Tom Brokaw relives 1968

Other than his years as an NBC newsman, Tom Brokaw is best known as the author of "The Greatest Generation," about the Americans who fought World War II.

His latest project looks at the Americans who faced the challenges of 1968.

"When I began this project, ('Doonesbury' cartoonist) Gary Trudeau said to me, laughing, 'What are you going to call this one, the worst generation?"' Brokaw told TV critics back in July.

His two-hour documentary, appropriately titled "1968 with Tom Brokaw," relives an extraordinarily turbulent year. American idealism was buffeted by the assassinations of Robert F. Kennedy and Martin Luther King, the bloodiest year in Vietnam, the onslaught of drugs, racial unrest, the fury and violence at the Democratic National Convention and the election of Richard Nixon.

So much happened in that single year that two hours isn't a lot of time to cover it. "It's been tough. This is a big subject," Brokaw said. "And I want to caution all of you that neither this two-hour special that we do on History nor my book will be the defining history of the '60s, because we're still in passage from that time.

"I am treating this as a virtual reunion, (featuring) the people who went through it, what they thought then, what they think now. You'll hear lot of voices. Unfortunately, this is one of those times in American life when everyone has their own prism, and they think what they saw, what they experienced, is the defining experience."

And Brokaw doesn't see it as America's worst generation. "I don't feel that way at all," he said.

Brokaw points to events in 1968 as forcing fundamental changes in America. "It's been an emotional experience for me because I've had to review my own life in the course of all this and think about the changes that I've gone through," he said.

When Brokaw started working for NBC in 1966, he was "a real product of the '50s" who had "no idea about how much more change was to come — good, bad, tragic and triumphant."

"One of the things that we hope to accomplish on the History Channel is to show the complexity of it," he said. "Also, there are cautionary tales across the political spectrum about excess, and I would hope the very essence of the History Channel is to learn about your past."

After living through it, making a documentary about '68 and writing a book about the '60s, Brokaw said the greatest achievement is "that we survived."