Episodes

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 branch in London’s Muswell Hill on 9th December, 1979, it was known as ‘Tim’s Free House’ – and closed […]

A woman played a female role on the London stage for the very first time on December 8th, 1660, as Desdemona in a revival of Shakepeare’s Othello. The actress was probably Margaret Hughes – though nobody bothered to record this at the time, so we can’t be sure. After the 1660 restoration of King Charles

The ‘ghost ship’ Mary Celeste was discovered drifting in the Atlantic by Captain David Morehouse of the Dei Gratia on 4 December 1872. On board there were intact provisions, undisturbed cargo, no evidence of violence or theft… and zero crew. Although some damage to the rigging and open hatches hinted at recent rough weather, nothing

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 draw the Moon through a telescope. But the contribution for which he’s most remembered is bringing back the potato to Britain – an event commonly

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 Hills police department, the state alcoholic beverage control agency and the state attorney General’s office. They seized her ‘little black book’ (actually a red Gucci diary)

Which young men should be sent to fight in Vietnam? Amidst a growing public outcry against the biases in the system, the United States instituted a live televised lottery draft on December 1st, 1969. In a sombre spectacle, plexiglass drums and capsules containing birthdates were drawn live on CBS, dictating the order in which men

The most notorious accused spy of the early Cold War, Alger Hiss, emerged from Lewisburg Penitentiary on 27th November, 1954; calm, composed, and determined to reclaim his reputation. Surrounded by a scrum of journalists, he insisted fear had shaped his conviction, and vowed to vindicate his name. A reserved, cultured “grey man” who had risen

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 Liberation Army, you hear a voice claiming to be ‘Vrillon’, of Ashtar Galactic Command, with a message for humanity. Such was the experience for

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 on 25th November, 1741 – intent on over-throwing Tzar Ivan VI (a baby), and seizing the Russian throne for herself. Although she was the

Dr. Vincenz Czerny performed the world’s first breast augmentation in Vienna on 24th November, 1893. After removing a benign tumour via a mastectomy, Czerny addressed the asymmetry left behind by innovatively transplanting a non-cancerous lipoma from his patient’s lower back to reconstruct her breast. Czerny’s work was cutting-edge for its time (pun intended): it wasn’t