Episódios
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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 post office in Blacksod on the far west coast of Ireland. Her duties included recording rainfall, wind speeds, temperature and air pressure.
On 3 June, she sent one of her hourly reports to Dublin, unaware that the figures were being passed on to the Allied headquarters in England. It was the first indication of bad weather heading towards the coast of France - and it was a huge blow.
Hundreds of thousands of British, American and Canadian servicemen had already gathered for the most ambitious operation of the war, the assault of the Normandy beaches on 5 June.
But after reading Maureen’s report, chief meteorologist Group Captain James Stagg advised a delay of 24 hours.
US General, Dwight Eisenhower, gave the order, and D-Day was finally launched on 6 June, 1944. A date that went down in history.
Maureen's son Edward Sweeney tells Jane Wilkinson about the family's pride in their mother.
(Photo: Maureen Sweeney. Credit: Sweeney family photo)
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In 1984, Russian engineer Alexey Pajitnov invented the popular computer game Tetris. But it was not until American businessman Henk Rogers joined him that the game became an all-time favourite in video game consoles across the world.
Chloe Hadjimatheou spoke to both of them about how the idea of the game originated and the challenges of exporting it from the Soviet Union. This programme was first broadcast in 2011.
(Photo: Tetris 99. Credit: Getty Images)
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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 far as the 7th Century.
Tuan Tuan and Yuan Yuan flew into Taiwan and became instant celebrities.
Eve Chen, curator of the Giant Panda House at Taipei Zoo says: “They were extremely cute and adorable. You could call them like the handsome and the beauty, like the Barbie and Ken in a panda.”
Eve tells Gill Kearsley about their arrival and what it meant to Taiwan.
(Photo: Tuan Tuan and Yuan Yuan in China. Credit: Visual China Group via Getty Images.)
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Forty years ago, a Hollywood director, some tech revolutionaries and a group of London skinheads created a commercial that would rock the advertising world.
Based on George Orwell’s dystopic novel ‘1984’, and launched in the same year, the ad was like nothing that had been seen before.
But its road to being shown was rocky, and the beleaguered advert almost never made it air.
Mike Murray was Apple marketing manager at the time, he speaks to Molly Pipe.
(Photo: Steve Jobs in a room of computers in 1984. Credit: Michael L Abramson/Getty Images)
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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 2014 it was nearly bankrupt. To save money, the city switched its water supply away from Lake Huron to its own Flint River, but state officials failed to treat the river water properly. As a result lead, a powerful neurotoxin, was released into the drinking water.
Despite mounting evidence, officials denied anything was wrong and it took them a year and a half to switch water supply back to Lake Huron. But many residents of Flint –a majority African-American city with high rates of poverty– have been left fearful about the long term impacts on their children.
Rob Walker speaks to lifelong Flint resident Jeneyah McDonald who had two young children at the time. He also hears from Dr Mona Hanna-Attisha – a paediatrician and professor of public health– who helped bring the scandal to national attention after showing that lead had found its way into the bloodstreams of the city’s children.
(Photo: Bottled water donations to help with the Flint Michigan water crisis in 2016. Credit: Dennis Pajot via Getty Images)
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A warning for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander listeners - this programme contains the names and voices of people who have died.
In 1971, Neville Bonner became the first Aboriginal person to become a member of the Australian Parliament.
In 1979, he was named Australian of the Year in recognition of his work fighting for the rights of indigenous Australians - Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people.
His great niece Joanna Lindgren shares her memories of 'Uncle Neville' with Vicky Farncombe.
"He was gentle, he was a terrific listener. It didn't matter that you were 13 years old, you never felt that he was not interested in what you had to say," she says.
(Photo: Old Parliament House, in Canberra. Credit: Getty Images)
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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 where millions of people could visit them.
But, years later they struggled to adapt to life back with their parents which led to a fight for compensation.
This programme was produced and presented by Simon Watts in 2012 using BBC archive.
(Photo: The quintuplets on their fourth birthday. Credit: Bettmann via Getty Images)
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In 1964, João Goulart, the president of Brazil, was overthrown in a military coup.
In the repression which followed, hundreds of people were disappeared or killed, and many more detained and tortured.
Carlos Lamarca was a captain who deserted the army and joined in the armed struggle against the military regime. He was shot dead in 1971.
His friend and fellow fighter, João Salgado Lopes, tells Vicky Farncombe about their time together hiding in the Caatinga, the Brazilian outback.
(Photo: Wanted poster of Carlos Lamarca. Credit: Memories of the Dictatorship)
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In 1984, Nike signed rookie basketball player Michael Jordan and created a shoe in his name – the Air Jordan.
The unprecedented deal would change sports marketing forever.
Former executive Sonny Vaccaro was the man who persuaded his bosses to put all their marketing budget on one untried player.
He became convinced of Michael’s talent after seeing him make the winning shot in a college game.
He tells Vicky Farncombe about the challenges of persuading Michael – an Adidas fan – to sign, and how the Air Jordan's controversial black and red colour scheme upset the National Basketball Association (NBA).
(Photo: Air Jordans. Credit: Getty)
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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 President Ferdinand Marcos, became famous for buying shoes, while millions of Filipinos were living in poverty. It’s thought she had in around 3,000 pairs.
Ella Rule has been through the archive to tell the story of Imelda and her shoes.
(Photo: Imelda Marcos' shoe collection. Credit: Christophe LOVINY/Gamma-Rapho via Getty Images)
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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 set up Adidas and Puma.
Adi Dassler played a crucial role in West Germany's victory in the 1954 World Cup with his game-changing footwear.
In 2022, Reena Stanton-Sharma spoke to Adi's daughter Sigi Dassler, who remembers her dad’s obsession with sports shoes and talks about her fondness for rappers Run-DMC, who paid tribute to her dad’s shoes in their 1986 song My Adidas.
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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 footwear industry started to expand, one company wanted to make something that was comfortable, inexpensive, and ideal for South America's long hot summers.
Havaianas soon became the favourite of the working class because of their affordability. Fast forward almost forty years and they featured on catwalks in Paris and Oscar goody bags in Hollywood, a surprisingly journey from their modest beginnings as the choice of farmers, builders, and tyre fitters.
Johnny I’Anson has been speaking to former employee and author Sergio Sanchez about the birth of a humble flip-flop, and how they became a global success story selling 250 million pairs a year.
(Photo: Rows of brightly coloured Havaianas flip-flops. Credit: Miguel Schincariol/AFP via Getty Images)
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Bata was a Czech company which pioneered assembly line shoemaking and sold affordable footwear around the world.
The factory near London was opened in 1933 and it became key to its expansion.
In 2018, Dina Newman spoke to one of its senior engineers, Mick Pinion, about the company's remarkable history, including how it sold millions of shoes in Africa and Asia.
(Photo: mobile shoe shop selling Bata shoes. Credit: Getty Images)
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In 2001, the American Ana Montes, who was working for the United States Defense Intelligence Agency was arrested for espionage.
Although the FBI knew that there was a spy they didn't know who it was. The Cubans always referred to Ana by a man's name.
Former FBI agent, Pete Lapp, tells Gill Kearsley the fascinating story of how he and his team tracked down and arrested Ana, who is known as ‘Queen of Cuba’.
(Photo: Ana Montes in 2001. Credit: FBI )
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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 decade, the pioneering band found themselves on a collision course with the dictatorship militants and the west.
The band was able to get inspiration from various bootleg tapes of heavy metal's greatest acts.
Acrassicauda performed under Saddam's regime, but because of censorship restrictions, they had to write a song that praised the dictator.
Johnny I'Anson speaks to bass player, Firas Al-Lateef.
(Photo: Acrassicauda perform in Iraq in 2004. Credit: Getty Images)
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It's 20 years since elections in French Polynesia in 2004, where the independence movement stunned the France-aligned government of the day, propelling pro-independence leader Oscar Temaru to the presidency.
It was a landmark in the country's politics, where protests against French rule had increased due to the practice of using Polynesian islands for nuclear tests.
Antony Geros, who helped lead the independence movement, recounts that night to Lizzy Kinch.
This is a Whistledown production for BBC World Service.
(Photo: Antony Geros. Credit: Getty Images)
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On 14 May 1948, the state of Israel was proclaimed.
Tears and applause met the declaration, witnessed by 200 dignitaries, but fighting intensified in the days that followed.
In 2010, Arieh Handler and Zipporah Porath spoke to Lucy Williamson about that day and its fallout.
(Photo: Young Jewish people celebrate the new state. Credit: AFP/Getty Images)
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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 was tense, at times violent and politically complex.
For Israeli Jews it was a chance to build their own nation after the genocide of the Holocaust. But for Arab Palestinian Muslims and Christians it was a time of loss.
Many were intimidated by the violence and changing demographics.
Rebecca Kesby speaks to Hasan Hammami who was 15-years-old when his family was forced out off Palestine.
The interview was recorded before the Hamas attacks on 7 October 2023 and subsequent Israeli military operation.
(Photo: Palestinians forced from their homes in 1948. Credit: Getty Images)
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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 was a photographer who documented the lives of the British royal family. His first visit to the Taj Mahal was to photograph Prince Charles in 1980.
He tells Gill Kearsley about his relationship with the royal family and about taking the iconic photograph.
(Photo: Princess Diana alone outside the Taj Mahal. Credit: Anwar Hussein/Getty Images)
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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 - which means foundation in many Indian languages - became the world's largest ever biometrics project.
It allowed millions of people to open bank accounts or access a mobile connection for the very first time.
But the project also attracted considerable opposition from privacy advocates and civil rights groups, who brought a case that went all the way to India's Supreme Court.
Dan Hardoon speaks to Nandan Nilekani, who chaired the Aadhaar project.
(Photo: Aadhaar system. Credit: Getty Images)
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