the screenwriter, with Vince Beiser, of The Great Antonio, an upcoming film, developed by Steven Soderbergh and Warner Brothers.
David E. Fanning is a South African American journalist and filmmaker. He was the executive producer of the investigative documentary series Frontline since its first season in 1983 to his retirement in 2015. He has won eight Emmy Awards and in 2013 received a Lifetime Achievement Emmy in honor of his work.
Richard Rowley is a documentary filmmaker. His films and TV shows have received three Emmy awards, an Oscar nomination, and other awards and nominations, as well as recognition at film festivals around the world.
Terry Benedict is an American film producer. He is the founder and CEO of The Shae Foundation.
Apollo 11 is a 2019 American documentary film edited, produced and directed by Todd Douglas Miller. It focuses on the 1969 Apollo 11 mission, the first spaceflight from which men walked on the Moon. The film consists solely of archival footage, including 70 mm film previously unreleased to the public, and does not feature narration, interviews or modern recreations. The Saturn V rocket, Apollo crew consisting of Buzz Aldrin, Neil Armstrong, and Michael Collins, and Apollo program Earth-based mission operations engineers are prominently featured in the film.
Day of Rage: How Trump Supporters Took the U.S. Capitol is a 2021 American documentary short film about the January 6 Capitol attack by supporters of former president Donald Trump, reported by The New York Times.
