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Today In History with The Retrospectors

The Retrospectors

BEST DAILY SHOW (British Podcast Awards Nominee, 2026). Curious, funny, surprising daily history - with Olly Mann (Answer Me This!), Rebecca Messina (The Week Unwrapped) and Arion McNicoll (The Chaser). 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! Get early access and ad-free listening at Patreon.com/Retrospectors or

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All Episodes

12:15

Marie Stopes' "Mother's Clinic"

Today In History with The Retrospectors ·

2025/03/17

Marie Stopes’ “Mother’s Clinic” opened its doors in Holloway, on March 17th, 1826. Stopes was a trailblazer, her birth control clinic providing working-class women with access to contraception and advice for the first time. However, her organisation's full name - "The Society for Constructive Birth Control and Racial Progress" - reveals her disturbing underlying belief in selective breeding for racial progress; a commitment that only strengthened as time went on, and she corresponded with

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11:28

Making The Mikado

Today In History with The Retrospectors ·

2025/03/14

The Mikado opened on March 14, 1885 to immediate acclaim, and went on to become W. S. Gilbert and Arthur Sullivan’s most famous and best-loved operetta, despite its tortured genesis. Due to growing creative tensions and their previous show flopping, Gilbert and Sullivan’s partnership was on the rocks, so The Mikado’s success took both completely by surprise. In this episode, Arion, Rebecca and Olly look at why the setting of The Mikado is really Japan in name only; discuss how Gilbert found

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11:55

Mata Hari: Showgirl, Seductress, Spy

Today In History with The Retrospectors ·

2025/03/13

Margaretha Geertruida MacLeod, better known to the world as Mata Hari, set the Paris stage ablaze on March 13, 1905, with a scandalous dance routine that turned her into an overnight success. Sporting a gold jeweled breastplate and bracelets, Mata Hari’s performance was a striptease that left little to the imagination. But even the wildest imagination couldn’t envisage what lay ahead for the exotic dancer, courtesan, traitor and spy whose name became synonymous with the femme fatale. In this

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12:05

When The Dixie Chicks Got Cancelled

Today In History with The Retrospectors ·

2025/03/12

As the Dixie Chicks’ lead singer, Natalie Maines, made an off-the-cuff remark at a London concert on 12th March, 2003, she could not have known the comments would haunt her band (now known as ‘The Chicks’) for decades. Just days before the US invasion of Iraq, and to cheers from the British crowd, she said from the stage: “We’re ashamed the President of the United States is from Texas.” A Guardian journalist jotted it down, and when those words reached the other side of the Atlantic, all hell broke

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12:05

COPS Hits TV

Today In History with The Retrospectors ·

2025/03/11

Producer John Langley had been pitching a no-frills, fly-on-the-wall documentary series following US Police Officers for six years when, in the midst of a writer’s strike, Fox finally bit. COPS made its debut on 11th March, 1989, becoming one of the longest-running shows in TV history. Langley called it ‘video vérité’; the New York Times called it ‘tabloid TV’. From the beginning, concerns about its depiction of race relations in America led to criticism that eventually brought about its

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11:15

Birth of the Book Club

Today In History with The Retrospectors ·

2025/03/10

The ‘Book of the Month Club’ was first launched, on March 10th, 1926. Its inaugural selection, ‘Lolly Willowes’ by feminist Bloomsbury author Sylvia Townsend Warner, underscores the transformative power that such clubs would go on to have (via celebrity endorsements such as Oprah and Richard & Judy): Warner leveraged her selection as a springboard for wider literary recognition in the United States. The visionary behind the Book of the Month Club, Harry Sherman, recognised the untapped potential

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11:13

Abducting Ellen Turner

Today In History with The Retrospectors ·

2025/03/07

Kidnapped from her prestigious Liverpool boarding school on March 7, 1827, 15-year-old Ellen Turner was led to believe her family would be financially ruined if she didn’t marry her 30 year-old abductor, Edward Gibbon Wakefield.Before she was able to deduce that his story was a sham, Turner was whisked off to Gretna Green and inadvertently passed over the keys to her father’s estate, Shrigley, to her assailant - until an intervention from the House of Lords, and a trial that captured Britain’s

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12:05

The Real Captain Birdseye

Today In History with The Retrospectors ·

2025/03/06

Birdseye Frosted Foods launched its first range of flash-frozen foods at a ‘test kitchen’ in Springfield, Massachusetts on 6th March, 1930 - and at the helm was Clarence ‘Bob’ Birdseye, an American entrepreneur of great ambition and insight.Like Captain Birdseye, the bearded, fictional mascot of the brand dreamt up for the British market, Bob had scoured the seven seas looking for innovative approaches to food preservation - a search that led him to the Inuit people of Labrador, Canada and their

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11:53

Vietnam's Singing Soldier

Today In History with The Retrospectors ·

2025/03/05

Barry Sadler’s "Ballad of the Green Berets" reached number one in the Billboard Hot 100 on 5th March, 1966 - the only pro-Vietnam War hit to ever top the charts.Before it even hit radio stations, Sadler had been performing the song at military bases and patriotic events, setting the stage for its massive success. RCA pushed it hard, knowing that in early ‘66, America’s support for the war was still strong. It wasn’t just a pop song—it was an anthem, played on news programmes and variety shows

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11:44

Trashing The White House

Today In History with The Retrospectors ·

2025/03/04

When Andrew Jackson was inaugurated on 4th March, 1829, large crowds of recently emancipated, enthusiastic voters turned up to the Capitol to watch the former Army commander become President. But the event soon spiraled out of control, descending into, at best, chaos; and, at worst, a brawl. Eyewitness Margaret Bayard Smith wrote: “No arrangements had been made no police officers placed on duty and the whole house had been inundated by the rabble mob… At one time, the President who had retreated

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12:12

Serfdom's Up!

Today In History with The Retrospectors ·

2025/03/03

The Emancipation Statute was unveiled by Emperor Alexander II: March 3rd, 1861, liberating the serfs of Russia. The culmination of years of bureaucratic efforts and peasant uprisings, the legislation marked a decisive break from the past and aimed to align Russia with European norms - whilst The United States still relied anachronistically on slave labour. Until this day, the institution of serfdom, though distinct from slavery, was nonetheless marked by profound inequalities and limitations on

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11:59

The Double Helix Quartet

Today In History with The Retrospectors ·

2025/02/28

Deciphering the structure of DNA was as complex as the double helix itself. On 28th February, 1953, Dr. James Watson and Dr. Francis Crick rushed to the pub and announced to their fellow drinkers in The Eagle, Cambridge that they had just found “the secret of life”. But their work would not have been possible without the uncredited contribution of Dr. Rosalind Franklin - whose photographs of the X-ray diffraction pattern of DNA were the first to reveal its three-dimensional structure. And it was

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12:08

Pokémon Hegemon

Today In History with The Retrospectors ·

2025/02/27

The first Pokémon videogames, ‘Red’ and ‘Green’ were launched in Japan on 27th February, 1996. The franchise went on to be the most successful ever video game to TV adaptation, and the highest selling trading card game in history of cards. Created by Satoshi Tajiri, the gameplay recalled his childhood obsession for bug-hunting, and made use of Nintendo’s new GameBoy connection cable to enable players to swap and collect monsters. But it wasn’t until the card-trading game went viral in playgrounds

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11:54

The Shoe That Made Nike

Today In History with The Retrospectors ·

2025/02/26

Bill Bowerman, co-founder of Nike, was on a quest for the perfect running shoe grip when he found inspiration in his wife’s waffle iron. Pouring polyurethane directly onto their wedding gift, he began to develop the prototype that would eventually become Nike’s legendary waffle sole trainer, and which received its patent on 26th February, 1974. But Nike wasn’t always the fashion powerhouse we know today. Back then, it was still Blue Ribbon Sports, importing Japanese running shoes. Bowerman, a top

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12:33

Britain's Backyard Bunkers

Today In History with The Retrospectors ·

2025/02/25

The Anderson Shelter, the pop-up sheds distributed to millions of Londoners during the Blitz was first erected on February 25th, 1939 - in the garden of Mrs. Spong, in Carlsbad Street, Islington.Devised to protect civilians from Nazi air raids, and handed out free to those who earned under £5 per week, the shelters were dug four metres into the ground and covered with earth, provided cramped but potentially life-saving cover for families during bombings. In this episode, The Retrospectors

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12:05

How Not To Invade Britain

Today In History with The Retrospectors ·

2025/02/23

The ‘Last Invasion’ of Britain was not, as most people assume, The Battle of Hastings - but actually a farcical French attempt to conquer the Pembrokeshire town of Fishguard on 24th February, 1797. Windy weather had already scuppered the first two prongs of this failed three-pronged attack, which was ultimately overthrown by a rag-bag militia of volunteers, a shipload of discarded booze, and a Welshwoman with a pitchfork. In this episode, Arion, Rebecca and Olly ask if the French had any realistic

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11:44

The First Hijack

Today In History with The Retrospectors ·

2025/02/21

Pan-Am pilot Byron Rickards was surrounded by soldiers and told he had become the prisoner of a revolutionary organisation shortly after landing in Arequipa, Peru on 21 February 1931 - the first recorded aircraft hijack in history. Rickards refused to drop pro-rebel propaganda, leading to a stand-off - although, astonishingly, it wasn’t the only time in his career that his plane would be hijacked… In this episode, Arion, Rebecca and Olly explain why the 1960s created the perfect circumstances for a

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11:39

How Orkney Became Scottish

Today In History with The Retrospectors ·

2025/02/20

On 20 February, 1472, Orkney and Shetland officially became part of Scotland having been offered up as security for the dowry of the daughter of King Christian of Norway and Denmark.The marriage was aimed at quelling a long-standing tax-related feud between the two powers. But as time wore on, it began to feel as though the Scandinavians just didn’t really want Orkney and Shetland all that much. In this episode, Arion, Rebecca and Olly look at how Vikings had come to control the islands in the

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12:08

Mexico's 45 Minute President

Today In History with The Retrospectors ·

2025/02/19

Pedro Lascuráin set an unbeatable record in presidential speedrunning—serving as Mexico’s president for a paltry 45 minutes on 19th February, 1913. His one achievement? To hold the title just long enough to hand it over to the real mastermind behind the coup, General Victoriano Huerta.Huerta didn’t last too long either - and eventually even the U.S., which had helped engineer the coup, withdrew their support for him. Meanwhile, Lascuráin retired from politics completely. Unlike most of his

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12:26

I Discovered Pluto

Today In History with The Retrospectors ·

2025/02/18

Clyde Tombaugh discovered Pluto - 84 years after star-spotters first began their hunt for a ninth planet in our solar system, the elusive ‘Planet X’ on 18th February 1930. The 24-year-old made the groundbreaking discovery at the Lowell Observatory, Arizona, just one week into a task that had mired other researchers for decades. That said, it was later realised that Pluto had been spotted on previous occasions, yet astronomers had mistakenly overlooked its significance. In this episode, The

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