Roundup

1968 Columbia protests still stir passion [audio 8min]

Forty years ago, Columbia University was a frequent scene of demonstrations against the Vietnam War and the university's relationship with its surrounding New York neighborhoods. Now, scholars and many involved in those protests disagree about their impact. One source of contention was a university gym under construction in nearby Morningside Park. Black Harlem community activists, along with both black and white Columbia students, opposed it because they believed neighborhood resid

Later life of Darwin's 'Beagle' [audio 15min]

As part of a series, BBC News follows Dr. Robert Prescott as he searches for the final resting place of the ship aboard which Charles Darwin began to formulate the ideas which would eventually become his theory of evolution. The search leads to the bleak and flat landscape of the Essex mudflats. As the mud begins to yield its secrets, Robert considers Beagle's later life as an anti-smuggling watch vessel and examines some of the poignant relics from the 25 years she was home to coastguard

Museum of Broken Relationships honors soured affairs [audo 4min]

A museum touring Eastern Europe makes use of old love letters and gifts from relationships gone wrong. The Museum of Broken Relationships gives new life to the leftovers from break-ups, one-night stands and ugly divorces. Scott Simon talks to the museum founders.

Clayborne Carson on 'The Social Gospel Radicalism of Martin Luther King Jr.' [audio 18min]

Stanford historian Clayborne Carson presents "The Social Gospel Radicalism of Martin Luther King Jr." from March 29th 2008 at the Oral History Association Meeting and Conference held in New York City, where a rountable session, "Forty Years Since King: Struggling to End Racism, Sexism, Poverty, and War," took place commemorating the 40th anniversary of the King assassination, sponsored by the Labor and Working-Class History Association.

Michael Honey on 'King, Black Workers, and the Spirit of Memphis' [audio 34min]

University of Washington historian Michael Honey presents "King, Black Workers, and the Spirit of Memphis" from March 29th 2008 at the Oral History Association Meeting and Conference held in New York City, where a rountable session, "Forty Years Since King: Struggling to End Racism, Sexism, Poverty, and War," took place commemorating the 40th anniversary of the King assassination, sponsored by the Labor and Working-Class History Association.

King's last march [audio 30min]

Four decades after Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr., was assassinated, he remains one of the most vivid symbols of hope for racial unity in America. But that's not the way he was viewed the last year of his life.

Lawrence R. Samuel on the 1964 New York World's Fair [audio 55min]

The Book Guys -- book appraiser Allan Stypeck and Washington DC radio host Mike Cuthbert -- interview Lawrence R. Samuel, who discusses his book about the 1964 New York World's Fair, The End of the Innocence. Samuel is author of Brought to You By: Postwar Television Advertising and the American Dream and Pledging Allegiance: American Identity and the Bond Drive of World War II.

Historian Dunn unsatisfied with Fla. apology for slavery [audio 28min]

The state of Florida recently apologized for slavery--but historian Marvin Dunn says he doesn't any feel better. In his Miami Herald op-ed"Make the Apology Meaningful," Dunn says Old South states should think about how to pay reparations to the African American community as a whole."The apology is a meaningless act that only a dolt or outright racist would oppose," Dunn writes."It cost the state nothing and of course, there was not a word about the thorny question of reparations. As one o

After the shot: Conspiracy theories surround Lincoln assassination [audio 28min]

On the night of April 14th 1865, in front of a thousand people at Ford’s Theatre in Washington, DC, John Wilkes Booth assassinated President Abraham Lincoln. Shouting Sic semper tyrannis--'Thus always to tyrants'--Booth believed that he was striking down a tyrant as surely as Brutus struck down Julius Caesar. Twelve days later Booth himself was shot dead in a barn in Virginia. From the moment Booth shot Lincoln, conspiracy theories surrounding the assassination have flourished--and 140 ye

Your help requested: Is London's Waterloo Bridge the "Ladies' Bridge"? [6min @21:40]

Biographer and broadcaster Vanessa Collingridge and the "Making History" team discuss listeners' historical queries and celebrate the many ways in which we all 'make' history. Filmmakers Karen Livesey and Jo Wiser contacted the programme to ask if any listener ever worked on the restoration of Waterloo Bridge in London during the Second World War. The story, kept alive by tour guides on Thames river cruisers, is that the bridge became known as the "Ladies' Bridge" because wom

Mapping Scotland: Confusion between Gaelic, Scots placenames [audio 9min @ 7:45]

Biographer and broadcaster Vanessa Collingridge and the"Making History" team discuss listeners' historical queries and celebrate the many ways in which we all 'make' history. Listener Talitha MacKenzie contacted the programme to ask: 'I was wondering if you could confirm the following story': A team of mapmakers came up from England looking to take down the Gaelic placenames on the Island of Lewis. While staying at a B&B in Kirkhead, they asked their landlady 'What does the Gaelic word kirk

Royal Navy's Murmansk Mutiny of 1919 [audio 1st 8min]

Biographer and broadcaster Vanessa Collingridge and the "Making History" team discuss listeners' historical queries and celebrate the many ways in which we all 'make' history. In the summer of 1919, fighting in the Great War was over but the grandfather of a "Making History" listener was still at sea with Britain's Royal Marines, helping out with the evacuation of Murmansk. But, rather than confront Bolshevism, the Marines seemed more intent in tackling their own officers! Li

From Bloomsbury poet to bag lady: Celia Robertson recalls the life of her grandmother [audio 9min]

'The girl poet is my discovery' announced Virginia Woolf in a letter to Hugh Walpole in April 1931 after reading some poems by Joan Easdale. Two volumes of her poetry were published by Woolf while she was still a teenager. But by the end of her life, Joan had changed her name to Sophie Curly and was living rough on the streets of Nottingham. So what happened to her in the intervening years? Celia Robertson joins presenter Jenni Murray to remember her grandmother and trace her extraordinary journ

Vibrators in history: Were they a 'cure' for hysteria? [audio 8min]

According to Victorian medical records, some doctors treated women thought to be suffering from hysteria with a vibrator, in order to induce orgasm. This scenario features in the third episode of the BBC One TV series, Casualty 1907, which portrays this ongoing practise. But just how widespread was this practice? Or was it simply easier to refer to sex toys euphemistically as instruments for medical ‘massage’? What were the motives of these male doctors? And what, exactly, did the female

The Somnambulists: Photographing life-masks [audio 9min]

We take it for granted that because of photography we can see what our grandparents really looked like, and perhaps even our great-grandparents – but what about those who were born in the early nineteenth century? Now one artist has managed to resurrect these forgotten faces, by making images of life-masks from the period. The effect is ghostly and remarkable--she’ll be explaining how she does it. The Somnambulists: Photographic Portraits from Before Photography by Joanna Kane is publishe

Bletchley Park code-breakers reunited [audio 45min]

Presenter Sue MacGregor gathers together five Bletchley Park code-breakers intimately involved in the decryption of German messages created by the complex Enigma machine during World War II. Their success, on an unprecedented scale and against enormous odds, is said to have shortened the war by two years, but ther nature of their work remained a secret for more than three decades.

The Norman yoke: 1067 and all that [audio 43min]

'Norman saw on English oak, On English neck a Norman yoke; Norman spoon in English dish, And England ruled as Normans wish.’ Taken from Sir Walter Scott’s novel Ivanhoe, these words encapsulate the idea of 'the Norman Yoke'--that the Battle of Hastings sparked the cruel oppression of Anglo-Saxon liberties by a foreign ruling class. Certainly, William the Conqueror writ large his occupying power in castles and cathedrals, but how true is the idea of a Norm

Samuel Pepys: Re-discovering the vim of his vigour [audio 33min @ 19:08:20]

For the series championing influential works of art, presenter Philip Dodd is joined by biographer Claire Tomalin, writer and broadcaster Iain Sinclair, and historian Vic Gatrell to discuss The Diary of Samuel Pepys. Pepys lived in some of the most turbulent years in British history--the death of Cromwell, the Restoration, the Second Anglo-Dutch War, The Great Plague, the Fire of London--and in the million words in his much-celebrated diaries, the MP and naval administrator provided a uni

Sylvia Pankhurst in Ethiopia: Her involvement in the Ethiopian cause of 1936 and subsequent life in Africa [audio 9min]

A fierce socialist and internationalist, Sylvia Pankhurst became involved in the Ethiopian cause in 1936, after the Italian invasion. Twenty years later, at the invitation of the Emperor Haile Selassie, she moved to Ethiopia with her son Richard and his wife Rita. And it's there – in Addis Addiba – that she's buried. Journalist Thembi Mutch meets Sylvia's family who still live there to find out more about her life in Africa.

Historian's Take on the News: Archives 11-1-02 to 1-29-03

AARON BROWN, CNN ANCHOR: What do you make of the events today? This is a difficult-this is going to be difficult, I would think, for the Israelis to deal with. DANIEL PIPES: It certainly is. The Israelis have clearly made a mistake, and need to be more careful. It's a tragedy. We must all urge the Israelis to approach these problems more carefully.That said, it is also important to realize that the Palestinians have the moral opprobrium here in having t