Today In History with The Retrospectors
Curious, funny, surprising daily history - with Olly Mann, Rebecca Messina and Arion McNicoll.
From the invention of the Game Boy to the Mancunian beer-poisoning of 1900, from Julius Caesar's invasion of Britain to America's Nazi summer schools... each day we uncover an unexpected story for the ages. In just ten minutes!
Best Daily Podcast (British Podcast Awards 2023 nominee).
Get early access and ad-free listening at Patreon.com/Retrospectors or subscribe on Apple Podcasts.
- Update frequency
- every day
- Average duration
- 12 minutes
- Episodes
- 1103
- Years Active
- 2021 - 2025
The Red Planet Gets Closer
The first images of Mars found their way back to Earth from NASA’s Mariner 4 mission on 15th July, 1965 - and were simultaneously revelatory and disappointing.
Delivered as binary code, rendered in …
00:11:35 |
Tue 15 Jul 2025
Catching Billy The Kid
Cold-blooded killer? Folk hero? Petty thief? Billy The Kid, who met his end on 14th July, 1881, was all of the above. His luck finally ran out in a dark bedroom in New Mexico, where his old friend, S…
00:12:37 |
Mon 14 Jul 2025
Blasphemy!
Mary Whitehouse successfully sued Gay News and publisher Denis Lemon at the Old Bailey in a trial that began on 11th July, 1977 - Britain’s last conviction for blasphemy.
What had ired the notorious…
00:12:15 |
Fri 11 Jul 2025
Adventures of the Boy Horsemen
The ‘Abernathy Boys’, Temple and Louis, were aged just 5 and 8 respectively when they departed Guthrie, Oklahoma for a 1,300-mile horseback trip to Roswell, New Mexico on July 10th, 1909. Alone.
Son…
00:12:25 |
Thu 10 Jul 2025
Bill Haley's Teenage Anthem
Rock Around The Clock was a moderately successful B-side - until its inclusion in the teen rebellion movie Blackboard Jungle - following which, on 9th July, 1955, Bill Haley and the Comets’ earworm b…
00:13:25 |
Wed 09 Jul 2025
The Miracle in the Ashes
‘Our Lady of Kazan’, a painting of the Virgin and Child, was discovered in the ashes of a fire in the Russian town of Kazan on 8th July, 1579. The icon quickly became associated with miracles after t…
00:11:35 |
Tue 08 Jul 2025
America's Child Ambassador
Samantha Smith, an 11 year-old from Maine, New England, left for the USSR on 7th July, 1983, as the personal guest of Soviet Premier Yuri Andropov.
Her adventure began with a letter she wrote him, …
00:11:56 |
Mon 07 Jul 2025
Defeat of the Great White Hope 🥊
Jack Johnson, the first Black world heavyweight champion, and Jim Jeffries, the so-called "Great White Hope", slugged it out in Reno, Nevada on 4th July, 1910 - in one of the most explosive sporting …
00:12:44 |
Fri 04 Jul 2025
When Bowie Killed Ziggy
David Bowie retired his alter-ego Ziggy Stardust live on stage at London’s Hammersmith Odeon on 3rd July, 1973. To the surprise of most of his band, the Spiders From Mars, he announced to a devastate…
00:12:05 |
Thu 03 Jul 2025
Cecil The Lion: Trophy Kill
Minnesotan dentist Walter Palmer killed Cecil The Lion on 2nd July, 2015; ending the life of a beloved and photogenic big cat, and kickstarting his career as the internet’s most vilified trophy hunte…
00:12:12 |
Wed 02 Jul 2025
The Walkman Effect
Sony’s revolutionary cassette player, the Walkman, debuted in the USA on 1st July, 1979, costing $150. It went on to shift a staggering 450m units.
Boasting a classy aluminium chassis, audio splitte…
00:11:42 |
Tue 01 Jul 2025
Writing 'Gone With The Wind'
Margaret Mitchell’s first and only novel, Gone With The Wind, was released on 30th June, 1936, and delighted readers and critics alike, shifting millions of copies and scooping the Pulitzer Prize.
…
00:12:12 |
Mon 30 Jun 2025
Meet The Black Donnelleys
The deadly fight between Patrick Farrell and James Donnelly on 27th June 1857 kickstarted one of the longest-lasting and most violent feuds in Canadian history.
The property the Donnellys had been s…
00:12:45 |
Fri 27 Jun 2025
Scanning The First Barcode
At a Marsh supermarket in Troy, Ohio, a packet of Wrigley’s Juicy Fruit gum became the first ever product to have its barcode scanned - at 8:01 a.m. on June 26th, 1974.
Inspired by the morse code tr…
00:12:39 |
Thu 26 Jun 2025
The Playboy, the Architect and the Showgirl
Architect Stanford White was shot three times at close range by millionaire Harry Kendall Thaw during a performance of Broadway comedy ‘Mamzelle Champagne’ on 25th June, 1906. At first, the stunned a…
00:13:15 |
Wed 25 Jun 2025
The Town That Danced To Death
‘Dancing Mania’ - in which people spontaneously danced to exhaustion, some until they broke their ribs and subsequently died, took hold of Aachen, Germany on 24th June, 1374.
We still don’t really k…
00:11:32 |
Tue 24 Jun 2025
Busting 'The Teflon Don'
John Gotti, the infamous ‘Teflon Don’ boss of New York’s Gambino crime family, smiled as he received a life sentence in a Brooklyn courthouse on 23rd June, 1992. Outside, chaos reigned as nearly a th…
00:12:39 |
Mon 23 Jun 2025
Inside The Black Hole of Calcutta
When the East India Company surrendered Fort William (in modern-day Kolkata) to the Nawab of Bengal on 20th June, 1756, dozens of British captives were imprisoned in a cell measuring only 18ft long a…
00:12:21 |
Fri 20 Jun 2025
It's A Royal Cock-up
The Grand Knockout Tournament (also known as It’s a Royal Knockout) was a one-off charity event first shown on BBC1 on 19th June 1987, to an audience of 18 million gobsmacked viewers.
The brainchil…
00:13:22 |
Thu 19 Jun 2025
Amelia Earhart Flies To Fame
Aviation pioneer Amelia Earhart became the first woman to cross the Atlantic by air on June 18th, 1928… but on this occasion didn’t actually fly the plane; she was a passenger aboard the Friendship, …
00:13:11 |
Wed 18 Jun 2025
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