Trailer
Preview: 10/1/2025 | 30sVideo has Closed Captions
Former classmates reconnect after a discovery linking their ancestry.
Two high school classmates from 1965—Jimmie, a Black football star, and De, a white student who respected him from afar—reunite 50 years later after a discovery linking their families changes their lives forever. This personal yet profoundly American story reveals the legacy of slavery, the complexities of race and privilege, and the power of truth in their journey toward healing.
Problems playing video? | Closed Captioning Feedback
Problems playing video? | Closed Captioning Feedback
Trailer
Preview: 10/1/2025 | 30sVideo has Closed Captions
Two high school classmates from 1965—Jimmie, a Black football star, and De, a white student who respected him from afar—reunite 50 years later after a discovery linking their families changes their lives forever. This personal yet profoundly American story reveals the legacy of slavery, the complexities of race and privilege, and the power of truth in their journey toward healing.
Problems playing video? | Closed Captioning Feedback
Where to Watch A Binding Truth
A Binding Truth is available to stream on pbs.org and the PBS app.
I have a story that started out as a sports story, that moved into a civil rights story, that moved into a genealogical slave history story.
How could something so significant have never been revealed?
The floor fell open and I slid down into the past.
[light piano music]
Reckoning with a Painful Legacy of Enslavement
Video has Closed Captions
Jimmie Kirkpatrick confronts his family’s history of enslavement and his path to healing. (1m 49s)
Video has Closed Captions
De Kirkpatrick confronts the unequal care of Black and white cemeteries. (1m 38s)
Walking Through Charlotte’s Past
Video has Closed Captions
Jimmie Kirkpatrick recalls Charlotte’s Black community of the 1960s. (1m 45s)
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