John Wayne's first television special, originally aired as Swing Out, Sweet Land on NBC-TV in 1970, is a patriotic and poignant journey through American history - with music, comedy and many famous friends. As host and narrator, Wayne walks through pivotal moments in America's past. His guests include Jack Benny as a citizen asking George Washington (Lorne Greene) about that dollar he supposedly threw across the Potomac River; Bob Hope and Ann-Margret entertaining the troops at Valley Forge; printer Red Skelton discussing dissent with apprentice Tom Smothers; Lucille Ball as Miss Liberty; and Bing Crosby as Mark Twain, philosophizing with freed slave Frederick Douglass (Roscoe Lee Brown). Also: Dean Martin as inventor Eli Whitney; Michael Landon as Peter Minuit, buying Manhattan Island from an Indian (Bonanza co-star Dan Blocker); brothers Rick and David Nelson fighting on opposite sides in the Civil War; Phyllis Diller as a 19th-century Presidential candidate; Dan Rowan and Dick Martin as the Wright brothers; Celeste Holm and Dennis Weaver as the parents of young Abraham Lincoln; Greg Morris as Crispus Attucks, a Negro who died in the Boston Massacre. Musical highlights include Ribbon of Steel by Johnny Cash, This Is a Great Country by Glen Campbell, Oh, Susannah by Roy Clark, Clementine by Leslie Uggams and God Bless America by the cast. JOHN WAYNE'S TRIBUTE TO AMERICA is a lavish and thoughtful timepiece of 20th-century television entertainment, presenting a parade of legendary stars in a humorous and hopeful celebration. John Wayne's Tribute to America (akd Swing Out, Sweet Land.) (DVD)
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