Ken Burns Turns His Camera on America’s Beleaguered Buffalo

Ken Burns says he has been thinking about the American buffalo all of his life: “It may be the most important mammal in the history of the United States.” He explains that this “magnificent” yet beleaguered animal, which roamed the Great Plains in the tens of millions less than 200 years ago, has often stalked the background of his films—figuratively and literally—during his career as a documentarian of Americana. “The buffalo intersects with all these interesting parts of American history,” he says, which is why he’s been plotting a project about its fate for nearly 40 years. But he’s glad that he waited. Time, he says, has helped him to better understand the nuances of what he calls an “epic American calamity.”