Witness History

Georgia’s political crisis

03 Jul 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Following the collapse of the Soviet Union in December 1991, the newly independent state Georgia found itself on the verge of a civil war. Rebel group...

Executed in Stalin’s Great Terror in Georgia

02 Jul 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Between 1937 and 1938, Soviet leader Josef Stalin carried out his most severe purge in Georgia. Known as the Great Terror, thousands of political riva...

Subway Art: The graffiti bible

01 Jul 2024

Contributed by Lukas

In 1984, urban photographers Martha Cooper and Henry Chalfant came together to publish an era-defining book about the early graffiti movement.They had...

I designed Hello Kitty

29 Jun 2024

Contributed by Lukas

In 1974 an unknown Japanese artist put pen to paper and created a character that would go on to be worth more than $80 billion.The illustration was ti...

The first CIA-backed coup in Latin America

27 Jun 2024

Contributed by Lukas

In June 1954, the first CIA-backed coup took place in Guatemala, when President Jacobo Arbenz was overthrown in a operation organised by the US govern...

Dignitas: Founding an assisted dying society

26 Jun 2024

Contributed by Lukas

In 1998, the assisted dying society, Dignitas was set up in Switzerland by lawyer Ludwig Minelli.It was the first end-of-life organisation in the worl...

Sagrada Familia: Completing Gaudi’s vision

25 Jun 2024

Contributed by Lukas

When visionary architect Antoni Gaudi died unexpectedly in 1926, his followers were left with incredible plaster of Paris models showing how to comple...

The expulsion of the Sudeten Germans

24 Jun 2024

Contributed by Lukas

At the end of World War Two, the Czechoslovak government expelled up to three million German speakers, known as the Sudeten Germans. They were accused...

Kawarau Bridge: The first bungee jumping site in New Zealand

21 Jun 2024

Contributed by Lukas

On 12 November 1988, the world’s first commercial bungee jumping site was opened near Queenstown, New Zealand. AJ Hackett and Henry Van Asch started...

The first mega cruise ship

20 Jun 2024

Contributed by Lukas

On 16 January 1988, the world’s largest passenger ship, Sovereign of the Seas, set sail on her maiden voyage around the Caribbean.She carried more t...

The beginning of Benidorm

19 Jun 2024

Contributed by Lukas

In the 1950s, the transformation of the sleepy little town of Benidorm began when Pedro Zaragoza was appointed mayor. He started by getting pipes b...

How Cancún became a tourist destination

18 Jun 2024

Contributed by Lukas

In 1969, Antonio Enríquez Savignac was given the go-ahead to transform a secluded Mexican island into a world-beating tourist destination.The technoc...

The first budget transatlantic flights

17 Jun 2024

Contributed by Lukas

In 1955, a small Icelandic airline, Loftleioir Icelandic, slashed the cost of flying across the Atlantic.For the first time, thousands of young Americ...

Orelhão: Brazil's iconic egg-shaped telephone booth

14 Jun 2024

Contributed by Lukas

In 1971, an architect called Chu Ming Silveira created Brazil's iconic egg-shaped telephone booth, Orelhão. More than 50,000 of the booths were insta...

Kielland disaster

13 Jun 2024

Contributed by Lukas

In 1980, 123 men were killed when the Alexander L. Kielland platform capsized in the North Sea oil fields.It was Norway's biggest industrial disaster ...

The Irish shopworkers strike against apartheid

12 Jun 2024

Contributed by Lukas

In 1984, a 21-year-old Irish shopworker refused to serve a customer buying two South African grapefruits. Mary Manning was suspended from the Dunnes s...

Boko Haram massacre in Gwoza

11 Jun 2024

Contributed by Lukas

In 2014, Boko Haram militants drove into Gwoza in north-east Nigeria and began an assault that would leave hundreds of people dead.Ruoyah, who was jus...

Nato bombs Serbian state television headquarters

10 Jun 2024

Contributed by Lukas

In April 1999 Nato bombed the Serbian state TV station in Belgrade, killing 16 people. It was part of a military campaign to force Serbia to withdraw ...

The Iraqi journalist who hurled his shoes at George Bush

07 Jun 2024

Contributed by Lukas

In 2008, Iraqi journalist Muntadhar al-Zaidi hurled his shoes at the President of the United States in protest at America's occupation of Iraq.George ...

Saving lives on D-Day

06 Jun 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Charles Norman Shay was a field medic in the United States Army when he landed on the Normandy beach codenamed Omaha on D-Day.On June 6, 1944, the US ...

The woman whose weather report changed the date of D-Day

05 Jun 2024

Contributed by Lukas

In 1944, a young Irishwoman called Maureen Flavin drew up a weather report that helped change the course of World War Two. Maureen was working at a po...

Tetris: The birth of an all-time favourite

04 Jun 2024

Contributed by Lukas

In 1984, Russian engineer Alexey Pajitnov invented the popular computer game Tetris. But it was not until American businessman Henk Rogers joined him ...

‘Panda diplomacy’: China gifts pandas to Taiwan

03 Jun 2024

Contributed by Lukas

In 2008, panda-mania hit Taiwan when China gifted the country two giant pandas.This practice known as ‘panda diplomacy’ is thought to date back as...

The commercial that changed advertising: 1984

31 May 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Forty years ago, a Hollywood director, some tech revolutionaries and a group of London skinheads created a commercial that would rock the advertising ...

The Flint water crisis

30 May 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Flint was once one of the richest cities in the United States. But in the 1980s, it was badly affected by the downturn in car manufacturing and by 201...

The first Aboriginal MP

29 May 2024

Contributed by Lukas

A warning for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander listeners - this programme contains the names and voices of people who have died.In 1971, Neville ...

The first ever quintuplets

28 May 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Ninety years ago, the first surviving quintuplets were born in a small village in northern Canada.The Dionnes grew up in a specially-adapted nursery w...

Carlos Lamarca: From army captain to Brazil's 'most wanted'

27 May 2024

Contributed by Lukas

In 1964, João Goulart, the president of Brazil, was overthrown in a military coup. In the repression which followed, hundreds of people were disappea...

How Air Jordans were created

24 May 2024

Contributed by Lukas

In 1984, Nike signed rookie basketball player Michael Jordan and created a shoe in his name – the Air Jordan.The unprecedented deal would change spo...

Imelda Marcos's famous shoe collection

23 May 2024

Contributed by Lukas

In 2001, more than 700 pairs of Imelda Marcos’s shoes were put on display at the Marikina Shoe Museum in the Philippines. The wife of the dictator P...

Adi Dassler's sports shoe obsession

22 May 2024

Contributed by Lukas

How the Dassler brothers created two global sportswear firms.In 1948, Adi and Rudi Dassler who lived in a small German town fell out. They went on to ...

How a Brazilian flip-flop took over the world

21 May 2024

Contributed by Lukas

In 1962, a new brand of footwear launched that would become one of Brazil’s most successful and best-known exports: Havaianas. As the country’s fo...

Bata: Pioneering shoemakers

20 May 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Bata was a Czech company which pioneered assembly line shoemaking and sold affordable footwear around the world. The factory near London was opened in...

When Cuban spy Ana Montes was caught

17 May 2024

Contributed by Lukas

In 2001, the American Ana Montes, who was working for the United States Defense Intelligence Agency was arrested for espionage.Although the FBI knew t...

Baghdad heavy metal

16 May 2024

Contributed by Lukas

In the late 1990s, a heavy metal band called Acrassicauda formed in Iraq, when the country was under the dictatorship of Saddam Hussein. Over the next...

How nuclear testing changed politics in French Polynesia

15 May 2024

Contributed by Lukas

It's 20 years since elections in French Polynesia in 2004, where the independence movement stunned the France-aligned government of the day, propellin...

The creation of the state of Israel

14 May 2024

Contributed by Lukas

On 14 May 1948, the state of Israel was proclaimed.Tears and applause met the declaration, witnessed by 200 dignitaries, but fighting intensified in t...

The ‘Catastrophe’ for Palestinians

13 May 2024

Contributed by Lukas

In 1948, tens of thousands of Palestinians were forcibly expelled from their homes in the Middle East. The period after World War Two in the region wa...

Princess Diana at the Taj Mahal

10 May 2024

Contributed by Lukas

In 1992, a photograph of Princess Diana alone on a bench in front of the Taj Mahal became one of the most famous photos in the world. Anwar Hussein w...

How a billion Indians got a digital ID

09 May 2024

Contributed by Lukas

In 2009, the Indian government embarked on an ambitious task to register all of the country's billion-plus citizens with a unique digital ID. Aadhaar ...

The pioneering eye surgery that led to Lasik

08 May 2024

Contributed by Lukas

In 1963, Dr Jose Ignacio Barraquer Moner performed the first surgery on a human eye aimed at correcting short-sightedness.The ophthalmologist had been...

East Germany's coffee from Vietnam

07 May 2024

Contributed by Lukas

In the 1980s, a thirst for caffeine caused an unusual global collaboration.Coffee-loving East Germans were left without after a crop failure in the wo...

Friends: The making of a smash hit

06 May 2024

Contributed by Lukas

When a new show called Friends hit American TV screens in September 1994, it made household names of its cast.Over 10 series, it charted the lives of ...

The Channel Tunnel breakthrough

03 May 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Thirty years on from the opening of the Channel Tunnel between Britain and France, we look at the moment the two halves of the tunnel were connected i...

Ukraine's 'museum of corruption'

02 May 2024

Contributed by Lukas

In February 2014, Ukraine’s ousted president, Viktor Yanukovych fled the country.His estate was abandoned by security guards, so for the first time ...

How to win friends and influence people

01 May 2024

Contributed by Lukas

In 1936, Dale Carnegie wrote one of the world’s most popular self help books - How to Win Friends and Influence People.The idea was suggested by a b...

How the Milgram 'obedience' experiment shocked the world

30 Apr 2024

Contributed by Lukas

In 1961, the American psychologist Stanley Milgram began a series of controversial experiments on ‘obedience to authority’.His study aimed to show...

Finding the victims of Stroessner's Paraguay

29 Apr 2024

Contributed by Lukas

It’s 70 years since General Alfredo Stroessner seized power in Paraguay in a military coup. Stroessner remained in power for almost 35 years, before...

Oliver Tambo returns to South Africa from exile

26 Apr 2024

Contributed by Lukas

On 13 December 1990, the anti-apartheid politician Oliver Tambo returned to South Africa after 30 years in exile.As the president of the banned Africa...

Brenda Fassie: Madonna of the townships

25 Apr 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Brenda Fassie was one of South Africa's biggest pop stars in the late 1980s. The singer’s career nosedived in 1990, but her comeback saw her dubbed ...

Sarah Baartman's 200-year journey back home

24 Apr 2024

Contributed by Lukas

In August 2002, the remains of an indigenous South African woman called Sarah Baartman were returned to South Africa after almost 200 years away. Sara...

Soweto uprising: Children who marched against apartheid

23 Apr 2024

Contributed by Lukas

When South African schoolchildren marched in protest against having to study Afrikaans in 1976, they were gunned down by the police.The killings spark...

South Africa's referendum on apartheid

22 Apr 2024

Contributed by Lukas

On 18 March 1992, white South Africans overwhelmingly backed a mandate for political reforms to end apartheid and create a power-sharing multi-racial ...

Major Charity Adams and the Six-Triple-Eight

19 Apr 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Major Charity Adams was the first African-American woman to lead a World War Two battalion. It was known as the Six-Triple-Eight (6888).The 6888 was a...

Deadly Everest avalanche

18 Apr 2024

Contributed by Lukas

On 18 April 2014, an avalanche on Mount Everest killed 16 men, who were carrying supplies for commercial expeditions to higher camps.The sherpas were ...

West Africa's Ebola virus epidemic

17 Apr 2024

Contributed by Lukas

The 2014 Ebola outbreak devastated West Africa, killing more than 11,000 people over a two year period. One country that suffered was Sierra Leone.The...

The friendship train: Connecting India and Bangladesh

16 Apr 2024

Contributed by Lukas

When the train service between India and Bangladesh was suspended in 1965, following war between Pakistan and India, it lay dormant for 43 years.But i...

Egypt and the ‘Cairo 52’

15 Apr 2024

Contributed by Lukas

A group of men known as the ‘Cairo 52’ were arrested in Egypt in May 2001. They were on board the Queen Boat, a floating gay nightclub on the Rive...

Hiroo Onoda, Japan’s last WW2 soldier to surrender

12 Apr 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Hiroo Onoda was an Imperial Japanese Army intelligence officer who spent nearly 30 years in the Philippine jungle, believing World War Two was still g...

St Teresa of Avila's severed hand

11 Apr 2024

Contributed by Lukas

After winning the Spanish Civil War in 1939, Franco's dictatorship began. During the war, he acquired St Teresa of Avila's severed hand and kept it fo...

The Scream: A stolen masterpiece

10 Apr 2024

Contributed by Lukas

When Edvard Munch’s painting The Scream was stolen in 1994, an undercover operation was launched to get it back.Thirty years on from its recovery, h...

How Lake Karla in Greece was drained

09 Apr 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Lake Karla supported hundreds of families in Thessaly, providing fish for all of the region and beyond. Christos and Ioanna Kotsikas grew up on the sh...

The 2010 Kampala bombings

08 Apr 2024

Contributed by Lukas

In July 2010, two bombs went off at a rugby club in Uganda's capital Kampala. It was where hundreds had gathered to watch the football World Cup final...

Bonus: The Black 14

06 Apr 2024

Contributed by Lukas

A bonus episode from the Amazing Sport Stories podcast – The Black 14. Sport, racism and protests are about to change the lives of “the Black 14”...

Sweden's Cinnamon Bun Day

05 Apr 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Sweden’s most beloved pastry is the cinnamon bun and every year on 4 October, locals celebrate the sweet, spiced snacks.The country’s first offici...

The Bluetooth story

04 Apr 2024

Contributed by Lukas

In the 1990s, Bluetooth was invented in a lab in Lund, Sweden.The technology is used today to wirelessly connect accessories such as mice, keyboards, ...

Sweden's pioneering paternity leave

03 Apr 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Fifty years ago Sweden became the first country in the world to offer paid parental leave that was gender neutral.The state granted mothers and father...

The man who invented the seat belt

02 Apr 2024

Contributed by Lukas

In 1958, the late Swedish engineer Nils Bohlin invented the three-point safety belt for cars. It's estimated to have saved more than one million lives...

Fifty years of Abba

31 Mar 2024

Contributed by Lukas

It's 50 years since Swedish pop group Abba won the 1974 Eurovision Song Contest.The victory provided a platform for the band to become one of the most...

Surviving the Rwandan genocide

29 Mar 2024

Contributed by Lukas

April 1994 was the start of the Rwandan genocide, 100 days of slaughter, rape and atrocities.As part of the Tutsi ethnic group, Antoinette Mutabazi’...

The founding of Nato

28 Mar 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Nato - the North Atlantic Treaty Organization - was formed in 1949 by 12 countries, including the US, UK, Canada and France.Its aim was to block expan...

Britain's first beach for nudists

27 Mar 2024

Contributed by Lukas

In 1980, the seaside town of Brighton opened a very unusual attraction.It was the first British beach dedicated to nudists.The opening followed a pass...

The Heimlich Manoeuvre

26 Mar 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Since its adoption as a first aid method, the Heimlich Manoeuvre has saved untold numbers of lives around the world. Developed by American physician D...

Britain's Mirpuri migration

25 Mar 2024

Contributed by Lukas

In 1967, a dam was built in Mirpur, Pakistan-administered Kashmir, that would spur a huge global migration. Water diverted by the dam forced around 10...

Wham! in China

22 Mar 2024

Contributed by Lukas

In 1985, the British band Wham! became the first Western pop act to play in China.Around 12,000 fans packed into the Worker’s Gymnasium in Beijing t...

Discovering the Terracotta Army

21 Mar 2024

Contributed by Lukas

It's 50 years since a chance find by Chinese farmers led to an astonishing archaeological discovery.Thousands of clay soldiers were uncovered in the p...

The 'comfort women' of World War Two

20 Mar 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Between 1932 and 1945, hundreds of thousands of women and girls across Asia were forced into sexual slavery by the Imperial Japanese Army.Referred to ...

Surviving re-education in China’s Cultural Revolution

19 Mar 2024

Contributed by Lukas

In 1968, Jingyu Li and her parents were among hundreds of thousands of Chinese people sent to labour camps during Mao Zedong’s so-called cultural re...

Pinyin: The man who helped China to read and write

18 Mar 2024

Contributed by Lukas

In 1958, a brand new writing system was introduced in China called Pinyin. It used the Roman alphabet to help simplify Chinese characters into words. ...

The last eruption of Mount Vesuvius

15 Mar 2024

Contributed by Lukas

The Mount Vesuvius eruption that buried Pompeii in 79AD is well known, but far fewer people know about the last time the volcano erupted in 1944.It wa...

Winifred Atwell: The honky-tonk star who was Sir Elton John’s hero

14 Mar 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Winifred Atwell was a classically-trained pianist from Trinidad who became one of the best-selling artists of the 1950s in the UK. She played pub tune...

Paraguay adopts its second language

13 Mar 2024

Contributed by Lukas

In 1992, Guarani was designated an official language in Paraguay’s new constitution, alongside Spanish.It is the only indigenous language of South A...

Finding the longest set of footprints left by the first vertebrate

12 Mar 2024

Contributed by Lukas

In 1992 off the coast of Ireland, a Swiss geology student accidentally discovered the longest set of footprints made by the first four-legged animals ...

11M: The day Madrid was bombed

11 Mar 2024

Contributed by Lukas

A regular morning turned into a day of nightmares for Spanish commuters on 11 March 2004.In the space of minutes, 10 bombs detonated on trains around ...

MH370: The plane that vanished

08 Mar 2024

Contributed by Lukas

On 8 March 2014, a plane carrying 239 passengers and crew disappeared.What happened to missing flight MH370 remains one of the world's biggest aviatio...

Rehabilitating Kony's child soldiers in Uganda

07 Mar 2024

Contributed by Lukas

In 2002, a Catholic nun arrived in Gulu, a town in northern Uganda, to help set up a sewing school for locals. For years, the town had been the targe...

The Carnation Revolution in Portugal

06 Mar 2024

Contributed by Lukas

25 April is Freedom Day in Portugal. Five decades ago on that date, flowers filled the streets of the capital Lisbon as a dictatorship was overthrown....

French child evacuees of World War Two

05 Mar 2024

Contributed by Lukas

In August and September 1939, tens of thousands of children began to be evacuated from Paris.The move, part of France's 'passive defence' tactic, aime...

Uruguay v the tobacco giant

04 Mar 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Uruguay was one of the first countries in the world to introduce anti-smoking laws.But in 2010, the tobacco giant Philip Morris took the country to co...

The Whisky War: Denmark v Canada

01 Mar 2024

Contributed by Lukas

In 1984, a diplomatic dispute broke out between Canada and Denmark over the ownership of a tiny island in the Arctic.The fight for Hans Island off the...

The discovery of the Lord of Sipan in Peru

29 Feb 2024

Contributed by Lukas

In 1987, Peruvian archaeologist Walter Alva received a call from the police urging him to look at ancient artefacts confiscated from looters.The seize...

The lost Czech scrolls

28 Feb 2024

Contributed by Lukas

On 5 February 1964, an unusual delivery was made to a synagogue in London. More than 1,500 Torah scrolls, lost since the end of World War Two, were ar...

Crimea's Soviet holiday camp

27 Feb 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Artek, on the shores of the Black Sea in Crimea, was a hugely popular Soviet holiday camp.Maria Kim Espeland was one of the thousands of children who ...

Russia annexes Crimea

26 Feb 2024

Contributed by Lukas

In 2014, Russia annexed the strategic Crimean peninsula from Ukraine, a move seen by Kyiv and many other countries as illegal.The crisis it caused was...

Whistler: Creating one of the world’s biggest ski resorts

23 Feb 2024

Contributed by Lukas

In 2003, Whistler Blackcomb won its bid to host the Winter Olympic Games for the first time. It was sixth time lucky for the Canadian ski resort which...

Columbus Lighthouse

22 Feb 2024

Contributed by Lukas

In 1992, Columbus Lighthouse opened in Santo Domingo, the capital of the Dominican Republic. It was designed to house the ashes of explorer, Christoph...

Trans murder in Honduras

21 Feb 2024

Contributed by Lukas

In June 2009, transgender sex worker and activist Vicky Hernandez was murdered in the Honduran city of San Pedro Sula.The killers were never identifie...

Icelandic women's strike

20 Feb 2024

Contributed by Lukas

In October 1975, 90% of women in Iceland took part in a nationwide protest over inequality.Factories and banks were forced to close and men were left ...

The Soviet scientist who made two-headed dogs

19 Feb 2024

Contributed by Lukas

In the 1950s, Soviet scientist Dr Vladimir Demikhov shocks the world with his two-headed dog experiments.He grafts the head and paws of one dog onto t...

Supermalt: The malt drink created after the Nigerian civil war

16 Feb 2024

Contributed by Lukas

In 1972, a food supplement used by soldiers during the Nigerian civil war was turned into a popular malt drink by a brewery in the Danish town of Faxe...