

The History Hour
BBC World Service
A compilation of the latest Witness History programmes.
Episodes
Mentioned books

Mar 9, 2019 • 50min
I was abused by a President
How allegations of child abuse engulfed Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega, the campaign to return the Elgin marbles to Greece, Britain's first black headteacher, the origins of the Barbie doll and how Baroness Warsi made history.Photo: Zoilamerica Narváez announces in a press conference that she is filing a law suit against her stepfather Daniel Ortega, March 1998 (RODRIGO ARANGUA/AFP/Getty Images):

Mar 2, 2019 • 50min
Venezuela's oil bonanza
When Venezuela was rich; surviving a mid-air airline disaster; Japan's Red Army militants of the 1970s, the origin of the swine flu epidemic and Iceland's Beer Day.
Photo: Seidel/United Archives/UIG via Getty Images

Feb 23, 2019 • 50min
The curse of Agent Orange
Millions left dead or deformed because of chemicals used in the Vietnam war, UK cigarette smoking warnings ignored, remains of the Nazi 'Angel of Death' discovered in Brazil, the Columbia Shuttle disaster which led to huge questions about American space safety and the unrest featured in the Oscar-nominated film, Roma, where Mexican students were killed by government-trained paramilitary troops.Photo: Child suffering from spinal deformity in rehabilitation centre in Saigon.

Feb 16, 2019 • 50min
Iceland jails its bankers
Why Iceland jailed 40 bankers after the 2008 financial crisis, how the Maastricht Treaty gave birth to the EU, plus America's first female airline pilots, Cameroon's historic referendum and homeless, drunk and yet a genius in the USSR.(Photo: Protesters on the streets of Reykjavik demand answers from the government and the banks about the country's financial crisis, Nov. 2008. (Halldor Kolbeins/AFP/Getty Images)

Feb 9, 2019 • 50min
The last days of Hitler
Hitler's secretary on the last days in the bunker; a CIA operative on the killing of Che Guevara, remembering the US invasion of Iraq, a child of the Soweto Uprising and the tricky task of bringing Disneyland to France.
Photo: Getty Images

Feb 2, 2019 • 50min
The Iranian Revolution
Explore the events leading up to the Iranian Revolution, including mass protests and the role of Iranian musicians. Hear firsthand accounts from individuals who were there during the revolution and their experiences being taken hostage. Discover the impact of the revolution on musicians and the aftermath of music censorship. Delve into the social and economic conditions in Iran prior to the revolution and the personal involvement of a student protester. Learn about Ayatollah Khomeini's return to Iran and the seizure of the US embassy in Tehran. Experience living through the Iranian Revolution and the fear it brought to the country.

Jan 26, 2019 • 42min
Vatican II: Reforming the Catholic Church
In January 1959 Pope John XXIII announced a council of all the world's Catholic bishops and cardinals in Rome. It led to sweeping reforms. Plus Carmen Callil recalls setting up Virago, the most successful feminist publishing house to date; India gives birth to the call centres and remembering the Carry-on films.(Photo; Pope John XXIII at the Vatican. Credit: Getty Images)

Jan 19, 2019 • 50min
Strikers in Saris
How South Asian women led thousands of UK workers in an industrial dispute in the late 1970s, plus Dr Crippen's alleged gruesome crime, Judy Garland's emotional last performances, the 'miracle waters' in Mexico and excitement over a whale in London's River Thames.(PHOTO: Jayaben Desai, leader of the Grunwick strike committee holding placard 1977 Credit: Getty images)

Jan 14, 2019 • 50min
When Stalin Rounded Up Soviet Doctors
Stalin's last terror campaign against the best Soviet doctors, Castro's triumphant entry into Havana, the extraordinary story of how a destitute single mother produced a best selling memoir about her life in a Brazilian favela. Also, the controversy over 'Fat Is a Feminist Issue', and the world's only seed vault. Photo: Yakov Rapoport, one of the few survivors of Stalin's 'Doctors' Plot'. Credit: family archive.

Jan 5, 2019 • 50min
Vikings in North America
The discovery that proved the Vikings got to North America, a former Marxist rebel describes how his group overran an army base in El Salvador's bitter civil war in the 1980s, the enormous palace built by the Romanian communist dictator, Nicole Ceausescu, how the prolific romantic novelist Barbara Cartland was made a Dame by the Queen and the summer of 1987 when thousands of tins of marijuana washed up on a Brazilian beach.Photo: Replicas of Norse houses from 1000 years ago at L'Anse aux Meadows. (LightRocket/Getty Images)


