Narrator: SHE WAS ALWAYS A WRITER AND ALWAYS A REBEL.

SHE WAS A DEBUTANTE WHO CHALLENGED SOCIETY WITH A BRAZEN DANCE... A REPORTER WHO ROAMED TOWN WHEN WOMEN STAYED AT HOME... A PHILANTHROPIST WHO RISKED HER LIFE TO BE GENEROUS.

A BORN STORYTELLER, SHE PRODUCED JUST ONE BOOK - BUT IT WOULD BECOME A RECORD SHATTERING BEST SELLER AND ONE OF THE MOST BELOVED FILMS OF ALL TIME.

SHE GAVE US SCARLETT O'HARA AND RHETT BUTLER, TWO OF THE WORLD'S GREATEST LOVERS.

LIKE SCARLETT, SHE WAS BEAUTIFUL AND BRASH.

LIKE SCARLETT, SHE HAD GUMPTION.

SHE WAS MARGARET MITCHELL... AN AMERICAN REBEL.

This program is made possible by the Ray M. and Mary Elizabeth Lee Foundation.

And by the generous contributions of viewers like you.

Thank you.

Narrator: MARGARET MITCHELL WAS BORN WITH THE NEW CENTURY IN 1900.

Voice of Margaret Mitchell: My people have always lived in the South, most of them in Georgia.

Narrator: MITCHELL'S HOMETOWN ATLANTA WAS BURNED TO THE GROUND IN THE CIVIL WAR.

FIRE WOULD IMPACT MITCHELL'S LIFE WHEN SHE WAS JUST THREE YEARS OLD.

Darden Asbury Pyron: Margaret Mitchell had a peculiar identity... she is not a traditional southern belle.

Why does she not fit that model?

Her brother explained a story that when she was a little girl that she's playing near the fire and her skirt caught fire.

Narrator: THE FIRE DID NOT HARM YOUNG MARGARET MITCHELL.

BUT IT CHANGED HER IDENTITY.

Debra Freer: And from that point on in her childhood her mother dressed her in pants.

And the neighbors referred to her as Jimmy.

And she wore a little cap and she wore trousers and she was a cute little child because, of course, Margaret was very petite.

Narrator: MITCHELL LIKED BEING CALLED JIMMY.

IN AN ERA WHEN LITTLE GIRLS WERE EXPECTED TO PLAY WITH DOLLS, SHE PLAYED BASEBALL AND WAS ONE OF THE BOYS.

THE ATLANTA OF MITCHELL'S CHILDHOOD WAS A CITY ON THE MAKE.

ITS MOTTO WAS THE PHOENIX RISING FROM THE ASHES.

Clifford Kuhn: It was a major railroad center, there was a lot of manufacturing going on here.

It was a hustling bustling striving community.

Darden Pyron: Atlanta is not a great big city in 1900.

It has a great big idea of itself in 1900.

Narrator: MITCHELL'S PARENTS BOUGHT INTO THAT BIG IDEA.

HER FATHER EUGENE MITCHELL WAS A LAWYER WHO HELPED BUILD ATLANTA'S FIRST PUBLIC LIBRARY AND CO-FOUNDED THE ATLANTA HISTORICAL SOCIETY.

Molly Haskell: Her father was interested in history and probably a very smart man.

He seems to have been a little dour and ill tempered.

Narrator: MITCHELL'S PARENTS WERE EMOTIONAL OPPOSITES.

HER MOTHER MAYBELLE WAS A FORCE TO BE RECKONED WITH.

Voice of Margaret Mitchell: Mother makes me mad.

She yells "duty" at me all the time!

Molly Haskell: She was a very stern sort of moralistic and intellectual woman.

Very well read, she spoke several languages.

Darden Pyron: Her grandfather was born in Ireland, she has a very very strong Irish identity and an intense Catholic identity.

Narrator: MAYBELLE MITCHELL EXPECTED GREAT THINGS OF MARGARET AND MARGARET'S OLDER BROTHER STEPHENS.

Darden Pyron: Stephens Mitchell said his mother saw life as a soldier's post.

And a classic sort of southern imagery - her back never touched the back of a chair - so back straight up all the time.

Narrator: AS AN ADULT MITCHELL WROTE OF HER CHILDHOOD, OF SUNDAYS SPENT IN THE COUNTRY WHERE SHE HEARD STORIES OF THE CIVIL WAR.

Voice of Margaret Mitchell: I sat on the bony knees of Confederate veterans and the fat slick laps of great aunts who survived the war and Reconstruction.

I heard how Grandpa Mitchell walked nearly 50 miles after the Battle of Sharpsburg with his skull cracked in two places from a bullet.

Marianne Walker: She was struck by the toughness of them all... tough meaning resistant, strong, having great endurance.

Molly Haskell: And in fact she said she was 10 years old before she realized the South had actually lost the war.

Narrator: IN GONE WITH THE WIND SCARLETT O'HARA REFUSES TO BELIEVE THAT WAR WILL COME TO THE SOUTH.

Scarlett O'Hara: Fiddledeedee.

War, war, war!

This war talk is spoiling all the fun at every party this spring.

I get so bored I could scream.

Besides, there isn't going to be any war.

Tarleton twins: Not going to be any war!

Why of course there's going to be a war.

Scarlett: If either of you boys says war once again, I'm going in the house and slam the door.

Tarleton twins: Don't you want us to have a war?

Debra Freer: Margaret was born a writer and as her brother put it, she started writing from the time she could hold a pencil.

Voice of Margaret Mitchell: Julia Weston waited where Sam had left her - alone, she thought, in the great woods... Suddenly someone caught her hands.

She felt a rope being tied around her wrists.

Darden Pyron: Margaret Mitchell is a natural genius.

She has a sense that the words are not just for conveying data, but a means of conveying feelings as well.

Narrator: MARGARET MITCHELL AS THE FREE SPIRITED JIMMY WAS A WRITER... BUT NOT MUCH OF A STUDENT.

Darden Pyron: Clearly she did not like school.

She was terrible in the classroom, she talks all the time, bad attention span.

This also sets up a problem of conflict with her mother, because her mother believed in this kind of absolute disciplined sort of education.

Narrator: MAYBELLE MITCHELL WAS NOT ABOVE BRIBERY OR AN OCCCASIONAL SMACK WITH A HAIRBRUSH WHEN DEALING WITH HER STRONG-WILLED DAUGHTER.

Molly Haskell: She paid her 25 cents to read Dickens and Thackeray, and Margaret Mitchell rebelled by not reading them and reading thrillers and romances.

Voice of Margaret Mitchell: She just about beat the hide off me for not reading Tolstoy or Thackeray or Austen but I preferred to be beaten.

Darden Pyron: Margaret Mitchell has two really clear notions about her mother, so that she associated her mother with punishment... But the other side, she also described her as a saint.

Narrator: IN THE FIRST TWO DECADES OF THE 20TH CENTURY MAYBELLE MITCHELL WAS AN IMPASSIONED LEADER IN THE SOUTHERN SUFFRAGIST MOVEMENT.

Molly Haskell: Her mother was a suffragette.

Maybelle was an activist which was very unusual in that day and age.

Margaret Mitchell was born in 1900 so that means her mother was among that wave of suffragettes that got women to vote in 1920.

Narrator: MITCHELL REVERED HER MOTHER, BUT IN HER JOURNAL SHE WROTE OF A LONGING THAT WOULD NEVER BE SATISFIED.

Voice of Margaret Mitchell: Mother doesn't understand me.

I love Mother and I suppose she loves me, but she never shows her feelings, hardly ever.

I would like to put my head in Mother's lap.

I feel like I want to cry, but I'll be durned if I do.

Narrator: MANY YEARS LATER MITCHELL WOULD WRITE OF A DIFFERENT MOTHER IN GONE WITH THE WIND... A MOTHER SO PERFECT SHE WAS UNREACHABLE FOR THE LIKES OF SCARLETT O'HARA.

Voice of Gone With the Wind: Ellen O'Hara was different and Scarlett regarded her as something holy and apart from all the rest of humankind.

When Scarlett was a child, she had confused her mother with the Virgin Mary, and now that she was older she saw no reason for changing her opinion.

Narrator: AS A SIGN OF THEIR GROWING PROSPERITY, MITCHELL'S FAMILY MOVED INTO A MANSION ON ATLANTA'S PEACHTREE STREET.

THE MOVE WAS UPSETTING TO THE REBELLIOUS TOMBOY AND MAY HAVE TRIGGERED THE FIRST OF MANY ACCIDENTS WHICH WOULD CAST A SHADOW OVER HER LIFE.

Debra Freer: She had a very serious accident with a horse.

It fell on her and that was the same leg that was later injured in life and I think was very problematic.

I'm not sure that it ever really truly healed.

Darden Pyron: Margaret Mitchell always had something going the matter with her... it's something like being accident prone.

Narrator: ACCIDENT PRONE OR NOT, MITCHELL HAD IRREPRESSIBLE ENERGY.

AS A TEENAGER SHE BEGAN WRITING AND STAGING PLAYS.

Molly Haskell: She adapted playwrights but she wrote her own plays and a lot of them have very interesting kind of cross gender themes.

She has girls acting like boys; so she's very attuned to kind of changing times for women.

Narrator: THE YOUNG PLAYWRIGHT MAY HAVE BEEN AN EARLY FEMINIST, BUT SHE WAS STILL PART OF A RACIALLY DIVIDED CULTURE.

The Birth of a Nation: IN 1915 D.W.

GRIFFITH'S THE BIRTH OF A NATION WAS ALL THE RAGE.

HAILED AS A BREAKTHROUGH IN MOTION PICTURES, FEW IN MITCHELL'S WORLD SEEMED TO NOTICE THE MOVIE'S RACISM.

Voice of Margaret Mitchell: We wanted a play.

Birth of a Nation was in town and we wanted something like it.

Narrator: MITCHELL'S NEW PLAY WAS AN ADAPTATION OF A NOVEL CALLED "THE TRAITOR," ABOUT THE DECLINE OF THE KU KLUX KLAN.

SHE DECIDED TO PLAY THE VILLAIN WHO BETRAYED THE HEROIC KKK.

Molly Haskell: This was Jim Crow and even northerners who believed in integration didn't necessarily believe in equality, so this is the world she was in and it makes us very uncomfortable today.

Narrator: AS A CHILD MITCHELL HAD LIVED THROUGH ATLANTA'S TERRIFYING RACE RIOT OF 1906.

SHE KNEW RACIAL VIOLENCE AND SEGREGATION FIRSTHAND.

IN ONE WAY OR THE OTHER, SHE WOULD DEAL WITH THESE ISSUES FOR THE REST OF HER LIFE.

RACE WAS NOT AN ISSUE AT WASHINGTON SEMINARY WHERE MITCHELL ATTENDED HIGH SCHOOL.

BUT IT WAS NOT HER KIND OF PLACE.

Darden Pyron: It's a very cliquey place.

Rich girls, rich white girls... the pretty ones, the bright ones, and the good ones and all the rest who abided by the rules and so forth.

And there's a kind of natural disharmony between Mitchell and all of those people.

Carol Miller: She wore men's clothes.

I mean her clothes were way out and I think for that reason people sort of looked at her you know like, what are you doing?

Darden Pyron: She likes playing at the edge of social order which is also playing at the edge of revolution.

Narrator: AT WASHINGTON SEMINARY MITCHELL'S WRITING REACHED A NEW LEVEL OF MATURITY... AND INTENSITY.

Voice of Margaret Mitchell: With infinite care Peggy slid the gun up to her eyes and found the man across the sights.

She must not miss now- she would not miss - and she did not.

IN HER STORY "LITTLE SISTER", MITCHELL CREATED THE CHARACTER OF PEGGY, A NICKNAME FOR MARGARET.

AFTER GRADUATING FROM WASHINGTON SEMINARY, PEGGY WOULD BE HER NEW PERSONA.

Darden Pyron: This is the kind of persona that allows her to be creative, to be wild... Nobody in her family called her Peggy.

Narrator: PEGGY WAS MITCHELL'S DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE.

AND PEGGY WAS AMBITIOUS.

Voice of Margaret Mitchell: I want to be famous in some way...artist, writer, soldier, prize fighter...anything for the thrills.

Narrator: IN THE SPRING OF 1917, THE UNITED STATES ENTERED WORLD WAR ONE.

YOUNG OFFICERS FROM ACROSS THE NATION CAME SOUTH FOR TRAINING.

THAT'S WHEN MITCHELL MET LIEUTENANT CLIFFORD HENRY.

Darden Pyron: Clifford belonged to an upper class silk stocking old New Yorker family.

He went to Harvard... he was handsome.

Narrator: AFTER A WHIRLWIND ROMANCE, 17 YEAR-OLD MITCHELL BECAME ENGAGED TO CLIFFORD HENRY.

Darden Pyron: All of these soldiers coming into the houses with a sense of both glory and impending doom.

It's very romantic.

Narrator: WITHIN A MONTH HE WOULD BE FIGHTING IN EUROPE... AND SHE WOULD BE ON HER WAY TO SMITH COLLEGE IN MASSACHUSETTS.

Kathleen Clark: Maybelle expected her daughter Margaret to pursue an education.

She envisioned a medical career.

Darden Pyron: She's not happy at Smith that year.

Also this is her mother's decision... it's not really her own decision.

Kathleen Clark: Her mother's vision for Margaret and her mother's role in life never seemed to fit well with who Margaret was.

Narrator: IN SPITE OF THESE TENSIONS, MITCHELL WAS KNOWN AT SMITH FOR HER SENSE OF HUMOR.

Voice of Margaret Mitchell: If Don Juan had been born in this cold climate, his career might not have been so vivid.

Narrator: MITCHELL SAW HERSELF AS PROGRESSIVE, BUT SHE WAS NOT READY FOR SMITH COLLEGE.

Darden Pyron: When she was at Smith, she's taking an American history course and there's a single black woman in the class.

Narrator: MITCHELL REFUSED TO BE IN CLASS WITH THE BLACK STUDENT.

SHE ASKED TO BE TRANSFERRED.

Kathleen Clark: Sitting in a classroom with an African American student offended her understanding of what was an appropriate context for blacks and whites to relate to one another.

Pearl Cleage: I think that Margaret Mitchell reflected the community that she was in.

I think she reflected the opinions and values of many of the people that she knew.

Narrator: AS UPPER CLASS SOUTHERNERS, MITCHELL'S FAMILY HAD LIFELONG, INTIMATE RELATIONSHIPS WITH BLACK DOMESTICS.

IN A LETTER TO HER MOTHER, MITCHELL DEFENDED HER ACTIONS AT SMITH.

Voice of Margaret Mitchell: I want to know if the teacher of that class had ever undressed and nursed a Negro woman or shielded a Negro man from being shot by the police.

Dr.

Robert Franklin: Margaret Mitchell was a person of her time and she was not a radical activist, feminist voice for social change, but she was also not altogether content for the racial status quo.

Narrator: MITCHELL'S YEAR AT SMITH WOULD BE MARKED BY TRAGEDY.

IN OCTOBER, HER FIANCEE CLIFFORD HENRY WAS KILLED IN FRANCE JUST AS THE WAR WAS ENDING.

SHE WOULD NEVER FORGET HIM.

Voice of Margaret Mitchell: No one yet has ever been able to portray truthfully a girl's first love.

That feeling only comes once.

Darden Pyron: She always sent Mr.

and Mrs.

Henry flowers on the anniversary of Clifford Henry's death.

For 30 years, up until she died.

Narrator: THREE MONTHS LATER HER MOTHER MAYBELLE WAS STRICKEN WITH INFLUENZA.

MITCHELL TOOK THE NEXT TRAIN TO ATLANTA... BUT ARRIVED TOO LATE.

Darden Pyron: Her mother's dead and her mother has written her a death bed letter which is simply extraordinary.

Voice of Maybelle Mitchell: Dear Margaret, I expect to see you again but if I do not, I must warn you of one mistake a woman of your temperament might fall into... Darden Pyron: It is devoid of affection, it's all about duty, what you should do and what you shouldn't do.

Voice of Maybelle Mitchell: Give of yourself to others but make sure to live your own life.

This is badly put.

What I mean is that your life and energies belong to yourself, your husband and your children.

Darden Pyron: It's very objective, it's intensely rational and it's also a tangle.

So she says "you have to do what's good for yourself."

And then she says, "of course what's good for yourself is what's good for your husband."

Narrator: MAYBELLE HAD WON THE RIGHT TO VOTE BUT SHE HAD NOT RESOLVED THE CONFLICT BETWEEN FAMILY AND FREEDOM.

ONLY 18, MITCHELL WAS LEFT ALONE TO CARRY ON THE STRUGGLE.

Voice of Margaret Mitchell: I have been in mourning and very sick as well.

Narrator: MITCHELL HAD LONGED FOR HER MOTHER'S LOVE, BUT MAYBELLE GAVE HER A DIFFERENT GIFT... THE FIERCE MODEL OF A WOMAN AHEAD OF HER TIME.

AT HER FATHER'S INSISTENCE MITCHELL FINISHED THE YEAR AT SMITH COLLEGE.

MISERABLE, SHE WROTE TO HER BROTHER: Voice of Margaret Mitchell: Steve, there is no use keeping on here.

There are so many more talented girls than I. If I can't be first, I'd rather be nothing.

Narrator: SHE RETURNED TO ATLANTA.

HER FORMAL EDUCATION WAS OVER, BUT HER ROARING TWENTIES WERE JUST BEGINNING.

♪ ♪ THE ROARING TWENTIES WERE MADE TO ORDER FOR MARGARET MITCHELL.

SHE BECAME A FLAPPER.

Molly Haskell: I think in her flapper faze she's Scarlett all the way.

Darden Pyron: She's very very sexy and very attractive.

Narrator: YOUNG WOMEN OF MITCHELL'S SOCIAL CLASS WERE EXPECTED TO BECOME DEBUTANTES.

WITH A STRONG SENSE OF IRONY, SHE GAVE IT A WHIRL.

Voice of Margaret Mitchell: Debut!

Poo!

Poo!

It strikes me as funny that I should shake a shimmy as a deb for I have no matrimonial aspirations.

Narrator: DEBUTANTES WERE CONSTANTLY IN THE NEWS.

MITCHELL WAS INTERVIEWED AFTER ORGANIZING A GROUP CALLED THE "REBEL DEBUTANTES."

Reporter: Miss Mitchell, what do you think of marriage?

Mitchell: It's not essential to salvation.

Reporter: Well what do you want then?

Mitchell: We are coming down off the auction block - and we are going to work.

Reporter: Doing what?

Mitchell: Oh, I am going to write comedies and short stories.

♪ ♪ Narrator: IN THE FOUR HORSEMEN OF THE APOCALYPSE, RUDOLPH VALENTINO ELECTRIFIED AUDIENCES WITH A STEAMY TANGO.

MITCHELL DECIDED TO PERFORM A FRENCH VERSION OF THE DANCE AT A DEBUTANTE BALL.

Ann Boutwell: Margaret had a dance partner that she did the apache which at that particular time it was a very edgy dance.

Ann Boutwell: She wore garters and she had little jingle bells on them, so every time she moved she jingled.

Ann Boutwell: Her partner kind of roughed her up, she kind of crawled around the floor a little bit and than it ends with a dip and a soulful kiss.

Narrator: MITCHELL'S PERFORMANCE HIT THE NEWSPAPERS.

SHE WAS THE TALK OF THE TOWN AND WAS BLACKBALLED FROM MEMBERSHIP IN THE JUNIOR LEAGUE.

Darden Pyron: She then is kind of an official pariah among the elites.

Sara Parsons: That's just the way she was known because she didn't fit into what she was supposed to fit into, which was a just ordinary sweet nice southern girl.

She had sense.

Narrator: DURING THIS PERIOD MITCHELL HAD ANOTHER HORSEBACK RIDING ACCIDENT AND INJURED THE SAME ANKLE.

ALONG WITH THE ACCIDENT CAME A SERIOUS BOUT OF DEPRESSION.

Voice of Margaret Mitchell: This depression is nothing new!

There is something missing in my life - but I don't know what it is.

More than ever is the desire to know if I'm worth anything.

I feel like a dynamo going to waste.

Narrator: CALLING HERSELF THE "VAMP DELUXE," MITCHELL HID HER DEPRESSION FROM THE WORLD.

SUITORS WERE VYING FOR HER ATTENTION, AND BY 1921 SHE HAD NARROWED THE FIELD TO TWO VERY DIFFERENT MEN.

Molly Haskell: Red Upshaw was a character.

He was sort of the model for Rhett because he was a rogue and a renegade and he was a kind of swaggering character but without the charm of Rhett.

JOHN MARSH DIDN'T HAVE RED UPSHAW'S CHARISMA, BUT HE WAS A GOOD NEWSPAPER MAN WHO LOVED LITERATURE.

Marianne Walker: I think he fell in love with her when he first saw her and she liked him but I don't think she loved him.

Narrator: MITCHELL BEGAN DATING BOTH RED UPSHAW AND JOHN MARSH.

John Wiley: She sort of went back and forth in fact I think even some nights where she had dates with both of them.

She would go out with one, come home the other one would be waiting his turn.

Voice of Margaret Mitchell: I have a penchant for the bizarre and wild that I've had to ride most of my life, but I guess I could ride it better if I were married.

Narrator: MITCHELL FINALLY MADE UP HER MIND.

SHE MARRIED RED UPSHAW.

Molly Haskell: Nobody understood what she saw in him.

He was a bootlegger.

He was down on his luck...and also there was something a little dangerous about him.

Narrator: THE LONG SUFFERING JOHN MARSH WAS BEST MAN IN THE WEDDING.

RED UPSHAW HAD NO JOB SO THE COUPLE MOVED INTO THE PEACHTREE HOME UNDER HER FATHER'S DISAPPROVING EYE.

Molly Haskell: It was horrible almost from the beginning but the one strangely good thing that came out of it he was so unsuccessful that she had to go to work.

Narrator: EUGENE MITCHELL WAS UPSET BY HIS DAUGHTER'S PLAN TO GET A JOB.

Kathleen Clark: For a married woman to go out and work was just something one did not do in Eugene Mitchell's eyes, not if one wanted to maintain a respectable position in society.

Narrator: MITCHELL FAST TALKED HER WAY INTO A JOB WRITING FOR THE ATLANTA JOURNAL SUNDAY MAGAZINE.

Voice of Margaret Mitchell: I had no newspaper experience and had never had my hands on a typewriter but I swore I was a speed demon on a Remington and got the job.

♪ ♪ Darden Pyron: Journalism in this period is extremely extremely exciting.

People are trying new things, doing new things.

She is just absolutely in her element when she's doing journalism in this period.

Narrator: MITCHELL EMERGED AS A POPULAR WRITER KNOWN FOR HER STORY-TELLING SKILLS.

SHE INTERVIEWED THE FAMOUS AND THE INFAMOUS, WORKED IN DANGEROUS PARTS OF TOWN AND SPENT TIME WITH PRISONERS ON DEATH ROW.

SHE RELISHED THE ROLE OF DAREDEVIL, PERFORMING STUNTS LIKE RAPELLING OFF A BUILDING IN DOWNTOWN ATLANTA.

Clifford Kuhn: One way to look at Margaret Mitchell is as a modern woman of the new South.

She entered a profession that was largely a male profession.

Narrator: FLAUNTING CONVENTION, SHE USED HER MAIDEN NAME AS HER BYLINE.

Molly Haskell: There's such a strong feminist sense in her.

She was interested in women working.

She did articles about did women want to continue working after they were married.

Narrator: RED UPSHAW DISAPPEARED SOON AFTER MITCHELL BEGAN WORKING.

HE RETURNED SEVERAL MONTHS LATER, PENNILESS AND ANGRY.

Molly Haskell: The marriage with Red Upshaw was a disaster and there was violence.

He beat her and may have even tried to rape her at one point.

Narrator: MITCHELL DIVORCED RED UPSHAW.

IN COURT SHE TESTIFIED HIS ASSAULTS HAD FORCED HER TO SEEK MEDICAL ATTENTION.

Kathleen Clark: She transformed that experience into her fiction, into one that was more positive for Scarlett.

Mitchell has depicted what we might term to be a rape as something that Scarlett took pleasure in and that had positive consequences for her.

Rhett Butler: It's not so easy, Scarlett.

You turned me out while you chased Ashley Wilkes, while you dreamed of Ashley Wilkes.

This is one night you're not turning me out.

Narrator: MITCHELL AT AGE 24 HAD ALREADY LEARNED SOME TOUGH LESSONS, BUT LIFE WAS ABOUT TO GET BETTER.

ON JULY 4, 1925 SHE MARRIED JOHN MARSH.

THIS TIME SHE GOT IT RIGHT.

Sara Parsons: John Marsh was a perfect husband for her because he admired her greatly, he was a writer and a journalist.

Marianne Walker: And they liked their life together.

I think they had a wonderful marriage.

Voice of Mitchell Mitchell: I'm not all the wonders he thinks I am.

But I have succeeded pretty well in keeping him fooled.

And if I can just keep him that way the rest of our lives, I think we will be very happy.

Narrator: THEY LIVED IN A TINY APARTMENT MITCHELL CALLED THE DUMP.

MARSH NOW WORKED FOR GEORGIA POWER AND MITCHELL HAD HER REPORTER'S JOB... UNTIL SHE HURT HER LEG AGAIN.

Voice of Margaret Mitchell: My ankle went bad again for no apparent reason.

I'm on crutches and haven't touched the floor in three weeks.

Narrator: AS IN THE PAST, MITCHELL'S LEG INJURY COINCIDED WITH THE RETURN OF DEPRESSION.

Molly Haskell: She's very volatile emotionally and psychologically during this period.

And I think it's because she wants to write... I mean it was okay to write for the paper.

Narrator: BUT WRITING FOR THE PAPER WAS NO LONGER ENOUGH.

MITCHELL SEEMED TO HAVE HIT A BRICK WALL.

CITING THE INJURY, SHE QUIT HER JOB.

Marianne Walker: She was pretty bored being at home all day while John was at work.

He would stop by the library and he would bring arm loads of books for her to read.

Marianne Walker: One day when John felt that he had exhausted all of the sources at the library he just told her, he said "you need to quit reading and write your own book."

Narrator: MITCHELL WANTED TO WRITE A NOVEL.

SHE HAD WORKED ON A JAZZ AGE STORY BUT DISCARDED IT.

THEN SHE REMEMBERED AN INCIDENT FROM HER CHILDHOOD.

♪ ♪ Voice of Margaret Mitchell: I didn't want to go to school.

I didn't like arithmetic.

I saw no value at all in education.

Marianne Walker: Her mother was just furious with her for saying that.

And apparently she just picked the child up and plopped her in that buggy that they had.

Voice of Margaret Mitchell: And Mother drove me down the road toward Jonesboro.

She showed me the ruins of houses where fine and wealthy people had once lived.

John Wiley: Plantations that had been burned by Sherman as he came through Georgia during the Civil War.

Voice of Margaret Mitchell: She said their world had exploded beneath them and she told me my own world was going to explode under me some day.

John Wiley: And you better have something that you can hang onto.

You have to have something within you to survive and make it through this life.

Narrator: MITCHELL HAD FOUND HER STORY.

♪ ♪ Voice of Margaret Mitchell: I wrote my book from back to front.

That is, the last chapter first and the first chapter last.

Darden Pyron: She clearly had the great plot outline in her mind before she started writing.

Narrator: MITCHELL WROTE HER INITIAL DRAFTS QUICKLY.

Darden Pyron: But it was like she had a kind of vision and she saw these things dancing before her and her duty then became to translate these images dancing before her into the printed word.

Voice of Gone With the Wind: With the spirit of her people who would not know defeat, even when it stared them in the face, she raised her chin.

She could get Rhett back.

She knew she could.

Darden Pyron: When somebody would drop in, one of her friends would drop in, she'd throw a tea towel over a typewriter so that people couldn't see what she was doing.

Narrator: MITCHELL WAS DEEPLY INSECURE AS A WRITER.

ONLY JOHN MARSH KNEW SHE WAS WORKING ON A NOVEL.

Molly Haskell: He was just a wonderful sounding board for her.

A wonderful reader... Marianne Walker: The book the characters, the people are all of hers, but John Marsh was her editor.

She had the advantage of living with her editor, being married to him.

Ann Boutwell: If Margaret Mitchell never married John Marsh or didn't have a person like John Marsh in her life, would she have written or finished Gone With the Wind?

Narrator: BECAUSE OF THE LEG INJURY, MITCHELL OFTEN WROTE IN PAIN.

A NEW PERSONA WAS BEGINNING TO EMERGE.

Molly Haskell: She loved to dance and now she had to wear these orthopedic shoes.

That was a huge thing.

The orthopedic shoes that made her feel like a little old lady, matronly.

Narrator: SHE WAS LEAVING PEGGY BEHIND FOR THE MORE MATRONLY MARGARET.

BUT SHE NEVER LOST HER SENSE OF HUMOR.

Voice of Margaret Mitchell: I will never be able to dance any more and we haven't any money to play poker or shoot craps.

I guess this is a moral universe after all and respectability is the punishment of the wild.

Darden Pyron: She started writing the novel in 1926 and she finished it essentially in 1929, just about the time of the great crash.

So she completed the novel in 3 years.

Narrator: IN MITCHELL'S MIND THE MANUSCRIPT WAS FAR FROM COMPLETE.

SHE WORKED ON IT SPORADICALLY OVER THE NEXT SEVERAL YEARS AND THEN FINALLY ABANDONED IT.

Voice of Margaret Mitchell: It seemed, to be quite frank, pretty lousy and I never bothered to try to sell it.

Narrator: MITCHELL MADE NO EFFORT TO PUBLISH HER BOOK... UNTIL FATE INTERVENED.

John Wiley: In the spring of 1935 an executive from McMillan publishing company in New York came to Atlanta on a book scouting tour.

Narrator: HAROLD LATHAM WAS LOOKING FOR NEW WRITERS.

HE HAD HEARD INTRIGUING STORIES ABOUT A CERTAIN MARGARET MITCHELL OF ATLANTA.

John Wiley: At first she said she didn't even have a book, didn't want to talk to him.

Finally he kept on and she admitted well she was working on something but it wasn't ready to be seen.

Molly Haskell: She knew enough to know her limitations.

She knew she wasn't literary... even from the beginning she knew she would be judged by literary standards and she had just such mixed feelings about that.

Narrator: LATHAM GAVE UP AND PREPARED TO LEAVE ATLANTA.

THEN ONE OF MITCHELL'S FRIENDS MADE A REMARK WHICH MAY HAVE CHANGED HISTORY.

John Wiley: And one of the woman supposedly said something like "Well I can't believe you can be writing book, you're not serious enough to write a book."

Darden Pyron: And that's all it took.

And so she explodes.

Voice of Margaret Mitchell: I got so mad that I rushed home and grabbed up what manuscript I could lay hands on, forgetting that I hadn't included the envelopes under the bed, or the ones that were in the pot and pan closet.

My idea was that at least I could brag that I had been refused by the very best publisher.

John Wiley: When Harold Latham took the manuscript he said he had to go buy an extra suitcase it was so large.

And he also commented that it was the worst manuscript he had ever seen.

Narrator: THE NEXT DAY ON THE TRAIN LATHAM RECEIVED A TELEGRAM: Voice of Margaret Mitchell: Send it back.

I've changed my mind.

Narrator: BUT HAROLD LATHAM DIDN'T SEND IT BACK.

HE HAD STARTED READING AND WAS ALREADY HOOKED.

WITH PUBLICATION LOOMING BEFORE HER, MITCHELL SPENT MONTHS REVISING AND CORRECTING THE HUGE MANUSCRIPT.

BUT THERE WAS ONE SECTION SHE DIDN'T CHANGE -- SCARLETT'S RETURN TO TARA AFTER SHERMAN'S MARCH THROUGH GEORGIA.

Voice of Gone With the Wind: But the small cloud which appeared in the northwest four months ago had blown up into a mighty storm and then into a screaming tornado, sweeping away her world, whirling her out of her sheltered life, and dropping her down in the midst of this still, haunted desolation... Was Tara still standing?

Or was Tara also gone with the wind which had swept through Georgia?

Narrator: GONE WITH THE WIND WAS PUBLISHED JUNE 30, 1936.

THE REVIEWS WERE EXTRAORDINARY.

SALES OF THE BOOK MADE PUBLISHING HISTORY WHEN A MILLION COPIES SOLD IN THE FIRST SIX MONTHS.

Pat Conroy: The entire country went crazy.

The book caused an explosion at book stores and they could not keep them in book stores.

It was on the way to becoming the most successful novel ever published in America.

Narrator: GONE WITH THE WIND WAS PUBLISHED AT THE HEIGHT OF THE GREAT DEPRESSION.

SCARLETT'S STRUGGLE TO SURVIVE HAD STRUCK A CHORD IN A VERY DIFFERENT ERA.

Molly Haskell: McMillan had to charge $3 because it was such a big book and Margaret Mitchell was astonished that anybody would pay $3 for a book in the middle of the Depression.

Voice of Margaret Mitchell: God knows, I didn't expect the book to sell like this... I'm flabbergasted!

Darden Pyron: Why does it have the enormous appeal?

It is a really good story.

It is a really good story.

It is a corking good story.

Narrator: A GOOD STORY HAS TO HAVE A GOOD BEGINNING AND MITCHELL HAD STRUGGLED WITH HER FIRST CHAPTER.

John Wiley: She could not find a way to open this book.

Eventually it started with a very simple line, "Scarlett O'Hara... Voice of Gone With the Wind: ....was not beautiful, but men seldom realized it when caught by her charm as the Tarleton twins were.

Pat Conroy: I think Margaret Mitchell was the first one to put a woman front and center and this is during the Civil War... but what a woman!

Narrator: WITH SCARLETT O'HARA MITCHELL HAD CREATED ONE OF FICTION'S MOST CAPTIVATING - AND INFURIATING - CHARACTERS.

Molly Haskell: She is selfish, she's greedy, she's obtuse.

She steals her sister's boyfriend.

She marries three men she doesn't love.

But she's fiercely courageous.

She's honest, she's straight forward... so it's so much of the rebel in her that women and young women all over the world have responded to that.

Narrator: SCARLETT O'HARA MET HER MATCH WITH RHETT BUTLER.

Rhett Butler whistles: Scarlett O'Hara gasps: Rhett Butler: Has the war started?

Scarlett O'Hara: Sir, you should have made your presence known.

Rhett Butler: In the middle of that beautiful love scene?

That wouldn't have been very tactful, would it?

But don't worry, your secret is safe with me.

Scarlett O'Hara: Sir, you are no gentleman.

Rhett Butler: And you Miss are no lady.

Narrator: THROUGH RHETT BUTLER, MITCHELL VOICED THE HOPELESSNESS OF THE SOUTHERN CAUSE.

Pat Conroy: His character was formed for me I think when he joined the Confederate forces when they were doomed.

Because he kept saying "we're gonna lose.

They're coming for us and we do not have the strength, the military strength to stop them."

Narrator: WITH HER CRITIQUE OF THE SOUTH'S RUSH TO WAR, MITCHELL FEARED A SOUTHERN BACKLASH.

BUT THE CRITICISM OF GONE WITH THE WIND WAS ALL ABOUT RACE.

Pearl Cleage: I do think that she is totally glamorizing and totally romanticizing what slavery was really like.

What being a slave owner really meant about you as a human being and certainly what it felt like to be another human being owned by someone who could sell your children away from you.

Narrator: ANTICIPATING THAT A MOVIE WOULD BE MADE, MEMBERS OF THE BLACK PRESS DENOUNCED GONE WITH THE WIND.

MITCHELL WAS SHOCKED.

Voice of Margaret Mitchell: They referred to the book as "incendiary and negro baiting."

I do not know where they get such an idea for as far as I can see, most of the negro characters were people of worth, dignity and rectitude.

Elizabeth West: Mitchell's black characters are not characters, they're caricatures.

If Gone With the Wind is the last statement about the experience of slavery in America, it would be a horrendous legacy for blacks to live with.

Narrator: BESSIE JORDAN WAS MITCHELL'S LIFELONG COOK AND CON-FIDANTE.

Molly Haskell: She got along famously with her housekeeper.

They were very close and her housekeeper was a little like Mammy.

Voice of Margaret Mitchell: Most of the time Bessie answers the phone.

I'd as soon pick up a snake as the receiver.

Bessie answers the phone: "Hello..." Marianne Walker: Bessie would answer the phone and she would say, "No we don't know what happened to Ms.

Scarlett or Mr.

Rhett, we don't know what happened to them two."

Narrator: MITCHELL WAS BESIEGED BY PEOPLE WANTING TO KNOW IF SCARLETT EVER GOT RHETT BACK.

Bessie hangs up phone: Lord have mercy.

Molly Haskell: Everyone has a yearning for Rhett and Scarlett as we all do in all romantic stories.

But she was tough and she did not have them get together in the end and I think that edge has really given it something that is very unconventional.

Scarlett O'Hara: Rhett, Rhett, Rhett!

Rhett, if you go, where shall I go?

What shall I do?

Rhett Butler: Frankly my dear, I don't give a damn.

Narrator: FOREIGN SALES OF GONE WITH THE WIND SWEPT THE GLOBE.

MITCHELL WAS SUDDENLY ONE OF THE WORLD'S MOST FAMOUS PEOPLE.

Marianne Walker: She was so famous that she got mail, envelopes that just said Margaret Mitchell dash Gone with the Wind.

Narrator: MITCHELL HAD ONCE WANTED FAME...BUT THE REALITY OF IT WAS A SHATTERING EXPERIENCE.

Voice of Margaret Mitchell: left town three days after I was published.

I'd lost about ten pounds in an alarmingly short time.

I felt dreadfully; wept when the phone rang and it rang every five minutes.

I wasn't cut out to be a celebrity.

I don't like it worth a damn.

Narrator: GONE WITH THE WIND WON THE PULITZER PRIZE FOR LITERATURE IN 1937.

THE BOOK'S PHENOMENAL SUCCESS ATTRACTED HOLLYWOOD PRODUCER DAVID O. SELZNICK, WHO PAID MITCHELL $50,000 FOR THE MOVIE RIGHTS... A RECORD SUM FOR A FIRST NOVEL.

John Wiley: After Selznick purchased the film rights to Gone with the Wind, he wanted Margaret Mitchell's help, whether to help him write the screenplay or answer questions about things.

She absolutely refused.

Voice of Margaret Mitchell: If Southerners didn't like the picture and knew I had worked on the script, I'd never live it down.

Narrator: MITCHELL NEVER WENT TO HOLLYWOOD.

INSTEAD, HOLLYWOOD CAME TO HER.

Newsreel Announcer: Gala days in Dixie.

Streamlined Wings of the Wind brings Hollywood to Atlanta in history making world premiere of the motion picture epic Gone With the Wind.

Southern hospitality is at fever pitch as distinguished visitors arrive, headed by producer David Selznick and screen stars Olivia de Havilland and Vivien Leigh.

Narrator: ON DECEMBER 15, 1939 THE MOVIE OF GONE WITH THE WIND PREMIERED IN ATLANTA.

AS CROWDS SWELLED TO THE HUNDREDS OF THOUSANDS, IT WAS APPARENT THE SOUTH HAD BEEN WAITING A LONG TIME FOR THIS MOMENT.

Molly Haskell: The premiere was the vindication of the South.

It was as if they had forced Sherman's army into retreat you know.

It was their victory, the long delayed victory.

Pat Conroy: This was the first articulate, fire response from the South and from a southern woman's point of view that told what they considered the true story.

Narrator: MITCHELL DID NOT ATTEND THE GLAMOROUS JUNIOR LEAGUE BALL ON THE NIGHT BEFORE THE PREMIERE.

YEARS EARLIER SHE HAD BEEN BLACKBALLED BY THE JUNIOR LEAGUE, AND SOME WONDERED IF SHE WERE GETTING HER REVENGE.

BUT CLARK GABLE FOUND HER AT A PRESS EVENT, PULLED HER INTO A PRIVATE ROOM AND SHUT THE DOOR.

John Wiley: We don't know what they said, but when Clark Gable came out he later told people that she was the most fascinating woman he had ever met.

Newsreel - Clark Gable: This is Margaret Mitchell's night and the people of Atlanta's night.

Newsreel Announcer: Diminutive Margaret Mitchell the author, who rarely appears in public, attends to see her brain child.

Narrator: AT THE PREMIERE MITCHELL SHRANK FROM THE LIMELIGHT BUT AFTER SEEING THE MOVIE, SHE SAID A FEW WORDS TO THE THEATER AUDIENCE.

Voice of Margaret Mitchell: This picture was a great emotional experience for me and I want to commend Mr.

Selznick's courage and his determination to get the exact cast he wanted... I think you'll all agree with me, he had the absolutely perfect cast.

Narrator: THE MOVIE'S BLACK ACTORS HAD NOT COME TO ATLANTA.

IN THE ERA OF SEGREGATION, THEY WOULD NOT BE ABLE TO STAY IN THE SAME HOTEL AS CLARK GABLE AND VIVIEN LEIGH.

THE FOLLOWING YEAR HATTIE MCDANIEL WOULD BECOME THE FIRST AFRICAN AMERICAN TO WIN AN ACADEMY AWARD FOR HER PORTRAYAL OF MAMMY IN GONE WITH THE WIND.

Molly Haskell: We cannot believe that Hattie McDaniel won, was the first black to win an Oscar and could not come to Atlanta to the premier.

It's just but at the same time, even in Hollywood when she went to the Oscars she was at a table by herself, she couldn't be with the rest of the cast.

Narrator: IN THE EARLY MORNING HOURS AFTER THE PREMIERE, MITCHELL WROTE TO HATTIE MCDANIEL.

Voice of Margaret Mitchell: The premiere audience loved you and so did I. The Mayor of Atlanta called for a hand for our Hattie McDaniel and I wish you could have heard the cheers.

Narrator: AS WORLD WAR TWO RAGED IN EUROPE THE NAZIS BANNED GONE WITH THE WIND.

THEY CLAIMED IT INSPIRED THE FRENCH RESISTANCE.

Debra Freer: I think the Nazis who banned Gone With the Wind were afraid that it would give people hope.

It would give people the will to survive under occupation.

Narrator: THE RUSSIANS WOULD LATER BAN GONE WITH THE WIND THROUGHOUT THE SOVIET EMPIRE.

SCARLETT O'HARA WAS NOT A FAN OF WAR, AND THAT MADE HER DANGEROUS.

Voice of Gone With the Wind: The Cause didn't seem sacred to her.

The war didn't seem to be a holy affair but a nuisance that killed men senselessly.

Narrator: THOUSANDS OF PEOPLE WROTE MARGARET MITCHELL FROM AROUND THE WORLD.

SHE ANSWERED EVERY SERIOUS INQUIRY.

Marianne Walker: She spent an inordinate amount of time writing letters.

She just wrote these long, long letters.

Darden Pyron: She's writing hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of letters.

Narrator: MITCHELL WOULD NEVER WRITE ANOTHER BOOK.

PERHAPS SHE DIDN'T HAVE THE TIME.

Marianne Walker: During the war she sent countless numbers of boxes, packages to victims in the war-torn countries.

Bessie often helped her.

Narrator: MITCHELL EMBRACED THE ROLE OF RED CROSS VOLUNTEER AND RAISED MILLIONS FOR THE WAR EFFORT.

John Wiley: She of course was asked to christen the U.S.S Atlanta.

She raised millions of dollars for that and went to New Jersey to christen that ship.

Newsreel Announcer: The very same Margaret Mitchell whose novel Gone With the Wind made literary and motion picture history.

What more appropriate than to have Atlanta's favorite daughter christen the Atlanta?

Newsreel - Margaret Mitchell: I christen thee the U.S.S.

Atlanta.

John Wiley: When it was sunk during the war she raised money and she christened a second U.S.S.

Atlanta.

Narrator: BY THE 1940'S MARGARET MITCHELL WAS NOT JUST FAMOUS, SHE WAS RICH.

Darden Pyron: Nothing about her changed in any significant way with the income from Gone with the Wind, none at all.

Voice of Margaret Mitchell: Friends wonder why in hell I persist in driving a 1929 model car and wearing four year-old cotton dresses.

Marianne Walker: Instead of spending it on herself, she used it wisely to help other people.

Narrator: IN 1942 MITCHELL RECEIVED A LETTER FROM DR.

BENJAMIN MAYS, PRESIDENT OF ALL-BLACK MOREHOUSE COLLEGE IN ATLANTA.

Ira Joe Johnson: He said, "Will you give one scholarship of eighty dollars for one student?"

and Margaret Mitchell wrote back and sent a check.

So that was the beginning of the relationship.

Dr.

Robert Franklin: It was enough to support a student for a year's worth of tuition, that's an attractive scholarship.

Narrator: BENJAMIN MAYS WAS A POWERFUL FIGURE WHO WOULD BECOME THE MENTOR OF MARTIN LUTHER KING JR.

HE SENSED THAT MARGARET MITCHELL MIGHT BE OPEN TO HIS IDEAS ON EDUCATION.

HE WAS RIGHT.

Voice of Margaret Mitchell: Dear President Mays, thank you for your ideas on the best use of the $2000 I sent you for medical and dental students.

Narrator: MITCHELL AND MAYS BEGAN A SECRET CORRESPONDENCE.

HE WOULD MAKE THE REQUEST AND SHE WOULD SEND THE MONEY TO EDUCATE AFRICAN AMERICAN DOCTORS.

Ira Joe Johnson: Racial tensions were very difficult and deep at that time.

It's amazing that Dr.

Mays and Margaret Mitchell were able to maintain that relationship in spite of it.

Narrator: A MOREHOUSE COLLEGE STUDENT COURIERED THE LETTERS BETWEEN MITCHELL AND MAYS.

BECAUSE OF THE DANGEROUS TIMES, THE TWO NEVER MET.

Ira Joe Johnson: I would liken it to an underground railroad in a sense of how they sent the letters back and forth.

Dr.

Franklin: If the world had discovered that Margaret Mitchell was supporting Morehouse College, that gesture could have threatened her life with those who might have been inclined to retaliate against anyone who's promoting black education.

Narrator: FOR THE REST OF HER LIFE, MITCHELL WOULD SEND SCHOLARSHIP MONEY TO DR.

BENJAMIN MAYS.

NONE OF THE AFRICAN AMERICAN DOCTORS KNEW WHO THEIR BENEFACTOR WAS.

LATER, SHE QUIETLY HELPED FUND THE FIRST HOSPITAL FOR BLACKS IN ATLANTA.

Voice of Margaret Mitchell: The time will come when Atlanta will be the largest Negro city in the South.

When that time comes, I hope we will have excellent Negro doctors to staff this hospital.

Robert Franklin: As time passed she grew, she relinquished some early beliefs and convictions with which she had been reared and began to see the world through her own eyes.

Ira Joe Johnson: She made such a great contribution to mankind.

It was greater than money.

It was something she did for humanity.

Narrator: AS MITCHELL'S CONSCIOUSNESS SEEMED TO EXPAND, HER PERSONAL LIFE WAS CONTRACTING.

IN 1944 HER FATHER EUGENE DIED AFTER A PROLONGED ILLNESS.

HER HUSBAND DEVELOPED HEART PROBLEMS.

Darden Pyron: Her world is really really really constricted and also she's in pain most of this time as well.

She has a series of back operations in Baltimore.

They're unsuccessful.

She has continuing agony in her legs.

Narrator: MITCHELL'S PERSONA WAS SHIFTING AGAIN.

NOW SHE IDENTIFIED HERSELF AS MRS.

JOHN MARSH RATHER THAN MARGARET MITCHELL.

Debra Freer: She could go places as Mrs.

John Marsh where people wouldn't know Mrs.

John Marsh, but they would certainly know Margaret Mitchell.

Molly Haskell: Margaret Mitchell's self image, her persona never settled into one form.

Darden Pyron: Am I a writer, am I a wife, shall I be famous on my own, shall I make more money than my husband, what happens if I make more money that my husband?

Is he Mr.

Margaret Mitchell?

Narrator: IN SPITE OF HIS WIFE'S SUCCESS JOHN MARSH STILL WORKED AT GEORGIA POWER.

HE ALSO MANAGED THE BUSINESS OF GONE WITH THE WIND, A FORMIDABLE TASK.

BUT IN 1945 HE SUFFERED A MASSIVE HEART ATTACK AND WOULD NEVER WORK AGAIN.

FOR TWO AGONIZING YEARS MITCHELL NURSED HER HUSBAND UNTIL HE WAS OUT OF DANGER.

THEY LIVED QUIETLY AND WERE SOMEWHAT RECLUSIVE.

THEIR FAVORITE PASTIME WAS WATCHING MOVIES.

BUT THEIR LOVE OF MOVIES WOULD END TRAGICALLY... IN MITCHELL'S FINAL ACCIDENT.

Narrator: ON AUGUST 11, 1949 MARGARET MITCHELL WAS HIT BY A SPEEDING CAR AS SHE AND JOHN MARSH WERE CROSSING PEACHTREE STREET.

THEY WERE GOING TO THE MOVIES.

MITCHELL WAS TAKEN TO GRADY HOSPITAL IN ATLANTA WHERE SHE LAY IN A COMA FOR FIVE DAYS.

THEN ON AUGUST 16, 1949 MARGARET MITCHELL DIED.

SHE WAS 48 YEARS OLD.

Narrator: SHE WAS BURIED AT OAKLAND CEMETERY IN ATLANTA.

A HALF CENTURY LATER, THE WORLD WOULD LEARN SHE HAD SECRETLY EDUCATED DOZENS OF AFRICAN AMERICAN DOCTORS.

BUT IT WAS NO SECRET TO ANYONE THAT MARGARET MITCHELL HAD WRITTEN A BOOK FOR THE AGES.

Pat Conroy: A woman who'd never written a novel comes out of nowhere, writes a book that becomes the biggest legend, most successful book published in the 20th century.

Darden Pyron: She wrote a text about what it means to be human.

Until we become machines or clones it will continue to speak to the human condition and people will continue to read it.

Narrator: MARGARET MITCHELL'S LAST ACT OF REBELLION CAME FROM BEYOND THE GRAVE.

SHE ASKED HER HUSBAND TO BURN THE ORIGINAL MANUSCRIPT OF GONE WITH THE WIND.

WITH GREAT SADNESS JOHN MARSH WATCHED AS THE FLAMES CONSUMED HUNDREDS OF PAGES.

BEORE IT WAS OVER, HE RESCUED SEVERAL CHAPTERS AND STORED THEM IN A VAULT, IN CASE ANYONE EVER QUESTIONED HER AUTHORSHIP.

WE MAY NEVER KNOW WHY MARGARET MITCHELL WANTED TO DESTROY THE STORY SHE HAD SPENT A LIFETIME CREATING.

BUT ONE THING SEEMS CERTAIN... GONE WITH THE WIND WILL LIVE ON...AND ON.

Voice of Margaret Mitchell: If the novel has a theme it is that of survival.

What qualities are in those who survive that are lacking in those who go under?

I only know that survivors used to call that quality 'gumption.'

So I wrote about people who had gumption and people who didn't.

This program is made possible by the Ray M. and Mary Elizabeth Lee Foundation.

And by the generous contributions of viewers like you.

Thank you.