In January 2012, American Experience presents the Wild West Collection: Billy the Kid, Custer's Last Stand, Wyatt Earp, Geronimo, Annie Oakley, and Jesse James.

Our 2012 season is announced with a special video from Executive Producer Mark Samels. We hope you enjoy our upcoming season, which kicks off with our "Wild West Collection" on your local PBS station January 10 at 9/8C.

October 20, 1973: Nixon fired Watergate prosecutor Archibald Cox in what becomes known as "The Saturday Night Massacre." The attorney general resigns and Congress files 21 resolutions calling for Nixon's impeachment.

Rosalynn Carter was a major figure in her husband's campaigns and policy meetings. "She wanted to be more than a fashion plate and somebody who gave teas," says historian E. Stanly Godbold.

On the White House lawn on August 5, 1990, H.W. Bush took a stand against Iraqi aggression against Kuwait. "He led with his gut, with his instincts," says biographer Timothy Naftali.

President Roosevelt's inaugural address filled the American people with confidence in their new leader. "They hear coming through their loudspeakers this voice so filled with courage, with self confidence, with a sense of leadership," says historian William Leuchtenburg.

Nancy Reagan made things difficult at times with her stubbornness. Nancy's importance to her husband "goes with the turf when you're dealing with the Reagans," says advisor Stuart K. Spencer.

Jimmy Carter attempted to stop runaway inflation with a White House press conference in 1978. "Carter implored labor and business leaders to keep wages and prices down, and pressured Congress to cut back spending."

When a new wave of striking unions shut down industries, Truman threatened to draft strikers into the army. "It was as high-handed, as unconstitutional, a measure as imaginable," says biographer David McCullough. "But he meant it."

After WWII, Truman watched most of Eastern Europe fall to the Communist "Iron Curtain." "I do not think we should play compromise any longer," Truman wrote.

Carter asked the American people to cut down their energy usage during a fireside chat on February 2, 1977. "All of us must learn to waste less energy," Carter said.

President Carter's attempt at resolving the dispute between Israel and Egypt almost ended in failure. Egyptian President Sadat threatened to leave the talks at Camp David, but Carter used a personal approach to keep the talks going between Sadat and Israeli Prime Minister Begin. The Camp David Accords would become Carter's greatest foreign policy achievement.

President Roosevelt's attempt to reshape the Supreme Court landed short and drew criticism from both Republicans and Democrats. "It was a recognition on his part that he had lost some measure of power," says David Ginsburg, member of FDR's administration.

Protests against the Vietnam War turned personal, with students blaming LBJ for the way the war was going. "He was frustrated because he couldn't end it and because he thought he couldn't win it," says John Connally.

When the Enola Gay dropped an atomic bomb on Hiroshima, Truman understood the repercussions. "This places a terrible responsibility upon myself and upon the War Department," he said.

Captain Harry Truman's leadership during his first clash with the Germans made his men look at him in an entirely new light. "After a while they began to realize that this fellow with the eyeglasses and the bank clerk look about him was in fact a man of real determination," says David McCullough.

On December 7, 1941, the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor. President Roosevelt was deeply shaken "knowing the navy was caught unawares."

President Truman interpreted the North Korean attack upon South Korea as direct aggression from the Soviet Union. The Soviet Union's support for the invasion, however, was limited and not driven by the Soviet leader Stalin. "What the United States got involved with in 1950 was not aggression from the Soviet Union," says historian Walter LaFeber, but "an incredibly bloody Civil War in Korea."

On March 30th, 1981, 70 days into his presidency, President Reagan was shot outside the Washington Hilton Hotel.

In the early 1990s, George H.W. Bush was faced with growing economic insecurity. But Bush believed there was little he could do.