Researching the identity of America's first peoples leads to Amazonian cave paintings, Mexican burial chambers, New Mexico's Chaco Canyon and waves off California's coast.

The rise of great American nations, from monarchies to democracies; lost cities in Mexico; a temple in Peru; a potlatch ceremony in the Pacific Northwest; shell beads in upstate New York.

Exploring America's ancient cities; a lost city on the Mississippi River; native elders reveal ancient powers of the sky.

Examples of resistance, survival and revival are revealed through horse-mounted Comanche warriors, secret messages in an Aztec manuscript and a grass bridge in the Andes.