The History Hour Podcast
A compilation of the latest Witness History programmes.
Episodes to download
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VE Day Special
Sat 9 May 2020
Eyewitness accounts of the fall of Nazi Germany and the end of World War Two in Europe.
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The 1957 flu pandemic
Sat 2 May 2020
A million die in 1957 flu, conflict in the Galapagos islands and trees in Hiroshima.
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The last survivor of the transatlantic slave trade
Sat 25 Apr 2020
The grandson of the last US slave, Pakistan's welfare hero and the Deepwater disaster.
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Apollo 13: The drama that gripped the world
Sat 18 Apr 2020
50 years since the near disaster on the Apollo 13 mission to the Moon.
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How technology revolutionised our lives
Sat 11 Apr 2020
Memories of milestones from webcams to social networks, from the iPhone to home-shopping.
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Women in the law
Sat 4 Apr 2020
Trailblazing British lawyer Rose Heilbron, plus Muslims in China and a Swedish warship
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The AIDS memorial quilt - a patchwork of loss
Sat 28 Mar 2020
How an LGBTQ+ activist decided to commemorate lost friends with a quilt.
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The launch of the Hubble Space Telescope
Sat 21 Mar 2020
Putting an observatory in space; China's cure for malaria; the "Red Scare" in Hollywood.
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The 1918 'Spanish' flu pandemic
Sat 14 Mar 2020
Eyewitnesses accounts of battling deadly viruses from the 1918 flu, to Ebola and SARS.
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The history of the Volkswagen Beetle
Sat 7 Mar 2020
How the British army helped rebuild the German car industry after WW2.
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Freeing American prisoners from Iran
Sat 29 Feb 2020
How a former prisoner fought to free her friends, an Antarctic mystery, and rebel nuns
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Saving Antarctica
Sat 22 Feb 2020
Environmentalists save the ice continent; how meditation changes the brain; Nigerian art.
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The publication of Harry Potter
Sat 15 Feb 2020
The origins of the boy wizard, plus Mao's Little Red Book and Erica Jong's Fear of Flying
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London's first black policeman
Sat 8 Feb 2020
London's first black policeman, a new sign language, and the release of Nelson Mandela
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The early days of the European Union
Sat 1 Feb 2020
The EU in the 1950s, the British royal scandal and the self-made female millionaire.
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The mystery of the disappearing frogs
Sat 25 Jan 2020
How scientists discovered that a deadly fungus was killing off amphibians.
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Storming the Stasi HQ
Sat 18 Jan 2020
East Germany's secret police; killing Osama Bin Laden; saving aristocrats' houses
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The Computers for Schools revolution
Sat 11 Jan 2020
Bringing laptops into education; the battle for Fallujah; environmentalist Chico Mendes.
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The book that warned of an end to civilisation
Sat 4 Jan 2020
Environmental warnings from 1972, El Salvador, East German punks and the Chippendales.
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The Soviet invasion of Afghanistan
Sat 28 Dec 2019
The Soviet-Afghan war, the invention of chemotherapy, and Cirque du Soleil.
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The Romanian revolution
Sat 21 Dec 2019
In December 1989 a wave of protests finally deposed communist dictator Nicolae Ceau葯escu.
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The Cuban writer who defied Castro
Sat 7 Dec 2019
The life and death of Reinaldo Arenas, plus Henry Moore and tracking down Pablo Escobar
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The man who gave his voice to Stephen Hawking
Sat 30 Nov 2019
The scientist who pioneered synthesised speech. Plus the first US AIDS case. .
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I saw the soldiers who killed El Salvador's priests
Sat 23 Nov 2019
An atrocity in El Salvador, the first Taser, and building the Delhi metro
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Rescuing migrants in the Mediterranean
Sat 16 Nov 2019
Rescuing migrants in the Mediterranean; the demolition of the Ayodha mosque; Wilfred Owen
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Britain's secret propaganda war
Sat 9 Nov 2019
'Fake news' in WW2, why Indian police blinded detainees and the Berlin Wall rock concert
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'Jane' - the underground abortion service
Sat 2 Nov 2019
The secret 1960s US abortion network and the battle to protect the Barrier Reef.
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The fall of the Berlin Wall
Sat 26 Oct 2019
A look at events across Europe in 1989 that led to the wall coming down in Germany.
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An environmental history special
Sat 19 Oct 2019
A pioneer of climate change science, UK's nuclear accident, the man who fed the world
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Black British history
Sat 12 Oct 2019
Some landmark moments in British Black history to mark Black History Month in the UK.
