In a conversation with us several years ago, the Kiowa poet N. Scott Momaday remarked that the American West "is a place that has to be seen to be believed, and it may have to be believed in order to be seen." For five years we have travelled that landscape, photographed its vistas, talked to its people, sought out its history, all as part of our production of THE WEST, an eight-part documentary series for public television.

Now -- 100,000 air-miles and 72 filmed interviews and 74 visits to archives and collections and more than 250 hours of film later -- we have begun to understand at least something of what Momaday meant. (continued....)