On Sunday night January 23rd, 1977, 10-year-old Zanobia Harper found a comfortable spot in the

Danifer South Carolina home. Zanobia's mom had made her take a nap earlier that day, to

be sure she could stay awake past 9 pm.

We already had our night clothes on, get our little snack popcorn or whatever, and we'd

lay on the floor, and we were there ready to watch.

There's a conversation about whether or not we should watch, but then it was determined

that, oh no, no, we had to watch it.

Hundreds of miles away in Indiana, Stephanie Dunn was sitting on her mom's lap.

That was very young, but I still will never forget it.

Tonight, we present a landmark in television entertainment.

After two years of production, we present this incredible saga in an epic motion picture,

Roots.

Roots was one of the most ambitious television projects ever.

A 12-hour history of American slavery, aired on 8 consecutive nights.

It laid bare the gruesome realities of the slave trade, beginning in the 18th century,

with the capture of an African teenager named Kuntakintay.

Come on in, you're going, you're going.

Come on.

All right, lock it up.

I remember tears in my mom's eyes just knowing the life that they're going to go to.

The first episode showed the horrors of the middle passage.

African captives shackled in the hold of a slave ship, forced to lie in their own excrement

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