Podcast Episodes
Back to SearchTiger Tamer | 5. crazy about wheelbarrows
Episode 1934
The great wheelbarrow craze of 1886-7 was a short-lived media sensation, witnessing a flood of people charging from Scotland to London with barrows. …
2 years, 4 months ago
Will the real Jesus please stand up?
Episode 1933
In the modern world we have a relatively narrow idea of who Jesus was, but things were quite different in the early years of Christianity. Many alter…
2 years, 4 months ago
Mary Wollstonecraft: life of the week
Episode 1932
Mary Wollstonecraft was a firebrand thinker of the Enlightenment – proposing radical ideas about the fundamental rights of women. And her life was ju…
2 years, 4 months ago
An obscenity trial that shocked Victorian Britain
Episode 1931
In 1877, Annie Besant took the stand. She was on trial for selling an "obscene publication" – a pamphlet designed to educate the masses on birth cont…
2 years, 4 months ago
The Capetians: everything you wanted to know
Episode 1930
How did the Capetian dynasty hold on to the French throne for such a long time during the Middle Ages? How did deep-seated religious beliefs shape th…
2 years, 4 months ago
Lothar II vs Theutberga: a marriage scandal that shook the ninth century
Episode 1929
King Henry VIII famously ran into a world of problems trying to get out of his numerous marriages. And interestingly, we can find a similar story of …
2 years, 4 months ago
Tiger Tamer | 4. celebrity pedestrian
Episode 1928
Tickling tigers one day, and cracking jokes to expectant crowds the next, Bob Carlisle was a circus showman, agent, clown and big cat tamer. In the t…
2 years, 4 months ago
A political earthquake: Britain's first Labour government
Episode 1927
In January 1924 Ramsay MacDonald, the son of a farm labourer, strode into 10 Downing Street as prime minister - and changed the nation's political la…
2 years, 4 months ago
James VI and I: life of the week
Episode 1926
James Stuart became king of Scotland at just 13 months old, and has since been known as 'the cradle king'. So, what was his childhood like? How did h…
2 years, 4 months ago
From Russia to Texas: the search for a Jewish homeland
Episode 1925
At the turn of the 20th century, millions of European Jews were seeking an escape from antisemitic persecution. While many dreamed of Palestine, a fe…
2 years, 4 months ago