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
Heimlich’s Big Manoeuvre
‘Cafe coronaries’ were a fact of life until The Journal of Emergency Medicine published details of The Heimlich Manoeuvre on June 1, 1974.
In so doing, they made a household name of thoracic surgeon …
00:11:42 |
Tue 01 Jun 2021
The Controversial Birth of Corn Flakes
John Harvey Kellogg believed his corn flakes had a future as a sexual suppressant when he filed a patent for "Flaked Cereals and Process of Preparing Same" on 31st May, 1895.
What the Seventh Day Adv…
00:11:58 |
Mon 31 May 2021
Super Mario Bros - The First Videogame Movie
Before ‘Tomb Raider’, before ‘Mortal Kombat’, before ‘Street Fighter’, there was something even WORSE. ‘Super Mario Bros’ - which opened in the United States on 28th May, 1993 - was such a critical a…
00:11:59 |
Fri 28 May 2021
Fan-Dancing, Dwarfism and Microwaves at Chicago World’s Fair
Microwave cookery was first demonstrated by Ross Kilgore of Westinghouse at the Chicago World’s Fair, which opened on 27th May, 1933. But the event was deemed to be a side-show of little scientific s…
00:11:54 |
Thu 27 May 2021
Athena’s ‘Man and Baby’ Photoshoot
The most iconic image of the 80s? Arguably. One of the biggest-selling posters of all time? Unquestionably. Yet ‘L’Enfant’ - captured on 26th May 1986 by photographer Spencer Rowell - was just a work…
00:11:19 |
Wed 26 May 2021
Shakespeare Unbanned
Chinese citizens were once again able to read and perform the works of William Shakespeare on 25th May, 1977.
Chiang Ching, Chairman Mao’s wife, had instituted the ban eleven years earlier - amidst …
00:11:41 |
Tue 25 May 2021
The Very First Eurovision
Spectacle, camp and glamour were NOT on the agenda in Lugano, Switzerland on 24th May, 1956: the inaugural Eurovision Song Contest was broadcast mostly on the radio, and featured a whistling duo as i…
00:10:50 |
Mon 24 May 2021
Greyhound Hits The Road
When Carl Wickman started America’s first bus company on 21st May, 1914, they weren’t a bus company, and they weren’t called Greyhound - they were a commuter service for miners in Hibbing, Minnesota.…
00:11:29 |
Fri 21 May 2021
The Accidental Vibrator
When Hitachi launched their ‘personal massager’ on 20th May, 1968, they had no idea (or so they claim) that they were about to, um, go down in sex toy history.
The Magic Wand was initially developed …
00:11:32 |
Thu 20 May 2021
Marilyn's Birthday Surprise
When Marilyn Monroe delivered her breathy, flirtatious rendition of ‘Happy Birthday’ to JFK on 19th May 1962, columnist Dorothy Kilgallen remarked, 'it seemed like Marilyn was making love to the Pres…
00:11:52 |
Wed 19 May 2021
Dracula! Live on Stage!
Bram Stoker’s Dracula was first introduced to the world NOT via his canonical novel, but rather in the pages of a seldom-performed - and by all accounts appalling - play-reading at London's Lyceum Th…
00:11:36 |
Tue 18 May 2021
The Man Who Invented The Wild West
Gun totin’, horse ridin’ spectacular ‘Buffalo Bill’s Wild West’ opened in Omaha, Nebraska on 17th May, 1883 - the start of a multi-decade run.
With a cast of hundreds, including Calamity Jane, Sitt…
00:11:18 |
Mon 17 May 2021
America's Last Witchtrial
Can ‘mesmeric’ mental powers harm you from afar? Well, no. But that didn’t stop Lucretia L. S. Brown accusing fellow Christian Scientist Daniel H. Spofford of ‘malicious animal magnetism’ in court; a…
00:11:10 |
Fri 14 May 2021
The $8 Billion 'Kill Switch'
‘WannaCry’, the biggest cyberattack the world has seen, was stopped in its tracks on 13th May, 2017. British blogger Marcus Hutchins found the 'kill switch'. He was 22.
The ransomware had attacked …
00:12:12 |
Thu 13 May 2021
The Birth of Alcoholics Anonymous
When Bill Wilson met Dr Robert Smith on 12th May, 1935, they could not have known that the 12-step plan they’d devised for treating addiction would spawn the world’s largest support group.
Despite…
00:11:24 |
Wed 12 May 2021
The Opening Night Of 'CATS'
At a cost of £2m, Andrew Lloyd Webber’s musical ‘Cats’ premiered at the New London Theatre on 11th May, 1981 - and the world had never seen anything like it.
With a cast including Brian Blessed an…
00:12:24 |
Tue 11 May 2021
The Lady Who Left Her Baby Outside
As Annette Sorensen drank margaritas in a New York BBQ restaurant on May 10th, 1997, she left her 14 month-old daughter outside, in a stroller.
She spent two days in jail, was accused of child neg…
00:11:59 |
Mon 10 May 2021
The Return Of 'The Scream'
The theft of Edvard Munch’s iconic painting ‘The Scream’ sullied the opening day of the Winter Olympics in Lillehammer - but, on 7th May, 1994, the iconic work was recovered.
The painting, which ha…
00:11:18 |
Fri 07 May 2021
Epping Forest Opens Up
Queen Victoria thrilled the locals with a personal appearance on May 6th 1882, to dedicate Epping Forest, near London, as ‘the people’s forest’.
It was a pivotal moment in the preservation of gree…
00:11:14 |
Thu 06 May 2021
Mary Whitehouse Cleans Up TV
It was standing room only at Birmingham Town Hall on May 5, 1964 - the day legendary anti-smut campaigner Mary Whitehouse launched her ‘Clean Up TV’ campaign.
Claiming the BBC’s Director-General wa…
00:10:49 |
Wed 05 May 2021
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