"We Shall Overcome" - Hisatory of the 1965 Speech from the White House History site
This site offering a backstory to the speech is still available in February of 2026.
18: Turbulent 1960s
LBJ -March 15, 1965: Speech Before Congress on Voting Rights "We Shall Overcome" Speech
Jon Meacham asserts that this the greatest speech made by an American president which is saying a lot compared to the Gettysburg Address, and the Lincoln and FDR Inaugurals , or Reagan after the Challenger. What stand out about this one however, is how much it has vanished from public memory of the 1960s
Somehow you never forget what poverty and hatred can do when you see its scars on the hopeful face of a young child.
to deny a man his hopes because of his color or race, his religion or the place of his birth—is not only to do injustice, it is to deny America and to dishonor the dead who gave their lives for American freedom.
Their cause must be our cause too. Because it is not just Negroes, but really it is all of us, who must overcome the crippling legacy of bigotry and injustice. And we shall overcome.
So I say to all of you here, and to all in the Nation tonight, that those who appeal to you to hold on to the past do so at the cost of denying you your future.
And I have not the slightest doubt that good men from everywhere in this country, from the Great Lakes to the Gulf of Mexico, from the Golden Gate to the harbors along the Atlantic, will rally together now in this cause to vindicate the freedom of all Americans. For all of us owe this duty; and I believe that all of us will respond to it.
We do have a right to protest, and a right to march under conditions that do not infringe the constitutional rights of our neighbors. And I intend to protect all those rights as long as I am permitted to serve in this office.
At times history and fate meet at a single time in a single place to shape a turning point in man's unending search for freedom. So it was at Lexington and Concord. So it was a century ago at Appomattox. So it was last week in Selma, Alabama.
But rarely in any time does an issue lay bare the secret heart of America itself.
"The Vietnam War: How Much Dissent?" - 1968 ABC Scope Program
Short video to convey the language and mood of anti-Vietnam movement. Jerry Rubin and George Wallace featured
Richard Nixon and his Secretary Rose Mary Woods in the White House on Vimeo
8 minutes of random video of Richard Nixon in the Oval with Secretary Rosemary Wood. Interesting look at the president in a way not often seen
Archibald Cox letter to students 1994
This should end every Watergate lesson
Women's Rights Movement - 1970 NBC News Report - Reel America Preview 2
Two minute video from April 1970 focusing on the Women's Rights movement in contraception and abortion which shows women at a congressional hearing. Audiences today might be surprised to see Senators smoking at a hearing concerning the health effects of contraception
Voices from Home
This reading teaches so much more than that tired old Gulf of Tonkin Resolution DBQ. Explorations of the lived experience of the past is history - what would students think about their parents if they had the chance to hear them when they were younger?
Allen Ginsberg
NPR : Revisiting Allen Ginsberg's 'Howl' at 50
The Project Apollo Image Gallery
The World-Wide Web's most extensive collection of high-quality Apollo images, featuring images scanned for Eric Jones' Apollo Lunar Surface Journal.
NASA - Welcome to NASA Headquarters
Home base for NASA information
JSC Digital Image Collection
This collection of more than 9000 NASA press release photos spans the American manned space program, from the Mercury program to the STS-79 Shuttle mission. This site includes both a full text search and a simple browse tool to help you find the photos you're looking for.
Politics and the English Language - George Orwell, 1968
If the font of garbage spewing from our screens and speakers aren't enough to inspire teachers to weave language instruction into Civics and Social Studies, this article will do it for them. Only for teachers, or perhaps advanced high school students. - Here's a taste Modern English, especially written English, is full of bad habits which spread by imitation and which can be avoided if one is willing to take the necessary trouble. If one gets rid of these habits one can think more clearly, and to think clearly is a necessary first step toward political regeneration.
The Mother of all demos - YouTube
Younger viewers may not be impressed by this, but those of us who came to the internet in our thirties will find this demonstration of a computer technology in 1968 unbelievable. Years before Pong and more than a decade before Space Invaders, the graphic interface, hypertext and a computer mouse. Point and click is older than Woodstock.
CPL Chicago: 1968, August: Disturbances at the Democratic National Convention
George Wallace: Settin' the Woods on Fire
Companion site for American Experience documentary with articles, timeline and links to resources
Rock Music Festivals
An Analysis Of Over Twenty Years Of American Rock Music Festivals
Sixties Project: Primary Document Archive
Links to primary source archives from the 1960s
NASA - Apollo Moon Landing -- 35th Anniversary
Images and short article geared toward 5-8 grade from NASA
The History Place - Apollo 11
Narrative article with images from the Historyplace
Immigration Form for Apollo 11 astronauts
The immigration form completed by the crew of Apollo 11 when they returned to earth
Aquarius Wept - Esquire
Magazine article describes how that Age of Aquarius ended on a racetrack in California. If Woodstock was a midsummer night's dream, Altamont was a true witches sabbath.
Spiro Agnew, The Dangers of Constant Carnival
Much of the conservative backlash to the youth revolt is captured in this transcript of a Spiro Agnew speech on October 30, 1970. Can students recognize these attacks on the "new left", that appeals to racial fears while complaining about the liberal mass-media? This can also be used as DBQ source material
Neil Armstrong Eating Breakfast before going to the moon
What assumptions could students make about this guy if they saw him eating breakfast in the corner of a diner? What would they think of you told them who it really is, and what he was going to do after breakfast?
Kent State clip
2 minute clip that could have a place in a lesson
Dancing In The Street / Rock & Roll - complete series (1995) : Free Download, Borrow, and Streaming : Internet Archive
Test Ban Treaty (1963)
On August 5, 1963, the Limited Test Ban Treaty was signed by the United States, Great Britain, and the Soviet Union. After Senate approval, the treaty that went into effect on October 10, 1963, banned nuclear weapons testing in the atmosphere, in outer space, and under water.
The Cold War review
These are notes to John Lewis Gaddis's book on the Cold War - great summary (and current) fo the Cold War
The Computer as a Communication Device
J. R. Licklider's 1968 paper in which he wrote that "in a few years, men will communicate through machine easier than they communicate face to face." His drawings of a meeting facilitated by computers is a remarkably accurate prediction of more than 30 years before PowerPoint became ubiquitous. Included here also is Licklider's "Man Comnputer Symbiosis" in which he argues for a simpler interface between people and computers.
The Cuban Missile Crisis, 1962: The Photographs
These are the photographs through which the United States learned of Soviet Missiles in Cuba