Witness History

On 31 December 1999, a piece of music started playing in a lighthouse on the River Thames in east London. It’s called Longplayer, and it’s set to keep going, without repeating, until the year 2999. It was created by Jem Finer from The Pogues, using 234 Tibetan singing bowls. Megan Jones meets Jem to find out why he wanted to create a one thousand year long musical composition. Eye-witness accounts...

Seventy-five years ago, Radio Free Europe started broadcasting news to audiences behind the Iron Curtain. It initially broadcast to Bulgaria, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, Poland and Romania and programmes were produced in Munich, Germany. It now reaches nearly 50 million people a week, in 27 languages in 23 countries. Rachel Naylor speaks to former deputy director, Arch Puddington. Eye-witness account...

In October 1984, as the market for mobile phones was just opening up, one man decided it would be useful if the new technology could be used to send and receive short, electronic messages. But colleagues of Friedhelm 'Fred' Hillebrand - an engineer for Germany's Deutsche Telekom - told him the system's 160-character limit for text messages rendered it "useless". After spending an evening typing-up...

In 1995, Klaus Teuber’s board game Catan launched in Germany. The board is made up of hexagonal tiles, and it's a game about strategy and collecting resources. It's since sold over 40 million copies and been translated into more than 40 different languages. Klaus Teuber died in 2023. Megan Jones speaks to his son Benjamin, who now runs the company, with brother Guido. Eye-witness accounts brought...

The Tamagotchi was first released in Japan in 1996 after it was developed by Akihiro Yokoi and his colleagues at his toy development company. Measuring just a few centimetres long, the egg-shaped digital gadget was home to a series of pixelated alien pets. Owners had to feed, clean and play with their pets by pressing three tiny buttons. Looking after your Tamagotchi and seeing them evolve was thr...

It was Back to the Future II that made a generation of children dream of travelling by hoverboard. In the 1989 film, the hero Marty McFly escapes from his arch nemesis Biff by jumping on a flying skateboard. But it wasn’t until 2011 that inventor Shane Chen came up with the next best thing – a motorised skateboard that moves intuitively and gives the rider a feeling of floating. The creation becam...

In 1956, one of the world’s most beloved children’s toys went on sale for the first time, but its origins were surprising. The modelling clay had started out as a household cleaning product. In the days when homes were heated by coal fires, it was used to clean soot and dirt from wallpaper. But its manufacturer ran into trouble as oil and gas heating became increasingly popular. Then Kay Zufall, w...

It's just over 30 years since the brick game was introduced to the world at a department store in London. Made of 54 wooden blocks stacked into a tower in rows of three by three, each player takes a turn to remove a block from the tower and place it at the top. When the tower falls, the game is over. Surya Elango speaks to its British designer Leslie Scott about how a family game that started in h...

On 24 December 1951, in the United States, television history was made with the live broadcast of Amahl and the Night Visitors, the first opera ever composed specifically for TV. Written by acclaimed Italian composer Gian Carlo Menotti, the opera almost didn’t happen. Struggling with writer’s block and a looming deadline, Menotti feared he wouldn’t finish, until a visit to an art gallery sparked a...

In December 1953, Hollywood film stars Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy spent a few weeks at the Bull Inn, Bottesford, Leicestershire, while they performed a show at the nearby Nottingham Empire. Stan’s sister, Olga Healey, was the landlady. Customers and staff said the duo spent time serving behind the bar, signing autographs and chatting with regulars. This was produced and presented by Rachel Naylo...

In the late 1980s, Norway needed a new market for its growing farmed salmon production. Fish-loving Japan and its lucrative sushi market seemed to fit the bill. But salmon was one fish the Japanese did not eat raw. Lars Bevanger speaks to Bjørn-Eirik Olsen, the man who came up with the idea of putting salmon on sushi rice, and who spent years convincing the Japanese to eat it. Eye-witness accounts...

In December 1995, India's parliament passed the country's first disability rights legislation. The landmark law aimed to give full participation and equality rights to an estimated 60 million people - around five percent of India's population who are affected by physical or mental disabilities. In 2015, Farhana Haider spoke to disability rights activist Javed Abidi who led the campaign to change t...

Operation Flagship was a U.S Marshals sting operation, where some of Washington DC’s most wanted fugitives, were lured to a convention centre under the pretence of having won coveted NFL tickets in December 1985. Upon their arrival, they were greeted by cheerleaders and mascots – all law enforcement officers in disguise. It led to one of America’s most successful mass arrests with more than 100 pe...

On 12 December 2015, nearly 200 countries adopted the Paris climate agreement. It legally committed countries to climate action plans, designed to stop global temperatures rising 2C above pre-industrial levels. Those commitments have influenced government policy and people's lives ever since. Christiana Figueres was head of climate negotiations at the conference. She speaks to Ben Henderson about...

Following the abolishment of Apartheid in the 1990s, South Africa had to find a way to confront its brutal past without endangering the chance for peace. But it was a challenging process for many survivors of atrocities committed by the former racist regime. Sisi Khampepe served on the Amnesty Committee of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, she spoke to Rebecca Kesby in 2018 about how she ha...

In 1938, South African museum curator Marjorie Courtenay-Latimer discovered a coelacanth, a fish that was believed to have been extinct for 65 million years. It is thought to be our ancestor and the missing link between how fish evolved into four-legged amphibians. This was produced and presented by Rachel Naylor, in collaboration with BBC Archives. Eyewitness accounts brought to life by archive....

In 2015, Banksy turned a derelict swimming pool in Weston-super-Mare, England, into a dystopian theme park which drew huge crowds and Hollywood stars. Working under cover of darkness, the street artist created Dismaland - a 'bemusement park' offering a satirical twist on mainstream resorts. The temporary exhibition featured a fire-ravaged castle, a riot police van sinking into a lake, and Cinderel...

In December 1975, four members of one of the IRA’s deadliest units were chased by police through the streets of London before hiding out in a small flat owned by a middle-aged couple called John and Sheila Matthews. The resulting six-day siege was covered live on television and radio, and gripped Britain. It ended when Metropolitan Police negotiators persuaded the gunmen to leave the flat peaceful...

In 2011, Lagos Fashion Week debuted, putting Nigerian style on the map. Omoyemi Akerele founded the event which helped to launch the careers of designers internationally. It has grown into a major fashion event and won the 2025 Earthshot Prize for sustainability. In 2023, Omoyemi Akerele spoke to Reena Stanton-Sharma about the first show. Eye-witness accounts brought to life by archive. Witness Hi...

In 1967, Nigerian writer Wole Soyinka tried to stop the country’s Biafra war, in which Nigeria’s Igbo people responded to violence by seceding from the rest of the country. They proclaimed a new Republic of Biafra. When the fighting began, Soyinka was building a reputation as a poet and playwright abroad. However, in a last-ditch attempt to avert civil war, he set off on a secret mission behind th...

When the south-east region of Nigeria declared itself to be the independent state of Biafra, civil war broke out in May 1967. More than a million people died before the fighting stopped. In 2021, Patricia Ngozi Ebigwe, now better known as TV and music star Patti Boulaye, spoke to Paul Waters about escaping the conflict. Eye-witness accounts brought to life by archive. Witness History is for those...

It's 25 years since the opening of the New Afrika Shrine, an open-air entertainment centre in Nigeria. A hub for Afrobeat music and culture, it's dedicated to the legacy of Fela Kuti who pioneered the genre. Omoyeni Anikulapo-Kuti, also known as Yeni Kuti, is Fela’s eldest daughter. She speaks to Surya Elango about building the New Afrika Shrine. Eye-witness accounts brought to life by archive. Wi...

In 2015, West African countries fought against the jihadist militant group Boko Haram which controlled large areas of northeastern Nigeria. The group, whose name means 'western education is forbidden', had killed thousands and displaced millions in the years preceding 2015. They made worldwide headlines in 2014 when they kidnapped 276 girls from a boarding school. Tim O’Callaghan speaks to retired...

Following the Beatles final concert tour, George Harrison travelled to India in 1967 to learn sitar under the renowned musician Ravi Shankar. Fleeing Beatlemania he travelled in disguise to Mumbai and then to Srinagar in Kashmir. Listening to BBC archive and using excerpts from a Martin Scorsese documentary, we hear one of the world's most famous guitarists challenge himself to learn a new instrum...

In 1946, an Indian woman made history by leading her country’s first delegation to the United Nations. Vijaya Lakshmi Pandit described it as a moment that reshaped her life. As the sister of Jawaharlal Nehru, India’s first prime minister, she was already in the public eye, but stepping onto the global stage was far from easy. She grappled with doubt before accepting the role at the United Nations....