''The Twentieth Century'' was a documentary

television program Television, sometimes shortened to TV, is a telecommunication medium for transmitting moving images and sound. The term can refer to a television set, or the medium of television transmission. Television is a mass medium for advertising, e ...

sponsored by the

Prudential Insurance Company Prudential Financial, Inc. is an American Fortune Global 500 and Fortune 500 company whose subsidiaries provide insurance, retirement planning, investment management, and other products and services to both retail and institutional customers thr ...

that ran on the

CBS CBS Broadcasting Inc., commonly shortened to CBS, the abbreviation of its former legal name Columbia Broadcasting System, is an American commercial broadcast television and radio network serving as the flagship property of the CBS Entertainm ...

network Network, networking and networked may refer to: Science and technology * Network theory, the study of graphs as a representation of relations between discrete objects * Network science, an academic field that studies complex networks Mathematics ...

from 20 October 1957 until 4 January 1970. It was hosted by

Walter Cronkite Walter Leland Cronkite Jr. (November 4, 1916 – July 17, 2009) was an American broadcast journalist who served as anchorman for the ''CBS Evening News'' for 19 years (1962–1981). During the 1960s and 1970s, he was often cited as "the mo ...

. The opening and closing theme music was written by composer

George Antheil George Johann Carl Antheil (; July 8, 1900 – February 12, 1959) was an American avant-garde composer, pianist, author, and inventor whose modernist musical compositions explored the modern sounds – musical, industrial, and mechanical – of t ...

. The program presented filmed reports on

news News is information about current events. This may be provided through many different Media (communication), media: word of mouth, printing, Mail, postal systems, broadcasting, Telecommunications, electronic communication, or through the tes ...

and

cultural Culture () is an umbrella term which encompasses the social behavior, institutions, and Social norm, norms found in human Society, societies, as well as the knowledge, beliefs, arts, laws, Social norm, customs, capabilities, and habits of the ...

events that were important for the development of the 20th century. The show did not just present the events, but also interpreted them. Such subjects as

World War I World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...

and major

assassination Assassination is the murder of a prominent or important person, such as a head of state, head of government, politician, world leader, member of a royal family or CEO. The murder of a celebrity, activist, or artist, though they may not have ...

s were presented in context. On 20 January 1967, the show, sponsored by

Union Carbide Union Carbide Corporation is an American chemical corporation wholly owned subsidiary (since February 6, 2001) by Dow Chemical Company. Union Carbide produces chemicals and polymers that undergo one or more further conversions by customers befor ...

("The Discovery Company"), was renamed ''The 21st Century''. The show's focus changed to the future and to what humankind could look forward to. ''The 21st Century'' was cancelled after three seasons (its final broadcast was on 4 January 1970). The reason given was that the writers had run out of things to talk about. However, CBS may have wished to replace it with a more commercially successful program.

External links

* * * * 1957 American television series debuts 1970 American television series endings CBS original programming 1950s American television news shows 1960s American television news shows 1970s American television news shows 1950s American documentary television series 1960s American documentary television series 1970s American documentary television series Black-and-white American television shows Films scored by Laurence Rosenthal Cultural depictions of Jawaharlal Nehru Cultural depictions of Indira Gandhi {{hist-documentary-stub