Witness History Podcast
History told by the people who were there. For nine minutes every weekday, Witness History takes you back to moments which have shaped our world.
Eye-witness accounts brought to life by archive. Witness History is for those fascinated by the past. We take you to the events that have shaped our world through the eyes of the people who were there.
For nine minutes every day, we take you back in time and all over the world, to examine wars, coups, scientific discoveries, cultural moments and much more.
Recent episodes explore everything from the death of Adolf Hitler, the first spacewalk and the making of the movie Jaws, to celebrity tortoise Lonesome George, the Kobe earthquake and the invention of superglue.
We look at the lives of some of the most famous leaders, artists, scientists and personalities in history, including: Eva Peron – Argentina’s Evita; President Ronald Reagan and his famous ‘tear down this wall’ speech; Thomas Keneally on why he wrote Schindler’s List; and Jacques Derrida, France’s ‘rock star’ philosopher.
You can learn all about fascinating and surprising stories, such as the civil rights swimming protest; the disastrous D-Day rehearsal ; and the death of one of the world’s oldest languages.
Episodes to download
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Discovering the Jet Stream
Fri 9 Apr 2021
Air raids and balloon bombs - the strange story behind the discovery of the Jet Stream
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From Leningrad to St Petersburg
Thu 8 Apr 2021
How the people of Russia's second city dropped the great communist leader's name
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David Attenborough's first expedition
Wed 7 Apr 2021
The ÃÛÑ¿´«Ã½ programme that launched the career of the famous nature broadcaster
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Mexico's female serial killer
Tue 6 Apr 2021
Juana Barraza was found guilty of murdering at least eleven elderly women in Mexico city
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The women who reclaimed the night
Mon 5 Apr 2021
How women in England took to the streets to protest against a serial killer
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Black Jesus
Fri 2 Apr 2021
In 1967 an African American church minister began preaching that Jesus was black.
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Kidnapped on an orchid hunt
Thu 1 Apr 2021
How two Englishmen were seized by Colombian rebels while crossing the lawless Darien Gap
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Mrs Thatcher’s ground-breaking Soviet TV interview
Wed 31 Mar 2021
How Mrs Thatcher shook up the Soviet media with a landmark interview in Moscow.
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When the prisoners ran the prison
Tue 30 Mar 2021
Prisoners at Walpole maximum security prison were in charge for three months in 1973
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Anorexia nervosa
Mon 29 Mar 2021
The death of the singer, Karen Carpenter, showed how devastating the illness could be.
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South Africa takes on big pharma
Thu 25 Mar 2021
The fight between Big Pharma and South Africa over the right to import cheap drugs.
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The woman who got America talking about sex
Wed 24 Mar 2021
Dr Ruth Westheimer first became popular on a radio show in New York in the early 1980s
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Banksy’s first street art mural
Tue 23 Mar 2021
It’s difficult to pinpoint the first major piece of Banksy street art, could this be it?
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The Ulster Workers' Strike
Mon 22 Mar 2021
Protestant workers went on strike in Northern Ireland in 1974
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The dirtiest chess match in history
Fri 19 Mar 2021
How the 1978 World Chess Championship was overshadowed by allegations of dirty tricks
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Mars-500 isolation experiment
Thu 18 Mar 2021
Why six men were locked inside a spacecraft on earth for 520 days
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Alva Myrdal - the woman who made modern Sweden
Wed 17 Mar 2021
The story of Swedish social reformer, Alva Myrdal, who won the Nobel peace prize in 1982
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Jamaica’s ‘drug lord’
Tue 16 Mar 2021
The hunt for the Jamaican drug lord which left dozens of civilians dead
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Paris is Burning
Mon 15 Mar 2021
The groundbreaking film about drag queens and LGBTQ+ people in New York
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The woman who asked Britain to return the Parthenon marbles
Thu 11 Mar 2021
Melina Mercouri, actress turned politician, requested the marbles be returned to Greece
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Jane: The underground abortion network
Wed 10 Mar 2021
How feminists ended up performing abortions for women in 1960s America
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Cixi: China's most powerful woman
Tue 9 Mar 2021
She was the power behind the Chinese throne for decades
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The women of Egypt's Arab Spring
Mon 8 Mar 2021
In 2011 women were at the forefront of protests calling for a change in power in Egypt
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Churchill's 'Iron Curtain' speech
Fri 5 Mar 2021
How the historic speech in March 1946 came to symbolise the beginnings of the Cold War
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The Sharpeville massacre
Thu 4 Mar 2021
In 1960, South African police shot dead 69 black protestors, sparking worldwide outrage
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When US police dropped explosives on a Philadelphia home
Wed 3 Mar 2021
How 11 people died when explosives were dropped on a house by a police helicopter
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The world's deepest dive 11km down
Mon 1 Mar 2021
Don Walsh was the first to go to the very bottom of the deepest part of the ocean in 1960
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The WW2 airman from Sierra Leone
Thu 25 Feb 2021
Johnny Smythe was one of very few West Africans to fly with Britain's airforce during WW2
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The fall of Kwame Nkrumah
Wed 24 Feb 2021
How one of Africa's most famous independence leaders was overthrown in 1966