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
- 1104
- Years Active
- 2021 - 2025
The Krays in Soho
The Hideaway Club, now part of London’s Chinatown, opened on 16th December, 1964. Ronnie and Reggie Kray didn’t turn up for the big night, even though they had booked a table.
It was an opening gambi…
00:11:57 |
Thu 16 Dec 2021
Napoleon's Second Funeral
Napoleon was buried in an unmarked grave in St. Helena. But, 19 years later, on 15th December, 1840, he got buried again: this time at Les Invalides, Paris.
It was an ornate state occasion, involving…
00:11:20 |
Wed 15 Dec 2021
Dubya Dodges A Shoe-ing
When George W Bush flew to Baghdad for a press conference with Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki on 14th December, 2008, he had hoped the headlines would reflect his triumphant appraisal of his de…
00:12:00 |
Tue 14 Dec 2021
Who Ate All The Mayonnaise?
Michelle "Cardboard Shell" Lesco achieved her third world record in competitive eating on 13th December, 2018 - this time for consuming the most amount of mayonnaise in three minutes.
She consumed 2,…
00:11:34 |
Mon 13 Dec 2021
Sinatra's Slapstick Kidnapping
19 year-old singer Frank Sinatra, Jr was snatched from his casino dressing room on 10th December, 1962. His famous father was willing to pay the kidnappers a $1 million ransom - but they insisted the…
00:11:49 |
Fri 10 Dec 2021
Welcome To Wetherspoons
Now a 900 strong pub chain, with an annual turnover of £1.6 billion, J.D. Wetherspoon is a big name on the British high street. But when entrepreneur Tim Martin flung open the doors of the first bran…
00:11:53 |
Thu 09 Dec 2021
There's Something About Mary
The Pope defined the dogma of The Immaculate Conception - confirming that, in the view of the Catholic Church, Christ’s mother Mary had not only been ‘full of grace’, but was completely absent of sin…
00:11:52 |
Wed 08 Dec 2021
Morecambe, Wise & Mr Preview
Oscar-winning conductor André Previn was an unlikely choice of celebrity guest for the Christmas special of ‘The Morcambe and Wise Show’ recorded on 7th December, 1971 - but the 13-minute sketch they…
00:11:25 |
Tue 07 Dec 2021
Joyce Brothers, $64,000 Swot
A female contestant had never scooped the jackpot on an American TV quiz show before New York psychologist Dr Joyce Brothers won $64,000 on 6th December, 1955.
Her specialist subject was boxing - a t…
00:11:40 |
Mon 06 Dec 2021
The Potato-Porting Polymath
Renaissance Man Thomas Harriot was noted for many things - devising the theory of refraction, creating mathematical symbols including ‘greater than’ and ‘lesser than’, and being the first person to d…
00:11:15 |
Fri 03 Dec 2021
Heidi Fleiss, Hollywood Madam
Tinseltown’s most notorious pimp was convicted of providing high-class ‘call girls’ to undercover police officers on 2nd December, 1994.
It followed a dramatic sting involving the LAPD, the Beverly H…
00:11:51 |
Thu 02 Dec 2021
There's Poison In My Pint
Thousands of beer barrels were emptied into the streets across Lancashire on 1st December, 1900 - when it finally dawned on people that the cheap stout they’d been drinking was contaminated with arse…
00:10:54 |
Wed 01 Dec 2021
Football's First International
England played Scotland in a publicly-advertised game for the first time on 30th November, 1872 - kickstarting international football as we know it today. The English team included players drafted in…
00:10:56 |
Tue 30 Nov 2021
Concorde - The Future of Flight
Supersonic aircraft took a giant leap forward when the French and British governments signed a treaty to join forces on designing Concorde on 29th November, 1962. Up until this point, the two countri…
00:11:20 |
Mon 29 Nov 2021
Signal-Jamming Aliens
Your TV signal wobbles. An alien voice (albeit one with a Southern English accent...) seizes control of your set. And, instead of newsreader Andrew Gardner reporting on the Zimbabwe African National …
00:11:43 |
Fri 26 Nov 2021
Elizabeth of Russia's Bloodless Coup
Wearing an armoured breastplate, clasping a silver cross and seizing an Army spontoon, 31 year old Elizabeth Petrovna appeared at the HQ of the elite Preobrazhensky Regiment guards in St. Petersburg …
00:11:25 |
Thu 25 Nov 2021
The Lucy Fossil - No Homo
It took over three million years to find her. But palaeontologists Donald Johanson and Tom Gray uncovered the remains of ‘the Lucy Fossil’ - a previously undiscovered species of pre-human - in Hadar,…
00:12:01 |
Wed 24 Nov 2021
The Tamagotchi Effect
With cutesy graphics and a female-focussed origin story, Tamagotchi was positioned as a ‘nurturing toy’ for Japanese girls when Bandai launched the brand on 23rd November, 1996. But the gadget's mass…
00:11:52 |
Tue 23 Nov 2021
Star Trek's Interracial Kiss
Capt. James T. Kirk (William Shatner) and Lt. Nyota Uhura (Nichelle Nichols) embraced and kissed on "Plato’s Stepchildren"; an episode of ‘Star Trek’ broadcast on 22nd November, 1968 - just a year af…
00:11:38 |
Mon 22 Nov 2021
London's First Olympics
After Mount Vesuvius erupted - and original hosts Rome pulled out - the British Olympic council sent a letter, dated 19th November, 1906, agreeing to host the fourth modern Olympic games.
With just t…
00:11:47 |
Fri 19 Nov 2021
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