From PEOPLE Magazine
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Then, too, the story was steeped in pathos because the focus remained on the bombing's youngest victims: the children in the second-floor daycare center. We were constantly reminded of their senseless suffering, beginning with the images of tiny bodies being carried from the rubble and culminating with the crowd of people clutching teddy bears at Sunday's service. On Saturday there was a touching televised session in the Oval Office as President Clinton met with the children of federal employees to talk about the tragedy. All weekend long, Nickelodeon ran a sensitive public-service spot in which Linda Ellerbee reassured kids that the deaths of their peers in Oklahoma City were sad and scary but an isolated incident.
Several broadcasting outlets distinguished themselves. NBC, for instance, created an inspired piece leading into its second NBA game on Sunday—a montage of churches from around the country as their bells began to simultaneously ring out in recognition of our national day of mourning. As usual, ABC and CNN provided the most sustained and reliable coverage. At the conclusion of the memorial service, CNN aired a powerful, 7-minute visual collage assembled by anchor Linden Soles. This poignant précis of the bomb's aftermath included heartrending home videos and snapshots of two young brothers who died in the blast.
CBS elected to show a golf tournament, the Greater Greensboro Open, rather than the memorial service and didn't present even President Clinton's address in its entirety. But the network made up for those gaffes later that evening with a memorable Clinton interview on 60 Minutes—the first live segment in the show's 27-year history. This was a different President than the one who, earlier that day, had addressed more than 10,000 mourners in simple, consoling, almost biblical cadences. On 60 Minutes we got a riled-up, tough-talking Commander-in-Chief. At one point, when Leslie Stahl asked if he regretted the government's actions at Waco the previous year (the suicide stand of the Branch Davidians has become a rallying point for right-wing militants across the country), Clinton became so palpably indignant that the skin beneath his left eye began twitching rapidly. It was an electrifying TV minute—the capstone to an extraordinarily emotional week.
AN AMBIVALENT HERITAGE
IN THE WAY WEST, AN AMBITIOUS UNdertaking for PBS's The American Experience, filmmaker Ric Burns (The Donner Party) assumes a larger canvas, one worthy of his older brother and fellow documentarian Ken (The Civil War, Baseball). This six-hour history, airing over two nights (Mon. and Tues., May 8 and 9, 8 p.m. ET), details American expansion from Missouri to the Pacific Ocean in the years 1845-93. During that turbulent, sanguinary era, settlers and adventurers tamed the vast continent while displacing and devastating the Native American population. The film takes the now-familiar Burnsian approach: a large and evocative assemblage of photos, knowledgeable talking heads (including authors Thomas McGuane and Ian Frazier) and readings from pertinent period texts. Along the way, some of the era's most influential and colorful figures—such men as Gen. George Armstrong Custer, Sitting Bull, Crazy Horse, Buffalo Bill Cody and Red Cloud—are tellingly profiled. The resulting opus is comprehensive but glum (a mood underscored by consistently plaintive music). As early as the prologue, the film's narration cites "the promise and sorrow of the American dream." The Way West is a rich, though rueful, history.
