FEATURED PROGRAMS on Blue Ridge PBS
Be sure to check our schedule for additional air times!
10 That Changed America
THREE EPISODES! Tuesday, August 11 @ 8pm
Host Geoffrey Baer takes viewers across the country to the legendary streets, monuments and man-made marvels that changed America. Explore the streets that change the way we get around, visit the Statue of Liberty and Mount Rushmore, and learn more about the engineering feats that made our civilization possible.
American Experience: Chasing the Moon
Fridays, July 24 - August 7 @ 9pm
Chasing the Moon thoroughly reimagines the race to the moon for a new generation, upending much of the conventional mythology surrounding the effort. The three-part series recasts the Space Age as a fascinating stew of scientific innovation, political calculation, media spectacle, visionary impulses and personal drama. Utilizing a visual feast of previously overlooked and lost archival material, much of which has never before been seen by the public, the film features a diverse cast of characters who played key roles in these historic events.
American Masters
Tuesdays @ 9pm
Explore the lives and creative journeys of America’s most enduring artistic and cultural giants. With insight and originality, the series illuminates the extraordinary mosaic of our nation’s landscape, heritage and traditions.
August 18 - Starring Dick Van Dyke
Ahead of his 100th birthday, celebrate the life and career of iconic actor Dick Van Dyke.
NEW! August 25 - Mary Oliver: Saved By The Beauty of the World
Celebrate the life and career of Pulitzer Prize-winning writer Mary Oliver. Shaped by a solitary childhood and rising literary fame, Oliver published more than 30 collections of poetry and essays on nature, beauty, and love.
Black Fire: The Documentary
Monday, August 10 @ 8:30pm
This documentary uncovers Washington, DC’s music and cultural heritage by highlighting the music, message, and art of the people behind Black Fire Records — a Black-owned independent jazz record label started in Chocolate City, aka the nation’s capital in the 1970s.
Breakthrough: The Ideas That Changed The World
Tuesdays @ 10pm
Take a mind-blowing journey through human history, told through iconic objects that modern people take for granted, and see how science, invention and technology built on one another to change everything. These are the secrets of how we got to our modern world.
August 4 – The Robot
Check out the history of robots and learn how they are becoming a part of everyday life.
Bugs that Rule the World: Beetlemania
Wednesday. August 5 @ 10pm
As the world’s most diverse and abundant species, the tiny yet mighty beetle plays crucial ecological roles in nearly every environment. Why are these colorful and ingenious creatures often regarded as “the most important species on the planet”?
City of a Million Dreams
Monday, August 10 @ 9:30pm
Jazz funerals are among the most recognized yet least understood traditions of New Orleans. Rooted in the legacy of "funerals with music," these rituals blend mourning and celebration, honoring the lives of the departed while affirming community continuity. CITY OF A MILLION DREAMS explores their cultural significance through the city's parading club culture, documented beginning in 2005 by writer and videographer Deb Cotton.
Craft in America
Back-to-Back Episodes! Friday, August 14
Examine original hand-crafted works created by contemporary artists.
@ 9pm – East
Explore how history, culture, and contemporary craft intertwine across the Eastern U.S. Through the artistry of a silversmith, a potter, fabric flower makers, and others, uncover the diverse expressions that have shaped modern American craft.
@ 10pm – West
Celebrate heritage and the handmade, inspired by the landscape, history, and culture of the West.
D. I. Ray, Season 1
Back-to-Back Episodes! Sundays, August 9 & 16 @ 8pm
When D.I. Rachita Ray, a British-Asian policewoman new to homicide is assigned to investigate the suspected honor killing of a young Muslim man, she quickly realizes the suspects can’t be guilty. The evidence against the two brothers from a British Hindu family is flimsy at best. Her attempts at conveying this to her superiors and her colleagues fall on deaf ears, hidden biases, and a keenness to wrap the case up. That is until her probing leads the team to a much more sinister crime. In this four-part drama, D.I. Ray goes on a journey that sees her uncover a complex web of deceit within organized crime, while laying bare the wounds deep within herself that she’s spent a lifetime ignoring.
Downton Abbey, Season 3 on Masterpiece Classic
Sundays in August @ 10pm
The Great War is over and the long-awaited engagement of Lady Mary and Matthew is on, but all is not tranquil at Downton Abbey as wrenching social changes, romantic intrigues, and personal crises grip the majestic English country estate. Shirley MacLaine joins the much-loved cast, which includes Dame Maggie Smith, Elizabeth McGovern, Hugh Bonneville, Dan Stevens, Michelle Dockery, Jim Carter, Penelope Wilton, and a host of others. “No family is ever what it seems from the outside,” observes Smith’s shrewd character.
Finding Your Roots
Tuesdays @ 8pm
Explore the mysteries, surprises and revelations hidden in the family trees of popular figures.
August 4 – Love and Basketball
Henry Louis Gates, Jr. maps the family trees of basketball stars Brittney Griner and Chris Paul—uncovering ancestors who had extraordinary talents.
August 18 – Westward Bound
Henry Louis Gates, Jr. maps the roots of talk show host Sara Haines and playwright Tracy Letts from the American west to surprising places back east.
August 25 – Family Harmonies
Henry Louis Gates, Jr. maps the roots of musicians Lizzo and Flea—traveling across the globe to find stories of the ancestors who inspired their work.
Grantchester on Masterpiece
SERIES FINALE! Sunday, August 2 @ 9pm, Encore presentation Thursday, August 6 @10pm
In the momentous summer of 1963, Geordie and Alphy face their greatest challenges yet. As an era comes to an end, the Grantchester family must face the depths of love, loss, and forgiveness one last time.
Great Performances: Vienna Philharmonic Summer Night Concert 2026
Friday, August 28 @ 9pm
Each summer, the world-renowned Vienna Philharmonic is joined by a guest soloist to perform an enchanting open-air concert under the direction of a guest conductor from the magnificent gardens of Austria's Imperial Schonbrunn Palace, a UNESCO World Cultural Heritage Site.
Great Performances at the Met: Eugene Onegin – NEW!
Friday, August 21 @ 9pm
Soprano Asmik Grigorian returns to the Met as Tatiana, the lovestruck young heroine in Tchaikovsky’s opera adaptation of Pushkin’s novel. Baritone Igor Golovatenko reprises his portrayal of Onegin, who realizes his affection for her all too late. Tony Award winner Deborah Warner directs.
Hemingway: A Writer (1899-1929)
Thursday, August 27 @ 9pm
Hemingway, yearning for adventure, volunteers for the Red Cross during World War I. He marries Hadley Richardson and moves to Paris, publishes The Sun Also Rises and finds critical and commercial success with his second novel, A Farewell to Arms.
Inside the Court of Henry VIII
Monday, August 17 @ 10pm
Part Renaissance prince, part medieval tyrant, Henry VIII is the most famous of English kings. Venture beyond the facade of his glamorous court to understand the danger and intrigue that routinely cost courtiers their heads.
Ireland’s Wild Coast
Back-to-Back Episodes! Thursday, August 13 @ 9pm
A personal journey along one of the most spectacular coastlines in the world featuring the wildlife and wild places that make it so special. Emmy award winning wildlife cameraman Colin Stafford-Johnson takes viewers on an authored odyssey along Ireland's rugged Atlantic coast - the place he chooses to make his home after 30 years spent shooting some of the world's most celebrated wildlife films.
The Letter: A Message for Our Earth
Wednesday, August 12 @ 9:30pm
This feature film documents a completely original set of events about a contemporary game-changing "call to action" that features unprecedented access from one of the world's most iconic leaders: Pope Francis. The storyline interweaves the lives of 5 principal characters on a voyage of discovery; which is both an adventure of the mind as well as the body. These life changing experiences raises questions about how science and spirituality are vital to solving perhaps the biggest globally defining issue of our time: climate change.
Lion: The Rise and Fall of the Marsh Pride
Wednesday, August 12 @ 8pm
This groundbreaking documentary tells the epic story of the famed Marsh pride of lions as it battles for survival in Kenya’s famous Maasai Mara Reserve. In a world where lions and humans are increasingly at odds, the film charts the rise and fall of the pride, which has been documented by the BBC for over 30 years. Featuring archival footage and testimony from those who have filmed the pride and lived alongside it, LION is a powerful tale of shifting loyalties, bloody takeovers, complex family dynamics and sheer resilience.
Mr. Bates vs The Post Office on Masterpiece
Back-to-Back Episodes! Sundays, August 23 & 30 @ 8pm
Follow one of the greatest miscarriages of justice in British legal history. Hundreds of innocent village Subpostmasters were accused of theft and fraud caused by errors in the Post Office’s computer system – something it denied for years.
Nature
Wednesdays @ 8pm
Forty years on, it is the premier voice for the natural world, an essential lens on the creatures, great and small, that sustain us all on our living planet.
August 5 – Big Little Journeys: Bloodlines
In Madagascar’s Kirindy Forest, a matchstick-sized chameleon goes on an epic journey through high trees and ground floors to find a mate and lay eggs before it’s too late. A water vole in the Scottish Highlands swims a lake, climbs a waterfall and scales a mountain also to find a suitor and a place to raise her pups.
August 19 – Lions of the Skeleton Coast
Lion researcher Dr. Philip Stander follows three orphaned desert lion cubs as they navigate the brutal Skeleton Coast of Namibia. Watch the cubs learn to adapt, hunt, and defy the odds of survival in this vast desert territory.
August 26 – Grizzly 399: Queen of the Tetons
Known only by her research number, Grizzly 399 has been a fixture in Grand Teton National Park since 2007, becoming the world’s most famous grizzly bear. Now 399 is raising four new cubs in the face of human encroachment, a warming climate and the threat of losing protection under the Endangered Species Act.
NOVA
Wednesdays @ 9pm
Explore the science behind the headlines in PBS's premiere science series.
August 5 – Return to the Moon
A half-century after Apollo, the Artemis missions aim to bring astronauts back to the Moon and establish a lunar space station. Follow the Artemis II engineers and crew on the perilous 10-day journey to orbit the Moon.
August 19 – Cat Tales
Worshipped as a goddess, condemned as satanic, and spun into a stunning array of breeds, cats have long fascinated humans. But did we ever really domesticate them? And what can science tell us about our most mysterious companions?
August 26 – Dog Tales
Dogs have been our companions for thousands of years. But why? Do they really love us, or are they just in it for the food? Scientists test wolf intelligence, decode canine DNA, and peer into dogs' brains to find out what domestication really means.
Once Upon a Time in Space
Tuesday, August 4 @ 9pm
Drawing on intimate, unseen archive and powerful first-hand testimony, this landmark 4-part series tells the human stories behind our quest to explore space, offering a unique perspective on our changing world and where we are headed. On the last episode, relationships aboard the ISS are tested when war breaks out on Earth.
Patience
SEASON FINALE! Sunday, August 2 @ 8pm
Patience and Frankie are held hostage by an escaped prisoner seeking justice. As armed police prepare to storm the building, Frankie’s past resurfaces. Meanwhile, Patience realizes she’s ready to be honest about her feelings for Elliot.
Resolve to Solve with Miles O’Brien – NEW SERIES!
Wednesdays @ 10pm
Miles O'Brien travels the globe searching for solutions to climate, water, and health crises. From building sea curtains in Antarctica to restoring wildlife in Argentina, the answers are closer than we think thanks to people with a resolve to solve.
August 19 – Wild Climate Fixes from Cows and Beavers
Miles O'Brien meets the innovators tackling climate change in surprising ways. A seaweed additive cuts cattle methane by 90%. Beavers fight drought and wildfire.
August 26 – Weathering Change Through Wind and Heat
Extreme heat is deadly and clean energy is contested. Miles O'Brien travels from Phoenix to Sydney to New Bedford finding solutions. The tools exist — do we have the will?