Who are the people of America? (1970)

We are the people of America. In the cities and towns and the farms of America. We work together and relax together. We are many races and religions and nationalities. We're the men and women of America. We are also the children of America. The young people in the cities in the suburbs in the country. The young people of America. The young people of America. The young. Old and young and in between. That's us. Her ancestors came to America 300 years ago. His came 100 years ago. He came himself. Americans. The people of America. Police officer. Elected official. Balloon seller. Doctor. Rancher. Americans. American cook. American cook. The people of America. Years of work coming to an end. Years of work just beginning. Ancestors from Europe. From Asia. From Africa. From the Americas. We are the people of America. A mixture of the people of the world. America was first discovered by people from Asia. The Indians. And the land was theirs. For thousands of years. And then explorers from Europe discovered the land again. The Vikings from the Scandinavian lands. Columbus of Italy. De Soto of Spain. Marquette and Joliet, France. Cabot of England and other brave exploring men who sailed their ships through unknown waters. And found the land of America. From England, men and women came to Jamestown in the south. And Plymouth in the north. And the settlement of the East Coast began. They cleared the land. and built their houses and it was home. But in a hundred years, the colonists began thinking of themselves not as Englishmen but as Americans. A new people with new feelings and new ideas. They believed they were entitled to certain rights that their British rulers were denying them. So, they began meeting to talk of winning their rights peacefully or fighting for them if they had to. And when they did fight, people of the world worked and fought with them. Von Steuben, German. Pulaski, Pole. Lafayette, Frenchman. Haym Salomon, American immigrant. Crispus Attucks, American. A battle won, a nation won. To join the other nations of the world who had given us the explorers, the settlers, the patriots, the founders of our nation. People from England settled mainly on the East Coast of America. And so did the people from Holland. In South Africa, men had been brought here as slaves and more were coming. People from France had settled in the South and middle part of the continent. People from Spain were living in the Southwest. More people came in the early 1800s to carve new lives out of the wilderness of America. Now from North and Central Europe. From Ireland, Germany and the Scandinavian countries. They came mainly to the Midwest, mainly to farm. They plowed and planted and harvested and drew food from the soil. When people were needed to help build a railroad across the continent, many came from China and settled mainly in the West. And now railroads carried food and people all over the land. Industry grew. Commerce expanded. Cities were becoming giants. More people were needed to work in the cities and build them. There was room for many people. So many more people came to America from Europe and Asia, from Eastern and Southern and Central Europe in the greatest wave of migration the world has ever known. Millions of people by the early 1900s from Poland, Russia, Japan, the Balkans, Italy, coming to America to begin new lives, coming for economic reasons and religious reasons and political reasons, but mainly coming for freedom. For freedom. For freedom. They came from many countries and they worked. They worked with Americans and they became Americans. The people of the world in America. They helped to build the America of the 20th century. From countries north of us and south of us, more people have come. The people of America, the people of the world. We Americans are something new. And new generations of us are on the way. Playing together, growing together, learning together. We learn to accept our differences, thinking more about how we are alike than how we are different. We grow in understanding. We share our many races and religions and nationalities and come out the people of America. And as we get older, we work together as Americans and relax together. And we share the things the people of the world have come here to find, the things we cherish. Our formal government, our justice, our elective system, the abundance of food from the fertile soil, freedom to worship as we choose, freedom to believe as we choose, and freedom of speech and when we feel any of these rights is being denied we have the freedom to speak out. We've done it in the past we do it now speak out protest against injustice. As Americans we have farmed the land and raised the food to feed the people. We've developed the industries to provide us with our own needs and we have built the cities that carry on the business for the people. America is a big country and millions of us live here with the freedom to go where we want and do what we want and get where we want. Wherever we live. Whatever we do. We have shared what we know and worked together. America is the better for it and we are too for we are the people of America.