SUNDAY, AUG. 17

Historic Homes of Boston

Home & Garden TV, 5 p.m.

Ever wish you could pay a personal visit to the heroes of our country's Revolution and thank them for securing our liberty? In this special, we can at least drop by and admire the homes of Paul Revere and John and Abigail Adams. We also tour residences of JFK and poet Henry Wadsworth Longfellow.

MON.-FRI., AUG. 18-22

The Bible: God's Message to Man

EWTN, 4:30 a.m.

& 6 p.m., daily

The Catholic Church is the Mother of the Bible and has the full Bible — none of the incomplete, altered versions that others sadly retain. This comprehensive, new, five-part series covers topics such as the Bible's divine inspiration, its varied writers, the original texts, surviving manuscripts, translations, the Old and New Testaments, the story of salvation, the Messiah and the compiling and dating of the Gospels.

WEDNESDAY, AUG. 20

Top Ten Toylands

Travel Channel, 10 a.m.

Little ones know the best toy of all is a faithful, well-worn cloth bunny, teddy or doll. But more flashy toys can have their place, too, and this program shows us some of them.

THURSDAY, AUG. 21

The Story of Knock

EWTN, 3 a.m. & 2 p.m.

The Irish have always loved the Mother of Christ; Brian O'Rourke, prince of Breffni, told his Elizabethan executioners in 1603, “I'll kneel to no queen but Ireland's Queen in Heaven above.” Much later, on Aug. 21, 1879, the Mother of Christ visited her Irish flock in Knock, County Mayo, and this program relates eyewitness accounts.

THURSDAY, AUG. 21

Life on the Rock

EWTN, 8 p.m.

Tonight's guest is Bishop Fabian Bruskewitz of Lincoln, Neb., where priestly vocations and seminaries are flourishing.

FRIDAY, AUG. 22

The Aleutians: Cradle of the Storms

PBS, 10 p.m.

The barren, frigid Aleutian Islands, which stretch from Alaska to Japan, are home to some of the world's worst weather, and they saw fierce battles in World War II. But over the past seven decades the resident Aleuts have survived and even flourished.

SATURDAY, AUG. 23

The Victory Garden

PBS, 12:30 p.m.

This episode's topics include gardening for children and advice from hand therapists on hands-friendly ways to prune and to hold garden tools.

SATURDAY, AUG. 23

Polar Bears Uncovered

Animal Planet, 8 p.m.

Polar bear cubs have to be tough to survive, but they also find time to cuddle and frolic.

Dan Engler writes from Santa Barbara, California.