About the Film
Every river has a story.
Although it’s recognized as one of the last such remaining ecosystems in the United States, the ancient 416 mile Neches River and its forest bottomlands in East Texas are largely unknown to most folks. The PBS one hour documentary film “The Neches River: Wild Heart of East Texas” will give viewers of all ages the opportunity to know and to celebrate the hidden beauty and crucial environmental value of the Neches with people who live on it, enjoy, study and preserve it, and who are as diverse as the plants and wildlife that also call it home. The film invites all who cherish wild things to journey the Neches River with some of those who know it best.
The film tells the story of the river from its beginnings as springs in Van Zandt County, as it flows 416 miles picking up volume from springs and creeks, slowing for 2 dams, but gathering force until it flows into Sabine Lake Estuary and then into the Gulf of Mexico.
A river, just like a person, has a story to tell. It speaks with the sounds of the flowing water. It also speaks with its plants, bugs and birds and mammals, its silent fish and clams, its roaring alligators, and the wind soughing in the pines, and hardwood trees rustling. And it speaks with the voices of the human beings who have settled it: the caddo drums, the cries of the hog and cow dogs, the rifle shot, the river songs and river stories, both spoken and written.
